Originally Posted by
REDREAD
I'm talking about % of times those "on base events" are converted into runs.
Here's a another example
Zach Cozart this year..
when he bats 7th or 8th.
7th: 20 runs, 37 hits, 6 BB..
8th: 5 runs, 9 hits, 3
total: 25 runs on 55 times on base = Zach scored 45% of the time he's on base.
Interestingly, when Zach batted #2, he was on base 80 times and scored 39 runs, which is
48%, which is pretty darn close to the rate he scored as a #7 / #8 hitter.
Now Hanigan..
For 2013: batting 8th.. 33 hits, 22 BB = 55 times on base. He only scored 15 runs.
That's only 27%.
Since Hanigan has been hurt this year, let's look at 2012:
76 hits, 40 walks, 22 runs. That means he scored 18% of the time.
Let's compare them to other major league teams:
I am going to pick a few good teams and bad teams from mlb.com
Not cherry picking, I just don't want to do the complete list.
For 7th hitters, percentage of time an "on base event" converts to a run:
Mets: 24%
Brewers: 36%
Giants: 26%
Braves: 26%
Cardinals: 32%
For 8th hitters:
Mets: 29%
Brewers: 34%
Giants: 29%
Braves: 27%
Cardinals: 36%
Again, these were not cherry picked. I did not want to do the entire league.
Just grabbed 5 teams.
Seems like, based on these 5 teams, there's not a huge gap in the percentage a guy
scores whether he bats 7th or 8th. Now granted, maybe if we ran the entire league, and
did it for multiple years, a different conclusion would be reached.
But compare that to the discrepancy we see between Hanigan and Cozart.
Cozart is actually similiar to Stubbs. Nice speed, decent power.
When Cozart actually gets on base, he scores at a high frequency.
In contrast, when Hannigan gets on base, he has little power and a lot of his
OBP comes from walks. So he starts off at first most of the time. Hannigan has
poor speed, thus he is purely a station to station guy.. That means it takes more
hits or smallball tactics to get him home.
This is the entire point. Not all players are created equal when they get on base.
OBP is important. The guys behind you influence how many times you score.
But some guys (like Hannigan) lack power and speed to such a degree that their OBP
is less valuable. Hannigan was healthy in 2012, had 334 plate appearances in the 8 hole and only
scored 22 runs.. Doesn't that stick out like a sore thumb?
If you want to blame the other hitters for his poor rate in 2012, Choo was added this year and his scoring percentage
only creeped up to 27%, compared to Cozart's rate of 45% out of the 7 hole.
Other teams do not have this large discrepancy based on batting order.
This is why Hannigan would be a horrible #2 hitter. There's more to scoring runs than OBP, although
OBP is certainly important. If Stubbs or Cozart could muster a 330-350 OBP, they'd be offensive stars.