The Golden Sombrero presents MLB Look-alikes: Justin Upton and Cedric Sanders

What’s there to say about Adam Dunn’s 2011 season that hasn’t already been said?  With an fWAR of -2.9 over 496 plate appearances, Dunn had one of the worst seasons in baseball history and recorded career lows in nearly every offensive category.  He finished the season with a triple slash line of .159/.292/.277, wRC+ of 59, .118 ISO, 27 extra-base hits, and a measly 42 RBI.

Along the way, the big man amassed three golden sombreros, putting him in a seven-way tie for first place in Major League Baseball.  He picked up his first on May 21 against the Dodgers and then followed it up with his second on May 26 against the Blue Jays.  The final sombrero came exactly a month later at the hands of the Washington Nationals.

Absolutely nothing went Dunn’s way in 2011; he hit like crap and was an utter disappointment in his first season with the White Sox.  There wasn’t a single moment where it seemed as though Dunn might turn the corner.  He never hit that dramatic walk-off bomb in front of a sold out home crowd or had a multi-home run game to rally the troops in his favor.

So what can be attributed to Dunn’s abysmal season? Well, his 35.7% strikeout rate is a good but obvious starting point.  In 415 at-bats this season, Dunn set a franchise record by fanning 177 times.  And although his penchant for striking out is as much of a defining trait as his longball potential, nothing pointed towards a complete offensive collapse.

In 2010, Dunn absolutely torched fastballs, as evidenced by a 32.1 wFB.  This past season, however, he posted a wFB of -8.5 (!), which is easily the worst of his storied career.  His inability to square up fastballs in turn damaged his approach at the plate, causing him to struggle mightily against offspeed pitches: -7.2 wSL (0.7 in 2010), -3.6 wCT (-2.5 in 2010), and -5.8 wCH (-3.9 in 2010) – all career lows.

Dunn also recorded a 57.8% O-Contact% (contact percentage on pitches thrown outside the strikezone), which, when supplemented by his 9.6% HR/FB rate, explains why he was seldom feared by opposing pitchers; they could comfortably attack him within the strikezone without the fear of 450-foot repercussions.

Here is Dunn’s ‘Swing Pitch Type’ chart from this past season:

While his selectiveness was decent—he did manage to coax 75 walks (15.1%)—Dunn simply was unable to consistently drive pitches within the strikezone, something that he’d never really struggled with.  Therefore, it comes as no surprise that Dunn failed to provoke an intentional walk all season for the first time in his 11-year career.

Yet, what Dunn’s season indicates, more than anything else, is a total lack of comfort and confidence at the dish – a realm of the game that cannot be quantified. Sure we can delve through endless statistics in search of some type of rationalization, but there is no true, metric-based explanation for why a player who averaged nearly 40 home runs and 100 RBI per season would suddenly hit his way out of a starting line up.

As any hitter will tell you, there’s nothing more detrimental to one’s performance than a waning level of confidence at the plate.  Once that confidence begins to waver, a hitter suddenly becomes susceptible to a slew of problems – some old, some new.  After scuffling through the first month of the season, Dunn never quite turned the corner as everyone expected he would, including himself.  Instead, his season spiraled out of control, as he absorbed the majority of the blame for the White Sox struggles, which in turn compounded his own personal issues.

On Tuesday afternoon, Major League Baseball and the Arizona Fall League announced this year’s participants for the 2011 Rising Stars Game.  The game, which will played on Saturday, November 5 at Surprise Stadium, will house many of baseball’s top prospects, players who will be appearing on the Sombrero’s Post-2011 Top 50 Prospects list.

Several of the top pitchers from the 2011 draft class will make their professionally televised debut, including Gerrit Cole (No. 1 overall, Pittsburgh Pirates), Danny Hultzen (No. 2 overall, Seattle Mariners), and Jed Bradley (No. 15 overall, Milwaukee Brewers).

Of course, the Rising Stars game would not be complete without the likes of Bryce Harper and Mike Trout, who will man the outfield for the East along with Robbie Grossman, Xavier Avery, and Tim Wheeler.

Who am I most excited to watch? Well, here’s a brief list with absolutely zero explanation as to why: East: Terry Doyle (CWS), Trey McNutt (CHC), Nolan Arenado (COL), Junior Lake (CHC), Joe Panik (SF); West: J.J. Hoover (ATL), Christian Colon (KC), Nick Franklin (SEA), Anthony Gose (TOR), and Wil Myers (KC).

The game will be played at 7 pm eastern and will be broadcast live on both MLB.com and the MLB Network.

RISING STARS ROSTERS

If you want to read one of the best and most entertaining posts you’ll read all year, head over to Diamond Hoggers for The Ups and Downs of an Epic, Last Minute Trip to Game Seven of the World Series. (Yes, it’s absolutely deserving of the bold font.) Franco, who runs Next Level Ballplayer and made a guest post here on the Sombrero just before the start of the 2011 season, tells the fantastic story of he and two other friends’ adventure from Nashville to St. Louis with the hope of catching Game Seven in the flesh.  Even though it’s long, reading it in its entirety is worth every damn minute.

The hitters in the Arizona Fall League haven’t been kind to Matt Purke.  After allowing an earned run over two innings in his AFL debut on October 15^th, the left-hander has surrendered 10 earned runs over his last inning and a third.

Making his first start against Surprise on October 21^st, Purke couldn’t escape a disastrous first inning. He allowed seven runs on five hits and walk, and managed to record only one out.  He followed it up with another brutal appearance nearly a week later in a relief appearance against Mesa.  Although Purke successfully made it through the inning, he still gave up three earned on four hits.

Just as it was towards the end of last season following several months of arm problems, Purke’s stuff has been flat this fall, and the 2010 velocity that once garnered No. 1 overall pick consideration is nowhere to be found.

According to Amanda Comak of The Washington Times:

Purke faced eight batters, he retired one. The one out he did get was a rocket high and deep to right field — but foul — that Phillies’ right fielder Tyson Gillies ran down and leapt for. He threw 22 pitches — 12 balls, 10 strikes — and fell behind to almost every single batter he faced. He walked one, Kansas City’s Wil Myers, on four pitches and hit another, Atlanta’s Todd Cunningham. His velocity reached 92 once but sat mostly in the 89-91 range and he didn’t seem to have great feel for his breaking stuff.

Sure Purke hadn’t faced hitters—let alone quality ones—since last spring before pitching in the AFL, but he has immediately emerged as the pitcher that no team wanted to touch with a 20-foot pole last June.

Here is some video of Purke during his breakout, red-shirt freshman season at TCU in 2010:

And here’s a video of Purke warming up before to his first AFL appearance: