First Base in 2014

[chadomac]

From the eyeball test, his approach is awful and he has a very lackadaisical way about him, but that doesn't necessarily mean anything.

 

That said, if he could be as good as Prince Fielder was at 1B for us defensively, he would probably be a good platoon option for sure.

 

It's too bad Hunter Morris isn't doing better in AAA this year so that this discussion didn't matter. The power is there (22 homers) but the OPS just isn't where it should be.

[reillymcshane]

Not to get off the subject of 1b for 2013, but does anyone know how Francisco's play at 3B is?

 

Fangraphs has his play at 3B as pretty average - but it's not a huge sample.

 

I was curious because, as we've all seen this year, Francisco is an awful first baseman. Could he potentially start at 3B (at least in a platoon) if the club moved Ramirez in this offseason (a longshot, but just a thought). Or could he be our 3B come 2015, when A-Ram's contract is up?

 

Obviously, if he goes to 3B that eliminates him as a 1B. But considering how bad he's looked, I don't know if that's such a terrible thing.

 

Just looking for some opinions from people who have seen him play 3B in the past.

[TooLiveBrew]

Not to get off the subject of 1b for 2013, but does anyone know how Francisco's play at 3B is?

 

Fangraphs has his play at 3B as pretty average - but it's not a huge sample.

 

I was curious because, as we've all seen this year, Francisco is an awful first baseman. Could he potentially start at 3B (at least in a platoon) if the club moved Ramirez in this offseason (a longshot, but just a thought). Or could he be our 3B come 2015, when A-Ram's contract is up?

 

Obviously, if he goes to 3B that eliminates him as a 1B. But considering how bad he's looked, I don't know if that's such a terrible thing.

 

Just looking for some opinions from people who have seen him play 3B in the past.

By the 'eye test' for the few instances (instance? Iirc it's been more than once) where he's played 3B this year for the Brewers... he's a 1B-only caliber defender. I wouldn't want anything to do with him defending at 3B on a team attempting to contend.

[502 to Right]

From the eyeball test, his approach is awful and he has a very lackadaisical way about him, but that doesn't necessarily mean anything.

 

That said, if he could be as good as Prince Fielder was at 1B for us defensively, he would probably be a good platoon option for sure.

 

It's too bad Hunter Morris isn't doing better in AAA this year so that this discussion didn't matter. The power is there (22 homers) but the OPS just isn't where it should be.

 

Who are you talking about? You don't say.

[chadomac]

From the eyeball test, his approach is awful and he has a very lackadaisical way about him, but that doesn't necessarily mean anything.

 

That said, if he could be as good as Prince Fielder was at 1B for us defensively, he would probably be a good platoon option for sure.

 

It's too bad Hunter Morris isn't doing better in AAA this year so that this discussion didn't matter. The power is there (22 homers) but the OPS just isn't where it should be.

 

Who are you talking about? You don't say.

 

Heh. Guess.

[chickinbrickin]

Anybody can drive in 80-85 runs if they bat in the middle of the order. That is why RBI is such a bad stat.

 

Rickie Weeks can't. Mike Cameron couldn't either batting in the middle of the Brewer order despite over 20 HR. Geesh, can't you guys just get off your high horses every time RBI is mentioned? So lets do away with it being part of winning a triple crown then.

 

My point was Francisco needs to be very productive offensively to offset his poor defense. That's regardless of what stat you look at as a measurement of productivity. I just threw RBI out there. I could have just as easily said he needs to slug close to .500. That wasn't the point but thanks for jumping on it anyway.

 

Getting back to Francisco, regardless he should never start a game against a lefty. He's never hit a HR off one in more than 100 PA. So if he's the guy at 1B next year, he'll need a platoon partner.

Quit bring it up like it means anything and we will.

 

To say RBI means nothing is ridiculous. Yes, it is certainly not a basket to put all your eggs in when looking at a players performance, but don't act like it is meaningless.

 

Earlier this year when the cards were dominating it was in large part due to their success with runners in scoring position, which translates into RBI, which is the name of the game. Scoring/driving in runs.

[LouisEly]

Quit bring it up like it means anything and we will.

In your opinion it means nothing. In his opinion it means something. The purpose of this forum is for people to be able to express their opinions.

 

RBIs in and of themselves are not a perfect stat, but like chickinbrickn says they are important because scoring runs is half of the bottom line of the game. BA w/RISP isn't perfect either because it doesn't take into effect sacrifices (bunts, flies) that score runs or move runners over - it treats them as a non-event (neither an AB nor a hit) but they are a successful AB in that scenario. There needs to be an OBP-type stat for RISP that measures hits + sacrifices per AB w/RISP or an inherited runners/allowed to score type of stat that shows number of RISP and % of those driven in or advanced. Just like pitchers need to hit their spots in certain situations, batters need to execute in certain situations and both are an important part of the game.

