The Indians have a 26-year-old third baseman who has been been both wildly successful and disappointing throughout his four years in the majors. And unfortunately, there’s been very little in between the two extremes.
The Indians have to make a decision regarding Lonnie Chisenhall’s future this offseason, and it’s not going to be an easy call to make.
Given the Indians financial situation, it will be difficult to bring a free agent into the fold, but the Indians do have the ability to adjust the roster via a trade. In need of an upgrade in the lineup, third base is one of the areas the Tribe could look to improve.
For the record, I’m not trying to make an argument for or against Chisenhall with this piece. I’m willing to trust the Indians on this one, as I’ll talk about later. This piece is simply set up to highlight a few of the major issues Chisenhall faces and what the Indians need to consider this offseason.
Performance vs Lefties
One of the most encouraging signs from Chisenhall’s early-season success was his performance against lefties. The Indians broadcasts continually showed Chisenhall’s stats against lefties due to the shocking numbers, but they were incredibly misleading due to a small sample size and an absolutely impossibly good, Babe-Ruth-combined-with-Barry-Bonds start to the year.
Chisenhall entered the All-Star break with a .333 average against lefties, which had Indians fans screaming that he should be in the lineup against lefties more often. But what Francona probably realized was the fact that his absurdly unsustainable .563 average in April and May skewed those numbers for the remainder of the year.
| AVG | SLUG | OBP | BABIP | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1. June – Sept ’14 | .247 | .301 | .307 | .324 |
| 2. April – May ’14 | .563 | .813 | .611 | .615 |
| 3. 2011-2013 | .194 | .387 | .225 | .209 |
As you can see from the chart, Chisenhall’s performance against lefties for the majority of the year (June through September) dropped back down into a more realistic and somewhat disappointing range.
A .307 OBP against lefties is not acceptable for an everyday third baseman, however, it’s still a substantial increase from the embarrassing .225 mark he posted through his first three years in the league.
The improvement is certainly encouraging, but the Indians need to determine how much more room there is for growth.
Too Many Strikeouts, Not Enough Walks, Not Enough Power
Strikeouts have become an acceptable part of the game, but only under certain conditions. For example, Carlos Santana struck out in 18 percent of his plate appearances last season. But 25 percent of Santana’s plate appearances resulted in either a walk or an extra-base hit.
Chisenhall also struck out in 18 percent of his plate appearances, but produced a walk or an extra-base hit in just eight percent of his plate appearances.
The rate at which Chisenhall strikes out doesn’t have to be concerning, but has become so due to his lack of an eye at the plate and the lack of development in his power.
Take a look at the list of corner infielders in their age-25 season since 1990 with twice as many strikeouts as walks and an OPS under .800. There are some recognizable names on here, but it’s a pretty disappointing list overall.
The Indians need to determine if Chisenhall has the tools to continue his development in this area and morph into a Joe Crede-type third baseman, or if the strikeout issue will continue to plague him and force him to fizzle out like former Indian Kevin Kouzmanoff.
Struggling with Inside Pitches
It’s tough to project sustained success for a player with an obvious hole in their swing.
Chisenhall struggles mightily with the inside pitch, and did not show any meaningful improvement during the 2014 season. His .154 career average on inside pitches ranks as the eighth worst among left-handed batters since 2011, and his .171 average in 2014 showed only marginal improvement.
The issue for Chisenhall on inside pitches relates to his issue with the strike zone. He chased 35 percent of the inside pitches he saw which were out of the strike zone, the 11th worst inside-pitch chase percentage among lefties in 2014. To better put that number into perspective, Santana chased just 15 percent of the inside pitches he saw off the plate.
So what should they do?
Chisenhall took a step in the right direction this season, and he’s only 26 years old. For those reasons, it’s certainly reasonable to hope that he could continue his development and emerge as a quality everyday third baseman. But only the Indians coaching staff and front office know if they can trust Chisenhall to continue to grow.
When I’m not writing for IPL, I’m scouting NFL prospects for DraftAce.com and Bleacher Report, which I have been doing for a little over a decade. If there’s one thing I’ve learned in attempting to project the development of young athletes, it’s that no outsider can predict development better than those who see the work ethic of the athlete on a daily basis.
Whenever I speak with a coach or teammate who speaks negatively about a prospect’s work ethic, that player eventually fails to succeed at the next level 100 percent of the time. For that reason, when it comes to a player like Chisenhall – someone who shows promise, but also reason for concern – I’m willing to trust those who see him every day.
The Indians will obviously look at the issues I’ve outlined here, and probably many others, when considering Chisenhall’s future. But if they decide it’s time to move on, I will fully support that decision. After seeing him at the major league level for parts of four seasons, the front office should have a strong understanding of Chisenhall’s work ethic and his ability to continue to elevate his game.
