Improving Mediocrity: Five Reasons to Find Hope in Rick Porcello

NOTE:

This article will be discussing Porcello on his merits alone, with nary a mention of Jon Lester. As most of you know, by virtue of the two trades, the Sox essentially traded Porcello for Lester. However, we will not be comparing Porcello, whose production since his rookie year in 2009 (98 ERA+, 4.30 ERA, 5.5 SO/9, 10.6 WAR) pales considerably to Lester (120 ERA+, 3.52 ERA, 8.7 SO/9. 24.1 WAR) during that same stretch. But we will not be mentioning Lester, got it? Not a single mention of the man with a career postseason 2.57 ERA and 1.071 WHIP. Sigh.

This is Rick Porcello. I don't know enough about him yet to  add a sarcastic remark.

By almost every quantifiable measure, 2014 was the best season of Rick Porcello’s career. In his sixth full season, he posted career-bests in WAR (4.0), WHIP (1.231), Wins (15), Innings Pitched (204.2), Complete Games (3), Shutouts (3), ERA (3.43), ERA+ (116), H/9 (9.3) and BB/9  (1.803). Entering his age-26 season, he already has 76 career wins and appears to be trending positively across the board.

Porcello has the talent, as evidenced by being the Tigers first-round pick in 2007. Despite the pedigree and career-best season, however, there has been one escapable fact: Porcello has been a slightly below average major league pitcher, with a career 98 ERA+ (100 is considered league average). In fact, last season was the first time since his rookie year of 2009 that he posted an ERA+ of better than 100. It was also the first time since 2009 that his ERA finished under 4.32.

In his career, he has given up more than 200 hits in three seasons, including a league-worst 226 in 2012. He has done so without striking out many hitters. In six seasons, Porcello has never struck out more than 142 batters season in a season. That combination - a ton of hits without many swings and misses - usually yields bad results.

But alas, it is not all doom and gloom and WHIP’s above 1.300.  There is hope. Kinda. Below are five reasons to be optimistic in 2015 about Rick “The Rick” Porcello:

1. He is durable. Porcello has started at least 31 games in five of six seasons, and started 27 games in 2010. He has never logged fewer than 170.2 innings in a season, with his career-high of 204.2 coming in 2014. On a staff fronted by perennial non-perennial starter Clay Buholtz, an average pitcher taking the ball every fifth day is to be celebrated (albeit quietly with a few, sad cheap beers).

2. He issues few walks. Traditionally, he’s been stingy with the base on balls, allowing just 2.2 per nine innings for his career and a 1.803 last season, eighth best in the league. Porcello has finished in the top-10 among AL pitchers in BB/9 three times since 2010, and he is currently eighth among all active pitchers. If Juan Nieves and John Farrell can continue to reduce the number of hits given up by Porcello, he could be a solid Number 2 starter on a playoff team.

3. His numbers have been trending in the right direction for multiple seasons. For the third consecutive season, his numbers of innings pitched increased as his WHIP and Hits/9 innings decreased. For the fifth straight season, his ERA decreased and ERA+ increased. In addition to his career-best 2014 numbers listed above, his SO/9 (5.7) and SO/BB (3.15) represented the second best marks of his career.

4. He is still young. Porcello will turn 26 the day after Christmas, and there is some veeerrryyy encouraging historical comparisons . Baseball-Reference lists uber Hall-of-Famer Greg Maddux as his number two career comp through age 25. Like Porcello, Maddux made his debut at 20, and spent a half-decade as an inconsistent young pitcher who issued few walks, but did not strike out many hitters and was always near the bottom of the league in hits surrendered. But, much like Porcello, his numbers began trending in the right direction from about his age-23 season forward. Finally, at age 26 in 1992,, Maddux broke through, winning 20 games, leading the league in games started, innings pitched, and ERA+, and earning the first of his four consecutive NL Cy Young Awards. Porcello might not be the next Maddux, but the numbers are remarkably similar. How does Poor Man’s Steve Avery hit your ear? Pretty sweetly, I know.

5. He will be a free agent after 2015. This is verging on baseless “Hot Takes” territory, but Porcello has every incentive to be great this upcoming season. With the Sox improved offensive, winning 15-18 games is a distinct possibility. And Porcello and his agent must know the insane offers that will await a  27 year old on the heels of an 18 win season. If he gets 6 years/$110 million from the Yankees next winter, it will be because he delivered big time for the Sox in the Summer of 2015.

