Continuing on the series that began with April Powers Part 1, I showed you the top hitters over the last 3 years in the month of April with the caveat that they had to be “hot” at least twice. This week we’ll take an initial look at the top hitters from April 2019 and see if how they performed in the following months, and maybe catch a glimpse of what to look out for in Part 3.
In honor of Star Wars week, let’s take a page from Master Yoda. Always in motion is the future, difficult to tell. But to find our way there, we can start by looking at the present. After all, it’s impossible to know where you are going, if you don’t know where you’ve been without feeling under pressure. Right, David Bowie? They said it couldn’t be done! Yoda and Bowie in the same reference? Check. Now lets look at the board:
| Name | Season | Apr wRC+ | May wRC+ | Jun wRC+ |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Cody Bellinger | 2019 | 248 | 155 | 141 |
| Daniel Vogelbach | 2019 | 208 | 91 | 121 |
| Christian Yelich | 2019 | 207 | 124 | 189 |
| Mitch Garver | 2019 | 198 | 198 | 90 |
| Anthony Rendon | 2019 | 193 | 141 | 142 |
| Hunter Dozier | 2019 | 190 | 122 | 84 |
| Austin Meadows | 2019 | 186 | 193 | 53 |
| Mike Trout | 2019 | 174 | 170 | 182 |
| Tim Anderson | 2019 | 168 | 89 | 103 |
| Willson Contreras | 2019 | 166 | 130 | 120 |
| Joey Gallo | 2019 | 165 | 152 | 289 |
| Trey Mancini | 2019 | 164 | 90 | 139 |
| Peter Alonso | 2019 | 164 | 122 | 184 |
| Brian Goodwin | 2019 | 164 | 73 | 52 |
| Paul DeJong | 2019 | 163 | 95 | 67 |
| Elvis Andrus | 2019 | 159 | 37 | 88 |
| Jeff McNeil | 2019 | 159 | 107 | 163 |
| Rhys Hoskins | 2019 | 158 | 122 | 126 |
| Yandy Diaz | 2019 | 158 | 57 | 136 |
| Jorge Polanco | 2019 | 156 | 165 | 85 |
| Alex Verdugo | 2019 | 154 | 108 | 122 |
| Shin-Soo Choo | 2019 | 152 | 115 | 90 |
| Christian Walker | 2019 | 152 | 68 | 92 |
| James McCann | 2019 | 151 | 136 | 128 |
| Nelson Cruz | 2019 | 150 | 79 | 171 |
| Yoan Moncada | 2019 | 150 | 88 | 189 |
| Howie Kendrick | 2019 | 149 | 128 | 144 |
| Matt Chapman | 2019 | 149 | 127 | 143 |
| Tyler Flowers | 2019 | 148 | 41 | 103 |
| Joc Pederson | 2019 | 148 | 188 | 53 |
| Gary Sanchez | 2019 | 148 | 150 | 111 |
| Clint Frazier | 2019 | 148 | 83 | 126 |
| J.D. Davis | 2019 | 145 | 63 | 132 |
| Luke Voit | 2019 | 144 | 117 | 159 |
| Aaron Judge | 2019 | 144 | 169 | 120 |
| George Springer | 2019 | 144 | 207 | 107 |
| Marcell Ozuna | 2019 | 143 | 94 | 120 |
| Giovanny Urshela | 2019 | 143 | 125 | 75 |
| Michael Conforto | 2019 | 143 | 139 | 91 |
| Carlos Correa | 2019 | 143 | 134 | 78 |
| Alex Gordon | 2019 | 142 | 108 | 58 |
| Alex Bregman | 2019 | 142 | 157 | 138 |
| Freddie Freeman | 2019 | 141 | 149 | 166 |
| Jason Heyward | 2019 | 141 | 62 | 147 |
| Tommy Pham | 2019 | 141 | 146 | 101 |
| Josh Bell | 2019 | 140 | 213 | 91 |
| Brandon Lowe | 2019 | 140 | 115 | 117 |
| Josh Reddick | 2019 | 140 | 86 | 94 |
| Michael Brantley | 2019 | 139 | 156 | 97 |
| Javier Baez | 2019 | 138 | 124 | 92 |
| Eduardo Escobar | 2019 | 137 | 127 | 113 |
| Max Kepler | 2019 | 137 | 106 | 150 |
| Omar Narvaez | 2019 | 137 | 106 | 120 |
| Fernando Tatis Jr. | 2019 | 136 | — | 195 |
| Tommy La Stella | 2019 | 136 | 139 | 114 |
| Ji-Man Choi | 2019 | 135 | 75 | 126 |
