Extreme Makeover: The Jarren Duran Edition

ookami7m

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I mean he's still in contact with the base, so I'd imagine he's impossible to tag out at that point.
 

soxhop411

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Ok. This got a good chuckle out of me

MINNEAPOLIS — Jarren Duran’s productive night at the plate turned into a costly one for one of his most veteran teammates.


Duran broke two bats in Boston’s 9-3 win over the Twins in the series opener at Target Field on his way to a 3-for-3 night with three doubles and two RBIs. The bats weren’t his, however. They belonged to designated hitter/first baseman Justin Turner, who has been lending some hardwood to the young outfielder in recent days.



“Every time I broke a bat it was like going to disappointed father,” Duran said. “Every time, I’d look in the dugout. After the second one, he was standing on the end of the rail holding his whole bat bag shaking it at me. I was like, ‘Oh God, maybe I’ll stay on second for this so I don’t have to go and see him.’”
Duran recently picked up one of Turner’s bats during a batting cage session and liked how he felt with it, so he has been borrowing from Turner for the last few days. With six games left on Boston’s road trip, Duran might have to slow down his bat consumption.



“My dad texted me and said ‘You broke four bats,’” Duran said. “I was like, ‘No, I only broke two.’ I’m not sure where the announcers were getting four from. I only broke two, thank God. J.T. is supplying the wood right now so I’ll have to buy him some wood for that.”
https://www.masslive.com/redsox/2023/06/red-soxs-jarren-duran-breaks-teammates-bats-calls-him-disappointed-dad.html
 

Sandy Leon Trotsky

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Nice story. Don’t know much about the unwritten rules of baseball, but having the most tenured slugger on the team let a young pup use his bats (I started to write ‘lend’ but he’s not getting them back :) )seems pretty cool.
A little wood glue, some clamps…. Sand it back down and bam!
 

The Gray Eagle

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Sounds like Duran is more comfortable with the veterans this year and they are helping him out. Turner with the bats and also from the article, Story talking baserunning.

A conversation with injured teammate Trevor Story got him thinking about taking the extra base more often this season. Duran said he tries to put pressure on opposing outfielders knowing that even if they make a perfect throw, he still will likely have time to turn and get back to first base.
And it's good to see him breaking out of that slump he was in for several weeks. Seems like he is a streaky hitter, which isn't so bad as long as he has enough hot streaks by the end of the season.
Duran has hit .478 (11-for-23) with five doubles, four RBIs and a 1.234 OPS in his last 10 games.
 

Petagine in a Bottle

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He’s been a 1.5 fWAR player this year so far, 2nd on the team behind Verdugo’s 2.4. Two guys who I think many would have been fine with moving on from this past offseason- pretty remarkable.
 

Fishy1

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With the three hits yesterday, Duran's BABIP is .411. That's, uh, maybe unsustainably high. For reference, Luis Arraez, who is currently hitting .400, has a BABIP only .006 higher. Joey Votto for his career was at .340. Mookie? .300.

So maybe we should expect that to come down. On the other hand, Duran has posted astronomical BABIPs before:

66203

.406 at A-, .438 at A, and .480 at A+. Those numbers came way down in AA/AAA, obviously, and a .318 BABIP in MLB didn't help him when he was striking out 35% of the time.

The optimistic case is that Duran is a speedster, and that he's hitting the ball hard 7% more, at a rate of 44%. That's not insubstantial. Mookie's hard-hit percentage for his career is 42.5%.

But I don't think it accounts for .100 points of batting average on balls in play. But his xBA of .270 and xSLG of .403, his wOBA - all of that would play. Which is to say that I think Duran has been more than a little lucky this year, but that at the same time, even removing some of the luck, he's had a much improved year. If he can cut down on the K's, put the ball in play 5% more... sky is the freaking limit.

