Alright so next on the chopping block is to look into the hitting performance of the Orioles over the first 'half' of the season.
Matt Wieters: Ok so the catcher for the Orioles is the first one I've decided to look at and his primary stats are more or less in line with what he did last year as well as his career average (those stats being AVG, OBP, SLG, OPS). Now on the other hand there are some slight changes that could indicate something further if the trend continues, for instance Wieters had 60 walks over the course of the season but so far with just 50 games left in the season he only has 30 (after playing 2/3 of the season already) so it's possible that he's being less selective at the plate and thus taking less balls though his strike outs have gone down so far but what does show whats going on is what happens after he hits the ball. That of course is the fact that his FB and GB percentages have gone up while his LD (line drive) percentage has gone down a fair bit from previous years and falling in line his HR/FB ratio has taken a nose dive of about 4% from last year. So basically what this shows is that he's trying to make contact on pitches that would otherwise be balls and is getting bad hits that end up being fly ball or ground ball outs. Now if he, like most, tends to deviate to his average then he should see a slight increase in power and average in the rest of the season however, not only has his hitting stats suffered a bit this season but he hasn't been nearly as good as expected defensively this year as his fielding runs above average has dropped 5.5 points and his WAR (wins against replacement, basically meaning how many games the team wins just by having him on the team) has dropped by nearly 2 points and is the lowest in his career. Overall I expect some bit of a turn around but don't expect high to start mashing the ball at an amazing pace either.
Chris Davis: So here we have the big anomaly of the year in baseball, now you should know what I mean by that as Davis has just come out of no where to become one of the games premiere power hitters. So obviously I cant really compare this years stats with what he's done in the past as it would seem obvious that he's changed something major that has triggered some innate ability he didn't have before. Anyhow let's get into it, at this point David is having his 3rd full year in the majors after a few year stint with the Rangers, where he was only up for one full season, and a full season with the Orioles the previous year as he was traded. Now his stats this year have been out of this world as he's been able to hold an above .300 AVG, high OBP and nearly above .700 SLG. The obvious explanation is that he has had an increase in his walk rate and a decrease of his strike out rate, then his ISO (isolated power, SLG-AVG) has shot up as well meaning not only is he being more selective about pitches and making more contact because of it but he's making BETTER contact and is driving more of his hits out of the park. Now there are already signs that Davis is starting to regress, what I'm talking about of course is the fact that his AVG dropped to below .300 in June but it's plummeted to .209 so far in July and he's been kicking way off what his pace was for home runs. So overall there are really 2 ways this can go, either Davis will continue to regress back to his previous years numbers or he'll right himself and remain a pretty high end power hitter in the AL, personally I think the later is more likely as I don't think he'd just click like this and then within a few months fall back into old habits for good.
Ryan Flaherty: Not much to talk about here as Flaherty has been just what he has been all his career, an infielder with not much power and not much ability to hit. Then in addition to this there hasn't been much change for him in the way of any of this stats be it offensive or defensive, he was more of a roster filler when the Orioles true second baseball Brian Roberts went down with injury during spring training so expect to see more of the same from Flaherty.
J.J. Hardy: Hardy, the SS for the Orioles, is one of those one/two tool short stops out there in the MLB similar to guys like Elvis Andrus who is really only useful for some average hitting and his speed however Hardy is better known for his defensive ability and his power hitting as he usually breaks 20 home runs but in doing so ends the season with a low .200's AVG. Ok so what we've seen from Hardy this year is more of the same, and thankfully his splits don't really indicate that he has specific areas of his hitting game that he is lacking in, but his strike out rate is 4% lower than the last 3 years and his career average to in the future I expect that to correct itself to some degree and his batting average to decrease slightly to accommodate for it. In addition to this his HR/FB ratio has gone up about 3% from last year and 2% on his career average, which would indicate that he may fall off pace in terms of power for the remaining games. Looking at the rest of his stats doesn't tell us much in terms of what to expect in the future however I believe that it would be wise to expect maybe another 8 or so home runs but a slight increase in strike outs and a slight decrease in his AVG, which would equate to a better year than 2012 but not quite as good as 2011.
Manny Machado: And here we have another rookie phenomenon and I personally think that he's been unfairly over shadowed by the start of Bryce Harper and Mike Trout. Now like Davis, Machado has been able, for the first half to sustain an AVG of over .300 and has been on a doubles hitting spree, now a problem is that he has had an exceedingly low walk rate so he isn't being as selective at the plate as he could be and if he did make those changes his OBP would go up a fair bit and he'd likely have more runs scored to show for it. On the positive side he has a strike out rate thats only a few points above the norm in the MLB and as a young player we all should expect it to decrease closer to the mean as his career continues in addition he has already taken steps to improving his ability as his line drive percentage has gone up by nearly 4%, which would account for the amazing amount of doubles that he been hitting. Now as like Davis, he to has been seeing a decrease in his stats as well, he's seen a severe drop in in AVG and walk rate meaning he's swinging more at pitches and likely pitchers are challenging him with tougher pitches, which can be seen in the fact that his LD% has decreased by 13% and then his GB and FB % have increased by 10% and 4% respectively. So in essence what this tells us is that he's swinging at more pitches that may not be the best to drive or put into play and as a result his at bats are resulting more in ground ball and fly ball outs. Now despite being a small sample size his HR/FB ratio has taken a huge leap, which if true, could mean he's sacrificing AVG for power much like the way that his team mate J.J. Hardy works at the plate. Though overall since he still is a very young player it's hard to say what people expect him to be in the end, but I do expect he'll continue on his normal trend but he won't end up as high as his initial 1st half numbers suggested he would as most high talent rookies end up crushing in the first half, then they get challenged by pitchers in the second half and their stats drop off until they make the necessary correction and I believe that Machado will be able to make that adjustment.
