Batting Average Dependent Tigers

Earlier in the week, I discussed team run production using batting average (BA), isolated power (ISO) and extra on base percentage (EOBP). Today, I’ll look at the individual Tiger hitters. Table1 below presents these statistics for Tiger players in 2007. Table 2 table shows how the Tigers ranked in each category among 133 American League players with 300 or more plate appearances (PA) plus recently acquired Edgar Renteria and Jacque Jones.

We can see from the tables that Magglio Ordonez was not only the best hitter on the team in 2007 but also the most well rounded. He was the only player on the team to finish in the top third in the league all 3 categories (1st in BA in BA, 37th in EOBP and 11th in ISO).

My rule of thumb is that a player should rank above average in 2 of the 3 categories to be considered a really solid hitter. Several Tiger regulars did reasonably well in only one category while falling below average in the other two categories in 2007. The one trick ponies included Ivan Rodriguez (61st in BA), Brandon Inge (56th in EOBP), Sean Casey (32nd in BA) and new Tiger Jacque Jones (58th in BA). Not surprisingly, none of these players finished in the top half of the league in runs created per game (RC/G).

Two players who were productive hitters without meeting the rule of thumb were Placido Polanco (3rd in BA) and Edgar Renteria (5th in BA if placed in the AL). Both finished in the top 20 in RC/G primarily because of very high batting averages. They were among only 7 major league players who finished in the top third in the league in RC/G despite despite finishing below average in the EOBP and ISO. All batted .315 or higher. No player in the majors who excelled in only EOBP or only ISO had a very productive season.

Dependency on batting average is not particularly desirable because batting average is by far the least repeatable of the three statistics. It will be difficult for Polanco and Renteria to repeat their career high batting averages of 2007 in 2008. Jones is not usually as dependent on batting average as he was last year. He usually hits for more power and will need to get it back if he's going to be more productive than 4.3 RC/G. And then Pudge needs to walk more but that's an old story.


Table 1: Detroit Tigers Run Production in 2007

Player	PA	BA	EOBP	ISO	RC/G
Ordonez	679	.363	.115	.232	9.47
Granderson	676	.302	.084	.250	7.78
Polanco	641	.341	.075	.118	6.98
Renteria	543	.332	.087	.138	6.82
Sheffield	593	.265	.157	.196	6.54
Guillen	630	.296	.092	.206	6.23
Raburn	148	.304	.054	.203	5.65
Casey	496	.296	.083	.097	5.11
Thames	284	.242	.049	.257	4.67
Jones	495	.285	.073	.115	4.32
Inge	577	.236	.101	.140	4.12
Rodriguez	515	.281	.019	.139	4.02
Infante	178	.271	.051	.084	3.77
Rabelo	185	.256	.059	.101	3.53
Monroe	372	.222	.059	.152	2.90

Table 2: Detroit Tigers Run Production Ranks in 2007

Player	BA Rank	EOBP Rank	ISO Rank	RC/G Rank
Ordonez	1	37	11	3
Granderson	22	83	6	7
Polanco	3	101	103	13
Renteria	5	78	86	16
Sheffield	85	10	33	19
Guillen	30	67	24	31
Casey	32	85	118	72
Jones	58	103	107	103
Inge	122	56	83	108
Rodriguez	61	135	84	111
Monroe	133	119	72	133