We’re now a quarter of the way through the 2019 MLB season, and things are finally starting to get back to the way they should be. The Houston Astros, Chicago Cubs, and Los Angeles Dodgers have the three best records in baseball, while the New York Yankees and Boston Red Sox seem to have figured things out and are quickly climbing back to the top of the standings. On top of that, most of the league’s struggling superstars are beginning to look like themselves again. However, the key word in that last sentence is “most” as there are still some traditionally great baseball players who just look plain bad right now. And as a result, we have another edition of Patience or Panic, so we can determine which of these still-struggling stars are worth keeping our faith in or not.
Joey Votto (1B, Cincinnati Reds) – .207 AVG, 19 R, 4 HR, 8 RBI, 1 SB
For the last decade, Joey Votto has been arguably the most consistent hitter in all of baseball, batting above .300 in every season except an injury-plagued 2014 season that held him to 62 games. This made his .284 batting average last year seem that much more alarming, despite it being a perfectly fine average for most professional baseball players. With his power down too, the major question entering 2019 was whether he would bounce back this season, or if father time was beginning to catch up to Votto. Unfortunately, it appears to be more of the latter.
Votto has not looked like his old self at the plate this year, striking out 24.4% of the time. Prior to this season, the veteran had never stuck out even 20% of the time. Part of this may be a result of the different way in which pitchers are attempting to deal with the lefty. Votto is facing fastballs 44.6% of the time this season, and he saw them on 41.1% of pitches last year, compared to seeing fastballs just 35.7% of the time over the course of his career. He is also seeing sinkers thrown to him just 11.6% of the time this year, versus 22% of the time for his career. This new, more direct approach toward facing him seems to be working very well for opposing teams, at least for now. Votto also is not drawing as many walks, with a walk rate of 13.1% compared to the 18.3% walk rate he averaged over the past five seasons.
When putting the ball in play, Votto is hitting fly balls and pop ups much more than he is known to do. He is hitting fly balls 44.3% of the time, compared to his lifetime average of 33.5%. Furthermore, his infield fly ball rate currently sits at 4.7% for the season, drastically higher than his utterly ridiculous career infield fly ball rate of 1.2%. In fact, you have to go all the way back to 2008 to find a season in which Votto had an infield fly ball rate higher than 1.8%. Interestingly enough, his launch angle this season is a career high 16.7°, compared to his 12.7° average launch angle since 2015. Unfortunately, this increase in launch angle has not brought him an increase in power, with just four home runs to this point. After a career-low .135 ISO a season ago, Votto currently has an even worse .132 ISO this year.
While his hard-hit rate and exit velocity are right around his career norms, it is clear that Votto is not the superstar first baseman he has been for the last decade. The 35-year-old’s best days are clearly behind him, and his power stroke looks like it may never be coming back. I still believe his average will rise at some point, and he won’t look quite this bad the rest of the season, but it’s entirely possible that Joey Votto may never again be a top-100 fantasy player.
Verdict: Panic
Yu Darvish (SP, Chicago Cubs) – 2-3, 5.40 ERA, 1.72 WHIP, 44 K, 36.2 IP
After an injury-shortened 2018 season, Yu Darvish looked ready to bounce back in a big way this season. Unfortunately, that has not been the case thus far, as seen in his disappointing 5.40 ERA and 1.72 WHIP. To make matters worse, his FIP is an even uglier 6.49. Darvish’s struggles this season primarily stem from his extreme lack of control and inability to find the strike zone. While he has never demonstrated great control, his walk rate is considerably higher than ever before, walking 19.3% of batters—twice as high as his 9.5% career average. In fact, Darvish has incredibly walked 33 batters across 36.2 innings, the most in the league. Darvish is also failing to keep the ball in the park, allowing 1.96 homers per nine innings pitched. His 29.6% home run to fly ball rate is more than double his career average of 12.9%.
However, there are some positive signs to look at as well. Darvish is still missing bats at a healthy clip, with a 25.7% strikeout rate, less than 2% lower than in his strong 2017 season that saw him post a 3.44 ERA with a 1.15 WHIP. He is also inducing ground balls at the highest rate of his career by far. His ground ball rate of 52.8% is 11.2% better than his career average. This is due to batters having a launch angle of just 6.9° against him this year, compared to the past three seasons in which their launch angles against him were 12.6°, 12.9°, and 13.2°. Batters are also making hard contact against Darvish 28.6% of the time, which is right in line with past seasons. Overall, it appears he still has the same stuff that made him such an effective pitcher in previous years. While the walks and homers certainly won’t help, Darvish should start to see better results sooner than later.
