Nolan Arenado’s Slump Adds to Cardinals’ Woes

Nolan Arenado may have received the Nationwide League Most Priceless Participant award final 12 months, although he misplaced out to teammate Paul Goldschmidt, who gave chase to the Triple Crown and completed with the extra eye-catching conventional stats (however barely decrease fWAR and bWAR). However whereas Goldschmidt has been equally productive this 12 months amid the Cardinals’ dreadful begin — certainly, his three homers on Sunday helped finish the group’s eight-game shedding streak — the identical can’t be mentioned for Arenado, who’s off to an uncharacteristically dangerous begin.

Between compiling their worst file via 35 video games in half a century and making the puzzling determination to maneuver marquee free agent Willson Contreras off of catcher, the Cardinals are such a mess that I discussed Arenado solely in passing on Monday. He’s nowhere close to the group’s greatest drawback, but on the similar time, the 32-year-old third baseman is hitting simply .232/.282/.326 for a 69 wRC+ to date. His 82-point drop from final 12 months’s 151 wRC+ is the majors’ second-largest amongst gamers with at the very least 400 plate appearances final 12 months and 100 this 12 months:

Arenado, whose 207-point drop in slugging can also be the majors’ largest at these cutoffs, isn’t the one MVP-caliber participant struggling. Decide, the reigning AL MVP, hasn’t come near replicating final 12 months’s astronomical numbers, although he’s nonetheless an above-average hitter. Machado, who completed between Goldschmidt and Arenado within the NL MVP voting (and edged each in WAR), is scuffling practically as badly as his fellow third baseman. A number of latest All-Stars apart from these gamers (Benintendi, Giménez, Marte, Rodríguez, and Springer) are represented above as properly. That’s baseball, Suzyn.

To have a look at Arenado’s stats is to play “What’s Fallacious with This Image?” as a result of a complete lot of his numbers are out of whack relative to final 12 months and his longer monitor file. The overarching theme that emerges upon nearer inspection is that he’s shedding the battle to regulate the strike zone, and his contact is the poorer for it. Swing charges begin stabilize to at 50 PA, so it’s noteworthy that he’s providing at 51.9% of all pitches, his highest price since his 2013 rookie season, and up from 48.4% final 12 months. Likewise with regards to his 40.2% chase price, up from 36.1% final 12 months. His 11.4% swinging-strike price is his highest ever, up practically three factors from final 12 months’s 8.6%, and two factors above his norm.

All of that matches into the sample of a participant who’s urgent. That wouldn’t be stunning below the circumstances, which on this case embrace a reigning division champion that even amid a two-game successful streak — the second of which Arenado sat out on Monday night time — owns the NL’s worst file at 12–24.

Pitch-wise, Arenado’s whiff charges are notably elevated in opposition to four-seam fastballs (20.7%, up from final 12 months’s 13.3%), changeups (34.6%, up from 23.2%), sliders (33.8%, up from 25.6%), and curves (26.3%, up rom 20.6%), which collectively account for about 72% of the pitches he’s seen. General, his 20.8% strikeout price is the best of his profession, six proportion factors above his profession price and practically double final 12 months’s 11.6% price. In the meantime, his 6.7% stroll price is his lowest mark since 2015, and down 1.7 factors from final 12 months.

So, he’s making contact much less, and when he does, it’s not nice. Arenado is hitting the ball on the bottom greater than ever, and his common exit velocity, barrel price and hard-hit charges are the bottom of his profession:

I’ve solely gone again so far as 2019, however the knowledge covers some peaks and valleys, beginning with that 41-homer season, then a tough and sad 2020 that was marred by his playing though an AC joint injury. His 2021 was a partial rebound, with 34 homers however only a .312 on-base proportion and 113 wRC+, down 18 factors from his 2017–19 run. Then got here final 12 months’s stellar marketing campaign, wherein he hit .293/.358/.533 and set profession bests with a 150 wRC+ and seven.3 WAR.

The one different time apart from this season wherein Arenado has ever had a groundball price above 40% was in his 2013 rookie season; taking part in half his video games in Coors Area, he shortly realized the benefit to getting the ball off the bottom and into the skinny air. He’s had just one different season with a groundball-flyball ratio above 1.0, and that was in 2018 (1.03, with a 39.9% groundball price).

