Comments on: Granderson’s Just Fine

By: darrell

darrell — Fri, 16 Oct 2009 23:48:50 +0000

I agree with longbomb. He hit some homers early and got pull crazy and became helpless against lefties. It also seemed to me he was less aggressive on the bases and more tentative in the field. He is a player like Bernie Williams, great talent, but with little natural feel for the game, sort of an anti-Jeter. Remember, his rookie year, Tiger fans were wondering if he could beat out Nuke Logan for CF, and now we are disappointed he’s not Tori Hunter. He is highly intelligent and motivated, and might be able to do better against lefties in the future. It would help if Leyland moved him down in the order. Tigers lost the division because of a weak offense, and their 2nd best power hitter spent most of the year leading off.

By: GOBLUEBILLY

GOBLUEBILLY — Wed, 07 Oct 2009 16:15:39 +0000

As a huge fan who watched most of the Tiger games this year, I agree with the conclusion that Granderson is a fine player (and great guy). Across the board, he was sligtly above average for centerfielders in every catagory.

Among the qualified CFs in 2009, he was 9th in the value calculation on this site, 11th in batting, 10th in fielding, 10th in arm strength, 14th in WPA (negative overall for the year), 12th in OPS, 5th in wRC, and 10th in speed.

My difficulty with the “he is fine” analysis is that he disappeared from August 1 until the last week of the season. I generally use +/- .1 when looking at the win probabilty added stat to identify statistically-significant games. While I admit this is an arbitrary number, it seems a reasonable gauge to see who impacted the game most.

During that stretch of 50 games (nearly a third of the year) when the Tigers were battling for the divisional title, Granderson had 8 statistically-significant games by that measure — 7 negative and only 1 positive. And he was benched often against tough left-handed pitching. In the “real world” he had a solid but somewhat disappointing season.

But I wish we had a lot more players like him.

By: longbomb

longbomb — Wed, 07 Oct 2009 11:57:08 +0000

I’m also a big tiger fan, and I have to disagree somewhat with the analysis. I think the drop in BB rate and the rise in K rate is more notable than referred to here in the analysis. When you look at K rate as a % of Plate Appearances, Grandy’s rate goes from 20.0% in 2008 to 17.8% in 2009. Moreover, from June 1 on, is 2009 K rate as percent of PA was 20.9%. I think such an increase in K rate and the fact that his flyball rate and pop-out rate climbed substantially (leading to more outs) was his downfall. His approach at the plate has apparently changed and I don’t think for the better, particularly for a leadoff guy. His success against lefties also took a significant dive. And all these downturns were at an age where he should be getting better, not worse. I have much bigger worry beads about Grandy than the author here has. Grandy seems to be a real smart kid and I’m hoping he recognizes and corrects his faults. He’s a great rep of baseball and I would love to see him go on to greatness. But in my opinion, he’s definitely moved in the wrong direction this year.

By: Topher

Topher — Thu, 01 Oct 2009 21:07:57 +0000

We need to be careful in how we interpret this analysis. Granderson is not more likely to bounce back next year because he had a down year this year. I’m not more likely to win the lottery just because I’ve never won it before. (The whole “he’s due” fallacy.) This type of analysis is useful because it identifies his underlying talent (.368 wOBA) which, along the player’s risk, is all a real or fantasy GM should be concerned about going forward. However, Granderson is just as likely to put up a year like 09 in 2010 as he was this year. (Although, I should say, I’m plenty happy with him on my team as he’s one of only three 30/20 guys in the AL this year. Even with a bad BA, I’ll take that any day.)

By: HAK

HAK — Thu, 01 Oct 2009 11:35:38 +0000

BUT, the point of baseball is to win games… Stats serve as a record of what a player did on the field, and what he did to help his team win games… RIGHT??

Yes, but the point of this website and especially the Rotographs part is to analyze the numbers inside and out and possibly give the readers some insight into what might be expected next year. Judging from the analysis, it seems as though a return of 2008’s production should be more likely than a repeat of 2009’s. If you play Rotisserie baseball, this can be a valuable tool when you decide when to draft, or how much to bid on, Granderson.

By: Polanco_Fan

Polanco_Fan — Thu, 01 Oct 2009 03:42:11 +0000

First off i am a Tiger fan who loves Grandy… I think he is a great player…

I understand the article, and know what the author is trying to say.. He is saying that Grandy had some bad luck this year, some great luck in ‘07, and that his true talent is probably close to his ‘08 numbers…

BUT, the point of baseball is to win games… Stats serve as a record of what a player did on the field, and what he did to help his team win games… RIGHT??

SO, even though Granderson should be better next year, he STILL DID have a bad season… IMO there is no way around that fact… he didn’t hit in as many runs, he didn’t get on base as much, and in the end he didnt do as much to help his team WIN as he did in the past…

We can predict his future performance all we want, but in the end, this year wasnt a good one for my boy C.J.

P.S. His 3 homers this past week were sure a step in the right direction though!!

GO TIGERS.. Win Thursday night and it’s BRING ON THE YANKEES!!!

By: CH

CH — Tue, 29 Sep 2009 00:00:17 +0000

Troll.

By: Bill

Bill — Mon, 28 Sep 2009 22:00:31 +0000

Grats to everyone for getting trolled.

By: Alex

Alex — Mon, 28 Sep 2009 21:40:59 +0000

oh that was very good.

By: Mario

Mario — Mon, 28 Sep 2009 18:08:27 +0000

LOL I needed a smile, thanks Klaus