Travis Hafner, Homeruns and Andy Marte

by afh4 on Oct 14, 2009 6:08 PM EDT in Analysis

The argument has been made that September statistics are fundamentally different than statistics from the rest of the year. There's an obvious logic to this: as rosters expand and teams are eliminated, more, worse players begin to both pitch and hit as team's evaluate young players, give starts to AAA veterans and everyone generally becomes bored. It was in the spirit of considering statistics against weakened competition that I started to dig through the homerun logs for both Travis Hafner and Andy Marte. Will the signs of hope that we saw out of both players down the stretch translate into further success come April? Well, I don't know. But I did decide to see what kind of pitchers these two woebegone sluggers feasted on this season.

Andy Marte hit six homeruns for the Cleveland Indians in 2009:

#	Date	@Bat			Pitcher	Score	Inn	Out	Pit(cnt)Sequence	RBI	Play Description
1	2009-08-25	CLE	@	KCR	Zack Greinke	behind 0-4	t 6	0	2,(1-0) BX	1	Home Run (Fly Ball to Deep LF)
2	2009-08-27	CLE	@	BAL	Jim Johnson	behind 3-4	t 9	2	6,(3-2) BBBCF>X	2	Home Run (Fly Ball to Deep LF); LaPorta Scores
3	2009-08-29	CLE	@	BAL	Chris Ray	behind 1-2	t 6	1	7,(3-2) CBFFBBX	3	Home Run (Fly Ball to Deep LF Line); Valbuena Scores; LaPorta Scores
4	2009-09-01	CLE	@	DET	Zach Miner	behind 4-8	t 6	0	9,(3-2) .BFCBFFFBX	1	Home Run (Fly Ball to Deep LF Line)
5	2009-09-05	CLE		MIN	Scott Baker	tied 0-0	b 3	0	5,(2-2) CBFBX	1	Home Run (Fly Ball to Deep LF-CF)
6	2009-09-26	CLE		BAL	Jason Berken	ahead 1-0	b 4	1	1,(0-0) X	2	Home Run (Fly Ball to Deep LF); Hafner Scores

Provided by Baseball-Reference.com: View Original Table
Generated 10/7/2009.

Looking at Marte's homeruns, the first thing I notice is that there's no argument as to where his power is: it's dead pull to left. More to our point, though, there doesn't look to be much counterfeit about Andy's power in 2009 outside of the obvious small sample caveat. The average AL pitcher in 2009 gave up 1.1 homeruns for every 9 innings pitched. Andy's victims gave up:

Zack Greinke	0.4
Jim Johnson	1.0
Chris Ray	1.1
Zach Miner	1.1
Scott Baker	1.3
Jason Berken	1.4

I don't see a story here. Marte took out a couple of really mediocre guys, a couple of decent relievers, a good pitcher with homerun issues and the best pitcher in the world. Most notable to me is the fact that all season, including in Columbus, Marte exhibited a pretty severe reverse-split, obvious here in the fact that, despite being a RHB, Marte got all six of his homeruns against righthanders.

Here's the same table for Hafner:

