I like Gardner, but - having watched the highlights - he could very easily have gone 0 for 3 on the first three hits.  Which were why BABIP makes you look at LD% and such.  On the other hand, perhaps they gave him the confidence to smack the ball the rest of the way…
In any event, he’s not looking overmatched, and that’s got to be a good thing.
Also, in a possible trade scenario, he belongs to one of player types that teams seem (to me) to tend to overvalue.

Any explanation or experience with the drop in HR rate?  Better eye, more patience, more even swing? I don’t watch a lot of games, so I don’t really see what he’s doing, and if he’s doing anything differently. 4.05 Pit/PA, no idea if that is good or not.

I meant drop in Gardner’s K rate.

Better eye, more patience, more even swing?

I don’t know that his eye could have gotten any better than his minor league stats suggested it would be.  And if anything, I’d argue that one of the easiest ways to cut down on your K rate is to be less patient.  Anytime you put the ball in play before you get to two strikes, you ain’t striking out in that AB.  I guess you could look at pitches/PA to get some indication of that, but you’d probably need to take a more granular approach to really tease out whether he’s showing less willingness to risk having to hit with two strikes.

I got nothing on his swing plane.

Considering [4], and more context, line with two strikes: .282/.360/.436. Predictably not good with 0-2 count, but improvement after getting past 0-2 count.

Not sure what this means exactly.

John Sterling is always right.

[6]
...in the Twilight Zone.

Maybe this is one instance in which we should give credit to Kevin Long.  Although, I have no idea how much work he’s done with Gardner.  But with a young player, most of the time hitting coaches have a lot of influence.

I knew Gardner had been doing well for a while, but I don’t think I had appreciated just how well.  Check out Gardner’s stats for his last 96 PA, which is more than half his season.  He’s been smoking hot.

One might want to have a line for average Yankee (averaged over a few seasons, reweighted by changes in league performance even) or an average player-on-a-95-win-team for comparison.

As to why Brett Gardner’s K rate has dropped, I posted this over at RAB, maybe my research can shed a tad bit of light on this: http://riveraveblues.com/2009/06/two-outfielders-heading-different-ways-13767/#comment-452687

How does the ROY race look?

I don’t understand the wOba chart - average is 0.310?  I thought it was more like 0.330 - you had Gardner at 0.310?  Also I thought wOba (for Fangraphs anyway) included baserunning.

The reason he has been so successful - I think - is because when he actually does swing the bat, he makes contact at an amazing rate. Using the same control group (MLB hitters with at least 170 PA), we see that Gardner ranks 27th in MLB with a contact rate of 89%, well above the league-average percentage of 80.6.

The question, then, is - is this the kind of stat with respect to which a player has a decent chance of remaining a relative outlier, or is this the kind of stat that tends to revert to the league norm?  In the sense that I don’t think most people are expecting David Wright’s BABiP to remain over .500…

The question, then, is - is this the kind of stat with respect to which a player has a decent chance of remaining a relative outlier, or is this the kind of stat that tends to revert to the league norm?

Awesome question, but I have not a clue. If I’d have to guess, I’d say yes, based solely on the notion that the ability to put bat on ball is a tool, much like hitting for power or one’s speed. However, that’s just a stab-in-the-dark kind of guess.

I found this post to be spectacularly informative and gets down to how you define “small sample size”.  Seems like contact% stabilizes very, very quickly.

Contact rate is something that players have control over. (in the sense that players can sustain different contact rates.  Compare Ichiro and Adam Dunn, for example.)  Gardner’s contact rate this year is the same as it was last year, though.

That lower O-Swing% is much more important, and I’m not so sure that that is stable.  Even the league average fluctuates.

and that post doesn’t split Swing%, unfortunately, but about 50% of pitches are in/out of the strike zone, so O-Swing% probably does stabilize well.

The thing about Gardner has always been his ability to adjust to higher levels of competition after initial struggles.  Of course, adjusting to major league pitching is not the same as adjusting to AA or AAA and Gardner needs to sustain his progress over a larger sample size but he’s just so much fun to watch that I hope he’s able to keep it up.

