MLB Spring Training 2011: 10 Players Whose Hot Spring Starts You Shouldn't Trust
While contemplating a list of players whose spring training statistics are meaningless, I must admit, I considered concluding "all of them" and just calling it a day. But that isn't completely fair. Some hot spring starts are important.
Take Ian Kinsler. He's hitting .500 with four home runs through his first six spring games. Does that mean Barry Bonds' single-season home run record is about to fall? Of course not.
What it does mean is that Kinsler appears to be healthy enough to drive the ball. At this time last year, Kinsler had a high-ankle sprain that sapped his power and ended up bothering him throughout the season.
I am already on the record as both a Kinsler fan and an optimist when it comes to injuries. Kinsler proved in 2009 that he has the ability to hit 30 HRs if healthy for a full season. His hot start this spring is important because it suggests that Kinsler, at least for now, is healthy enough to have a nice year.
You could also argue that hot spring starts could boost the confidence of players who have been good in the past but are coming off of inexplicably-poor seasons. Nate McLouth and Yunel Escobar are a couple examples that come to mind.
Other players' spring performances are important because they are fighting for playing time.
For instance, Kila Ka'aihue is hitting .375 with two HRs so far, making it an easy decision for the Royals to keep top prospect Eric Hosmer—who's also swinging a hot bat—in the minors to slow down his arbitration clock. Braves starter Mike Minor has a 1.80 ERA through his first two spring appearances as he fights for the team's final rotation spot and Atlanta reliever Jonny Venters has given up just one hit through four scoreless frames this spring, helping his case for first dibs at the Braves' closer job over Craig Kimbrel, who has an ERA north of 15.00 so far.
But while spring stats may sway managers' roster decisions, outside of showing that a player is healthy and confident, they are not a great predictor of future performance. This is especially true for veterans with long track records and established levels of ability.
Which brings us to 10 players whose hot spring starts are no more consequential than where their teams place in the spring training standings.
10. Carlos Zambrano, SP, Chicago Cubs
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For all the talk of how all over the place Zambrano is mentally, his performance on the field has been remarkably consistent.
Zambrano has finished with an ERA between 3.26 and 3.95 in each of his last six seasons in Chicago.
It's a bit early for this type of exercise in the first place (the sample sizes are tiny), but some Cubs fans may be excited about the fact that Zambrano has hurled five scoreless innings to start the spring while allowing just two hits.
But don't let his nice early-spring stats convince you that Zambrano's about to post his first sub-3.00 ERA since 2004. He's a very solid pitcher, but he's not about to put up a Cy Young-caliber season.
9. Jake Fox, C, Baltimore Orioles
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Fox is hitting a cool .438 with three long balls through his first 16 spring at-bats. While that performance may cause O's skipper Buck Showalter to consider carrying three catchers on the roster, it doesn't mean Fox is going to be an offensive asset all year long.
We have a good idea of what Fox is capable of at this point. Yes, he has some decent pop, and he could conceivably hit 20 HRs if he ever managed to get 500 at-bats in a season.
But he has trouble reaching base with any regularity and he is a defensive liability wherever he plays, which is why he has an uphill battle to even earn a reserve spot in Baltimore.
8. Marlon Byrd, CF, Chicago Cubs
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I promise the list won't be all Cubs and former Cubs, but Byrd has to be mentioned since he's hitting .600 through his first six spring games.
Maybe hitting at half that clip (.300) is a reasonable goal for Byrd. He's not a bad hitter and you could even say he's somewhat underrated. Byrd does have two .300-plus seasons under his belt, but he's hit between .283 and .298 in each of the last three years.
This probably won't surprise you, but he's not about to compete for a batting title.
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7. Joe Blanton, SP, Philadelphia Phillies
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Halladay. Lee. Hamels. Oswalt. Blanton?
Contrary to popular belief, not every pitcher in the Phillies' rotation is an ace. But Joe Blanton is doing his best this spring to prove he belongs with his rotation mates, allowing just two runs on four hits through his first 6.2 innings.
But while Blanton isn't bad for a fifth starter, don't count on his 2.70 ERA and 0.90 WHIP this spring to translate to the regular season. Blanton has been in the league long enough to clue us in on what to expect from him: an ERA around 4.00 in a good year and an ERA closer to 5.00 in one of his more forgettable campaigns.
And his hot spring start doesn't make the former any more likely than the latter.