66205

I would also note that I'm not sure if xSLG accounts for speed: for example, Duran forced the outfielder's hands on 2 of his 3 doubles last night, IIRC, on what would have been singles for anyone else on the team.
 

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Jason Bae

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With the three hits yesterday, Duran's BABIP is .411. That's, uh, maybe unsustainably high. For reference, Luis Arraez, who is currently hitting .400, has a BABIP only .006 higher. Joey Votto for his career was at .340. Mookie? .300.

So maybe we should expect that to come down. On the other hand, Duran has posted astronomical BABIPs before:

View attachment 66203

.406 at A-, .438 at A, and .480 at A+. Those numbers came way down in AA/AAA, obviously, and a .318 BABIP in MLB didn't help him when he was striking out 35% of the time.

The optimistic case is that Duran is a speedster, and that he's hitting the ball hard 7% more, at a rate of 44%. That's not insubstantial. Mookie's hard-hit percentage for his career is 42.5%.

But I don't think it accounts for .100 points of batting average on balls in play. But his xBA of .270 and xSLG of .403, his wOBA - all of that would play. Which is to say that I think Duran has been more than a little lucky this year, but that at the same time, even removing some of the luck, he's had a much improved year. If he can cut down on the K's, put the ball in play 5% more... sky is the freaking limit.

View attachment 66205

I would also note that I'm not sure if xSLG accounts for speed: for example, Duran forced the outfielder's hands on 2 of his 3 doubles last night, IIRC, on what would have been singles for anyone else on the team.
Great post. And while he can cut down on the K's, his contact rate (78%) and SwStr% (10.4) aren't very worrisome.
 

Sandy Leon Trotsky

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There was a lot of speculation that a guy like him, if he stopped swinging for power and went more for contact, that he could turn into a doubles machine with the change in defense shift rules. So far that seems to be happening- some of it luck, but it really appears that a lot of those predictions were accurate so far. Swinging for contact rather than power does impart some hit placement skills onto the batter.
 

Rovin Romine

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With the three hits yesterday, Duran's BABIP is .411. That's, uh, maybe unsustainably high. For reference, Luis Arraez, who is currently hitting .400, has a BABIP only .006 higher. Joey Votto for his career was at .340. Mookie? .300.

So maybe we should expect that to come down. On the other hand, Duran has posted astronomical BABIPs before:

View attachment 66203

.406 at A-, .438 at A, and .480 at A+. Those numbers came way down in AA/AAA, obviously, and a .318 BABIP in MLB didn't help him when he was striking out 35% of the time.

The optimistic case is that Duran is a speedster, and that he's hitting the ball hard 7% more, at a rate of 44%. That's not insubstantial. Mookie's hard-hit percentage for his career is 42.5%.

But I don't think it accounts for .100 points of batting average on balls in play. But his xBA of .270 and xSLG of .403, his wOBA - all of that would play. Which is to say that I think Duran has been more than a little lucky this year, but that at the same time, even removing some of the luck, he's had a much improved year. If he can cut down on the K's, put the ball in play 5% more... sky is the freaking limit.

View attachment 66205

I would also note that I'm not sure if xSLG accounts for speed: for example, Duran forced the outfielder's hands on 2 of his 3 doubles last night, IIRC, on what would have been singles for anyone else on the team.
Another factor to consider is the shift ban. Conceivably, a very fast groundball/line-drive hitter might see an uptick in BABIP. (Until the league starts pitching him in a way to entice him to hit flyballs.) I love baseball savant, but in a way it's not granular enough for me. I'd love to see what kind of pitches were getting him out during his cold streak, for example. (Also the percentage of hits off line-drives v. soft flies.)

Duran's also using the whole field: https://baseballsavant.mlb.com/savant-player/jarren-duran-680776?stats=statcast-r-hitting-mlb I'm not sure what to make of the lack of hits to deep right - is he consciously not pulling? Or has he been consistently caught flying out to RF?

