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How does Burleson’s strikeout rate stack up on the team?
I’m not going to do any more work/research for you–everyone can see you operate in bad faith and will just blithely ignore the research, analysis, and data provided by others if they don’t confirm whatever it is you want to believe. You’re welcome to look up your own stats and actually do some honest research to support (or, even better, falsify) your own views–I think you’ll find if you take it upon yourself to support your claims with evidence/analysis/data and actually engage with other posters and their substantive arguments in good faith, you will get a much better response.
Sometimes, you just have to trust your eyes. I see too many bad swings, resulting in strikeouts, from some hitters when they have two strikes. Ex. Gorman, Goldschmidt, Arenado and Walker. Not so much from Donovan and Burleson.
So once again, completely ignore the mountains of directly-on-point research and data provided by other posters and just take your word for it, even though you have absolutely no evidence to support your view whatsoever. More constructive, good faith, give-and-take “baseball talk” . . .
And before anyone asks, I didn’t do 2024 because the overall sample size is incredibly small, making the splits even more microscopic. These stats are pretty meaningless at this juncture. But if you’re curious, a summary view:
2024 With 2-Strikes (sOPS+)
Donovan: 244
Winn: 189
Contreras: 188
Arenado: 143
Gorman: 94
Herrera: 60
Walker: 40
Burleson: 26
Goldschmidt:4Again, I wouldn’t put any weight in those numbers, but they do go to show that even if one were to limit the discussion to the tiny 2024 sample, Shady’s assertion that Burleson somehow “competes” better than “some of the players [who] seem to go down feebly, too often, when they have two strikes” is baseless (although at least technically you could say that Burleson has “competed” better with 2 strikes than exactly one regular thus far).
Shady wrote:
I like the way Donovan, Nootbaar and Burleson compete when they have two strikes on them. Some of the players seem to go down feebly, too often, when they have two strikes.
*Sigh* Another fact-free attempt to smuggle Burleson into a grouping/designation to which he plainly doesn’t belong.
With 2-Strikes (2023)
Nootbaar: .181/.303/.312/.615; 57 tOPS+; 136 sOPS+
Donovan: .173/.275/.276/.551; 41 tOPS+; 112 sOPS+
Burleson: .168/.248/.219/.467; 39 tOPS+; 80 sOPS+Some other regulars, for comparison/context:
Walker: .190/.272/.340/.612; 56 tOPS+; 134 sOPS+
Goldschmidt: .189/.281/.307/.588; 46 tOPS+; 125 sOPS+
Contreras: .183/.270/.309/.579; 42 tOPS+; 122 sOPS+
Gorman: .149/.249/.324/.573; 44 tOPS+; 119 sOPS+
Carlson: .178/.285/.263/.547; 69 tOPS+; 111 sOPS+
Arenado: .196/.239/.303/.542; 42 tOPS+; 107 sOPS+
Edman: .178/.248/.238/.485; 40 tOPS+; 87 sOPS+Who are these unnamed players who “seem to go down feebly, too often, when they have two strikes?” Name some names. Because the actual numbers say every regular on the Cardinals roster hit better with 2 strikes than Burleson, including Tommy Edman. Burleson was 20% worse than league average with 2 strikes–if that’s “good,” what does “bad” look like?
Note:
tOPS+: OPS for split relative to player’s overall OPS (less than 100 equals worse performance in split than overall)
sOPS+: OPS for split relative to MLB Average OPS for split (less than 100 equal worse than MLB average in split)It’s almost as if players have different track records and decisions aren’t being made based on a relatively minuscule sample of PAs . . .
RBK, hold on! I expressed my concern for the way Burleson started out the season. Your wires are crossed on yjisw.. So, why not acknowlege the progress he was making?
No, you’re trying to have it both ways (again). For weeks, you said no one should put any credence in Burleson’s statistics (in 441 PAs) because it was way too early to draw any conclusions. Then, Burleson has a couple of good games, and suddenly you’re back on here cherry-picking 7 PAs and conclusively stating they’re evidence of “progress” and that he’s a “hot hitter.”
It’s a straightforward question: When you tell everyone it’s too early to draw any conclusions based on 441 PAs, why is it OK (or remotely reasonable) for you to draw any conclusions based on 7 PAs?
Shady wrote: “RBK, sometimes a team needs to “ride the hot hitters” at the time. Same with Herrera. When Nootbaar came back, against the RHP for Arizona. Noot should have been in CF, Burleson in RF and Herrera either DH or catcher. Vice versa with Contreras.”
So once again, for weeks you told everyone on here to completely disregard Burleson’s stats and data (over 441 PAs) because you said it was too early to draw any conclusions. But now you’re fine drawing conclusions (at least the ones you already desperately want to believe) and making decisions based on 7 PAs???
RBK, sometimes a team needs to “ride the hot hitters” at the time. Same with Herrera. When Nootbaar came back, against the RHP for Arizona. Noot should have been in CF, Burleson in RF and Herrera either DH or catcher. Vice versa with Contreras.
A whopping 2 games and 7 PAs qualify someone as a “hot hitter?” So by that same logic, when Burleson was 3 for his last 19 going into those 2 games against the Phillies, he shouldn’t even have been playing at all because at that time he was a “cold hitter,” right? Your argument is nonsense.
I hate to break this to you, but professional baseball organizations don’t run themselves like every day is an open tryout, and they don’t radically alter their views based on a handful of ABs.
AdM, that’s ridiculous. Check out what he did against the Phillies right before Nootbaar was called up. I saw a pattern of productive hitting. Do you disagree?