#	Date	@Bat			Pitcher	Score	Inn	Out	Pit(cnt)Sequence	RBI	Play Description
1	2009-04-09	CLE	@	TEX	Eddie Guardado	behind 7-12	t 9	0	2,(1-0) .BX	1	Home Run (Line Drive to Deep RF Line)
2	2009-04-10	CLE		TOR	Scott Richmond	ahead 2-0	b 3	2	3,(1-1) CBX	1	Home Run (Fly Ball to Deep RF Line)
3	2009-04-12	CLE		TOR	Brandon League	ahead 5-4	b 8	1	5,(2-2) BBFFX	2	Home Run (Fly Ball to Deep CF-RF); Martinez Scores
4	2009-04-18	CLE	@	NYY	Jose Veras	ahead 20-4	t 8	1	6,(3-2) FBBFBX	1	Home Run (Fly Ball to Deep LF Line)
5	2009-06-05	CLE	@	CHW	John Danks	ahead 3-0	t 6	2	1,(0-0) X	1	Home Run (Line Drive to Deep RF)
6	2009-06-15	CLE		MIL	Mark DiFelice	ahead 9-7	b 6	1	4,(1-2) BSSX	3	Home Run (Fly Ball to Deep CF-RF); Martinez Scores; Choo Scores
7	2009-06-16	CLE		MIL	Carlos Villanueva	behind 3-7	b 9	1	3,(1-1) BCX	2	Home Run (Line Drive to Deep RF Line); Choo Scores
8	2009-06-30	CLE		CHW	Clayton Richard	behind 0-4	b 2	2	4,(2-1) BCBX	1	Home Run (Line Drive to Deep RF)
9	2009-07-03	CLE		OAK	Trevor Cahill	behind 0-2	b 2	1	3,(1-1) BCX	1	Home Run (Fly Ball to Deep CF-RF)
10	2009-07-24	CLE	@	SEA	Ryan Rowland-Smith	ahead 1-0	t 7	0	1,(0-0) X	2	Home Run (Fly Ball to Deep CF-RF); Peralta Scores
11	2009-07-26	CLE	@	SEA	Miguel Batista	ahead 8-2	t 6	2	3,(2-0) BBX	2	Home Run (Fly Ball to Deep LF); Choo Scores
12	2009-08-22	CLE		SEA	Doug Fister	behind 1-3	b 4	1	3,(1-1) SBX	1	Home Run (Fly Ball to Deep CF)
13	2009-08-24	CLE	@	KCR	Gil Meche	tied 0-0	t 4	1	4,(3-0) BBBX	3	Home Run (Fly Ball to Deep CF); Cabrera Scores; Choo Scores
14	2009-09-02	CLE	@	DET	Rick Porcello	behind 1-4	t 8	0	2,(0-1) ..CX	1	Home Run (Fly Ball to Deep RF)
15	2009-09-08 (1)	CLE		TEX	Neftali Feliz	behind 5-8	b 7	2	2,(0-1) CX	1	Home Run (Line Drive to Deep CF-RF)
16	2009-09-30 (1)	CLE		CHW	Carlos Torres	ahead 4-1	b 6	0	1,(0-0) X	1	Home Run (Fly Ball to Deep CF)

Provided by Baseball-Reference.com: View Original Table
Generated 10/14/2009.

Not a lot going on here either. The pitchers Hafner took out were giving up an average of 1.243 HR/9 and they ranged from the horrendous (Jose Veras, member 2009 Indians bullpen) to the unhittable (Neftali Feliz). It does stand out to me that Hafner still has power to all parts of the park. Hafner's splits are about where we'd expect, with 75% of his HRs (12/16) coming against righties. That's eerily in line with his career splits (123/163 HRs against RHP).

So, have we learned anything? It's hard to say. I think we can reject the idea that Marte and Hafner piled up homeruns against AAAA pitchers; at the same time, this is such a miniscule sample that we can hardly claim anything definitive in a positive direction. I'm saying Hafner's good for one about every 16 ABs and Marte will take somebody out about every 19 ABs. What do you think?

Tweet Comment 43 comments | 0 recs |

Do you like this story?