6. Jason Kubel, DH/OF, Minnesota Twins
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Between Kubel, Jim Thome, Michael Cuddyer and Delmon Young, the Twins have four solid hitters for three lineup spots. That seems to have motivated Kubel, who has a .538 average and five runs driven in through his first 13 spring at-bats.
Kubel is a decent hitter, but his sizzling spring doesn't make him a great bet to repeat the career-best .300-28-103 line he put up in 2009.
Kubel probably won't struggle like he did last year, but a .270 average and about 20 HRs is a fair expectation for him, regardless of what he does this spring.
5. Nick Blackburn, SP, Minnesota Twins
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Blackburn's 0.00 ERA and 0.40 WHIP through his first five spring innings must have impressed manager Ron Gardenhire, who recently confirmed that Blackburn has won a spot in the Twins' rotation to start the year.
But Blackburn's spring stats don't mean that he'll have a breakout year or even be a better bet than Scott Baker and Kevin Slowey, who are still battling it out for the Twins' final rotation spot. Sure, Blackburn should be able to best last year's horrific 5.42 ERA and 1.45 WHIP.
But he doesn't have great stuff and he's never posted an ERA below 4.00 or a WHIP below 1.36 in the majors, so a nice spring is not nearly enough of a reason to expect a major turnaround.
4. Alfonso Soriano, LF, Chicago Cubs
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Soriano is hitting .400 with a homer and five RBI through his first seven preseason games. As a result, some fans may be expecting one more vintage Soriano season, but it ain't coming.
Soriano's production has taken a nosedive the last two seasons, as he's stopped running and he has become a major liability in the batting-average department while also seeing his power numbers decline. At 35 years old, there is little reason to expect Soriano to return to form at this point in his career.
Don't let a hot week in March fool you.
3. Derek Lowe, SP, Atlanta Braves
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Lowe has tossed five shutout frames to begin the spring while surrendering just two hits. That may have some people thinking that Lowe is about to return to the sub-4.00 ERAs and solid WHIPs he had with the Dodgers from 2005-2008.
But while Lowe has long been a better pitcher at home than on the road, he was especially comfortable at Chavez Ravine. Lowe has a cool 3.20 ERA and 1.13 WHIP over more than 440-career innings at Dodger Stadium versus a 3.92 ERA and 1.41 WHIP over about 240 innings at Turner Field. Add in the fact that Lowe is 37 years old, and a major rebound becomes even harder to fathom.
Lowe is still a solid pitcher, but his strong March is not a sign that he is about to post top-of-the-rotation regular-season numbers.
2. Chris Davis, 1B/3B, Texas Rangers
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Chris Davis is such a tease.
His hot start to the spring has already convinced the Fort Worth Star-Telegram's Jennifer Floyd Engel to write: "For being left for sports dead less than a year ago, Chris Davis looks surprisingly good. Really good, actually. I arrived at Texas Rangers spring training to find him absolutely crushing and acquitting himself well defensively at third base. He had a 3-for-4, home-run, multiple-RBI game Sunday against Milwaukee, which is kind of exactly like his start to spring, which has numbers like .421 for punctuation."
Here's the problem, though. Davis hit .304 with five HRs and 13 RBI in 79 spring at-bats in 2009, and then hit just .238 with 21 HRs and 150 strikeouts in 391 regular-season at-bats.
Then in 2010, he hit .364 with two HRs and 13 RBI in 77 spring training at-bats before hitting just .192 with one HR and 40 strikeouts in 120 regular-season at-bats.
I don't mean to pick on Engel. Maybe this really is the year Davis finally puts it all together. But forgive me for not interpreting Davis' good start to this spring as a sign that he is finally about to develop into a legitimate major-league hitter.
1. Ben Francisco, RF, Philadelphia Philles
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With prized-prospect Dominic Brown out for four-to-six weeks with a broken hand, the Phillies can only hope that Francisco can carry his hot hitting over from March to April.
Even before the injury, Brown was unproven at the major-league level and hand injuries can be especially difficult for hitters to recover from, so Philadelphia may be relying on Francisco for well more than the season's first month.
But while Francisco's .320 average, two HRs and six RBI through 25 spring at-bats may be comforting to Phillies fans, they may lose patience with him quickly once the games actually start counting. Francisco is a career .263 hitter over almost 1,100 major league at-bats during the last four seasons, and he's yet to top 15 HRs or 54 RBI in a season.
He may end up being a serviceable option, but his spring numbers don't make him any less of a long shot to be an above-average contributor in the Phillies lineup.
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