After all the Slack conversation about Omaha’s Emilio Morales, I’m finding the Puckett voting between Morales and Dong-po Thum to be quite interesting.
As it stands, Morales appears to be ready to edge Thum out for the award, and at first blush I guess that kind of makes sense. I mean, Morales hit 63 homers. Sixty-F’en-Three. That’s a lot of homers. He’s a five-time winner of the Puckett, too. At 30, he's at the height of his productiveness, and the fact is that his presence in the lineup is a major factor in what makes Omaha the post-season team it is.
So there’s reason to have him in the spotlight.
Make no bones about it, Emilio Morales is a very good hitter, and a worthy award recipient.
And, yet, there’s Dong-po Thum right close behind. I mean, right behind.
The kid is only 23, I know. And he's not got that thing the chicks love--at least nowhere near to the level that Morales has it. He's a lead-off guy, after all, and those guys don't win Pucketts, do they? That's the power of the long ball, we guess. Which is excatly the thought that got me writing this little thing. Is that it? Is this really the power of the home run at work, or is there anything else?
So, let’s take a look at some numbers. First, here are some …
Standard Counting Numbers
Name | G | PA | AB | H | 2B | 3B | HR | RBI | R | BB | IBB | HP | SO | GDP |
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
Thum | 157 | 730 | 635 | 216 | 48 | 20 | 13 | 94 | 123 | 63 | 9 | 22 | 60 | 12 |
Morales | 159 | 661 | 628 | 183 | 23 | 1 | 66 | 156 | 110 | 22 | 0 | 5 | 54 | 23 |
On top of that, Thu walked 50 more times than Morales (including 9 intentionals to none). Thum also got hit 22 times to Morales’s 5. They struck out about the same, but Thum hit into 11 fewer double plays than Morales.
The bottom line here is that in literally every other stat than home runs, Thum was considerably better than Morales.
So, now let’s look at …
Some Rate Stats
Name | AVG | OBP | SLG | OPS | OPS+ | BABIP | ISO | wOBA |
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
Thum | 0.34 | 0.413 | 0.54 | 0.953 | 141 | 0.356 | 0.2 | 0.387 |
Morales | 0.291 | 0.318 | 0.646 | 0.964 | 138 | 0.228 | 0.355 | 0.384 |
Thum was second in the league for the hitting crown behind Seattle’s marvelous Todd Rice, and second in OBP behind Horrible Simpson. Morales, on the power of those homers, eclipses Thum in slugging, Add it up and you see Morales takes a small lead in OPS (.964 vs. 953). But, wait! There’s the ballpark to take into consideration—whish is why we like OPS+, right? Make these adjustments, and you see Thum leap-frogs Morales to register a +141 vs a +138 score.
So, yeah, even with that power advantage for Morales, OPS+ points to Thum.
And then there’s that BABIP number. Holy smokes…Thum was .356 on balls in play, Morales .228. In other words, if the ball doesn’t leave the park, Morales is in trouble. Of course, for Morales, the ball does go out of the park. So it’s still a fair comparison.
All total it adds to a nice wOBA of .384 for Morales, but again, Thum takes the crown at .387.
So, like every counting stat except homers and the ilk, these slash line and summary stats say Thum.
But, I hear you…what about some of them ‘thar …
Advanced Trickerooo Stats
Name | WPA | RC/27 | wRC | wRC+ | wRAA | WAR | PI/PA |
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
Thum | 7.64 | 8.2 | 135 | 142 | 41.1 | 7 | 3.42 |
Morales | 5.41 | 6.7 | 120 | 140 | 35.1 | 5.7 | 3.18 |
How about Win Percentage Added? You know, the thing that counts how much situational value a guy actually created? Well, It’s Thum 7.64 to 5.41.
That Bill James guy’s Runs Created/27? Thum 8.2 to Morales’s 6.7…which weights out to a 135-120 advantage overall, and then after doing the notorious adjustment to compare them across the league, you get Thum +142 to Morales +140. Weighted Runs Above Average? Thum 41.1 to Morales 35.1.
And, WAR? 7 for Thum to 5.7 for Morales.
Yeah, I know. What is it good for?
And then there’s this interesting add-on. Thum’s discipline drew 3.42 pitches per plate appearance, to Morale’s 3.18. So one can argue Thum wore pitchers down just that little bit more.
So, let your geek flag fly and you come up with Thum over Morales.
And, finally, how about running? I mean, that’s offense, too, right?
Base Running
Name | SB | CS | BatR |
---|---|---|---|
Thum | 58 | 28 | 39.9 |
Morales | 0 | 1 | 35 |
Really, at the end of the day Thum got thrown out enough to where this works out to be a wash. Still, Thum’s daring do on the basepaths makes him immanently more watchable.
Add it all up, though, and the overall Batting Runs says, advantage Thum 39.9 to 35.
So …
So, yeah. Morales is a fine hitter. And 63 homers is a big number. How big, you ask? Well, I’d say it’s apparently so big that the light from it is getting in the way of certain other elements that might actually matter more. [grin]
At least that's the opinion of the 9-News staff.
YMMV.