The reason he has been so successful - I think - is because when he actually does swing the bat, he makes contact at an amazing rate.

I’d be cautious about chalking Gardner’s contact rate up to an innate skill of his.

Take a look at the distribution of pitches he’s seeing.  Gardner so far this year is seeing an inordinate number of fastballs with relatively few off speed pitches.

68% of all of the pitches he’s seen have been fastball.  For comparison only 61% of all pitches Melky has seen have been fastballs.

Young players who first come up often see an inordinate number of off speed pitches because that’s what they haven’t seen in the minors.  Gardner hasn’t gone through that.  Last year he saw 71% fastballs.

Up to now pitchers have treated him like a light hitting guy who can’t drive the ball.  They’ve thrown him predominantly fastballs with the idea of knocking the bat out of his hand.  They’ve been trying to minimize the probability that they’ll walk him - why should they given his speed and what has until recently been very limited power at the major league level.

Now you have to give Gardner a lot of credit because he’s done what all young players need to do when they get to the majors - adjust.  He’s adjusted to seeing a lot of fastballs.

But now the league is going to adjust back. He’ll see fewer fastball and more off speed pitches.  The yankees have also shielded him from left handed pitching.  That’ll need to change.

The league is going to adjust back to gardner.  They are going to pitch him differently and he’ll need to prove that he can meet that challenge and hit a different distribution of pitches.

It’ll be interesting to see if he can continue making high rates of contact seeing a different mix of pitches both by type and distribution inside and outside of the zone.

I knew Gardner had been doing well for a while, but I don’t think I had appreciated just how well.  Check out Gardner’s stats for his last 96 PA, which is more than half his season.  He’s been smoking hot.

Which raises a possible explanation for why Gardner might be outperforming his projections based on his MLEs. Like many players, he had a tendency to struggle when he was first promoted to the next level in the mLs (as he did when he was first promoted to the MLs). From looking at the aggregate stats (as opposed to the game logs) of his first 217 ABs at Trenton in comparison to his next 203 the following season, and his first 181 ABs at SWB in comparison to his next 341 the following season, there was a huge uptick in his ISO P (.046 to .119 at Trenton; .071 to .126 at Scranton). His K rates appear to be more stable.

The yankees have also shielded him from left handed pitching.  That’ll need to change.

I’m not sure that does need to change.  He can have a very useful career as a platoon player who pinch runs and goes in for late inning defense in the games he doesn’t start.

This is going to sound a lot more negative than I intend it to be, but I think it still needs to be said.  The biggest thing to remember with Gardner is the smallness of the sample sizes.  All of them, good and bad.  He was horrible in April, but of course we can dismiss 65 PA as not being indicative of his true talent.  The flip side is that his recent performance level is pretty obviously not sustainable.  There is absolutely nothing in his track record or scouting reports that even remotely suggests that we should have expected what he’s done in May and June.  Yes, he’s had a history of doing better the second time around at a level, and yes, he’s shown upticks in isoP.  But he had an isoP of .201 in May, and is hitting .390 so far in June.  That is not going to continue.  Period.  All he is proving so far is that anybody can hit anything in 60 PA.

All he is proving so far is that anybody can hit anything in 60 PA.

And that numbers look a lot better if you increase your season OPS by close to 70 points in just one game.

OK.  Anybody can hit anything in 6 PA.  Better?

And if anything, I’d argue that one of the easiest ways to cut down on your K rate is to be less patient.

I think this is part of it.  I can’t find anywhere that splits out pitches seen per game to see if his P/PA has changed, but that’s something I’d like to check.

I don’t understand the wOba chart - average is 0.310?  I thought it was more like 0.330 - you had Gardner at 0.310?  Also I thought wOba (for Fangraphs anyway) included baserunning.

AL CF in 2009 are averaging 0.310 for wOBA.  I’m not comparing Gardner to everyone, just AL CF.  League average overall is 0.332. 

