Kyle Tucker vs. Cedric Mullins

[wildcard]

2 minutes ago, Frobby said:

Absolutely.  None of us knows how Mullins or Tucker will do in the future, we can only guess.   I do think though that, putting aside where they were drafted, the fact that Tucker is two years younger, was a much better minor league hitter, and has been somewhat better offensively as a major leaguer so far despite the age gap weighs very heavily in his favor.   

Don't CFers have a higher position value than right fielders?

[Frobby]

6 minutes ago, wildcard said:

Don't CFers have a higher position value than right fielders?

Of course they do.  That’s a plus for Mullins.   The difference between CF and RF is in the neighborhood of .8 - .9 rWAR over a full season.  However, Tucker was graded a +10 RF whereas Mullins was graded a -1 CF, so that pretty much wipes out Mullins’ positional advantage if you believe in Rdrs as a defensive measure (that is what feeds into rWAR).  Roughly, 10 DRS = 1 WAR.

[Tony-OH]

19 hours ago, Aristotelian said:

And Hays could play CF now if needed. If Houston were to somehow be interested in Mullins for Tucker you do it and move guys around to cover CF. 

Cedric's arm concerns me. 

Overall their numbers last year were very close (5.7 WAR) but you have to go with Tucker on overall resume and pedigree. 

I mean, in theory he can run around out there and catch the ball, but he would be a well below average defensive center fielder. 

Hays footspeed:

            Age  Ft/S      %rank
2017    22    28.9       91.7
2019    24    28.6       85.8
2020    25    27.9       75.8
2021    26    27.4        58.4

Defense

            reaction  burst  route    ft/avg   ft covered

2017    -0.3            0       -0.4     -0.8      31.6
2019    -1.1             0.9      0.6      0.4      34.6
2020   -0.8            1.4       0.5      1.5       34.1
2021    -0.6          -0.3       0.2    -0.8      31.7

So in 2021 his foot speed dropped to 58.4 percentile and he covered 2.4 ft/sec less than in 2020 in the outfield.

I doubt he's going to suddenly get faster and better at covering ground at 27.

Hays is a fine corner outfielder, but if he played every day in CF he'd be well below average. 

The average CF foot speed is about 28.4 ft/sec. His 27.4 ft/sec would be the 5th slowest among CFer with 50 or more chances last season.

 

[Frobby]

9 minutes ago, Tony-OH said:

I mean, in theory he can run around out there and catch the ball, but he would be a well below average defensive center fielder. 

Hays footspeed:

            Age  Ft/S      %rank
2017    22    28.9       91.7
2019    24    28.6       85.8
2020    25    27.9       75.8
2021    26    27.4        58.4

Defense

            reaction  burst  route    ft/avg   ft covered

2017    -0.3            0       -0.4     -0.8      31.6
2019    -1.1             0.9      0.6      0.4      34.6
2020   -0.8            1.4       0.5      1.5       34.1
2021    -0.6          -0.3       0.2    -0.8      31.7

So in 2021 his foot speed dropped to 58.4 percentile and he covered 2.4 ft/sec less than in 2020 in the outfield.

I doubt he's going to suddenly get faster and better at covering ground at 27.

Hays is a fine corner outfielder, but if he played every day in CF he'd be well below average. 

The average CF foot speed is about 28.4 ft/sec. His 27.4 ft/sec would be the 5th slowest among CFer with 50 or more chances last season.

 

We do know that Hays was playing with a core muscle injury that required surgery after the season, so I think it’s possible he could pick up a couple tenths of a second next year on his sprint speed times.  But he’s pretty certain to be below average in foot speed for a CF.

[Aristotelian]

7 hours ago, Tony-OH said:

I mean, in theory he can run around out there and catch the ball, but he would be a well below average defensive center fielder. 

Hays footspeed:

            Age  Ft/S      %rank
2017    22    28.9       91.7
2019    24    28.6       85.8
2020    25    27.9       75.8
2021    26    27.4        58.4

Defense

            reaction  burst  route    ft/avg   ft covered

2017    -0.3            0       -0.4     -0.8      31.6
2019    -1.1             0.9      0.6      0.4      34.6
2020   -0.8            1.4       0.5      1.5       34.1
2021    -0.6          -0.3       0.2    -0.8      31.7

So in 2021 his foot speed dropped to 58.4 percentile and he covered 2.4 ft/sec less than in 2020 in the outfield.

I doubt he's going to suddenly get faster and better at covering ground at 27.

Hays is a fine corner outfielder, but if he played every day in CF he'd be well below average. 

The average CF foot speed is about 28.4 ft/sec. His 27.4 ft/sec would be the 5th slowest among CFer with 50 or more chances last season.

 

How does Mullins' arm rank? I'd rather have Hays/Tucker than Mullins/Hays. 

[wildcard]

8 hours ago, Aristotelian said:

How does Mullins' arm rank? I'd rather have Hays/Tucker than Mullins/Hays. 

Not with you on this one.   The CFer needs to be able to cover the ground and catch the ball.  And players need to be able to stay on the field and play at a high  level.    Hays can't cover the ground that Mullins does and he is injury prone whether he plays with the injury (poorly) or not.     

Mullins arm is the worst of the three.   No question.   But if a player does not get to the ball the out is not made.   I'll take Mullins in CF.

[Frobby]

7 minutes ago, wildcard said:

Not with you on this one.   The CFer needs to be able to cover the ground and catch the ball.  And players need to be able to stay on the field and play at a high  level.    Hays can't cover the ground that Mullins does and he is injury prone whether he plays with the injury (poorly) or not.     

Mullins arm is the worst of the three.   No question.   But if a player does not get to the ball the out is not made.   I'll take Mullins in CF.

I haven’t seen Tucker play, so I really can’t comment on his defense.   My sense is he’s pretty rangy, having played CF 25% of the time in the minors.  His sprint speed last year was 27.4, same as Hays.   I think you’d definitely lose something on defense if you replaced Mullins with Tucker, regardless of whether he or Hays played CF.  The offensive advantage with Tucker probably would make up for it and more, IMO.   But it’s all academic.  Neither team is going to pursue that trade.   If the O’s are trading Mullins they aren’t looking for an outfielder in return.  

[wildcard]

19 minutes ago, Frobby said:

I haven’t seen Tucker play, so I really can’t comment on his defense.   My sense is he’s pretty rangy, having played CF 25% of the time in the minors.  His sprint speed last year was 27.4, same as Hays.   I think you’d definitely lose something on defense if you replaced Mullins with Tucker, regardless of whether he or Hays played CF.  The offensive advantage with Tucker probably would make up for it and more, IMO.   But it’s all academic.  Neither team is going to pursue that trade.   If the O’s are trading Mullins they aren’t looking for an outfielder in return.  

Totally agree.

[jamalshw]

All the talk of whether or not Hays could play CF has me flashing back to Karim Garcia in CF and thinking how far we've come...yet are still coming off a 110 loss season.