| Jarrod Dyson | 2019 | 134 | 57 | 87 |
| Mookie Betts | 2019 | 134 | 115 | 102 |
| Tim Beckham | 2019 | 134 | 81 | 19 |
| Edwin Encarnacion | 2019 | 134 | 106 | 138 |
| Josh Donaldson | 2019 | 133 | 100 | 115 |
| Marcus Semien | 2019 | 133 | 81 | 122 |
| Mike Moustakas | 2019 | 132 | 118 | 151 |
| Eric Thames | 2019 | 131 | 90 | 189 |
| Carlos Santana | 2019 | 131 | 142 | 159 |
| Ronald Acuna Jr. | 2019 | 130 | 96 | 157 |
| J.D. Martinez | 2019 | 129 | 122 | 153 |
So the interesting thing here is you see the top performers in April of 2019 had many different patterns in the following months. The difficulty trying to find patterns is you have to be mindful of externalities (word of the day). A big one being playing through injuries or missing time altogether. Take Fernando Tatis Jr. for example; he missed all of May so it’s hard to say if he’s a rhythm player (ramps up each month with more exposure and working out timing like Carlos Santana) or if he’s a fast-starter with a May dropoff and a summer heat boon like Nelson Cruz and Yoan Moncada. Both of which have a clear pattern starting hot in April with a wRC+ over 140 for their career, and a noticeable drop in May.
Then you have rookies like Jeff McNeil, they hit the ground running often because no one has a book on them yet. Then there’s an adjustment period for the league, followed by adaption. Because of this, it’s hard to gauge what type of hitter a rookie will be until they get a few seasons under their belt like Moncada.
Which brings us to the breakout players; you may have noticed that Cody Bellinger and Christian Yelich did not appear in Part 1. Bellinger did not break camp in 2017 and had a comparably rough 2018, whereas Yelich didn’t break out until the second half in 2018. They also serve as examples of nearly opposite profiles. Yin and Yang, Belli and Yeli. Bellinger after 3 seasons has shown himself to be a first-half hitter. His career wRC+ split is 149/129 with 2019 being a very loud example. Whereas Yelich has shown to be a second-half hitter with a career split of 130/144, but is still a little murky post-breakout since getting injured and shut down in September last year. Hmmmm, in redrafts one could draft Belli and trade for Yeli at the All-Star break and reap the best of both worlds.
And then there’s Javier Baez. Since his second-half breakout in 2017, he’s shown himself to be a first-half hitter which was compounded by a heel injury in June last year and never fully recovered from it. He had a .924 OPS before the injury, and a .797 OPS after it. I am looking forward to a healthy Baez in this shortened season after he was hitting .429 with 3 HRs in spring training before it was put on pause. His stroke and timing were once again ready for Opening Day in short order.
The final hitter I’d like to highlight is Michael Conforto. His career splits are 116/144, yeat April is always his hottest month followed be continuous decline until July. Which, he then gets a second wind for the home stretch. You could say he’s a 2-peak hitter, which there are many of. Many things could be responsible for that: the cycle of adjustments between hitters and pitchers, physical conditioning, and summer weather to a degree.
