Will the real Jason Heyward please stand up?

.4 runs per game is 65 runs in a season. or a run every 2.5 games. which yes is a lot.

To put in perspective, that's often the difference between a good offensive team and a bad one (for example last year we scored 4.2 runs, the Phillies scored 3.8 we were obviously a much better offensive team)
 
Ryan Langerhans was fantastic on defense too. I don't see many people upset that we let him get away.

Base running and defense are nice, but he's going to have to show some offense to be worth keeping around. That being said, I fully expect Heyward to get hot at some point as long as he doesn't get injured.

This just goes to show ridiculous of a stat WAR actually is. In what reality is Heyward and his .566 OPS more valuable than Freeman and his 1.033 OPS. Even if Freddie were Adam Dunn defensively (he's not by the way) and even if Heyward were Ozzie Smith defensively (he's not either by the way, as good as Heyward may be), there is no way that the defensive difference is even remotely close enough to compensate for the massive difference in offense that Freeman provides.
 
KeithLockhart said:
Francoeur never walked. Heyward still gets walks.

Batting average means nothing comparing the two because Francoeur's value was simply singles and homers. Plus Francouer's range in the outfield is nothing like Heyward's.
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And right now, those are two of the three major advantages Heyward has over Francoeur (also baserunning). Heyward is clearly the better player, but I think anyone who isn't somewhat troubled by his inconsistency with a bat in his hands is in a bit of denial. He's got talent and he'll likely go on a tear that will boost his stats. But he's not playing that well.
 
Heyward supporters acknowledge he's struggling right now, but to compare him to Francoeur is ridiculous IMO.

Better range and defense, Francoeur had a better arm for throwing.

Heyward better plate discipline by far and of course he actually takes walks compared to Francoeur.
 
Carp said:
Ryan Langerhans was fantastic on defense too. I don't see many people upset that we let him get away.

Base running and defense are nice, but he's going to have to show some offense to be worth keeping around. That being said, I fully expect Heyward to get hot at some point as long as he doesn't get injured.

This just goes to show ridiculous of a stat WAR actually is. In what reality is Heyward and his .566 OPS more valuable than Freeman and his 1.033 OPS. Even if Freddie were Adam Dunn defensively (he's not by the way) and even if Heyward were Ozzie Smith defensively (he's not either by the way, as good as Heyward may be), there is no way that the defensive difference is even remotely close enough to compensate for the massive difference in offense that Freeman provides.
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Jason Heyward will never be as bad of a hitter and is a much better defender than Langerhans, bad comparison bro.

And preventing runs is as important as scoring them. You can argue the fine points. But Jason has been valuable to this team defensively. Our team's pitchers have significantly outperformed their FIP and Simmons and Heyward are the 2 biggest reasons. Despite having no range Freddie, terrible Uggs and Johnson we kill it.
 
Freddie may not have the best range, but he gets pretty much every wild throw that Uggla, Johnson, and Simmons throw over there. He picks up the 1 hop throws as good as anybody at 1B, and as Friday suggested, he is a good 1B to hold the bag.
 
jsebe10 said:
Never said that. JHey is a gold glover and rightfully so...but what good is catching the third out of the World Series if you can't hit to even get there?
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In the playoffs, games are close, defense is huge, he brings that.

Runs come are a premium in the postseason.

Ask the Sox how much Drew's defense helped them last year despite not hitting for ****, it's clear you dont like Heyward, why that is, is anybody's guess.
 
KeithLockhart said:
Heyward supporters acknowledge he's struggling right now, but to compare him to Francoeur is ridiculous IMO.

Better range and defense, Francoeur had a better arm for throwing.

Heyward better plate discipline by far and of course he actually takes walks compared to Francoeur.
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Heyward's career slash is .256/.349/.435, with the Bravos had a slash of .266/.308/.424 so Jason was only slightly worse at average so far, but has an insanely high OBP and higher power numbers as well, in a lower offensive era. Or to show in a way that people don't have to use their brain as much. Jason has a 112 OPS+ Francoeur in Atlanta had an 89.

