Anthony Santander - Now a Core Player Going Forward?

[Il BuonO]

6 hours ago, Moose Milligan said:

Also has a 0.00 ERA.

So! A two way player. He’s a keeper. 

[Hallas]

What's your definition of a core player?

 

Some people would limit that to people like Rutschman and Gunnar Henderson.  Others might include decent to good players that are technically interchangeable in the right circumstances, but also provide value.  Santander falls in the latter category.

 

I'm all for keeping Tony if we can.  But it depends on how the FA/trade market shakes out.  There are probably more scenarios where I think we should be keeping him than not.  If we're trading for Ohtani and signing Judge, then yeah maybe Santander isn't going to work out for us.  But we probably aren't acquiring one of them, much less both.  I'm much more concerned about a player like Hays, who's lost a lot of his defensive value and has not progressed as a hitter enough to warrant keeping around. Hays has been a worse defender this year than Santander, and he's been on the field only about 20% fewer innings.

[Hallas]

10 hours ago, Frobby said:

I think many posts I have read this year have not taken into account the offensive environment of 2022, where the league OPS is down by 28 points from last year.   It’s actually down by 59 points from 2019.   And that’s the league as a whole — the O’s hitters also have the new LF dimensions to contend with.

Also, i think people fail to appreciate that the league OBP has slipped to .310.  For Santander to post a .325 OBP to date is impressive.   He’s had a nice offensive season in a year where offense is generally down.  

It’s funny, though — until four days ago he was having a bad September, .589 OPS for the month.  Even after hitting 6 homers in 4 days, his BA and OBP for September are subpar.  On the year though he’s been much improved.  

 

I'm spitballing here a bit, but based on past park changes I'm guessing the wall change is going to drop OPACY's park factor around 5-7 points.  It was sitting at around 103-106 and it's currently settling in around 99 for this year, with a lot of room for movement because park factors are notoriously volatile.  But the wall change in 2012 increased the park factor by about 2 points on average, and the 1-year dimensions change in 2002 or 2003 reduced the park factor by around 7 points.  There's a lot of noise in this data, so I might end up being off in my estimate, but I think it's a reasonable guess.  That would make OPACY a very mild pitcher's park, but nothing crazy.

 

I still don't love the look of the stadium now, but it is what it is.

 

It definitely is hard to get a grasp of the 2022 offense.  It feels like the offense regressed a bit, but for the most part they're playing better than expected, it's just hard to see because of the league and park context.

[DrungoHazewood]

22 hours ago, LookinUp said:

Santander has improved. He seems to actually be somewhat adaptable to the new plate approach the O's are pushing. Yeah, he's "only" a 2.3 WAR guy right now. He's also losing a pretty significant amount of WAR from his defense. And as a switch hitter, he's not a liability against LHP or RHP. He's a perfect DH, especially for Camden Yards, and maybe you can get some 1B innings from him.

Santander is about -12 from defense+position, playing all but 30 games in the field.  If he were to DH all the time and hit the same (somewhat unlikely as most hit a little worse when DHing) he'd be a +0 defender, but -17.5 runs of positional adjustment, so he'd be five runs worse off.  Probably more like 3-4 since he's already being docked a few runs on positional adjustment for the 30 games he'd DH'd this year.  The breakeven point is a -10 RFer would be no worse off as a full-time DH. A -12 or -15 RFer (which is, like, Mark Trumbo or Delmon Young terrible) would be more valuable DHing.

At least in that set of assumptions he would be almost half a win worse as a full-time DH compared to what he's playing this year.

[Frobby]

1 hour ago, DrungoHazewood said:

Santander is about -12 from defense+position, playing all but 30 games in the field.  If he were to DH all the time and hit the same (somewhat unlikely as most hit a little worse when DHing) he'd be a +0 defender, but -17.5 runs of positional adjustment, so he'd be five runs worse off.  Probably more like 3-4 since he's already being docked a few runs on positional adjustment for the 30 games he'd DH'd this year.  The breakeven point is a -10 RFer would be no worse off as a full-time DH. A -12 or -15 RFer (which is, like, Mark Trumbo or Delmon Young terrible) would be more valuable DHing.

At least in that set of assumptions he would be almost half a win worse as a full-time DH compared to what he's playing this year.

Good analysis, but of course in the real world it also depends who your alternatives are in COF or as DH.  Santander’s WAR couid go down but the team WAR could go up if you have a better defensive alternative who saves more on defense than you’d lose on offense by playing some other guy at DH.

Just to look at this in a concrete way, are you better off with Santander in RF and Mancini at DH, or McKenna in RF and Santander at DH?  The fact that Santander individually loses some WAR by moving to DH is irrelevant.   

[LookinUp]

You guys are right in terms of WAR, so I was just curious where Santander ranked by position. Per ESPN, Santander ranks:

1. 11th in OPS for all MLB outfielders. I couldn't believe this, but it's true.
2. If he qualified as DH, that same OPS would rank 2nd in MLB.

