{"id":2743,"date":"2011-01-28T14:21:07","date_gmt":"2011-01-28T20:21:07","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/thegoldensombrero.com\/wordpress\/?p=2743"},"modified":"2011-01-28T14:23:09","modified_gmt":"2011-01-28T20:23:09","slug":"pablo-sandoval-was-2009-or-2010-the-fluke","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/thegoldensombrero.com\/wordpress\/archives\/2743","title":{"rendered":"Pablo Sandoval: was 2009 or 2010 the fluke?"},"content":{"rendered":"

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Yesterday I took a look at Jose Bautista<\/a><\/strong> and whether his 2010 season was a fluke<\/a>. Now, let\u2019s move over to the NL and take a look at a guy that many are hoping regains his 2009 form, and forgets about his pathetic 2010 campaign (especially myself considering that I drafted him last year).\u00a0 He set a career low in batting average.\u00a0 He nearly tied his career high in strikeouts.\u00a0 He hit 50% fewer HR\u2019s than he did in 2009.\u00a0 He is incredibly likable.\u00a0 He has an awesome nickname.\u00a0 He is the Kung-Fu Panda.\u00a0 He is Pablo Sandoval<\/a><\/strong>.\u00a0 So let\u2019s take a look at things and ask, which year was the fluke, 2009 or 2010?<\/p>\n

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Quick editor\u2019s disclaimer here: because Pablo\u2019s career is only two and a quarter seasons old, I will try to take into account what he did in the minor leagues as well, when possible.<\/em><\/p>\n

Normally reliable in batting average, it was very disturbing for Sandoval owners to witness him hit for a paltry .268 last season.\u00a0 Throughout his minor league and big league career, Pablo has been a .305 hitter.\u00a0 Was it bad luck?\u00a0 Not as much as one would think.\u00a0 He has a career BABIP (MiLB & MLB) of .325.\u00a0 Last year it was a .291.\u00a0 This is definitely not a big enough shift to cause a -.70 point shift in batting average.\u00a0 This aspect of Sandoval\u2019s game was definitely a fluke in 2010.<\/p>\n

What about the sever power outage for the Panda?\u00a0 Including his minor league seasons, he has never hit more than 12 homeruns.\u00a0 He turns 25 in August so we can still expect him to gain some man strength over the next few years before he reaches his prime.\u00a0 In \u201909 Kung-Fu Panda had an ISO power of .226, and in \u201910 it dipped all the way to the mark of .140.\u00a0 I see a rebound coming next year considering that his career ISO sits right around .180.\u00a0 With reports that Sandoval is losing weight<\/a> and entering the spring in the best shape of his life, there is reason to believe that another rebound is in store.<\/p>\n

There is one last set of numbers that are encouraging for the resurrection of Pablo Sandoval<\/a><\/strong>.\u00a0 Take a look at his BB% and K%.\u00a0 In 2009 he had a BB rate of 8.2%.\u00a0 In 2010 it dropped to 7.6%.\u00a0 In 2009 his K rate was 14.5% and in 2010 it was a nearly identical 14.4%.\u00a0 What this tells me is that because he is not striking out any more than usual, he stands to return somewhere near his 2009 numbers.\u00a0 The only concerning numbers for me are the increase in his swing% at pitches outside the strike zone and his decrease in swing% of pitches in the strike zone.\u00a0 I wouldn\u2019t worry too much though as the changes are about 5% in each category and can simply be the byproduct of trying to do too much in the midst of a struggling season.<\/p>\n

So, what do we make of Pablo Sandoval<\/a><\/strong> in 2011?\u00a0 I expect a rebound from his 2010 season.\u00a0 Yes, this seems like an obvious conclusion, but I don\u2019t think that he returns to his 2009 form for another couple years.\u00a0 I see Pablo being a great late round pick as a handcuff, or if you miss out on some higher caliber third basemen.\u00a0 You shouldn\u2019t have to pay too high a price to get him and can expect a line somewhere near .308\/.365\/.493 with 20 HR, 80 RBI, and 77 R.
\n<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Yesterday I took a look at Jose Bautista and whether his 2010 season was a fluke. Now, let\u2019s move over to the NL and take a look at a guy that many are hoping regains his 2009 form, and forgets about his pathetic 2010 campaign (especially myself considering that I drafted him last year).\u00a0 He […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":6,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[76,1300,17,6,11,13,14],"tags":[411,1741,1054,584,1742],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/thegoldensombrero.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2743"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/thegoldensombrero.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/thegoldensombrero.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/thegoldensombrero.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/6"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/thegoldensombrero.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2743"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"http:\/\/thegoldensombrero.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2743\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2748,"href":"http:\/\/thegoldensombrero.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2743\/revisions\/2748"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/thegoldensombrero.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2743"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/thegoldensombrero.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2743"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/thegoldensombrero.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2743"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}