That’s right. It’s singular: first baseman. We looked at several breakout catchers earlier in the week but at first base, one player deserves all the attention. The way Jose Abreu has burst onto the scene this year after coming over from Cuba is astounding. Is this just a flash in the pan or is what he’s doing sustainable throughout his prime?
Abreu is tied for the league lead in homeruns with Giancarlo Stanton and Nelson Cruz, each of whom has played in at least ten more games than he has. He is tied for the league lead in RBI with baseball’s best run producer over the past decade, Miguel Cabrera, who’s played in eleven more games than he has. Abreu has accumulated these huge power statistics while also maintaining a .300 average so far this season. These statistics are more reminiscent of a Triple Crown winner than a first-year player out of Cuba.
Since this is Abreu’s first season stateside, and many of the advanced stats tracked throughout the minors are not readily available from the Cuban league, we’ll have to stack his numbers up against recent comps to decide if this type of season is something Abreu is capable of producing on a year-to-year basis.
If we look at Abreu’s BABIP, it’s slightly above league average. Abreu has posted a .325 mark so far this season while league average is near the .300 mark. Abreu’s line drive rate is also above average at 23.8%, while the league mark is at 20%. Since Abreu seems to make hard contact a bit more often than the typical major leaguer, it doesn’t seem as if his batting average this year has anything to do with luck.
What about the homeruns? Abreu’s HR/FB ratio currently sits at 30.4%. Only three players with a qualified number of at-bats have finished the season with 30% or more of their fly balls leaving the yard over the past ten years:
- Ryan Howard (2006, 2007, and 2008)
- Jack Cust (2007 and 2008)
- Travis Hafner (2006)
Two of these players are extremely rich but I’m willing to bet you’d say only one of them will ever end up receiving any votes for the Hall of Fame. We’re also bumping into the tail end of the steroid era so we’ll look at some comps from more recent seasons. The statistics we’ll check out and the order in which they’ll be listed are BABIP, BB% (percentage of plate appearances ending in a walk), K% (percentage of plate appearances ending in a strikeout), HR/FB ratio (percentage of fly balls that are homeruns), LD% (percentage of batted balls deemed to be line drives), swinging strike percentage (percentage of pitches the batter swings at and misses).
- Abreu: BABIP .325, BB 7.0 %, K 22.3%, HR/FB 30.4%, LD 23.8%, Swinging Strike 14.3%
- 2013 Chris Davis: .336, 11.9%, 29.6%, 29.6%, 21.9%, 15.2%
- 2013 Miguel Cabrera: .356, 13.8%, 14.4%, 25.4%, 24.0%, 9.6%
- 2012 Josh Hamilton: .320, 9.4%, 25.5%, 25.6%, 21.3%, 20.0%
- 2012 Miguel Cabrera: .331, 9.5%, 14.1%, 23.0%, 21.7%, 8.1%
Abreu’s BABIP is in the same range as the other lines, with the exception of 2013 Miguel Cabrera. He walks in fewer plate appearances than each of the other players which may be a cause for minor concern but he strikes out considerably less than 2013 Chris Davis and 2012 Josh Hamilton, and considerably more than Cabrera in his 2012 and 2013 season. He has a higher HR/FB ratio than the bunch and a line drive percentage handily exceeding each of the other players with the exception of 2013 Miggy. Like the strikeout percentage, he swings and misses less than Davis and Hamilton, but more than Cabrera in 2012 and in 2013.
Davis and Hamilton haven’t been able to replicate the numbers they put up in the referenced seasons at any other point in their careers. There are many reasons why they haven’t been able to do so, but swinging and missing in more than a quarter of their at-bats and their luck running out on batting average on balls in play have to be two things at the top of the list.
Miguel Cabrera is a first ballot Hall of Famer. Abreu’s line drive rate is consistent with what Cabrera has put up for the past two seasons and his contact rate is between the elite ones Cabrera puts up and the sub-par rates of Hamilton and Davis. Is Jose Abreu the next Miguel Cabrera? Not likely. Abreu doesn’t have the contact skills of Cabrera. Is he a flash in the pan somewhat like Hamilton’s 2012 and Davis’ 2013? Probably not. He’s posting better contact skills and a higher line drive rate than either of them.
Jose Abreu is already in his prime but there’s no reason to think he won’t be able to approach numbers similar to what he’s put up this year if his ability to make hard contact and his contact skills stay consistent over the next five years.
Photo by Gregory Shamus/Getty Images
