Angels sign Brett Phillips (1 year, $1.2 million), DFA Austin Warren

[jsnpritchett]

2 hours ago, Angel Oracle said:

Phillips over 900 career MLB PAs so far has averaged just under 50 BBs per 500 PAs, not bad at all.

If he could just get the BA up to .240/.250, will definitely be a big asset as 4th OFer, a guy who can fill in for someone on the IL as he can play multiple OF positions.

The word "just" is doing a lot of work in that sentence.  He's a career .188 hitter whose highest BA in any season during which he got significant AB is .206--and he's coming off a year in which he hit .144 in over 200 AB.  I think a more realistic goal would be something like .220.  Anything above that would be a huge bonus.

[Warfarin]

https://blogs.fangraphs.com/angels-continue-adding-roster-depth-sign-brett-phillips/

Quote

While Phillips likely won’t win many games with his bat, his defensive abilities rank among the best in baseball. The base component of any outfielder’s skillset is speed, and his 28.9 ft/s sprint speed ranks in the 88th percentile in the league. Not only is he ridiculously fast, but his natural instincts and ability to accelerate to that top speed also give him more range than almost any other fielder. According to Statcast’s outfield jump leaderboard, he ran 4.3 feet more than average in the first three seconds of chasing down a fly ball; only Kyle Isbel ranked higher. With these factors combined, Phillips has put up 22 OAA in the past two seasons, landing him in elite company

This is a very good, in-depth article that breaks down Phillips' value.  Worth a read.

[Blarg]

I hope he gets very little playing time. 

[Chuck]

3 hours ago, jsnpritchett said:

The word "just" is doing a lot of work in that sentence.  He's a career .188 hitter whose highest BA in any season during which he got significant AB is .206--and he's coming off a year in which he hit .144 in over 200 AB.  I think a more realistic goal would be something like .220.  Anything above that would be a huge bonus.

Maybe with his new approach he can improve significantly. Who knows?

Was looking at his career minor league stats and they're not bad. 

.274/.364/.847 slash with 99 HR and 107 SB. 

His best season was in AAA back in 2017 when he slashed .305/.377/.567 with 19 HR in 105 games. 

Worst case, we get a guy with good defense who has a little pop and can steal a base late in the game. 

[Warfarin]

1 hour ago, Blarg said:

I hope he gets very little playing time. 

If he is starting a lot of games, either something has gone horribly wrong on the injury front, or we should be hiring Woodward immediately because Phillips has been transformed into an All-Star.

[jsnpritchett]

3 minutes ago, Chuckster70 said:

Maybe with his new approach and he can improve significantly. Who knows?

Was looking at his career minor league stats and they're not bad. 

.274/.364/.847 slash with 99 HR and 107 SB. 

His best season was in AAA back in 2017 when he slashed .305/.377/.567 with 19 HR in 105 games. 

Worst case, we get a guy with good defense who has a little pop and can steal a base late in the game. 

Yeah, I'm not complaining about the signing.  I'm just saying that 50+-point jumps in batting average are pretty rare these days!  And he doesn't have to do that in order to still be an effective 4th OFer.

[arch stanton]

11 hours ago, jsnpritchett said:

The word "just" is doing a lot of work in that sentence.  He's a career .188 hitter whose highest BA in any season during which he got significant AB is .206--and he's coming off a year in which he hit .144 in over 200 AB.  I think a more realistic goal would be something like .220.  Anything above that would be a huge bonus.

So he’s the outfield version of John McDonald. We could do worse 

[Rollinghard]

His best season was in AAA back in 2017 when he slashed .305/.377/.567 with 19 HR in 105 games.

Those ^^^^^ are good numbers. My guess is some boneheaded hitting coach tried to "fix" him somewhere along the way and he ended up with that horrible looking swing. He can only get better with his new swing.  

[Rollinghard]

enjoy

 

[tdawg87]

I like this guy. I hope he gets fewer than 300 PA's but he seems like a spark plug. 

I think Perrence knows what he's doing, it's just a matter of the players he brings in actually performing. 

[Docwaukee]

He's on the team so Moniak and Adell can play everyday.  One way or another whether in AAA or the majors.  I'm sure it's a kick in the nuts that neither is likely to start the year in the bigs but they really don't deserve it at this point.  That said, they're both in line to be first up in case of a DL stint by any one of the starting three OFers.  And as I've mapped out in the past, it's likely there will be about 500 PA in the OF that those three won't cover.  Phillips isn't going to get anywhere close to all of those.  He's still the 4th OFer or perhaps becomes more of a platoon guy should Adell get called up.  They're not gonna bring him up to sit on the bench should the need arise.  

