Seth Smith is among the league leaders

<div style="color: #444444; line-height: 1.5; margin-bottom: 24px; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">Where I live is the northeasternmost city in the United States. That makes this location about as far from San Diego as any other place in the country outside of Hawaii or Alaska. San Diego is also three time zones different from here and usually play their games when I am dreaming of playing golf in my sleep. So forgive me for being surprised that <strong style="color: black; line-height: 1.5;"><a data-mce-href="http://www.baseball-reference.com/players/s/smithse01.shtml?utm_campaign=Linker&utm_source=direct&utm_medium=linker-www.flagrantfan.com" href="http://www.baseball-reference.com/players/s/smithse01.shtml?utm_campaign=Linker&utm_source=direct&utm_medium=linker-www.flagrantfan.com" style="color: #743399; line-height: 1.5;" target="_blank">Seth Smith</a></strong><span style="font-size: small;"> is currently eighth in the Majors in fWAR and rates even higher in rWAR. Seth Smith?</span></span></div><div style="color: #444444; line-height: 1.5; margin-bottom: 24px; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">Let me run some of the surprising numbers Seth Smith has put up thus far. His OPS is 1.054. His wRC+ is 195 or 95% better than the average replacement player. His ISO is .277 and his wOBA is currently at .451. Holy smokes! Seth Smith!?</span></div><div style="color: #444444; line-height: 1.5; margin-bottom: 24px; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">And all that offense has come playing for the Padres in a home park that is akin to hitting in Death Valley. You would think that most of his offensive damage has come on the road. But no, he is killing the ball at home. His OPS at Petco is 1.245. And they talk about Tulowitzki getting signs in Colorado?</span></div><div style="color: #444444; line-height: 1.5; margin-bottom: 24px; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">Smith, who has been platooned most of his career, even has a .921 OPS against left-handed pitching this year. Never a great defensive player, even his defense is improved this season. How is all of this happening?</span></div><div style="color: #444444; line-height: 1.5; margin-bottom: 24px; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">Smith had some pretty good years for the Rockies. But that was for the Rockies, joke, joke, Coors Field and all that. His supposed true colors came out after playing for the Oakland A's for two seasons where he put together two seasons while compiling only 2.4 WAR. In fact, Baseball-Reference.com has his current rWAR higher this year, right now, than those two years combined and the highest of his career. His previous high was 2.4 for the Rockies in 2009.</span></div><div style="color: #444444; line-height: 1.5; margin-bottom: 24px; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">Is this some sort of fluke? Is this a guy who is going to sink to his mean for the rest of the season. Maybe not.