Matsui Out, Johnson In, Yanks Better
Written by Bill   
Friday, 18 December 2009 09:00

Quick(ish) hit today:

Hideki Matsui, unwanted in New York, signs a one-year, $6 million contract to be the Angels' DH.

To replace him, apparently, the Yankees have brought Nick Johnson back on a one-year, $5.5 million contract to be their DH.

I imagine a lot of Yankee fans are, much like Rich at Empire Sports Now, displeased with this development.

Well, I'd be a little upset too. If I were an Angel fan.

In 3116 PA since 2001, Johnson has hit .273/.402/.447. He has a 125 OPS+, a .371 wOBA, and a 130 wRC+ (a brand new formulation based on wOBA on the same skill as OPS+; so by that evidently more accurate measure, he's been 30% above average rather than 25%).

In 3816 PA since 2003, Matsui has hit .292/.370/.482. He has a 124 OPS+, a .367 wOBA, and a 127 wRC+.

If you stop there (and we're going to skip WAR for once, since Johnson's sizeable advantage comes mostly from being a better fielder six or seven years ago, and neither of these guys should even own a baseball glove at this point), it's already pretty clear that, at the very least, Johnson is just as good a hitter as Matsui.

Then consider that Johnson is more than four years younger than Matsui. At 36, Matsui could just fall apart. He probably won't, in a one year deal, but he could. At 31, Johnson is in the prime of his career.

What else is there? As I said, neither is likely to play a game in the field. They've both missed significant time to injury in the last several years. Matsui has done it despite being a primary DH for the last two seasons; at least with Johnson, you have the hope that moving to the AL and not having to play first base anymore can help keep his bat in the lineup. Rich in the link above has a problem with giving up power and adding OBP...but that's never a bad thing, regardless of the makeup of your team (and of course the Yankees are retaining plenty of power as it is). What a team needs isn't a leadoff hitter, #2 hitter, #5 hitter, and so on; what a team needs, rather, is to put a lineup out there that's going to score as many runs as possible. Nick Johnson might not fit the profile of a #5 or #6 hitter as well as Matsui did, but he'll very likely help create more runs than Matsui would have, so I'll take that instead.

They got younger, got better, and saved $500,000. And I don't think it's even a given that they've given up power so much; Johnson's always had good doubles power, which could well turn into HR power as a lefty in New Yankee.In all, this was an absolute no-brainer of a deal for the Yankees.

Damn them.



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Comments (4)Add Comment
...
written by Empire Sports Now, December 18, 2009
So your argument is that Johnson is better than Matsui because:

Johnson .273/.402/.447. He has a 125 OPS+, a .371 wOBA, and a 130 wRC+
Matsui .292/.370/.482. He has a 124 OPS+, a .367 wOBA, and a 127 wRC+

Matsui has better AVG, SLG, a worse OBP and everything else he is minutely behind. There's no mention of Matsui being a proven DH when Nick Johnson hasn't been a primary DH before in his career. No mention of postseason experience and what Matsui did coming off the bench in the WS. No mention of # of Ks, HR, Hits, RBIs. Your entire reasoning is on OBP and a small difference in OPS+ wOBA, wRC+.

You must love the book "Money Ball" by Billy Beane b/c he stands by OBP.

Matsui has a better OPS by 3 points if we want to nitpick.

The age of 35/36 is not over the hill yet. Matsui has one more big year in him.

Johnson is going to get the job done as the Yankees # 2 hitter though, I don't want to take anything away from him.

Thanks for the discussion.
...
written by Bill@TDS, December 18, 2009
Thanks for the comment.

Matsui has better AVG, SLG, a worse OBP and everything else he is minutely behind.
It's not the kind of thing where you add up who leads in what categories and declare a winner. The categories that Johnson leads in -- OPS+ and (especially) wOBA and wRC+ above, and a slew of similar types of numbers -- incorporate all those other stats. What they say is that taken altogether, considering Johnson's OBP advantage and Matsui's BA and SLG advantage and everything else you've mentioned and more, Johnson is a slightly better hitter. Attempting to consider all those things individually along with things like wRC+ and WAR is like saying "yeah, you might have more money, but I have more nickels and quarters--your only advantage is in dollar bills and total money!"

I made a comment on your blog that talked about the "postseason experience" thing, but it got eaten by the internet. Postseason baseball is exactly the same as regular-type baseball, except the competition is better. Matsui's World Series, incredible as it was, doesn't make him an especially good "postseason player." In the three postseasons he played in before 2009, Matsui hit .213/.313/.319. It's the luck of the draw.

Billy Beane didn't write Moneyball. But, yes, it's a very good book.

36 may not be over the hill, but it's very definitely post-peak. Duke Snider, Jeff Bagwell, Harmon Killebrew, and Eddie Mathews all pretty much fell off a cliff at or around age 36. You never know. What you do know is that all else being equal, a 31 year old is a better bet tha na 36 year old.
Wow
written by YardYoder, December 18, 2009
You'd think by now people would realize that Moneyball wasn't written by Billy Beane. It of course was authored by Michael Lewis who also penned the book turned heartfelt movie with Sandra Bullock, The Blind Side.

I wrote something similar today as Johnson had spent his last several years in Washington. It seems to me that Johnson has lost a good deal of power since his injury plagued 2007+2008.

"A look at Johnson's last two healthy seasons:
2006: .290/.428/.520, 23 HR, 46 2B, .404 wOBA, 5.3 WAR
2009: .291/.426/.405, 8 HR, 24 2B, .373 wOBA, 2.4 WAR"

I also wrote though, that playing in Yankee stadium, and playing DH, should help his power.
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written by Richie, January 08, 2010
Haha Bill I love your little quotes and analogies. I do agree with the age thing although I personally think Matsui's power will be missed in the Yankees lineup.

As you could probably tell, I'm not a big fan of sabermetrics or Moneyball (and sorry about the Billy Beane thing but it's his philosophy so I assumed he wrote it). Moneyball hasn't proven to work in a sport that is powered by rich teams. On an even playing field, I'd be interested to see if moneyball would win. Unfortunately, an even playing field is a dream.

We can go back and forth on this issue and it was a joy to discuss the issue with you. Keep up the good work!

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