Eye On the Tigers

Brayan Pena Should Not be an Everyday Starter

2013-05-21T19:05:00.000-04:00

It's the end of May and just past the ¼ mark of the season, which means there's enough playing time for people to stop using the "it's early" and "small sample size" excuses. One such instance is Alex Avila, who has gotten off to a horrible start, hitting only .179/.256/.304 with a 51 wRC+ in 125 PA. In the meantime, Brayan Pena has much better numbers, hitting .275/.296/.412 with an 88 wRC+, but in only 55 PA. Tiger fans are fed up and want a change.

@eyeontigers @bossofrenfield Right now, Pena is far superior to Avila.Avila has been a complete turd. Pena needs more playing time right now
— Jonathan Knerr (@JonathanKnerr) May 21, 2013

As well as posts from Detroit Tigers.com message board and Motown Sports message board.

Looking deeper in the numbers, it doesn't appear that Pena would be much of an upgrade.

First of all, historical stats say that Avila is a better hitter:

Brayan Pena:

Year	PA	AVG	OBP	SLG	BB%	K%	wOBA	wRC+
2010	174	0.253	0.306	0.335	6.9%	15.5%	0.288	75
2011	240	0.248	0.288	0.338	5.0%	10.0%	0.277	70
2012	226	0.236	0.262	0.321	4.0%	10.6%	0.254	55
2010-2012	640	0.245	0.284	0.331	5.2%	11.7%	0.272	66

Alex Avila:

Year	PA	AVG	OBP	SLG	BB%	K%	wOBA	wRC+
2010	333	0.228	0.316	0.340	10.8%	21.3%	0.299	81
2011	551	0.295	0.389	0.506	13.2%	23.8%	0.384	141
2012	434	0.243	0.352	0.384	14.1%	24.0%	0.327	104
2010-2012	1318	0.260	0.358	0.423	12.9%	23.2%	0.343	114

Even if Avila's 2011 season gets heavily discounted because of a fluky career year, his 81 wRC+ in 2010 is still better than any of the last 3 years by Pena. The only year that Pena has done better than an 81 wRC+ and had significant playing time was in 2009, when he had a 94 wRC+. The same principle of fluky career year could also be applied to that year too since he hasn't come close to matching that until the 13 games he's played so far this year.

So maybe Pena is doing something different. Maybe he's changed his approach to become a more successful hitter?

Year	BABIP	LD%	GB%	FB%
2010	0.295	16.3%	45.0%	38.8%
2011	0.261	22.9%	44.3%	32.8%
2012	0.253	24.6%	48.2%	27.2%
2013	0.279	11.1%	57.8%	31.1%
Career	0.266	20.9%	48.8%	30.3%

There's definitely a huge increase of ground balls, and a decrease in line drives. Pena has 14 hits and 7 of them have been hit on the ground (including 3 infield hits). That's 50% of his hits coming from ground balls compared to 34% in both 2012 and his career. Pena isn't the fleetest of foot, so to have him have continued success by hitting ground balls instead of line drives isn't very likely. This is likely random variance from only playing in 13 games.

Here are his plate discipline numbers:

Year	O-Swing%	Z-Swing%	Swing%	O-Contact%	Z-Contact%	Contact%	Zone%
2010	31.4%	64.5%	48.5%	65.6%	90.5%	82.7%	51.7%
2011	28.7%	61.0%	45.1%	79.4%	93.9%	89.4%	50.6%
2012	31.9%	60.4%	46.5%	76.7%	94.5%	88.5%	51.1%
2013	29.5%	63.0%	45.9%	67.7%	95.2%	86.2%	48.8%
Career	30.5%	61.2%	45.8%	76.7%	93.5%	87.9%	49.8%

There isn't much difference in his 2013 numbers than his recent seasons or his career totals. The stat with the most difference is his O-Contact rate is lower, which means when he swings at pitches out of the strike zone, he's missing more often. That is the opposite of an improvement.

What about Avila? Is he doing something different to cause less success?

