JDM’s value to the Sox

[Jerry’s Curl]

Since the JDM signing thread was locked, I feel we need a JDM contribution thread. IMO, he’s 1B in importance to the Sox along side of Mookie. He’s single-handedly help the team win at least two out of the Sox 20 wins. He’s an amazing hitter to watch, particularly his ability to hit the ball the other way with power. His offensive numbers are fantastic and he hasn’t even warmed up with the home run ball. He’s going to be an extremely important piece this year in adding consistency to the lineup.

 

[lapa]

Well Mookie has 1.8 but Porcello has 1.6, JDM is 3rd and has 0.8 WAR
https://www.fangraphs.com/warleaders.aspx?season=2018&team=all

based on that his value has been 0.8 x what, 10,11 million dollars?

Certainly bouncing back from a very cold start in those first few games, as you say, his HR power hasnt really come into full force yet but the oppo field swing is very nice and he certainly looks good when he makes contact. Is he striking out a bit too often maybe, thats a very anecdotal observation based on seeing about half the games this season.

I think he's definitely going to start heating up and glad we have him in the lineup

 

[dbn]

Current oRAR numbers (only listing those above zero):
Mookie: 16
JDM: 10
Hanley: 7
Xander: 7
Brockstar: 6
10D: 3
Devers: 2
Mitch: 2
T-W Lin: 1

 

[DeadlySplitter]

his WAR accounts for his negative defensive value (I assume). any "nice" catches he's made are due to a lack of range that Mookie/JBJ would have had much more easily.

as a pure hitter I think he's been 1+ WAR and will keep growing. anecdotally the last two games we've won were games I think we lose in 2017. I hope as the season goes on he's a DH 3/4s of the time, but AB/JBJ sucking against lefties might make that hard to do.

 

[Red(s)HawksFan]

his WAR accounts for his negative defensive value (I assume). any "nice" catches he's made are due to a lack of range that Mookie/JBJ would have had much more easily.

as a pure hitter I think he's been 1+ WAR and will keep growing. anecdotally the last two games we've won were games I think we lose in 2017. I hope as the season goes on he's a DH 3/4s of the time, but AB/JBJ sucking against lefties might make that hard to do.

WAR does account for defense though the defensive stats that go into it aren't all that reliable with so few games played. That said, it's a good thing he is hitting well and at opportune times (leading the team in RBI). His defense leaves a lot to be desired. For example, Kimbrel bailed him out in the 8th yesterday after what looked like a relatively easy fly ball to left got over his head for a double.

I'm hoping the appease-him-by-letting-him-play-the-field thing doesn't last much longer. Once every couple weeks is tolerable, but he's made nearly as many starts in the OF as he has at DH (12 and 13 respectively). Eventually that may burn them.

 

[grimshaw]

I'm hoping his reps in the field are more a function of giving players breathers early in the season than what to expect % wise. When Moreland was hot it was good getting all three bats in the lineup, but aside from that I, I hope he's a once or twice a week guy at most.

Yesterday was understandable since Porcello is their best groundball guy and they were at home, but I hope Cora wins him over.

 

[Jerry’s Curl]

I’m also an advocate of less OF play. With Moreland raking it was tolerable, but when he’s not (and Betts is healthy) I’ll take the three B’s.

 

[Byrdbrain]

As this team is built JDM is the 4th OF which means he'll be in the field a couple times a week if everyone is healthy. Since everyone not being healthy is the norm during a baseball season I would expect JDM to be in the field as often as not moving forward.

Note I didn't say I liked it but that is how I expect it will be going forward.
I expect he'll get a bit better in LF at Fenway but that just means he'll probably go from godawful to just awful.

 

[Todd Benzinger]

It bothers me when he plays OF, but he insisted that he was going to be an OF when he signed. He has hit worse as a DH in a pretty small career sample, and has a 105 wRC+ career in about 200abs, and 102 in 50 this season.

Not meaningful, but the back in the day I remember reading about how the DH hitting penalty is a real thing... So there is that. Being a DH may affect his hitting, at least for an unknown adjustment period.