Comments

i’d be curious what pitch marte’s hitting out. looking at the counts, i’d guess he hits homeruns when he’s sitting fastball.

by Brick. on Oct 14, 2009 6:16 PM EDT reply actions

Yeah, that’s certainly worth looking at. On Fangraphs I’m guessing? Maybe I’ll look it up later.

by afh4 on Oct 14, 2009 6:18 PM EDT up reply actions

I’ve got 20 minutes to kill, so I thought I’d look it up. I couldn’t find it as quickly as I hoped on Fangraphs, so I jumped ship to MLB’s Gameday archives. They can be inaccurate occasionally, but for a quick reference:

#1: Fastball, 93
#2: Fastball, 91
#3: Changeup, 81
#4: Fastball, 92
#5: Fastball, 94
#6: Slider, 84

by JRontherim on Oct 14, 2009 7:17 PM EDT up reply actions

I’d guess that the above combination is pretty close to the proportion of pitches Marte actually sees.

by APV on Oct 14, 2009 7:22 PM EDT up reply actions

Really? Only 1 of 6 pitches he sees are breaking pitches? Maybe that’s right, feels like it should be more.

by Ryan Kelsey on Oct 14, 2009 7:30 PM EDT up reply actions

Per fangraphs, about half of the pitches Marte sees are fastballs. Putting this in perspective, that’s less than any team throws on average (Jays are closest, throwing only 51.8% fastballs).

I don’t know how many fastballs each team threw so I can’t weight the percentages, but it looks like league average is right around 60%. I’m willing to bet Marte’s 51.9% fastballs is significantly different than the mean FB%.

I’m guessing the scouting report says something like “DON’T THROW HIM FASTBALLS.”

My uncle says you've got a screw loose.
Your uncle molests collies.

by gorilla_baller on Oct 14, 2009 8:11 PM EDT up reply actions

Marte see’s 51.9% fastballs, the Jays throw 51.8%.

51.9% is not less than 51.8%.

My bad.

My uncle says you've got a screw loose.
Your uncle molests collies.

by gorilla_baller on Oct 14, 2009 8:11 PM EDT up reply actions

So he’s Pedro Cerrano, now this is starting to make sense.

by hans on Oct 14, 2009 9:46 PM EDT up reply actions 1 recs

get him a live chicken.

by clusterchuck on Oct 14, 2009 9:53 PM EDT up reply actions

Hats for bats.

Il faut d'abord durer.

by CU Adam on Oct 16, 2009 9:29 AM EDT up reply actions

thanks.

by Brick. on Oct 15, 2009 10:22 AM EDT up reply actions

Isn’t that how Barry Bonds buttered his bread? Isn’t that how much power hitters operate? Working the count to where he could sit fastball. Well, that and with steroids. Unfortunately, Marte’s minor league walk rate drop from a career average upwards of 10% to below 7%. In the bigs this year it was 8%

by Matt in LA on Oct 14, 2009 6:45 PM EDT up reply actions

Quick but interesting read. I like it.

by Jeffrey R on Oct 14, 2009 7:04 PM EDT reply actions

If you are looking for a more respectable sample size, you might include doubles.

by elsandito on Oct 14, 2009 8:07 PM EDT reply actions

It’d be interesting but the HR logs are much easier to access and compile then doubles + HR logs.

by afh4 on Oct 14, 2009 10:55 PM EDT up reply actions

Hafner doubles.

Marte doubles and his one triple.

by Jay on Oct 14, 2009 11:25 PM EDT up reply actions

My concern isn’t that Marte won’t hit for power. It’s that he’s going to be an all-or-nothing RH pull-hitter who’ll be eaten alive, spare the occasional hanging slider and misplaced fastball. I’m discouraged at how few balls he hit with any authority to CF and RF.

Is he Pedro Feliz, a sub .300 OBP with great defense and 20HR? Is he Adrian Beltre? David Bell? And at what point is it worth displacing Jhonny Peralta? I’m not a fan of keeping him on the roster just to play 1B. Ryan Shealy is always floating around.

Also, while we’re at it, who is the real Jhonny Peralta?

by xrickx on Oct 14, 2009 8:10 PM EDT reply actions

And at what point is it worth displacing Jhonny Peralta?