That's OPS+ which doesn't properly weight events (read OBP values walks the same as hits, and it double counts hits adding an over value to SLG)
 
KeithLockhart said:
Freddie may not have the best range, but he gets pretty much every wild throw that Uggla, Johnson, and Simmons throw over there. He picks up the 1 hop throws as good as anybody at 1B, and as Friday suggested, he is a good 1B to hold the bag.
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Freddie is great at fielding throws. Unfortunately there's no way to statistically track that. I don't think Freddie is a butcher at 1B by any stretch and he's undervalued by WAR likely because I'm sure he's an above average receiver.
 
Come on Zito...I'm a Heyward fan but he has been a disappointment overall thus far. That of course has more to do with the hype train and his rookie season but Heyward has not lived up to his potential as of yet. I hope that changes soon and he is here long term.
 
I find it funny how people act like defense doesnt matter.

Preventing runs if just as important as scoring/driving them in.

Ask our pitchers if Heyward's defense doesnt matter, breaking it does, a LOT.
 
And first base range is vastly overrated. Sure, its nice to have but just like with catching the most important thing is how you receive the ball being thrown to you.
 
Heyward said:
I find it funny how people act like defense doesnt matter.

Preventing runs if just as important as scoring/driving them in.

Ask our pitchers if Heyward's defense doesnt matter, breaking it does, a LOT.
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Defense is very important, yes. But players drive in 100 runs plus in a season, not save 100 plus runs. At the end of the day you still have to score runs to win, so saving runs is not nearly as important as driving runs in.

A huge plus if the player can do both.
 
thethe said:
Come on Zito...I'm a Heyward fan but he has been a disappointment overall thus far. That of course has more to do with the hype train and his rookie season but Heyward has not lived up to his potential as of yet. I hope that changes soon and he is here long term.
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Heyward has posted a 6.4 fWAR season and assuming his bat returns to normal and his defense drops to normal he'll probably be in the 5-6 range. Which is great. No he's not Trout, but those types are super rare. And for comparison it took Cutch til his 25 year old season to hit his superstar status, Jason may very well wind up in that same boat. he's only 24. Even if he doesn't, he's still a heck of a baseball player. If you expected him to be Bonds or Trout, then yeah you'll be disappointed, but Heyward has been for 3 of his 4 seasons an All-Star or near All-star level player and he's under 25, is that really a disappointment?
 
zitothebrave said:
Jason Heyward will never be as bad of a hitter and is a much better defender than Langerhans, bad comparison bro.

And preventing runs is as important as scoring them. You can argue the fine points. But Jason has been valuable to this team defensively. Our team's pitchers have significantly outperformed their FIP and Simmons and Heyward are the 2 biggest reasons. Despite having no range Freddie, terrible Uggs and Johnson we kill it.
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But right now Heyward is as bad of a hitter (worse actually) than Langy. Langy played a very good CF in his prime, so it stands to assume he would have been a plus defender in RF as well. But that isn't really the point.

I'm not arguing defense isn't important, but it is nowhere near important (individually anyways) as offense. Yet WAR would have you believe he's been worth more wins than Freeman AND and that Heyward has been one of the 10 best players in baseball this yr.
 
jsebe10 said:
Defense is very important, yes. But players drive in 100 runs plus in a season, not save 100 plus runs. At the end of the day you still have to score runs to win, so saving runs is not nearly as important as driving runs in.
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But a player who saves 20 and scores/drives in 160 is just as valuable as someone who saves 0 and scores/drives in 180 even using your overly simplistic look on stats no?
 
jsebe10 said:
Defense is very important, yes. But players drive in 100 runs plus in a season, not save 100 plus runs. At the end of the day you still have to score runs to win, so saving runs is not nearly as important as driving runs in.

A huge plus if the player can do both.
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14 players had 100+ RBI's last year in ALL OF BASEBALL.

Does everyone who didnt drive in 100 runs suck then according to this logic.

And RBI's is a dumb stat just like pitcher wins.

And Heyward hits leadoff, so it's gonna be VERY hard to drive in 100 runs from the leadoff spot.

Doubles, walks, runs, and saving runs with defense is just as important as RBI's which is a flawed stat.

Brandon Phillips lead the NL in RBI's, is he the best hitter in the NL then?

We'll agree to disagree before Keith warns me again.
 
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