Cardinals Acquiring Nolan Arenado

[bpj]

Sure like you bet against Betts not being able to hit away from Fenway. Hey you can bet on players all you want, sometimes you will be correct, other times not so much. But basing it simply on home and away splits isn't going to help because if you were to really dig into I doubt you find much correlation

Betts had a great 55 games.

And he also didn't have near the Home/Away OPS splits as LeMaheiu, Desmond or Arenado.

Betts contract will be even worse by the time it's over than Ian Kinsler and Dustin Pedroias careers ended.

[bpj]

I'm assuming this is what you're remembering. I still think Betts value would take a hit in San Diego.

[bpj]

That projection by the way is almost exactly the top end of what I would project for Arenado in St. Louis.

He looks like an .825 OPS player for the year in St. Louis imo.

I'm not handing out prospects plus $25M/yr for that.

Maybe he'll be better than his career splits suggest, as ISLTM pointed out. $25M worth? Yeesh. Not for this guy.

[Donn Beach]

Keep laying bets, players have extreme home and away splits for all sorts of reasons, I don't see any particular coorilation to there not being able to hit in a new park one way or the other. Yelich's splits have been crazy I understand, so he wouldn't be able to hit in a park other than Miller Park? It's interesting how these guys manage to land in parks so suited to their abilities

[bpj]

Yelich had a .944 OPS in Away games in 2018 and 1.004 in 2019.

He still had large splits, but he could still clearly hit in other parks.

When we're talking about their Away splits being sub-.800 OPS and you're talking a $25M player, yeah, it's more of a concern.

LeMahieu has a .697 career Away OPS, for example. Some people wanted to bring him in.

You see the difference between a guy hitting for a 1.000 OPS and one hitting like Mallex Smith at .697 in away games right? It's not a problem when you still hit above average in Away games.

When you don't, you're a negative on the team. Im certainly not paying up for that.

[Donn Beach]

That projection by the way is almost exactly the top end of what I would project for Arenado in St. Louis.

He looks like an .825 OPS player for the year in St. Louis imo.

I'm not handing out prospects plus $25M/yr for that.

Maybe he'll be better than his career splits suggest, as ISLTM pointed out. $25M worth? Yeesh. Not for this guy.

He has an 131 OPS+ from 2017-1019, that's park adjusted, I think he can hit, as well as being a premior defender. The Rockies are picking up $50 mil of his salary. Cards are on the hook for more like $21 mil a season. Come on, that's Kyle Seager money. I doubt they any real regret over that

[bpj]

We'll see.

I know the Mariners aren't throwing $20M contracts around, so when they do, I hope they do it for a player that can hit in the other 29 parks also.

Projections and park adjusted mean diddly-squat.

Proof will be in the pudding. They could have spent less for an .825 OPS. All I'm saying.

[DavidGee24]

We'll see.

I know the Mariners aren't throwing $20M contracts around, so when they do, I hope they do it for a player that can hit in the other 29 parks also.

I think in our case we're hoping the player can hit at T-Mobile also. Even with the fences in 2013 having been moved in I believe the Mariner batting splits are still a little better on the road.

[bpj]

That's basically what I'm getting at.

Nobody is going to come to Seattle and throw up an OPS .200 points higher at home, so if they can't perform on the road, they're not going to be making up for it in the home park.

If they hit .900 in NY and. 700 in Away games like LeMahiue, they're not going to replicate that home park success in Seattle. They're DOA.

[D-train]

Here is Ball park factors. T Mobile is below average but not bottom 10

http://www.espn.com/mlb/stats/parkfactor/_/year/2019