Via the years, Arenado’s Statcast numbers have typically been fairly middling. Apart from final 12 months’s barrel price, which positioned within the 53rd percentile, he hasn’t had an exit velo, barrel price, or hard-hit price within the fiftieth percentile or above since 2019. Even in the most effective of instances, he makes a variety of dangerous contact — balls that Statcast classifies as weak, topped, or below however which are considerably elusive of their precise parameters. By way of the Baseball Savant Pitch Highlighter hyperlink (below Visuals from the primary Baseball Savant menu — I share this as a result of I can’t discover it with out breadcrumbs), you will get a really feel for them through these fancy interactive radial graphs, the place rollovers illustrate every kind of contact and the way the hitter has carried out inside that class. For instance, listed here are screenshots for his topped balls — these with low exit velocity and principally unfavourable launch angles — for 2022 and ’23:

Should you squint on the stat strains close to the underside, you’ll be able to see that he’s hitting extra of these as a proportion of his batted balls, and that his batting common on them has fallen by practically half. Certainly, balls within the weak, topped, and below buckets not often go for hits. Final 12 months, these accounted for 60.4% of Arenado’s batted ball occasions, on which he hit .103 and slugged .155; for 2015–22, they make up 60.8% of his batted balls, with a .136 AVG and .194 SLG. This 12 months, they make up 64.8%, his highest price save for his dismal 2020 (71.1%), and on these, he’s hitting and slugging simply .087; he’s truly a bit unfortunate on these, given his .124 xBA and .155 xSLG. That’s contributing to him falling wanting his general anticipated numbers for the primary time within the Statcast period:

I’ve solely proven the the previous 4 seasons plus this one right here, however the development goes again to 2015. I don’t know if that’s a Coors Area factor or if Arenado has lived a charmed life, however each single 12 months, he outdid his xBA, xSLG, and xwOBA, a development that continued to St. Louis. 5 instances in eight seasons, his slugging proportion was at the very least 81 factors greater than anticipated. This 12 months, for the primary time, he’s lagging behind his anticipated stats, and so his 91-point year-to-year drop in xSLG turns into the aforementioned 207-point drop in precise slugging proportion.

Even with that in thoughts, Arenado is struggling as badly as he ever has by way of energy. Right here’s his rolling xSLG over 75 PA:

Arenado has taken among the blame for the group’s sluggish begin and vaguely acknowledged points along with his swing. Via the St. Louis Submit-Dispatch’s Lynn Worthy:

Arenado’s timing has been out of whack on the plate, and he has been attempting to kind via points along with his swing and described himself as “slightly disconnected” mechanically.

“It’s unlucky,” Arenado mentioned. “I feel if we have been successful, I in all probability wouldn’t be fearful about it a lot. However the truth that we’re shedding, it feels rather a lot worse as a result of I’m not taking part in my half. That comes with the territory, I assume. I count on to repair it. I’m working laborious on it, and hopefully at present is an efficient day.”

On the timing be aware, the slugger’s efficiency in opposition to four-seam fastballs notably stands out and in addition factors again to the SLG-xSLG hole:

Arenado’s slugging proportion in opposition to all four-seamers has fallen off by 201 factors relative to final 12 months, but his xSLG in opposition to them is down solely 31 factors. His basic performances in opposition to the pitch have various, usually out of step with the remainder of his strains (be aware the sturdy 2020 in an in any other case weak 12 months, adopted by a drop-off in what was in any other case a a lot stronger marketing campaign). A peek at his performances in opposition to heaters 95 mph or greater exhibits extra constant work from 2019 to ’22, with a drop this season which will simply owe to pattern dimension. He’s truly whiffing much less in opposition to these pitches, and his xSLG on them is definitely greater, all of which brings to thoughts Ben Clemens’ Abreu-flavored investigation into year-to-year correlations (or the shortage of them) after we get this granular. Brief model: whiff charges on four-seamers of 95 mph or extra correlate moderately properly from 12 months to 12 months, however run values — which summarize the standard of contact in addition to the swings-and-misses — don’t.

All of which is to say that I don’t assume that is the start of the tip for Arenado. He’s in a foul stoop which will owe one thing to the self-induced strain of not producing as his group hits the skids, however that’s to not counsel he received’t get out of it. I’ll exit on a limb and counsel that fixing his swing remains to be in all probability simpler to do than remaking a lackluster rotation that’s scapegoating the brand new catcher.