Anyway I don't disagree with your thought that we might see some recession toward the league mean. . .but I'm guessing it may not entirely be fluke luck either. More of an approach that can make some luck, if you will.
 

Fishy1

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Great post. And while he can cut down on the K's, his contact rate (78%) and SwStr% (10.4) aren't very worrisome.
Thanks! And that is encouraging stuff - his contact % is about 5% lowers than Masa and Turner and around the same as Devers. I wonder if there's some granular stuff about the sorts of pitches he needs to lay off in tough counts - sliders and curveballs in, etc.


Another factor to consider is the shift ban. Conceivably, a very fast groundball/line-drive hitter might see an uptick in BABIP. (Until the league starts pitching him in a way to entice him to hit flyballs.) I love baseball savant, but in a way it's not granular enough for me. I'd love to see what kind of pitches were getting him out during his cold streak, for example. (Also the percentage of hits off line-drives v. soft flies.)

Duran's also using the whole field: https://baseballsavant.mlb.com/savant-player/jarren-duran-680776?stats=statcast-r-hitting-mlb I'm not sure what to make of the lack of hits to deep right - is he consciously not pulling? Or has he been consistently caught flying out to RF?

Anyway I don't disagree with your thought that we might see some recession toward the league mean. . .but I'm guessing it may not entirely be fluke luck either. More of an approach that can make some luck, if you will.
Interesting perspective. I mostly agree, I just think a BABIP of .411 is probably unsustainable over a career... .340-.370 though, given the way he's hitting and the way he's placing the ball, seems totally within the realm of reason. If he keeps it up, I'll eat crow, and I don't think it's impossible for him to have seasons where he's around .400
 

chrisfont9

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Thanks! And that is encouraging stuff - his contact % is about 5% lowers than Masa and Turner and around the same as Devers. I wonder if there's some granular stuff about the sorts of pitches he needs to lay off in tough counts - sliders and curveballs in, etc.




Interesting perspective. I mostly agree, I just think a BABIP of .411 is probably unsustainable over a career... .340-.370 though, given the way he's hitting and the way he's placing the ball, seems totally within the realm of reason. If he keeps it up, I'll eat crow, and I don't think it's impossible for him to have seasons where he's around .400
Agree, terrific post. One thing I'll toss out there are his L/R splits, which are considerable -- this year alone he's +.260 points of OPS vs RHPs. He's at 200 PAs for the season, only 36 vs LHPs. Last season was similar in terms of usage, but he was pretty punchless against RHPs (and hopeless vs LHPs). Now that they have a healthy OF they can afford to really lean on his strengths vs RHPs. I was a little worried when Cora lifted him last night, but it worked for the team (massively) and leaving him in there vs tough lefties is probably the only way to dent his confidence right now.
 

chawson

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I’ll plead guilty on both counts. Great to see.
Same here. Quite happy to be wrong (so far) about Duran. The skill set is nifty, and if he can keep up average defensive play in center, he's probably our guy the next half decade.

With the three hits yesterday, Duran's BABIP is .411. That's, uh, maybe unsustainably high. For reference, Luis Arraez, who is currently hitting .400, has a BABIP only .006 higher. Joey Votto for his career was at .340. Mookie? .300.

So maybe we should expect that to come down. On the other hand, Duran has posted astronomical BABIPs before:

View attachment 66203

.406 at A-, .438 at A, and .480 at A+. Those numbers came way down in AA/AAA, obviously, and a .318 BABIP in MLB didn't help him when he was striking out 35% of the time.

The optimistic case is that Duran is a speedster, and that he's hitting the ball hard 7% more, at a rate of 44%. That's not insubstantial. Mookie's hard-hit percentage for his career is 42.5%.

But I don't think it accounts for .100 points of batting average on balls in play. But his xBA of .270 and xSLG of .403, his wOBA - all of that would play. Which is to say that I think Duran has been more than a little lucky this year, but that at the same time, even removing some of the luck, he's had a much improved year. If he can cut down on the K's, put the ball in play 5% more... sky is the freaking limit.

