Bradley: Deal with It.
- Thread starter shaggydog2000
- Start date
http://m.redsox.mlb.com/bos/video/v387360483/clebos-bradley-jr-connects-for-a-threerun-homer/?team_id=111
Someone can GIF this and a bunch of other stuff from this game, but there is his dinger.
A lot of times, guys can go on big tears because they have fixed a hole in their swing and pitchers haven't adapted. JBJ has hit a bunch of balls this month based on the fact that pitchers are still busting him inside, aiming for a hole that he has closed up.
This is even better, a bomb off a decent fastball, on the outside corner, that he crushed.
Someone can GIF this and a bunch of other stuff from this game, but there is his dinger.
A lot of times, guys can go on big tears because they have fixed a hole in their swing and pitchers haven't adapted. JBJ has hit a bunch of balls this month based on the fact that pitchers are still busting him inside, aiming for a hole that he has closed up.
This is even better, a bomb off a decent fastball, on the outside corner, that he crushed.
Pilgrim said:
I was defining it as since August 6, when his OPS bottomed out. He *really* got going a few games later.
edited to add: As for the contact rate being disappointing, he's not facing Corey Kluber and Chris Sale down in the IL.
Another statistical thing with Bradley is that he'd been showing a really pronounced reverse split (in TINY samples), so it was good to see him hit some balls deep off a right hander in Kluber.
Pilgrim said:
Not to go overboard, but it was even better than that. Kluber starts him off with three pitches located within an inch or two of each other on the outside corner - two FB and then a curve. It's now 1-2 and Kluber JUST misses with another CB on the bottom inside corner. That could have been strike 3 for a more anxious JBJ. So it's 2-2 and he's clearly now looking for Kluber to go back to the FB on the outside part of the plate. It wasn't a mistake pitch - Kluber hit exactly where Santana set up. JBJ was looking for it and went with it for power. Really encouraging.
This is interesting -- JBJ was still using the toe tap as recently as July in AAA:
http://www.milb.com/multimedia/vpp.jsp?content_id=285007983&sid=milb
I wonder what/who prompted the change once he was recalled to the majors. If Bradley has finally settled on the "right" mechanics, and only just recently, then maybe he can be even better than what he's shown in the minors to date (.853 OPS this year). Or maybe this is all some random, mostly unsustainable hot streak like his 2013 spring training. I sure hope not.
http://www.milb.com/multimedia/vpp.jsp?content_id=285007983&sid=milb
I wonder what/who prompted the change once he was recalled to the majors. If Bradley has finally settled on the "right" mechanics, and only just recently, then maybe he can be even better than what he's shown in the minors to date (.853 OPS this year). Or maybe this is all some random, mostly unsustainable hot streak like his 2013 spring training. I sure hope not.
In the games leading up to that I recall him having a lot of good at-bats with bad outcomes. You could probably go back to his callup and find more evidence that things had changed, even if the real production didn't start till later.nvalvo said:
Here's the catch, hopefully I did it right
http://m.redsox.mlb.com/bos/video/topic/8878860/v387146983/cle-bos-bradley-jr-jumps-makes-great-grab-at-track
Sorry about the small ad at the beginning, I'm not that smart.
Love Dombrowski with the "WOW" after the play happens...DO NOT TRADE THIS MAN
http://m.redsox.mlb.com/bos/video/topic/8878860/v387146983/cle-bos-bradley-jr-jumps-makes-great-grab-at-track
Sorry about the small ad at the beginning, I'm not that smart.
Love Dombrowski with the "WOW" after the play happens...DO NOT TRADE THIS MAN
On my MBP Retina, SOY's link produced a sharp HD video when I made it fullscreen. Rev's embedded video produced a blurry one.
If the toe tap was indeed the change that made the difference, he should hopefully be considered untouchable now.
threecy said:
Players change their batting stance/motion all the time. Sometimes things get better, sometimes things get worse, sometimes things stay the same. The player will always credit the change, but most of the time it's just chance. How many times have we seen a mediocre player have a good week, explain how he changed his stance, and then promptly regress back to his career mediocrity even with the new stance? Most of it is just superstition.
