Seattle Sports Insider

NEWZ or NOIZ? Ask Robby

back in the 90s, BP studied "synergy" once. Haven't seen anything since

Posted by

3/23/18

Brent Stecker has made a habit out of publishing good reads, Mariners-wise, and I enjoyed this one tho'ly. In it, Robinson Cano talks about contending, what it takes to go to war big-time, against dreadful opponents who put the foil on and expect you to do the same .... Robby's point starts with this:

“I always say this: for you to win, you have to have a real leadoff and a second-hole hitter,” Cano told Danny, Dave and Moore, bringing up Seattle’s leadoff man Dee Gordon and No. 2 hitter Jean Segura. “You got Dee and you got Segura, a guy who can go gap to gap. … When I was in New York, I remember until we got Johnny Damon we didn’t win the World Series. (Then) you got a leadoff, you got a guy that knows what he has to do, taking pitches, see pitches for the guys behind so we get a better idea.”

Very nice! If the pressure starts for real with the very first hitter, a 200-hit guy, then you get to see the enemy pitcher's guess what.... best game he's got.

You bring in two 200-hit guys, you've got the other 7 guys in the dugout watching the other starting pitching do battle ---- > the same way he's going to battle them with men on base in the 4th inning. Such is the concept, anyway.

.....

BJOL would start with a "study" of all teams who had 200-hit players at the top, or 4-WAR players, or something, and see how they did. I don't have the tools for that. Lacking such tools, I can assure you that --- > they did better than teams who lacked such weapons.

;- )

......

Just for fun, now, just chatting baseball, Dr. D's mind starts racing to the World Series teams that had vicious weapons already in the #1 and #2 holes as you started the game:

1976 Big Red Machine. Pete Rose hit .323 and scored 130 (!) runs. Ken Griffey Sr. benefitting I'll bet you from synergy!, hit .336 with a .401 OBP and scored 111 runs.

Last year's Astros. George Springer led off and racked up a 144 OPS+; Josh Reddick hit .314/.363/.484 and you wanna bet that was synergy too, with Jose Altuve lurking at #3? (Reddick's lifetime slash line is .264/.323/.439.)

2009 Yankees, the team Robby is talking about. Johnny Damon going .282/.365/.489 with 107 runs, Robby going #2 I guess at .320/.352/.520, and a bunch of guys like Jeter, ARod, Godzilla, Posada etc behind them.

1990 Bash Brothers. Any team with Rickey has half its 1-2 punch already; Rickey went for his usual 189 OPS+ (!) and 65 SB's; Dave Henderson hit .271/.331/.467 for a 126 OPS+, which in that lineup was easily good enough to set up for McGwire, Canseco, Carney Lansford, Harold Baines, Steinbach, et al.

The 2001 Mariners had Ichiro (.350/.381/.457 and the MVP) usuallly followed by Mark McLemore and his angry, chip-on-the-shoulder 115 OPS+. Per Robinson Cano's theorem, this allowed Bret Boone, Edgar Martinez and John Olerud to organize their thoughts against whatever the pitcher was going to to that day.

.........

I do LIKE the idea Robby throws out, that pressure from the immediate 1-2 slots can create synergy especially if you've got some moscle to back it up later in the order. I dunno how sabe it is, but I like it.

And I dunno how sabe you wanna measure Dee Gordon and Jean "Sudden" Segura as 1-2 hitters compared to the rest of the league, but the guess here is that they don't fare badly.

Tags:

Robinson Cano

Comments

Now-Old Argument

You're right it's not very sabe. Cano is smarter than me on baseball stuff, but the only issue I have is that his perception of Gordon/Segura don't match their reality. Both are in the bottom half of "pitches per plate appearance," which I personally don't think matters much, but Robi seems to think they "see pitches." Gordon himself would probably laugh at the notion he goes deep in counts for his teammates' sake.

Every study since THE BOOK came out shows fairly convincingly that OBP is MOST important to the success of 1&2 hitters. Speed is more fun, for sure, and may have some unidentifiable effect on sequencing, etc which can benefit the lineup, but OBP = runs scored (and by association, RBI for ROBI). Both players' OBP is tied neatly to their BABIP. Let's hope for plenty of line drives, bleeders and bloops (or by some stroke of conscience either player sees a plateau leap from their career 4.5% walk rate, which I kind of expect from Segura, actually. In either case, Cano will look like a genius.)

Lastly, I love your examples of historical 1-2 punches, and Cano is right about their value. Notice the OPS+ of all those guys. Now check out Gordon's lifetime 93 (last year: 94).

OBP is king of baseball statistics

You can pretty much stop any conversation with a circuit that leads to OBP>any other consideration. No doubts here about the truth about that statement, either.

But! ;-)

Teams do 'gel' some would say 'unpredictably.' Why might this be? (I know, I know--another 'why' question when noted physicists assure me 'why' is an invalid form for inquiry to take). I think Robbie might be giving us a window into a potential contributing factor to such 'unpredictable gelling.'

How might a high-contact/high-speed leadoff hitter/duo change the way a MOTO hitter thinks? How might it order his thoughts differently than, say, having John Olerud hitting and running in front of him? Could the added speed of the 1-2 hitters make the MOTO batter think, even just a little bit, more about getting a good break while on the basepaths so as to take advantage of the lead runner's speed? Could it possibly make them a little bit more aware of breaking out of the batter's box after making contact? What about letting a MOTO hitter 'loosen up' in his approach and not try to crush every single pitch every single time, knowing the burners in front of him are perfectly capable of going 1B-Home on a double, or to score from 2B on an average single?