Verdict: Patience
Bryce Harper (OF, Philadelphia Phillies) – .219 AVG, 25 R, 7 HR, 25 RBI, 1 SB
After signing a monstrous $330 million, 13-year contract to play for the Phillies this past offseason, Bryce Harper has had a tough time living up to his paycheck in the early going. While his numbers on the year are far from spectacular, he has struggled even more in recent games, batting just .188 with three home runs in the last month, and he has just two hits with no homers or RBI in the last week. Harper has been striking out more than usual this season and is currently tied for the league lead in strikeouts (54), owning a 30.9% strikeout rate, compared to 21.5% for his career. This may have something to do with how pitchers are attacking Harper, as he is being thrown fastballs 39.8% of the time, 6% more than he faced throughout his career. He has also seen sliders 19.9% of the time, over 5% more than he dealt with in prior seasons. When he does connect with the ball, he is pulling it more than half the time. His pull rate of 52.2% is a full 7% more than he has in any other season. However, he is still making hard contact just as much as he always has, and his exit velocity of 91.3 mph is actually slightly higher than in any other season. Harper is still getting on base, having drawn the second most walks in the league so far, and his expected batting average of .247 shows that he should start to get a few more hits in the future. Overall, Harper has proven to be one of the streakier players in the game, and it’s only a matter of time before he’s performing like one of the best players in baseball again and living up to his monumental contract.
Verdict: Patience
(Photo by Quinn Harris/Icon Sportswire)
Patience or Panic for Corey Seager, Robbie Cano, Daniel Murphy and Yasiel Puig? I own all four :-/
Thanks.
I actually wrote about Seager in last week’s edition, and bottom line is that he’s coming off a major injury and started spring training late, despite probably needing even more time to get back into the swing of things. Definitely be patient there. Cano is 36 years old, striking out more than ever before, and hitting in a less-than-spectacular Mets lineup. I would panic on Cano. Murphy has been a major disappointment, but I personally have him in three leagues and I’m staying patient. He’s simply too good of a hitter and the move to Coors and the Rockies lineup should start to help him sooner than later. Puig has always been one of the streakiest players in baseball, and he had a nice week last week so maybe he’s starting to come on. His BABIP, expected batting average, and expected slugging percentage all show that he has seemingly been pretty unlucky so far, so he is due for some positive regression as well. Stay patient. Hope this helps!
Appreciate it, Kyle. I agree on pretty much everything you said. My only question is that there’s so much depth at SS that Seager’s value is blah.
That’s a fair point, but Seager’s ceiling makes hanging tight still worth it in my opinion.
Picked up Murphy off waivers because someone is impatient and Darvish is there again (he got cut over the weekend then someone picked him up on waivers JUST to stream this start).
Same logic of patience applies if he was a waiver add? I’m probably gonna cut away the low end owned guys on my bench then (Chavis, Walker) or one of my bottom tier RPs like a Buttrey
Yes, I’d say to still have patience in those guys even if they are waiver adds. However, I would only say to do it if you feel you have expendable players on your roster. I wouldn’t part ways with a guy like Chavis for example, who I think will be a solid contributor the rest of the season.
it is far from a given that Harper is going to live up to his monumental contract. I think you could argue that he already can’t live up to it. The end is going to be a disaster for sure. A big part of a signing like that it the immediate impact. Once the honeymoon is over people will realize the payroll problems on the horizon – at some point Harper’s contract will be the most important factor in the entire organization and they will need to just eat parts of it or give away much of their future to rid themselves of it. That day grows closer every minute and this bad start really does count IMO. Of course you have to hold him if you own him this year, but the Phillies are screwed long-term. I don’ think there is any chance he lives up to the contract – it was a bad decision which will get passed off to another management group – the people that made the decision won’t have to answer for it, but that won’t help Harper live up to the contract.
Someone in my league has made the offer of Bryce Harper to me in exchange for either Brantley or Hoskins. Thoughts?
I am considering tossing Brantley his way. Do you think Brantley will be regressing at some point?
Thank you for any advice!
That might be a bit too high of a price for Harper in my opinion. Even if Brantley does regress a bit, he’s shown more than capable of maintaining a high average in the past and the runs and RBI will continue to be there hitting in the middle of Houston’s lineup. I don’t think the gap between Harper’s potential and Brantley’s current production is enough to take the chance on Harper actually returning to that form. The same goes for Hoskins.
Any ideas on which players I should be trying to buy for Votto (sell low)?
10 teamer x Categories
You might be able to find someone trying to sell high on someone who got off to a hot start like a Chavis or Hunter Dozier. Or maybe if a middle-tier pitcher who also hasn’t gotten off to the best of starts like a Zack Wheeler. I’d start by tossing out some offers with the mindset that Votto will return to form soon, or at least close to it, but don’t be afraid to lower those standards if no one bites.