Yes, those numbers can move for any number of reasons, but he certainly looks like he could be one of the top DHs in MLB. WAR doesn't value that very highly, but I don't really care about that. Not all stats are always helpful.

To Frobby's point, if he's replaced by a better defensive outfielder with a decent bat, it could be a really nice net positive move.

https://www.espn.com/mlb/stats/player/_/position/of/table/batting/sort/OPS/dir/desc

[Frobby]

11 minutes ago, LookinUp said:

You guys are right in terms of WAR, so I was just curious where Santander ranked by position. Per ESPN, Santander ranks:

1. 11th in OPS for all MLB outfielders. I couldn't believe this, but it's true.
2. If he qualified as DH, that same OPS would rank 2nd in MLB.

Yes, those numbers can move for any number of reasons, but he certainly looks like he could be one of the top DHs in MLB. WAR doesn't value that very highly, but I don't really care about that. Not all stats are always helpful.

To Frobby's point, if he's replaced by a better defensive outfielder with a decent bat, it could be a really nice net positive move.

https://www.espn.com/mlb/stats/player/_/position/of/table/batting/sort/OPS/dir/desc

Well, it depends a little bit who you count.  First of all, on the link you posted, Santander is 12th, not 11th.   Second, if you go to the same list from Fangraphs, he’s 14th, with Yordan Alvarez and Jeff McNeill treated as outfielders by them.   Then, if you ramp down the PA requirement to, say,  400, Santander drops to 17th, with Trout, Harris and Pederson added to the mix. But any way you look at it, Santander has had a very good offensive year in the 2022 hitting environment.  

[tntoriole]

In answer to the OP, yes.  I think Santander can still be even better offensively and could ultimately become an Ortiz type DH .. 

[Can_of_corn]

3 minutes ago, tntoriole said:

In answer to the OP, yes.  I think Santander can still be even better offensively and could ultimately become an Ortiz type DH .. 

OK, we have entered the portion of the program in which we compare Oriole players to Hall of Famers.

[RZNJ]

2 minutes ago, Can_of_corn said:

OK, we have entered the portion of the program in which we compare Oriole players to Hall of Famers.

If Santander goes on the Ortiz and/or Nelson Cruz diet there's still a chance.

[Frobby]

7 minutes ago, Can_of_corn said:

OK, we have entered the portion of the program in which we compare Oriole players to Hall of Famers.

Yeah, I think that’s pretty laughable.  (Sorry, tntoriole).   Ortiz had a career OPS+ of 141, and 12 seasons well above Santander’s current 124.

Here’s a more realistic question: will Santander have a better career than Trey Mancini?  Mancini through age 27 had a 118 OPS+ and had been worth 7.3 rWAR.   Santander to this point has a 106 OPS+ and has been worth 4.9 rWAR.  Hopefully, he won’t have a life-threatening disease during his age 28 season and won’t have to deal with the after effects.  So, he could catch up on Trey a bit in the next few years.  But I’m not sure who I’d bet on to finish with the better career.

[tntoriole]

25 minutes ago, Can_of_corn said:

OK, we have entered the portion of the program in which we compare Oriole players to Hall of Famers.

Hall of Famers were once Oriole players too.. Ortiz didn’t impress the Twins that much  .. 

[tntoriole]

27 minutes ago, Can_of_corn said:

OK, we have entered the portion of the program in which we compare Oriole players to Hall of Famers.

Nelson Cruz ok too lol 

[tntoriole]

21 minutes ago, Frobby said:

Yeah, I think that’s pretty laughable.  (Sorry, tntoriole).   Ortiz had a career OPS+ of 141, and 12 seasons well above Santander’s current 124.

Here’s a more realistic question: will Santander have a better career than Trey Mancini?  Mancini through age 27 had a 118 OPS+ and had been worth 7.3 rWAR.   Santander to this point has a 106 OPS+ and has been worth 4.9 rWAR.  Hopefully, he won’t have a life-threatening disease during his age 28 season and won’t have to deal with the after effects.  So, he could catch up on Trey a bit in the next few years.  But I’m not sure who I’d bet on to finish with the better career.

First 6 years through age 27 with Minnesota, Ortiz had oWAR of 3.5,  Santander is at age 27 and 6years and is at 4.6.. the question is whether Santander can dramatically improve as Ortiz did .. unlikely but possibly imho

[DrungoHazewood]

3 hours ago, Frobby said:

Just to look at this in a concrete way, are you better off with Santander in RF and Mancini at DH, or McKenna in RF and Santander at DH?  The fact that Santander individually loses some WAR by moving to DH is irrelevant.   

I think you need a tool like WAR to do the analysis between these choices.  I don't think you can eyeball a pretty good hitting/below-average fielding RFer, a DH/1B DHing, and a good fielder/below-average hitter in RF and make a sure choice.  With the analysis you probably aren't 100% sure. 

Without running that analysis I think it's close enough that I'd go with Santander/McKenna because then you have more money left over to improve pitching or other positions.