Yankees Infield Puzzle Revolves Around Gleyber Torres

Now that Manny Machado is out of the equation, the New York Yankees have a bit of a puzzle to solve in the infield. The additions of Troy Tulowitzki (and the promise made to him that he will be a shortstop) and DJ LeMahieu further complicate things. And then what happens when Didi Gregorius comes back? Obviously, the Yankees can cut ties with Tulowitzki when Didi returns since they are only on the hook with him at league minimum. But that is not the case with LeMahieu. The latter is considered insurance if Miguel Andujar does not improve defensively. A large part of this puzzle, though, is what exactly the Yankees think of Gleyber Torres moving forward.

The first question is whether Torres is a second baseman or a shortstop. Do the Yankees see Torres as their second baseman in the coming years or the successor to Didi at short? As much as Andujar's defense was dissected a season ago, Torres did not exactly light up the defensive stats. He did better than Andujar, but his defense was far less than what was expected.

In fairness to Torres, he did look like a special defender when he first got the call to play full-time. He had that glorious month where he was hitting everything in sight and was making special plays in the field at second.  Then it sort of went away. There were questions about his concentration and he stopped making highlight reels and started adding errors.

My feeling was that he was not right physically the second half of the season. You could kind of see it in his body language. That first month and a half, he was exuberant and there was a twinkle in his eyes. The second half showed far fewer smiles. But there is more to talk about then just the perception of his body language.

If you look at his range numbers in the minors compared to his range numbers on the Yankees in 2018, there is no comparison. There was a significant drop in his range. If the body language argument leaves you limp, then the drop-off of range should provide better circumstantial evidence.

Other than his stint on the disabled list, his health was never really mentioned after Gleyber Torres returned. But I still insist he was not right. A drop-off in his offensive production and his defense certainly manifested itself in the latter months of the season.

It will be instructive to see what he looks like early in 2019. If his health is better than it was in the second half, we should see more range and a more athletic infielder like he was in the minors. If I am totally off here and what he showed in 2018 was what he is, then he certainly should not be considered shortstop material. LeMahieu was the highest rated second baseman defensively in 2018. It is hard to fathom taking that guy and making him a super utility player. Not for $24 million anyway. But LeMahieu is nowhere near the offensive player Torres is and his numbers away from Coors in his career are in the .700 OPS range. He will not replace Torres at second for that reason.

Both Torres and Andujar are going to be fabulous offensive players for years to come. The team did not sign Manny Machado. To justify that decision, Andujar needs to be given a chance to show his hard work will pay off and that he can be a serviceable third baseman anchored there for years to come.The Yankees have shown strong interest in signing Didi Gregorius to an extension which means that second base will be where Gleyber Torres will play if the former's deal gets done.

For those reasons, LeMahieu should not take away much of either's playing time. Andujar cannot improve his defense or prove improvement by not playing defense and Torres is still hoped upon to be a star player on both sides of the ball.

Much to my delight (sorry if you disagree), the Yankees have said "no thanks" to Machado and have shown commitment to developing this strong young core. The team's leadership just needs to stay calm and try not to muck it up.

Troy Tulowitzki Pick Up Is A No-Brainer

Troy Tulowitzki is a name that appeared many times over the years in this blog. He has been coveted, mourned and buried for dead. He was once the best shortstop in the game. But he has averaged only 107 games a season in his twelve-year career. Now coming off another lost season, dumped by the Blue Jays, the New York Yankees have taken a no-brain decision to sign him for the league minimum. The Blue Jays, clearly licking their wounds and rebuilding, will pay the rest of his salary.

What is the worst that could happen from this deal? Nothing really. If he gets hurt again, Tulowitzki did not cost anything.

What is the best thing that could happen? The best that could happen is Troy Tulowitzki summoning a bit of his old glory giving the Yankees a fill-in for the injured Didi Gregorius (thus keeping Gleyber Torres at second where he will be when Gregorius returns anyway). He could be a real boost for the Yankees early in the season and it would be a nice story for the former #1 draft pick to rebound for a hurrah.

Consider that despite his injuries, Fangraphs.com has never given Tulowitzki a negative score for his fielding. Baseball-reference.com gave him one negative season for a season he only played 42 games. So, even an older, slightly rickety shortstop like Troy Tulowitzki should give the Yankees some solid defense. If he hits, which he could still do as of 2016, that will be a bonus.

