Taguchi the Defensive Liability
Last season, the Phillies employed a season-long strategy in which Pat Burrell would play six or seven innings before a defensive replacement helped rest his ailing feet. Usually coming in the form of speedster Michael Bourn, the strategy often worked to perfection; a natural centerfielder, Bourn could cover more ground and get to more balls. Those against the move argued that the Phillies shaky bullpen would give up many leads; in doing so, the Phillies were likely to have Chase Utley and Ryan Howard followed by Bourn in crucial situations, rather than Burrell.
Said proponents of leaving Burrell in the game could not deny that Bourn’s defensive prowess definitely helped the Phillies. Bourn was shipped to Houston in the Brad Lidge deal and so So Taguchi (yes that was planned) signed with the team to serve a similar role.
The problem thus far has been Taguchi’s inability to field his position in replacing Burrell. Add on the facts that Burrell has been posting gaudy numbers and the Phillies bullpen is still suspect and the move does not look good. Taguchi has only recorded one error on the season but there have been three other plays he should have made and did not. That accounts for four plays in his ten leftfield replacements that were not made. The plays in question have not necessarily been terrible but ones that a fan/manager/sane person would definitely expect to be made by a defensive upgrade.
In last night’s Phillies/Mets game, Taguchi misplayed a tough fly ball in the eighth inning, poorly timing his dive/slide. The ball bounced off of the front of his glove, allowing Raul Casanova to slide safely into second. Though the play ultimately did not result in a run it definitely did nothing to ease the pressure placed on the shoulders of JC Romero, now in the midst of his second inning of work. Here’s a graph of the game:
While it is not very likely Burrell would have produced different results if still in the game, Taguchi has not done a very good job as a defensive replacement. Looking at the Phillies likely 7th-9th inning pitchers we get the following:
- 7th: JC Romero - GB% increased from 57-63 % from 2005-2007
- 8th: Tom Gordon - career GB/FB of just 1.27
- 9th: Brad Lidge - career GB of 39.6 %, career FB of 38.6 %
Since Romero is primarily a ground ball pitcher it would make more sense to let Burrell stay in the game for the seventh inning, especially if his batting position is nearby in the offensive half of the inning. If Romero stays in for the eighth inning, like last night, it would not necessarily hurt to leave Burrell in as well due to his vast offensive advantage over Taguchi. With Gordon or Lidge on the mound it would make more sense to look for a defensive replacement but preferably one that would provide a significant upgrade. Nineteen games into this season Taguchi has not lived up to expectations.
TC said,
April 21, 2008 @ 11:01 am
I could be wrong, but Burrell’s defense (though still less than impressive) seems a lot better this year than in years past. I’ve long been an opponent of taking PB out of the game (in most situations), but it would seem to me that, if his LF defense is close to league average for the season, there’s hardly any excuse to sub him out for Taguchi’s mediocre glove and subpar bat.
Eric Seidman said,
April 21, 2008 @ 11:25 am
TC, my feeling has always been that it depends on the situation, as obvious as that sounds. For instance, up 5-1 with the closer coming in, yeah letting Burrell come out is fine. The original idea was to rest his injured feet which I’m not too sure are still an issue. Last year Bourn could field everything due to his speed. He couldn’t hit, so when it was Utley-Howard-Bourn it hurt the team but at least Bourn was a legitimate defensive upgrade.
This year, so far, Taguchi has been bad in the sense that Utley-Howard-Taguchi is not anywhere near as good as Utley-Howard-Burrell and on top of that he has not been much better than Burrell in the outfield.
I’m not a fan of taking Burrell out either. If it’s a legitimate upgrade, yeah, let’s talk, but otherwise it makes no sense to bring in someone MUCH worse offensively and barely better defensively.
Larry Seltzer said,
April 21, 2008 @ 11:52 am
I’m also skeptical of the routine defensive replacement strategy. The Phillies often seem to be short of batters late in the game.
Burrell has no speed and therefore covers little ground, but he’s competent with his glove and - correct me if you have numbers on this - it seems to me he has an excellent arm.
David Appelman said,
April 21, 2008 @ 12:03 pm
Here’s some additional info:
UZR had Burrell as the worst defensive LF last season at -34.
Best and worst of 2007 UZR
I think Taguchi is around 0, might be slightly negative.
Eric Seidman said,
April 21, 2008 @ 12:07 pm
Yeah, Burrell won’t make a ton of errors he just won’t get to as many balls as someone like Michael Bourn would, which is evidenced by his bad UZR. Unless I’m sorely mistaken UZR measures the amount of range for a fielder, the amount of plays he makes relative to an average fielder.
Burrell has been good at throwing runners out (outfield assists) in recent years, though by this article by John Walsh, Best outfield arms of 2007, it would seem Burrell was closer to being neither positive or negative in 2007 with regards to his arm.
I think a lot of it has to do with runners constantly testing him. For instance, Soriano will get many outfield assists because few think he can throw them out.
Burrell definitely hurts the Phillies defensively but maybe these numbers can help, his Batting Runs Above Average (BRAA) and Fielding Runs Above Average (FRAA):
2005: -13 FRAA, + 41 BRAA, net +28
2006: +1 FRAA, +23 BRAA, net +34
2007: -16 FRAA, +35 BRAA, net +19
Based on these numbers his offense makes up for fielding inadequacies.
Eric Seidman said,
April 21, 2008 @ 10:39 pm
And keeping up with the trend, TJ Bohn replaced Burrell tonight and promptly bobbled a catchable ball coming in the form of the middle ground between a lineout and a flyball. 11 defensive replacements for Burrell and 5 misplayed balls.
Kanka said,
April 22, 2008 @ 1:58 pm
I know that Taguchi has mostly been used as a platoon player and defensive replacement in his career. But the last few times I’ve watched him play, he looked lost on defense. So I looked up his fielding stats, and almost every metric has him as a league average defender at best. That’s not just recent -that’s throughout his career. I think you’d expect a little more from a defensive replacement.
Eric Seidman said,
April 22, 2008 @ 2:43 pm
Kanka,
Definitely, especially if the offensive dropoff is that severe. For me, as a Phillies fan, it is especially annoying because the bullpen is streaky. Even Romero, who, despite his 0.00 ERA has already allowed 5 of 8 inherited runners to score (last yr only 6 of 26). When the bullpen is going to give up leads I don’t want one of the best offensive players on the team out of the game, and if his replacement is going to do a poor job at serving his purpose it makes no sense from a management standpoint. If Taguchi was a gold-glove caliber fielder it is one thing but he has been absolutely useless this year. I liked the signing, in theory, at first, but he cannot hit and he has been ineffective as a defensive replacement.