Fangraphs does use SB in their wOBA numbers, but I am using the original definition which only looks at batting events.

How does the ROY race look?

Here are the rookie leaders in VORP in the AL:

Romero and Bergesen are having good years, although there’s not much hype around them.  Porcello seems to be getting more recognition because he’s racking up the wins (8 compared to Romero and Bergens’ 5).  I’d probably say Porcello is the leader right now based on how the MSM thinks.

But Aceves had a late start.
I’m going to go out on a limb and bet that Aceves shoots up to the top of that list, or close, if you measure it in terms of VORP per AB/batter faced.

I’m not sure that does need to change.  He can have a very useful career as a platoon player who pinch runs and goes in for late inning defense in the games he doesn’t start.

On the whole I agree so let me clarify my point.  By that’ll have to change I was referring to the idea that Gardner should play everyday as a starter or at least have his playing time increased substantially.  That’s a reasonable position to take given his recent success.  Play him more and see how he does.

But if he’s going to play everyday he’ll eventually have to see left handed pitchers.  He’s been protected from that during this hot streak.  He’s been protected from playing against many of the oppositions top starters.  Girardi has used him successfully in that pick and choose way.  So it’s an open question as to how he’ll do in a expanded role.

I agree with your point.  It’s a handful of at bats and difficult to generalize from them in any way.  The league is going to adjust.  An expanded role will test his skill set.  We’ll see.

Ultimately his best role could be as a situational player.

Aceves being the most valuable rookie at the end of the year would be the greatest thing since Pavano starting on opening day.  Do relievers win rookie of the year awards?

From Jamal G‘s link: “Brett Gardner has actually been far less aggressive at the plate this season, compared to last.”

I’m pretty sure he’s talking about wrt earlier this season.  Thanks by the way for the data-driven link.

I argued here pre-season that Gardner should have good contact rates based on his (maybe ratcheted) MiL #s but I agree that this is a small sample - maybe not statistically for this metric but systematically, as the league adjusts to him and because the endpoints sculpt the result.

There is absolutely nothing in his track record or scouting reports that even remotely suggests that we should have expected what he’s done in May and June.

MC, am I wrong in believing that, at his age, there is significant room for these to change?  I’m not saying that I’m crying from the rooftops: “He’s going to be a STAR!!!”... but the recent bend in his performance curve does justify watching with interest, being intrigued, no?

And listening to Boston talk radio you’d think Jacoby Ellsbury is the second coming of Christ Jesus in his Chariot of Fire.

Wasn’t that Enoch or Elijah?
Actually, I kind of like that - we could call him Elijaberry!

“There is absolutely nothing in his track record”

The ratchet would argue his 0.389 wOba - ok, that’s fangraphs, let’s say 0.837 OPS at his last repeated level isn’t inconsistent with his performance this year.  Even his non-ratcheted projection is consistent, as noted above. Given the small sample size of May/June, I don’t see why we shouldn’t have expected his performance in the “there’s a good chance that” sense.

Quite a few Boston fans believe that Ellsbury is better and more valuable than BJ Upton.

let’s say 0.837 OPS at his last repeated level isn’t inconsistent with his performance this year

I said there was nothing to lead us to expect what he’s done in May and June.  Those are .955 and 1.040 OPS, respectively.  I don’t see how an OPS of .837 at AAA predicts 100+ PAs of ~1.000 in the majors.

MC, am I wrong in believing that, at his age, there is significant room for these to change?

I’m not sure what you mean.  He’s 25, not 20.  Can he keep getting better for at least the next couple of years?  Sure, but that’s not going to change his track record to date, and if he ever puts up an OPS of .900, much less 1.000, for a full season in MLB… well, lets’ just say that anybody who tells you that they saw that coming will be lying.

I’m not saying that I’m crying from the rooftops: “He’s going to be a STAR!!!”

Yep, that gigs taken.

I don’t see how an OPS of .837 at AAA predicts 100+ PAs of ~1.000 in the majors.

I guess I should add something like “unless you’re saying that we should expect wild swings in his performance from month to month based on ‘the ratchet’.”

