June Hitting

nsacpi

nsacpi

Expects Yuge Games
Team wRC+ of 123. Best in the NL. Dodgers were second at 113. Cardinals bring up the rear by some distance at 69 (ouch!).

June wRC+ by player:

Freeman: 167
Acuna: 158
Joyce: 157
Albies: 148
Culberson: 134
Swanson: 131
McCann: 122
Camargo: 120
Donaldson: 116
Flowers: 103
Riley: 97
Markakis: 96
 
If Riley is a 97 wRC+ hitter moving forward due to his contact issues, a healthy Inciarte in CF will be a nice improvement.

Would the Braves keep Riley on the MLB team in a part time role? I can't imagine that's an option for a guy who needs reps to work on things.
 
Enscheff said:
If Riley is a 97 wRC+ hitter moving forward due to his contact issues, a healthy Inciarte in CF will be a nice improvement.

Would the Braves keep Riley on the MLB team in a part time role? I can't imagine that's an option for a guy who needs reps to work on things.
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A Duvall/Riley swap might make sense at some point if things continuing trending this way.
 
Enscheff said:
If Riley is a 97 wRC+ hitter moving forward due to his contact issues, a healthy Inciarte in CF will be a nice improvement.

Would the Braves keep Riley on the MLB team in a part time role? I can't imagine that's an option for a guy who needs reps to work on things.
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Yeah, Riley isn't better than ender right now. Hopefully he picks it back up
 
Southcack77 said:
A Duvall/Riley swap might make sense at some point if things continuing trending this way.
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If Ender comes back as the 3 win guy he's been, it might make sense to swap Ender for Riley, and Duvall for Camargo.

I still think Camargo needs more PAs vs LHP to evaluate whether or not he's going to be OK in the role of Markakis' platoon-mate. Someone else needs to be taking those PAs vs LHP, whether that’s Camargo, Culberson, Riley or Duvall
 
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Just like Riley was due to regress, he's due to bounce back. His K/BB ratios showed a lot of growth this year. The strikeouts should come down a little in the 2nd half, and the walks will go up. He's a threat with the bat and can change a game a game with one swing. No way should Ender be anything more than a 4th OFer right now.
 
atl717 said:
Just like Riley was due to regress, he's due to bounce back. His K/BB ratios showed a lot of growth this year. The strikeouts should come down a little in the 2nd half, and the walks will go up. He's a threat with the bat and can change a game a game with one swing. No way should Ender be anything more than a 4th OFer right now.
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I'm interested in seeing the data you're looking at that suggests his K/BB ratios have shown a lot of growth.

https://www.fangraphs.com/graphs.as...tArray=&start=2019&end=2019&rtype=mult&gt1=15

That chart shows K/BB rates that have pretty much held steady the whole time. I guess the BB rate is ticking up a bit.

Literally the only differences between Riley's May and June are the luck baked into his BABIP and HR/FB numbers. The moment those rates regressed, his production plummeted.

What data points to him being due to bounce back?
 
Enscheff said:
I'm interested in seeing the data you're looking at that suggests his K/BB ratios have shown a lot of growth.

https://www.fangraphs.com/graphs.as...tArray=&start=2019&end=2019&rtype=mult&gt1=15

That chart shows K/BB rates that have pretty much held steady the whole time. I guess the BB rate is ticking up a bit.

Literally the only differences between Riley's May and June are the luck baked into his BABIP and HR/FB numbers. The moment those rates regressed, his production plummeted.

What data points to him being due to bounce back?
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So you think his babip in June (.274) isn't unlucky?
 
msstate7 said:
So you think his babip in June (.274) isn't unlucky?
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Could very well be, or it could be reasonable considering he is a slow RHH who hits a lot of FBs. I haven't really dug into his xBABIP.

Boost it to .300 or whatever you think it reasonable and get back to me with the updated line. That's how projections based on actual data work.

