Sandoval’s slow start
Posted By Jeff Fletcher on April 16, 2009 1:38 pm
Pablo Sandoval, also known as the Greatest Hitter Ever, is hitting just .179 so far this year. Of course, it’s too early to draw any major conclusions about that, but Henry Schulman had a bit about Sandoval in his blog.
“I think Pablo has been getting some good swings off,” Bochy said. “I thought he did the last game. He just missed a ball the first time up. If it gets to the point where I think Pablo needs a day, I’ll give him a day. I don’t think he needs one right now.”
Bochy acknowledged Sandoval has expanded his zone a bit, which is not good considering his zone is as big as Antarctica as it is. But in Monday’s game, Bochy said, “I thought he was more in control. He stayed back a little better.”
That immediately sent to me Fangraphs to see if Sandoval really was swinging at even more pitches this year.
Well, he’s not. Sandoval swung at 64.6 percent of the pitches he saw last year, including 53.8 percent of those outside the strike zone. (Those were both major league highs, by the way.) So far in the very small sample size of this year, he’s at 60.0 percent and 51.2 percent on those figures.
So he’s not really swinging at any more pitches than he did last year. Maybe he’s just getting unlucky. I suspect, however, that he was just getting lucky last year for six weeks, and a lot more than his fair share of hits were falling. That’s counter-intuitive, to say that this year’s small sample size is more accurate than last year’s larger one. However, I think last year’s was too small, too, and I’ll go by the very large sample size of everyone else in the majors.
Fact is, guys who swing at everything don’t tend to be good hitters. Although there are rare exceptions, they are just that. Rare. Sandoval may prove to be one of them, but for now I’m going to assume that he’s not.
Sandoval is going to have to prove me wrong. And do it for more than six weeks.
At Sandoval’s age (22) and with his lack of experience, the player’s offensive performance is affected by his lack of defense and visa versa. Sandoval needs to be switched to first base, where he has better skills, thus, improving his confidence. He’s the better of the two corner prospects, so why not concentrate on developing him properly?
When the ’08 season ended, Sandoval was designed to handle first base. Suddenly, as if the Tooth Fairy had materialized out of thin air, Ishikawa was the incarnation of Will Clark, and Sandoval had mysteriously developed 3B skills.
It’s the manger’s job, well, to manage and evaluate the personnel he’s given. Sandoval is a poor defensive 3B. Can the subroutines be updated in Bochy’s program to recognize reality?
Looks like the book may be out on the golden boy who ain’t so golden…
Yep. No good hitter in the history of the game ever had a 5 for 28 stetch. Ever. At any point in his career. Stick a fork in this guy. Time to move on.
I’m not necessarily disagreeing with you, but let’s look at the sample size we do have since the start of 2008.
A/AA – 485PA, .350
SF – 154PA, .345
Not too shabby. Let’s not get too worked up over a 31 PA stretch.
How about the idea that maybe, just maybe, he’s somewhere in between. Yes, he’s slumping right now, and was excellent at the end of last season, but I’m guessing that once he feels a little more comfortable at 3B, and once he realizes he needs to lay off a few pitches (this stretch of play is bound to teach him a little), he’ll take off again, and end up much closer to what we saw at the end of last year, than what we’re seeing now.
Give the kid some time?
Nick, let’s not say those minor league at-bats are the same as his major league at-bats. They barely even have scouting reports in the minors, so a players’ tendencies are exploited as much.
And I’m not basing my opinion on what he’s done in the first couple weeks of the season, Alex. I’m basing it on what he has done in his eight weeks in the majors. He swings at everything. Generally speaking, that doesn’t work in the long run. I think he’s got to prove that he’s the exception — over a whole season — before we assume that he is. That’s my only point.
Jeff, I am willing to give Sandoval more time and at bats before we judge him one way or the other, although I think he is out of position at 3rd base, and would do better at 1st instead. The guy I feel sorry for is Ishikawa, what the heck is Bochy doing sitting him almost every other day because there is a left hander pitching? He is not even giving Ish a fair chance to produce, I thought he said it was not going to be a “platoon” issue there? Not surprised though because this is one reason why the Giants do not develop position players, they are not given a fair shot because Bochy would rather try and win with “veteran” players like Aurilia and Uribe, even in a year when management has already conceded that the team will not be ready to contend until next year, or beyond. Bochy is like Don Nelson with the Warriors, another coach who does not know how to develop young players. In fact the Giants and Warriors have similar management problems, are they two peas in the same pod?
[...] ready, after watching him swing at everything for six weeks at the end of last season, to be sure that he was for real. (Also, I wrote here what a scout said about Sandoval.) A player who can be [...]