The Z Files: Eight First Half Disappointments

There's a mindset suggesting it's unfair to overly scrutinize early draft picks or top auction purchases since there's a whole lot more that can go wrong than go right. The general tenet is to expect the upper end players to simply come close to breaking even, while the rest of your roster generates the profits needed to take down a fantasy baseball league. If a $35 player generates $25 worth of production, he's still a second-round player. How can a second-round player be a disappointment?

In standard auction terms, it takes about $320 worth of production to win a fantasy baseball league. There's more to it than that, as categorical distribution needs to maximize points, but in a nutshell, winners take their $260 draft-day budget and realize around a $60 profit.

As such, a $10 deficit is a $10 burden, regardless if it's your $35 bringing back $25 or a $15 guy dropping to $5. It's another $10 worth of stats necessary to accrue elsewhere. Granted, it's a lot easier for a $35 player to underproduce than overproduce, but a deficit is a deficit.

With that as a backdrop, I'm comfortable calling out the following eight hitters for disappointing pre-break performances. The criteria begin with injuries not playing a part. The fewest plate appearances of anyone on the list is 344. To make the list, the initial expectation was they would be top-50 hitters as determined by the aggregate projections of RotoWire, Baseball HQ and Mastersball. Projected earnings for a 15-team mixed league were computed and compared to actual earnings up to the All-Star break, with the eight biggest losers discussed. The batters are listed via largest earnings shortcoming to smallest.

Jose Ramirez (Projected $40, Earned $11, Loss $29)

No surprise here, as the consensus top-five pick has been the game's biggest disappointment. To be fair, some were leery of Ramirez and his uneven 2018 heading into 2019, but even his most ardent naysayers didn't expect this level of ineptitude.

The most frustrating element of analyzing Ramirez is there's nothing obvious to blame. He's the baseball equivalent of "Once you know the answer, they change the question."

Last year, especially at the end of the regular season and into the playoffs, Ramirez couldn't hit anything with a wiggle. To wit, after the break in 2018, Ramirez posted a .996 OPS on four-seam fastballs and a .463 mark on curves and sliders. To date this season, Ramirez's OPS on four-seamers is .604 while he's recorded a .713 mark on breaking pitches.

OK, so his slump isn't from how pitchers adjusted to him. What about Statcast data? This is a little more telling and could be a lesson learned for the trio of prognosticators. Ignoring 2019 for a moment, Ramirez's hard-hit data from 2017-2018 was below average while his average exit velocity was league average. During that span, Ramirez's wOBA (weighted on base average) was around .395 but his expected wOBA was 30 points lower. Granted, a .365 wOBA is exceptional, just not first-round level. The message here is expectations may have been unfair. This isn't to say those who were cautious were "right", unless they specifically noted the good luck, which wasn't part of the preseason narrative.

Ramirez's current wOBA is .284, 42 points shy of his .324 xwOBA. If Ramirez was expected to post near the .365 level but was checking in at .324, he'd still be underproducing, but not to the egregious extent incurred so far.

Perhaps the fairest question is whether Ramirez can produce at a .365 wOBA for the remainder of the season, as this should rightfully be his baseline. Lo and behold, Ramirez's wOBA the last month heading into the break was .363, fancy that. His slash line in this span was a very palatable .250/.368/.500. This feels like a reasonable, and fair, baseline. He's been doing it the past month, and there's no apparent reason he can't maintain this over the rest of the second half. The key is accepting that some of his past success was a blessing from Lady Luck. In short, expectations were too grandiose, and Ramirez played at the lower end of his skills range for a couple month before rebounding to his basal level.

Paul Goldschmidt (Projected $32, Earned $8, Loss $25)

For those checking my math, the apparent discrepancy in the loss is from rounding, as everything is presented to the nearest whole dollar. On the surface, it looks as if Goldschmidt has been a little snake bit over the first half, as most of the underlying metrics are in line with accepted variance and his hard-hit rate remains well above average.

This seems like a reasonable assessment, with the conclusion a strong second half is in order. The problem is Goldschmidt's xWOBA muddles the matter. Even with the high exit velocity, Goldschmidt's xWOBA is a solid but not stud-like .349. In fact, his xwOBA has been in decline, dropping about 16-17 points each season since 2015.