View attachment 66205

I would also note that I'm not sure if xSLG accounts for speed: for example, Duran forced the outfielder's hands on 2 of his 3 doubles last night, IIRC, on what would have been singles for anyone else on the team.
Good post.

.411 is a bit much, but I think the most encouraging thing about the sustainability of Duran's high BABIP is his line drive rate. He ranks 7th of 192 hitters in LD% (27.8 percent). Arraez is 2nd (30%).

It looks similar to Jarred Kelenic's transformation in Seattle, a dramatic decrease in fly balls (BABIP killers) which may or may not be related to the shift ban.

Duran's surge was fueled by an uptick in power but this version is much better than that guy. We've seen him turn so many sharp line drives into the alley into extra base hits.
 

Benj4ever

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Same here. Quite happy to be wrong (so far) about Duran. The skill set is nifty, and if he can keep up average defensive play in center, he's probably our guy the next half decade.



Good post.

.411 is a bit much, but I think the most encouraging thing about the sustainability of Duran's high BABIP is his line drive rate. He ranks 7th of 192 hitters in LD% (27.8 percent). Arraez is 2nd (30%).

It looks similar to Jarred Kelenic's transformation in Seattle, a dramatic decrease in fly balls (BABIP killers) which may or may not be related to the shift ban.

Duran's surge was fueled by an uptick in power but this version is much better than that guy. We've seen him turn so many sharp line drives into the alley into extra base hits.
He's also staying back on pitches and slapping the ball to LF, which undoubtedly helps his BABIP.
 

Sin Duda

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For those complaining the team is no fun, I counterpropose the act of Duran shooting a line drive just a few yards away from an outfielder and motoring into 2B before the unsuspecting outfielder gets the throw into the base. That's exciting baseball!
 

Van Everyman

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For those complaining the team is no fun, I counterpropose the act of Duran shooting a line drive just a few yards away from an outfielder and motoring into 2B before the unsuspecting outfielder gets the throw into the base. That's exciting baseball!
It makes you wonder if part of Bloom's charge this year was to hold off investing big dollars in "get us over the top" players to see if the players we have--specifically, Duran and Verdugo but maybe also Casas and Wong--could be part of that. My sense is that other than Casas, who has shown flashes, the answer is yes on the other three counts.
 

jmcc5400

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For those complaining the team is no fun, I counterpropose the act of Duran shooting a line drive just a few yards away from an outfielder and motoring into 2B before the unsuspecting outfielder gets the throw into the base. That's exciting baseball!
Seriously, his third double last night was a thrilling display of pure athleticism. That had no business being a double.
 

Fishy1

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It makes you wonder if part of Bloom's charge this year was to hold off investing big dollars in "get us over the top" players to see if the players we have--specifically, Duran and Verdugo but maybe also Casas and Wong--could be part of that. My sense is that other than Casas, who has shown flashes, the answer is yes on the other three counts.
Yep. And if Casas keeps up the pace he's set in the last couple of months, then he becomes a yes too. He was absolutely snakebit on balls in play in the first month and has been robbed by umps of BBs more than his fair share, and I suspect they'll start to give him the benefit of the doubt more as he spends more time in the league. I imagine they see the same reports we do.
 