For weeks: “Disregard all the stats and data on Burleson (442 PAs), it’s way too early to draw any conclusions.”
Now: “Check out the stats from Burleson’s whopping two good games against the Phillies (7 PAs), time to draw some conclusions!”
He was pretty consistently below-average throughout, but he wasn’t the kind of liability someone like Ramirez was.
Holliday OF Defensive Metrics (DRS/UZR/OAA)
2010: 5/7.3
2011: -2/1.7
2012: -6/-2.8
2013: -14/-6.3
2014: -3/-5.6
2015: -6/-1.7
2016: -8/-4.3/-7In other words, below average, but not catastrophically bad to the point that it destroyed his overall value given his offensive production (138 OPS+).
A less extreme example would be someone like a Matt Holliday during his Cardinals tenure: below average fielder according to pretty much every metric, but enough offensive production (138 OPS+) to more than make up for it.
It’s all about tradeoffs. There is always some level of offensive productivity that can more than compensate for subpar defense. But with Cardinals, most of the guys who are bad defenders don’t have the kind of bats that meet that bar. And of course, the tradeoff is on a sliding scale: the worse the defense, the better the offense has to be to justify playing time.
No doubt expectations were higher for Carlson. And objectively he has been disappointing the last two seasons. There’s still time, but the clock is definitely ticking. All that said, he’s still a better player than Burleson, and they’re the same age.
And since we’re at it:
Carlson: .243/.322/.394/.717. 99 OPS+, 99 wRC+
Burleson: .239/.295/.368/.663. 82 OPS+, 83 wRC+Maybe you should stick to comparing Burleson to Carlson as a hitter–at least he has a shot at catching Dylan. Of course, there’s still that pesky fielding thing to have to deal with . . .
RBK, i feel you are wrong on that. We’ve seen some fine hitting from Burleson recently. Let’s see if Noot is a proficient before making a wild claim like that.
What you “feel” is entirely subjective and irrelevant. More importantly, what is your supporting evidence? What are the facts? Let me help you out . . .
The FACTS are these:
Nootbaar: .246/.351/.429/.780. 116 OPS+, 117 wRC+
Burleson: .239/.295/.368/.663. 82 OPS+, 83 wRC+(And that’s not factoring in defense.)
Nootbaar has produced that hitting line in just a little less than 2 full seasons in MLB. That’s a 41% difference in offensive productivity. And you say “let’s see if Noot is proficient before making a wild claim like that???” More like let’s see if Burleson is proficient at anything. I mean, in the words of John McEnroe, you cannot be serious.
Burleson isn’t even in the same area code as Nootbaar as a hitter at this point in their careers. How about we wait until Burleson actually makes it to a 100 OPS+ (i.e., an average MLB hitter) before we start making any comparisons?
He has to be like a Manny…
Well, he doesn’t have to be that good offensively (career 154 OPS+), but yeah, you get the point . . .
Among current players, Nick Castellanos comes to mind. Annually one of the worst outfielders defensively, he still continues to get big contracts and play in the field because of his bat. With Schwarber also on the team, DH is blocked.
But set aside the (bad) contract and look at the actual production:
9 full seasons
113 wRC+
-112 DRS
-75 UZR
-76 OAA (only tracked for last 6 full seasons)
13.9 total fWAR, or 1.54 fWAR/yr.Not only is he not worth $20mm/yr, he’s not even an average MLB starter. But has a career 112 OPS+. To my prior post, a bat-only player has to hit much better than that to justify his existence.
I am not opposed to young higher ceiling players but if they can’t play defense then their ceiling is going to be limited.
Any bat-only player has to have an exceptional bat simply to justify regular playing time. And by exceptional, I mean at least a 115-120 OPS+, but probably even higher. One-dimensional guys like Vogelbach, Tellez, and Choi, who have reached the 115-120 OPS+ level in recent years, aren’t regulars, and they don’t generate a lot of value. Even in the years Matt Stairs was a regular, his OPS+ was >130. Burleson has a lot of work to do just to get to 100 OPS+ (league average).
Hard to absolve Montgomery of responsibility in this: players hire Boras for a reason, usually when they believe they have unusual/peak leverage entering FA and want Boras’s particular approach to extracting the absolute maximum surplus from bidders. Of course, that a particular strategy may be optimal across a portfolio of clients is of little consolation to the client who doesn’t end up winning big.
*Sigh* We’ve already covered this ground several times before–a low K% in the abstract isn’t very informative without greater context as to how a player is achieving it and what he is giving up (trading off) elsewhere in his game. A low K% with a low BB% and low OBP isn’t impressive, but a low K% with a high BB% and OBP is. One is not like the other. Yadier Molina had a career 10.8% K-rate–was he a “fabulous” hitter, in your parlance? The objective of the game is to maximize production and minimize outs; it is not to minimize one particular type of out at the expense of everything else.
Other than the fact they both bat left-handed, Burleson and Donovan have almost nothing in common as hitters.
I suppose if one strained to find a similarity, one could say that neither hits for a lot of power–of course, the problem there is one is a versatile utility infielder and the other is a bat-only DH.
Right call or not, players are taught to always turn right on a bang-bang play at 1B for precisely that reason (unless the runner knows with certainty that a throw is past the first baseman and he should try to advance).
Thompson racking up the innings and K’s
Where did his FB velocity go? He’s down almost 3.5 MPH from last year, barely averaging 90 MPH. Worth monitoring as this is now a multi-game trend.
