Ready for Take-off
June 1, 2005
April is a confusing month. After the rosters are decided out of
spring training, most of the promising youngsters are sent back down to
the minors because they still have options while scrap heap players
like Chris Singleton get one last chance to prove they belong.
Hot spring training streaks spill over into the regular season and cold
starts - especially those by pitchers - make one wonder whether last
year
was a fluke or that this year is the final curtain call of a star's
great career.
But by the time May rolls around, most of the scrubs have shown their
true nature and have made way for the stud rookies to begin making
their first appearances. All becomes right in the game and from
May Day until October, baseball reveals it's truth. No longer are
the stats polluted with the noise from the Joe Horgans and Enrique
Wilsons... er, well, ok, with the exception of Dusty Baker-managed
teams, who seem to always have a spot for these guys, most of the
hangers-on are gone.
What I like to do every year around the end of May is check out who is
heating up this month and who is cooling down since this is really the
first month of the season where the competition is pretty much set
personnel-wise. Managers and GMs see what they have and begin
making plans to find what they need in June and July. So I
thought I'd look at a few of the cold starts from April and see which
direction they went in May.
Eric Chavez
April OPS: .588; May OPS: .597
Chavez May didn't look very different from his horrid April. Last
year he hit for low average out of the gate, but the difference was
that by the time June rolled around he already had 13 homers and drawn
nearly 40 walks. This year, he's got 4 homers and 16 walks going
into June. Maybe he's trying to carry a team that really doesn't
have many good hitters, especially in the power department.
Whatever it is, it's bound to change because he is simply too young and
too talented for this to continue the entire season. However,
there's no guarantee the turnaround will occur soon.
Vernon Wells
April OPS: .620; May OPS: .838
Wells is a notoriously slow starter plus he went into the season with
the added pressure of being the main guy in the Blue Jays offense, a
mantle Carlos Delgado wore previously. It was interesting to
watch him early on because there didn't appear to be anything wrong
with his swing; he just didn't appear to be seeing the ball very
well. He's been picking up lately and while his goal of 30 steals
seems far fetched, he has enough speed to get into the high teens as
his batting average rises high enough to get more opportunities.
Richard Hidalgo
April OPS: .515; May OPS: 1.095
Hidalgo is a classic streaky hitter, who looks helpless one week and
unstoppable the next. We know what kind of season he's capable of
and the Ballpark at Arlington is as good a place to hit as any in the
AL. The question is how long will his streaks last, both good and
bad. Right now, he's seeing the ball very well, walking as
often as striking out. With number of opportunities that line-up
provides, this hot streak will probably last a while.
Victor Martinez
April OPS: .620; May OPS: .602 (vs. lefties: .863)
After a breakout season last year, Martinez has really struggled.
At least part of it could be that he's overswinging in an attempt to
justify the contract he got this spring. Whatever it is, the news
isn't all bad. Sure, his walk rate has dropped, but so has his
strikeout rate and he still seems to be able to hit pretty well against
lefties. He has hit in each of his last four games (6-for-15 with
a double and two homers) so it appears as though he's starting to come
out of his slump.
Adrian Beltre
April OPS: .645; May OPS: .598
Like Martinez, he may have put exaggerated expectations on himself
after signing a lucrative contract this offseason. And like
Martinez, he's been on somewhat of a hitting streak of late, getting a
hit in 9 of his last 10 games, even though it's only been one hit per
game. On the plus side three of the ten hits have gone for extra
bases. Beltre has a history of slow starts. In fact last
year was the first season in which he didn't post a pre-All Star Break
OPS of under .700. So these kind of struggles aren't really
anything new; they're just different than last year. Expect a
second half rebound, but not like last year. His walk rate in
2004 was his best since 2000. This year's rate more resembles
what he did from 2001-2003.