Sin Duda

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It makes you wonder if part of Bloom's charge this year was to hold off investing big dollars in "get us over the top" players to see if the players we have--specifically, Duran and Verdugo but maybe also Casas and Wong--could be part of that. My sense is that other than Casas, who has shown flashes, the answer is yes on the other three counts.
I think many of us were so burned by Dalbec coming up and hammering the ball (despite a sky-high K rate) then crashing to earth, we've forgotten that some of these guys work out with playing time. Verdugo is an established major leaguer, and hopefully Duran, Wong, and Casas join him as starters on a contending-level team.
 

trs

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Interesting perspective. I mostly agree, I just think a BABIP of .411 is probably unsustainable over a career... .340-.370 though, given the way he's hitting and the way he's placing the ball, seems totally within the realm of reason. If he keeps it up, I'll eat crow, and I don't think it's impossible for him to have seasons where he's around .400
I'll echo what everyone else has said -- great post! I'll agree too that a .400 BABIP is probably unsustainable, even for an extremely fast line-drive hitter. However, if Duran is for real, and can continue hitting the ball hard 40% of the time, I could certainly see his BABIP being well above league average, so .370 is definitely not out of the question. The other interesting thing, and this points to what @jmcc5400 said, his speed is turning singles into doubles and that is impacting his slugging. According to Baseball Savant his xSLG is just .403 but he's actually slugging at .463. You gotta think some of that has to do with batted balls that for most players end up being one total base but for him it's two.

it does appear that his approach is intended to sacrifice lift and power for contact and line drives, but I think over time he will adapt again and get some balls up in the air, but that's pure speculation.
 

jmcc5400

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I'll echo what everyone else has said -- great post! I'll agree too that a .400 BABIP is probably unsustainable, even for an extremely fast line-drive hitter. However, if Duran is for real, and can continue hitting the ball hard 40% of the time, I could certainly see his BABIP being well above league average, so .370 is definitely not out of the question. The other interesting thing, and this points to what @jmcc5400 said, his speed is turning singles into doubles and that is impacting his slugging. According to Baseball Savant his xSLG is just .403 but he's actually slugging at .463. You gotta think some of that has to do with batted balls that for most players end up being one total base but for him it's two.

it does appear that his approach is intended to sacrifice lift and power for contact and line drives, but I think over time he will adapt again and get some balls up in the air, but that's pure speculation.
And if he hadn't had Casas in front of him, his second double would have been (at least) a triple.
 

chrisfont9

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It makes you wonder if part of Bloom's charge this year was to hold off investing big dollars in "get us over the top" players to see if the players we have--specifically, Duran and Verdugo but maybe also Casas and Wong--could be part of that. My sense is that other than Casas, who has shown flashes, the answer is yes on the other three counts.
I think many of us were so burned by Dalbec coming up and hammering the ball (despite a sky-high K rate) then crashing to earth, we've forgotten that some of these guys work out with playing time. Verdugo is an established major leaguer, and hopefully Duran, Wong, and Casas join him as starters on a contending-level team.
Said this before but I thought it was significant that Duran went back to Worcester last summer after his poor stint in Boston and raked, .840 OPS (for all of AAA 2022, can't seem to find splits on his last month after demotion), while going 18/21 in steals. He put himself right back into the conversation, I suspect, rather than just going quietly into the offseason. Given all his tools, it's no shock Bloom didn't rush to cut him loose. He was 25 last year, which isn't old for AAA.
 

shaggydog2000

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I'll echo what everyone else has said -- great post! I'll agree too that a .400 BABIP is probably unsustainable, even for an extremely fast line-drive hitter. However, if Duran is for real, and can continue hitting the ball hard 40% of the time, I could certainly see his BABIP being well above league average, so .370 is definitely not out of the question. The other interesting thing, and this points to what @jmcc5400 said, his speed is turning singles into doubles and that is impacting his slugging. According to Baseball Savant his xSLG is just .403 but he's actually slugging at .463. You gotta think some of that has to do with batted balls that for most players end up being one total base but for him it's two.

it does appear that his approach is intended to sacrifice lift and power for contact and line drives, but I think over time he will adapt again and get some balls up in the air, but that's pure speculation.
I took a look at the last three seasons (start of 2021 to now), and among qualified hitters the highest BABIP is .352 for Tim Anderson. There are only 26 guys above a .325 BABIP. So being consistently around .370 sounds like asking a lot out of Duran. And I get that his speed seems like a way for him to maintain that, but none of the top 5 guys in that time period are significant stolen base threats except for Marte., so I don't know how strong of a correlation there is for that.

