Armchair Zone Rating: Miguel Cabrera on Sunday
With the exception of a seventh inning that saw him concede three well-struck hits — including a homer to Garrett Jones — and two runs, Detroit right-hander Justin Verlander was excellent on Sunday in Pittsburgh, striking out seven, walking just one, and inducing weak contact all day (box).
Indeed, despite the fact that Verlander entered that seventh inning having allowed two hits already, it’s not outside the realm of possibility that he could have entered same in pursuit of his 13th no-hitter, or whatever number he’s on now. For, of the two hits that the Pirates recorded between innings one and six, neither left the infield — and, notably, both were hit in the direction of third baseman Miguel Cabrera.
Detroit’s decision to field a number of defensively challenged players (Cabrera, Prince Fielder, Delmon Young) — whatever the advantages in terms of clubhouse morale — appears to be not without its consequences in terms of run prevention. As of Monday, the Tigers are 28th in the majors in terms of unadjusted defensive efficiency (and last in the American League), 26th by Defensive Runs Saved (-22), and last in the majors in UZR (-32.2). There are certainly caveats to be made regarding defensive metrics. In this case, however, they suggest what many would suspect anyways — that the Tigers are a poor defensive team.
In what follows, we’ll consider, specifically, Miguel Cabrera’s role in the first two hits allowed by Verlander. There are likely other instances from this season that we could observe for this purpose — of determining, that is, whether Cabrera turned a likely out into a hit, or vice versa. That said, few batted balls are as prone to scrutiny as the ones allowed by Justin Verlander, who, it seems, is always on the verge of a no-hitter.
Below is video footage of the two plays in question — a first-inning bunt single by Alex Presley and a third-inning infield hit for catcher Michael McKenry. In each case, the reader is asked a question: Do you think a league-average third baseman would convert this batted-ball into an out?
The results will give us a sort of Armchair Zone Rating — that is, an assessment of Cabrera’s performance conducted not by math and computers, but by honest, hardworking Americans (in the 18-49, college-educated, bespectacled male demographic).
First Inning, Alex Presley
The following GIF allows us to see both Cabrera’s original positioning on Presley’s bunt single and his play on the ball.
Third Inning, Michael McKenry
In this case, we have two GIFs. The first one here gives us an idea of the nature of McKenry’s batted-ball, and also Cabrera’s charge of same.
This second one focuses more on Cabrera’s original positioning and his exchange from glove to throwing hand.
A Simple Poll Regarding Miguel Cabrera
In which the reader does his part — for FanGraphs, for America.
The Presley bunt seems like a play that ends up being a hit a high percentage of the time. The McHenry ball is the play he didnt look good on.
I agree with this. Somebody looking more for a bunt or with high level quickness could have gotten Presley, but I don’t think a league-average 3B does that. The McHenry ball he’s definitely playing back, and loses the out with the semi-double clutch, something that for some reason was more apparent to me watching it live. To be fair, that’s the first time I’ve seen him do that, so the glove exchange doesn’t seem to be a systemic issue.
I went back and forth on this one, but Miggy was already playing in and still took forever to get there and get rid of it.
These two plays can be summed up by one word: slow. Granted most third basemen wouldn’t be called fast, but even average speed would’ve allowed him to get to that Presley bunt in time to throw him out. On the McKendry hit, I’m pretty sure most college third basemen would’ve transferred the ball quicker.
Third basemen seem to need quickness more than speed. They need that instinctive first step. Just from my experience watching White Sox baseball, Brent Morel and, even more, Joe Crede were quick and could make a play on a hard hit ball or a bunt. Gordon Beckham is a better athlete and faster than either of those two but didn’t look good at third.
Maybe it’s the GIF, but he looks slow both in charging the ball as well as releasing the ball.
I really am having trouble getting past just how slow he runs in slow motion.
Initially I thought the implication was that Cabrera’s range is equivalent to sitting in an armchair.
Cabrera is not nearly the problem defensively he was made out to be in spring training and the start of the season. Watching every Tigers game, Cabrera has made some really fine, near great plays, and looked mediocre and average on some, coming in on bunts is most difficult for the big man.
He has been mostly good, some average, and some bad which were mostly on hard hit balls and reaction time, others to see a large man like him diving to his left or right and coming up with the ball, is something you don’t expect to see from a 260 pound brute.
