Anthony Santander 2024

[DirtyBird]

I’m tired of seeing this .230 OBP black hole penciled into the heart of the lineup card every game.
He would bat 7th and start about 60% of the games for a legit contender.

[Frobby]

Last year Santander had a .241 OBP/.491 OPS after 14 games.  Hyde’s not going to be that reactive to every slump a player has.   

[DirtyBird]

8 minutes ago, Frobby said:

Last year Santander had a .241 OBP/.491 OPS after 14 games.  Hyde’s not going to be that reactive to every slump a player has.   

Last year was last year. And the offense needed to take a step forward from last year in order to be a contender.

[Frobby]

10 minutes ago, DirtyBird said:

Last year was last year. And the offense needed to take a step forward from last year in order to be a contender.

The Orioles are on pace to score 880 runs, which is 73 more than last year.   Individual players are going to have ups and downs during the year.  

[ORIOLE33]

3 hours ago, DirtyBird said:

I’m tired of seeing this .230 OBP black hole penciled into the heart of the lineup card every game.
He would bat 7th and start about 60% of the games for a legit contender.

And You could say the exact same thing about Gunnar. 

[DirtyBird]

1 minute ago, ORIOLE33 said:

And You could say the exact same thing about Gunnar. 

Not really. Gunnar is among the league leaders in hard hit balls. Similar to Westburg, odds are, he will start catching some breaks.

Santander is chasing twice as much as Gunnar and is toward the bottom of the league in hard hit %

[Jim'sKid26]

2 hours ago, ORIOLE33 said:

And You could say the exact same thing about Gunnar. 

And you would be wrong.

[Orioles Jim]

I felt this way last year during his slow start. We all know how that turned out.

I think I remember hearing something last year that he thrives in the hot weather/hates the cold. It’ll be above 70 today and it’ll be getting consistently much warmer than that soon, so hopefully his bat heats up accordingly.

[Frobby]

I think the number that best sums up Santander’s current slump is his 27% infield fly/fly ball rate.  He’s also got a .27 GO/AO ratio right now, less than half his normal rate.  Simply put, he’s getting under the ball much too often right now.  I have complete confidence he will straighten that out and go on a tear eventually.   

[Bahama O's Fan]

19 hours ago, Orioles Jim said:

I felt this way last year during his slow start. We all know how that turned out.

I think I remember hearing something last year that he thrives in the hot weather/hates the cold. It’ll be above 70 today and it’ll be getting consistently much warmer than that soon, so hopefully his bat heats up accordingly.

How was he once it cooled off last fall, in September and October?

[Sports Guy]

Santander is an incredibly streaky hitter. He is always up and down. Last year he would go on a complete tear and then look like garbage for 40 at bats.  
 

Everything, good and bad, is exacerbated early in the season.

 

[Spy Fox]

6 minutes ago, Bahama O's Fan said:

How was he once it cooled off last fall, in September and October?

There could be something to it. For his career he has a .636 March/April OPS, .645 Sept/Oct OPS, but every other month is much higher. 

[Orioles Jim]

2 minutes ago, Spy Fox said:

There could be something to it. For his career he has a .636 March/April OPS, .645 Sept/Oct OPS, but every other month is much higher. 

Trade him to the Marlins! 

[.500_OR_BETTER]

Meh.  Santander has not been playing well since the second half of last year.  He had a couple "streaky" months (May 2023 & August 2023) but statistically everything from the second half and into this season, is not pretty. 

We got some young guys (Stowers / Kjerstad) knocking on the door but are we going to just stick it out with him this season.... we know we are not re-signing him, maybe it's time to explore some options.

[Frobby]

24 minutes ago, Sports Guy said:

Santander is an incredibly streaky hitter. He is always up and down. Last year he would go on a complete tear and then look like garbage for 40 at bats.  
 

Everything, good and bad, is exacerbated early in the season.

 

I think most hitters are pretty streaky, moreso than people think.  And yes, it stands out when someone is hot or cold to begin the year.   

When I was a kid, I followed the Rod Carew rule: no statistics meant anything until Rod Carew was leading the league in batting.   That worked pretty well while Carew won 6 batting titles in 7 years (he finished 3rd by two points the other year).   Nowadays, I basically generally don’t take stats too seriously until the end of May.