Sometimes, a change may actually fix something. There's always Bautista. But outside of Bautista, there aren't many examples of long-term improvements from changes in the majors. (Changes in the minors are much more likely to be fixing a fundamental issue than changes in the majors, of course.)
That's not to say changing a stance is always pointless. If it boosts a player's confidence, or makes him feel like he can be more (or less) aggressive, the psychological impact could well be huge.
So I wouldn't put much stock in Bradley's stance change being the cause of his recent breakout. More likely, this is a talented kid, who is capable of hitting major-league batting, having a run of good luck that's offsetting the run of bad luck he had earlier. He's not going to OPS 1.500 for his career, but he's not going to OPS .400 either. But his minor-league numbers are perfectly consistent with him being an .800-ish batter going forward.
You have to love the story and we all want to see him succeed. My only concern is whether he can maintain the approach. How will he react when his numbers decline or he scuffles? It's going to happen as pitchers adjust, etc. With so much up and down, so many adjustments along he way -- fairly significant ones -- what will happen? How about over the offseason with gaps in play time?
It's an awesome ride and I hope he has figured something out and can become that .750ish (+) OPS guy that would make him a fixture in CF.
Of course... that may be for another team.
It's an awesome ride and I hope he has figured something out and can become that .750ish (+) OPS guy that would make him a fixture in CF.
Of course... that may be for another team.
Madmartigan said:
Well, JBJ made an inside-joke shout out to Eck on Twitter pointing out what he "couldn't do" that was taken by some here as a dig at Eck's in-game commentary. Then he made a noticeable change to his hitting mechanics under assistant hitting coach Victor Rodriguez.
I am of the opinion, however unsubstantiated it may be, that whatever Eck told JBJ he "couldn't do" as a hitter against MLB pitchers actually happened off-camera. Then whatever was said finally spurred JBJ into seeking out help from a coach, one he could trust: the old Minor League hitting coordinator from his days of success in Salem and Portland, rather than a new face.
Why JBJ didn't make the change last season or earlier this season, who knows? However, although it's again without direct proof, I don't think it's any coincidence that his insane hot streak at the plate started 8/11, and has coincided exactly with John Farrell being away from the team since 8/9.
There is enough evidence from media reports since last season, that suggests those two have had a bad relationship since Grady Sizemore was on the team.
Pilgrim said:
Yup, and in the current hitting environment, that 22.8 mark isn't terrible, just fringey.
If he can sustain that K rate, but raise his BB rate permanently to, say, 11%, sustain a BABIP around .290, and put up an XBH line of 30/5/15, then he's a .700 (.235/.320/.380) OPS hitter. That's not exactly exciting, but it's the kind of offense I think most of us would agree makes him a viable starter with his defense.
If he can get the K rate down to 20%, and the walk rate up to 12%, then his OPS gets up into the .725 range, and clearly at that point he's a useful CF. Add a few more XBH and it's up to .735-.740.
It remains to be seen where he ends up when the dust settles from the recent tear. But really, he has always had three things he needed to do to get over the ML hump offensively: bring the K rate down under 25%; get the BB rate up over 10%; and get the ISO up into the .150+ range. These are all things he should be able to do, and now it looks like he may have figured out how to do them. Good times.
To those who don't want to trade him, I ask what do you expect our OF to be next year? We have no real evidence that the Red Sox are really considering moving Hanley to 1B, and I'd say for better or worse Castillo and Hanley have locked in the corner OF spots with Mookie at cF.
I have a feeling all this hot streak is doing is increasing his trade value this offseason....
I have a feeling all this hot streak is doing is increasing his trade value this offseason....
NDame616 said:
I expect Hanley to be traded in the offseason, perhaps as Dombrowski's very first move to build a better team. But if Hanley's still on the team, then I see him moving to 3B after Sandoval is traded instead.
There's no chance that the Sox go into next season with both players on the roster.
I think there are two viable options. First is that JBJ would start the year as the 4th outfielder. People get hurt, people need time off, etc, and he could be a real asset there and still get plenty of playing time.NDame616 said:
The other option, as unsettling as it may be, is that Mookie could be the centerpiece of a blockbuster trade. Mookie is the kind of talent that could land you Chris Sale or Matt Harvey.
