Stat Abuse: Batting Average on Balls in Play (BABIP)
Mandatory Credit: Brett Davis-USA TODAY Sports
It has happened again – a national writer has got my dopper in an uproar after trying to sound all geeky and quote an “Advanced Baseball Metric” in support of an opinion.
It was Ken Rosenthal’s fault.
"Braves third baseman Chris Johnson is batting .338 with an .844 OPS, but there’s a caveat to his success: he leads the majors with a .421 batting average on balls in play, well above the league average of .296.Johnson’s high BABIP indicates that he is likely to regress at some point, but there also is this: He entered Sunday with the third highest line-drive percentage in the majors, behind only James Loney and Joe Mauer."
By the way: after his 3-for-4 Sunday night game, Chris is now #1 in the National League with a .338 batting average. But I guess Kenny expects that to slip.
Hey Ken: he already had regressed. Now he’s just locked in. Check out this chart:
Chris Johnson
BABIP
Strikeout Rate
March/April
.460
21.8%
May
.389
28.1%
June
.355
18.7%
July
.458
19.1%
Since AS Break
.455
12.5%
Through May, Chris was part-timing it with Juan Francisco. In June, Chris became an everyday player… and clearly made some adjustments in doing so. But it seems that the transformation is complete – and much for the better: his strikeouts are way down, his average is up, and that pesky BABIP stat is through the roof.
Oh yeah – I was complaining about BABIP. This stat eliminates strikeouts and any other result in which a batter fails to put the ball in play. His batting average is then computed based on those ABs alone. It is often spoken of as a “luck” factor – even by fangraphs, the source of all of this data today.
Let me throw another stat at you: line drive percentage. Rosenthal mentioned it…he should have looked a little deeper.
In the majors, Chris Johnson is third with 28.5% of his plate appearances ending in a line drive hit somewhere. Fourth on that list is Freddie Freeman (27.8%). Freddie’s BABIP is “only” .365 and Johnson’s is .421. So what’s the difference?
I submit that the difference between the two is power. Check out the hit charts for each player (Turner Field only):
Chris Johnson’s hit chart Freddie Freeman’s hit chart
The difference is in how many of Freddie’s liners reach the outfielders… and some beyond, of course. Johnson’s hitting is landing – more often – in front of the outfielders. That’s simply the kind of hitter he is. In fact, it looks like no left fielder has yet to record a fly out against Chris – at least when he’s hitting at home. Johnson will occasionally display gap power – and those show up on this chart, too, but there are many more such balls at that distance from Freddie’s chart… and many more outs.
Stats need to be read in context. The context here is that while Chris Johnson decides to avoid the weight room, he should continue to be a high BABIP hitter. This isn’t about luck and it isn’t about a “regression.” This is simply because his line drives get past the infield and then fall short of the outfielders… roughly at the distance umpire Sam Holbrook thinks infield fly balls still exist.
Yes, I’m still bitter. But a 3 game sweep helps. A little.