Disappointing MLB Superstars Poised to Rebound in 2015
It is part of the American fairy tale: picking one's self up off the dirt, dusting off and coming back stronger than ever.
Whenever a well-known name can accomplish such a trying feat, it's all the better for warming our hearts. It reminds all of us that rebounds are possible.
Baseball is good for this kind of yarn season after season. Every year, a group of the game's superstars falls flat. Injuries happen, as do extended stretches of ineffectiveness. Then an offseason flies by, spring comes and we are left talking about them having a bounce-back to their previous elite form.
Last year provided no shortage of candidates for this season. These once top-flight players—based on years of quality past performances, and in one case overwhelming expectations—enter spring training attempting to prove last summer was a fluke, and they can still be counted on to be major contributors.
Whether injury or downright bad play made them candidates, projection systems like ZiPS and Steamer see them being better producers in 2015, and while some of them are only slightly better, there is always the possibility they outperform expectations.
Alex Rodriguez, New York Yankees
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It is not completely out of the realm of possibility that Alex Rodriguez surprises most of us by being a productive player, say in the neighborhood of a two-win season.
The Yankees don't have much in the way of another candidate for designated hitter, so the job should be A-Rod's to lose. Assuming he does not do that during spring training, he could realistically find himself with 500 plate appearances. This, of course, also assumes relatively good health.
In 2012, when Rodriguez was already being seen as a declining hitter, he posted a 2.2 WAR in one calculation (Baseball-Reference) and a 1.9 in another (FanGraphs). And in just 181 plate appearances in 2013, he was again relatively productive.
We are now dealing with a player coming off a year away from the game, and that could mean severe decline. ZiPS projections see A-Rod as having 15 homers but only a .312 OBP, and since he is not likely to provide any value as a fielder, that drops his projected WAR to 1.2.
Hardly an impressive return.
Still, we are talking about a player who was once the best in the business. If he can tap into just a little bit of that, Rodriguez can be better than expected, especially when it comes to getting on base.
Bryce Harper, Washington Nationals
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Putting a 22-year-old on a list of players hoping to rebound seems crazy, but Bryce Harper has already been a full-time major league player for three seasons. And last year was by far his worst of the trio.
Injuries nagged Harper all season, and he produced about one win through either WAR formula you prefer. The injuries sapped his power, and he managed just 13 home runs, 10 doubles and a .768 OPS. His defense was also affected considering his fielding and positional adjustments dropped to minus-5.1, a career low.
The thing with having such a young player on this list, though, is that he can not only rebound but do so like he was shot out of a rocket. If healthy, Harper is the kind of player Steamer projects to have a four-win season, while ZiPS sees him at 3.5.
Let us also not forget that Harper has yet to have a completely superstar-like season. Because he is still so young—he has just 1,489 career plate appearances—it is possible that he has a breakout year aside from simply bouncing back from a down one.
Justin Verlander, Detroit Tigers
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We are three seasons removed from Justin Verlander's truly dominant 2011, a year that saw him win the American League Cy Young Award as well as the league's MVP. Since then, his ERA+ has dropped 84 points, and his Baseball-Reference WAR has plummeted by more than seven wins.
Last year, both stats were at career lows—88 and 1.1, respectively—making him a prime candidate for a rebound year.
ZiPS likes Verlander for 14 wins, a 3.78 ERA and a nice 3.8 WAR. The projection also sees him at around 200 innings, but an extra 20 or so is not an absurd belief. Given that Verlander is such a durable arm, his counting stats—WAR, strikeouts, innings—could look quite respectable come early October.
If this is the kind of season Verlander gives the Tigers, it won't be elite, but it is far better than what he provided last season. If he is that kind of reliable No. 3 starter, he significantly boosts the Tigers' chances at winning a fifth consecutive AL Central championship.
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Prince Fielder, Texas Rangers
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For his first eight full major league seasons, Prince Fielder was the face of durability. From 2006 through 2013, Fielder missed a total of 13 games. Seriously. That is the real number.
That is why his 42 games played last year was one of the biggest shocks in all of baseball. It was a herniated disc in his neck that eventually led to season-ending surgery, and it chopped Fielder's WAR to less than zero.
Fully healthy and back in a ballpark that favors hitters, Fielder can again do some significant damage. Figuring in that Fielder, before last season, had eight consecutive seasons of at least 25 home runs and seven of the last eight of at least 102 RBI, another 25-100 season is a reasonable expectation. ZiPS and Steamer see him finishing below those benchmark numbers, but having healthy players hitting in front of him could boost his production.
Still, going from a negative WAR to something like 2.5 is nearly a three-win jump. That would make Fielder a strong candidate for Comeback Player of the Year.
Matt Cain, San Francisco Giants
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Since pitching a career-high 249.1 innings between the regular season and postseason in 2012, Matt Cain has not been the same pitcher he once was. After posting an ERA+ in the 120s or higher for four consecutive seasons, Cain dropped to 86 in 2013 and then 84 last season before season-ending elbow surgery.
Removing bone chips from the elbow could help Cain regain a spot near the top of the Giants rotation, but after consecutive seasons of a 4.00-plus ERA, the team is playing wait-and-see.
The rotation as currently constructed does not scream elite-level, and part of that reason is ZiPS sees Cain as improving but not too much more than average. The projection system has him with a 3.85 ERA and 114 strikeouts in 135 innings, which would be good for a 1.3 WAR, far off from the days when he was putting up well above three wins a season.
