Wednesday, August 25, 2004

Projecting Jason Bay

I’m surprised that more hasn’t been said or written about the type of season Pirates “rookie” Jason Bay is having. I put rookie in quotation marks because he is only a rookie according to the letter of the law set forth by MLB. In reality, he received fairly significant playing time last season and is advanced enough in age (25) that I hardly consider him on the same developmental level as most other rookies such as John Van Benschoten. Lumping Bay and guys like BJ Upton into the same group for comparison purposes is hardly fair to Upton. Regardless, he’s having a remarkable year, especially when you consider that he missed significant portions of the first half recovering from a shoulder injury. Back, wrist, and shoulder injuries are poison to a hitter, especially with regard to hitting for power. But Bay has shown little or no ill effects from his off season surgery. Give credit to the Pirates for easing Bay back into the lineup, thus avoiding debilitating flare ups. Credit also goes to Bay for a successful rehabilitation.

That said, I’m left wondering what we can expect from Bay for the next couple of years. Let’s take a quick look at his rate stats for this season:

AVE/OBP/SLG = .306/.374/.580

That’s pretty darn good. Bay currently has somewhere around 280 at bats, and while that’s a fairly small sample size with which to make career projections, it is enough that the league has had ample time to scout Bay and make adjustments to take advantage of his weaknesses. It’s not unusual for young players to start hot and cool off as teams figure out their weaknesses. While I don't have his month by month statistics, this doesn’t seem to be happening to Bay.

Next, let’s compare his performance to a list of performances from contemporary superstars during their age 25 season: (keep in mind some of these players had several MLB seasons under their belt by age 25.)

A - .301/.406/.565
B - .355/.434/.612
C - .290/.352/.536
D - .328/.415/.538
E - .301/.349/.510

As you can see, Bay stands up pretty well to these 5 contemporary superstars. Who are they?

A – Barry Bonds
B – Brian Giles
C – Jim Edmonds
D – Manny Ramirez
E – Magglio Ordonez

I selected these 5 players off the top of my head, so this is by no means a representative sample. However, I noticed something peculiar about all of these players except Manny Ramirez. The peculiar similarity is that the other 4 players had their breakouts during their age 25 season. For reasons unknown to god, Giles was relegated to platoon duty for another season before he was liberated by the Pirates, but those 4 players, for the first time, had what could be described as a break out season. Manny actually had his breakout at age 23, but I leave it to you to determine if Manny was really 23 and not 25 when he had his breakout. Those Dominican birthdates often seem to be determined by a random number generator.

Of these players, Giles seems to be the best ‘comp’ for Bay in terms of career development. Both were probably kept in the minors a little bit longer than was necessary, and therefore both were fairly old when they got their first full time MLB job. In terms of skills sets, Bay probably matches up best with Edmonds. Both hit for very good but not great power. Both maintain high, but not very high averages. Both have a fair amount of speed but don’t steal tons of bases. And both have a terrific propensity for striking out. No matter who you think Bay most resembles on this short list of players, there is one thing that I should point out. The average MLB hitter peaks around his age 27 season. All of the players on this list peaked beyond their 27th birthday, and appear to be aging very well.

If Bay follows the career path of any of these players, the Pirates will have another superstar to complement the already dominant Oliver Perez for several years.

posted by bkopec @ 1:43 PM   1 comments