Alex Gordon Is Returning To Being Alex Gordon
by Freneau on May 11, 2011 4:00 AM EDT
in Kansas City Royals News
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PrintGoodbye Alex Gordon the .300 hitter, it was nice knowing you.
Much virtual ink was spent last month discussing Gordon's new approach at the plate, how he was emphasizing contact more and making himself into a new hitter. On April 16th the old grand river Batting Average crested, sending Gordon to a .373/.403/.559.
Following an 0-4 last night against the Yankees, Gordon is now all the way down to a .300 average. His secondary skills are still decent, but the clock is ticking on Gordon being a plus batting average guy. He's not going to hit .360, he's not going to hit .340, he's not going to hit .320 and he's probably not going to hit .300. He's Alex Gordon.
And that's not necessarily a bad thing, although the Royals and Gordon himself will probably fight it. Gordon has been properly Seitzerized, which means that he's striking out less, but he's also walking less, mitigating any benefit. His LD rate, for whatever that's worth, is actually down.
We see this every year, when random fluctuation suddenly means a guy must be totally new. Just about every time, he's not new. Of course, the breakout stories never get retracted, the writer never offers a correction, there's never a return to the subject. Instead we all just bounce along like nothing ever happened.
The Royals should embrace Gordon as a prototypical 3B-styled hitter, in the mold of a Corey Koskie: average to bad BA, good walk numbers leading to a solid OBP, decent power. Although Gordon isn't actually a 3B anymore, it really doesn't matter. Those guys were useful members of a lineup. For a supposedly old school organization, they've entirely forgotten about this hitting profile. We all know how this will turn out.
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Alex Gordon
I think it’s far too early too judge Gordon’s “Seitzerization”. He’s made some progress early on, he’s still a young guy, and I think the added contact he’s making will make this a big season for him eventually. Actually, the Frenchy factor could help him out as well. It’s interesting that Francouer is still just 27, yet he’s been up and down and all around. But he seems to be flourishing under Seitzer. I say give the likes of Gordon and Francouer a chance—-the former number one picks seem to have some chemistry at a still young age, and perhaps it will be contagious. Losing to the Yanks always sucks, but it’s a long season.
And I’m sure you’ll offer a correction if this is just a slump, which all hitter go through? Oh wait no you won’t, if he finished the season hitting .310 you’ll write a column about how if he was a REALLY good hitter he’d have hit .311 because you spend your life bitching about your “favorite” team.
by seelztlb on May 11, 2011 8:48 AM EDT reply actions 1 recs
This tires me, but
We are all enjoying the .500 run right now, and this post is not “bitching.” It’s analysis based on fact and history, not emotion. History says that Alex Gordon has been a .249 hitter thus far in the major leagues and, well, even though he is likely to improve during his peak years (now), he’s probably a Corey Koskie-type bat, not a Ryan Braun-type bat.
Saying that Gordon can’t sustain .300+ performance all season long isn’t “bitching,” it’s being realistic. DId you even look up Corey Koskie? A career .275 / .367 / .458 hitter. Not Ruthian, but very useful to a major league roster. Will is letting a ray of hope peep through his analysis that Gordon will be a player worth keeping around for the long haul. If anything, this is an optimistic peice based in reality.
by Tito42 on May 11, 2011 9:49 AM EDT up reply actions 1 recs
I am fine with the player Gordon can be
Especially if he is decent in LF, which by all indications he is.
There was lots of chatter all Spring about Gordon’s new approach, new swing, new attitude, etc.
And really, as the data piles up, all I’m seeing is less patience.
He was pretty patient last night
… when he struck out looking at three straight pitches. Ouch. I don’t think it’s necessary to assume that young players will always regress to the mean of their first couple seasons. It makes a fair amount of sense to expect young players to improve. Either way, whether we’re looking at a .300 hitter in a slump or .275 hitter returning to earth, Alex has struggled on the road all season, so I wouldn’t expect him to turn it around against NY or DET.
If you want to crown his ass, crown his ass
But he is what we thought he was.
Relive Royals History at royalsretro.blogspot.com
Awesome!