Nate McLouth: McLouth this year has shown a bit of a turn around since after being passed around 3 teams in the last few years he's managed to decrease his strike out rate a fair amount and is hitting more for average these days with Baltimore, what has been most surprising is that the last 3 years has seen his development of his speed and it is currently at it's peak. Now in terms of regression there doesn't seem to be any realistic stats to indicate this is not real as there has been a steady increase in these areas since he's come over to the Orioles. This shows that he's had a decent increase in the AVG and speed departments but the stats that show how this is happening is his BABIP, and his LD, FB and GB percentages, the percentages have all steadily increased or decreased in the right direction of the last 3 years (LD up, GB and FB down). Then BABIP is a stat called 'batting average against balls in play', it's basically a way to better look at what a players average SHOULD be or at least what direction you can expect it to move in and in McLouth's case his BABIP has, like his percentages, have gone up and is sitting pretty at .313. All of this basically tells us that McLouth is starting to come into his own and hitting the prime of his career, lucky thing the Orioles traded for him, and like I've said his stats have steadily increase since the beginning of the 2009 season so it's a real increase in his abilities and it is not likely that his current pace will decrease and even more his second half stats so far have also indicated that theres unlikely to be a heavy decline in his skill set.
Adam Jones: Now heres the real muscle of the Orioles batting order good ol' Adam Jones. Like many of the Orioles hitters Jones has been surprisingly consistent throughout his tenure with the Orioles, however there are a few things this year that do raise a bit of question, that being his walk rate, which has gone down a couple percent from the last couple of years and is very low at the point it's at. In addition to this there has been an decrease above his career average for FB and GB percentages and a increase as compared to his career average of line drive percentage, since we lack the same sort of steady increase in his stats over the past few years like we've seen with McLouth theres no reason to think that these changes will necessarily be permanent in the second half and that there won't be a drop off. This can be seen even more by the percentages more or less righting themselves in the few second half games he has had so far, but his walk rate has also increased, which makes up for the lower number of line drives to some extent. Now one thing I haven't mentioned in all of these evals is batting average with runners in scoring position and pitch count splits, now the reason for that is because all of the Orioles hitters don't have any issues with any sort of situational or clutch hitting and in the cases of Machado, Jones and McLouth they seem to thrive in those situations. Overall just like the majority of the hitters for the Orioles we can expect more of the same from Jones, now yes there will likely be a decrease in the amount of power hitting that we see from him in the second half, however he has also increased his walk rate and his slugging has taken a sharp upward turn so there is a good chance that he may not even see a decrease since he has decrease in one way but an increase from the other end.
Nick Markakis: With more consistency to the Orioles line up we see Nick Markakis. This guy has been doing the same thing for the past couple years, his numbers have stayed rather steady and unchanged. Though his ISO (isolated power) has decreased over the last 2 years to this year it's important to note that despite this decrease those 2 years only saw him take 400 or so at bats over the whole season whereas this year he's likely to sport around 500-600 at bats and get about the same number of home runs as the previous years. As well his LD%, GB% and FB% are slightly above/below what his career averages, which indicates that his stats are going to decline, however even though his career averages aren't as good his past 3 years have actually been slightly better in those 3 stats that his current coverage, making the idea that we could even see an increase in his production more likely. One more thing that proves this theory on my part is that his OBP, AVG, SLG and OPS are currently a bit lwoer than his career averages but even more so when you look at his previous 2 years of production. In essence what this tells us is that Markakis has yet to show us his best and is likely to get better in the last couple of months of the season.
Nolan Reimold: Now the reason I'm writing in Reimold is because out of all the other people that have been cycled into the DH position he's the only one that has been present for 100+ at bats, the rest having less and in most cases 40 or less at bats. Now in terms of Reimold, he has shown rather lacklustre ability so far this year hitting at a pitiful .195 so far and his OBP and OPS have followed suit and the reasoning for this can be seen in the fact that his strike out rate is up 9% more than his norm and his walk rate is down about 2.5% from the norm. Now the unfortunate news about this is that like McLouth, this trend has been occurring over the past 3 years so there is less evidence to suggest that it isn't going to be permanent. However on the other hand if we are to expect that the changes that have occurred over the past years are permanent we must also expect that his heightened line drive rate from 2012 must also follow suit so despite the lower walk rate and higher strikeout rate there is good potential that at the very least his OBP and AVG should improve to a degree for the remainder of the year.
Ok, now onto the final, and most playoff relevant, team over the week I should have posts on the Cardinals hitting and pitcher for the first half.
-Eric
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