The looming problem will be what will happen if he plays well and Didi returns? Other than DH, Troy Tulowitzki has never played a position other than shortstop in the Major Leagues. Can he fill in at second? Can he fill in at third? Can he play first base? Those are all question marks. He does not fit the normal profile of a utility infielder (and he does not seem to want that either).

One possibility if things go well is that the Yankees can flip him in a trade for a needed piece once Didi returns.

Notice that these thoughts are trying not to mention Manny Machado nor Miguel Andujar. The continued hope here is that the latter will still be here when the season starts and the former will not. A strong comeback for Tulowitzki would be especially needed if the former does not come to Yankee Stadium.

It is truly a shame that Troy Tulowitzki could not totally play to his career potential. His story is not a rare one. Others like Tony Oliva, Rico Carty and even George Brett come to mind. Even if the Yankees had not taken this step, Tulowitzki would be worth rooting for after a career far too marred by injuries.

The over/under of PECOTA's top 15 players

I love projections. I fully understand that they are simply computer-generated predictors based on past performance and current playing factors. I also fully understand that they are somewhat helpful to fantasy baseball players. But projections are not perfect and never have been.

I do not have a favorite projection system. I may like ZiPs a little more because I follow the guy on Twitter and he is personable. But they all have their place and some are more conservative than others.

PECOTA is Baseball Prospectus' proprietary system and it tends to be conservative. I found their top fifteen position player projections very interesting. As such, I wanted to spend some time with these fifteen players and give you an over/under on whether PECOTA was too conservative or not. Too conservative is an over vote. Not conservative enough is an under vote. I will give you the player, the projected triple slash line, WAR(P) and then a justification of over or under. Here we go.

15 - Evan Longoria - .261/.350/.480  4.3 WARP: This is very conservative, so over. I don't have too much of a problem with the triple slash line as they are near to what Longoria did last year. But I consider Longoria's season a year ago to be disappointing on the offensive side. I think he will be better. And his fielding puts him over six WAR easily.

14 - Joe Mauer - .315/.402/.456  4.4 WARP: These numbers are all under his career averages and he beat each of them last year. Playing first base will free him up physically and as I wrote a few days ago, I think that will lead to bigger offensive numbers and make up for his loss of positional value by moving to the dead zone of first base. Over.

13 - Matt Kemp - .282/.344/.486  4.5 WARP: PECOTA must be still smoking whatever Kemp was having back in 2011. Of all the systems I have looked at, this is the most optimistic version of Matt Kemp of all of them. Unless proven otherwise, the 2011 Matt Kemp is gone for good in a haze of shoulder troubles. Under.

10 - Prince Fielder - .285/.393/.518  4.7 WARP: All the systems are conservative on Fielder, which is odd considering that he is moving from one of the toughest stadiums on hitters to one of the best. PECOTA is more optimistic than all the others for the big first baseman but still only projects him to hit 33 homers. Based on an albeit small sample size, I think he will hit 20 homers at home and 13 on the road should be a piece of cake. All Fielder has to do is get back to where he was in 2012 to beat this projection. Over.

10 - Andrew McCutchen - .278/.358/.465  4.7 WARP: This is probably the easiest one of the bunch. McCutchen has beaten these numbers in each of the last two seasons. Barring injury (knocking wood), he should breeze by these numbers. My only concern is if the Pirates fall back to a non-contention team. Over.

10 - Buster Posey - .294/.367/.466  4.7 WARP: Projecting a catcher is always problematic because so much depends on dings and dents accumulated over the season. All you have to do is look at the wild swing of Posey's fWAR numbers over the last four seasons to see what I mean: 3.9, 1.7, 7.7 and 4.8. PECOTA pegs Posey right around his numbers for last year, which I considered a bit of a down year for him. If he bounces back at all to somewhat near what he did in 2012, he will blow past these numbers. But again, for a catcher, this is a crap shoot at best. Over.

7 - Robinson Cano - .293/.343/.490  4.9 WARP: PECOTA is really expecting Safeco Field and the lack of protection in the lineup to mess with Cano. But let's look at it this way: In forty games played at that field, Cano has a .837 OPS, which is four points higher than this projection. All Cano has to do to blow away this projection is to do better on the road. Cano has batted over .300 in six of his last seven seasons including the last five in a row. His OBP has been 35 to 40 points higher than this for the last two seasons. And he has been over .500 slugging for five straight seasons. Yeah, Safeco will dampen him a bit, but come on. Over.

