Andrew Benintendi Can't Hit Middle-Middle

[KenTremendous]

It's anecdotally been the case for a while now, but the season-long numbers are stark, and bizarre. You want to get Andrew Benintendi out? Throw the ball right down the middle of the plate, thigh-high.

Want to essentially guarantee you get him out? Throw a fastball down the middle of the plate. He hits .037 on fastballs middle-middle. .037!

He has a .365 SLG on all pitches down the middle. That's Tucker Barnhart's SLG. Andrew Benintendi becomes Tucker Barnhart on anything right down the damn middle of the plate.

I guess my question, here, is: what the hell?

 

[Reverend]

What is it with you and bad stuff that is statistically impossible but happening to the Red Sox?

 

[AB in DC]

Small sample size?


(That kinda works as an answer to both questions...)

 

[Van Everyman]

What is it with you and bad stuff that is statistically impossible but happening to the Red Sox?

This is what happens when he takes a break from Twitter.

That said, I’d be interested to know if pitch sequence has anything to do with this – as in, they set him up with breaking stuff low and away and then fire one down the middle.

 

[Reverend]

Small sample size?


(That kinda works as an answer to both questions...)

Well, he has a larger body of work, too.

This is what happens when he takes a break from Twitter.

That said, I’d be interested to know if pitch sequence has anything to do with this – as in, they set him up with breaking stuff low and away and then fire one down the middle.

I don't know about pitch sequence, but there's lots of sortable specific pitch data over at Texas Leaguers.

Andrew Benintendi, LF, Boston Red Sox





At the very least, it doesn't appear that he's taking many fastballs down the middle. The swing data is obviously a bit noisy...

 

[Reverend]

 

[Savin Hillbilly]

Brooks confirms this:




His whiff rate to this zone is not notable in either direction -- the issue here is specifically quality of contact. I wish we had Statcast data by zone--wait! we do:




According to Baseball Savant, the expected wOBA for batted balls with those numbers is about .487.

What's going on here? Is it something about Fenway, or is he just massively unlucky?

 

[Dewey'sCannon]

Ok, so based on the launch angle and exit velocity data, it doesn't look like he's just getting overanxious and popping everything up when he gets a fastball middle-middle. Is data available on his BABIP on these pitches? Or scatter plots? It must be something like he's hitting the ball right at the fielders - could be bad luck, or that he has a tendency to hit those balls in certain spots that opponents have discovered and addressed with defensive positioning (shifts). So could be somewhat similar to the issues JBJ was having earlier in the year. But I think you'd have to expect some regression on the BABIP.

Although it was also worrisome to hear on the radio broadcast last night that he only has 2 HRs since the ASB (both in August).

 

[Savin Hillbilly]

The Savant link includes his BABIP and expected vs. real BA for that zone. It's a pretty big difference: expected BA .262, real BA .192. The biggest difference is between SLG and xSLG: .370 to .477.

I'd be curious about positioning too. I'd also love a home/road breakdown of these.

 

[TheYaz67]

Well, those charts also confirm something that our eyes tell us, which is that he hits great on low pitches right over the middle (and well as high middle and out of the zone middle!), which again, makes the middle-middle thing so curious....

 

[bosockboy]

He has 3 HR's since June 21; slugging has been cratering for 90 days.

 

[KenTremendous]

What is it with you and bad stuff that is statistically impossible but happening to the Red Sox?

It's residue of my pre-2004 anxiety, that I have now concluded will never leave my psyche.

 

[Cesar Crespo]

He has 3 HR's since June 21; slugging has been cratering for 90 days.

He's had a lot of slumps this year but they never seem to last longer than 30ish games, and then he goes on a tear for 30. He's put up solid numbers every month but he's been brutal in September. He's been really, really streaky this year.

His performance since 6/21 is still respectable despite the lack of power: 308 PA, .278/.342/.401. He's been particularly bad since 8/11 though: 132 PA, .221/.267/.295, .260 BAbip.

 

[EvilEmpire]

I admire his dedication to the long con and pity the pitcher who gives him a middle-middle fastball at a key AB during the playoffs.

 

[TheYaz67]

I admire his dedication to the long con and pity the pitcher who gives him a middle-middle fastball at a key AB during the playoffs.

That's the spirit!

 

[ToeKneeArmAss]

It's residue of my pre-2004 anxiety, that I have now concluded will never leave my psyche.

If you ever do overcome it, please let me know how. When they lost a few games in late August I was all "It's 1978 all over again!!!"

Old habits die hard.

 

[pantsparty]

I admire his dedication to the long con and pity the pitcher who gives him a middle-middle fastball at a key AB during the playoffs.

I remained convinced that Koji never showed his best pickoff move in the regular season so he could nail Wong in the 2013 World Series.

 

[EricFeczko]

I'd either go with massively unlucky or some manner of batch effect. Keep in mind that the sample size here is something like 126 pitches, which amounts to less than 50 PA.

His line-drive rate is extremely low this year, only 9 line drives according brooks player's card.

Meanwhile, he had 24 groundballs in the middle of the zone:

Despite conventional wisdom, I'm skeptical that these hitting profiles are stable when the zone is split like this. I guess it could be function of benintendi's growth as a hitter; he focused on hitting pitches out of the middle of the zone and it appeared to pay off. Here's his line drive profile from last year:

 

[Reverend]

I'd either go with massively unlucky or some manner of batch effect. Keep in mind that the sample size here is something like 126 pitches, which amounts to less than 50 PA.

His line-drive rate is extremely low this year, only 9 line drives according brooks player's card.

Meanwhile, he had 24 groundballs in the middle of the zone:

Despite conventional wisdom, I'm skeptical that these hitting profiles are stable when the zone is split like this. I guess it could be function of benintendi's growth as a hitter; he focused on hitting pitches out of the middle of the zone and it appeared to pay off. Here's his line drive profile from last year:

That’s basically what the scientist said last time too.

But then it all came to pass.

 

[EricFeczko]

That’s basically what the scientist said last time too.

But then it all came to pass.

It's the curse of dimensionality

EDIT: Well, that combined with the human tendency to remember the weird/unexpected/novel more than the mundane/expected/familiar.

SECOND EDIT: The fact that it came to pass is still awesome, even if it there's little reason for it to replicate next year.

 

[Kenny F'ing Powers]

Kind of feels like he has too much focus on an approach - guessing pitches, working the count, protecting pieces of the plate - so he gets caught off guard when it's straight down the pooper. He knows he has to swing, but reacts too late because, you know, it's hard to hit something going 94 mph when you recognize it late.

I know this is a thing, because I do the exact same thing in my MLB The Show Video game. So, put that theory in the bank.

 

[EricFeczko]

Kind of feels like he has too much focus on an approach - guessing pitches, working the count, protecting pieces of the plate - so he gets caught off guard when it's straight down the pooper. He knows he has to swing, but reacts too late because, you know, it's hard to hit something going 94 mph when you recognize it late.

I know this is a thing, because I do the exact same thing in my MLB The Show Video game. So, put that theory in the bank.

Problem with this logic is if you split the season by two halves, his second half just looks unlucky. Second half of the season he had 8 line drives in 28 balls in play down the middle -- only three hits with a 0 ISO. He had one line drive in the entire first half, yet had a .178 iso down the middle.

Not saying it isn't a plausible idea, however, we're looking at tiny sample sizes here. Even if the idea is true, it would be almost impossible to support with any real evidence.