At the point when we can sell relatively high on Peralta.

by Jay on Oct 14, 2009 8:24 PM EDT up reply actions

Perhaps after 2011, when he’s a free agent.

by xrickx on Oct 14, 2009 9:28 PM EDT up reply actions

After about 5 years of showing what he’s all about (his first, excellent year, and 2009 bellyflop notwithstanding), is there really any expectation that Peralta’s value will change in any significant way, and that we can sell him at any higher than he is right now?

In the new Geico commercial, Marte sings "Let me be myself" on Wedge's front lawn (with the cavemen).

by V-Mart Shopper on Oct 15, 2009 1:23 AM EDT up reply actions

In a word, yes. How can you not recognize that Jhonny had a pretty severe down year? Maybe you didn’t realize how good he was before?

Keeping it simple, here’s his OPS for the last three seasons: 771, 804, 690. Is it not painfully obvious we’d be selling low on him?

Jhonny had a pretty nice comeback going for a while there. From May 5 to Sept 5, a span of 100 starts, he had a 790 OPS, which basically is what we expect out of him. At that point, you could say, “He had an early season something-or-other, but look, he’s still that 790 OPS type of hitter.” But he apparently lost focus completely over the last month, posting a 412 OPS over the last 26 games, so he ended the season at a near-unemployable 690 OPS.

There’s also the defensive issues. I think at the 780 OPS level, Jhonny can still be very attractive as a 3B who can fill in at shortstop. It does seem, though, that at times he looked great around the bag, and at other times he was inconsistent. Jhonny is famously consistent, of course. My guess is that with a little work at the position in the winter and spring, we’ll eventually see a very solid defender at that position, maybe even a plus defender given the accuracy of his arm.

If he can do that and get his bat back on track in the first half of 2010, yes, I think it will elevate his trade value. Most GMs are too smart to believe in short-term results, but Peralta seems like a player whose “true level” is in doubt and in flux.

by Jay on Oct 15, 2009 12:29 PM EDT up reply actions

“How can you not recognize that Jhonny had a pretty severe down year? "

I do (and did) recognize that. I called it a “bellyflop.” You didn’t see that part of my question?

But does anyone expect he’s going to hit like he did last year for the rest of his life? It’s not like he got old or injured. It seems to me it’s an aberration.

In the new Geico commercial, Marte sings "Let me be myself" on Wedge's front lawn (with the cavemen).

by V-Mart Shopper on Oct 16, 2009 4:30 PM EDT up reply actions

In other words, his resume includes more than just last year, and he’s not going to make anyone think he’s a ‘hidden Jim Thome’ with a few months worth of solid play in 2010.

In the new Geico commercial, Marte sings "Let me be myself" on Wedge's front lawn (with the cavemen).

by V-Mart Shopper on Oct 16, 2009 4:31 PM EDT up reply actions

I did overlook the word “bellyflop” in your post; my mistake.

I think there’s a genuine question out there as to how well Jhonny can and will hit. You may disagree.

by Jay on Oct 16, 2009 5:25 PM EDT up reply actions

cols, please note that it appears that this is a topic you may disagree with.

by Brick. on Oct 16, 2009 5:41 PM EDT up reply actions

See, this is what I’m talking about — the guy is just rude.

by Jay on Oct 16, 2009 6:45 PM EDT up reply actions

I’m discouraged at how few balls he hit with any authority to CF and RF.

Yeah, that’s never been something he could do, and with the way his hips fly open, I can’t imagine he will ever be able to use the whole field. He’s hit that way every year in Cleveland, and I assume he has always been that way, even before he signed a professional contract.

That doesn’t mean he can’t be successful…he just needs to be able to do something with pitches on the outer part of the plate. Pitchers who know what they’re doing can eat him alive out there…he’s pretty defenseless at this point against those guys. He just needs to stay on the ball a touch better and hit line drives up the middle.