Year	BABIP	LD%	GB%	FB%
2010	0.278	21.5%	43.5%	35.0%
2011	0.366	21.7%	37.8%	40.5%
2012	0.313	23.8%	46.4%	29.8%
2013	0.219	19.7%	50.0%	30.3%
Career	0.316	21.7%	42.8%	35.5%

Avila's BABIP is down almost 100 points from last year and his career. His batted ball data doesn't have a dramatic change from his previous seasons and his career. Therefore, it's reasonable to conclude that Avila is either suffering from BABIP bad luck or an injury is causing it.

Avila's plate disciple numbers:

Year	O-Swing%	Z-Swing%	Swing%	O-Contact%	Z-Contact%	Contact%	Zone%
2010	23.4%	64.3%	44.2%	52.3%	86.8%	77.8%	50.7%
2011	24.7%	60.2%	43.0%	49.0%	86.1%	75.8%	51.5%
2012	20.9%	58.7%	39.3%	51.6%	82.1%	73.8%	48.8%
2013	20.3%	62.8%	42.0%	46.3%	79.3%	71.5%	51.0%
Career	22.6%	61.1%	42.1%	49.9%	84.7%	75.5%	50.5%

Avila's main problem is his Contact%, both in the strike zone and out of the zone. He's swinging and missing more often than he ever did, which definitely explains the increase in strikeouts (28.8% in 2013) and decrease in walks (9.6% in 2013). It's hard to imagine a 26 year old suddenly become a weaker hitter than he was a year ago, so I'm leaning towards the injury theory.

Finally, there's ZIPS rest of the season stats. While these stats don't show exactly what will happen in the future, they do show who is likely to be better for the rest of the season.

Player	PA	AVG	OBP	SLG	BB%	K%	wOBA	wRC+
Brayan Pena	164	0.260	0.293	0.369	4.3%	11.8%	0.290	77
Alex Avila	351	0.236	0.334	0.390	12.6%	25.3%	0.320	97

Alex Avila may need to be replaced (or DL'd), but the answer isn't Brayan Pena.

Rick Porcello’s Improved Changeup

2013-05-15T18:14:00.001-04:00

When Rick Porcello decided to ditch his slider this year, most people expected that it would be his curveball to show marked improvement since that was the pitch that he was substituting the slider for. Well so far, it's been the changeup that's shown much improvement.

According to Pitch f/x pitch values/100, Porcello's changeup has a value of 3.63 so far this year. That's not only the best value pitch for Porcello this year, it's the best value pitch that he's ever had (0 is average, positive results are above average, negative results are below average).

Year	4-Seam FB	2-Seam FB	Cutter	Slider	Curveball	Changeup
2009	0.92	0.22	-1.38	-2.94	-1.49	-1.20
2010	0.45	0.09		-1.77	-3.81	0.44
2011	-0.13	-0.65		0.18	-0.84	-0.45
2012	-0.68	0.14		-3.84	0.65	0.07
2013	-2.10	-2.05		1.42	0.35	3.63

Of course, it's still May and so, "beware of small samples." Porcello has thrown a total of 543 pitches so far this year and only 98 of them have been changeups. FanGraphs even tells us that these pitch values have little predictive values:

This statistic has limited predictive power. It can show you what pitches a pitcher has had success with in the past, but you should be careful in extrapolating those results and projecting the future. It’s a descriptive statistic, not a predictive one.

Looking deeper in Pitch f/x, we can see why his changeup has been so valuable.

Changeups	PA	HR	BB	K	AVG	OBP	SLG
2009	100	3	8	12	0.275	0.333	0.429
2010	80	0	1	13	0.253	0.263	0.304
2011	78	1	0	14	0.253	0.260	0.427
2012	103	3	7	14	0.240	0.291	0.406
2013	35	0	1	9	0.176	0.200	0.206

The one stat that jumps out at me the most is the strikeouts. Already Porcello has 9 strikeouts on the changeup in 35 PA, 5 less than his career high that took him 103 PA last year and 78 PA in 2011. Has Porcello finally gotten his strikeout pitch?