I'm just musing aloud here without any real point to be made. It seems to me that having such a rare ability, like elite SPD, in front of a MOTO hitter might have subtle, but important, impacts on a MOTO hitter's frame of mind. I do agree that, as far as single stats go, OBP (and baserunners allowed, conversely) is the grand stat of baseball. But assuming you can't lead the league in OBP at every slot, how else might you catalyze an offense?

Seems to me that a couple of high-contact burners atop the lineup, who aren't likely to K and are going to make the D work HARD for every out, would naturally invigorate the rest of the lineup in a few different ways. Whether that translates to the box score is a question for someone better with data mining than myself, but there are structural reasons to think it might in addition to psychological ones.

Internal consistency is better than variety.

Contrary to intuition, statistical studies have shown that teams score more runs when they're all slugging or all on base or all high contact hit tool players than they do when there is a mixture of hitting types of roughly equivalent value. So...Which do the Mariners have more of? Hit tool, on base, or slugging?

I'd say they are about equal in all three...Which doesn't bode well.

If you think about it...here are the scouting scores for each skill for the starting nine plus two biggest bench players.

HIT

GORDON: 70, SEGURA: 65, CANO: 60, CRUZ: 60, SEAGER: 55, HANIGER: 60, HEALY: 60, ZUNINO: 35, GAMEL: 55, VOGELBACH: 60, HEREDIA: 55, ICHIRO: 55

PWR

GORDON: 25, SEGURA: 50, CANO: 60, CRUZ: 75, SEAGER: 55, HANIGER: 60, HEALY: 65, ZUNINO: 75, GAMEL: 40, VOGELBACH: 60, HEREDIA: 35, ICHIRO: 25

EYE

GORDON:, 60, SEGURA: 50, CANO: 55, CRUZ: 50, SEAGER: 45, HANIGER: 55, HEALY: 30, ZUNINO 30, GAMEL: 40, VOGELBACH: 65, HEREDIA: 65, ICHIRO: 35

SPD

GORDON: 80, SEGURA: 60, CANO: 30, CRUZ: 30, SEAGER: 30, HANIGER: 55, HEALY: 45, ZUNINO: 30, GAMEL:.55, VOGELBACH:.25, HEREDIA: 60, ICHIRO: 50

So, the thing w have most of is unclear but maybe leaning toward contact? In which case, Segura and Gordon make for a smarter 1-2 than other iterations of this club?

I don’t know

Are you sure the answer isn’t Hit tool? To me players liable, even likely, to hit 280 or better: Dee, Segura, Cano, Cruz, Haniger, outside shots from Seager and Gamel/Heredia. I don’t see the A’s style OBP machine (used to seem like some years EVERY player was 350 OBPish) or NYY slugging but I do see a team built pretty well around Hit.

OBP > AVG, sure

But at the same time, no one goes from first to third on a walk...or scores from second on ball four. I think part of what Cano is seeing here is the idea that you can not shift realistically on Segura given how he sprays the ball. And that means neither of the middle infielders can cheat over to cover the bag when Gordon steals.

But most of all, I think he's salivating at the image of having two guys racing around the bases before he steps to the plate, no matter how many pitches they take. And if you add Heredia or Ichiro or Gamel before those two for the rest of the game...party's on.

Extra days off

Something I would like to see explored is how teams may use the extra days off to their advantage.

Obviously, starting pitchers can shuffle every once in awhile. Relief pitchers will get more automatic days off.

Where can they gain added value in the 25 man roster given that they may not HAVE to have an extra relief pitcher. OR, They could look at it the other way.

More days off will mean more rest days for position players so they shouldn't need subs as often.

Is there more opportunity in carrying extra pitching even if you may not need the 13th, 14th guys at all given the extra days of? Or hitters/defenders for replacements? But who do you replace? Ichiro, obviously, but I don' see a lot of need for pinch hitters either..

Seems like we may be in for even more pitching changes per inning this year.

I think Depth up top

With Heredia, Haniger Gamel and even Ichiro (maybe even Vogelbach hitting 2nd if needed?) is better than most teams ever have. Bishop probably being the closest OF on the farm adds further depth for...Later in Cano's career if not late this summer.

Regarding multiple 200 hit guys, I posted some info on Slack recently;

Everything breaking right could involve 4 players clearing 200 hits. Dee, Segura and Cano have all previously had 200 hit seasons. Only 1 team, the 91 Rangers, have ever had 3 do so the same year. Sierra, Palmeiro and Franco. Only Betts/Pedroia, Gonzales/Ellsbury, Cano/Jeter, Ordonez/Polanco and Soriano/Williams have paired up so since Ichiro/Boone in 2001.

For extra context there, Ichiro makes 4 current Mariners with previous 200 hit seasons but Haniger was my 4th potential. His April+September (Read; mostly healthy months) last year were on a 200+ hit pace. Dee and Cano have repeated 200 hits before, Segura only once. Willing to consider the possibility of Vogue clearing it but it's very unlikely if he's bench bound early on. 200 hits is generally only 1 to 5 guys in a given year but occasionally 0 or >5. Representing 15 MLB 200 hit seasons on one roster is a HUGE number. Doesn't necessarily mean anything by itself, but I find it interesting.