And Upton’s not exactly lighting it up this season, so I’m not sure just what those Boston fans are bragging about.

Not only is he striking out less he’s walking more and as one of his biggest detractors I must admit happily to probably being wrong in my evaluation of Garnder’s worth.  I do however agree with WP that he could easily have gone 2 for 6 instead of 5 for 6 which even he admitted in the post game.

Hmm, having trouble posting - trying again:

I wouldn’t be surprised to see swings in his performance due to the ratchet (if there is in fact one) because one way to explain the effect is a low plain talent level but a high ability to calibrate mechanics and recalibrate approach - a ratchet in the minors, predator-prey cycles in the majors after settling.  An opposite source of variance is a high plain talent level but a low ability to etc. - slumps and hot streaks.  But more I was thinking that there’s his true talent, his predicted true talent, and the estimator of his true talent - and with low stats on the last and large systematics on the first, it’s not a priori obvious to me we should be surprised.

Now you might well argue that the estimates of uncertainties should be asymmetric and the upper end was greatly exaggerated, I don’t know.

My thinking was much more basic—his ratcheted minor league numbers have never approached what he’s done in the past two months.  So what is the basis for expecting the ratchet (or the variance) to get even more pronounced?  Or to put it another way, we’re talking about Brett Gardner putting up an OPS close to 1.000 for a couple of months.  How can we not be surprised?

It’s two months, but it’s only 23 games started and 111 PAs, so the sample size is a little smaller than one-third of the season.  As Falstaff notes, many of those PAs probably PAs that were selected because they were adantageous to Gardner.

It is definitely still surprising.  If you had set the over/under on Gardner HRs (non inside the park variety) in 2009 to two, I’d have taken the under.

Anything can happen with Gardner going forward.  We never really know how a player’s performance will translate to the majors, no matter how much fancy number crunching we try to do. 

I do think we’re seeing him show that at the very least, he’ll have a career as a bench option for pinch-running, late inning defense, and some platoon ABs.

it’s only 23 games started and 111 PAs

Yeah, I know that.  In fact, I think I said that.  But I’d almost be willing to make a small wager that Gardner has never OPS’d over .950 for 111 PAs at any professional level.

Wasn’t his performance last year two-peaked?  Someone posted a link to a site that allowed selective endpoint summing…

One of these days I’ll have to build a simple monte carlo in my copious free time so I can assess the statistics of 111 PA with some biasing cuts - but since Gardner’s true talent level isn’t 1.0 OPS, we’re seeing a statistical fluctuation plus some unknown ratchet contribution, and the only question is how many sigma and how big an amplitude, resp.  A simple way to get at the former would be to look at the distribution of OPS per 111 PA for all players of say 0.840 OPS true talent.

Yeah, so linking via [9], 0.957 OPS from Sept 15-26, but that’s just 35 PA.

A simple way to get at the former would be to look at the distribution of OPS per 111 PA for all players of say 0.840 OPS true talent.

Of course, limiting the analysis to players who have had enough total PA to have established a true talent level will take most of the fun out of it.

Not that they’re totally similar, but Devon White had a 17-year career as a ~.750 OPS/SB%/Defense CFer.  Devo had more power, but less plate discipline.  If Gardner can keep a .725-50 OPS he’ll be a vaulable CFer for a while.

For the Yankees?  What was 0.750 in OPS+?

“enough total PA”

Nice thing about a lot of PA is that it allows a bunch of selective endpoints.

If Gardner can keep a .725-50 OPS he’ll be a vaulable CFer for a while.

Yeah, league average CF is generally around a .750 OPS.  Since Gardner’s OPS would likely be OBP heavy he’d probably be a little above average.

For the Yankees? What was 0.750 in OPS+?

Tough to say this season, but in the last few years for the Yankees, an average OPS (OPS+ of 100) has been around .769.

I meant, the Yankees expect to field above-average players - would 0.750 plus steals plus defense cut it for us in CF?  What’s the point where AJax would get prePipped?