Jul
21
2011

Justin Turner, One Of the League’s Best RBI Guys?

An article by XtreemIcon

That’s right, Le Petit Orange is the 6^th-best RBI guy in the league, he of the 36 total RBIs.

Jimmy: “But wait, I just checked (insert stats source) and it says he’s got 36 RBI and that’s tied for 51st!”

Xtreem: “That’s right, Little Jimmy, but RBI TOTAL is not a good measure of talent and ability. And that’s the truth.”

See, it’s not just how often you succeed that matters most, but how often you succeed given your chances. Let me introduce you to OBI%. OBI stands for Others Batted In, and it’s “formula” is RBI-HR. A grand slam will give a batter three OBI, as will a bases-clearing double. Justin Turner has 34 OBI (36 RBI minus 2 HR).

OBI% is the success rate of driving in other runners give your plate appearances with men on base. Think of it like batting average for runs batted in. If I asked Little Jimmy who the better hitter was: Player A with 220 hits in a season, or Player B with 150 hits, he would immediately think Player A was. But if I qualified it with Player A’s 650 at-bats and Player B’s 400 at-bats, the answer is different now, isn’t it?

Jimmy: “So, Player A hit .338, but player B hit .375. So the total doesn’t tell the whole story? We need to know how many chances the player had to put it in perspective.”

Xtreem: “NOW you’re getting it, Little Jimmy!”

Back to Le Petit. If batting average is the most common statistic in baseball, and home runs per at-bat is a widely-known statistic, why is RBI left to be misunderstood all by its lonesome? It’s part of the triple crown, too, darn it! Talk about a third wheel…

Luckily for us, Baseball Prospectus keeps track of OBI% and all related statistics, right down to how may runners were on each individual base for a batter and how many times a batter drove in a base runner from each individual base. It’s quite interesting. You can see for yourself right here, and you can sort the other columns if you’re a member.

It shows plain as day that Justin Turner has the 6^th best OBI% in the league at 19.9%, which means he succeeds 6^th most often in driving in runs. NL RBI leader Ryan Howard? Fourteenth, at 18.1%. Sure, Howard has more than double the amount of RBIs Turner does, but he’s been up to bat this season with 309 ducks on the pond (most in the league by a wide margin) in 218 plate appearances (also most in the league). Turner, comparatively, has had only 171 ducks (81st in the league!) in just 132 plate appearances (75^th).

If LPO had Howard’s opportunities, he’d have 61 OBI, six more than Howard, and those 63 RBI (remember his two home runs) would put him amongst the league leaders, despite minimal power. He’d be the talk of baseball.

Let’s put it in some more perspective. The highest RBI total in the NL since 2004 (when we could start somewhat trusting power numbers again) is 149 by our friend Mr. Howard in 2006. That year, he finished with an OBI% of 18.1 (hey, at least he’s consistent). He had 509 runners on base for him that season. So at Turner’s success rate, even though you could count his home runs on one hand, he’d exceed 100 RBI. Isn’t that something?

“Justin Turner, RBI Guy.” Whoda thunk?

About the Author: Jesse Elgarten

14 Comments + Add Comment

alex68 July 21, 2011 at 10:23 am

so, at the end of all this, what your article is basically saying that he’s a clutch hitter who produces runs despite the fact that he gets less opp to drive them in??
Old Backstop July 21, 2011 at 10:26 am

Great post, I enjoy learning new things and this is one stat that does make a lot of sense to me. It’s almost kind of an indicator as to how clutch a player is with men on base? Anyway, that’s what it seems like to me based on your description. It also dispells the notion that you need to have a big homerun bat to be a solid RBI guy.
- XtreemIcon July 21, 2011 at 10:39 am
  
  Thank you for the comment. Turner’s hitting over 100 points higher with men on base than he is with the bases empty this season. That’s going to be very hard to sustain, but the Mets should take advantage of it sooner rather than later. He should be batting fourth after Beltran is traded (Murphy, Turner, Wright in the middle) until he cools down and regresses to the mean.
Metsie July 21, 2011 at 10:44 am

Great Article AND metric X!

