Your 2019 Cleveland Indians

[Scrote Squad]

Time to worry about Ramirez? He has been awful dating back to the end of August last year.

 

[Derek]

Time to worry about Ramirez? He has been awful dating back to the end of August last year.

I wouldn’t. Most numbers point to him being extremely unlucky.

 

[The Wizard of Moz]

I wouldn’t. Most numbers point to him being extremely unlucky.

BB% is more than 3 times lower than last season (which was admittedly absurdly high and was unlikely to be repeated), infield hit percentage and percentage of hits classified as soft are both way up from career highs. Pull percentage is at 20% down from 50%

He’s got a low BABIP but 31.4% of those balls in play were soft contact so I wouldn’t really call it all unlucky. He’s making worse contact with the ball, he’s not drawing walks, and he’s not pulling the ball

It’s not all luck

That said, I don’t care about a 42 at bat sample size with a lot of this. But in those 42 at bats attributing it mostly to luck I don’t agree with. And I care more about this because of the freezing cold finish to last season.

 

[Derek]

BB% is more than 3 times lower than last season (which was admittedly absurdly high and was unlikely to be repeated), infield hit percentage and percentage of hits classified as soft are both way up from career highs. Pull percentage is at 20% down from 50%

He’s got a low BABIP but 31.4% of those balls in play were soft contact so I wouldn’t really call it all unlucky. He’s making worse contact with the ball, he’s not drawing walks, and he’s not pulling the ball

It’s not all luck

That said, I don’t care about a 42 at bat sample size with a lot of this. But in those 42 at bats attributing it mostly to luck I don’t agree with. And I care more about this because of the freezing cold finish to last season.

His soft contact% may be up, but so is his hard contact%, line drive rate, and groundball rate. All of those factors point to an increase in BABIP, not one under .200

 

[Urban]

Seattle ain’t gonna be selling anytime soon...

The fuck is up with that team?

They struck me as a team that would be bad, but not as bad as everyone thought because that lineup has a lot of power. EE is still a pretty damn good DH. Bruce and Santana were bad last year but we have seen that they can be good players. Mallex Smith was a pretty good get for Mike Zunino. Narvaez is a pretty solid hitting catcher.

We will see if the lineup can continue to keep the pitching afloat going forward.

 

[FrontPageNews]

Cargo coming soon?

 

[The Wizard of Moz]

His soft contact% may be up, but so is his hard contact%, line drive rate, and groundball rate. All of those factors point to an increase in BABIP, not one under .200

Where are you getting your data?

Fangraphs has line drive % down from 20.7 to 17.6 and groundball rate down from 33.4 to 32.4

Hard hit % is up from 36.1 to 37.1, but that change is much less than the soft hit % which jumped from 18.3 to 31.4%

 

[Derek]

Where are you getting your data?

Fangraphs has line drive % down from 20.7 to 17.6 and groundball rate down from 33.4 to 32.4

Hard hit % is up from 36.1 to 37.1, but that change is much less than the soft hit % which jumped from 18.3 to 31.4%

My bad on the LD% and GB%, my eyes got crossed up and looked at the wrong rows.

Still, I'm not saying he's playing well enough to be an MVP candidate, but he's at least swinging well enough to be hitting in the .260-.280 range if not for an absurdly low BABIP.

That's what I mean when I say it's mostly luck. He should at least be posting ok numbers if not for bad luck.

 

[Huber.]

My bad on the LD% and GB%, my eyes got crossed up and looked at the wrong rows.

Still, I'm not saying he's playing well enough to be an MVP candidate, but he's at least swinging well enough to be hitting in the .260-.280 range if not for an absurdly low BABIP.

That's what I mean when I say it's mostly luck. He should at least be posting ok numbers if not for bad luck.

What's his stats since August of last year?

 

[Derek]

What's his stats since August of last year?

.231 BABIP in August
.184 BABIP in Sept/Oct

The biggest thing is he's stopped pulling the ball as much. Almost like he's been trying too hard to beat shifts.

Still, those BABIP numbers simply aren't sustainable over the long run.


EDIT: So far this year he's hitting .167 on line drives, last year he hit .625 (for reference, Mike Trout hit .744 and Alcides Escobar hit .713)

 

[Urban]

As @Derek pointed out, he is pulling the ball much less now.

The BABIP is down a whole .100 points. .280 is an extremely reasonable number to maintain, it's not like it was something like .370

He has been walking and striking out at similar rates, both of which are great. Ground ball rate is up, but marginally. Hard hit rate down 10%, but only 5% redistributed to soft contact.

I think he is a bit in his own head and once he settles down the results will come back to an all star caliber hitter.