Why trade Betts if you can find a taker for Pedroia, and just put Betts at his real position and keep Bradley up the middle? Or is Pedroia untradeable?Bob Montgomery's Helmet Hat said:
Again, you don't trade Betts just to unclog a logjam. You trade him because he's the kind of talent that could land you a Sale or Harvey.The X Man Cometh said:
The X Man Cometh said:
Perhaps because Betts is the piece that will get the team what it wants (if it is a Harvey/Sale type) and Pedroia wouldn't?
Whether the ownership/FO is willing to move Pedroia or not is irrelevant, at least in a discussion like this. The question is whether a 32-year-old second baseman, signed long-term and with a tendency to get banged up quite often, is a valuable trade chip or not.
Not for nothing, but I wish JBJ all the success in the world. His is a tremendous, down to earth guy and a genuinely good person.
Its all the more reason I am very excited to see him have success at the major league level because baseball is a better place when he is playing outfield (especially for the Sox). All that being said, any suggestion of trading Betts is downright crazy.
Its all the more reason I am very excited to see him have success at the major league level because baseball is a better place when he is playing outfield (especially for the Sox). All that being said, any suggestion of trading Betts is downright crazy.
I understand in a sense why people obsess with the K-rate, but I feel like a lot of projections are made based on k-rate that assume a pretty simple input/output relationship which I don't think actually exists. People seem to want to apply the same types of combination of component/rate stats to pitchers and hitters in similar fashion and frankly that doesn't work either.
As an example, if a batter strikes out more because they are actually becoming more selective and making less weak contact, they can improve their output while this input goes up. Whereas a pitcher hardly ever gets worse as their k-rate goes up, at least in the long run. This is because batters have a lot more control over their BABIP than pitchers do. And it's why all advanced metrics like SIERA and FIP include k rate for pitchers while advanced metrics for hitters do not distinguish the type of out.
Anyway, here is k-rate vs. wOBA for the top 20 k-rates in the league this year for hitters. There is literally no relationship here. Of course there is a selection bias as this only includes qualifying players which means there are a bunch of scrubs with high k-rates who don't merit playing time, but those data points obfuscate the data as much as clarify it, so I'll accept the bias.
As an example, if a batter strikes out more because they are actually becoming more selective and making less weak contact, they can improve their output while this input goes up. Whereas a pitcher hardly ever gets worse as their k-rate goes up, at least in the long run. This is because batters have a lot more control over their BABIP than pitchers do. And it's why all advanced metrics like SIERA and FIP include k rate for pitchers while advanced metrics for hitters do not distinguish the type of out.
Anyway, here is k-rate vs. wOBA for the top 20 k-rates in the league this year for hitters. There is literally no relationship here. Of course there is a selection bias as this only includes qualifying players which means there are a bunch of scrubs with high k-rates who don't merit playing time, but those data points obfuscate the data as much as clarify it, so I'll accept the bias.
Red(s)HawksFan said:
I guess I'd rather have the 22 year old star at a key defensive position, who is a non-Boras client for that matter, than trade him and his surplus value for the privilege to keep the 32 year old.
If you're going to spend inefficiently, why not do it directly on a pitcher in real dollars, rather than indirectly in the form of Betts' surplus value?
To follow on with this, there's typically 100 games or more for OF not in the top three, so having four good OF isn't a problem, it's a necessity. (Whether they in fact would have four good OF, and whether Hanley is really an OF at all, is another matter)Bob Montgomery's Helmet Hat said:
Ugh, I would hate this so much. Betts is already arguably the best player on the team (1st in bWAR with 4.1; Holt is #2 at 3.2) and he doesn't turn 23 until October. You have to give up something to get something, but giving up your best player when he is super-young and cost-controlled strikes me as taking two steps backward to take one step forward.Bob Montgomery's Helmet Hat said:
The X Man Cometh said:
I think you misunderstand. It's not about keeping Pedroia over Betts in this instance. It's about the fact that Pedroia has a fraction of the trade value that Betts does, and if the idea is to trade for a young, cost-controlled ace-type pitcher such as Harvey or Sale, Betts is the piece that could get the deal done. Pedroia wouldn't.