Could even be the CLUTCH metric many of the saber rattlers claim does not exist.
Of course as with any metric it has to be applied correctly. Leadoff Men would likely have lower than usual opportunities and therefore their percentage could easily be skewed lower but as long as you remember that and compare him to other players with similar opportunities it would still be a decent clutch indicator.

As I have said in our past discussions, RBI is a very important number in judging the value of the player in question. And while those numbers are somewhat dependent on players in front of him, this at least takes those opportunities (or lack of) into account and it can be determined if the low RBI is him or those players not getting on in front of him!

It does penalize HR hitters like Howard who seem to have an opportunity to get an RBI in every PA but that can be remedied by a mere glance at the HR totals so it’s not a problem for me.
- XtreemIcon July 21, 2011 at 10:53 am
  
  Thanks, Metsie. Where have you been?
  
  This metric exists as an answer to the skewed way RBI totals are looked at. The percentages wouldn’t be skewed. Look at Pablo Sandoval. He’s got fewer than half the RBIs Howard does, 46% to be exact. But he’s batted this season with only 42% of the runners on base Howard has. It’s a perfectly valid argument that Pablo Sabdoval is better at driving in runs than Ryan Howard is. Actually, there are thirteen hitters in the league better at driving runners in than Howard, Turner included.
  - Metsie July 21, 2011 at 11:07 am
    
    It’s baseball season and have been working a few games as vacation replacement! SO been on the road a lot.
    That and I have been busy trying to write an operating system for my phone! LOL
    
    The skewing I spoke about could occur if a player with few opportunities got those few with lets say the bases loaded and failed but succeeded in one or two where there was only one guy on. Reverse it and it skews the opposite way.
    
    It is not a major statistical issue for me though as really the anomolies are more due to the same sampling issues most metrics and stats have. Not anything to do with the metric itself in fact the metric does everything it can to offset that situation.
    - XtreemIcon July 21, 2011 at 11:15 am
      
      You’re right about the bases loaded vs. man-on-first issue. Which is why I find it very good foresight that BP also includes the OBI from each individual base. You’re able to put it all in perspective.
      - Metsie July 21, 2011 at 11:28 am
        
        Yes it does show POTENTIAL of a batter to drive in runs provided he gets the opportunities which is really what you want to know when judging RBI potential of a player.
        Get more guys on base and he is likely to drive him in.
        
        At some point players with many more opportunities than normal will get hurt merely because of limitations of batting average which Howard might fall under.
        
        If you get up everytime with a runner on it is unreasonable to think a batter’s OBI could go much higher than his BA in that scenario but it does even out the disparity between players opportunities for normal. As with any metric extremes will skew but I don’t think it is enough to say it is not usable. Just like any metric you have to recognize the extremes and compensate accordingly.
        
        Metsie July 21, 2011 at 11:33 am
        
        sorry that should read higher than his BA would allow.
      - Metsie July 22, 2011 at 10:27 am
        
        I wonder how telling this stat would be on a TEAM basis!
    - XtreemIcon July 21, 2011 at 11:16 am
      
      You should write an MMO app. Get text updates when someone posts a new article or someone comments on your thread.
      - XtreemIcon July 21, 2011 at 11:18 am
        
        Shoot, that’s actually a great idea. I got dibs on intellectual property! Profits split with the one who actually knows how to write apps.
        
        Metsie July 21, 2011 at 11:31 am
        
        LOL I would however let the site owners create the market account so whatever they charged for it would help pay for the server costs here.
        
        They can cut you in! LOL
      - Metsie July 21, 2011 at 11:22 am
        
        I could have one done in an hour (App) as long as the site has an RSS feed. There is a new site called AppYet that you put in the RSS feed info and it automatically creates an App (Android) that can be put on the Market.
        
        If the mods are interested here is the link.
        http://www.appyet.com/
        
        If you want some help feel free to let me know I can create it for you but it really is as simple as filling out a form and getting a download.

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