 

Back to 1B, obviously Francisco is not a good defender right now. But given that he has had very limited experience at 1B prior to this season, do people think that playing 1B through the rest of the season plus a season of winter ball and a full spring training at 1B will allow him to improve enough to be serviceable at 1B?

[logan82]

RBI are not predictive and are highly lineup dependent. They tell what happened. They are not useful for looking at what is likely to happen. So if we are talking about a player's value going forward they are a terrible stat.

[saget]

How about putting Weeks at 1B? Problem solved. He's probably going to put on another 30 pounds of mass in his upper body while his leg is healing so his range will be Yuni-like next year anyways.

[mothershipconnection]

Earlier this year when the cards were dominating it was in large part due to their success with runners in scoring position, which translates into RBI, which is the name of the game. Scoring/driving in runs.

 

Still, we have better measures of how well a batter hits, and how he hits with runners on or in scoring position than a count of how many he drove home. I don't care so much about the number of opportunity-bound performances, as it's more useful to know the probability of a given outcome. 3-4 with 3 solo homers is more predictive of offensive prowess than 1-4 with a bases-loaded double. I'll take a guy who has a higher probability of reaching base or getting XBH than the guy with a higher RBI count who performs worse in rate stats.

[MNBrew]

But low power numbers (or low relative to the player's proven capabilities) AND a lousy BA w/RISP amounts to bad "production," a.k.a. "results," which has been Weeks in a nutshell this year. Historically bad production, as has been noted many times, at the 1B position before Francisco came out of his horrible stretch pointed out a similar deficiency at a 2nd position (don't jump -- I know the specifics vary, but the point is that overall power & RBI numbers have been ugly at 2 positions, not just one, which doesn't help a team with other glaring struggles).

 

There's plenty to like in Francisco's bat, but he's still a streaky hitter and a very poor defender, so to me he's exactly the type of guy Melvin should "sell high" on this winter. I like what he's doing now. But I don't like him as the long-term solution at 1B.

 

We have plenty of good hitters - enough that I think we can spare Francisco since 2013 1B Plans A, B, & C should all be healthy next year -- but we still need to keep the main focus for improvement on pitching & defense.

[StearnsFTW]

Anybody can drive in 80-85 runs if they bat in the middle of the order. That is why RBI is such a bad stat.

 

Rickie Weeks can't. Mike Cameron couldn't either batting in the middle of the Brewer order despite over 20 HR. Geesh, can't you guys just get off your high horses every time RBI is mentioned? So lets do away with it being part of winning a triple crown then.

My point was Francisco needs to be very productive offensively to offset his poor defense. That's regardless of what stat you look at as a measurement of productivity. I just threw RBI out there. I could have just as easily said he needs to slug close to .500. That wasn't the point but thanks for jumping on it anyway.

 

Getting back to Francisco, regardless he should never start a game against a lefty. He's never hit a HR off one in more than 100 PA. So if he's the guy at 1B next year, he'll need a platoon partner.

 

Where do I sign?

 

RBIs.....

[Outlander]

How about putting Weeks at 1B? Problem solved. He's probably going to put on another 30 pounds of mass in his upper body while his leg is healing so his range will be Yuni-like next year anyways.

Not sure how the problem would be solved since he can't hit, better option than Yuni at first but that is about it.

[DuWayne Steurer]

It could be that Francisco is just reaching his peak (and will be going into his age 27 season next year. His walk rate is certainly up from previous years. He's not a world beater, but a slash line of .250/.320/.480 isn't an unreasonable expectation I would think.

 

And any guy that hits .250 with 20 - 25 homers can and should reach 75 RBI in the middle of an order unless he's abominably bad in RBI/men on situations. Most guys will hit within 10% of their career norms in RBI situations. Over the course of a season, when your RBI/men on/RISP plate appearances tend towards small samples, you can certainly have seasons that look like outliers, and this is where the 'clutch'/'unclutch arguments come from, but most players will normalize to their career numbers in RISP situations given enough plate appearances.

[Fear The Chorizo]

It's probably Francisco's job in 2014 unless Morris takes the next step, or by some miracle Gamel stays healthy and produces.

 

I really don't want to mess around with resigning Hart and counting down the days until he has more leg problems. Once tall guys start breaking down it normally doesn't pay to hope for a return to form.

[JohnBriggs12]

Every time I think Francisco might be the answer, he does something like strikeout 4 times in back to back games. The jury is still out on him. His K rate is right up there with the all timers like Dunn, Jose K, Mark Reynolds and Branyan.

 

Whether he's a 35-40 HR guy over a full season is open to question. We know he has power surges not unlike the rest of those guys, but are his lulls so bad and his defense so shaky that he's a net minus? That and the fact that there are some intriguing alternatives out there in the FA market, makes me wonder.