Red(s)HawksFan said:
Yes, but Betts has easily been the best all around player on this team. At ages 21 and 22 he's now had a full seasons worth of ABs proving he can hit at the major league level. So now we'll trade 5 years of his prime + prospects for Sale, whose left arm looks like it could literally fly into the stands with any pitch? Based on what, 60 plate appearances by Bradley?
Yeah, it would be tough to swallow. My point is simply that there aren't many young, elite, cost-controlled pitchers around, and if one became available, Mookie is the type of talent who could land one. And JBJ being legit could make the Sox, at least, think about it.Super Nomario said:
ehaz said:
I'm not advocating trading Betts at all. I'm just countering the notion that they should trade Pedroia instead.
I'm not down with trading a young potential star hitter for a pitcher due to the high risk of injury.Red(s)HawksFan said:
I'm starting to think you just go into next year assuming Betts and Bradley are going to man the left side of the field and enjoy zero balls falling in. If Bradley is still a historically bad hitter, you just shift Betts back to center.
I know that being Boston fans we simply consider left field a lower end postion, but having a left fielder with center field range is a good thing. There is nothing wrong with shifting Betts there, he isn't going to suddenly lose the ability to play center. Remember how annoying it was to play Carl Crawford in his prime?
I want hitters to get frustrated, and Betts and Bradley roaming more than 2/3's of the outfield is gonna make dudes lose some hair.
I know that being Boston fans we simply consider left field a lower end postion, but having a left fielder with center field range is a good thing. There is nothing wrong with shifting Betts there, he isn't going to suddenly lose the ability to play center. Remember how annoying it was to play Carl Crawford in his prime?
I want hitters to get frustrated, and Betts and Bradley roaming more than 2/3's of the outfield is gonna make dudes lose some hair.
The biggest obstacle is trying to make use of Hanley Ramirez, but it sounds like they will do what they can to not have to worry about him next year.
The next this is whether you can extract better value to the team by trading a CF to a team that needs one while finding a corner OF for a lower price elsewhere. Or, trying to find a JD Martinez type who is a decent but not able to play CF type OF with a better bat. etc.
Either of these things are hard to do, of course. And for now probably better off sticking with keeping what they have going into the year.
The next this is whether you can extract better value to the team by trading a CF to a team that needs one while finding a corner OF for a lower price elsewhere. Or, trying to find a JD Martinez type who is a decent but not able to play CF type OF with a better bat. etc.
Either of these things are hard to do, of course. And for now probably better off sticking with keeping what they have going into the year.
This is more than just a change in stance. His entire motion was a problem due in large part to the extra toe tap. I think it also could explain why he could hit at lower levels, but with MLB scouting and pitching, he was about as bad as could be. Just by virtue of timing alone, the toe tap had him already committed before the pitch was delivered, and for no productive reason. It also appeared to rob him of power, as his lower body drive was messed up from it.iayork said:
Sound mechanics can go a very long way. If they can keep him from reverting to bad habits, he could well be a good MLB hitter, which is huge when including his elite defensive skills.
Right, it's almost writing on the wall that Hanley is going to be moved. I mean, it's actually pretty amazing how candid DD is being about it. I think if you can procure value from Bradley then you do it, but I don't think he's going to fetch more than his actual value. I don't think you can trade Bett's unless its something really really special, and i just don't see it happening.smastroyin said:
But saying that there is no relationship between K rate and wOBA among different hitters, and saying that an individual hitter would not be likely to change his wOBA by changing his K rate, are two different things, no?smastroyin said:
K rate correlates more or less randomly with wOBA because it's only one of several components that may not be entirely independent, but don't correlate consistently either. For instance, among the current top 10 in MLB K rate there are ISOs ranging from .128 to .288, BB rates ranging from 5.2% to 16.3%, and BABIPs ranging from .225 to .357. As a result, it's not surprising that the wOBAs are also all over the map (.283 to .384).
But if any individual hitter reduces his K rate from, say, 28% to 23%, should we assume that other components of his offense will deteriorate proportionally, leaving his wRC+ unchanged? It's possible, of course, but is there any reason to assume it as a default? It seems counterintuitive.
SouthernBoSox said:
DDski's clearly visible "wow" after Bradley somehow pulled in Lindor's easy 1st-inning 2B (and likely more, depending on the carom), when combined with JBJ's depressed trade valuation due to his horrific batting line from last season, leads me to conclude he won't be traded this winter.
He's too magnificent a fielder to be just a throw-in to a bigger deal. But even if he continues to show the current pop that goes oppo over the Monster and sends Chisenhall to the bullpen wall, he'll still have last year's failure as an albatross hanging around his neck. So he can't realistically be a centerpiece to bring back value either, the way the other three OF options might.
My take on DDski's comments is that he's letting it be known to Hanley that he can either return to the infield, or he'll be sent to another team. Maybe both.
Because he walks a fair bit, JBJ can survive with a K rate over 20%. Assuming he keeps that K rate in the 20-22% and has a normal ~.300 BABIP, he can be a solid hitter in the range of .250/.330/.400. He's not going to sustain an ISO north of .200, but I think his minor league numbers suggest a doubles-heavy .150 ISO is definitely possible. In today's game, a .730 OPS is roughly league-average production. Basically, Lorenzo Cain before he broke out with the bat, and Cain at that point (2012) was a ~3 win player if he had a full-time role. 2014 Juan Lagares was similar to that as well, and he was worth 4 wins in 450 PAs.
Buzzkill Pauley said:
Much as DD may love JBJ, he sits in a position of depth for this team. What it may mean is that DD could be more willing to trade one of him, Betts and Castillo in tandem with one of Swihart/Vazquez in order to reel in some frontline pitching.
The X Man Cometh said:
Should we pin the "Pedroia has a full no-trade clause" link at this point, or is Bradford's article inaccurate?
I still dont get why the Sox would trade anything of value for frontline pitching when you have three top starters hitting FA this offseason. I keep seeing that bandied about and it makes zero sense to me.jscola85 said:
Enjoy you OF depth that is cost controlled, clear salary by trading one of Hanley or Panda if you must. But trading any one of JBJ, Betts or Castillo at this point is crazy. You've got three pieces to one of the best outfields possible right now, and if the bats come around thats gravy.
As these guys have played better the offense has been much improved as well. This OF doesn't need the classic "hide a big bat at LF" type, even though thats what we're accustomed to.
Trlicek's Whip said:
Is this true? Cot's has "limited no-trade protection" and I've seen or read more than once that his NTC kicks in at the end of 2016. Or is it limited UNTIL then and then full going forward?
At the end of 2016 he's a 5/10 guy - but he has full protection now which was likely granted because he signed such a team friendly deal. The only way Pedroia is being traded is if he goes into Dombrowski's office and asks to be traded. Y'all need to just stop w/ that silliness.
Savin Hillbilly said:
Yes, and I understand what you are trying to do. I just don't think it's appropriate to say "Here we have a guy with a 28% K-rate, 9% BB-rate, .290 BABIP, .100 ISO and now if we just change the one input, this is what happens" other than as a fun thing to do, because I don't think it's an appropriate assumption that the other inputs stay constant.
I realize it is not you necessarily saying this, but I still take a lot of umbrage to the idea that a high K rate hitter can't ever succeed (So I apologize if I took your post to leap off and make that point, but a few people before you were talking about his k-rate as if it is the greatest predictor of his success). This, again, is usually associated with the idea that nothing else will change. So yes, a high K, low BB, low ISO player is probably going to be bad, but players have other ways of improving than simply reducing K's.
Well, someone might argue that you might be looking at ceiling effect for the relationship between K-rate and wOBA. It probably would have made more sense to simply include all qualified players, instead of just the 20 with the worst K-rates. Of course, your claim is still accurate; the proportion of variance in wOBA explained by K-rate is about half a percent across all qualified MLB hitters. By way of comparison, BABIP explains about 17 percent of the variance in wOBA.smastroyin said:I understand in a sense why people obsess with the K-rate, but I feel like a lot of projections are made based on k-rate that assume a pretty simple input/output relationship which I don't think actually exists. People seem to want to apply the same types of combination of component/rate stats to pitchers and hitters in similar fashion and frankly that doesn't work either.