</span></div><div style="color: #444444; line-height: 1.5; margin-bottom: 24px; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">The Oakland A's got him for a reason. Those A's and <strong style="color: black; line-height: 1.5;"><a data-mce-href="http://www.baseball-reference.com/players/b/beanebi01.shtml?utm_campaign=Linker&utm_source=direct&utm_medium=linker-www.flagrantfan.com" href="http://www.baseball-reference.com/players/b/beanebi01.shtml?utm_campaign=Linker&utm_source=direct&utm_medium=linker-www.flagrantfan.com" style="color: #743399; line-height: 1.5;" target="_blank">Billy Beane</a></strong> love them some place discipline. Plate discipline does not slump. Unfortunately, Smith did not hit for them and had some difficulty staying healthy. He still managed walk rates of 11.3% and 9.5% in Oakland.</span></div><div style="color: #444444; line-height: 1.5; margin-bottom: 24px; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">This year, he is at a career high at 14.1% with his walk rate. His O-swing percentage (swinging at pitches out of the strike zone) and his overall swing rates are both at career lows thus far. Meanwhile, his swinging strike rate is at a career low (except for his first year cup of coffee) and his 15.4% strikeout rate is the lowest of his career. That is hard to put in the fluke category. That is a guy with a plan who is covering the plate.</span></div><div style="color: #444444; line-height: 1.5; margin-bottom: 24px; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">He is batting .338 currently and that is a bit of a fluke, I think. His BABIP of .377 is way over his career norm and his line drive rate is only 17.8%. So he has been a bit lucky. But there is also the fact that he has not hit an infield popup all season. So he is making good contact. And his current career-high home run to fly ball percentage probably won't last either.</span></div><div style="color: #444444; line-height: 1.5; margin-bottom: 24px; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">Smith pulls most of his ground balls so expect him to see a lot more infield shifts. But his line drives and fly balls are sprayed around in the outfield. I just don't see him finishing above .290 for an average. But I could be wrong.</span></div><div style="color: #444444; line-height: 1.5; margin-bottom: 24px; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">But he is currently third in baseball in on-base percentage and like I said, plate discipline does not slump. So expect his OBP to stay in the upper .300s, which is terrific. And it seems that the Padres have come up with something very good here in Seth Smith.</span></div><div style="color: #444444; line-height: 1.5; margin-bottom: 24px; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">One of the biggest surprises is that Smith is hitting left-handed pitching. The sample size is extremely small. And his career numbers against lefties is awful with a .594 OPS. So I don't think his success against them this year will last and he will likely get platooned some or struggle when he does face lefties.</span></div><div style="color: #444444; line-height: 1.5; margin-bottom: 24px; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">But the thing is that Seth Smith has some skills that were not realized totally in Oakland but are manifesting themselves in San Diego. That makes watching him from here very interesting just as watching his team, the Padres, is interesting. I had no idea he was having this good a season. But I do now and I'll be paying attention!</span></div>