Here's how Porcello's changeup compares to his other pitches:

2013	PA	HR	BB	K	AVG	OBP	SLG
2-Seam FB	58	1	4	5	0.415	0.466	0.528
4-Seam FB	27	3	1	5	0.269	0.296	0.654
Curveball	17	1	1	2	0.125	0.176	0.375
Changeup	35	0	1	9	0.176	0.200	0.206

Again, the one stat that jumps out at me is the strikeouts. Historically, Porcello has gotten most of his strikeouts on his 2-Seamer (or sinker as he calls it). But this year it's come from the changeup. "Beware of the small samples" again; things could even out by the end of the year. However, I would like to see Porcello throw his changeup a little more often to see if there's something there. He already is throwing it more than he has in the past:

Year	Changeup %
2009	14.4%
2010	11.7%
2011	11.4%
2012	13.6%
2013	18.1%

Although, I'd like to see it be his 2^nd most frequent pitch, right after his 2-Seam FB (sinker):

Pitch Type	Percentage
4-Seam FB %	24.3%
2-Seam FB %	38.9%
Slider %	0.7%
Curveball %	18.1%
Changeup %	18.1%

Max Scherzer’s LOB%

2013-05-11T13:23:00.002-04:00

Max Scherzer is having a really good year this year, especially so if ERA is ignored. In defense independent stats, Scherzer ranks as one of the best starting pitchers in all of baseball so far this year:

Stat	Value	Rank
fWAR	2.0	T-2nd
FIP	1.87	T-2nd
xFIP	2.30	3rd
tERA	2.18	3rd
SIERA	2.27	2nd

However, his ERA is 3.61, which ranks him at 56 among starting pitchers. What's going on? Well it seems it all has to do with his left on base percentage (LOB%). His LOB% is 63.1%, ranking him 8^th lowest and well below the league average rate of 73.3%. If these runners aren't left on base, it means they are scoring and raising the pitcher's ERA. It's been long thought of that this stat is a luck stat and will eventually even out by the end of the season to around league average.

In 2012, FanGraphs introduced fielding dependent pitching, suggesting that pitchers do have some control over balls in play and that it's not all luck (as FIP only factors in strikeouts, walks, hit batters and home runs). One of those stats was LOB-Wins, stating that there could be some skill involved in stranding runners.

Below is how Scherzer has been in LOB-Wins while with the Tigers:

Year	LOB-Wins
2010	0.3
2011	0.4
2012	0.6
2013	-0.9

The -0.9 ranks him 2^nd lowest among starting pitchers . However, he's always been able to have a positive number, which means he's been a little bit better than league average, as shown:

Year	LOB%	League LOB%
2010	74.9%	72.2%
2011	73.7%	72.5%
2012	76.5%	72.5%
2013	63.1%	73.3%

One of two things is happening. Either he's doing something differently that has changed his skill (either mentally, mechanically or something else) or it truly is luck and he'll regress back to mean. If it is luck (unfortunate luck in this case) or something mechanical that can be fixed, then Scherzer is primed for a really good year this year as he regresses back to his career norm.

Should Jhonny Peralta be batting 5th?

2013-05-08T16:56:00.000-04:00

It seems like this discussion was going on last year. An underperforming player is hitting 5^th while not a great option, but seemingly better one, is hitting lower in the order. Only this time the underperforming player is Victor Martinez instead of Delmon Young and both times that seemingly better player looks to be Jhonny Peralta .

With a little more than a month into the season, we're at a point where "it's still early" is becoming less and less of a valid argument. Victor Martinez has gotten off to a very slow start and is only hitting .220/.277/.297 with 1 HR and a 55 OPS+. Meanwhile Jhonny Peralta is having a nice bounce-back season hitting .298/.339/.404 with 2 HR and a 99 OPS+. It appears that V-Mart has picked it up lately hitting .279/.273/.442 over his last 10 games, but Jhonny has kept pace hitting .275/.311/.400 over his last 10 games. The level of competition should also be factored in too as the Tigers just finished a 4-game sweep of the lowly Houston Astros.

