Blue Jays: A rebuttal to the Morales rebuttal

The 2018 projection for Kendrys Morales is a topic of much discussion. The debate continues!

Jim Scott wrote a rebuttal to my Kendrys Morales article. The purpose of my original piece was to present a less optimistic view than what Jim had, of what to expect from Kendrys Morales in 2018. This post is my response to some of Jim’s rebuttal points. My objective is to make clear what I wrote, what I did not write, and what I should have written more clearly.

Contact% is “drop-the-mic” critical for a hitter’s success

With respect to contact rates, I wrote the following:

"Is the fall in Morales’ contact rate an anomaly, or a sign that he is on the downward side of the aging curve?"

Nowhere in my article did I present Morales’ contact rate, which is a combination of O-Contact% and Z-Contact%. The paragraph that contained the excerpt above dealt solely with Z-Contact%, which is the contact rate when swinging at pitches in the strike zone. O-Contact% is the contact rate when swinging at pitches outside the strike zone.

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I acknowledge that I may have created confusion by including the word “contact” into the noted paragraph. I should have only used the term Z-Contact% and not even referenced exit velocity, launch angle and contact. My apologies for the poor wording in this regard.

For the record, I used the Captain Obvious GIF to poke fun at myself for stating the obvious: contact is important. I was not proclaiming that contact was more important than exit velocity or launch angle.

Nevertheless, the 2017 drop in Morales’ Z-Contact% is noteworthy. Prior to the 2017 season, Morales’ career Z-Contact% was 88.2%. In 2017, Morales’ Z-Contact% was 81.5%; his lowest Z-Contact% in the previous four seasons was 2016’s 87.9%. This data is per FanGraphs.

My view is that a significant drop in the contact rate on swings on pitches in the strike zone, albeit a one-year decline, is not a signal to expect a better performance next season from a 34-year old hitter.

Strikeouts are the devil’s handiwork

I did not mention strikeouts at all in my original article; I did speak of whiff percentage.

Morales’ whiff percentage on hard stuff (fastballs, cutters, and sinkers) has risen from its 2014 level. To be clear, whiff percentage pertains to the rate at which the batter swings and misses on a pitch category, in this case the hard stuff. This number is not a strikeout stat. For example, Morales’ 2017 whiff percentage on hard stuff was 22.4%. In other words, for every 100 swings on pitches classified as hard stuff, Morales swung and missed 22.4% of the time. I noted that in each of the last three seasons, Morales has had a higher whiff percentage on hard stuff than he did in 2014. Additionally, Morales’ 2017 whiff percentage on hard stuff was almost double the 2014 rate.

I think that Morales’ higher whiff percentage on hard stuff in each of the past three seasons, compared to his 2014 season, is a concern and may be a sign of a veteran hitter in decline.

Kendrys’ 2017 swinging strike and contact percentages are unacceptably bad

I did not write that Morales’ swinging strike and contact percentage are unacceptably bad. I certainly did not call Morales’ stats ugly. My analysis did not describe Morales’ 2017 stats as good or bad.

With respect to Morales’ swinging strike percentage (SwStr%), which is the rate at which a batter swings and misses on total pitches, I noted that his 2017 SwStr% was higher than his 2015 and 2016 seasons, not to mention his career average. I did provide the 2017 Major League average SwStr% (10.5%) but only to give the reader some context for a stat that is not commonly referred to by those in the mainstream media. The purpose of presenting Morales’ SwStr% for the past three seasons, and career, was to highlight that Morales was less disciplined at the plate in 2017 than he was in recent seasons.

On the subject of contact percentages, as I noted earlier in this response, I was referring to Morales’ Z-Contact%. His 2017 Z-Contact% plummeted noticeably from previous seasons and his career average.

The last word

I wrote this post as a response to Jim Scott’s rebuttal to my original Morales piece. My objective was to make clear what I wrote, what I did not write, and what I should have written more clearly.

Jim and I are friends and we enjoy discussing and even arguing about the Blue Jays; we happen to disagree about what to expect from Kendrys Morales in 2018. I think the analogy below is apropos of our different projections for Morales.

"All this debate about the Kessel deal. Was it worth it? Was it not worth it? I find it amusing. I got news for you, we’re all going to know at some point. This is no different than (sic) two farmers, side-by-side, arguing whether they plant soy beans or corn. And they argue and one guy plants corn and one guy plants soy beans. Guess what, we’re going to know at some point who won. We don’t have to argue the whole time while the plants grow for God’s sake.Brian Burke"

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