Vladdy Still Not the Favorite in the AL Rookie of the Year Race
Based on his hot bat over the last month, it looks like Vladimir Guerrero, Jr. is who we thought he was. After a delayed start to the 2019 season so he could “work on his defense” in AAA, the 20-year-old third baseman came up in late April and struggled during his first month of major league play. On May 28, he was hitting just .225/.301/.402. He had some ups and downs over the next month, including back-to-back three-hit games in mid-June followed by a 3-for-25 stretch just after. Then he really kicked it into gear. In the 23 games since July 6, Vladdy is hitting .367/.418/.611, with five homers and 24 RBI. This is the young stud we were expecting all along.
Those expectations were evident among fans and experts alike during the pre-season. In the FanGraphs staff predictions post on March 28, Guerrero received 20 of 32 votes for the AL Rookie of the Year Award, with Eloy Jimenez finishing second (9 votes), Nathaniel Lowe third (2 votes), and Kyle Tucker receiving one vote. Our own Off The Bench predictions did not include an AL Rookie of the Year category. With less than two months remaining in the season, Jimenez has a .292 OBP, Lowe has only played 30 games, and Tucker is more likely to win the PCL MVP Award than the AL Rookie of the Year Award. Tucker has yet to play a major league game for the Astros in 2019.
Despite his recent hot-hitting, Guerrero is still not the favorite to win the AL ROY Award. The combination of his delayed start and his middling production during his first couple months has put him behind other AL rookies. Using FanGraphs WAR as a starting point, the current leader is Brandon Lowe (2.5 fWAR through Sunday, 8/4), followed by Yordan Alvarez (2.2) and Daniel Vogelbach (2.1). Then we have a couple pitchers: John Means (1.8) and Spencer Turnbull (1.8), followed by a string of less-heralded players until we get to Guerrero (1.0), who is currently 1.5 fWAR behind Lowe.
Of course, fWAR isn’t the determining factor in award voting, nor should it be. Still, it’s one way to identify the most likely contenders. Also, the rest of the season will be key. Even though we don’t know how it will play out, we can use projections to estimate the end-of-season production for these rookies. Combining each AL rookie’s current fWAR with their Depth Chart projection from FanGraphs gives us a top-seven that looks like this:
2.9 fWAR—DH Yordan Alvarez, Houston Astros
2.7 fWAR—1B/DH Daniel Vogelbach, Seattle Mariners
2.7 fWAR—2B Brandon Lowe, Tampa Bay Rays
2.4 fWAR—SP Spencer Turnbull, Detroit Tigers
2.2 fWAR—SP John Means, Baltimore Orioles
2.0 fWAR—C Danny Jansen, Toronto Blue Jays
2.0 fWAR—3B Vladimir Guerrero, Jr., Toronto Blue Jays
It should be noted that Vlad is projected for the most WAR going forward. It’s just that he’s already pretty far behind Alvarez, Vogelbach, Lowe, and others. Also, Rookie of the Year voters will have their own individual criteria. Some undoubtedly use a wins-related metric, either from FanGraphs, Baseball-Reference, Baseball Prospectus, or some combination of the three, but traditional baseball statistics are also a major factor.
Considering the list above, it’s reasonable to exclude some of these players unless they are very good over the next couple months. Danny Jansen, a catcher, gets most of his value from defense. He’s hitting .204/.275/.350 and is unlikely to bring those ratios up enough to receive any votes. The two rookie pitchers on the list above, Spencer Turnbull and John Means, are also unlikely to get many votes. Turnbull is 3-9 with a 3.72 ERA for a terrible Detroit Tigers team. Means is 8-6 with a 3.12 ERA for a terrible Baltimore Orioles team. Of the two, Means has the advantage in ERA and wins, which may still matter to voters, but we hope not. Regardless, he will have a tough time getting more votes than the hitters above him on the list.