It's hard to find players who accumulated 500+ PAs in a single season with K and BB rates as drastic as Riley's. The closest ones are guys like Pedro Alvarez and Chris Davis before he learned how to walk a bit.
 
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Enscheff said:
Could very well be, or it could be reasonable considering he is a slow RHH who hits a lot of FBs. I haven't really dug into his xBABIP.

Boost it to .300 or whatever you think it reasonable and get back to me with the updated line. That's how projections based on actual data work.
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The predictors on fangraphs predict between .312-
.324. Seems .274 would be unlucky.
 
Steamer projection for Riley rest of this season:

.255/.311/.468, BABIP of .312, ISO of .222, 0.6 WAR in 62 games
 
msstate7 said:
The predictors on fangraphs predict between .312-
.324. Seems .274 would be unlucky.
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nsacpi said:
Steamer projection for Riley rest of this season:

.255/.311/.468, BABIP of .312, ISO of .222, 0.6 WAR in 62 games
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OK...so nsacpi just reiterated exactly what I've been saying for 2 months now...

That's a league average hitter who provides little defensive value and negative value on the bases.

I'm not even sure what we are discussing anymore...so I guess we sit and wait to see what Riley does from here on out.
 
Enscheff said:
OK...so nsacpi just reiterated exactly what I've been saying for 2 months now...

That's a league average hitter who provides little defensive value and negative value on the bases.

I'm not even sure what we are discussing anymore...so I guess we sit and wait to see what Riley does from here on out.
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I have no idea what he does from here out, but I'll bet you he has a higher BABIP than .274 from here out. I just think you were fair to say his babip in May was lucky, but you aren't conceding he's been unlucky the other way in June
 
msstate7 said:
I have no idea what he does from here out, but I'll bet you he has a higher BABIP than .274 from here out. I just think you were fair to say his babip in May was lucky, but you aren't conceding he's been unlucky the other way in June
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I've said it could be bad BABIP luck at least 3 times...

Enscheff said:
Could very well be, or it could be reasonable considering he is a slow RHH who hits a lot of FBs. I haven't really dug into his xBABIP.
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Enscheff said:
The June .274 BABIP may or may not be low for his true talent
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Enscheff said:
He obviously won't sustain the .200 BABIP any more than he was going to sustain .452, but the other numbers aren't that flukey.
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And I don't doubt he's been getting a bit unlucky with balls in play.

Difference between my comments and the comments of others is I don't make claims without actual data to back it up. I haven't dug into Riley's xBABIP, so I don't know...therefore I don't make definitive statements if I don't have data to back up those claims. It's known as not being willingly ignorant.

Like I said, make the adjustments to his line based on a higher BABIP, and report back what his line "should be". My rough estimate is that since he Ks and HRs so much, even a 30 point boost in BABIP will only increase his BA/OBP marginally. He simply doesn't put enough balls in play for BABIP to be a huge driving force behind his production.
 
Riley has a ton of upside in my eyes. I think he has a chance to be a really, really good hitter in the NL.

I also think that Riley is going to have to do a ton of work on refining his approach in order to tap into that upside. His only goal this offseason should be working to cut down his K% to around 25% and his BB% up to around 8-10%. At those rates, I think he can be a pretty valuable player. And those are pretty much in line with his rates in the minors so I think that type of improvement is within his capability.

But if by this time next year he is still striking out 32% of the time and walking less than 5%, then we may have a serious problem.
 
we should consider the case of Swanson in thinking about how Riley might evolve as a hitter...obviously they are different kinds of hitters...but both had this initial success in the majors that was misleading in terms of where their underlying baseline stood
 
nsacpi said:
we should consider the case of Swanson in thinking about how Riley might evolve as a hitter...obviously they are different kinds of hitters...but both had this initial success in the majors that was misleading in terms of where their underlying baseline stood
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Dansby has matched that wRC+ of his initial action this season
 
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