[Revad]

7 minutes ago, Docwaukee said:

He's on the team so Moniak and Adell can play everyday.  One way or another whether in AAA or the majors.  I'm sure it's a kick in the nuts that neither is likely to start the year in the bigs but they really don't deserve it at this point.  That said, they're both in line to be first up in case of a DL stint by any one of the starting three OFers.  And as I've mapped out in the past, it's likely there will be about 500 PA in the OF that those three won't cover.  Phillips isn't going to get anywhere close to all of those.  He's still the 4th OFer or perhaps becomes more of a platoon guy should Adell get called up.  They're not gonna bring him up to sit on the bench should the need arise.  

I complained earlier in the year about outfielder depth, but it’s not that bad.  There needs to be a way for them to succeed, which in the end means there needs to be an open position.

[Hubs]

Over/Under to when Phillips comes out in a Rally Monkey suit? I say June 15th.

 

[Inside Pitch]

1 hour ago, Docwaukee said:

He's on the team so Moniak and Adell can play everyday.  One way or another whether in AAA or the majors.  I'm sure it's a kick in the nuts that neither is likely to start the year in the bigs but they really don't deserve it at this point. 

They invested in both of their futures by poaching a guy away from the Mets with a track record of developing MLB hitters to act as the AAA hitting coach.  The ball is both Moniak and Adell's court.  If and when they make it to the majors and prove themselves quality players then they can start asking for heated towel holders and crap.

[BTH]

18 minutes ago, Inside Pitch said:

They invested in both of their futures by poaching a guy away from the Mets with a track record of developing MLB hitters to act as the AAA hitting coach.  The ball is both Moniak and Adell's court.  If and when they make it to the majors and prove themselves quality players then they can start asking for heated towel holders and crap.

Did they poach him, or did the Mets fire him?

 

[Inside Pitch]

35 minutes ago, Trendon said:

Did they poach him, or did the Mets fire him?

He was hired in December, the Mets have yet to fill the position.  Could be they willingly chose not to renew him which is pretty much as good as being fired. 

[BTH]

3 minutes ago, Inside Pitch said:

He was hired in December, the Mets have yet to fill the position.  Could be they willingly chose not to renew him which is pretty much as good as being fired. 

What I’m asking is did the Mets want him back, but the Angels lured him away? Or did the Mets not want him back?

It’s semantics, but knowing whether his former employer wanted him back is an indicator of how good he is at his job.

And FWIW, they did fill the position:

 

[Inside Pitch]

8 minutes ago, Trendon said:

What I’m asking is did the Mets want him back, but the Angels lured him away? Or did the Mets not want him back?

It’s semantics, but knowing whether his former employer wanted him back is an indicator of how good he is at his job.

And FWIW, they did fill the position:

 

New info on the hitting coach as of 3 days ago.  I'm sure much as you were able to find that nugget, you'll be able to dig up info on how the Eppler front office viewed him.  Hetzler BTW was a driveline guy they hired in 2021 and served as their hitting ops manager.

[Angel Oracle]

On 1/11/2023 at 11:47 AM, jsnpritchett said:

The word "just" is doing a lot of work in that sentence.  He's a career .188 hitter whose highest BA in any season during which he got significant AB is .206--and he's coming off a year in which he hit .144 in over 200 AB.  I think a more realistic goal would be something like .220.  Anything above that would be a huge bonus.

Based on Phillips’ nearly 10% career walks, a .220 BA over say 300 PAs would produce close to a .300 OBP.

Edited January 13, 2023 by Angel Oracle

[Stradling]

1 hour ago, Angel Oracle said:

Based on Phillips’ nearly 10% career walks, a .220 BA over say 300 PAs would produce close to a .300 OBP.

If he walks 10% and hits .220 he’d be a .320 OBP guy. 

[Angel Oracle]

2 hours ago, Stradling said:

If he walks 10% and hits .220 he’d be a .320 OBP guy. 

Here’s how I arrived at near .300 OBP with 300 PAs and .220 BA.

10% BBs (30 BBs) subtracted from 300 PAs leads to 270 at bats.

270 times .220 = 59.4 hits 

59.4 hits + 30 BBs = 89.4

89.4 / 300 PAs = .298 OBP.

 

 

Edited January 13, 2023 by Angel Oracle

[mmc]

 

[Docwaukee]

8 hours ago, Stradling said:

If he walks 10% and hits .220 he’d be a .320 OBP guy. 

at 10% it's about a 70-90 point differential depending on the number of hits without taking into account SF and HBP.  

In other words, the lower the average, the greater the impact the walks (and other stuff) has on the obp difference from the BA.  

If he got hit 9 time and didn't have a sac fly, he'd have an obp around .320.  

Canha is a funny example.  He got hit 28 times and only had four sac flies.  With his 8.9% walk rate his differential was .101.  

This is definitely something that Fletcher should add to his game.  

[tdawg87]

6 minutes ago, mmc said:

 

Sweet.