As you can imagine, the true contenders are the guys at the top of the list. Seattle Mariner slugger Dan Vogelbach is trying to escape his “Quad-A” label with a strong rookie season that already includes 26 homers in 103 games and a .229/.358/.500 batting line. He came out of the gate scorching hot in March and April with a 209 wRC+ (meaning he was 109% better than average on offense after league and ballpark effects are accounted for; 100 is league average). He cooled down in May (93 wRC+), before heating up again in June (130 wRC+), and “struggling” again in July (.197/.305/.451, 103 wRC+). We’ll have to see if he can have another hot streak or two over the rest of the season.
The current fWAR leader among AL rookies is Tampa Bay’s Brandon Lowe. In 76 games, Lowe is hitting .276/.339/.523 (127 wRC+) with solid defense at second base. Unfortunately, he fouled a ball off his leg on July 2 and hasn’t played since. He may be in the lead now, but will need to get back to a full-time role to stay in contention because the guy behind him is coming on strong.
On a per-plate appearance basis, the best rookie in the AL so far has been the Houston Astros’ Yordan Alvarez. He made his big league debut on June 9 and had eight hits in his first five games, including four home runs. He didn’t slow down much at all in July, with a .333/.419/.627 (178 wRC+) batting line. He’s currently second in FanGraphs WAR, despite playing just 41 games, slightly more than half the total of Brandon Lowe.
Playing time for each of the contenders is likely to be a key in the AL ROY race. Vogelbach has played in 103 of the Mariners’ first 114 games and should finish with around 145 games. Lowe played in 76 of the Rays’ first 86 games, but has been out for a month with no definite return date set. The FanGraphs Depth Charts project him to play in just 14 more games, which would leave him at 90 games for the season.
Alvarez didn’t play in the Astros first 66 games of the season. He’s played in 41 of the team’s 47 games since then and is projected to play in another 43 games, which would give him 84 games for the season. The fewest games ever played by an American League Rookie of the Year is 88, by Wil Myers in 2013. Myers won the award in a year without any other standout rookies. Behind him were Jose Iglesias, Chris Archer, Dan Straily, and JB Shuck.
Guerrero wasn’t called up to the Blue Jays until late April, so he missed the team’s first 25 games. Since his promotion, he’s played in 82 of the team’s 89 games. He’s projected to play in 42 more games, which would give him 124 for the season. He will likely be among the contenders for the award, along with the Alvarez, Vogelbach, and Lowe.
Here are the projected final numbers for these four rookie hitters:
84 G, 353 PA, 94 H, 48 R, 22 HR, 70 RBI, 2 SB, .303/.382/.597—Yordan Alvarez
146 G, 591 PA, 115 H, 82 R, 34 HR, 90 RBI, 0 SB, .234/.356/.484—Daniel Vogelbach
90 G, 364 PA, 90 H, 47 R, 18 HR, 56 RBI, 6 SB, .273/.336/.511—Brandon Lowe
124 G, 522 PA, 133 H, 66 R, 20 HR, 74 RBI, 1 SB, .285/.355/.476—Vladimir Guerrero, Jr.
Lowe won’t have a chance if he doesn’t get back on the field soon and Little Vlad’s numbers are projected to be well short of Vogelbach’s. With less than two months to go, it’s really Vogelbach and Alvarez as the front-runners. It will be interesting to see if the voters believe roughly 85 games of a higher-quality performance from Yordan Alvarez is more worthy of a Rookie of the Year vote than roughly 145 games of strong hitting from Vogelbach. Historically, a guy with 34 bombs and 90 ribbies would get the nod over Alvarez’ 22 dingers and 70 RBI, but the voters are considering other metrics these days.
The 2010 AL Cy Young Award, which went to Felix Hernandez and his 13-12 record, was seen as something of a monumental embrace of the “Kill The Win” movement. Will the 2019 AL Rookie of the Year turn out to be when voters embrace rates of production, rather than sheer volume?
-Bobby Mueller