The key question is if he can rediscover his ability to draw walks. If he can do that, I can see him doing something like .260/.350/.450, and if he’s playing 3B with his plus defense, that obviously has value. I know that his age and a high BABIP really helped him in AAA this year, but it can’t be all luck that he hit about 50 points higher than any other prior season save for one. In other words, I think what he did in Columbus was at least significant enough for them to hang on to him and see what happens next year.

by TribeJay on Oct 14, 2009 11:25 PM EDT up reply actions

Veras!

Resident Take the Football References One Step Too Far Guy

by westbrook on Oct 14, 2009 8:39 PM EDT reply actions

If there was a chart for “B.J. Upton’s Happy Moments of 2009” there would be only one moment, and Veras would be on that one too.

by xrickx on Oct 14, 2009 9:30 PM EDT up reply actions

For comparison’s sake, Carlos Pena, your 2009 AL HR king (fewer PA than Tex gives him the tiebreaker)

Resident Take the Football References One Step Too Far Guy

by westbrook on Oct 14, 2009 8:46 PM EDT reply actions

I gave him the tiebreak for not being a jackass.

by Roger Dorn on Oct 14, 2009 9:10 PM EDT up reply actions 1 recs

I have a question. Is it better to hit HRs off very good pitchers and not off crummy pitchers, or to hit HRs off crummy pitchers and not very good pitchers?

by APV on Oct 14, 2009 11:33 PM EDT reply actions

I’ll take the guy who hits 7 each off of Masterson, Carmona, Huff and Sowers over the guy who hit 3 each off of Maddux, Glavine, Millwood and Smoltz.

Resident Take the Football References One Step Too Far Guy

by westbrook on Oct 14, 2009 11:50 PM EDT up reply actions

Meaning! The more [and more importantly, the higher the OPS] the better.

Resident Take the Football References One Step Too Far Guy

by westbrook on Oct 14, 2009 11:51 PM EDT up reply actions

Well, against a very good pitcher, it’s either a low-scoring game or a lost cause. If it’s a low-scoring game, then a home run is more valuable in that game than it is in an average game. If it’s a lost cause, then of course the home run is worth less. Tough call.

There are a lot more crummy pitchers than very good pitchers, and when you hit a home run off a crummy pitcher, there’s typically going to be more guys on base than against a very good pitcher.

Tiebreaker: close and late situations have the highest leverage, and generally you will be facing a good pitcher. As an aside, Marte’s apparent lack of platoon weakness is especially valuable in that sense.

by Jay on Oct 14, 2009 11:55 PM EDT up reply actions

The one who hits them off very good pitchers will probably be better in a playoff series facing better pitchers?

In the new Geico commercial, Marte sings "Let me be myself" on Wedge's front lawn (with the cavemen).

by V-Mart Shopper on Oct 15, 2009 1:25 AM EDT up reply actions

Nothing to do with this topic, but I found this quote in the local paper today.

"That was regular season, this is the post-season. I won’t take it personal if they boo me," Thome said.

Well in that case Jim, I believe Brick has a few words for you….

by supermarioelia on Oct 15, 2009 9:00 AM EDT reply actions

i only boo him when someone makes a prediction that i think they might link back to someday.

also! why would philly fans boo him, other than because they boo lots of people?

by Brick. on Oct 15, 2009 10:23 AM EDT up reply actions

Yeah, I’m curious to see if he gets booed around here. I still see Thome jerseys at games on occasion, it’s not like he left on a bad note or anything. In fact, trading him got them a pretty decent couple of years out of Aaron Rowand AND freed up 1B for Ryan Howard. And I know Pat Burrell came back for the ring ceremony & really got an awesome ovation from a crowd that’s pretty notoriously anti-everything.

*sigh*

by zempf on Oct 15, 2009 12:45 PM EDT up reply actions

Someone should tell Thome that the postseason is a crapshoot. Anyone can get hot or cold or cheered or booed for 7 games and look like a hero (or a goat.) SSS. Real fans boo in the regular season, when it matters.

Il faut d'abord durer.

by CU Adam on Oct 16, 2009 9:33 AM EDT up reply actions