Stats Geek: Bay More Than Kept Up With Braves' Jones

Tuesday, October 04, 2005
By Brian O'Neill, Pittsburgh Post-Gazette

The top of my National League Most Valuable Player ballot would look like this if I could vote:

1. Derrek Lee
2. Albert Pujols
3. Jason Bay
4. Andruw Jones.

Were I to lay a bet, however, I'd pick Jones to win. A center fielder who hits 51 home runs and leads a team loaded with rookies to the playoffs? What's not to love?

Jones had a great year, but the other three had better ones. Let me concentrate on Bay because he'll be the one who gets the least love from real voters. Bay has the misfortune of doing almost everything well rather than one or two things exceptionally, and doing it all for a terrible team.
Let's begin with the Triple Crown stats and the respective rankings:

HR RBI AVG
Jones -- 51(1) -- 128 (1) -- .263 (53)
Bay -- 32 (11) -- 101 (12) -- .306 (9)

Leading the league in two of the three marquee categories makes Jones' mediocre batting average less important. In contrast, Bay's year merely looks solid.

Once past the big three, however, Bay's breadth of accomplishments is more impressive. Jones was fifth in slugging and Bay eighth (.575 to .559), and Jones was fourth to Bay's fifth in total bases (337 to 335). From there it's all Bay. He finished second in extra-base hits (82) to Jones' fourth (78). Bay also finished fourth in runs (110), fourth in doubles (44), seventh in hits (183), seventh in walks (95), eighth in on-base average (.402) and fifth in on-base plus slugging (.961), while Jones did not crack the top 10 in any of those categories. Bay was in another league as a base stealer, stealing 21 bases in 22 attempts, a rate of 94.45 that was seventh best in major-league history. Jones stole five bases in eight attempts.

Despite all that, some might be surprised that Bay put more runs on the scoreboard than Jones. Remember that the run from a home run counts twice on a player's baseball card (in runs and RBI) but only once on the big board. Bay scored 110 runs and drove in 101. Minus his 32 home runs and Bay's run production is 179.

Jones had 95 runs plus 128 RBIs. Minus his 51 home runs and his run production is 172. Bay had a seven-run edge. Not convinced? Let's see what each player did with his RBI opportunities. Baseball Prospectus tallied the number of runners each batter found on base in 2005.
Jones came to the plate with 503 runners looking back at him this season, second in the league. Bay saw 41 fewer.

Jones knocked in 15.3 percent of his runners and Bay knocked in 14.9 percent. But you have to remember a walk or a hit that doesn't score the runner doesn't help a batter here, though it might help his team. So it's important to see where runners were when the player batted.

Baseball Prospectus breaks down Bay's and Jones' runners by the bases they were on:

1B 2B 3B -- Total
Jones -- 236 -- 167 -- 100 -- 503
Bay -- 237 -- 153 -- 72 -- 462

Jones saw 14 more runners on second and 28 more on third than Bay did, and drove in just eight more of them. Bay actually hit better with runners in scoring position, batting .346 and slugging .614 while Jones hit .208 and slugged .388.

Bay did that while playing half his games in PNC Park, death to right-handed batters with its deep left-center field. Bay hit .337 with 23 homers and 60 RBIs on the road.
Ah, but what about defense? Jones has seven consecutive gold gloves.

Jones is a better outfielder, but the difference between Bay and the average left fielder may be greater than the difference between Jones and the average center fielder. Baseball Prospectus says Bay saved six runs above the average outfielder this season, while Jones saved four. Had they switched positions for the entire season, Jones almost certainly would have the advantage, but nobody can say Bay's defense was a weakness.

What about value to his team? Well, Bay accounted for 179 of the Pirates' 680 runs or 26.3 percent. Jones accounted for 172 of the Braves' 769 runs or 22.4 percent.

Bay is reportedly the only player in baseball this year and the only Pirate in history to have at least a .300 average, 30 home runs, 40 doubles, 20 stolen bases, 100 runs and 100 RBIs. Without checking, I'm confident Bay is also the only player in 2005 to outdo his nearest teammates by 20 home runs, 18 doubles, 13 stolen bases, 50 runs and 38 RBIs.

Because of Bay, Pirates left fielders finished first in the league in on-base plus slugging (OPS) while Braves left fielders finished 13th. Because of Jones, Braves center fielders finished first in the league in OPS while the Pirates center fielders finished 13th.

Hard to see much difference. Switch them and their teams' fortunes likely wouldn't have changed much. Bay will nonetheless finish well behind Jones in the MVP balloting. Nobody has been thinking about a guy who managed only to keep his team ahead of Kansas City.

(Brian O'Neill can be reached at boneill@post-gazette.com or 412-263-1947.)