Bay’s stats are great in 08. Now are they sustainable?

In the off-season we speculated as to why Jason Bay had such a piss poor 2007 campaign. We had a few guess’, including an change in approach (more aggressive) & his knee causing him to be late on pitches (brought forth by intrepid mopupduty.com writer Callum). Either way, two things were certain. One his BB/K ratio was way off career norms and two he wasn’t pulling the ball as he had in the past. Let’s tackle these one at a time and compare his 2008 data.

Career Stats

Walks & Strikeouts

Prior to 2007 Jason Bay fit the profile of most elite power hitters, he struck out a ton but he made up for this with close to 100 walks per season. This held true in his strong 2005 & 2006 seasons. As we can see from the stat line below 2007 was a huge blip, with his K rate remaining relatively the same but his walk rate shrinking all the way down a measly 59 walks. Well there is some good news for Bay & Bucco fans alike; this season Jason already has 40 walks and has actually improved his K/BB ratio to 1.0, which is awesome. This shows us that the patient OBP machine Bay is back in 2008

Spray Chart

Taking only home data (that’s all we could muster-up) we see that 2006 featured Bay pulling or go straight up the gut with a good portion of his extra base hits. Remember that Bay is a right handed batter.

In 2007 we find most of his extra base hits going up the middle or now the other way.

Now the 2008 Spray Chart

He’s back to pulling his extra base hits, which is certainly a good sign when taking into account his past tendencies.

If you’re a fantasy owner of Bay or a Pirates fan the why probably isn’t all that important to you. Of more concern is the question of sustainability? Well by judging Bay’s past performance data I’d have to conclude that he’s back in 2008 and may even be primed for his best season yet.