Brief editorial interlude! This post and the one below it about Kevin Correia aren’t meant to evaluate the signings of Correia and Overbay, but instead just what we might be able to expect from them in 2011 and what the chances are that they’ll be useful to the Pirates in the coming year. I think we all agree that the signings weren’t great (though we may disagree on how not-great they were), but these guys are Pirates now and so it’s time to press forward into 2011. Seriously, I don’t want to think about 2010 anymore.
Who was better at the plate in 2010: Lyle Overbay or Garrett Jones? It’s a straightforward question with an easy answer. Overbay had a better OBP (.329 to .306), a better SLG (.433 to .413), and he played in baseball’s toughest division. His wOBA (weighted OBP/OBP, which includes a power factor that better combines power and on-base skills than OPS) is quite a bit better than Jones’s, .332 to .314. That’s not to say Overbay was good in 2010 — he finished 18th of 24 qualified first baseman in wOBA — but he was certainly better than Jones (who was next to last).
Of course, whether Overbay was better than Jones in 2010 isn’t really the question. The question here is whether Jones will be better than Jones in 2011 and how much he’ll actually help the Pirates in the coming season. Last year, Overbay hit 20 homers for the first time since his first year with the Blue Jays, though in two of the four interceding years he didn’t top 140 games played. Despite his mini-power surge, last year was his worst full season since him time with the Diamondbacks (for reference; he was traded to the Brewers for Richie Sexson … remember that guy?) save 2007, when he battled some injuries. That’s because his OBP dropped, which was mostly a function of his batting average dropping.
Since Overbay just turned 34, that’s obviously a concern. Why did his batting average drop? Is it something we should be concerned about him repeating in 2011, or is it something he can overcome? His FanGraphs page says that he swung at nearly one in every four pitches outside of the strikezone last year, the most since his rookie season with Arizona. It’s not a coincidence that his strikeout rate (24.5%) was also as high as it’s been since 2003.
You could read that stat one of two ways; 1.) that Overbay is getting old, his bat is slowing down, and he has to guess a bit more, which is producing more swings and misses, or 2.) O-Swing% is variable from year to year (Overbay went from 16.9% to 21.0% to 19.0% from 2005 to 2007 and later bottomed out at 15.4% just two years ago in 2009) and it’s nothing to worry about. If Overbay can regain some plate discipline, I think he’ll probably be OK with the Pirates in 2011 and I doubt we have to worry about him beyond this coming season; in all likelihood he’ll be traded away at the deadline if he hits well, especially if the Pirates draft Anthony Rendon and officially peg Pedro Alvarez for first base. Then again, if he can’t rein the swing in, then there’s a decent chance he’ll go even further backwards and be a disaster.
It’s at least worth noting, though, that while Overbay’s probably on the wrong side of the aging curve at age 34, that’s not exactly a death sentence for his career. I know that following a rebuilding team causes fans to focus on age and want younger players (this is certainly what I want) that might perform well in the long-term, but it doesn’t preclude Overbay from having a bit of a bounce-back year in 2011. His two most similar players through age 33 on Baseball-Reference are Donn Clendenon and Eddie Robinson. Both players had solid careers, rough seasons at age 33, and very good bounceback years at age 34. That doesn’t make it a slam dunk for Overbay to do the same in the coming year, but it’s definitely not impossible.
Perhaps the larger question, though, is if Overbay improves the Pirates. Theoretically, his addition allows the Pirates to platoon Garrett Jones and Matt Diaz in right field and it should open up some playing time for Steve Pearce against some (or all) lefties since the Pirates don’t really have a reason to give Overbay 600 at bats. And if Overbay does struggle mightily, the Pirates should at least have some more depth at the 1B/RF position between he, Pearce, Diaz, Jones, and Bowker than the club had with Jones, Lastings Milledge, and Ryan Church last year. Given the platoon splits for each guy, I think Clint Hurdle should be able to engineer something vaguely productive out of those two positions, which would be a heck of a lot more than the Bucs got last year.
But did the Pirates need him with Bowker already on the roster? That’s where this signing gets dicey for me. It’s possible that Bowker just isn’t much of a big league hitter (actually, it’s probably more “likely” than “possible”) and having Overbay on the roster makes for nice insurance in the case that he doesn’t, but I’d rather see Bowker get the shot first . Now there’s a good chance that Bowker will get lost in the roster shuffle (he’s out of options) and so we’ll have acquired him, given him 77 plate appearances, and sent him on his merry way. Given that Joe Martinez already got lost to waivers, it would make the Javier Lopez trade a pretty pointless endeavor if that’s how things play out.
Of course I haven’t mentioned his glove at all yet, which has traditionally been pretty good and will almost certainly be the best first base glove the team has besides maybe Steve Pearce. I know I wasn’t the only person that wanted to see the Pirates do that and Overbay does, even if it’s not as dramatic an ugrade as someone like JJ Hardy would’ve been.
All in all, though, I think this is a bit riskier than the Correia signing, mostly because of Overbay’s age and the fact that he started to tail off a bit last year, even if he was still productive for Toronto. That said, I’m not sure putting him out there at first base every day is necessarily worse than it would’ve been for the Pirates to put Jones back at first every day after his ugly 2010. At the very least, I think (hope?) that Overbay will be more capable than Church and Crosby were last year.
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