Pittsburgh Pirates 2016 Projections – Jordy Mercer

Fully recovered from a knee injury he suffered in 2015, Jordy Mercer looks to recover the offense that made him one of the great stories early in his career, but what do the projections have to say about his chances?

We continue with the projection series by looking at the defensive wonder of the Pittsburgh Pirates middle infield Jordy Mercer. Yesterday, Aaron Benedict took a look at the projections for third baseman Jung Ho Kang.

When the Pirates were the surprising winner of the rights to sign Korean Baseball Organization star Jung Ho Kang last offseason, many questioned where the shortstop would fit in with his new club. Pittsburgh native Neil Walker was the clear incumbent at second, while Josh Harrison was coming off an All-Star campaign that made him difficult to unseat at third. Coming off of a rather disappointing 2014 campaign, Jordy Mercer was the clear candidate to find himself playing second fiddle to the Korean slugger.

Not only did Mercer not rebound in 2015, he even saw his batting average drop below his career average with a slight uptick in his strikeout rate. Mercer was further impeded by a knee injury he suffered on July 19th when Milwaukee’s Carlos Gomez slid into him in an effort to try to break up a double play after being tagged out about ten feet from second base.

After returning from the disabled list on August 23rd, Hurdle said Mercer would have to earn his way back into the lineup. Kang was swinging a hot bat in relief of Mercer at shortstop, despite struggling defensively. However, Mercer would start all but three of the 36 games he played in during the remainder of the season.

His 2015 stats can be a little deceiving if looking strictly at the splits before and after his injury. Between 2014 and 2015, Jordy Mercer batted a pitiful .196 in 276 at-bats before June. Over the same two seasons, he batted .274 over 624 at-bats after May.  This is contrary to his stellar 2013 season, where he batted .271 over 59 at-bats in May and .288 in 274 at-bats through the rest of the season. In each case, Mercer has gone the way of the Pirates’ seasons. He was just getting his season on track after an agonizingly slow start to the 2015 season before the injury derailed him. Despite success in a tiny sample size after his return in August, he never fully regained the same offensive prowess.

Overall, the poor offensive showing had negative ramifications on other statistical categories.  After posting a positive win probability added of 0.29 to the team in 2013, Mercer has posted two consecutive seasons of negative win probability, -1.42 and -1.86 respectively, which means that he lessened the ability of the Pirates to win based strictly on the context in which Mercer performed at the plate throughout the season. The rating has no bearing on Mercer’s ability to come through in the clutch. It just means he had less opportunity and marginally reduced the team’s ability to win. To put it in context, the Pirates’ best hitter Andrew McCutchen posted a 5.62 win probability added (WPA) in 2015. Most notably, Mercer has been hampered by a career .204/.261/.269 slash line batting from the seventh to the ninth inning.

Completely inept hitting late in the game does not mean Mercer is incapable of coming through when it counts. If anything, Mercer has shown an increased ability to hit in the clutch, despite posting the lowest batting average of his career in the final three innings in 2015. Prior to 2015, Mercer batted .236 in high-leverage situations. In 2015, he dramatically increased that to .264 in the same category. However, his medium-leverage average of .248 and low-leverage average of .229 in 2015 were both lower than his career averages of .310 and .240, respectively. The leverage index is a subjective model, but it’s still an encouraging sign in Mercer’s most disappointing full season yet.

For his career, Jordy Mercer has experienced a downward trend of .275, .261, and .233 in batting averages, respectively, corresponding to the number of outs in an inning. While rather unimpressive, his batting averages in 2015 corresponding to the number of outs in the inning was consistent, much like his 2013 numbers.

Speaking of consistent, Mercer consistently hits the ball where he is least likely to get a hit. For his career, he has a .272 batting average when the ball is hit back up the middle, which he has done 56.3% of the time. In 2015, he hit the ball up the middle 56.4% of the time. He has batted .391 when pulling the ball, which he does at an average of 26.9% of the time. In 2015, he pulled the ball only 23.7% of the time. He hits the ball to the opposite field 16.8% of the time, which is less than the 19.9% clip he hit to the right side in 2015. The 43.6% of the time he did not hit it up the middle in 2015 was higher than the 42.2% in 2014, but it fell short of the 45.0% he hit in 2013. He has a .605 batting average for his career on line drives, and in 2015, his 25.8% line drive percentage was a career best.

Mercer also posted his best plate discipline in 2015. He swung at just 31.5% of pitches out of the zone, down from 34.4% and 34.5% over the two years prior, respectively. Coupled with his ability to crush left-handed pitching, Mercer has a career .332 batting average batting second in the lineup. The improved discipline and batting ability should force the Pirates to put Mercer second in the lineup in front of Andrew McCutchen against left-handed pitchers in 2016. Against right-handed pitchers, the Pirates could sacrifice the performance of Mercer to have other players in ideal lineup spots, which may be the best solution, or they could bat Kang second with Mercer sixth, Harrison seventh, and Cervelli eighth.

Jordy Mercer has come a long way from the player that got called up in 2012, and he was always expected to be at least a marginal improvement offensively over his predecessor Clint Barmes. Barmes was a wonderful mentor for Mercer, coaching him through the rigors of the longest season in professional sports. He taught him how to charge and field a ball. As our own Aaron Benedict pointed out in his position comparison for Mercer, the Pirates shortstop posted the third-best range factor per game among shortstops in the National League last season. Defensively, he compared to some of the league’s best shortstops in the game like Andrelton Simmons and Addison Russell.

Jordy Mercer has three years of team control left. He may get to be the mentor one day, but the best candidate to be his successor, Cole Tucker, underwent surgery for a torn labrum and will possibly lose all of his 2016 season. Even with an aggressive development program, he probably would not be ready until 2019 now, so Jordy Mercer’s future is secure in Pittsburgh for the time being.

Overall, the 2016 projections are rather conservative, reflecting many of his career averages. I feel the advanced stats discussed here reflect a player poised to return to form if used in the right situations offensively. He also will need to rebound against NL Central opponents in 2016. He certainly doesn’t need to match his 2013 average of .273, although that would be nice, but if he can just beat his career average of .230 against the division foes, the Pirates should be in good shape. If he stays healthy, Mercer could match the Steamer projection for home runs and exceed many of the other categories.

Under the ideal circumstances, I could see Jordy Mercer batting about .267/.333/.390 with 45 runs, 55 RBIs, 30 doubles, and 3 triples.

Please click HERE to read more of our 2016 Projections analysis.

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