The 2010 Red Sox Autopsy: Hitters

The 2010 Boston Red Sox could hit. Even with out Cameron and Ellsbury playing the majority of the year and the loss of three of their best hitters for over two months, the Sox managed to rank 2nd in baseball in wOBA and wRAA (.345, 123), to the New York Yankees (.347, 132). They were slightly better than NY by OPS, leading the league in that less advanced metric. Much of that success was due to a monster year by Adrian Beltre, who led the team in runs created and fWAR. A resurgent David Ortiz takes second in runs created, but given the injuries it would be remiss of fans to overlook the excellent work of several bench players.

The first player who comes to mind is Bill Hall. Hall was acquired to play the role of super-sub, giving the Red Sox a player who could back up at all three outfield positions, and second and third baseball. Hall delivered that flexibility, seeing 429 innings in the outfield across all three spots and filling in at second, third and even shortstop. As a hitter, Hall took an interesting path to productivity. He was a major swing and miss guy, striking out over 30% of the time and walking only 8% of the time. His average and OBP suffered, but he managed an above average slugging percentage and wOBA largely on the strength of his .208 ISO. When Hall managed to connect, he hit the ball hard, notching 18 HRs and 16 2Bs over his 382 PA. A lot of people might look at his .247 batting average and write him off, but a hitter who can back up at nearly every position and still create 10% more runs than the average player is something of decent value.

Much like Hall, Darnell McDonald was a player acquired to add depth and flexibility to the system who wound up as a near regular because of the injuries. His .342 wOBA is exactly equal to Hall’s, though he didn’t have the power Hall did. Instead McDonald overachieved on balls in play, putting up a .342 BABIP, .045 points above his career average. Luck may have helped him out, but he also managed a career best line drive percentage and HR/FB rate.

While Hall and McDonald are veteran players who were better than their established track records, one bench player looked like a guy starting to breakout. After the seemingly endless string of injuries derailed his career and cost him prospect status, Jed Lowrie came up Boston late in the 2010 season to put up a monstrous .393 wOBA, over 197 PA. The small sample size caveats certainly apply, but the numbers don’t look as fluky as you might assume. Lowrie’s BABIP was right in line with his career level. He improved his walk rate and struck out less. He also saw significant improvements in his line drive rates and his HR/FB, but neither of them is unrealistically high. His production in limited opportunities was very valuable to the Sox offence this season and he has brought himself back into the picture for 2011.

In the minors, Lowrie has shown fantastic plate discipline at times and he is capable playing second and third base very well and holding his own at shortstop. At the very least, he should replace Hall as the super-sub infielder in 2011. However, the weakest link in the ‘regular’ lineup this year was Marco Scutaro and there are a number of reasons to consider Lowrie over Scutaro next year.

Both players are similar hitters. Neither one has much power and they both rarely strikeout. Scutaro was signed after posting a career best 13.2% walk rate in 2009 and he saw that rate drop to 7.6% in 2010. For his career he walks about 9 % of the time, while Lowrie has walked more than 11% of the time. They both hit around .290 on balls in play, but Lowrie has an edge in ISO and HR/FB rate and is nine years younger and a switch hitter. As fielders, both Lowrie and Scutaro are weak shortstops. Lowrie has not seen enough time there for us to be quite sure how bad he really is, but he is clearly not good. I think it very likely that they split time at short next season and that should help Boston’s offence improve on its stellar performance.

Given the injuries the 2010 Red Sox had to absorb, I think their offensive numbers are just amazing. Their core players, Pedroia, Youkilis, and Ortiz were just awesome when they were playing and Adrian Beltre made himself a not-so-small fortune with his bat, but Tito and Theo did an excellent job at cutting offensive dead weight and finding production on the fly. It seems pretty clear to me that they know how to evaluate hitters in Boston and that gives me a lot of confidence in the coming off-season and for 2011.

Once again, if you enjoyed this piece you can read more of my thoughts on baseball and the Red Sox at www.spacemanspancakes.wordpress.com