With the ongoing Mookie Betts splooge-fest thread, I thought I'd start a thread for Benintendi where we can analyze his 2018 performance.
In the midst of the offensive onslaught the Sox have unleashed on the league so far in 2018, Beni's contributions have seemed muted so far. Qualitatively, he doesn't seem to be barrelling up the ball and making consistent, solid contact. However, he's been walking a ton and hasn't been striking out.
So what's happening? Here are some of his stats, per Fangraphs:
Not a surprise, Beni's walk rate is way up, his k rate is stable, and his average and slugging are down. However, his BABIP is also down, so perhaps he's just been unlucky and the hits will start coming soon. But how is he hitting the ball?
It's less that Beni has been unlucky and more that he's simply making worse contact. His GB % is way up and his LD%, FB%, HR/FB% and hard contact % are way down. He's also pulling the ball a lot more than last year. The implication is that he's pulling grounders to the right side and hitting pretty weak fly balls. Considering the new focus on launch angle and hunting strikes to be aggressive, this is a bit surprising. But, the stats indicate that Beni is likely trying to do just that:
Beni is being just as selective in swinging at strikes outside the zone and he's not swinging and missing at pitches any more often. If anything, he looks more aggressive at pitches inside the strike zone and seems to be making contact at close to his normal rates. With that said, let's see how he's being pitched to:
Even though Beni's approach at the plate seems largely unchanged, the same can't be said for the pitchers facing him. When looking at the pitches he sees, the biggest difference seems to be that he's seeing far fewer curveballs and far more changeups. Is the explanation simply that he's seeing more changups and pulling too many of them as weak groundballs? If so, how does he adjust?
I'm sure others can add more sophisticated analyses to that above. I wonder, though - if Beni keeps getting on base yet struggles to hit for power, and Mookie continues to mash, does it make sense to switch them in the batting order?
[EDIT] Fixed typos.
In the midst of the offensive onslaught the Sox have unleashed on the league so far in 2018, Beni's contributions have seemed muted so far. Qualitatively, he doesn't seem to be barrelling up the ball and making consistent, solid contact. However, he's been walking a ton and hasn't been striking out.
So what's happening? Here are some of his stats, per Fangraphs:
Season | BB % | K % | BB/K | AVG | OPB | SLG | OPS | ISO | Spd | BABIP | wRC+ |
2016 | 8.5% | 21.2% | 0.40 | 0.295 | 0.359 | 0.476 | 0.835 | 0.181 | 5.2 | 0.367 | 122 |
2017 | 10.6% | 17.0% | 0.63 | 0.271 | 0.352 | 0.424 | 0.776 | 0.154 | 4.5 | 0.301 | 103 |
2018 | 16.2% | 16.2% | 1.00 | 0.232 | 0.354 | 0.378 | 0.732 | 0.146 | 8.1 | 0.273 | 100 |
Not a surprise, Beni's walk rate is way up, his k rate is stable, and his average and slugging are down. However, his BABIP is also down, so perhaps he's just been unlucky and the hits will start coming soon. But how is he hitting the ball?
Season | GB/FB | LD% | GB% | FB% | IFFB% | HR/FB% | PULL% | CENT% | OPPO % | HARD % |
2016 | 0.94 | 25.0% | 36.3% | 38.8% | 9.7% | 6.5% | 43.9% | 29.3% | 26.8% | 32.9% |
2017 | 1.04 | 21.5% | 40.1% | 38.4% | 10.1% | 11.2% | 34.3% | 37.0% | 28.7% | 34.3% |
2018 | 1.57 | 19.4% | 49.3% | 31.3% | 9.5% | 4.8% | 47.8% | 23.9% | 28.4% | 19.4% |
It's less that Beni has been unlucky and more that he's simply making worse contact. His GB % is way up and his LD%, FB%, HR/FB% and hard contact % are way down. He's also pulling the ball a lot more than last year. The implication is that he's pulling grounders to the right side and hitting pretty weak fly balls. Considering the new focus on launch angle and hunting strikes to be aggressive, this is a bit surprising. But, the stats indicate that Beni is likely trying to do just that:
Season | O-Swing % | Z-Swing % | Swing % | O-Contact % | Z-Contact % | Contact % | Zone % | F-Strike% | Sw-Str% |
2016 | 25.2% | 62.9% | 42.7% | 71.9% | 87.8% | 82.8% | 46.5% | 61.9% | 7.4% |
2017 | 29.0% | 64.5% | 44.0% | 71.2% | 89.4% | 82.5% | 42.2% | 54.7% | 7.6% |
2018 | 28.6% | 69.5% | 45.3% | 73.5% | 88.6% | 83.0% | 40.8% | 57.6% | 7.7% |
Beni is being just as selective in swinging at strikes outside the zone and he's not swinging and missing at pitches any more often. If anything, he looks more aggressive at pitches inside the strike zone and seems to be making contact at close to his normal rates. With that said, let's see how he's being pitched to:
Season | FB % | SL% | CT% | CB% | CH% | SF% |
2016 | 54.3% (92.6) | 15.8% (83.6) | 9.1% (87.8) | 7.8% (78.3) | 11.6% (83.6) | 1.5% (86.3) |
2017 | 54.3% (92.9) | 11.8% (84.0) | 6.4% (88.9) | 10.9% (79.2) | 13.7% (85.0) | 2.8% (84.7) |
2018 | 51.7% (92.3) | 11.7% (82.4) | 7.7% (87.2) | 5.2% (78.4) | 21.1% (84.6) | 2.5% (82.5) |
Even though Beni's approach at the plate seems largely unchanged, the same can't be said for the pitchers facing him. When looking at the pitches he sees, the biggest difference seems to be that he's seeing far fewer curveballs and far more changeups. Is the explanation simply that he's seeing more changups and pulling too many of them as weak groundballs? If so, how does he adjust?
I'm sure others can add more sophisticated analyses to that above. I wonder, though - if Beni keeps getting on base yet struggles to hit for power, and Mookie continues to mash, does it make sense to switch them in the batting order?
[EDIT] Fixed typos.