Ladies and gentlemen: your NL home run leader
Posted by Andy on August 15, 2011
It's none other than Albert Pujols.
His rate stats are still well off from his career averages and he's still leading the league in GIDP, but he also might lead the NL in homers for the third straight year.
One very interesting stat, though, is intentional walks:
| Year | G | PA | IBB | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2000 | 133 | 544 | 7 | |
| 2005 | 161 | 700 | 27 | |
| 2006 | 143 | 634 | 28 | |
| 2007 | 158 | 679 | 22 | |
| 2008 | 148 | 641 | 34 | |
| 2009 | 160 | 700 | 44 | |
| 2010 | 159 | 700 | 38 | |
| 2011 | 106 | 468 | 6 |
Even with Holliday and Berkman behind him, pitchers don't seem nearly as afraid...
August 15th, 2011 at 4:46 am
He has really turned it on in the last month or so. He's got a decent shot at getting that average up to .300, I think.
August 15th, 2011 at 6:20 am
If the Cards somehow win the NL Central is he your NL MVP for a 4th time?
August 15th, 2011 at 7:00 am
Of course his intentional walk totals will go down when the guy behind him has 28 homers.
August 15th, 2011 at 7:01 am
"Even with Holliday and Berkman behind him, pitchers don't seem nearly as afraid..."
Just take the word "even" off that sentence....
August 15th, 2011 at 7:03 am
There have been other good hitters behind Pujols before, but just like with Bonds, Pujols was often walked intentionally regardless. But now that Pujols' hitting is 'merely' excellent, he's not getting the Bonds treatment.
August 15th, 2011 at 7:05 am
isn't lineup protection a myth anyway?
August 15th, 2011 at 7:09 am
You're right that my inclusion of the word 'even' is quite wrong.
August 15th, 2011 at 7:39 am
@1 JustEd Pujols hit .295 in July and is at .294 for August. He's not going to reach .300 that way.
August 15th, 2011 at 8:06 am
Even more interesting, Pujols is 1 back in runs scored. This would be the 6th time he's lead the league, and second time three consecutive years! So he would have lead the league in HR and Runs scored for three straight years. I see Ruth did it back in the day, has anyone else?
August 15th, 2011 at 8:56 am
Andy, you pointed out his drop in IBB, but what about his 103 to 40 BB drop off. Is there anyway to check for steepest drop off in BBs for guys with at least 100 the season before?
August 15th, 2011 at 9:08 am
Maris had 0 intentional walks in '61. Who's batting behind you has everything to do with it.
August 15th, 2011 at 9:16 am
"isn't lineup protection a myth anyway?"
Anyone have a comment on this? There has always been a ton of talk here in Philly about "protecting" Ryan Howard. It always seemed backwards to me. If he's your $25m hitter then pitchers should be throwing more strikes to the #3 hitter so as not to face Howard with runners on. Also, he should be getting on base so pitchers are pressured to throw more strikes to the #5 guy. However, the sentiment is 100% the other way around.
August 15th, 2011 at 9:49 am
There's two kinds of protection-a good hitter behind you reducing the number of IBB, vs. the guy behind you giving you better pitches to hit. The former unquestionly exists (the Giants IMHO screwed up badly by not signing another elite hitter to put behind Bonds, as in that one year when he had 232 walks, the next batter rarely did anything after a Barry IBB-yes I checked). The latter is more mythological than real.
August 15th, 2011 at 10:00 am
I think John is oversimplifying a bit but basically has got it right in #13. IBBs are, nearly always, strategic decisions made before the first pitch of a plate appearance. (Too much emphasis is given to the "unintentional intentional walk". The IBB decision is based on the strength of the hitter at the plate, the base-out situation, and the strength of the hitter(s) on deck. So, yes, clearly there is a major effect from the strength of the hitters than follow in the lineup, particularly since base-out effects tend to even out over the season.
In terms of seeing better pitches, I don't think it happens too much. Pitchers are taught not to nibble, especially with strikeouts rates at an all-time high. I think pitchers tend to be aggressive with the first couple of pitches of an at-bat, and if they get ahead, try to get a strikeout or swing at a pitch with movement, and if they fall behind, they are more likely to stay outside the zone and let the batter walk. I don't think, though, that 2-3 pitches into an at-bat they are thinking about who's on deck and using that info to determine whether to throw a strike or a ball--I think they are thinking only about the current hitter, the count, the set-up, etc.