https://www.fangraphs.com/leaders.aspx?pos=all&stats=bat&lg=all&qual=y&type=8&season=2023&month=0&season1=2021&ind=0&team=0&rost=0&age=0&filter=&players=0&startdate=2021-01-01&enddate=2023-12-31&sort=12,d
 

Fishy1

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I took a look at the last three seasons (start of 2021 to now), and among qualified hitters the highest BABIP is .352 for Tim Anderson. There are only 26 guys above a .325 BABIP. So being consistently around .370 sounds like asking a lot out of Duran. And I get that his speed seems like a way for him to maintain that, but none of the top 5 guys in that time period are significant stolen base threats except for Marte., so I don't know how strong of a correlation there is for that.

https://www.fangraphs.com/leaders.aspx?pos=all&stats=bat&lg=all&qual=y&type=8&season=2023&month=0&season1=2021&ind=0&team=0&rost=0&age=0&filter=&players=0&startdate=2021-01-01&enddate=2023-12-31&sort=12,d
Point well-taken. .340-.370 is unreasonable. I also couldn't help noting that of those first thirty guys, only two of them had a wrc+ under 100. The majority of the list clubbed the shit out of the ball.

Just out of interest, I took a look through to see if K% correlated at all with BABIP. There's four or five guys in those first 30 guys with a K% over 25%: Judge, Teoscar Hernandez, Tyler O'Neill, and Chris Taylor (.325). And JD Martinez is just south of 25%. In the next 30 guys, there's 8. From 60-90, there's only one guy. From 90-120, another 5. Which goes to show... uh... I'm not sure it goes to show anything.

It does happen that guys will go over .400 over the course of a single season. In 2014, in 109 games, our very own Justin Turner had a BABIP of .404. His next closest number is .347, from 2020. Dustin "Laser Show" Pedroia never posted a season over .339. Luiz Arraez has had three seasons counting this one over .350. Ichiro had a career BABIP of .338, and posted 5 seasons over .350 (one at .399!) and another 3 or four just south of .350. Manny Ramirez had seven seasons north of .350, including a .403 in 2000. Harper has had four.

And these are some of the very best hitters in baseball, which, apologies to Jarren, I don't feel very confident saying he is. But .330 to .340 is absolutely not out of the question - in fact, it's what ZIPS projects him for. And a high BABIP unsurprisingly does correlate with well-above-average production. So Jarren is in good company, and his future is bright.
 

shaggydog2000

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Point well-taken. .340-.370 is unreasonable. I also couldn't help noting that of those first thirty guys, only two of them had a wrc+ under 100. The majority of the list clubbed the shit out of the ball.

Just out of interest, I took a look through to see if K% correlated at all with BABIP. There's four or five guys in those first 30 guys with a K% over 25%: Judge, Teoscar Hernandez, Tyler O'Neill, and Chris Taylor (.325). And JD Martinez is just south of 25%. In the next 30 guys, there's 8. From 60-90, there's only one guy. From 90-120, another 5. Which goes to show... uh... I'm not sure it goes to show anything.

It does happen that guys will go over .400 over the course of a single season. In 2014, in 109 games, our very own Justin Turner had a BABIP of .404. His next closest number is .347, from 2020. Dustin "Laser Show" Pedroia never posted a season over .339. Luiz Arraez has had three seasons counting this one over .350. Ichiro had a career BABIP of .338, and posted 5 seasons over .350 (one at .399!) and another 3 or four just south of .350. Manny Ramirez had seven seasons north of .350, including a .403 in 2000. Harper has had four.