7 - Adrian Gonzalez - .286/.366/.485  4.9 WARP: Perhaps I have to admit my bias here. I really can't stand Adrian Gonzalez. There is no rhyme or reason for my antipathy, but there is. Even so, this is overly optimistic. Gonzalez's fWAR figures the last two seasons were 3.3 and 2.8. That is hardly close to 4.9. PECOTA has him hitting 28 homers. Not a chance. Under. But I am biased.

7 - Giancarlo Stanton - .267/.345/.546  4.9 WARP: Every projection system expects Stanton to have a monster season. The average projection for him is 5 WAR and 35 homers or more PECOTA has him at 40 homers. There are two things that concern me. First, pitchers have stopped pitching to him, second he strikes out too much and lastly, he cannot stay on the field for 150 games. I see only a chance for one of those three things to change. Under.

6 - Mike Trout - .288/.354/.467   5.2 WARP: Are you kidding me? Over. Easily. The Angels are going to have a better year and that can only help Trout. Over. Over. Over.

5 - Troy Tulowitzki - .298/.369/.524   5.4 WARP: One of these years, Tulowitzki is going to play 150 games or more. And if he does, these numbers will look puny. He is the best overall shortstop in the game, who unfortunately, cannot seem to get a full season in. I am going out on a limb here and saying that this is the year. Over.

3 - Miguel Cabrera - .313/.392/.560  5.7 WARP: Duh. Over. He will miss Prince Fielder, but the guy has murdered these numbers for years now.

3 - Ryan Braun - .302/.364/.544  5.7 WARP: Would you really say Ryan Braun in the same breath as Miguel Cabrera? No, but he has put up these kinds of numbers regularly. But how will he react after last year's fiasco? What will it be like with all that pressure to show he is that good without the drugs? I think this is 50/50. But I'm going under.

2 - Joey Votto - .299/.400/.531  5.9 WARP: The final OPS number is similar to what Votto put up last year. His on-base percentage was much higher, but his slugging was lower. I really don't understand the knock on him that Reds fans have of the guy. He is a great hitter. All that said, last year seemed like a down year for him when he did put the bat on the ball, though his BABIP was right in range with his career average. I don't know. The guy seems like a lock to get at least 5.9 WARP, but I am not real sold on the lineup around him. Under.

1 - Albert Pujols - .296/.382/.548  6.9 WARP: Surprise! I bet you wouldn't guess this in a million years. Not only does PECOTA project Pujols as the top WARP guy in baseball, but by a win! Wow. Pujols hasn't had a WAR this high since 2010. He is older. He is not the guy anymore. The guy now is Cabrera. Pujols isn't even the best player on his team. That would be Mike Trout. But...what if his struggles the last three years were because of his legs? What if that was fixed now and he has his base back under him. The guy was the superstar of superstars. He was better than Cabrera during his peak. What if, for one magical season, we see the Albert Pujols of old with a monster year? It could happen. Will it? I would not bet real money on it. But it is in the realm of possibility. Just ask the computer. Well...ask PECOTA's computer as no other projection system has him close to these numbers.

The most accurate shortstop arms

When I was a kid, my brother and I made up this game called, "Ground ball to first." We would stand on opposite sides of the street about 70 to 90 feet apart and each half inning of a nine inning game consisted of us taking turns playing shortstop and first base. The first baseman was on "offense" and would throw grounders to the other. An out required a perfect field of the baseball and a perfect throw back to the first baseman. Errors were the only way to score. It was from that game that I have always appreciated the strong, accurate throw from the shortstop position.

I had the idea to go through the list of shortstops in the last fifty or so years who are on Baseball-reference.com's assist leaders. I also took a look at those with the top fielding percentages and zone ratings. Please note that I am not looking for the best fielding shortstops here. I am only looking for the most accurate arms. If you dig down enough for each player, you can find out how many of his total errors were throwing errors and then it is a simple case of dividing the throwing errors by throwing errors plus assists.

I know this is not perfect because some of the throws might have been relay throws and some benefited from year to year by who played first base and that first baseman's scooping ability (or height!). But I would assume all of that stuff evened out over the length of each player's career. I also know that I did not get everyone. I added to my list at least four times and am sure I missed a couple.