 

[Cavs Need To Win]

Time to worry about Ramirez? He has been awful dating back to the end of August last year.

I wrote this a week ago and I'm doubling down on this. Jose Ramirez is not going to be a good hitter again. He won't ever come close to the MVP level seasons he had. The last two and a half months of last season he didn't good at all, and he's off to an awful start this year. He looks lost at the plate, swinging at junk. Also as I said, he's not some huge big and strong guy where he's always going to be able to smash the ball. He's a 5'9 guy who was only projected to be a utility player, not projected to be an All-Star. Nobody had him being a star player, the last coupe of years he overachieved.

And I don't like that stat about batting average of balls put in play to point out he's been unlucky. That stat assumes every single ball put in play has the same exact odds of being a hit. There is a difference between line drives and being off balance and popping a ball up or rolling over on a ball to hit a weak grounder. Every ball put in play doesn't have the same chance of being a hit so the stat BABIP is flawed.

 

[Lee]

I wrote this a week ago and I'm doubling down on this. Jose Ramirez is not going to be a good hitter again. He won't ever come close to the MVP level seasons he had. The last two and a half months of last season he didn't good at all, and he's off to an awful start this year. He looks lost at the plate, swinging at junk. Also as I said, he's not some huge big and strong guy where he's always going to be able to smash the ball. He's a 5'9 guy who was only projected to be a utility player, not projected to be an All-Star. Nobody had him being a star player, the last coupe of years he overachieved.

And I don't like that stat about batting average of balls put in play to point out he's been unlucky. That stat assumes every single ball put in play has the same exact odds of being a hit. There is a difference between line drives and being off balance and popping a ball up or rolling over on a ball to hit a weak grounder. Every ball put in play doesn't have the same chance of being a hit so the stat BABIP is flawed.

I don't know your qualifications, I know this is a message board so everyone is entitled to their opinions, but not all opinions are equal. Not sure if you are aware, but 2 of the posters in the section work in baseball. No, they are not a GM, but they are stats guys or low level scouts, either way they think Jose will return to form. I am nervous too, but I am going to trust the guys with the pedigree in baseball of someone who has less than 100 posts.

Now if you tell me you work for some teams spring training team, then I will agree, but 3 months of baseball and a slump is nothing. Jose got homers because of launch angle and solid driving of the ball. No reason he cant get it back once he gets out of his own head.

 

[Urban]

I wrote this a week ago and I'm doubling down on this. Jose Ramirez is not going to be a good hitter again. He won't ever come close to the MVP level seasons he had. The last two and a half months of last season he didn't good at all, and he's off to an awful start this year. He looks lost at the plate, swinging at junk. Also as I said, he's not some huge big and strong guy where he's always going to be able to smash the ball. He's a 5'9 guy who was only projected to be a utility player, not projected to be an All-Star. Nobody had him being a star player, the last coupe of years he overachieved.

And I don't like that stat about batting average of balls put in play to point out he's been unlucky. That stat assumes every single ball put in play has the same exact odds of being a hit. There is a difference between line drives and being off balance and popping a ball up or rolling over on a ball to hit a weak grounder. Every ball put in play doesn't have the same chance of being a hit so the stat BABIP is flawed.

I mean, you're "doubling down" on awful since end of August (true) to awful for the last 10 weeks of the season (false)

The guy has 3 seasons with over 1600 AB's that show he's well above a good hitter. He's not a one hit wonder and saying he'll never be a good hitter again is a scorcher of a take

 

[Cavs Need To Win]

I don't work for any teams in baseball. I've been an Indians fan my whole life, so I'm not at my TV rooting against the Indians or any player. Even though Jose isn't hitting, he still has some stolen bases, good base runner so he'll score some runs, he's playing good defense at third, and I don't think his personality is where he'll ever be a bad guy in the locker room, he's a good "clubhouse guy".

But this is 3 months of not hitting. At this point this is a trend not a slump. Pitchers have caught up to this guy, and he's swinging at a lot of junk up there, and not adjusting. I have seen nothing out of him at the plate that tells me this trend is going to end. He looks lost up there. And I still go back to the fact that he's 5'9 and he was never considered a top prospect so he's not oozing with natural God-given talent. Lindor was a top rated prospect. Someone like Lindor has more natural born talent and should be an All-Star for his career. Jose's greatness comes from his hard work and making the most of what he's got. If he's lost his confidence he's toast. And it's not uncommon or unheard-of for players to put up great couple of years and weekly fade away in baseball. It happens.

As you said this is a messageboard and everyone is entitled to their opinion, and if we look back at the stats in a few months and I am wrong about this then you all can let me have it. But I am stating that Jose is never going to turn it around and be a good hitter this season.