Seth Smith is among the league leaders

Where I live is the northeasternmost city in the United States. That makes this location about as far from San Diego as any other place in t...

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The best and worst bullpens thus far

<div style="color: #444444; line-height: 1.5; margin-bottom: 24px; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">Measuring how a team's bullpen is doing can be tricky business. You really can't go by WAR like in other positions because, for example, the Red Sox' bullpen leads baseball in WAR. But that may be because they are pitching more innings than other teams' bullpens. The Red Sox' bullpen is actually doing extremely well, but is it the best as the WAR seems to indicate? One thing is for certain: If your team is not doing well in the bullpen, you are quite aware of that fact as it gets ugly.</span></div><div style="color: #444444; line-height: 1.5; margin-bottom: 24px; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">So how then should we measure bullpens? We can look at FIP, which is probably better than looking at ERA. We can look at WPA. We can look at which teams have better success with inherited runners scoring. We can look at strikeout to walk ratios. We can look at a lot of different things. Let's look at the top and bottom five in each of these categories and see what we can see.</span></div><div style="color: #444444; line-height: 1.5; margin-bottom: 24px; text-align: justify;"><strong style="color: black; line-height: 1.5;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">FIP</span></strong></div><div style="color: #444444; line-height: 1.5; margin-bottom: 24px; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">The top five teams in FIP are:</span></div><ol style="color: #444444; line-height: 1.5; list-style-image: initial; list-style-position: initial; margin: 0px 0px 24px 1.5em; padding: 0px;"><li style="line-height: 1.5; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">The Braves - 2.32</span></li><li style="line-height: 1.5; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">The Royals - 2.88</span></li><li style="line-height: 1.5; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">The Athletics - 2.93</span></li><li style="line-height: 1.5; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">The Red Sox - 2.96</span></li><li style="line-height: 1.5; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">The Padres - 3.02</span></li></ol><div style="color: #444444; line-height: 1.5; margin-bottom: 24px; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">The worst five teams in FIP</span></div><ol style="color: #444444; line-height: 1.5; list-style-image: initial; list-style-position: initial; margin: 0px 0px 24px 1.5em; padding: 0px;"><li style="line-height: 1.5; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">The Astros - 4.70</span></li><li style="line-height: 1.5; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">The Reds - 4.65</span></li><li style="line-height: 1.5; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">The Rays - 4.61</span></li><li style="line-height: 1.5; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">The Phillies - 4.60</span></li><li style="line-height: 1.5; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">The White Sox - 4.38</span></li></ol><div style="color: #444444; line-height: 1.5; margin-bottom: 24px; text-align: justify;"><strong style="color: black; line-height: 1.5;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">WPA</span></strong></div><ol style="color: #444444; line-height: 1.5; list-style-image: initial; list-style-position: initial; margin: 0px 0px 24px 1.5em; padding: 0px;"><li style="line-height: 1.5; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">The Padres - 3.87</span></li><li style="line-height: 1.5; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">The Giants - 3.52</span></li><li style="line-height: 1.5; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">The Brewers - 3.35</span></li><li style="line-height: 1.5; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">The Red Sox - 2.38</span></li><li style="line-height: 1.5; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">The Braves - 1.61</span></li></ol><div style="color: #444444; line-height: 1.5; margin-bottom: 24px; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">The bottom five:</span></div><ol style="color: #444444; line-height: 1.5; list-style-image: initial; list-style-position: initial; margin: 0px 0px 24px 1.5em; padding: 0px;"><li style="line-height: 1.5; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">The Astros: -2.51</span></li><li style="line-height: 1.5; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">The Cubs: -2.22</span></li><li style="line-height: 1.5; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">The Marlins: -1.62</span></li><li style="line-height: 1.5; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">The Reds: -1.61</span></li><li style="line-height: 1.5; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">The Blue Jays: -1.52</span></li></ol><div style="color: #444444; line-height: 1.5; margin-bottom: 24px; text-align: justify;"><strong style="color: black; line-height: 1.5;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">Inherited Runners:</span></strong></div><ol style="color: #444444; line-height: 1.5; list-style-image: initial; list-style-position: initial; margin: 0px 0px 24px 1.5em; padding: 0px;"><li style="line-height: 1.5; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">The Pirates - 84%</span></li><li style="line-height: 1.5; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">The Giants - 83.8%</span></li><li