But the list became interesting as it is and gives a pretty good snapshot of what shortstop's arm was accurate or not. Here are my numbers from best to worst:

1. Larry Bowa - .0022
2. Dave Concepcion - .0037
3. Mark Belanger - .0041
4. Bill Russell - .0046
5. Bucky Dent - .0048
6. Don Kessinger - .0053
7. Leo Cardenas - .0057
8. Bert Campaneris - .00596
9. Robin Yount - ..00599
10. Bud Harrelson - .0067
11. Roy McMillan - .007105
12. Cal Ripken, Jr. - .007108
13. Omar Vizquel - .00711
14. Chris Speier - .007198
15. Ozzie Smith - .007199
16. Alan Trammell - .0073
17. Garry Templeton - .0075
18. Luis Aparicio - .008638
19. Rey Sanchez - .008647
20. Tony Fernandez - .0090
21. Jimmy Rollins - .0104
22. Ed Brinkman - .0119
23. Ozzie Guillen - .0126
24. Alex Rodriguez - .0134
25. Royce Clayton - .0144
26. Barry Larkin - .0158
27. Miguel Tejada - .0164
28. Edgar Renteria - .0167
29. Derek Jeter - .0178

Larry Bowa was amazingly accurate and tops our list of modern shortstops with the most accurate arm. Eight of his sixteen full seasons at shortstop had zero throwing errors. Zero! And five others included only one throwing error. He made only 15 throwing errors his entire career. Eight of those were in the first two seasons he played. He went from 1974 to 1980 without a single throwing error. Amazing.

Of course, throwing accurately is only part of a shortstop equation. B-R also tracks something called Percentage of fielded balls that turned into outs. Throwing is only a part of that equation. Release and simply catching the ball cleanly also play a part. During all seasons I looked at, 89 or 90% was the league average.

1. 95% - Mark Belanger
2. 93% - Leo Cardinas, Rey Sanchez, Bud Harrelson, Roy McMillan
3. 92% - Larry Bowa, Bert Campaneris, Alan Trammell, Cal Ripken, Jr., Alex Rodriguez, Luis Aparicio, Bucky Dent, Robin Yount
4. 91% - Conception, Templeton, Speier, Jeter, Ozzie Smith, Omar Vizquel, Brinkman, Guillen
5. 90% - Tejada, Russell, Rollins
6. 89% - Clayton, Renteria, Fernandez
7. 88% - Kessinger

So the old saw would apply that most of these long-time shortstops "made all the plays."

For 2013, the top five in throwing accuracy from shortstop were:

1. Stephen Drew - .0030
2. Jose Iglesias - .0057
3. Asdrubal Cabrera - .0095
4. Jhonny Peralta - .0101
5. Troy Tulowitzki - .0104

Please remember that I am not saying this makes the best shortstop. Good old Asdrubal points that out in this list. But it is interesting to see who has the most accurate arms from the shortstop position. Larry Bowa should be smiling at Stephen Drew.

Troy Tulowitzki reclaims best shortstop title

The only thing that has kept Troy Tulowitzki from acclaim as baseball's best shortstop has been his propensity to get injured. He only played 47 games in 2012. He won Silver Slugger Awards in 2010 and 2011 as the best hitter for his shortstop position despite missing forty games in 2010 and another 19 in 2011. Despite missing those 59 games in 2010 and 2011, he was still a 6 WAR player. If he can dodge this injury thing in 2013, he has a chance to be the National League MVP. He is that good.

How good is Troy Tulowitzki when he is healthy? How about a career .373 wOBA? How about a career ISO of .212? His career triple slash line of .292/.364/.504 puts him among the best of the game, never mine his position.

He is a very patient hitter who also does not swing and miss very often. He has a 6.4% swing and miss rate for his career, but that figure has been under five for the past two seasons. He waits for a pitch he likes better than most too as his swing percentage is also among the lowest at 43.6%. He will walk between nine and ten percent of the time and only strikes out 15.7% for his career. He only struck out 9.4% of the time in his brief 2012.

His home runs per fly ball have always been in double digits for a percentage. The only flaws in his offensive game is that he hits as surprisingly high percentage of pop flies to the infield (13.4% for his career) and hits slightly more ground balls than fly balls. Well...and yeah, the injury thing.

Combine Troy Tulowitzki's offensive prowess as a shortstop with his fielding and you get a superstar. Well...that is until you get to 2012 where he was rated slightly below average in the field. That was probably a one year blip because his defensive metrics have always been excellent. It seems certain that if Tulowitzki had been able to stay healthy for the full season, he would have pulled the defensive metrics back where they usually are.