Against other 5^th place hitters, the Tigers are 23^rd in MLB:

Rk		G	GS	PA	AB	R	H	2B	3B	HR	RBI	SB	CS	BB	SO	BA	OBP	SLG	OPS	sOPS+
1	BAL	35	33	138	114	22	35	9	0	11	34	0	0	18	37	.307	.399	.675	1.074	187
2	CLE	32	30	127	108	21	33	4	0	7	23	2	0	16	29	.306	.402	.537	.939	155
3	COL	32	32	140	128	20	41	8	1	6	23	2	0	11	23	.320	.371	.539	.910	146
4	OAK	39	34	152	129	26	37	5	1	6	22	4	0	19	33	.287	.384	.481	.865	136
5	KCR	29	29	121	109	14	36	8	2	1	11	5	2	7	13	.330	.380	.468	.848	131
6	ARI	35	33	147	134	18	42	6	1	4	22	2	0	12	27	.313	.367	.463	.830	126
7	SFG	35	33	140	130	16	36	10	1	6	19	5	0	9	27	.277	.321	.508	.829	123
8	LAA	33	32	143	135	15	43	8	0	4	16	1	0	8	33	.319	.357	.467	.823	124
9	BOS	34	33	139	118	17	27	9	0	7	23	0	2	16	45	.229	.338	.483	.821	122
10	TEX	34	33	137	125	15	32	4	1	8	20	1	1	12	21	.256	.321	.496	.817	120
11	NYY	39	31	129	110	18	24	4	0	8	12	1	0	18	19	.218	.333	.473	.806	118
12	TBR	42	32	133	124	15	37	8	1	3	16	1	2	9	23	.298	.346	.452	.797	117
13	LAD	45	32	135	116	7	32	3	0	4	13	0	1	18	16	.276	.378	.405	.783	116
14	HOU	36	33	139	121	22	27	7	3	5	14	0	0	16	37	.223	.317	.455	.771	109
15	PHI	42	34	136	121	12	32	5	2	3	11	0	0	13	26	.264	.338	.413	.751	105
16	STL	40	32	132	126	11	40	6	0	1	21	3	1	5	18	.317	.348	.389	.737	102
17	CHC	42	33	136	125	17	30	10	0	5	17	5	1	7	24	.240	.289	.440	.729	96
18	PIT	40	32	132	112	8	26	6	1	2	14	1	1	18	20	.232	.348	.357	.706	95
19	MIL	45	31	127	112	17	24	2	1	5	16	1	2	13	27	.214	.299	.384	.683	86
20	WSN	34	32	128	117	12	26	7	1	3	9	2	0	10	32	.222	.281	.376	.657	78
21	MIA	34	34	144	136	15	31	9	0	4	16	2	0	7	34	.228	.266	.382	.648	75
22	SDP	39	33	139	120	9	29	6	0	1	16	2	0	17	36	.242	.331	.317	.648	80
23	DET	35	30	139	125	10	30	8	0	1	16	1	0	12	14	.240	.302	.328	.630	73
24	CIN	35	34	153	143	18	34	9	1	1	16	0	2	10	52	.238	.288	.336	.623	71
25	ATL	39	32	135	126	16	26	8	0	4	13	1	0	7	42	.206	.252	.365	.617	67
26	MIN	29	29	122	108	13	21	8	0	1	10	1	0	10	30	.194	.279	.296	.575	58
27	NYM	45	29	124	112	15	20	5	0	4	16	0	0	8	35	.179	.242	.330	.572	55
28	CHW	39	31	127	119	9	23	4	0	3	9	0	0	5	30	.193	.244	.303	.547	49
29	SEA	36	34	143	130	10	24	6	1	2	9	0	0	11	40	.185	.252	.292	.544	49
30	TOR	36	34	138	124	11	20	3	1	1	5	2	1	14	42	.161	.246	.226	.472	31
	TOT	1110	964	4075	3657	449	918	195	19	121	482	45	16	356	885	.251	.321	.414	.735	100

Provided by Baseball-Reference.com: View Original Table
Generated 5/8/2013.