August 15th, 2011 at 10:07 am
It's funny, Andy -- I was all set to use that very title if Uggla took over the HR lead!
August 15th, 2011 at 10:10 am
twice this season I've seen Yuniesky Bettancourt starting in the 5-hole batting behind Prince Fielder.
August 15th, 2011 at 10:13 am
of course... it's not like Casey McGehee is doing much in that 5 hole for the Brewers.
August 15th, 2011 at 10:14 am
And, according to 60 Minutes, he's a darn nice guy too. Which is surprising, because when you see him at the plate, he looks like he wants to kill everything in his path.
August 15th, 2011 at 10:32 am
Umm... did you just link to a generic leader board on mlb.com, from a blog post on baseball-reference.com?
Why, pray tell, would I traverse the internet tubes to mlb.com to get baseball stats?
August 15th, 2011 at 10:33 am
Albert is Awesome.
But I can't help but notice that since 2008, his BA & OBP have been steadily dropping and his K's have been slowly rising. Altho this year he might end up with a little less strikeouts than last year. Still, I'm beginning to wonder if maybe Albert's begun to fade in '09 but he's so good that it's barely noticeable. I hope I'm totally off on that, 'cause I'd love to see some more great seasons from Pujols.
August 15th, 2011 at 11:02 am
****OFF TOPIC**** - post idea: just noticed that Colin Cowgill of the DBacks is a righty hitter, lefty thrower. Thought I remembered that was pretty rare so played a little with the Play Index. Looks to me like he is only the 41st position player to be righty/lefty. In addition, with Cody Ross & Ryan Ludwick also featuring this, it looks like the 1st time in a long time that there have been 3 such players in the majors at the same time.
BTW, it is much more common with pitchers - I got 442 pitchers that are righty/lefty.
FWIW
August 15th, 2011 at 11:06 am
There are 3 differences in Pujols' game this year.
1. Fewer doubles.
2. More strikes.
3. More ground balls.
He's hitting fewer doubles because he's hitting more ground balls. He's seeing more strikes - probably because of the lineup protection issue. I suspect that the biggest reason he's hitting more ground balls is because his contact rate is so high and he's seeing so many strikes. He can't be as selective as before, so he puts balls in play that maybe he wouldn't before.
That's my two cents. He can still rake, of course, and even though he's probably beginning his decline, there's no reason he can't pull off a fine old man career. He's a line drive power hitter with good plate discipline, and that's the kind of thing that ages well.
August 15th, 2011 at 11:23 am
With respect to the lineup protection issue; Adrian Gonzales has walked only 47 times this year.
August 15th, 2011 at 11:54 am
@21/ Anon - would the best righty hitter, lefty thrower (position player) be Rickey Henderson?
August 15th, 2011 at 1:09 pm
@24 - Rickey by a wide margin: 113 WAR v 22.6 for #2 Hal chase.
BTW I said there are 3 active and that hasn't happened in a long time but I was way off. I believe there were 6 or 7 in 2003 if I counted correctly
August 15th, 2011 at 1:26 pm
@25/ Anon - thanks; any speculation why this combination is so rare amongst position players?
I'll start by noting that lefty throwers cannot play third, second, short, or catcher. This still leaves first base and all three outfield positions, though. Could it be that most lefty throwers are also naturally lefty batters? (Forgive me if I am stating the incredibly obvious...)
August 15th, 2011 at 2:09 pm
@5
No one, not even Pujols has EVER gotten the Bonds treatment. 30-40 IBB's isn't 120 BB's. Bonds averaged for his career over 30 a season. Let's not get careless with our words here. If Bonds ever had a better park to hit in(which he never did) and better hitters around him(Rich Aurilia, Edgardo Alfonso, J.T. Snow, Pedro Feliz, Glenallen Hill to name a few hitters behind Bonds over the years) besides 5 Jeff Kent years his numbers would be even better.
August 15th, 2011 at 2:22 pm
Most of Albert's deflated stats occured in the first two months. Since June 3rd, which marked the end of his beginning of the year slump, he is hitting .315/.374/.695 in 48 games.
Here are those numbers pro-rated to a 156 game season:
PA: 700
Hits: 198
2B: 48
HR: 64
RBI: 141
BB: 58
Albert's hitting problems this season are actually just his hitting problem in April and May. Except for the walks part. He is still walking at the lowest pace of his career.