Projection theory calls for a weighted average, with more credence put on recent seasons. As an example, if asked for the next number in the series 5, 4, 3, some may say 2. A projectionist might average and say 4. Someone putting more weight on the recent would fall between 3 and 4. If there's an age-related decline, the guess would be closer to 3.

This is a possible explanation for what's happening. Instead of anticipating a continued slide for Goldschmidt, the weighted average called for something in between and at least so far, he's maintained the same degree of loss as incurred the past two seasons.

It should be noted it wasn't wrong to assume a weighted average, as history demonstrates it's a more likely outcome than "2". That said, another factor is that Goldschmidt changed teams, and hence home venues. Even with the humidor, Chase Field is far more hitter friendly than Busch Stadium, plus all players aren't affected by a venue linearly. It could be Busch Stadium is even less compatible with Goldschmidt's batted ball profile than the norm.

The last factor is he has yet to steal a base, which isn't reflected in wOBA but is a significant reason for the drop in fantasy production. Last season's scant seven bags was a harbinger of less running, though no one thought he'd completely stop. Granted, even if Goldschmidt swiped five bags he'd still be on the list, but even less running must be baked into future expectations.

All told, this doesn't mean Goldschmidt won't have a better second half, only to temper the degree of bounceback. His wOBA is .333, 16 ticks below the expected .349.

Joey Votto (Projected $23, Earned $2, Loss $21)

Votto is another example where hindsight is 20/20 as it's likely last season was a harbinger and not just an off-year, marred by injuries. That said, many fantasy drafters took the "I'd rather run away a year too early" approach and have avoided a land mine as a result. However, no matter how fast they sprinted, Votto has fallen even further than expected.

We can pick apart the numbers left and right, but the bottom line is we're probably looking at a genuine skills decline, occurring at a steeper rate than most players of Votto's ilk. I'm chalking this up to a lesson learned. Every offseason, I tweak my projection engine to reflect new data, and so far all three players discussed provide a platform to investigate changes.

J.D. Martinez (Projected $40, Earned $20, Loss $21)

Sorry Red Sox fans, Martinez is the first of three defending champion batters to make the list. As opposed to the first three hitters discussed, Martinez's lofty expectations seemed justified. The 2018 leap in batting average stands out, but it's predicated by Fenway Park's penchant for boosting that eight percent over the norm, or about 16 points.

A .304/.376/.541 slash would be a career best for most MLB players, but Martinez's expectation was he would produce like an early first rounder, and thus even more was anticipated. Statcast data suggests Martinez has been a bit unlucky, as his .383 wOBA trailed the .416 xwOBA. For comparison, last season Martinez posted a .428 wOBA with an expected mark of .421.

There's a bit more to Martinez's woes than bad luck though, as his barrel rate, average exit velocity and hard-hit rate are all down. Keep in mind skills are not static, they're a range. All we're seeing is Martinez producing at the lower end of his basal skill range. This feeds back to the intro and how hard it is for the top players to simply break even. When you're on that level, you can perform within your expected skill range and still be a disappointment.

On the surface, it appears Martinez's HR/FB mark is unlucky at around 20 percent compared to 30 percent the past couple of years. The thing is, his average fly ball distance is down 10 feet from last season and about 20 from 2017. This is doubly damning, since the reduced drag on the ball should add about 10 feet over last season, so Martinez has lost about 20 feet after the adjustment.

This suggests the HR/FB drop is justified and not bad luck. Furthermore, Martinez's average exit velocity on fly balls is the lowest it's been since Statcast began tracking in 2015.

It appears Martinez really hasn't been unlucky; he's hitting fly balls with less authority. Keeping in mind this is descriptive and not predictive, he could easily revert to career levels the rest of the season and is a decent bet to do just that. Especially in a lineup as potent as Boston's (even with the other disappointments below), more homers take on even more fantasy juice with the associated runs and RBI.

Mookie Betts (Projected $45, Earned $25, Loss $20)

Here's the classic case of a first-round player producing at a second-round level but still being a disappointment. As they say, $20 is $20, and teams with Betts are required to make up for the loss as well as generate $60 more profit to compete.

