With the end of the regular season comes a time for reflection for the majority of baseball fans. What went right? What went wrong? You probably have a few ideas where your teams fell short or exceeded expectations, but what about a completely objective point of view? Throughout this season I have shown what batter and pitcher production looks like when we regress balls in play to look more like what the players should have seen using exit velocity and launch angle. The offseason will be no different as I take a team-by-team look at how the season fared for the club, while going a little deeper on players who were selected in the 2 Early Mock Draft. Provided there is a decent amount of history worth looking into. Player analysis will run from 2015 to present regardless of employer.
The order of release is the reverse of the final season ranking report so you can expect to find some depression leading to elation here. A quick review of that previous post can also give you a good idea of how a team rates compared to their peers as these analyses will focus upon each individual team. Lastly, playoff data has been included, which will not impact the first dozen or so teams, but does factor into league averages, and is included within player analysis. It’s going to take some time, but I would like to get one to two of these out each week which should allow for every team being covered before our glorious game returns to continue threshing our hearts.
Team Batter Production & Discipline
The Texas Rangers feel a bit caught in between with a core that alternates between past prime veterans, young players trying to acclimate and those who have already established themselves mostly stagnating rather than showing continued growth. It all adds up to a bunch of players who just aren’t enough. The strengths, and there are some, mostly do not seem to outweigh the weaknesses by enough to be a truly explosive offense. So it was in 2020 as the team spent virtually all of the season as a worse than average offense. They struck out around the average for much of the season, but there was a sustained upward bubble towards the end of the season. Incidentally, a time when they just stopped walking. Overall they took the free pass at an average or worse rate. Between the two there were large gaps between the strikeout and walk ratios for much of the season, but especially late when the offense mostly cratered outside of going back up for a breath before being dragged back under.
Batter Seasonal Line
Before diving in I want to mention that the park factors for awOBA* were not estimated for the new park. With the old park being such a hitter’s haven it stands to reason that awOBA* would rise a decent amount even if Globe Life is a neutral park. This shows up pretty clearly with virtually every player failing to get to their expected level. This does not affect calculations, but is something to think about when wondering why so many players fell short of expectations.
There was no standout offensive performance last year, though both Shin-Soo Choo and Nick Solak were good enough to lead the team despite going about it differently to get there. Choo was more patience and power showing strong walk rates, per usual, while striking out a bit more than average. His expected production on contact was much higher than actual results, and going back long enough in his career that this looks real enough to expect suppressed actual production likely due to lack of athleticism and the heavy lefty shift. Solak ended up with the same above replacement wins due to leading the team in plate appearances, and while he ran lower strikeout and walk rates he also hit the ball with much less authority. Putting a ton of balls in play as an above replacement, below average hitter is a pretty decent outcome in Solak’s first full season, but also shows there is plenty to work on to get even better.
The highest drafted hitter, Joey Gallo, had one of his worst seasons in a pretty good career. As ugly as the strikeout rate was it was not that far off from the last few years with walk rates right there, as well. The weird thing is that his power was not good enough to offset the absurd strikeout rates as he has for much of his career. The rookie catcher Sam Huff acquitted himself well over a sample that is unfortunately too small to lend much analytical goodies. In his brief run he showed worse than average strikeout rates and a whole mess of power. The levels are not preordained heading into next year, but the shape of the production might already be clear. Throughout his minor league climb it looked like Leody Taveras would be able to make a name for himself based on good defense and speed on the bases, but upon promotion this past year he showed fairly similar aggregate production to Nick Solak, though coming in more of the Shin-Soo method of walks and pop and too many strikeouts. Given his history of stealing bags there will likely be a lot of interest here despite never playing in AAA. It will be interesting to see if Texas keeps him in MLB to start the season.
Then we get into a section of players who just could not hit enough. Todd Frazier did some Todd Frazier shit walloping lefties, and likely leaving open the door for that kind of reduced role for yet another season in 2021. Again, Ronald Guzman showed that he just cannot hit lefties so they had the makings of a good platoon here between these two, though calling them exciting would be a poor description. Next up is Elvis Andrus who was probably a fine hitter considering the position, but not really a a starting player on a contender and the steals drying up in fantasy makes him waiver bait. Danny Santana didn’t play a whole lot, but it was more of the good walk, crazy strikeout, good pop for him this year, though that production on contact didn’t translate anywhere near as well as 2019. Rougned Odor struggled with lefties, but was closer to average against righties. The strikeout to walk remains odious, but he does show above average production on contact.