Of course, Tulowitzki will always get a bit of stink eye because he plays his home games at Coors Field. And sure, his career OPS at home is nearly a hundred points higher than his road OPS. But his road OPS is still .812 and that is pretty darned good.

Despite the fact that it has seemed like Troy Tulowitzki has been around for a long time, He is heading only into his Age 28 season, so he is just reaching his prime as a player.

Because of his injury past, it seems that projections for 2013 are conservative for him. Here are some of them with the biggest ones on top:

• Bill James - .298/.372/.522 with 28 homers
• Baseball Prospectus - .292/.370/.524 with 28 homers
• Steamer - .300/.374/.540 with 23 homers
• ZiPS - .294/.365/.535 with 23 homers

Only Bill James and Baseball Prospectus expect him to get a full playing season in. The rest have him missing games and that is fair considering his history.

But if Tulowitzki plays 155 games, he will hit over .300, hit over 30 homers and will be an MVP candidate with his combination of batting, position and fielding skills. Those projections that predict WAR give him a range of 5.5 to 6 as a projection for 2013. If he stays healthy, I don't see why that can't be pushed up to seven or seven and a half.

Troy Tulowitzki is one of the most talented players in baseball. Unfortunately, injuries have robbed us of far too much of his playing time. It would be great if he can play 155 times this season. Well...if would be great unless you were an opposing pitcher.

If Not Tulo, Then Who?

Keith Law was just one dissenter in the seven year extension the Rockies just bestowed (or are about to bestow) on Troy Tulowitzki. The signing means that the Rockies have Tulowitzki locked up until the 2020 season with an option for 2021. The prevailing opinion is that the deal is too long and contains too much risk. The Fan disagrees and Tulowitzki is probably the only player on the market where the Fan would make this length of a deal.

Keith Law compared the contract to the Ryan Howard deal for incredulity. But Howard doesn't add the value that Tulowitzki does.  There is nobody in baseball like Tulowitzki. He stands alone as the best shortstop in the game today. He has it all. He hits for power. He hits for average. And he is superb at his position. That combination exists to any degree in one other shortstop in baseball: Stephen Drew and Drew's numbers don't compare to Tulo's. These two shortstops were the two of the three regular shortstops in the majors that were in the plus column for both hitting value and fielding value. Uribe was the other (though just barely).

There were only five shortstops that finished above the zero line in value on offense: Tulowitzki, Drew, Hanley Ramirez, Uribe and Jose Reyes. And Tulowitzki was on top of the list with a 31.9. Hanley Ramirez was a distant second (in an off year) at 25.9.  Drew was third at 13.0.

There were only eight shortstop in the majors that ended up with a value of over $10 million in 2010. We are not exactly in the golden age of shortstops. And to have so many shortstops under $10 million in value despite getting a 7.5 positional punch and a 20 replacement punch and that's pretty sad. According to the value charts, Derek Jeter was the ninth highest rated shortstop despite what many consider to be a terrible season.

In short, players like Tulowitzki don't come around very often. And when you compare shortstops around baseball as apposed to first baseman, where there are at least fourteen that are seriously productive, Tulowitzki is the cream of the crop.

Many have taken great pains to point out how expensive Tulowitizki will be in the back end of this deal. But if you factor in his value over the life of the next ten years, the Rockies should get their money's worth because they are getting a bargain for the next four years. For example, he will make around $5 million in 2011 and he was worth almost $26 million in 2010 even though he missed some playing time.

Baseball Prospectus projects Tulowitzki as a $28 million dollar player in 2011, $26.5 million in 2012 and sliding down about $1.3 million a year every year after that. According to their projections, he should still be worth $19.5 million in 2018. If you added all that value up, according to their projections, Tulowitzki's values should come almost dead on with what he is being paid. The only real risk, according to BP is in the last two years of the contract and the Rockies have already taken care of that in 2020 when only $14 million is guaranteed.

The only real precedent for this deal at this position is Derek Jeter. And Jeter arguably played terrific in eight of the ten years of his contract. The Fan thinks that the Rockies would be happy with similar results from Tulowitzki and Tulo is a much better fielder than Jeter ever was and he has much more power.

To sum up the Fan's feelings on all of this, Tulowitzki is the best player at a position that does not have a lot of talent around the majors. The projections on Tulo seem to add up to what he will be making. That combination seems to be a sweet deal for both Tulowitzki and for the Rockies and certainly for the fans of the Rockies.