Shortstops
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AB AVG OBP SLG OPS SB CS
Edgar Renteria 52 .250 .264 .462 .726 0 0
David Eckstein 37 .270 .438 .324 .762 1 0
Head to head so far Eckstein is clearly the better offensive player. He's managed 8 walks to Renterias 1, which is why is OBP is so much higher than Renterias despite batting averages that are fairly similiar. Renteria is hitting for much more power than Eckstein, with 5 extra base hits (3 doubles, a triple, and a home run) to Ecks 2 (both doubles).
There are two interesting things to note about Renterias season so far:
AB AVG OBP SLG OPS SB CS
Edgar Renteria 2004 586 .287 .327 .401 .728 17 11
Edgar Renteria 2005 52 .250 .264 .462 .726 0 0
If Renterias average went up by .037 points he'd have a carbon copy of his 2004 season, which wasn't that great (what would it take to get Edgar that bump? Change two outs to hits and he'd be sitting at an almost exact replica of last year).
The other interesting thing is that Renterias power is up a lot from last year. If the two hits drop in he's still hitting for much more power this year than last. In fact if he keeps this up he'll have the highest slugging percentage he's had since 2003 when he hit .330/.394/.480/.874 his best year to date.
Renterias Isolated Slugging for the last 5 years:
Isolated Slugging
2000 .145
2001 .111
2002 .134
2003 .150
2004 .114
2005 .212
Meanwhile David Eckstein's outlier is obvious as well:
AB AVG OBP SLG OPS SB CS
David Eckstein 2004 566 .276 .339 .332 .671 16 5
David Eckstein 2005 37 .270 .438 .324 .762 1 0
The average and slugging both track perfectly from last year, but the OBP is way off. Looking at Ecksteins career walk rate tells the story:
Walk Rate
2001 .070
2002 .070
2003 .073
2004 .063
2005 .168
One player is walking twice as much as he ever has in the majors while the other is hitting for almost twice as much power as he did last year and roughly 40% more power than his peak year and almost double last year. It's still really early, and a slump or hot streak by either player could change this but at this point I'd rather be paying $2.3 million that the Cards are paying Eckstein than $8 million that the Red Sox are paying Renteria. If Renteria drops back to not so good Edgar the Sox are on the hook for a lot of cash, but if Eckstein drops back to not so good David the noose isn't as tight around the Cardinals neck.
Money aside the Cardinals have the better shortstop so far this year, and since it's not my money thats all I care about.
Posted by Josh at April 19, 2005 02:26 PM
I love this site, I've added it to my Kinja. I'm happy to see Eckstein with Stl, he has always been an intense competitor and puts a level of fire into the game that I think will go a long way. Praying that Walker starts hitting though...
Posted by: Joseph Santos-Lyons at April 19, 2005 03:02 PMI wouldn't be surprised to see the general trend---Eckstein higher OBP, Renteria higher SLG---continuing throughout the year, although, of course, the final numbers will be different.
Perhaps Eckstein can ratchet up his walk rate as he is leaving a franchise known for a philosophy that espouses "hitting" (as opposed to "walking") and joining another that has five 25+ homer guys hitting directly behind him....
Posted by: salvo at April 19, 2005 03:16 PMAnd I thought they were paying Edgar $10 million.... (if $10 million is just the average for the 4-yaer deal, and they're only paying him $8mil this year, does that mean a 34-yr-old Renteria will be making $12mil?)
Posted by: salvo at April 19, 2005 03:19 PMThat's an interesting point salvo: The Angels were at the bottom of the AL last year in walks and over the last 4 years and over Ecksteins career they are 11th out of 14 teams. They definitly have an organizational approach geared towards contact.
It could very well be that Eckstein has a decent batting eye he just hasn't been using it on purpose.
Posted by: josh at April 19, 2005 04:20 PMNice comparison and comments about why. Can't help but also say it's interesting that both Womack and Eck seemed to enjoy a nice bump in OBP by batting leadoff specifically for the Cards. Wonder why? Could Barry Weinberg be a master hypnotist?
Another idea would be to also compare other possible replacements. If we hadn't gotten Eck, who would be our SS now and how are they doing?
Amen on the Walker comment. We all sort of expected him to get hurt but also hit radically well when healthy. We'll see. As soon as I proclaimed Rolen was fighting himself, he jacked a HR in each of his next 2 games. Maybe Walker will wake up too.
Geesh, our lineup hasn't even really caught fire yet.
Posted by: Ryan at April 19, 2005 05:33 PM