style="line-height: 1.5; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">The Padres - 80.7%</span></li><li style="line-height: 1.5; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">The Brewers - 79.6%</span></li><li style="line-height: 1.5; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">The Nationals - 78.6%</span></li></ol><div style="color: #444444; line-height: 1.5; margin-bottom: 24px; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">The worst five:</span></div><ol style="color: #444444; line-height: 1.5; list-style-image: initial; list-style-position: initial; margin: 0px 0px 24px 1.5em; padding: 0px;"><li style="line-height: 1.5; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">The Cardinals - 66.3%</span></li><li style="line-height: 1.5; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">The Tigers - 66.8%</span></li><li style="line-height: 1.5; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">The Astros - 67.5%</span></li><li style="line-height: 1.5; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">The Royals - 68.7%</span></li><li style="line-height: 1.5; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">The Rangers and Yankees: 68.8%</span></li></ol><div style="color: #444444; line-height: 1.5; margin-bottom: 24px; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: inherit;"><strong style="color: black; line-height: 1.5;">K/BB Ratio</strong>:</span></div><ol style="color: #444444; line-height: 1.5; list-style-image: initial; list-style-position: initial; margin: 0px 0px 24px 1.5em; padding: 0px;"><li style="line-height: 1.5; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">The Brewers: 3.53</span></li><li style="line-height: 1.5; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">The Braves: 3.47</span></li><li style="line-height: 1.5; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">The Cardinals: 3.20</span></li><li style="line-height: 1.5; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">The Giants: 3.19</span></li><li style="line-height: 1.5; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">Tigers: 3.14</span></li></ol><div style="color: #444444; line-height: 1.5; margin-bottom: 24px; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">The worst</span></div><ol style="color: #444444; line-height: 1.5; list-style-image: initial; list-style-position: initial; margin: 0px 0px 24px 1.5em; padding: 0px;"><li style="line-height: 1.5; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">The White Sox: 1.21</span></li><li style="line-height: 1.5; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">The Reds: 1.68</span></li><li style="line-height: 1.5; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">The Rays: 1.81</span></li><li style="line-height: 1.5; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">The Mets: 1.90</span></li><li style="line-height: 1.5; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">The Dodgers: 1.96</span></li></ol><div style="color: #444444; line-height: 1.5; margin-bottom: 24px; text-align: justify;"><strong style="color: black; line-height: 1.5;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">WAR</span></strong></div><ol style="color: #444444; line-height: 1.5; list-style-image: initial; list-style-position: initial; margin: 0px 0px 24px 1.5em; padding: 0px;"><li style="line-height: 1.5; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">The Red Sox: 2.4</span></li><li style="line-height: 1.5; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">The Braves and Royals: 2.1</span></li><li style="line-height: 1.5; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">The Athletics 2.0</span></li><li style="line-height: 1.5; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">Two tied with 1.99</span></li></ol><div style="color: #444444; line-height: 1.5; margin-bottom: 24px; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">The worst:</span></div><ol style="color: #444444; line-height: 1.5; list-style-image: initial; list-style-position: initial; margin: 0px 0px 24px 1.5em; padding: 0px;"><li style="line-height: 1.5; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">The Mets: -1.3</span></li><li style="line-height: 1.5; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">The Rays: -1.0</span></li><li style="line-height: 1.5; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">The Astros and Reds: -0.7</span></li><li style="line-height: 1.5; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">The Phillies and Angels: -0.4</span></li></ol><div style="color: #444444; line-height: 1.5; margin-bottom: 24px; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">So have we seen any sort of patterns here? It is hard to pick on the Reds because they went most of the season thus far without <strong style="color: black; line-height: 1.5;"><a data-mce-href="http://www.baseball-reference.com/players/c/chapmar01.shtml?utm_campaign=Linker&utm_source=direct&utm_medium=linker-www.flagrantfan.com" href="http://www.baseball-reference.com/players/c/chapmar01.shtml?utm_campaign=Linker&utm_source=direct&utm_medium=linker-www.flagrantfan.com" style="color: #743399; line-height: 1.5;" target="_blank">Aroldis Chapman</a></strong>. But the worst bullpens appear to be (from appearances at the bottom of the most categories) the Mets, the Astros, the Rays and the Reds. The Yankees have made a run for the worst lately.</span></div><div style="color: #444444; line-height: 1.5; margin-bottom: 24px; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">As for the best bullpens, thus far, the Braves, Red Sox, Padres and the Brewers appear to have the best bullpens in baseball followed closely by the A's and the Royals.</span></div>