And these are some of the very best hitters in baseball, which, apologies to Jarren, I don't feel very confident saying he is. But .330 to .340 is absolutely not out of the question - in fact, it's what ZIPS projects him for. And a high BABIP unsurprisingly does correlate with well-above-average production. So Jarren is in good company, and his future is bright.
I think you're looking at the rest of season projections, which make sense if he's at a .400 BABIP so far. The preseason ones are more in the .315-.330 range, which is still above average. Like you point out, complete outlier BABIP years happen to guys sometimes, so maybe he will keep it up. And some great hitters never put up huge numbers in that, but others do. It's an odd one, but it is definitively not something you see from a terrible player over a good sample size. It's part skills, partly the makeup of the contact you have, and a decent part luck. I would be concerned that it is not predictive for Duran though. And that doesn't make him a bad hitter, it just makes it difficult to project his future production based off of a season where one really important factor could be flukey luck.
 

trs

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I took a look at the last three seasons (start of 2021 to now), and among qualified hitters the highest BABIP is .352 for Tim Anderson. There are only 26 guys above a .325 BABIP. So being consistently around .370 sounds like asking a lot out of Duran. And I get that his speed seems like a way for him to maintain that, but none of the top 5 guys in that time period are significant stolen base threats except for Marte., so I don't know how strong of a correlation there is for that.

https://www.fangraphs.com/leaders.aspx?pos=all&stats=bat&lg=all&qual=y&type=8&season=2023&month=0&season1=2021&ind=0&team=0&rost=0&age=0&filter=&players=0&startdate=2021-01-01&enddate=2023-12-31&sort=12,d
No, you're completely correct -- I dumbly forgot that BABIP excludes homeruns and was just doing some quick and dirty BABIP calculations based on the info on the Baseball Savant spreadsheet I was on to get BABIPs. Should have realized they all seemed high.

Duran's BABIP numbers are certainly inflated by luck so far this year. He has hit the ball hard and on a line quite a bit this year, and that should result in a higher than normal BABIP, since his hard-hit balls are largely staying in play. I'm sure they'll start to find fielders, but as others have said, that will be harder to "game" with defensive shifts.

I do think that Duran will continue to slug higher than expected due to his speed, and this is an interesting thing to look at. We mostly look at high slugging or ISO and think about potential RBI production, but in his case, it appears, for now, those numbers will be somewhat the result of speed, meaning he's far more of a run-scorer than a run-batterer-inner. This is evident when you sort by ISO (https://www.fangraphs.com/leaders.aspx?pos=all&stats=bat&lg=all&qual=200&type=8&season=2023&month=0&season1=2023&ind=0&team=0&rost=0&age=0&filter=&players=0&startdate=2023-01-01&enddate=2023-12-31&sort=11,d&page=4_30) and find Duran at .167 (a bit above the .161 league average) and he's a bit of an HR outlier with just 3.

Anyway, not much here I suppose -- just backs up what we're all seeing. Duran's value as a hitter is partially the result of some good luck with where his batted balls end up (phrasing) and we shouldn't really count on that, and that his value also comes from turning singles into doubles and potentially doubles into triples (though that hasn't happened yet). This second part of his value I think we can count on -- certainly outfielders won't continued to be caught off guard by his aggressive baserunning, but I just don't know if it will matter.
 

BaseballJones

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I don't know how much of Duran's improvement is real and how much is a mirage. But he wouldn't be the first (or last) guy to kind of start to figure it out at age 26 or 27.

Duran: .300/.360/.467/.827

And then Casas, since May 1: .268/.365/.457/.822

Add in Wong, who is one of the best defensive catchers in baseball already, and is hitting .245/.314/.447/.761, 103 ops+, thus making him one of the better overall catchers in baseball (elite defense + slightly above average offense at the position = one of the better overall catchers in the game).

And if all that is real, and not a mirage, it improves Boston's chances right now, but also makes the future much, much, MUCH brighter.

All three are under team control through 2028.
 

NickEsasky

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I was skeptical but I’m coming around on Duran. His .400 BAPIP is unsustainable, so he’ll normalize but he’s seems like a low cost keeper.
 