Just awesome.
I need to go take a Davies and wipe my Elarton. Excuse me.
by royaldaddy on May 11, 2011 1:07 PM EDT via mobile up reply actions
Boom
Facebook’d
Thank you for contributing.
by SagehenMacGyver47 on May 11, 2011 4:41 PM EDT up reply actions
Maybe we need some more Royals bibliomancy.
"That's fine wood from... somewhere."
by KeepItCopacetic on May 11, 2011 9:02 AM EDT reply actions
Can we also call on a wiseman and a diving rod
to find all those lost opportunities from last night?
How would a diving rob post work?
“guys, i’ve got this stick. i’m going to point it at something. I’ll come back in 20 minutes and let you know how it went.”
Toss diving rod into ocean, pond, ditch, puddle, glass of water
in search of lost keys, lost opportunities, or lost time. Wait. Walk away, return, wait some more. Get dinner, read William Gass’ The Tunnel in one sitting, return, wait some more.
Lose more opportunities and time; buy more diving rods.
by RoyalCreole on May 11, 2011 10:51 AM EDT up reply actions
Sooo Rowsdower...
Is that a… stupid name?
by OnixConcepcion on May 11, 2011 10:33 AM EDT up reply actions
You are never allowed to say anything negative
about your “favorite” team, even if it is entirely based on facts.
Slow flushing toilets at other people's houses make me nervous.
Yeah!
There is only so much room on the Gordon train and once you're off, you can't get back aboard!
A community of mimes we are.
"That's fine wood from... somewhere."
by KeepItCopacetic on May 11, 2011 1:05 PM EDT up reply actions
But your verbal admission that negative things exist about the team,
whether or not you name them, means that you are saying something negative:
Banned
by SagehenMacGyver47 on May 11, 2011 5:03 PM EDT up reply actions 1 recs
Article on Gordon
= Gordon 6 for 6, hit for cycle, 12 RBI tonight?
by Yamfun Cheng Kamfun on May 11, 2011 9:31 AM EDT reply actions
His K% is still down 5% from his career average
And he’s been walking more lately.
I think you’re right that Gordon is never going to be a .300 hitter, but there’s a long way between .300 and the Alex Gordon of past seasons. Gordon’s career batting average, including this year, is .249. If the ‘new’ Alex Gordon is a .270 hitter, we should consider that a huge improvement.
Gordon has always struck out a lot because his contact rate on pitches out of the zone was a pretty awful 55%. This year, it’s 71%. I think the leveled swing is playing a big role in that improvement, and I think it’s going to make a lasting impact on his K% and batting average. I don’t see why it would hurt his BB% either, since fouling off pitches is better for going deep in counts than swinging and missing.
Gordon’s improvement seems to be about what I expected. A .320 hitter was unrealistic, but a .270-.280 hitter with power and patience is a likely outcome. I don’t think the average will likely drop below .270, but the thing to watch is that if his average continues to fall much below .300, he’s going to need to return to his career BB%. The BB% has been climbing, but the current 7% is still too low.
It also means he's putting the balls in play, cuts down on chances to take 4 balls.
I don’t see why it would hurt his BB% either, since fouling off pitches is better for going deep in counts than swinging and missing.
Glad I came, just wish I hadn't stayed so long.
Rock Chalk Talk
Yes, I considered that. I still think the ability to make contact when you swing is a net positive for taking walks. The majority of Gordon’s swings on balls out of the zone should happen when he already has 2 strikes, and when a player puts a swing on a ball out of the zone, they usually foul it off. If he swings and misses, the PA is over, but if he makes contact, it will likely be fouled off. The only cases that making contact would be worse than missing for BB% would be if there’s 0 or 1 strikes, Gordon swings at a pitch out of the zone, makes contact, and puts the ball in play. Someone is welcome to run the numbers, but it seems to me that the ability to make contact when you swing should be a net positive for going deep into counts.
Ok, from Texas Leaguers:
Here’s his numbers from this season:
and May only (putting balls in play more often recently)
and April 2010 to present:
Glad I came, just wish I hadn't stayed so long.
Rock Chalk Talk
Lots of info there but it does look like he's more likely to put the ball in play than foul it off when swinging.
Glad I came, just wish I hadn't stayed so long.
Rock Chalk Talk
Maybe I'm reading it wrong
But the top 3 pitch types (FF SL CH) make up the fast majority of the pitches analyzed, and for these pitch types, it looks like he puts the ball in play a little less than half the time that he swings and makes contact. I’m getting that by dividing the In Play% by (Swing% – Whiff%).
More importantly, this data appears to reflect all pitches seen. From my experience watching games, it seems like Gordon puts the ball in play much more often on balls in the zone, and when he makes contact on a pitch out of the zone, he fouls the pitch off much more often than he puts it in play. We really need to look at only pitches out of the strike zone.
Whoops, didn’t see that they have a Foul%. That makes it a lot easier. So the Foul% is pretty close to the In Play% on all pitches meaning that the Foul% is very likely signifianctly higher than the In Play% on pitches out of the zone.
Here's a chart with all his pitches this year, the "spoil" swings you're talking about just aren't showing up.
Glad I came, just wish I hadn't stayed so long.
Rock Chalk Talk
Out of the zone, I count 10 balls put into play. I count 13 fouls. It’s too small a sample to be meaningful, but it certainly doesn’t provide evidence against the ‘spoiling’ effect.
Additionally, when a hitter is confident in his ability to make contact with 2 strikes, he should be more willing to go deep in counts.
In any case, whether improved contact on pitches out of the zone marginally hurts or helps BB%, it’s going to be a very small effect. The reduced BB% seems to be all about approach and/or small sample size. I don’t see any reason to believe that improved contact ability would hamper his ability to return to his career walk rate.
and one last one because I'm bored today, from Fangraphs leaderboards:
BB% and Contact% in a little scatter plot:
Glad I came, just wish I hadn't stayed so long.
Rock Chalk Talk
This is barely relevant to the current discussion
This shows that players who swing and miss more also walk more. I’ll bet you that power hitters swing and miss more and that power hitters also walk more. But in this case, we’re talking about a single player who improves his contact ability, and how that will affect his walk rate.
Moreover, this is again showing contact rate for all pitches. We care about pitches out of the zone which is where most of Gordon’s improvement lies.
Because swinging and missing will lead to seeing more pitches
compared to swinging and making contact leads to shorter AB’s. You’re continuing to just ignore that fact completely.
Glad I came, just wish I hadn't stayed so long.
Rock Chalk Talk
I'm not ingoring that fact
I just think it’s balanced by the fact that swinging and missing also shortens AB’s when you strike out. You see a LOT of foul balls on 2 strike counts.
Too early to tell
He had a good start – now he is slumping.
Too early to write him off just as it was too early to proclaim him a star.
WHY DO YOU HATE THE SUNSHINE AND CELEBRATE THE NIGHT!!!!!!!
Killing time until time kills me
by EspeciallyK on May 11, 2011 11:09 AM EDT up reply actions 1 recs
I think we're just writing him off as a .350 hitter.
I’d say .280 average with 15-20 bombs is his maximum upside.
I hope Mazzaro has his sh!t together and throws some good games.
I really enjoyed watching him in Oakland and was sad when he got traded.
"OK and now everybody who said 'game over' at some point
GO KNEEL IN THE CORNER!" - elcroata
by Gaijin_Suketto on May 11, 2011 12:28 PM EDT up reply actions
C'MON, VIN!
I used to be an A's fan until they left town and got good.
by philofthenorth on May 11, 2011 3:35 PM EDT up reply actions
So, what's Seitzer's biggest success as a hitting coach?
it’s either the Royals finishing 2nd in batting average and 9th in OPS last year, or Yuni hitting home runs last year.
Because i’m guessing minor league gimmicks like “The Net” (“Everybody must hit line drives”) probably didn’t turn DeJesus or Podsednik into good batting average guys, nor did it dispel the idea that Seitzer tries to turn everybody into the exact same hitter. But the difference between Arizona and KC is that Seitzer is a Royals alumni so this org will be far more reluctant to fire Seitzer when it’s obvious what he is and isn’t as a hitting coach.
