On Ryan Braun

This article includes a lot of technical terminology, but it's worth the read because it's a very frank look at Braun's defense.

Ryan Braun's Defense
by Nate Silver
Publish Post
I’ve made several snide remarks about Ryan Braun’s third base defense in recent weeks, most recently in my review of the 50 most valuable players in baseball. I don’t have anything against Ryan Braun; it would be hard for someone with the last name Silver to root against the Hebrew Hammer. Nor is this based on any sort of personal observation. I’d probably have to see a player at least 10 times in person or 25-30 times on television before I’d be comfortable contributing any kind of scouting take on his defense, and the only teams I see play that often during the season are the two local clubs, and maybe the two that advance to the World Series. But there’s no doubt about it: Ryan Braun’s defense is bad.

These were the trailers in Clay Davenport’s Fielding Runs Above Average (FRAA) last season:

-22 Kouzmanoff, 3B, SD
-20 Braun, 3B, MIL
-19 Durham, 2B, SFG
-18 Burrell, LF, PHI
-18 Harris, INF, TB
-17 Willingham, LF, FLA
-17 Dunn, LF, CIN
-17 Atkins, 3B, COL
-16 Fielder, 1B, MIL
-16 Hall, CF, MIL
-16 Lugo, SS, BOS
-15 Eckstein, SS, STL
-15 Sanchez, 2B, PIT

Braun doesn’t actually have the lowest score on this list — he has the second lowest behind Kevin Kouzmanoff. But FRAA is a counting stat rather than a rate stat, and Braun played only about two-thirds of the season, whereas most everybody else had the full year to accumulate their low scores. On a rate basis, Braun was a little worse than Kouzmanoff, and Braun and Kouzmanoff were quite a bit worse than any other regular or quasi-regular in the game. By the way, notice how many of these players are notoriously old, slow, fat, or were playing out of position; these are exactly the people you’d expect to see on a list like this one.

We can also look at a second-generation, play-by-play based metric like the Hardball Times’ Revised Zone Rating. According to that statistic, there were five regular defensive players who made at least 10% fewer plays than an average player at their position. Ryan Braun is one of them; in fact he rates at the second-worst defender in baseball relative to his position, ahead of only Manny Ramirez.

-19.1% Ramirez, LF, BOS
-16.4% Braun, 3B, MIL
-12.0% Encarnacion, 3B, CIN
-13.4% Young, 1B, WAS
-10.7% Sexson, 1B, SEA
-9.5% Fielder, 1B, MIL
-9.3% Bautista, 3B, PIT
-9.2% Atkins, 3B, COL

And so we have agreement from two systems, with radically different approaches, that Braun was one of the very worst defensive players in baseball in 2007.

I don’t have Braun’s rating in my favorite third-gen metric, UZR, but here’s what Mitchel Lichtman had to say about him:

Braun would certainly be the worst [third baseman], if he qualified. Even using zero UZR to make up the games he “missed” he is still probably the worst. That is a shame since he is such a good hitter, and his poor defense takes most (75% or so) of his hitting value away.

Making a few inferences from Mitchel’s statements, this would imply that Braun’s UZR falls somewhere between Miguel Cabrera’s -28, and 75% of his 2007 VORP, which works out to -43. So here again, Braun ranks as one of the worst four or five defensive players in baseball, challenged only by Pat Burrell’s -34, Manny Ramirez’ -33, and Raul Ibanez‘ -30. By consensus view, Braun was probably the very worst defensive player in baseball in 2007; the only real competitors for the title might be Ramirez, and perhaps Burrell.

But the question is not so much whether Braun was bad in 2007 — he was awful — but how he’s likely to play going forward. Before the season, Braun was regarded anywhere from a somewhat below-average defender at third base to a problematically bad one. Here’s what Kevin Goldstein wrote about him last December.

Despite the tools, Braun is still inadequate at the hot corner. His footwork is bad, and while he has plus arm strength, his throws lack accuracy. His bat is nearly major league ready, so if the glove doesn’t catch up fast enough, he could be moved to right field. The bat will play anywhere.

This view is largely confirmed by Tom Tango’s Fans Scouting Report:

Speed 60
Arm Strength 57
First Step 52
Instincts 50
Hands 25
Release 9
Arm Accuracy 0

Braun grades out as roughly average in several categories, including the range-based metrics of speed and first step. Unfortunately, his hands are bad, and his release and throwing accuracy are off-the-charts bad. And double unfortunately, these would tend to be the categories that are most important for a third baseman; speed doesn’t matter much at all, for instance.

Are these things that Braun can work on? Perhaps: I’d certainly hold out more hope that a coach could improve a player’s accuracy and release than his arm strength. But the thing is, once a player reaches the major leagues for a competitive club, there isn’t much room for experimentation. What’s the upside to that experiment? Braun goes from being a way below-average defender at third base to a somewhat below-average one. And then you have to move him in a couple years anyway once he bulks up and slows down. What’s the downside? Braun can’t or won’t improve, or he takes a long time to do so, costing the Brewers runs in the field each week while the experiment in progress. Even worse, you could trigger a crisis of confidence, or detract from his work on his hitting approach, which requires more improvement than you might think. And all of this for what benefit? National League third basemen hit .280/.348/.456 last year, which is actually a bit better than the .275/.344/.442 it got out of its right fielders, and only slightly worse than the .278/.358/.478 from the left field position. The gap in the defensive spectrum between third base and corner outfield is small as compared with the gap between third base and center field or second base.

Braun, in spite have never played the position professionally, is probably much closer to being an adequate defensive corner outfielder than an adequate defensive third baseman. He runs reasonably well, and while his arm is not accurate, it is probably strong enough to deter baserunners from advancing on him Johnny Damon style. And the good news is that there are any number of permutations that would allow the Brewers to improve their defense without really losing any ground at the plate. For example:

* Move Braun to LF, sign Mike Lowell at 3B, sit on Matt LaPorta for a year

* Move Bill Hall to 3B, Braun to RF, and Corey Hart to CF; LaPorta gets the opportunity to make the big league club out of spring training.
* Trade Bill Hall and Claudio Vargas for Joe Crede and Faustino de los Santos, move Hart to CF, Braun to RF.

You get the idea … there are a million ways the Brewers can play this without incurring any real transaction costs.

If Braun does move to the outfield, does he become one of the most valuable commodities in baseball? We’ll have to see what PECOTA does with him, since there’s room for concern about his plate discipline numbers too. But the worst case would seem to be that he becomes another version of Jeff Francoeur, and that’s a pretty good worst-case scenario.