Isiah Kiner-Falefa and Willie Calhoun will be on the team next year, but unless they can meld into one more complete player neither looks like more than depth on a contender. Neither strikes out all that much on the good side, but the walks are below average, as well, and the production on contact just so woeful it is hard to see future success without the explanation of a severe injury. Kiner-Falefa playing so much makes it hard to lend him that excuse, but Calhoun’s broken jaw in spring sure does give him a get out of jail free card for next year when it will probably be a true sink or swim season for him.
Team Batter Batted Ball Profile & Production on Contact
Occasional flirtations with average exit velocity were brief and infrequent with much of the contact coming im a bit to well below. Again, we see the gap between actual and expected production and feel good that the actual should be a couple of points higher closing some of that gap, but even going purely by expectations this is a team that lacked the ability to punish the baseball. Their best stretch was between their 900th and 1,300th plate appearance where they seemed to be consistently making better contact, but for the most part this was an offense that struck the ball around the average with as much above average performance as below.
Team Pitcher Production & Discipline
As seen in the final season league review the pitching was not bad coming in just shy of the average by xwRAA, and you can see several strong runs. An issue, however, is that when they were bad, especially in the first half, they were pretty bad. Performance rarely seemed to settle in at a level, though the second half seemed less volatile with a nice sustained run of good performance. The team showed a couple stretches of sitting batters down at a 30% clip, but lived more often in the average or worse range. the end of the season saw the walk rate a bit more under control, and while not a strength showed improvement over much of the season.
Pitcher Seasonal Line
Coming in at the beginning of the fourth round according to the 2 Early Mock drafts is Lance Lynn. He was extremely good in the short season running an above average strikeout rate with well better than average contact. He was very good against the many lefties he saw, while being more above average against righties with more walks and slightly harder contact that manifested much more harshly. It’s a pretty big step down, but a big leap forward for Jonathan Hernandez who improved dramatically upon his rough taste in 2019. He showed similar zone control as Lynn with even better contact, but coming in a shorter sample he couldn’t touch their ace on volume. He is someone to keep an eye on after this kind of leap, but with an undefined role that seems unlikely to favor either wins or saves, and the lack of track record of being this good you can see why he was an afterthought in most drafts.
Several relievers showed strong results on short samples including Kyle Cody, Taylor Hearn, Brett Martin and Joely Rodriguez. They seem to overlap well in the pen being able to cover one’s weakness against, say lefties (Martin or Rodriguez) or righties (Cody) or a lack of strikeouts (Cody or Martin) or too many walks (all of them except Rodriguez who also strikes out the most). Again, in fantasy formats an established pecking order will diminish the value of most of them, but this looks like a fairly deep strength for the real life Rangers.
Near average production out of Mike Minor prior to his trade wasn’t exciting, but seems like they got some volume out of him. The wide platoon split was driven by better production on contact from the right-handed batters, though he showed fine zone control against them. As a free agent he seems like a useful back of rotation guy best suited for a division with great lefty hitters or lineups. Being a little less useful, but seeing similar volume was Kolby Allard who really did not acquit himself well. He walked too many with a below average strikeout rate, but average expected contact. Possibly a guy who plays up in shorter stints. It was another year of soaking a ton of volume, but doing so in a pretty ugly way kind of like the massive willow tree that came down near my garage last weekend. They can probably find a more scenic view, but it’s an awful lot of water to carry.
Team Pitcher Batted Ball Profile & Production on Contact
The collective staff did pretty well to suppress hard exit velocity with a particularly wild stretch early in the season. Things were more around the average or better the rest of the way. Subsequently, the production on contact was typically in a pretty good place, though a couple of spikes early and another late that looks less justified by expectations do show there were tougher stretches. Having to replace Minor will be a challenge, but down the stretch they showed well without him and his production should be replaceable even if it gets chopped up amongst a handful of guys. A lot to like here, though if Lynn gets moved a lot of the shine comes off the apple.
Player Analysis in order of 2 Early Mock ADP
It is important to remember throughout, but especially for well established players, that the most plate appearances anybody received this year was 327 including the postseason (378 for a pitcher). Meaning 2020 production is only a narrow slice of what is being shown for entrenched players with a long history. For players where 2020 makes up a larger part of their resumé the more recent data is going to take up more of the space. Considering what every player had to go through this year I do not think it makes sense to over-weight what we saw throughout this season so hopefully incorporating more track record will be more informative than simply showing what occurred this year. Also, the vertical axes will remain locked to make side-by-side comparisons much easier, but throughout this series please pay attention to that x-axis as it will change from player to player.
