James Loney Does Not Like to Travel

May 18, 2008 at 9:26 am | Posted in James Loney, Mark Sweeney | 4 Comments

After watching James Loney’s brutal “0-5 with a major throwing error” performance yesterday, I realized that I haven’t exactly been overwhelmed by his performance this season. He hasn’t been bad, per se, but he hasn’t struck me as being all that we’d hoped for either. After most Dodger fans spent the first few months of last year watching Nomar struggle to hit and begging for Loney to be recalled, he came up and did exactly what we all hoped he would: .331/.381/.538, for a 131 OPS+ and 15 homers in just 96 games. Everyone drooled at what he could do once finally given a full season as the unquestioned starter at first base. But so far? .281/.333/.450. Again, not horrible, but the numbers prove my suspicions – with a 101 OPS+, he is almost exactly league average. We’ve even barely mentioned him on the blog so far, as he hasn’t been bad enough to harp on, yet not productive enough to praise. I’m no scout, but he doesn’t look any different than last year to me. So what’s going on?

Well, check this out:

Loney, 2008 at Home:
.375/.447/.556 1.003 OPS 165 OPS+
Loney, 2008 on Road:
.205/.228/.364 .592 OPS 64 OPS+
(stats from Baseball-Reference)

Is that not one of the biggest home/road splits you’ve ever seen? He’s literally 101% better of a hitter at Dodger Stadium than he is everywhere else. To put it another way, at Chavez Ravine, he’s Manny Ramirez (1.001 career OPS); and everywhere else he’s, well, hell, even Neifi Perez put up a .672 career OPS, and I’m not mentally prepared to look up hitters 80 points worse than Neifi Perez.

But here’s the odd part – he’s always been a better hitter on the road. Even factoring in this season’s wild splits, in his MLB career he’s actually put up a 112 OPS+ on the road, and only an 88 OPS+ at home. Those numbers were certainly even more divergent before this season.

I’m not really saying there’s anything that can be done about it, nor would I want to do anything except for let Loney play every day – we certainly pined over him for long enough, and we’ve seen him be successful. I would just love to know what causes home/road splits like what he’s doing so far this season.

In other news that’s only tangentially related to first base… why was Mark Sweeney batting 5th yesterday? He went 0-4 and is now batting a robust .125 on the season. That’s 4 hits in 32 at-bats. When you’ve got Delwyn Young wasting away on the bench, Mark Sweeney should not be your designated hitter. And when you’ve got guys simply killing the ball at triple-A (Andy LaRoche, Terry Tiffee, and John Lindsey all have OPS’s over 1.000, and Lindsey hit three homers last night), Mark Sweeney shouldn’t even really be on your team. He can’t hit, he’s 38, he offers less defensive flexibility than both LaRoche and Tiffee, and he can’t hit. Time to move on, no?

- Mike Scioscia’s tragic illness

4 Comments »

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I think Loney the hitter is probably somewhere between what he showed last season and thus far this season – a .800+ OPS hitter, as opposed to a .875+ OPS bopper. He has a good eye and is a selective hitter, but he sprays the ball more than being a pull hitter, thus hasn’t put up big HR numbers in his pro career. Being somewhat of a plodder he doesn’t have the footspeed to turn long singles into doubles, which keeps his SLG down a bit. The comparion to Mark Grace still appears appropriate.

I have been disappointed with him defensively. He is smooth and ranges far off the bag, but misses a lot of hit and thrown balls that a great defender would nab. Hopefully, he is still developing in the position as he must have focused a lot on pitching in his teen years.

Comment by kennerbuggy— May 18, 2008 #

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I mostly agree with you, KB. (also, another throwing error today? What’s going on?). But I’d mostly just like to know what it is he loves so much about Dodger Stadium to cause such home/road splits.

Comment by Mike Scioscia's tragic illness— May 18, 2008 #

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I am not ready to toss Loney under the bus, as it were. Yeah, his splits are weird to say the least, but I wonder if the problem may be his vision. I think he had contact problems in the past and I think he had Lasix surgery, but I wonder if there are still problems there.

One thing I have noticed is that he is trying to pull more balls. I don’t see him as a pull hitter and when he is going good, he sprays the ball all over the field. The pull thing could be his way of trying to improve him power to fill the void caused by Jones’ inability to do anything and Furcal being out of the lineup.

Lastly, Sweeney needs to be gone. The same should be said for Bennett. Neither fill their roles well and we have guys like LaRoche, Tiffee, and Lindsey wasting their time on the farm while this clown couldn’t hit the ground with his hat. As for Bennett, he needs to go away. Either call up Lucas May (although I would prefer he work on his catching on a more regular basis on the farm) or Danny Ardoin (who is a career backup and might be more receptive to playing once or twice a month). Of course, it would be nice if we can get Furcal healthy, call up LaRoche and use Nomar as the super sub. Of course, that still doesn’t address our problems with Pierre and Jones. But, I don’t have a simple solution for that issue….yet.

Comment by grabarkewitz— May 18, 2008 #

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I think Loney may have “settled in” a bit, which might explain his better home stats. The problem is that DS suppresses 2Bs & 3Bs while being neutral on HRs, and James isn’t a HR hitter. Thus, the expectation is that he would do better in Phone Booth Park, the Dog Pound and the hitters havens in PHX and Denver, where his style of batting would play better.

Stats are weird. Sone guys flip flop between being better vs. LHPs or RHPs on an almost annual basis, or better or worse on the rd vs. at home.

I wouldn’t mind Loney’s lack of HR stroke, if it weren’t the same issue with all of our young kids and if James had proven to be a better defender.

Comment by kennerbuggy— May 18, 2008 #

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Mike Scioscia's tragic illness