August 15th, 2011 at 2:25 pm
A few comments above about Pujols walk total seem to indicate he's not walking because he has good hitters behind him.
Might I throw in that he is walking at the *lowest* rate of his career. A career that saw Jim Edmonds (1.005 OPS from 01-04) hitting behind him, Scott Rolen before that...and Matt Holliday was there last year too.
So, lineup "protection" isn't new for Pujols.
August 15th, 2011 at 3:39 pm
There have been lefty catchers. In theory, it might make it harder to throw out guys stealing third, but otherwise, there's really no reason why a lefty *can't* be a catcher, because his basic throws are back to the pitcher and down to second base - straight on ahead - unlike 2b, 3b, and ss, where the most frequent play is back towards first base. A middle INF trying to turn two would be especially awkward and vulnerable to getting run over.
I found five lefty catchers in MLB history according to the site in the link. I'm sure others could have been very good receivers if their coaches had been open to the idea.
August 15th, 2011 at 3:40 pm
Could it be that most lefty throwers are also naturally lefty batters?
Of course.
There is an advantage to batting lefty, so lots of natural righties learn to do so. Not sure how people end up the other way around.
August 15th, 2011 at 3:41 pm
**clarification - five lefty catchers with 200 or more career games.
August 15th, 2011 at 3:42 pm
@1 JustEd Pujols hit .295 in July and is at .294 for August. He's not going to reach .300 that way.
not correct ed #8
pujols is having a great august so far. in 13 games he has 5 hrs and 10 rbis. hitting .327 (18-55) and has scored 13 runs.
since his return from the DL in early july he has played in 34 games and hit .308 with 28 runs scored and 12 hrs. he has knocked in 30 runs.
with 41 games to go, if he remains anywhere near as hot as he has been in the last few weeks he will once again reaqch for the 11th straight ime the .300+ batting avg/30+ hrs/100+ rbis plateau that ONLY pujols has reached for the first 10 yrs of his remarkable career.
August 15th, 2011 at 3:47 pm
The Dodgers have done a terrible job of protecting Matt Kemp, and his IBB total kind of shows it (15 this year after a previous career high of 6) but it's still less dramatic than I would expect. Typically hitting after Kemp has been Juan Uribe and James Loney. Since Kemp has batted in the 4 spot all year, I can look at the 2011 Dodgers 5 spot and see that it has an OPS of .686, which is almost 300 points lower than Kemp's OPS. In fact, the difference between Kemp and the hitter following him has been so dramatic that even Vin Scully, who I've always thought of as being very impartial, has repeatedly commented that he doesn't understand why anyone would ever pitch to Matt Kemp in any important situation.
August 15th, 2011 at 4:00 pm
They are not yet convinced that Kemp is that good or that he cannot be pitched to. Can anybody remember, without looking, who batted behind Sosa in 1998?
August 15th, 2011 at 4:34 pm
A couple of things about Lefty throwing catchers. About 2/3+ there would be a "arm side " batter when they were throwing to 2nd on a steal atempt. This may cause problems relative to a righty thrower. Even worse when the baserunner is trying to steal 3rd.
If a player can throw well enough to be a catcher, but not hit well enough to play the outfield, and throws lefty; he will get lots of chances to be a pitcher.
August 15th, 2011 at 5:14 pm
Re: Left-handed throwing catchers
When I was playing little league everyone provided their own glove, except that the catcher's mitt was provided by the team/league and there was 1 or 2 per team. If you threw with your left hand, you had 2 options: provide your own catching mitt or play another position.
I'm curious if this was consistent with others' experiences. If it is, I would think that lack of access to equipment might be a significant reason for the lack of left-handed catchers.
August 15th, 2011 at 5:41 pm
@ 14: The phrase "unintentional intentional walk" is actually backwards, but announcers don't often seem to think about what they're saying (what a surprise!). The act of pitching "around" a batter without officially issuing an IBB should actually be called an "intentional unintentional walk".
August 15th, 2011 at 5:55 pm
i told you already. pujols will hit .301, the same number alex gordon of the royals will end up at.
August 16th, 2011 at 2:57 am
@ 38 ha, very true
I guess a legit unintentional intentional walk would be like Rick Ankiel in the playoffs for the Cardinals