Porcello is a young, dependable starting pitcher with steadily improving numbers in a contract year pitching in front of what could be a top-tier offense. It is a gamble, but it is a worthwhile risk, in my opinion. And I feel this way even if he is never as great as He Who Will Not Be Named in This Article (It's Jon Lester. Jon Lester is the guy who will not be named. Jon Lester).

P.S.

Jon Lester

Baseball!

Baseball is still just the best. Good night.

Third-Base: I mean, do teams even really use that position still? Oh, they do? The Sox just seem like they don't? That's cool.



Oh, Mike Lowell, you were only in your early 30's, but you'll always look 55 to me.
 

The tale of his season has now been told and rehashed in barrooms and barbershops throughout New England, but in 2014, the Red Sox employed a third baseman who hit .571/.625/1.286, with a 422 OPS+. In putting together Roy Hobbs-like numbers, his legend grew and grew, leading to him winning the batting title, MVP, Nobel Prize for Physics, and the Fred Biletnikoff Award, given annually to the best wide receiver in college football.

His name was Carlos Rivero and he played in eight meaningless September games. He went 4-7, with two doubles and a RBI. And he just might have been the position’s brightest star in a long time now. I mean other than the .105/.227/.105 line produced by Ryan Roberts in eight games this season, of course.

For much of the past 30 years, the Sox have excelled at putting players at the Hot Corner. The list includes a decade of a first ballot Hall-of-Famer (Wade Boggs), a capable stop-gap (2 time All-Star Scott Cooper), an unheralded batting champion (Bill Mueller, who posted a .326/.398/.540/140 OPS+ in 2003, and followed that up with a still great .283/.365/.466/106 OPS+ in 2004), a World Series MVP (Mike Lowell, whose average season from 2006-2009 was 19 home runs, 35 doubles, and a line of .295/.350/.479/110 OPS+), and a top-10 all-time at the position whose time here was criminally short (Adrian Beltre, who in 2010 led the league with 49 doubles, added 28 home runs and 102 RBI’s, and posted a line of .321/.365/.553/141 OPS+)

Since the start of the 2011 season, however, the position has been a dumpster fire so slow-building and depressing that it has earned both the pity and hurtful insults of other dumpster fires.  

The match was ignited and tossed in December 2010 when the Sox allowed Beltre to walk, signed Adrian Gonzalez for 7 years at $164.3 million, and moved Kevin Youkilis from first base to third base.

Beltre, meanwhile, signed with the Rangers for 5 years/$80 million. You probably know the rest. In the past four years his production has been monstrous (see graph below), and he has earned two Gold-Gloves, three trips to the All-Star Game, and two Top 7 finishes in the AL MVP vote. Plus, this:

Gonzalez, to be fair, has produced, just not at what the Sox expected for the investment. Since 2011, he’s averaged 158 games played, 41 doubles, 24 home runs, 110 RBI’s, and compiled a line of .302/.359/.489/133 OPS+.

2+ seasons of that production, however, has taken place in Los Angeles’s beautiful Chavez Ravine neighborhood. And even when looking at all four seasons, Beltre has consistently out-produced Gonzalez at 48% the cost.

This is all a meandering, convoluted way of saying third base has been a steady disaster for nearly a half-decade. Forget words, though, and just look at the numbers.

Below are the seasons put together by the player who played the most games at the position in every season, starting with 2011. At the top is Adrian Beltre’s average season since leaving Boston:

Player	Games	At-Bats	Hits	Walks	Doubles	Home Runs	RBI	AVG	OBP	SLP	OPS	OPS+
Beltre	147	568	179	42	33	29	94	.315	.364	.530	.893	139
Youkilis	120	431	111	68	32	17	80	.258	.373	.459	.833	123
Middlebrooks	75	286	77	13	14	15	54	.288	.325	.509	.835	121
Middlebrooks	94	348	79	20	18	17	49	.227	.271	.425	.696	88
Middlebrooks	63	215	41	15	10	2	19	.191	.256	.265	.522	48

 It has been a slow decline to into well below league average production at the position, with Beltre’s average season outpacing any individual campaign from a Sox third baseman.

What happened?