 

Hart is going to be relatively cheap and wants to be here. It's hard to overlook that. I do wish we could see a bit more of Halton too. Not that he'd be the prime guy, but as a fall back if they went with Francisco.

 

Morris isn't a serious candidate carrying a .731 OPS at AAA. Maybe he'll blossom next year in AAA, but that remains to be seen.

[DuWayne Steurer]

I honestly don't care how much he K's, as long as he puts up an OPS around .800.

 

Chris Davis has struck out 152 times for the O's already. I don't know that this has caused a lot of consternation for the O's and their run production.

[Outlander]

I'm more concerned about his defense than his strikeouts. His defense is so bad that his 800 OPS still results in a zero WAR. Now if he somehow had an OPS greater than 1 like Chris Davis then I wouldn't really care too much about his defense.

[reillymcshane]

Francisco's defense has been epically bad.

 

He has a .981 fielding % - easily the worst in baseball for a guy with 50 starts at the position. Adam Dunn is the next worst guy - a .987 %.

 

He has a UZR of -8.0 (Adam Dunn is worse -8.4).

 

In Juan's defense, he's never played the position. Perhaps an off season of practice, and spring training, will make things a lot better.

 

He'd really make a good left-handed DH / backup 1B/3B type player.

[PrestigeWorldwide]

I admit this is a completely cynical, judgmental take, but Juan doesn't strike me as the kind of guy who will put in a ton of off-season work to get good at playing 1B.

[TooLiveBrew]

Agreed, MNShady. He reminds me of Prince, defensively. Not very athletic or skilled, and not the appearance of much effort being put forth to improve.

 

And imo this has zero to do with him having never really played 1B before. How & why clubs stuck with him at 3B as long as they did is a complete head-scratcher to me, because he's terrible there. Just a bad defensive player all-around.

[mothershipconnection]

I still struggle to understand how even a bad 3B can be this tremendously bad as a 1B. Braun may have been the worst 3B I've ever watched, but I'd still expect him to not be a wreck at first.

[MNBrew]

Sorry to be redundant, but I just hope the Crew is trying to beef up Francisco's value for eventual trade purposes. TH's tweet today captures my feelings in a nutshell:

 

"Juan Francisco on the home stand for #Brewers: 2 for 22 with 14 strikeouts, 1 HR, 2 RBI. Brewers say they want to see what they have in him."

 

Francisco has more errors than anyone else on the team -- in nearly half the games played than the two guys with the next-most errors -- and he's been a 3B long enough that 1B, while an adjustment, isn't THAT MUCH of an adjustment.....

 

- 4 games at 3B for MIL, 4 errors -- and came to MIL with a 3B reputation that the Brewers said they viewed him as a pretty-much-exclusive 1B

- 54 games at 1B, 10 errors

 

Even if errors aren't the ultimate measure of defensive play, they're at least a basic enough indicator that very high error numbers = bad defensive player. Francisco? The guy is horribly lousy defensively no matter where you put him. He pretty much makes Weeks look like Robbie Alomar by comparison (and I know how bad many of you think Weeks is because any time I assert that he's improved enough over the years to be generally solid in the field nowadays, I immediately get contradicted repeatedly).

 

That's why he screams "DH" to me and I sure hope we can find an AL team to give us something half-decent for him. Two trades with Texas over the years typify the type of deal I'm hoping for (both amount to typical Melvin nugget-mining):

 

- 2002: Jesus Pena (non-roster invitee) traded at the end of ST for Luis Vizcaino (who eventually wore out his welcome but was a very pleasantly surprising asset for a couple years) -- outstanding return for a guy who we got for nothing and who never really had a chance to make the team

- 2006: Enrique Cruz actually netted us Brian Shouse, who was a very positive performer for a few years -- outstanding return for one of the worst Rule V pickups in team history (who was actually kept -- and yes, I remember Matt Ford)

 

Francisco has performed too well to be a parallel to Jesus Pena or Enrique Cruz, but that's all the more reason to hope for a return that'd be on par with how Vizcaino & Shouse played for their first season or two in MIL -- reasonably productive & extremely serviceable, even if eventually quite replaceable.

[JohnBriggs12]

I honestly don't care how much he K's, as long as he puts up an OPS around .800.

 

Chris Davis has struck out 152 times for the O's already. I don't know that this has caused a lot of consternation for the O's and their run production.

 

Davis K rate is one strikeout every 3.45 plate appearances. Francisco's is one every 2.82. Of course if Francisco can slug .500 and maintain an .800 OPS, the strikeouts won't matter, but he needs to make a bit more consistent contact for that to happen.

[homer]

Francisco is not a 1st baseman, he's a DH. I'd much rather let Khris Davis just takeover at 1st and see what you have. His defense can't be any worse.