Lance Lynn (47)
The very strong run for Lance Lynn over his last thousand or so batters faced has him looking like an ace with sustained well above average performance, and poorer runs mostly ending up around the average. This is not unprecedented territory as earlier in his career he would pitch to this type of performance, though back then the spikes were usually much more vicious. He had taken his strikeout rate into the stratosphere touching 40% and living above 30%, but that fell back a bit in the truncated season to be more around the average. His earlier good performance didn’t show quite the impressiveness in his strikeout to walk ratios with few positive gaps with much of the middle showing too high of a walk rate that has since mostly diminished. His exit velocity yielded ranges from average to quite good with a fair bit of volatility. The launch angle has gradually ticked upward to be higher than average, but his production on contact does not present as an issue over a very large sample. When he’s striking out north of 30% you have to include him in the Cy Young discussion, but when he’s managing his walks, getting enough strikeouts and doing well to suppress hard contact you are still looking at as a guy worthy of the true ace label.
Joey Gallo (126)
One of these years Joey Gallo is going to have one of the greatest seasons of all time. He will avoid the injury issues that have plagued him, find a way to strike out at a normal person rate and still see so many of his flyballs find the seats. He might even have more singles than homers. That year was not 2020 when he stayed reasonably healthy around a bum wrist in early August to put up the worst season of his career with production levels on par with when he first broke into the league. In between you see an above average producer who can occasionally be one of the best hitters in the game, but not with any sort of consistency. That becomes a bit more palatable when he is going three or so rounds later than last year, but it doesn’t appear that he is going to stop striking out near 40% of the time. The walk rate is almost always better than average, often wildly so, but still not enough to typically offset the absurd strikeout rate.
The approach helped him put up some of the strongest exit velocity in the history of the game with elevated launch angles that mean so much of his contact turns into fly out or out of the park, but those high speed tracers turned into much more average speed and the angles ticked up even more in the shortened season. What has, at times, been off the charts production on contact saw him look much more mortal. It is possible Gallo was left behind due to the weird season, and never was able to get on track. Playing through a hand injury wouldn’t help, either. This might be a blip as it is entirely possible Gallo puts up a career season next year. This should be the best price you have seen on Gallo in years, which will be enticing, and he will surely be better than this next year, but it is really hard for me to get excited about one of the most powerful hitters of all time.
Nick Solak (197)
We have around half a season of plate appearances for Nick Solak now, and it has mostly been uninteresting performance so far. He overperformed a bit in his cup of coffee last year, but that has turned the other way over the end of this past season. Throughout all you can see a very consistent true wOBA right around the average, and again, with park adjustments it is possible the park factors are holding down awOBA* more than they should so maybe that gap is a bit tighter. The soon to be 26 year old strikes out at a better than average rate, though there was some collapse in the walk rate taking his trend from above to below average. He hits the ball with authority against showing a very tight distribution ranging from average to above on the exit velocity and mostly trending up over time. The launch angle similarly shows consistency, but tells us that a lot of his contact is down.This led to expected production on contact that was around the average. Consistency like this shows up best over the course of a long season so, perhaps, Solak will go on to have an unsexy career while getting his every year. In that regard he might be like a Michael Young type of hitter. Real growth will come when he can find a way to build on the strongest exit velocity, while also getting the ball off the ground more.
Corey Kluber (243)
It has obviously been a great career for Corey Kluber, but over the last two seasons you are talking 36 innings over 8 starts combined and with major injury to his pitching arm the cause it begs the question if he will be able to compete going forward. If that is the case this is more of a retrospective look at one of the game’s greats. We see true ace ability to combine volume with production that stays better than average and often wildly so. This most recent stretch, while brief, represents some of his worst performance with career worst strikeout and walk rates. Previously, an enormous strength with massive gaps between his above average to league elite strikeout rates compared to his walk rates where average was a bad day and half that was frequently the norm. Beyond controlling the zone he also turned bats into reeds incapable of doing any damage. Absurd exit velocity suppression in the middle of these past several years took it to a new level, but even the bookends show better than average. Unsurprisingly, this led to production on contact ranging from average to much, much better. It seems unlikely that he will ever get back to this incredible level shown a few years back, but the later it gets in your draft the more worthy the flier.