Youkilis simply continued on a natural, expected decline on the wrong-side of 30. Middlebrooks cannot stay healthy or lay-off breaking pitches. The former is out of the majors, and the latter could be on the way out. The other players to log time at the position– Brock Holt, Brandon Snyder, Jonathan Herrera, Jose Iglesias – produced too little to be everyday starters on a contending team.  Beltre, meanwhile, is closing in on 3,000 hits and 400 home runs, and putting together a pretty damn strong HOF resume. He is an endlessly entertaining, all-time great at the position who left Boston in the prime of his career. That is not replaced easily. Damnit.

Third base’s one bright spot was in the 2013 postseason, when Xander Bogaerts appeared in 12 of 16 games, started eight contests, and produced at a clip of .296/.412/.481, with six walks and six RBI’s.

So, the plan from 2010 has not worked. Is 2015 and beyond looking any better? Honestly, who knows? There are too many questions that need to be answered.

Will the Sox give Middlebrooks yet another chance to win the job? His refusing assignment to the Arizona Fall League is certainly not starting the offseason on the best foot.

Is the answer super-prospect Garren Cecchini? At just 23, he posted a .831 OPS in 11 games for the Sox in 2014. In a full season at AAA, though, his OPS barely topped .700.

Is it a high-priced free agent like the Giants’Pablo Sandoval? He is sure to command six figures and will turn 30 in the second year of the deal.

What about the Brewers’ Aramis Ramirez? The 36 year old is due to make $14 million in 2014, and is likely to be bought out at $4 million by the Brewers. He is coming off his fifth All-Star selection in a year in which he produced 23 doubles, 15 home runs, and a 110 OPS+. For his career, he has 366 home runs and 2,200 hits. Would he fit at 2 years/$10-15 million?

Personally, I vote for platoon of a 56 year-old Boggs starting versus right-handers and 57 year-old Carney Lansford, winner of the 1981 AL batting title for the Sox, in the lineup versus left-handers.

I mean, good god, could that really make things any worse?

Biggio vs. Jeter: A Brief Comparison of Stats, Perception, and a Third Thing to Complete the Rule of Three

His look says "focused," while everything about the card screams "It's MLB in the 1980's!"

Craig Biggio retired following the 2007 season, after making the announcement he would do so during Spring Training.  A seven time All-Star, his last appearance in the Mid-Summer Classic was in 1999. He did not make the All-Star team in 2007, and he did not deserve to in the midst of posting a .251/.281/.285, with a 71 OPS+. He did, however, finish the year with 10 HR and 31 doubles, which is pretty impressive for a 41 year old second baseman.

Derek Jeter, through the first 94 games of 2014, is posting a .272/.324/.322, with an 81 OPS+. He is on pace to finish his final season with 3 HR and 15 doubles. Not only did he make the 2014 AL All-Star team, but he was triple-teamed by FOX’s broadcast booth in a 3.5 hour aggressive verbal orgy.

Joe Buck told Jeter “It was an honor to cover you.” Like a true gentleman, Buck stopped before saying with what he would like to cover Jeter.

Harold Reynolds began lobbying for Jeter to win the MVP in the second inning.

Tom Verducci said Mike Trout, who has more than 1/3 of Jeter’s career oWAR in 2.5 seasons, “might someday be the next Derek Jeter.”

"Yeah, Jeets!"

I mention the All-Star game, because it highlighted how out of whack the Jeter-love is with many in the mainstream media. He is retiring as a top 5-10 all-time shortstop, and a deserving first-ballot Hall-of-Famer. However, in the past decade, we have seen the retirement of several players who are top 5-10 all-time at their respective positions. The list includes: Greg Maddux, Mariano Rivera, Randy Johnson, Pedro Martinez, Ivan Rodriguez, Mike Piazza, Jeff Bagwell, Barry Bonds, Chipper Jones, Larry Walker, Edgar Martinez, and Biggio. With the exception of Rivera in 2013, none of these deserving players received anything that resembled the over-the-top sendoff Jeter received on Tuesday night. And even Rivera did not receive this love, and he was the greatest of all-time at his position.

I mention Biggio, though, because they are players similar in terms of skills and numbers, but far, far off in terms of public and media perception and praise. One plays in NYC for a team with 27 World Series championships. The other played in Houston for a team that still exists. Jeter will go into the Hall-of-Fame damn near unanimously on the first ballot. Biggio missed induction by two votes in his second year of eligibility. Two. Fucking. Votes.

For their careers, Jeter will finish with more plate appearances, hits, runs scored, runs batted in, triples, a higher batting average, a higher OPS, and a higher OPS+ by the slimmest of margins. He is at 3,408 hits and still going. His current career WAR is 72.1.

