Tim Anderson Has Found a New Home

With spring coaching video games in full swing, the strain is mounting for baseball’s remaining free brokers to seek out properties. In spite of everything, no one desires to overlook out on the climate in Florida or Arizona this time of 12 months, and Opening Day is only a few weeks away. Now Tim Anderson received’t have to worry. Anderson is heading to the Miami Marlins on a one-year, $5 million deal. With a transparent path to the beginning shortstop position, the 30-year-old will little doubt hope to re-enter free company this winter having bounced again from his disappointing closing season in Chicago.

Anderson’s slot in Miami is an fascinating one. If he can keep wholesome and return to his prior type, he may assist to stabilize the shortstop place in Miami. However he additionally constitutes a dangerous addition to an already unsure Marlins lineup. It’s not laborious to think about a state of affairs the place neither Anderson nor Jazz Chisholm Jr. has an offensive bounce-back, Luis Arraez regresses, and Jake Burger’s contact overhaul proves to be only a flash within the pan; it may all go sideways fairly rapidly. But when it goes proper, this may very well be an thrilling lineup. If nothing else, the highest three of Arraez, Anderson, and Chisholm make for a really enjoyable group. Nonetheless, to ensure that issues to go proper for Anderson, he must get better a number of the BABIP expertise that have been a key cause for his success. Let’s deal with how precisely that may occur.

From 2019-2022, Anderson led the majors in batting common with a .318 mark. On successful per plate look foundation, no one was extra productive. Then in 2023, he cratered. Knee, shoulder, forearm, and neck accidents all contributed to the contact hitter dropping to a 60 wRC+ and -0.5 WAR in 123 video games. Add to that considerations about his skill to stay at shortstop, and you’ve got your self a participant who fell $3 million wanting his median crowdsourced contract prediction. The form of Anderson’s manufacturing via his profitable four-year run was inherently unstable. He undoubtedly possessed expertise that propelled him to run above-average BABIPs, however the margin for error for that hitting model is razor skinny; a handful of accidents and a few lack of power could make an in any other case productive profile nearly unplayable.

Final week, I wrote about Anderson as a part of my evaluation of the variance amongst hitters with steep swings. The piece in contrast how hitters with steep Vertical Bat Angles (VBA), the angle of the barrel at contact relative to the bottom, can have extraordinarily totally different offensive profiles due to the opposite components at play in relation to measuring bat path. Regardless of an especially steep VBA that’s on par with some fly ball heavy hitters, Anderson had a league-leading groundball price because of different limiting points of his swing. From 2021-2023, Anderson’s VBA was between the 96th and 97th percentile. It’s a trait he has had for some time, together with in his profitable offensive seasons. However as his VBA remained constant, different components modified.

Final season, Anderson made contact very deep within the zone, far more so than within the earlier three years. Together with his inside-out swing, he has usually been in a position to persistently hit line drives even with deep contact factors. That could be a widespread ability amongst contact hitters as a result of they have a tendency to create a ton of depth of their bat path, which will get them on aircraft with the ball deep within the hitting zone. However like I mentioned earlier than, this model of hitting has razor skinny margins. If a hitter begins making even deeper contact than typical, they will discover themselves operating a 60% groundball price after they had usually hovered within the mid-50s.

Along with contact level, you possibly can have a look at different bat monitoring parts corresponding to Assault Angle (AA) to know what could have modified for Anderson. However earlier than doing that, I wish to observe how AA and VBA differ from each other in order that we would higher perceive their relationship. VBA is the angle of the barrel relative to the bottom on the level of contact. AA is the angle of the trail the barrel is on at contact. AA is an expression of the vertical path the bat is shifting in, whereas VBA is merely a snapshot at contact. Ideally, a participant desires their barrel to be on an upward trajectory via contact as a result of it straight impacts launch angle. A participant’s vary of AA will rely upon how a lot power they’ve; the stronger they’re, the upper their vary of AA will be. Nonetheless, it ought to at all times be optimistic.

Up to now, AA knowledge hasn’t been publicly accessible, however fortunately SwingGraphs simply made some knowledge accessible final week, so we don’t must do as a lot guess work. It’s not uncooked AA knowledge, however they did give percentile rankings from 2019-2023, which is simply as helpful. Here’s a fast snapshot of how Anderson’s VBA and AA have trended:

At the same time as Anderson’s VBA has remained constant in the previous couple of seasons, his AA has continued to fall. As his AA has fallen, so has his xwOBACON. Final season, he posted his lowest xwOBACON since earlier than his offensive breakout. Getting again to his greatest swing would require him reversing some regarding tendencies in his AA. Maybe improved well being may support in him in that, but it surely’s not a given. To supply an instance of one other contact hitter with the same swing model that has been constant for a number of seasons in a row, look no additional than Arraez, Anderson’s new center infield mate. Final season, he ran a ninety fifth percentile VBA with a twenty third percentile AA. In 2022, he ran an 82nd percentile VBA with a forty first percentile AA. The hole between Arraez’s AA and VBA in 2023 was important, however not practically as huge as Anderson’s. In truth, no hitter with a minimum of 225 batted balls in 2023 had a bigger hole between their AA and VBA than Anderson. If he desires to benefit from his expertise, he’ll must get his swing working in a extra optimistic path via contact by rising his AA again to his 2019-2021 ranges. On prime of seeing how Arraez has balanced these two measures, he already has his personal blueprint for fulfillment.

I do know this may be laborious to conceptualize with out really seeing a spotlight of Anderson’s swing path, however I wish to simplify it like this: Regardless of how steep or flat your VBA is, it’s splendid for any hitter to have their bat working up via contact. Flatter will be good relying on the peak of the pitch or the hitter, however the degree Anderson was at in 2023 is a launch angle distribution killer. Perhaps Arraez’s method might help Anderson. It’s at all times good to have a like-minded hitter in the identical clubhouse. Nonetheless, it’s been a multi-year development of shifting within the incorrect path for Anderson. It’ll take a major bodily adjustment for him to reverse it.

It’ll be thrilling to see if Anderson can bounce again. If all goes effectively, he’ll play nearer to his offensive ceiling and enter free company with a possibility to safe a multi-year offers, maybe having contributed to surprising playoff pushes in Miami.