 

[lapa]

Its an interesting point about the DH thing. Has that been analysed in a meaningful way over a large number of hitters or is it just a specific thing to each individual? JDM seems very organised in terms of his routines, I wonder if sitting as a DH makes him too tense, or lets him overthink the next at bat, whereas being out in the field you have to focus on that at least. Or is it a physically keeping warm/loose thing? Maybe a contract thing, does he think playing OF will help his value down the road. Will be interesting to see at seasons end if theres any significant difference in his stats on his DH days vs OF days, probably wont be enough of a sample size for a while to make any observations

 

[Reverend]

Its an interesting point about the DH thing. Has that been analysed in a meaningful way over a large number of hitters or is it just a specific thing to each individual? JDM seems very organised in terms of his routines, I wonder if sitting as a DH makes him too tense, or lets him overthink the next at bat, whereas being out in the field you have to focus on that at least. Or is it a physically keeping warm/loose thing? Maybe a contract thing, does he think playing OF will help his value down the road. Will be interesting to see at seasons end if theres any significant difference in his stats on his DH days vs OF days, probably wont be enough of a sample size for a while to make any observations

I don't know of any systematic study, but I remember people investigated it back when Manny said he hit better when he played the field.

If I recall correctly, the data did not support Ramirez's hypothesis.

 

[BaseballJones]

1/6th of the way through the season, and here's what Martinez' numbers project to:

90 runs
36 doubles
6 triples
30 homers
132 rbi
slash line of ..330/.374/.567/.941, 146 ops+

I'd like a few more home runs, but on the whole, that's a hell of a season, if he keeps this up.

 

[OurF'ingCity]

don't know of any systematic study, but I remember people investigated it back when Manny said he hit better when he played the field.

If I recall correctly, the data did not support Ramirez's hypothesis.

There was this back in 2013, which seems to have been the last attempt to quantify the issue, at least that I can find. It suggests the average decrease in wOBA for someone DH'ing instead of playing the field is 14 points - of course, that's only an average so even if the analysis is correct that doesn't tell us a ton about any possible effect on JDM specifically. Plus, I'm almost certain that any reduction of JDM's offense from DH'ing more and playing the field less would be more than made up for by the improved defense of one of the starting OFs, Swihart, or even Holt.

 

[Jerry’s Curl]

1/6th of the way through the season, and here's what Martinez' numbers project to:

90 runs
36 doubles
6 triples
30 homers
132 rbi
slash line of ..330/.374/.567/.941, 146 ops+

I'd like a few more home runs, but on the whole, that's a hell of a season, if he keeps this up.

To me, the average is most impressive and I think it will remain around .330 all year. While he has tremendous power to all fields, he has no problem shooting a single up the middle if that’s what the pitcher gives him. As temperatures warm up, more of those deep drives are leaving the park.

 

[SumnerH]

I don't know of any systematic study, but I remember people investigated it back when Manny said he hit better when he played the field.

If I recall correctly, the data did not support Ramirez's hypothesis.

Manny's career OPS in the field was 1.005, vs. .958 as DH (and .536 as a PH in extremely SSS).

 

[Reverend]

Manny's career OPS in the field was 1.005, vs. .958 as DH (and .536 as a PH in extremely SSS).

Huh. Interesting--and potentially important. Do you know what it was just with the Red Sox?

 

[Jerry’s Curl]

Manny's career OPS in the field was 1.005, vs. .958 as DH (and .536 as a PH in extremely SSS).

Manny being Manny?

 

[SirPsychoSquints]

Huh. Interesting--and potentially important. Do you know what it was just with the Red Sox?

I'm not in a good position to support this with links, but my understanding of the current thinking is that DH has a penalty similar to pinch hitting - the number 17 points of OPS sticks in my head?

 

[SumnerH]

Huh. Interesting--and potentially important. Do you know what it was just with the Red Sox?

Not immediately. You can do a year at a time on b-ref's splits. You might be able to cajole the event finder into it.

 

[williams_482]

Two things about the DH penalty: It's definitely real, and it applies to pretty much everyone, which makes it basically irrelevant.

JDM will hit better in the outfield than he will at DH, but whoever plays DH in his place will very likely hit worse than they would if they were playing the field. Thus, the objective (all else equal, etc) is still to get the best nine guys in the lineup with the worst defender at DH, and accept that said worst defender will hit a little worse as a result.

 

[Boggs26]

Two things about the DH penalty: It's definitely real, and it applies to pretty much everyone, which makes it basically irrelevant.

JDM will hit better in the outfield than he will at DH, but whoever plays DH in his place will very likely hit worse than they would if they were playing the field. Thus, the objective (all else equal, etc) is still to get the best nine guys in the lineup with the worst defender at DH, and accept that said worst defender will hit a little worse as a result.

That's an interesting and logical argument. Assuming you are correct about the effect being real, the only way to avoid it would be to find a guy who it didn't effect (as with anything there's certainly going to be outliers who play better as DH). Otherwise you're right, if DH effect is -X points of WAR, that's basically just built into the lineup.