The best and worst bullpens thus far

Measuring how a team's bullpen is doing can be tricky business. You really can't go by WAR like in other positions because, for exam...

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Is Will Venable vulnerable to regression?

<div style="color: #444444; font-family: Georgia, 'Bitstream Charter', serif; font-size: 16px; line-height: 1.5; margin-bottom: 24px; text-align: justify;">Being an East Coast writer sometimes makes it difficult to appreciate or notice players from the other coast. After all, most of their games are starting just when I am thinking about going to bed. I would like to think that I keep track of what's going on pretty well still. But I question that when looking at <strong style="color: black; line-height: 1.5;"><a data-mce-href="http://www.baseball-reference.com/players/v/venabwi01.shtml?utm_campaign=Linker&utm_source=direct&utm_medium=linker-www.flagrantfan.com" href="http://www.baseball-reference.com/players/v/venabwi01.shtml?utm_campaign=Linker&utm_source=direct&utm_medium=linker-www.flagrantfan.com" style="color: #743399; line-height: 1.5;" target="_blank">Will Venable</a></strong>'s 2013 season and being surprised at the numbers I saw there. Once discovered, the obvious question is whether he can repeat those numbers.</div><div style="color: #444444; font-family: Georgia, 'Bitstream Charter', serif; font-size: 16px; line-height: 1.5; margin-bottom: 24px; text-align: justify;">First off, let me say that I have always rooted for Will Venable. I have a soft spot for the offspring of players that I have watched in the past. I saw <strong style="color: black; line-height: 1.5;"><a data-mce-href="http://www.baseball-reference.com/players/v/venabma01.shtml?utm_campaign=Linker&utm_source=direct&utm_medium=linker-www.flagrantfan.com" href="http://www.baseball-reference.com/players/v/venabma01.shtml?utm_campaign=Linker&utm_source=direct&utm_medium=linker-www.flagrantfan.com" style="color: #743399; line-height: 1.5;" target="_blank">Max Venable</a></strong>, Will's dad, play and that automatically makes me interested in Will. More on Max in a second.</div><div style="color: #444444; font-family: Georgia, 'Bitstream Charter', serif; font-size: 16px; line-height: 1.5; margin-bottom: 24px; text-align: justify;">J. Baumann of Fangraphs.com <a data-mce-href="http://www.fangraphs.com/fantasy/the-power-of-will-venable/" href="http://www.fangraphs.com/fantasy/the-power-of-will-venable/" style="color: #743399; line-height: 1.5;" target="_blank">has already written</a> a fairly comprehensive piece on Venable and strongly believes in regression for 2014. I wish I had not read it because I like to make up my own mind. But many of you might be like me and will be surprised by Venable's 2013 season, so let's look at some of the numbers.</div><div style="color: #444444; font-family: Georgia, 'Bitstream Charter', serif; font-size: 16px; line-height: 1.5; margin-bottom: 24px; text-align: justify;"><span data-mce-style="font-size: 16px;" style="font-size: 16px; line-height: 1.5;">So what were the surprises I found with Will Venable's season? The first thing I noticed were the stolen bases. I had no idea he was so good at doing that. Venable has stolen more than twenty bases in a season for four straight years. Not only that, he is very good at it.</span></div><div style="color: #444444; font-family: Georgia, 'Bitstream Charter', serif; font-size: 16px; line-height: 1.5; margin-bottom: 24px; text-align: justify;">Venable's success rate of stealing bases for his career is 81.8%. That is fantastic. What I love is that his father was good at stealing bases too. Despite Max being more of a utility player, he stole at a 78% success rate. Combine them both and they, as a family, have been successful for 80.5% of the time stealing bases. I wondered if that was some kind of record (minimum 200 attempts).</div><div style="color: #444444; font-family: Georgia, 'Bitstream Charter', serif; font-size: 16px; line-height: 1.5; margin-bottom: 24px; text-align: justify;">My first look was at the two <strong style="color: black; line-height: 1.5;"><a data-mce-href="http://www.baseball-reference.com/player_search.cgi?results=raineti01,raineti02&utm_campaign=Linker&utm_source=direct&utm_medium=linker-www.flagrantfan.com" href="http://www.baseball-reference.com/player_search.cgi?results=raineti01,raineti02&utm_campaign=Linker&utm_source=direct&utm_medium=linker-www.flagrantfan.com" style="color: #743399; line-height: 1.5;" target="_blank">Tim Raines</a></strong>. And stopped dead there as that family's combined percentage was like 84.5% or something. But still, the Venables have done alright stealing bases.