130 of those 139 PA have come from Victor Martinez. Substituting in Peralta's numbers would move the Tigers to around 15^th. It's a small improvement, but every little thing helps.

What about run production? Peralta doesn't have the reputation of driving in runs as Victor Martinez does and the 5th spot in the order kinda demands run production. So far this year with runners in scoring position:

Rk		G	PA	AB	H	2B	HR	RBI	SB	CS	BB	SO	BA	OBP	SLG	OPS	sOPS+
1	Miguel Cabrera	25	54	43	23	1	4	32	1	0	9	2	.535	.611	.837	1.448	293
2	Matt Tuiasosopo	6	10	10	4	2	1	8	0	0	0	5	.400	.400	.900	1.300	247
3	Austin Jackson	19	26	21	6	1	2	10	0	0	5	3	.286	.423	.619	1.042	182
4	Jhonny Peralta	21	33	25	9	1	1	14	0	0	5	7	.360	.438	.520	.958	162
5	Prince Fielder	23	47	38	9	2	3	21	0	1	7	8	.237	.340	.526	.867	134
6	Torii Hunter	21	34	31	9	0	0	12	0	0	3	6	.290	.353	.290	.643	78
7	Victor Martinez	25	45	37	8	3	0	12	0	0	6	6	.216	.311	.297	.608	67
8	Omar Infante	19	27	24	6	1	0	7	1	0	2	2	.250	.296	.292	.588	62
9	Andy Dirks	13	24	20	5	0	0	5	1	0	2	3	.250	.304	.250	.554	53
10	Don Kelly	3	4	4	1	0	0	1	0	0	0	0	.250	.250	.250	.500	37
11	Brayan Pena	6	12	12	1	0	0	1	0	0	0	3	.083	.083	.083	.167	-54
12	Alex Avila	17	27	25	1	0	0	0	0	0	2	9	.040	.111	.040	.151	-57
13	Ramon Santiago	3	5	5	0	0	0	0	0	0	0	3	.000	.000	.000	.000	-100
	Team Total	30	348	295	82	11	11	123	3	1	41	57	.278	.358	.427	.786	114

Provided by Baseball-Reference.com: View Original Table

Generated 5/8/2013.

After Miguel Cabrera , Peralta has the 3rd highest OPS among regular starters (and Austin Jackson isn't going to be moved out of the lead-off spot any time soon). Now I don't believe he can keep it up, but Peralta is currently 350 points higher in OPS than Victor Martinez in run producing situations. It only makes sense to put him in a better position in the batting order to take advantage of this, even if only temporary.

Temporary is the key word here. We're only talking 33 and 45 PA respectively. That's a small sample and time will stabilize it. Peralta is a career .273/.350/.432 hitter with runners in scoring position while V-Mart is a career .316/.403/.462 hitter with runners in scoring position. However it should be noted that Martinez missed all of the 2012 season due to injury and may never be the hitter he once was.

Speaking of career numbers, Peralta hasn't historically been a good #5 hitter:

Split	G	GS	PA	AB	R	H	2B	3B	HR	RBI	SB	CS	BB	SO	BA	OBP	SLG	OPS ▾	tOPS+
Batting 2nd	11	8	36	33	7	11	4	0	3	5	1	0	3	8	.333	.389	.727	1.116	191
Batting 6th	299	296	1237	1121	135	317	61	3	39	151	3	1	96	247	.283	.338	.447	.785	109
Batting 4th	138	137	610	551	85	149	42	3	15	87	1	1	48	120	.270	.331	.439	.770	105
Batting 3rd	150	148	669	589	104	150	33	2	22	82	0	1	74	153	.255	.341	.430	.770	106
Batting 7th	259	253	1050	954	113	260	53	7	26	140	1	5	77	201	.273	.326	.425	.750	100
Batting 9th	87	76	293	268	32	68	17	3	8	32	0	3	18	63	.254	.298	.429	.727	92
Batting 8th	110	102	402	359	45	94	12	2	9	36	2	3	37	88	.262	.335	.382	.717	93
Batting 5th	248	247	1057	947	113	230	49	2	25	126	3	5	91	207	.243	.308	.378	.686	84
Batting 1st	2	0	3	0	2	0	0	0	0	0	0	0	3	0		1.000

Provided by Baseball-Reference.com: View Original Table

Generated 5/8/2013.