Now if you want to talk about Young, Boesch, raburn who are collectively craptastic defensively, I’m not sure if the post will pass the profanity filters.
Unless a slow guy and fast guy are running side-by-side, you can’t really tell how slowly the slow guy really is moving.
Miggy C is the slowest guy to play third in eons. And dives/flops for balls more nimble 3rd basemen reach while keeping their feet. Never mind if he hasn’t done many Sportscenter-level butcherings, Miggy has been awful at third.
Any stats to support your claims?
Because I have yet to find a defensive metric that considers Cabrera “awful.” Below average, yes, but not legitimately awful.
He’s the lowest rated 3B according to UZR of all qualified leaders.
Worst does not equal awful, as we generally have a solid defensive 3B base crop right now. His UZR does not indicate to the -25 to -30 runs that some FG writers were assuming he would cost DET when the switch was announced. That is what I consider truly awful. With his bat at 3B, -10 to -15 runs is acceptable. I wouldn’t consider that awful. Perhaps we have different understandings of what counts as awful (which wouldn’t be shocking, as that is a fairly subjective word).
I think RSF is hitting the nail on the head. Cabrera’s fielding is “only” on pace to cost about a win, leaving him on pace to still be a 6 win player from the 3B position. This would still be roughly his third or fourth best season by WAR in his career. Also, consider his offensive numbers have been a bit down by the high standards he’s set the last few seasons, so it’s not crazy to think there’s some positive regression in his offensive numbers.
If you look at the combined WAR of 1B and 3B for the Tigers last season, and compare it to the combined ZIPS projections for Cabrera and Fielder this year, the Tigers are coming out with 10 combined WAR compared to 7.7. So forgetting money for a second, moving Miggy to 3B to fit Prince at 1B has been a worthwhile change.
Now, of course there is an argument to be made that if keeping Cabrera at 1B would’ve kept him more on track as a 7 WAR player, the money would’ve been better spent on a shorter term contract to grab someone that could play 3B at a roughly league-average, 2 win pace (like Jamey Carroll for example). But we also have to just wait and see. The team has under-performed offensively, and I would expect that Jackson being back healthy (and continuing to play well) should help Cabrera and Fielder post better numbers than they have thus far.
Lastly, the eyeball test is still valuable (as the OP is essentially pointing out). And as a Tigers fan watching Cabrera play most every day, the eyeball test says that he has well below average range, but a very strong and mostly accurate arm that helps offset the lack of range. In the end, the Tigers have bigger problems on D than Miguel Cabrera (Young, Boesch, Raburn). The and with Cabrera’s offensive value at 3B, I’d argue the bigger issue for the left side of the infield is Jhonny Peralta.
I agree. Miggy is — as the halfway point approaches — playing around average defense at third. A plus arm, a minus range, he catches what he should, and decent composure. Last I checked, his RF was around 2.50.
Now if you want to talk about Boesch, Raburn or Peralta — different story. I can’t talk about Delmon Young’s defense without feeling pain. And Fielder’s play at First is making me re-think the importance of avoiding use of a bad defender at first (his very bad play really does seem to matter…).
Rick Porcello should find a way to be kidnapped until Spring Training.
But Miggy’s defense seems to be sufficiently average so that even if they talked Fielder into moving to DH (oh please), you can’t throw just any experienced player in at 3B and assume he’ll be an upgrade defensively at Third.
Second one should be an out for sure… I am going with “A good fielder would make the first play but not an average fielder.”
Cabrera’s been a pleasant surprise for me. At the beginning of the year, people were predicting -20, -30 runs for him on defense. While there’s no doubt he’s got poor range and has made some mistakes, we’re almost halfway through the year now; Fangraphs is giving him -4 runs and B-R is giving +1 (!!!) runs. It’s not pretty, but so far the “experiment” seems to be working out about as well as anyone could hope.
On the first one, it is worth remembering that Presley is very fast. No saving graces on the second one, however.
Being a Tigers fan, I’ve watched almost every groundball to 3B this season, and am totally confident in saying that Cabrera is playing a respectable 3B, and at the very least, miles better than everyone expected. The arm is good, the glove is solid, and the range is limited, but not terrible.