Let’s just say I am not looking forward to Seitzer working with Moustakas to sap his power and get him to hit more linedrives towards left field.
Follow me on Twitter: http://www.twitter.com/bhindepmo
Chairman, The Melky Cabrera Seasoning Sauce. It's great on your outfield!
to rephrase the question
What is Kevin Seitzer’s crowning achievement as Royals hitting coach?
Because the media loves to go to their annual articles about Seitzer changing the teams approach for the better and possibly being the reason why they’re hitting. I think the 2010 article on this was followed by an offensive slump. But even for the 80s alumni like Seitzer, someone is gonna have to ask “What is his biggest achievement”, right?
Follow me on Twitter: http://www.twitter.com/bhindepmo
Chairman, The Melky Cabrera Seasoning Sauce. It's great on your outfield!
I think the message to be got here is the media need to stop writing about changed approaches,
because they f****** jinxing our success.
BUST!!
"To quote the sensei/sorority house janitor from Nude Ninjas... 'Nothing is as it seems.'" - Some guy named "Stiadaik" from AVclub.com
by Crooow on May 11, 2011 12:03 PM EDT reply actions 1 recs
I hope you're wrong
Alex has been taking ugly, almost tentative cuts lately. It feels temporary to me. Sure as hell hope so. I wasn’t crazy about old .249 Alex.
Biggest thing thats bugging me right now with Alex and Billy...
And especially Billy:
They seem like they are taking every first pitch mo matter a strike or ball. I mean I understand taking a ball of course, but the past few days Billy has seen some throw right down the middle with a runner on or we are down runs. Billy should be letting them rip. He always puts himself in a hole right away.
I’d like to see Billy swinging away more often at first pitch.
Alex has had somewhat of the same “problem.” Although his recently shown patience is down right Hosmer like.
by KCTiger on May 11, 2011 1:42 PM EDT via mobile reply actions
you see the 8th inning last night?
Butler’s one pitch outing?
Butler’s first-pitch swinging percentage is 18% this year, and hasn’t been above 25% since his rookie year.
Gordon swings at 27% of first pitches, above the league average of 26% (Francoeur leads the team with a 31% there, followed by Betemit and Gordon).
The problem here isn’t looking at first pitches.
Although there are some situations where you have to wonder when they look at fastballs down the middle, I don’t think that just going to swinging at more first pitches is going to work. Butler’s problem isn’t being too selective, it’s hitting too many groundballs to the shortstop
Follow me on Twitter: http://www.twitter.com/bhindepmo
Chairman, The Melky Cabrera Seasoning Sauce. It's great on your outfield!
Bro-ham did you calculate the # of grenades the Dominator "fell" on for Joba the Hutt in college
by Official Arrowhead Pride Parade on May 11, 2011 2:08 PM EDT reply actions
almost forgot
this analysis was total gym guy, no bro I don’t care about how many plates you threw up, okay, maybe, maybe I care about living healthy and living longer, that’s why I p90x, today’s plyo’s bro, time to get sick. Pshh! Gym guy, Bro, BRO, I’m tellin you, plyo’s are nasty but they’re good, so so good. I can taste them now, and YOU KNOW WHAT, I like it. That’s how sick it is, and you can be sick like me too. Trust me bro.
/romeified
by Official Arrowhead Pride Parade on May 11, 2011 2:11 PM EDT up reply actions
is Gordon's average
Dropping b/c of strikeouts and weak grounders or is he still smacking the ball, just not to the gap?
"The greater the struggle, the more glorious the triumph"
Eric Berry counted to infinity -- twice.
Twitter: @Mr_Hoosier
Gordon Never Was
A true .249 hitter. As I have pointed out, aside from his disastrous April and May in 2007, he was a .266 BA with an approximate seasonal average of 16 HRs, 35 2B and 60+ walks through the 2008 season. All projections were for improvement in 2009, and we all know what happened.
I used to be an A's fan until they left town and got good.
by philofthenorth on May 11, 2011 4:38 PM EDT reply actions 1 recs
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