This is a quick outline for you to see that players can follow different patterns, and especially in Roto leagues understanding these patterns can help you maximize the production of your lineup and make savvy trades at ideal times. Next issue, Part 3, I will attempt to clear the bats from the belfry and dive in deeper. Digging for trends in batting profiles and player adjustments, we’ll try to predict who can be a fast-starter in “April” that might not have an established pattern yet, and maybe even why that is. Stay tuned!
Love the Baez call!!
Also dug the throwback. His 2017 second half was one of the many times tracking the month-to-month movement of a young hitter brings profit.
Maybe I’m alone in feeling this, but there seems to be a current of split-shaming running through game these days. I guess I’m cool w that because I think it’s an awesome way to identify possible trends and go looking for the reasons for those sexy split seasons, but it’s always interesting how people decide they’ll distinguish between signal and noise.
Thanks dude! Yeah I’m not really into heavily weighing splits for the most part. But I do think they are very useful in understanding approach and tracking progress of a players development. And like I pointed out, if certain players show a pattern, repeated bahavior, over multiple cycles, it’s worth pointing out and at least having it in the back of mind – yet there are so many extra factors you have to be mindful of too, like breakouts. A player may have had a pattern pre-breakout but a new pattern post-breakout because their skills etc have shifted.
Jose Abreu is like that… 60% of the time, it works every time
Yeah, I hear that too, Itch…People want to ignore splits like they’re random, but maybe a guy just is better during a different part of the season for a reason — be it weather, gets off hot, wears down mid-summer, etc
I know I personally like it hot
I hear it’s similar for some
I prefer medium rare… now i’m hungry
Hey now! What on earth *pulls on collar*
My favourite split going into the 2019 season … Jorge Soler 2018 pre broken foot and after. He was in the midst of a break out in 2018 and then he hit a ball into his foot. Folks still debating whether or not he broke out in 2019 when it’s already been two years.
This is great stuff, whip! Why do I want to draft Vogelbach now…Hmm….
haha yeahhhh, he’s an interesting case… I dodged highlighting him because I didn’t have any concrete data to back him up as this was his first real season, i guess I should of listed him with McNeil… but one thing that is in his favor is plate discipline a la Mitch Garver, and in spring training part 1 the hitting coach said his contact skills were improved… so maybe theres something there… a dart throw???
Yeah, that’s what I’m thinking…Gonna look at him and see if there’s anything more… He is kinda garbage tho, methinks
Just doesn’t seem like he’ll ever catch up to stuff high or inside
*tags in the Itch*
HAHA
He’s garbage
Nice work!
Now I can’t stop picturing David Bowie and Yoda sitting in full lotus watching Cosmos…
Kinda wish I didn’t say anything now
Oh, wrong thread…I thought this was about Lenny Kravitz…Haha
BAHAHAHA… *looks aorund room… then slowly backs out*
talk about being Under Pressure…
*gulps*
you are welcome, sir.
they just caught a glimpse of Oz’s legs…
“it’s the terror of knowing what this world is about”
LOL
Thanks Coolwhip!
Correction- Conforto didn’t go cold in June and July-he was just too scared of colliding into Robinson Cano in the on deck circle if he didn’t get on base that he couldn’t concentrate at the dish.
haha I totally forgot about that. Feels like ages ago now.
Certainly give us another perspective, – interesting info thanks CW! Let’s play ball!
np thanks!
Good thing we had that ‘Season’ column to remind us last year was 2019!
Interesting, but not sure if there is anything really actionable from this table… if I’m being honest.
Who and where someone played also has a big impact. Like Gleyber in Baltimore, wRC+ will account for that to som extent, but it doesn’t know he was playing against AAA pitching.
—
BTW, I got some info on the distribution of steals in a typical year. Obviously, we all know homers go up in the summer. No surprise there.