</div><div style="color: #444444; font-family: Georgia, 'Bitstream Charter', serif; font-size: 16px; line-height: 1.5; margin-bottom: 24px; text-align: justify;">The other thing to look at with Will Venable was his sudden power surge in 2013. In Venable's first five years, he hit 45 homers in 1,582 plate appearances or 2.8%. He hit 22 in just 481 plate appearances in 2013 or  4.6%. That's quite a jump.</div><div style="color: #444444; font-family: Georgia, 'Bitstream Charter', serif; font-size: 16px; line-height: 1.5; margin-bottom: 24px; text-align: justify;">The jump is also reflected in his home run to fly ball rate. For his first five years combined, his rate was 10.7%. That figure jumped to 19.8%. Baumann explains part of that (at least) by the change in the dimensions of Petco Field where the right field fences were brought in before the 2013 season. All but one of Venable's homers were pulled to right field.</div><div style="color: #444444; font-family: Georgia, 'Bitstream Charter', serif; font-size: 16px; line-height: 1.5; margin-bottom: 24px; text-align: justify;">Baumann also focuses on Venable's success against left-handed pitchers in 2013, something he was abysmal at for most of his career as a left-handed batter. In that piece, Baumann buys somewhat Venable's account of his new stance and the work he had done with hitting coach, <strong style="color: black; line-height: 1.5;"><a data-mce-href="http://www.baseball-reference.com/players/p/plantph01.shtml?utm_campaign=Linker&utm_source=direct&utm_medium=linker-www.flagrantfan.com" href="http://www.baseball-reference.com/players/p/plantph01.shtml?utm_campaign=Linker&utm_source=direct&utm_medium=linker-www.flagrantfan.com" style="color: #743399; line-height: 1.5;" target="_blank">Phil Plantier</a></strong>. But you have to wonder if that new found success was the fluke or what the five years before of futility against left-handers more indicative of what to expect moving forward.</div><div style="color: #444444; font-family: Georgia, 'Bitstream Charter', serif; font-size: 16px; line-height: 1.5; margin-bottom: 24px; text-align: justify;">The thing about Venable is the contradictions. For the past three seasons, Venable has had a high line drive rate, so you would think his batting average would be higher than his high of in the .260s range. He also has a moderately high BABIP rate for the last three years as you would expect from those line drives. But why isn't the average higher?</div><div style="color: #444444; font-family: Georgia, 'Bitstream Charter', serif; font-size: 16px; line-height: 1.5; margin-bottom: 24px; text-align: justify;">You would think that, since he pulls the ball so often, his ground ball BABIP would be low, but it is fairly healthy at .242.</div><div style="color: #444444; font-family: Georgia, 'Bitstream Charter', serif; font-size: 16px; line-height: 1.5; margin-bottom: 24px; text-align: justify;">The low average, then, must be in part because he swings at a lot of balls out of the strike zone (37% in 2013) and his high strikeout rate (22.9%). If he was more selective, he would have a better chance at more quality contact.</div><div style="color: #444444; font-family: Georgia, 'Bitstream Charter', serif; font-size: 16px; line-height: 1.5; margin-bottom: 24px; text-align: justify;">I can see why Will Venable would be excited about what occurred last year. From appearances, something clicked for him in July and after a putrid first half, he had an wOBA of .388 in the second half good for an OPS in that half of over .900.</div><div style="color: #444444; font-family: Georgia, 'Bitstream Charter', serif; font-size: 16px; line-height: 1.5; margin-bottom: 24px; text-align: justify;">But a lot of the fluctuation seemed to be tied to his BABIP, which was extremely high (even for him) at .375 for the half. And he regressed in September after BABIPs through the roof in July and August. Much of the rest of his numbers were similar. He hit eleven homers in the first half and eleven again in the second. He struck out just as much in the first as in the second.</div><div style="color: #444444; font-family: Georgia, 'Bitstream Charter', serif; font-size: 16px; line-height: 1.5; margin-bottom: 24px; text-align: justify;">Venable is a nice player overall. He is a good base runner and plays center field very well. He will give you a wins above replacement somewhere between two and three wins. But his lack of plate discipline will not change much and even seems to be heading in the wrong direction. I root for him for the reasons stated above. But I don't see 2014 being as good for him as 2013. But that's why they play the games.</div><div style="color: #444444; font-family: Georgia, 'Bitstream Charter', serif; font-size: 16px; line-height: 1.5; margin-bottom: 24px; text-align: justify;"><br /></div>

Is Will Venable vulnerable to regression?

Being an East Coast writer sometimes makes it difficult to appreciate or notice players from the other coast. After all, most of their games...

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