Biggio will have played played more games, hit more doubles, home runs, and extra base hits, drew more walks, stole more bases, hit by more pitches. In fact, with 285 career hit by pitches, Biggio ranks second all-time. He finished with 3,060 hits. Biggio’s final career WAR is 65.1.

We called this play "The Biggio."

If you break it down by their respective best season, best five year stretch, and their 162 game average, you will find two very similar players…with the bonus of being spared my obviously biased analysis! You know what? Let’s do just that. Follow me to the fun!

Best Season:

	Jeter, 1999	Biggio, 1997
WAR	8.0	9.4
Games	158	162
Plate Appearances	739 (Led AL)	744
At-Bats	627	619
Runs	134	146  (Led NL)
Hits	219 (Led AL)	191
Doubles	37	37
Triples	9	8
Home Runs	24	22
RBI	102	81
Stolen Bases	19	47
Walks	91	84
HBP	12	34  (Led NL)
Batting Average	.349	.309
On-Base Percentage	.438	.415
Slugging Percentage	.552	.501
On-Base Plus Slugging	.990	.916
Total Bases	346	310
OPS+	153	143

 Best Five Season Stretch:

	Jeter, 1998-2002	Biggio,  1995-1999
WAR	28.8	32.6
Games	762	785
Plate Appearances	3,528	3,627
At-Bats	3,104	3,062
Runs	614	628
Hits	1,005	930
Doubles	154	198
Triples	24	16
Home Runs	97	95
RBI	408	394
Stolen Bases	130	183
Walks	345	391
HBP	46	117
Batting Average	.324	.304
On-Base Percentage	.398	.399
Slugging Percentage	.483	.472
On-Base Plus Slugging	.880	.871
Total Bases	1,498	1,445
OPS+	130	131

 Career 162-game average:

	Jeter	Biggio
Plate Appearances	744	711
At-Bats	661	618
Runs	115	105
Hits	206	174
Doubles	32	38
Triples	4	3
Home Runs	16	17
RBI	78	67
Stolen Bases	21	24
Walks	65	66
HBP	10	16
Batting Average	.311	.281
On-Base Percentage	.379	.363
Slugging Percentage	.443	.433
On-Base Plus Slugging	.822	.796
Total Bases	293	268
OPS+	116	112

 You have to admit, that was pretty fun. A strong argument can be made Biggio had the superior peak. Overall, though, I can recognize(begrudingly) that, Jeter was superior to Biggio, at least offensively.

Defensively, however, Biggio had a pretty clear edge.

Jeter has won five Gold Gloves, and a sixth could very likely be on the way in 2014. Psssh, you know it could happen He has played more than 2,600 games at a shortstop, while compiling a dWAR of -9.4. His best season came in 1998 when he posted a 1.1 dWAR, the only positive year of his career.
Biggio won four Gold Gloves in 1,989 games as a second baseman. He also played the first 400 games of his career as catcher, and just short of 400 more as an outfielder at the end of his career. He posted a career -3.9 dWAR, with his best season being a 2.2 in 1997.

In the end, Jeter has pinstripes, the Yankees mythologizing, and the payroll and supporting cast to appear in 16 postseasons and counting.

Meanwhile, Biggio had the pinstripes the Astros began wearing in the early 2000’s, two oddly put-together home ballparks in Houston, and Morgan Ensberg.

However, despite his clear advantages and support, the over-fawning (a real word?) of Jeter should not take away from his greatness. By comparing him to Biggio I merely wanted to highlight that many other deserving, comparable, and better, in some cases, players receive considerable less fanfare and adulation. I hope that came through, despite the snark, bitterness, and Buck-Reynolds-Verducci-Jeter verbal gangbang imagery.
Thanks for your time.

P.S.

Biggio and Bagwell, aka “The Killer B’s”, teamed up for 14 seasons to form maybe the greatest, certainly the most underrated, right-side of the infield in MLB history. That has to count for something. After the Astros made the playoffs twice in the organization’s first 32 seasons, Biggio and Bagwell formed the core of the team that reached the postseason six times in nine seasons, winning a pennant in 2005 and losing a game 7 in the NLCS in 2004. Together, they posted a combined career WAR of 144.7.

By comparison, Ryan Howard and Chase Utley, who spent a half-decade as the gold standard on the right-side of the infield, have a combined career WAR of 79.4.

Killer B’s all day, yo.

 

Bagwell preparing to destroy the other team's world. My all-time favorite player.