Steve Finley
April OPS: .549; May OPS: .875
Finley is beginning to heat up, but that doesn't mean that he's going
to stay hot. Like Hidalgo, he's a very streaky hitter. In
fact, since 2001 he's had seven different months in which he he hit
less than .235 (three of them under .200), but also six different
months in which he's hit .335 or better. When all is said and
done, his numbers will still be below where he finished last season
because a) he's still new to the league, but more importantly b)
because Anaheim is a tougher park to hit in than either the BOB or
Chavez Ravine.
Jermaine Dye
April OPS: .517; May OPS: .933
Word must've gotten to Dye that his job security was at risk once Frank
Thomas returned to the roster. He was hitting .175 entering May
with only 3 homers, but by May 22nd his average had climbed 56 points
and he had added 6 more homers to his tally. He still doesn't
have a firm grasp of the right field job but his chances improved when
Carl Everett slumped in the last half of May. Thomas' iffy status
over the next week and a half will afford him additional time to prove
that he belongs in the everyday line-up. Staying healthy and
avoiding another second half slump like last year will be his biggest
challenges.
Phil Nevin
April OPS: .720; May OPS: .744 (but his average has jumped 70 points.)
With Nevin, the problem seems to fairly easily explained: he just
didn't hit for much power in May. He appears to have been the
victim of bad luck in April and the beneficiary of good luck in May
when it comes to balls in play. Neither his strikeout or walk
rate changed, so it's probably best to expect a leveling out on the
batting average side. Nevin has a history of better power numbers
in the second half so this is probably just a typical year with an
atypically unlucky beginning.
Aramis Ramirez
April OPS: .802; May OPS: .870
Ramirez' April and May are somewhat strange in that despite hitting
.241 in April and .289 in May, his on base was higher in April.
He drew 13 walks while striking out 13 times during the first month of
the season, but followed it up with a more aggressive approach walking
only 5 times with 14 Ks in May. The change paid off as his
slugging percentage rose nearly 100 points. But it will be
interesting to see if he can integrate the two approaches as the season
wears on in order to become an elite hitter.
Mike Lowell
April OPS: .578; May OPS: .573
With the addition of Carlos Delgado, one would have thought that Lowell
would have gotten off to a better start, especially since he a
notoriously fast starter. Since 2002, his pre-Break OPS has been
nearly 200 points better than after. However, he's gotten off to
perhaps the worst start of his career and there don't appear to be any
explanations. His walk and K rates are pretty much in
line with his career numbers. There's really no reason to expect
him to hit better other than the fact that he shouldn't be hitting this
badly.
Jim
Thome
April OPS: .651; May OPS: .766
Back troubles plagued Thome for the first month until they sidelined
him for a few weeks. Since then, he more resembles the real Jim
Thome but isn't all the way back. His walk rate has improved as
has his strikeout rate, so it's really a matter of him getting his
timing back before the power starts to show up en force. The
caveat here is that back troubles don't often just disappear forever so
they may continue to be a concern. However, with what he is
capable of producing - he's had six 10-homer months in the last
three years and three in which he drove in 30 runs - he worth the risk.
Carlos Lee
April OPS: .647; May OPS: 1.004
Lee appears to be making these slow starts a habit. Last year he
hit for decent average but only had 4 homers after the first two
months. In 2003, he hit for decent average and power but really
turned it on after the Break. In 2002 he didn't hit for average
or power until the second half. So it's not a surprise that he
got off to a slow April. What is a surprise is that he's started
to crush the ball this early. In May he hit 9 homers and drove in
30 with a batting average of .304. Is this a career year for
him? It could be, hitting in that ballpark against the depleted
pitching in the Central division.
Jack Wilson
April OPS: .393; May OPS: .720
Wilson was slow to fully recover from an appendectomy, but appears to
be making up ground now. Obviously, he's not going to fully
recapture the magic of last season as that had al the earmarks of a
career season. However, his strikeout/walk rate is much improved
so we should still see a pretty solid hitter the rest of the way.