Leody Taveras (254)
It’s a short sample for Leody Taveras who brings the kind of elite, game-changing speed that can take over a real life game or send your team flying up the stolen base leaderboard. This will make him tantalizing, but will fans be eager to jump on him after being burnt by similarly speedy players who just could not hit enough? At the 17th round as of the 2 Early Mock drafts it’s worth the shot. Production so far has been around the average by true wOBA, and if we think Globe Life’s park factors are holding down the actual you can see that not far off, either. That came with pretty lousy strikeout rates north of 30%, but it should be noted that he has never breached even 22% at any prior level and completely skipped AAA due to the weird season. Encouragingly, he did show average or better walk rates so we are likely looking at a patient, if not passive, batter. The walk should remain a useful tool as exit velocity looks to be softer than average, though he did go from too down to more liners over the course of the season. The angles help his pedestrian velocity play up as expected production on play came in above average, and again, it’s likely actual is right there. With expected improvement to his strikeout rate and good production on not necessarily very hard contact, which may rise over time, this is a player who looks poised to rocket up draft boards over the course of the winter.
Willie Calhoun (269)
Going a round later and coming off a lost season that started with a fractured jaw caused by an errant pitch is Willie Calhoun.He has shown that he can be something like an average producer, though the stretch of over-performance in 2019 likely has players remembering a better version of Calhoun who might not necessarily be coming back even if you fully write off this year’s slide. He avoids the strikeout pretty well, and this year showed a walk rate closer to the average before it settled back in at prior lower levels. The juiced ball of 2019 looks particularly favorable with all the balls he got in the air and likely providing a culprit. for the better than expected results. Exit velocity hasn’t strayed far from the average save a good run earlier, but that hasn’t helped his combinations profile as better than average for the most part, and the slide this year does few favors. Considering the meh track record I think it’s easy to be pessimistic on Calhoun for the coming season.
Rafael Montero (271)
As a pure saves play you could do a lot worse than Rafael Montero who inherited the role when Jose Leclerc went down last year. Long a talented arm his third act sees him going from failed starter to useful reliever to potentially a chance to add some zeroes to future contracts. The performance over sustained stretches has often been pretty good, but there were also corresponding rougher patches that speak to a lack of consistency, and that’s throwing out his pretty bad stretch as a starter early. The jump in strikeout rate is nice to see as 30% rates play well in the backend of a bullpen, and in conjunction with the drop in walks, the first strong levels of his career, the good performance shouldn’t be surprising. It was a dramatic improvement in both facets that could revert back to more pedestrian levels going forward, but even if so his contact allowed has been pretty strong. Exit velocity shows league leader levels throughout his career, though production on contact sees him more around the average, while generally seeing worse results in reality. If he keeps the Ks and the role you are looking at a second tier closer with slippage from there as more ifs turn into nos.
Rougned Odor (306)
Into the 20th round now people are no longer ignoring the things Rougned Odor cannot do on a baseball field when it comes to pricing him. From a pure production standpoint most of his has come in at a below average clip since the earliest run here where consistent above average actual production was a bit unjustified by the expectations. Outside of the occasional ethereal spike it has been at that lower level where he has settled. He strikes out a ton, and while walking more of late it cannot be called a strength of his game. The strikeout rate getting worse has come with the benefit of harder contact so not a complete wash and he has done a good job throughout his career of getting the ball in the air. This has left the production on contact at above average levels for the most part, but have not been enough to offset the deleterious effects of his (lack of) discipline. At this point in the draft you might only care about ugly steals and power, but at some point the Rangers are going to stop giving so much time to a below average player.
Danny Santana (316)
Another ugly speed and steals play comes in the form of Danny Santana who has taken average strikeout rates earlier in his career to new heights practically linearly in effort to goose just a bit more hard contact out of his bat. That part of the equation has been going to plan as he has done well to lift not only his exit velocity, but also the ball off the ground. That has led to above average production on contact over his last few hundred balls in play. While the approach has helped him looks something like an average producer overall the gap in his strikeout to walk rates is just so absurd it is hard to portend future success. Unconventional success from an extreme approach seems like a way to have a better start than finish, but Santana has shown some viability and as you lend more credibility toward the spike in walk rate the more you can see him being a useful guy next year. I’d take him over Odor instead of having him almost a round later.