Cain's innings will be limited because of the injury, but if he can produce better than expected while he is on the mound, he becomes a pleasant surprise as the Giants try to break their pattern of missing the playoffs a year after winning the World Series.
Chris Davis, Baltimore Orioles.
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The Orioles had enough offense to absorb Chris Davis' awful season, plus his suspension for using Adderall that cost him 25 games, which includes the first game of this season. But this year, they are going to need him to be at least a shadow of the hitter he was in 2013, when he hit 53 home runs and produced a 168 OPS+.
Last year, in 525 plate appearances, Davis hit 26 home runs but had a .196/.300/.404 slash line with a 98 OPS+. Among qualified hitters, Davis' average was the worst in the American League, and his 0.5 WAR (FanGraphs) ranked 64th out of 76 players.
This offseason the Orioles lost Nelson Cruz and Nick Markakis, who combined for 54 home runs last year. If the O's are going to make up that offense, Davis has to be a big part of it. His therapeutic use exemption for Adderall this season could help.
All projections have him bouncing back with ZiPS calling for a .241/.326/.495 line with 34 homers and 2.2 WAR. If he indeed provides that, and Baltimore gets healthy seasons from Matt Wieters and Manny Machado, the Orioles have a solid chance to repeat as American League East champs.
Jay Bruce, Cincinnati Reds
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Much of the bounce-back talk concerning a Reds hitter has been about Joey Votto, but Votto's numbers were only down because he played in just 62 games. He still had good rate stats, like his 127 OPS+. That hardly constitutes a bad season.
As for Jay Bruce, he played in 137 games and produced a career-low 84 OPS+ to go with an ugly .217/.281/.373 line and 18 homers. He hit 30 homers and had a 120 OPS+ in 2013.
There are two reasons to believe Bruce could rebound in 2015, with the first being he has a healthy knee. He had surgery on his left knee to repair a torn meniscus, but he missed only about three weeks, which is a quick turnaround for that kind of surgery.
The second reason to believe Bruce can bounce back is his .269 BABIP was far off his marks of .322, .283, .297 and .334 in the previous four years. If that returns to normal, it could put Bruce back into the range of the 120 OPS+ he is accustomed to.
Bruce is also going into his age-28 season, which is around the time hitters see career spikes. He is certainly young enough to believe he is not a player in decline.
Eric Hosmer, Kansas City Royals
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In order to qualify as rebounding from a down season, a player has to have had a strong one before. In Eric Hosmer's case, outside of an arguably strong 2013 campaign, his last three have been mostly disappointing. However, a wonderful postseason has his future again looking bright.
Hosmer had a .270/.318/.398 line with a 98 OPS+ in 2014, but once the Royals found themselves in the playoffs, his line jumped to .351/.439/.544 with a .983 OPS. That's the kind of eye-opening October that leads to high expectations the following season.
Hosmer is no stranger to those expectations considering he was the third overall pick in 2008, but the projection systems are not too kind to his 2015. ZiPS has Hosmer for a .293/.346/.443 line with 17 home runs and 2.0 WAR, while Steamer is at .278/.337/.437 with 18 homers and 2.3 WAR.
Considering Hosmer was at 0.2 WAR last year, though, those are significant bumps.
David Wright, New York Mets
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A bad left shoulder plagued David Wright for much of last season, and the inflammation ultimately led to him being shut down near the end of the year. But Wright looks healthy at spring training after rehabbing the injury for much of the winter.
Wright still managed 586 plate appearances, but they were mostly bad ones. His walk rate plummeted from 11.2 percent in 2013 to 7.2 last year. His strikeout rate rose from 16.1 percent to 19.3, and he saw a six-win 2013 sink to 1.9 (per FanGraphs).
If Wright is healthy for most of this coming year, he can certainly regain his form. ZiPS projects 558 plate appearances this season with his walk rate rising and strikeout rate falling slightly. It also gives him 3.8 wins, but if he can manage 600 plate appearances, that could easily get above the 4.0 plateau.
Wright is only a season removed from having the sixth-highest WAR among players with at least 400 plate appearances, and because his decline came by way of a seemingly isolated injury, there is little reason to think he can't reach something close to that level again.
Jered Weaver, Los Angeles Angels
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Jered Weaver was one of the game's elite pitchers as recently as 2012, when he finished third in American League Cy Young Award voting. Injuries hampered his next season, though, and overall ineffectiveness dropped him to an average starter (101 ERA+) despite his league-leading 18 wins.
Part of Weaver's problem could be a drop in fastball velocity, from 87.8 mph in 2012 to 86.3 last season. Possibly because of that dip, Weaver has stopped throwing the fastball and slider as much, according to FanGraphs, while drastically picking up the frequency of his curveball and changeup.
"I don't care about velocity. I just want to be stronger for the whole nine innings," Weaver, who got his weight up to 224 pounds during the offseason, told the Los Angeles Times' Mike DiGiovanna. "If velocity comes along, so be it. I think I've shown I can pitch from 83 to 93 mph."
Weaver threw 213.1 innings in 2014, but ZiPS projects just 169 this year with a 3.67 ERA and a 2.3 WAR, up from 1.5 last season. That is not a huge improvement, but if Weaver can stay durable and take the ball 30 to 33 times, those counting stats will look better and could help the Angels to another division title.
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