It can also be argued that Victor Martinez has been suffering some unfortunate luck. More observation than statistical, but it seems like Martinez has been hitting the ball well, only to have a great defensive catch being made. It might make sense to wait it out while his luck turns around. V-Mart's 19.6% LD rate should be producing a higher BABIP than .236 (and therefor higher batting lines). Career-wise, V-Mart has a 20.5% LD rate and a .314 BABIP.

Tonight the Tigers play in a National League park for the first time this year, and so will be without a DH and Victor Martinez. Someone else will be hitting 5th, most likely either Andy Dirks or Jhonny Peralta. Maybe they should think about making it more permanent, at least until Victor Martinez shows that he's the Victor Martinez of old again.

Anibal Sanchez’ Strikeouts

2013-05-06T18:01:00.000-04:00

Anibal Sanchez’ strikeout rate has unexpectedly skyrocketed so far this year. Since he became a full-time starter:

	Strikeout %
2010	18.7%
2011	24.3%
2012	20.4%
2013	31.5%

That strikeout rate has placed him 5th among starting pitchers :

	Strikeout%
Yu Darvish	40.5%
Max Scherzer	35.1%
A.J. Burnett	33.3%
Ryan Dempster	32.4%
Anibal Sanchez	31.5%

The first thing that came to my mind was the 17-strikeout performance against the Braves was inflating his totals. And in a way, they are. If we subtract out that performance, we get a 25.4% strikeout rate, which isn’t much higher than his 2011 24.3%. So we could chalk it up as a combination of small samples and a career game. However, it did happen and it begs the questions, what is he doing differently and can he keep it up?

Looking at Pitch f/x plate discipline:

	O-Swing%	Z-Swing%	Swing%	O-Contact%	Z-Contact%	Contact%	Zone%
2010	29.6%	60.1%	45.9%	65.3%	85.6%	79.5%	53.4%
2011	32.3%	62.9%	48.0%	61.7%	84.2%	76.9%	51.3%
2012	31.0%	62.3%	47.3%	61.6%	87.0%	79.0%	52.2%
2013	30.1%	60.1%	45.7%	52.1%	84.2%	74.1%	52.0%
Total	30.4%	61.1%	46.3%	61.6%	85.9%	78.2%	51.8%

The one stat that stands out is the O-Contact%, which means batters are swinging and missing at more pitches out of the strike zone.

Looking deeper at O-Contact%:

O-Contact%	4-Seam FB	Slider	Changeup	Sinker	Curveball	Cutter
2010	74.0%	53.8%	58.5%	78.7%	70.2%	71.8%
2011	75.0%	51.7%	51.1%	96.6%	84.0%	78.1%
2012	71.8%	54.2%	54.9%	79.0%	55.0%	85.4%
2013	72.0%	46.4%	41.9%	40.0%	100.0%	33.3%
Total	71.9%	52.8%	53.3%	82.6%	63.5%	77.4%

There’s very little difference in the 4-seam fastball, and that makes sense. He’s thrown that pitch 253 times so far this year, more than any other pitch. The higher the sampling, the more it stabilizes. The sinker and cutter appear to have the most improvement in this category.

And this is the reason why I don’t think Sanchez can keep it up, the small samples.

	# Pitches	Percentage
4-Seam FB	253	38.9%
Slider	131	20.2%
Changeup	126	19.4%
Sinker	60	9.2%
Curveball	54	8.3%
Cutter	26	4.0%