First Basemen, a brief (and recent) history
Hopefully spreadsheets are worth a thousand words (DJ, cont.)
The conversations with lr (and others) about DJ Peterson have been both intriguing and enlightening. I thought it time to talk about corner power and expectations a little more in depth, however - how do we know whether we should be enthusiastic or wary of DJ if we don't know whether his slash line/ wOBA is actually what we want to see from a corner slugger?
For a wider angle on this, here's the last thirty years worth of 1B performances at the plate in a handy spreadsheet:
And for a team-centric snapshot, here's the performance of first basemen for the Mariners through the years:
Not sure how readable those are. What do those two pics look like to me at a glance? Well, a few things stand out:
1) I would have expected Iso among first basemen to go down after the Roid Era. It has not, at least not significantly.
Approximate Iso by era:
Pre-roid 84-92: .155
Roid era: .190
Post-roid: .183
And look at the home runs. You can't just do plain HR totals as the league expanded in this timeframe (Rockies and Marlins in '93, Rays and D-Backs in '98). But HR/team goes 24-ish per for the pre-roid timeframe selected, up about 32-and-a-half for the roid era (there's a baseball strike to account for), and just about 31 for the years after. Power may be down, but for first basemen the HR power ain't down THAT much.
Now, I personally feel that "Post-roid" should fall around 2009, but we started some form of drug testing in 2006, so I cut it there. So maybe the last dregs of the Steroid Kerfluffle (why can't we call it that instead) are boosting the Iso totals... or maybe the new era of first basemen are sacrificing something else to keep their power up.
2) K's are through the roof. Slugging is a bit down, (it goes .423 to .467 to .447 through the eras) but the Modern Age still hasn't fallen quite back to 1980s levels. Why? Because hitters are definitely still swinging for the fences.
Strikeout percentage:
Pre: 13.8%
Roid: 16.6%
Post: 19.1%
And note that 22+% last year. Guys are definitely not getting cheated up there. When we talk about how we'd like DJ to strike out less, we kinda have to remember that only 5 guys were around or under that 15% mark last year, another 4 under 18%. He can still have a plus K-rate at 18%. (Which would be an improvement for him, but not a crazy one).
3) The Mariners have not had a lot of shiny pretty first basemen in their history. I remember Tino being great, but really Tino was slightly less-decent than David Segui (who has something like DJ's expected slash line if Deej's power doesn't come in).
You can see why Alvin Davis was Mr. Mariner (before my time) and why Ole was beloved. But when we say "DJ has to be a 130-140 wRC+ player to REALLY be worth it at first base" what we're really saying is "DJ needs to be the best first baseman in Mariners history over his club-controlled years for us to feel truly satisfied with his performance." Not sure that's gonna happen, and this park is tough on everyone.
OTOH - Smoak's 110 wRC+ last year came on a .238/ .334/ .412 line. So we're also saying DJ needs to be a .750 OPS hitter to get to the Tino / Segui level of first baseman. That's not what we want from him, but the bar isn't high around here. League-wise, he needs about a .290/.340/.460 in our park to get to a satisfactory 125-ish wRC+ (around #10 in league-wide performance at the position the last 3 years). DJ should also be a plus-fielding first baseman – he has good actions around the bag and as a borderline 3B he should be plus on the other side, even as a shorter fielder. That will help his WAR if nothing else - and on a team with groundballers it's a good thing. Gun to my head, I would take lr's projected line for DJ's first full season ( .260/.310/.450) which should get him a nice 110-115 wRC+ in his break-in year, or about the best that Smoak has managed in his career (and well above his worst).
BTW, speaking of Smoak: apparently he's the second-worst first baseman in the history of the Mariners to get more than a seasons-worth of PAs with as bad a career line (and wRC+) as he has. Pete O'Brien holds the title right now and I don't think Smoak is gonna get a chance to be bad enough to take it back.
And as a last breakdown, here are the top-5 minor league 1B (per MLB) and their age and 2014 performances:
Dom Smith, 20: .290/.350/.350
Vogelbach, 21: 270/.360/.420
Matt Olson, 20: .240/.390/.525
Kyle Parker, 24: .290/.345/.475
Greg Bird, 21: .270/.355/.415
Peterson, 22: .325/.375/.600
I like Olson, and Vogelbach is working on getting his stocky tubbiness to work for him. Dom Smith is young and hitting in a pitcher's park, but a .060 ISO is REALLY low even considering that. Who do you like significantly MORE than Peterson? And do you see the first-base numbers going back up toward Roid Era production five years from now with those guys climbing the ladder, or is it more likely that it stays where it is or falls off more?
And what else stands out to you guys on those sheets?
~G
Blog:
Gordon