Jose Leclerc (317)
Until the team formally anoints Rafael Montero to the Closer role it makes sense to keep an eye on Jose Leclerc who seems like a lock for a great strikeout rate that will come with a lot of walks, but maybe not too many considering the punch out rate. As he has sought to moderate the walks he has seen contact yielded tick upward with harder exit velocity from once elite levels and enough in the air to see his once very strong contact production suppression reach more around the average. Add in the injury history and it is hard to get the excitement back up to previous levels, though it would not surprise if he comes out and saves a dozen or more games next year as an above average reliever.
Isiah Kiner-Falefa (349)
A catcher that can steal bases is a special sort of fetish for the fantasy baseball player. To that end, Isiah Kiner-Falefa has been incredibly useful over these past two years. His first as a wild card who didn’t hit much, and his second more of the same while shedding the eligibility that made him worth owning in the first place. However, stealing eight bases in the short season was rather marvelous and may help offset the lost position. The data shows mostly a below average hitter who controls the zone fairly well, but doesn’t strike the ball all that hard outside of a rather sustained stretch where he did close with the average. Subsequently, his production on contact has been muted, but not all that far from the average if he can do other things well if he can keep swiping like 2020. He will need to if he has to stick on your roster as a leftside infielder.
Kyle Gibson (412)
Believe it or not it there has been more good than bad throughout the long career of Kyle Gibson, much of which has been around the average. The recent stretch is on par with his worst run a couple seasons ago, and it is questionable how many miles are left on this hoss. He faced the second most batters on the team this year and with two more years under contract should be able to soak up outs even if a bit ugly. Gibson has garnered more strikeouts on a rate bases the past couple of years than prior with walks showing a wide range around the average. He has done a fairly solid job of limiting high exit velocity throughout his career, but has generally seen his contact production allowed ranging from a little better than average to well worse. Being a familiar name he might seem appealing when you are desperate late, but you know how this book ends.
Jonathan Hernandez (457)
There is potential for this price to appear a pittance in hindsight as Jonathan Hernandez showed tremendous growth moving from his from his first taste a year prior to a very strong 2020. The fulltime move to the pen paid dividends with production coming in well better than average by the end of the year being heavily driven by an above average strikeout rate that has managed to stay up in the face of improving walk rates. He has given up fairly soft contact in his career with better than average exit velocity, though higher trajectories earlier lifted expected production above actual and it has been at that lower actual level where things have coalesced. The likelihood of being a fireman reliever who sees all the heat, but none of the accolades is high here, and with a pen so deep in good arms he might not see either wins nor saves, but the performance should bode well for future opportunity.
Mike Minor (473)
The short season was even shorter in Texas for Mike Minor who found himself traded to Oakland ahead of his bid in free agency. The production has gotten a bit more tilted toward the bad, but it is a long track record of average or better performance including a correction following the trade this year. Strikeouts have generally been in the average range, but have shown a propensity to touch 30%. That comes with average and better walk rates for the most part including of late. Better than average exit velocity throughout his career has been helpful in suppressing offense, though putting the ball in the air so often can be a bit scary at times. The production on contact was mostly in the worse than average zone of late, a place he has been before, but usually finds himself able to get back onto the better side. As an older pitcher he may not see that same elastic snapback, but with many teams needing arms for next year it’s possible he lands in a good spot that could leave him as a bargain this late.
Shin-Soo Choo (485)
It has been a long career of average to quite good production out of Shin-Soo Choo, though without approval for both leagues using the designated hitter there should be real concerns about if he will receive an offer for 2021. The fact that most of his performance has been more above average than good or more good than great or great, but brief means he has been more of a compiler throughout his career. The strikeouts have trekked upward to more of the 30% level that is harder to offset, but he still walks with aplomb. He also hits the ball pretty hard, which was not the case for a long stretch, but in both you can see above average production on contact. With so much mystery surrounding the erstwhile masher we will need more clarity on his situation next year before committing too many chips to the pot.
Elvis Andrus (492)
Throughout his career Elvis Andrus has been a nice support system for your stolen base needs, but it appears that view looks better backwards. The years that he has also hit well he was extremely useful, but those times have been less frequent. While much of his good performance outstripped expectations there were a couple of genuine spikes that were reinforced by the underlying data. Many of his outcomes are dictated by how well he struck the ball owed to the plethora of balls in play due to low strikeout and walk rates. He has occasionally flirted with average exit velocity, but much more often saw his contact play softer with a mostly downward trajectories. Rarely has that led to expected production on contact coming in above average. Pairing that weak contact with few walks makes for an unsexy piece you can probably find on waivers if the ball is falling in a bunch.
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