Stolen bases tend to peak in the first couple months, and then go down as homers go up. Makes sense. It’s just nice to confirm that…
Soooooo, what do we do w/ that information for this year? Me still thinks the guys who get ~4-8 bags in a year will be completely unreliable. Think you need multiple 15/20+ steal guys, and maybe one 30+ guy (like a Robles, haha sorry, I had to!) in order to do well in the category.
I’m usually not a fan of having a 30 or 40+ steal guy on the squad. Don’t like the risk of having such a large % of a scarce category being relied on one guy. Prefer the “antifragile” — “death by a thousand paper cuts” — strategy, usually.
What do you think? Thanks, Whip!
RE the second comment (Gleyber graph) — I meant to include that the main issue w/ the table for me is the small sample size. You surely listed some important factors to consider, and definitely some interesting thoughts in your paragraphs, but those are all idiosyncratic to each player.
In the aggregate, it’s hard to draw too many conclusions when looking at monthly data. I understand you are just presenting the data and that is totally fine!
Just wanted to clarify that part….
Yep, the goal was to point out the different factors that can come into play when dissecting the data. And then by showing some examples. I should have been more clear and said it at the outset – a certain teething child is stealing all my sleep! lol – This was to show that in my researching process trying to find predictable trends I came across a host of anecdotal and (as you pointed out) idiosyncratic cases. But at the same time those cases are often not 1-offs. The are many players that do fall into trending behaviors, and in the coming parts I’m hoping to find trends in profiles that can clue us into possible behavior trends in the future.
Yep, sounds good, man! Thanks for the reply!
Also, some 10-12 steal guys should be fine too. Can’t entirely be 15/20 steal guys obviously. And it’s not that you *don’t* take 5 steal guys, it’s just that I wouldn’t be relying on them as much as usual, hence the one 30+ guy to make up for them…
Last thing I want to add there is a minor correction. The distribution of steals is a U-shape, actually. There tends to be another spike in September. Will be interesting to see in the future if that goes away without the dumb Sep roster expansion rule…
I think they decided to keep that rule for the shortened season, no? Can’t remember at all, lol.
Saying all that just now made me realize that, depending on how much they increase rosters, maybe steals will be up a bit above (the summer) trend? Also if homers don’t pick up in July as much as normal…
REALLY hard to say. At the least, we need more info on how much they increase the roster size, if it all.
Ahhh gotcha, so it does trend up at end of season… so that might support what i said, also could be all the callups and expanded rosters with a lot of young players with fresher legs and steal/baserunning specialists on active rosters to help teams make the push – a la Gore, and functionally as we saw with Dave Roberts with “The Steal”.
If rosters are expanded all season, i think there might be an increase in steals per week across the league… or at least in attempts.
Yep, Berti, Hampson, etc. — hard to say but definitely something to keep in mind!
haha, yes Season is there to remind everyone this chart is only for 2019, not past 3 ;-)
So when it comes to steals… I think the biggest factor is “fresh legs”. In the dog days of summer after the first 60-70 games, guys aren’t feeling quite a fresh, aches and pains of long season start to surface a bit. And yeah, probably another factor being that HRs go up in the heat so teams probably are willing to give their guys more opportunity to clear bases rather than risk a SB.
Did SB bases go up again in the fall? I would think when you are in a pennant race, teams would be more willing try for extra bases when more is on the line and every 90 ft counts.
HAHA… so you raise an interesting point… the “handful” guys, 4-8 bags might be more willing to steal in a short season because YOLO, each game matters more and they don’t have to be concerned about preserving themselves for 160 games. Will be interesting to see. I agree that the best strategy is to have multiple medium steal guys.. like a well diversified portfolio! ;-) best practice is to spread the risk, and the gain, so that a hit to portfolio doesn’t sink the whole ship. I.E. day-to-day injuries etc. Like when Mondesi owners lost him for a stretch last year.
Lotta good points here — thanks, man!
Super busy day and has been like that the past week. Not as much free time these days as the prior weeks, :-(
I always go the antifragile approach with steals. Asking for trouble if you load up on just a few big steal guys.