Betts finished as the best fantasy producer in 2016 and 2018, so there's no doubt his top-three status was justified. Coincidentally, his current numbers look a lot like 2017, the year in between his top finishes. If Betts doesn't revert to last season's form, brace for the Bret Saberhagen-esque "every other year" nonsense narrative.

Because of the manner three-year weighted averages work, next spring Betts' baseline will fold in 2017-2019, seriously deflating expectations. A lot will depend on how he finishes, but Betts is an early favorite for a possible first-round source of profit next spring.

Getting back to the matter at hand: what's happened, and can it be rectified. Betts' underlying metrics lag last season by a wide margin, partially because 2018 will likely archive among his career best campaigns, if not the best. The better comparison is to 2016 and 2017, and 2019 is still superior. A .367 wOBA is significantly short of his .392 xwOBA, alerting to some misfortune before the break.

Given that last season's otherworldly campaign likely bloated 2019 expectations a bit unfairly, Betts is performing within his expected skills range, just not enjoying the commensurate outcomes. In addition, from a fantasy perspective, he's not running as much, something not captured by wOBA but pertinent to fantasy analysis.

Something necessary to consider is Betts has publicly discussed the challenges of being a new father, especially regarding proper sleep. Whether this is an excuse or a reason, it likely is a factor. As much as number crunchers like myself treat players as statistic-generating pieces of meat, they're human beings with off-the-field life issues.

While some will call it a pattern (it's not), early in his career Betts has played to either extreme of his skills range. He's towards the lower end so far, and there's no reason he can't change that in the final two-plus months.

Lorenzo Cain (Projected $23, Earned $8, Loss $15)

Cain could be another victim of aggressive initial expectations, but they feel justified especially since they were tempered with a health hedge and he's largely avoided the injury bug to date. There's no doubt Cain's numbers are depressed, but he's also influenced by the current landscape. Less power certainly hurts; however, Cain's fantasy assets are more in the batting average and steals departments. With the overall decline in both areas, Cain's lessened contribution hurts even more.

I wish it were more intricate, but Cain appears to be the same player as last season, just being frowned upon by Lady Luck. Nearly every leading indicator is on par with last season. He's just not enjoying the same positive results. It depends where you are in the category, but you can still make up points in batting average. Cain is one of the better targets to aid in that pursuit.

Andrew Benintendi (Projected $27, Earned $12, Loss $15)

Benintendi put on some muscle in the offseason and was also announced as Boston's leadoff hitter for the 2019 campaign. In a way, these seem contradictory, perhaps contributing to his woes. Be it by design or happenstance, Benintendi appears to have joined the launch angle revolution, averaging 18.5 degrees as compared to a 12.6 degree level last season. This has resulted in a career high 46 percent fly ball mark, well over his career 38 percent level. Unfortunately, even with the juiced horsehide, Benintendi's HR/FB has plummeted, so he's not taking advantage of the added lofted batted balls. Luckily, the additional lofted batted balls are not affecting his BABIP, which is a typical repercussion.

The one area Benintendi is suffering this season is contact. His 22.9 percent K rate is a tick above league average, but several points ahead of his career 18 percent mark. Most of those benefiting from the increased launch angle don't sacrifice contact.

Something to note is Benintendi's hard-hit rate is league average. This is acceptable, but opens him to more variance, or a smaller margin of error.

Circling back to the power outage, his average fly ball distance is up over last season, which should portend more long balls. This, along with more strikeouts, are the culprits. With the same level of performance, Benintendi's homers should increase with more runs and RBI dovetailing. The excessive whiffing is a concern but not irreconcilable. Look for the fly-chaser to put up better numbers the rest of the season.

Nicholas Castellanos (Projected $23, Earned $9, Loss $14)

Looking under the hood, the major difference between 2019 and Castellanos' underlying metrics the past few seasons is a fly ball exit velocity drop, buoying a slip in HR/FB. That said, while Castellanos' average fly ball distance reflects the exit velocity drop, it should still result in more big flies, hinting at some bad luck.

Here's that phrase again – this is descriptive, not predictive. Granted, the luck aspect should return to neutral, adding a few more dingers, but there's no tangible reason Castellanos won't revert to lofting batted balls in a more authoritative manner.