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Tuesday, October 30, 2012

2012 In Review - Curtis Granderson

Coming off an MVP-caliber season in 2011, Curtis Granderson was expected to regress somewhat in 2012.  The regression was expected to come mainly in his power numbers, but it turned out that it came elsewhere.

Projection	PA	AB	R	H	2B	3B	HR	RBI	SB	CS	BB	SO	GDP	HBP	avg	obp	slg	wOBA	BR	BR/650	BRAR
cairo	644	560	103	147	24	7	32	86	16	6	73	142	7	6	.263	.353	.502	.366	97	98	45
davenport	607	532	86	139	29	8	31	83	18	6	68	131	7	7	.261	.354	.521	.374	96	103	37
marcel	598	522	93	132	22	7	28	80	18	6	63	131	7	6	.253	.338	.483	.351	85	92	37
oliver	612	534	82	131	22	8	25	79	15	5	65	135	6	5	.245	.330	.457	.339	81	86	32
pecota	724	642	95	167	29	11	30	102	21	6	75	159	8	7	.261	.347	.481	.357	105	94	47
zips	628	547	104	140	22	8	31	92	16	7	71	143	7	6	.256	.347	.495	.361	92	95	42
average	635	553	102	145	25	8	30	87	17	6	69	140	7	6	.263	.349	.492	.358	95	97	43
Projection	PA	AB	R	H	2B	3B	HR	RBI	SB	CS	BB	SO	GDP	HBP	avg	obp	slg	wOBA	BR	BR/650	BRAR
cairo	684	595	110	156	26	8	34	92	17	6	77	151	8	6	.263	.351	.502	.366	103	98	48
davenport	684	599	97	157	33	9	35	94	20	7	77	148	8	8	.261	.353	.521	.374	108	103	42
marcel	684	597	106	151	25	8	32	92	21	7	72	150	8	7	.253	.336	.483	.351	97	92	42
oliver	684	597	92	146	25	9	28	88	17	6	73	151	7	6	.245	.328	.457	.339	91	86	36
pecota	684	606	90	158	27	10	28	96	20	6	71	150	8	7	.261	.345	.481	.357	99	94	44
zips	684	596	113	152	24	9	34	100	17	8	77	156	8	7	.256	.346	.495	.361	100	95	45
average	684	595	110	156	27	9	32	94	19	6	74	151	8	7	.263	.347	.497	.362	102	97	47
2012	684	596	102	138	18	4	43	102	10	3	75	195	5	5	.232	.319	.492	.345	95	90	40
diff			-8	-18	-9	-5	11	8	-9	-3	1	44	-3	-2	-.031	-.029	-.006	-.017
2012 League Avg	684	615	80	157	30	3	20	76	12	4	55	132	14	6	.255	.320	.411	.311	79	75
2011	684	577	135	151	26	10	41	118	25	10	84	167	12	12	.262	.362	.552	.386	114	108	59

diff: Difference between average projection and 2012 actual statistic
wOBA: Weighted on-base average
BR: Linear weights batting runs
BRAR: BR above replacement level, adjusted for position

The second set of projections, league average and 2011 stats are pro-rated to 2012 PA to allow a direct comparison.  League average is not adjusted for DNYS so mentally account for that.

Granderson’s average projection pegged him at around 30 HRs, 32 if given his actual 2012 PA, but he ended up hitting 43, even more than last season.  Unfortunately, he hit 9 fewer doubles, 5 fewer triples and 4 fewer singles which cost him about .031 in batting average.  While that is partially a function of the spike in his strikeout rate (he struck out 44 more times than he projected to given the same # of PA), he also had a career low BABIP of .260.  That was despite hitting more line drives (23.0% vs. 18.2%) and fewer fly balls(44.0% vs. 48.0%) than he hit in 2011 when he had a BABIP of .295.  Teams were shifting on Granderson quite a bit this year which surely plays into the discrepancy although I don’t know how much more they were shifting on him this year than last year.  His performance in 2012 was about 7 runs worse than his average projection and around 19 runs worse than his 2011.

Granderson was hitting .276/.394/.632 on May 1 and hit .224/.306/.468 afterwards.  That’s one great month and five bad months and it made his season feel worse than it probably was.

Of course, like most of the rest of the wretched hive of Yankees Granderson had a horrific postseason.  I thought he struck out 34 times in 33 AB but it was actually 16.  He hit .100/.182/.200 and went 0 for the ALCS.

Granderson had his second consecutive below average defensive season according to most of the metrics.  He was above average in 2009 (around +10) but was around -6 in 2009 and -15 in 2010.  Trends aren’t predictive in baseball, but defense does decline as a player gets older and at this point he’s probably better suited to a corner.

My guess is that Granderson played his way out of the Yankees long-term plans with his performance from May 2 through the postseason.  They picked up his option because he’s almost surely worth a one year, $13M deal.  However, they may see what he could fetch in a trade although I’m not sure how much value he has given that he’s probably going to project as around a 3.0 WAR CF which is probably worth $15-18M and is only signed for one year.  The low average and the fact that 26 of his 43 homers came at DNYS may cause teams to be wary about him, although he hit 30 of his 65 homers on the road in 2011 and 2010.

Granderson’s 2012 performance is probably my biggest disappointment in the non-injury, non-Nova division.  He didn’t have a bad season in terms of overall value, but he didn’t have the season I hoped for and obviously his postseason speaks for itself.  I was looking forward to watching him play in pinstripes for another four or five years but now while I’d be perfectly happy watching him as a Yankee in 2013 I’m more interested in seeing if he can fetch more than I think he can in a trade.

That’s a bummer.