HangingW/ScottCooper

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I was ready to write him off as a 4A player. All the credit in the world to Duran for taking the opportunity given to him this year. His doing so gives them more financial flexibility next year.
 

simplicio

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I didn't see them all, but how many of those would have been doubles for any other (non-Hamilton) member of the team? It's not like he's gotten faster this year, but he's using his speed so much more impactfully.
 

azsoxpatsfan

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I didn't see them all, but how many of those would have been doubles for any other (non-Hamilton) member of the team? It's not like he's gotten faster this year, but he's using his speed so much more impactfully.
Two were off the wall and were obvious doubles. One was a pop up to no man’s land between the third baseman and left fielder, my guess is no one else tries for it. And the other was a grounder up the middle on the second base side and the outfield was shifted towards left so it was in the gap a bit. Again I doubt anyone other than him even tries it, he was sprinting immediately out of the box
 

TimScribble

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I’m not sure the second one was an obvious double. That was stung off the wall and played really well by Springer. I don’t think the majority of the regulars try for two on that one.
 

azsoxpatsfan

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Fair enough, it probably isn’t for like 50% of the starting lineup. The first one and the third one were ones that really made his speed stand out more imo
 

TimScribble

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Fair enough, it probably isn’t for like 50% of the starting lineup. The first one and the third one were ones that really made his speed stand out more imo
100%, the first one especially. It’s great to see that he’s making that decision so quickly as well. No hesitation rounding first.
 

azsoxpatsfan

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100%, the first one especially. It’s great to see that he’s making that decision so quickly as well. No hesitation rounding first.
I couldn’t watch live, but on the third double DOB says it’s a base hit and whoever did color today (was it merloni?) immediately said double. Duran sprints out of the box and always seems to be looking to take an extra base, I love his level of hustle
 

chrisfont9

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Two were off the wall and were obvious doubles. One was a pop up to no man’s land between the third baseman and left fielder, my guess is no one else tries for it. And the other was a grounder up the middle on the second base side and the outfield was shifted towards left so it was in the gap a bit. Again I doubt anyone other than him even tries it, he was sprinting immediately out of the box
Also the "bunt" single in the 9th was sublime. He just pressures defenses so much.
 
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Al Zarilla

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When Duran is up and he hits the ball anywhere between people, I imagine the defense as some combination of Lou Costello, Jackie Gleason (the poor soul). Laurel and Hardy, the Three Stooges, Lucille Ball and her friend Vivian Vance. Might as well be, major leaguers can't hold him to "normal bases".
 

JM3

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The thing I find mind boggling about this list is that the single season record for doubles is held by a Boston RF, Earl Webb. With 67 doubles I can’t believe that he couldn’t manage a pair of three double games.
In 1931 when he set the record, Earl Webb had 0 3-double games, 11 2-double games & 45 1-double games.
 

Tokyo Sox

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There
Tied Mike Lowell for a Red Sox single season record today...

View: https://twitter.com/SoxNotes/status/1675582886471168001
The thing I find mind boggling about this list is that the single season record for doubles is held by a Boston RF, Earl Webb. With 67 doubles I can’t believe that he couldn’t manage a pair of three double games.
Surely the tweet must just be showing that small part of a greater list. Because in my memory Jody Reed hit a double in every other at bat of the 1990 season, and Mitch Moreland did the same in 2017/18.
 

JM3

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Surely the tweet must just be showing that small part of a greater list. Because in my memory Jody Reed hit a double in every other at bat of the 1990 season, and Mitch Moreland did the same in 2017/18.
Jody Reed hit a league-leading 45 doubles in 1990. He had 39 1-double games & 3 2-double games.

Mitch Moreland hit 34 doubles in 2017 & 23 in 2018. In 2017 he had 32 1-double games & 1 2-double game. In 2018 he had 19 1-double games & 2 2-double games.