As a general habit, I always remark in my head whether or not a given ball would have been fielded by a better defender on every play, and Cabrera stands up pretty well. I don’t know how each individual play affects is DRS, UZR etc, but on the whole, he’s making most routine plays and even a noticable number of difficult plays.
This is really lazy analysis. Just because Cabrera made a rough play (or maybe two) on Sunday, he gets picked on in this article with no mention of how neither of those runs scored. In addition, none of Cabrera’s defensive metrics are mentioned. The author bases his comments on two plays in one game. There is no evidence provided about whether this was typical or atypical behavior by Cabrera.
The Tigers are below average defensively, but ask any Tigers fan and we’ll be sure to tell you that no one is remotely worrried about 3B defense. Corner outfield, middle infield, and 1B are much bigger problems.
Ask yourself this: if Cabrera sucked at third base in 2007, how would he be better 5 years later? He’s always had problems with his conditioning and things aren’t going to better as he gets into his 30s.
-4.4 UZR in 1300 innings in 2007 does not equal “sucked.” Basically he was a little below replacement defensively back then, and now he is significantly below replacement, but still not an abortion over at 3B. With his bat, he merely needs to avoid being atrocious at 3B in order to maintain a great amount of value.
I think that’s harsh on the author… he’s just crowdsourcing, I’d lay off him. ;-)
And as a fellow Tigers fan, I’m sure you see these people as much as I do, there are plenty of the old “OMG I LUV INGE!!11@” folks still around that will swear till the day they die that this team should’ve kept him, and that Cabrera’s defense is so much worse than Inge’s that even with Miggy’s offense, the team is worse off.
Certainly, educated Tigers fans would agree with what you say, but the typical Comerica Park, fun-in-the-sun, yard of margarita fan just wants Brandon Inge’s whitebread ass back at third base because of his “grit” and “work ethic” and “range” and “fundamentals.”
Another thing to consider is that maybe Presley wouldn’t have attempted a bunt with a better third baseman manning the position.
Why is Miggy getting dinged for his defensive positioning? That was coming from the dugout.
I thought the idea was more that it’s important to consider his initial positioning when deciding whether he should have made the play.
2013 should be the last yr we see Miggy at 3b and Biggy at 1b, as Castellanos should be ready by then,…and the way Avila’s knee looks, vMart may be catching….yeek
What leads you to believe that he’ll be ready by next year? Castellanos has played 16 games in AA. At best, I think he’s a midseason call up next year. However, with Prince, Miggy and Victor all on the team next year, I’m not sure that would happen either (barring injury).
Sorry man, this makes no sense. Where do you expect Miggy to go? With the money where it is, a “healthy” V-Mart has to be the DH, which leaves Prince at 1B (he wouldn’t be serviceable anywhere else). You going to put Miggy in right field? Given we’re used to Mags or Boesch out there Miggy probably couldn’t be worse. But in right he could be the -20 a lot of folks thought he’d be a third. At least at third this year, he’s shown a commitment to losing weight and playing the position hard. And he looks to be right around a -10. That’s a big difference.
Is this ESPN.com? We’re isolating two plays from a single game to determine whether or not someone is a good third baseman?
I expect better from this site.
Well, it’s all in context. JV entered the 7th having allowed two hits – both plays shown above that could’ve just as easily been made into outs.
This is much better analysis than anything ESPN, because the point of the exercise was to crowdsource and see what a wide variety of fairly intelligent baseball-watching folks (the type that read FanGraphs) think about the plays, as well as what they’ve seen of Cabrera both on the field and on the scoresheet this season. Contribute to the conversation like the rest of us and then you’re a part of quality analysis. Or troll around like this and run counter to the purpose of the exercise.
Pointing out that this is a sloppy way to determine the abilities of a 3b is trolling? Sorry, I didn’t realize the site was above criticism.
We could do this same sort of analysis on any number of plays/players…crowdsourced or not, it’s not going to tell us if said player is any good at their position or not.
Quality analysis doesn’t come from a ton of opinions on a single play, but from analyzing several plays over a long period of time.
Everyone seems to really like pointing out uzr/150 stats without mentioning that those numbers take a long long time to stabilize. DRS is far more reliable at this point.