As an example, if a batter strikes out more because they are actually becoming more selective and making less weak contact, they can improve their output while this input goes up. Whereas a pitcher hardly ever gets worse as their k-rate goes up, at least in the long run. This is because batters have a lot more control over their BABIP than pitchers do. And it's why all advanced metrics like SIERA and FIP include k rate for pitchers while advanced metrics for hitters do not distinguish the type of out.
Anyway, here is k-rate vs. wOBA for the top 20 k-rates in the league this year for hitters. There is literally no relationship here. Of course there is a selection bias as this only includes qualifying players which means there are a bunch of scrubs with high k-rates who don't merit playing time, but those data points obfuscate the data as much as clarify it, so I'll accept the bias.
BB-rate explains about ~30 percent of variance.
As Smas states (bolded above), I also suspect that the reason for the low relationship has to do with the fact that K-rate may reflect the strategy of the hitter. Hitters that make stronger contact are also going to get more strikes. FG's %hard (whatever that means) explains about 21 percent of the variance in K-rate.
Again this is all in a collection of 156 hitters, so take this with a pound of salt please.
Although linear analysis is used to identify components underlying a composite score of hitting, it is important to keep in mind that these things do not operate linearly. Changing one's K-rate may be an indication that the strategy has changed; however, the effect on wOBA will likely not be caused nor even predicted by the K-rate change.Savin Hillbilly said:
For example, a hitter may adopt a more aggressive strategy, which leads to more pop-ups and soft ground balls in turn this could also drive his K-rate up. A separate player may adopt a more selective strategy, letting strikeouts occur but waiting for pitches that can be hit. Such a player may have a higher K-rate, but also geneate more extra base hits, more walks, and more home runs.
In both cases the K-rate increased, but for completely different reasons.
timlinin8th said:
The reason the Sox would trade for pitching, rather than sign FA is the luxury tax..(CBT) Exceed the salary cap for more than 3 years in a row, and you're assessed a 50% penalty for all salaries above the cap limit. Simple as that.
Moving H. Ramirez and/or Sandoval, won't give you much cap relief if you have to pick up a good part of their salaries. So, it makes all the sense in the world to deal away part of your surplus of 3 outfielders that can play center field.
I truly believe the way that the situation plays out is that they will trade either Hanley or Panda and the other one plays 3B. JBJ, Betts, and Rusney will be the starting OF in 16.
shoebox91 said:
That would be the ideal situation, but I have a hard time finding trading partners without paying a huge part of their salary. If the consensus is that Ramirez is now a full-time DH, I'd estimate that the Sox would have to pick up 40% of the $66 million guaranteed. Sandoval might be an easier trade, but I'd estimate at least a third of his contract ($78 mil, after this year) would have to be subsidized.
After the 2005 season the Sox moved Edgar Renteria to the Braves for stalled (but still highly rated) prospect Andy Marte, They also picked up 30% of the remaining $26 million owed Renteria, plus, were committed to paying $3 mil of his buyout for his option year.
In 2005, Renteria did have both an offensive and defensive slump, and also like Panda, was in his late 20s. Of course, Edgar didn't have the weight issue, although there were rumors about back issues.
Moving either would be a tall order for Dombrowski, and I suspect that if he does move either, without huge subsidy, he'll be getting back an equally bad contract for an underachiever.
Who Plays 1B in this situation? I love what Shaw's done so far, but I'm not sure you can go with him as a starting 1b in 2016. I think that unless you can either move Hanley or Panda and clear a ton of salary in the situation or if Hanley is vehemently opposed to returning to the IF you have to go with whatever Hanley/Panda combo at the corners you think is better defensively.shoebox91 said:
WenZink said:
Depends - they're both functional players, just with large contracts. For example, I'd imagine someone would take Sandoval at 1/2 his salary, plus a fringy prospect, if the Sox were all that much worried about the luxury tax. We'd end up with a hole at 3b though.
I think we're equally likely to see pitching for pitching trades. Clay, Porcello, Rodriguez, Wright, Owens, Kelly, Barnes, Miley, Johnson, Escobar (doing very well in his post-asb return). Someone has to go, especially if we trade for pitching.