I wonder if there are any teams that actually track DH play to see if they can find unaffected players. Seems like it could be an ingredient worth exploring if the numbers back it up

 

[Saints Rest]

But part of the value in DH is actually eliminating negative defensive value while maintaining a bat. So even if JBJ OPSed 30 points more as DH than as CF and JDM was -30, it’s not worth putting JD in the field over JBJ

 

[Pitt the Elder]

That's an interesting and logical argument. Assuming you are correct about the effect being real, the only way to avoid it would be to find a guy who it didn't effect (as with anything there's certainly going to be outliers who play better as DH). Otherwise you're right, if DH effect is -X points of WAR, that's basically just built into the lineup.

I wonder if there are any teams that actually track DH play to see if they can find unaffected players. Seems like it could be an ingredient worth exploring if the numbers back it up

An important question is how often does a player have to play in the field to attenuate this dip in performance, if at all? In other words, if a player plays the field every other game, is there some residual benefit to his batting in between games in the field? Would getting a few innings in the field each game do the same thing?

It's possible you could minimize JDs defensive limitations by only starting him in the field when you have an extreme strikeout or extreme groundball pitcher. You could also get really creative with shifts and basically rotate him between left and right field, depending on the batters tendencies. A simpler approach would be to start him against left- or right-heavy lineups and effectively do that on a game-by-game basis. All this would be quite a lot of work to regain ~30 pts of OPS and you could argue that it's not worth the disruption to try and optimize, but it might be something a team could experiment with.

EDIT: Typos, clarity

 

[SirPsychoSquints]

The current theory is that the penalty is derived from lack of activity/focus during the game. Like - the point of batting practice is to get players focused on baseball rather than anything else in her life. And this focus can be broken by doing pretty much anything other than playing.

I don't pretend to fully understand this but I'm sure teams are seeking ways to keep players engaged, perhaps simply by staying in batting cages between at bats or something... or VR?

 

[grimshaw]

Anecdotally, I know Frank Thomas who was physically capable, but not good at 1b preferred DH'ing.

There just aren't that many full time DH's who didn't play the field during the prime of their careers, so it's hard to draw much of a statistical conclusion. The two greatest DH's of all time (Papi and Martinez) hit way better once they were off the field full time.

 

[SumnerH]

Big Papi hit slightly better as a DH than when playing in the field, and I believe claimed to prefer to DH.

No idea if it was statistically meaningful, though.

 

[sean1562]

so can we change this to the JDM appreciation thread? I know that, with the protracted contract negotiations, he had to prove himself with this team to be a "true Red Sox" but man has this guy pulled through. His presence has completely transformed this lineup and I am looking forward to more go ahead fly outs to Yankee stadium RF for years to come. Any initial trepidation is gone, JDM is a boss

 

[uncannymanny]

I knew about it, mostly second hand, but his oppo power is nuts.

 

[LesterFan]

The homer tonight was on a 97.4 mph fastball that was inside and he drove it to right for a homer. Granted, it only went 350 ft, but not many hitters in the majors can drive that pitch to right like that.

 

[pantsparty]

Manny's career OPS in the field was 1.005, vs. .958 as DH (and .536 as a PH in extremely SSS).

Not really relevant to the main discussion of OF vs DH offensive production, but Manny's poor PH splits are probably a result of that any time he was brought in as a pinch hitter it's likely that it was late in a game and he was facing an elite reliever.

 

[grimshaw]

Papi's last season - .315/.401/.620 wRC+164
JDM - .348/.395/.623 wRC+169 (he had a 166 last year).

Of course Martinez has the .443 BABIP thing going for him, but his production is exactly what the doctor ordered.

 

[Sampo Gida]

The homer tonight was on a 97.4 mph fastball that was inside and he drove it to right for a homer. Granted, it only went 350 ft, but not many hitters in the majors can drive that pitch to right like that.

And unless you play half your ganes at YS3, not many want to. That park is a joke

 

[mfried]

JDM is perfectly capable of hitting the right pitch out of any corner of Fernway, but an inside pitch to RF - that’s a Yankee Stadium special.

 

[LesterFan]

The homer tonight was on a 97.4 mph fastball that was inside and he drove it to right for a homer. Granted, it only went 350 ft, but not many hitters in the majors can drive that pitch to right like that.

Nice article on JDM by Speier here

According to Baseball Savant, there have been 548 right-on-right fastballs thrown in “Zone 13” (down and off the plate inside) with a velocity of at least 95 m.p.h. this year. Of those pitches, hitters have swung at roughly 35 percent, with nearly one-third of those hacks resulting in a swing-and-miss. In the 67 instances when the ball has been put in play, hitters posted a .284 average with a .463 slugging mark.

Just three of the 548 high-octane fastballs in that zone were hit for homers, and just one — Martinez’s solo homer — went out to the opposite field.