Not sure how the list is exactly disappointing. Around half of those players had or currently have decent major league careers. Not saying Chisenhall has issues, just not sure how the list provides any foretelling of future success or failure. I would also note that although Chisenhall’s numbers cooled off in the last two months of the season, it wasn’t his numbers against LHP that caused his numbers overall to plummet the way they did the second half, it was the numbers against RHP. If he was to hit LHP like he did the last two months, but hit RHP like he did the first half and keep that kind of split, that is more than enough to be a regular starter, considering the RHP to LHP split is 70-30 and if you rest him once a week against a LHP, his overall numbers would be great. And let’s not forget, in spite of his lower numbers against LHP the last two months, those were still much better numbers than Kipnis put up against LHP this year, and yet Kipnis still had 60 more PAs than Chisenhall against LHP in spite of being on the DL for more than a month.
Chisenhall hit .217 against lefties over the final 2 months of the season.
I say again what I said after your last column… it seems like you’re making the assumption that the good parts of Chisenhall’s season are a fluke, while the bad parts are the “real” Chisenhall, especially based on his previous years.
It’s possible that’s the case, but it’s also possible that the “real” Chisenhall is the good one, and that his regression at the end of the season is a fluke. It’s very possible that he made some solid strides this season, but regressed badly at the end. Most likely, the real Lonnie Chisenhall is somewhere in the middle.
Take, for example, his OBP vs. lefties, which you took exception to in this article. On the season, only Santana, Brantley, and Gomes had a higher OBP vs. lefties than Chisenhall. Everyone else was worse. In fact, Jason Kipnis’s OBP vs. lefties was almost a hundred points behind Chisenhall’s.
Yes, Kipnis had a bad year. So did Raburn, Aviles, Swisher, etc. In fact, other than Chisenhall and Brantley, everyone in the Indians’ lineup performed worse than their career averages last year.
Too many strikeouts? Fangraphs rates a 20% strikeout rate as average, 16% as above average. At 18.6%, Lonnie was slightly above average – and average for the Indians too.
As for walks, Lonnie was average to slightly below average. Santana, Swisher, Murphy, and Brantley had higher BB% than Chisenhall, but Bourn, Cabrera, Raburn, Gomes, and Aviles did worse.
OPS? Only Brantley, Santana, and Gomes were better. Everyone else was worse.
I think the difference here is that you’re looking at Chisenhall compared to what a third baseman “ought” to be able to do. But whether the Indians can or will spend money to get a typical third baseman is an entirely different proposition. It’s also a question of where the Indians ought to focus their efforts on improving, and the value that they’re getting from the players they have.
So sure, maybe Chisenhall fails at the examples you looked at historically. But how expensive were those players at those times? How do they compare to Chisenhall’s current salary and contract status? Most importantly, who’s out there & available at third base that the Dolans would actually pay for, and who would provide not just a greater performance but a greater value than Chisenhall? And is this theoretical upgrade at third more important & valuable than the upgrades that are available & affordable at other positions?
Of course, all of this depends on Lonnie’s “value”. He’s eligible for arbitration, and with such highs and lows in the same season, who knows how that will turn out. And next year, his value may change a lot, and I wouldn’t be surprised if it clarified one way or the other.
In this age of ridiculous salaries & penny-pinching Dolans, I think taking a gamble on a guy like Chisenhall is not only a good idea, it’s absolutely necessary if the Indians are going to succeed.
Baseball always has players who put up numbers in one half of a season that are WAY WAY WAY better than anything they have done in the past, and rarely produce in the future. If interested I can post a few. I’m afraid that this is where Lonnie is.
We are talking about a guy who over about 70ish games was amazing, rest of career at the Major League lever has been trash.
I agree that a Joe Crede type 3rd basemen would be fine. But this player most assuredly is not Chisenhall. Crede was a good defensive 3rd basemen, Lonnie is an awful defensive 3rd basemen.
His offense and defense are well below what this team needs. If he did either well the story might be different, but outside of 70 games he just hasn’t shown much of anything
Would love to be wrong, but I see nothing to indicate much future success. Best outcome I can see for the Tribe is to be able to move him for a 5th through 8th SP type with potential upside and minor league options.
Again, he also had a decent 2012 with a .741 OPS in 46 games. He has pedigree of hitting at all levels in the minors as well, most of the time at an age significantly younger than his competition. Also, this is the first year his defense has been this horrible, and it tightened up as the year went along. That list that was provided has a lot of names of players in the middle of or already had good long ML careers, so not exactly sure why we would be afraid of him being one of them if that is the case.
hey man, another great article. down the stretch for him was brutal for sure. .247 avg and was slightly lucky with the .324 babip. i’m a fan of lonnie’s and hope he continues to develop. looking at the numbers i can’t believe that stretch where he had an over 1.400 OPS. that’s effing insane.
Yeah, the hitting was up and down, but what’s most frustrating to me was the defense. Lonnie was dead-last in fielding percentage among qualified third basemen, and it wasn’t even close. He had a .931 fielding percentage and 2nd to the bottom was Cody Asche at .943. It’s not like that was much of an abberation either, as his career number is .939. To me, this is the main reason to move on.
Personally, I think Lonnie will probably average out to a 1.0 – 1.5 WAR kind of guy. Above replacement level, but nothing special. If you aren’t providing much offensively, you better be doing so in the field, and Lonnie is absolutely not carrying his weight there.
If you look historically at even just his ML games, do you see any indicator that his defense this year is something that should be considered normal or abnormal for him? And going by dWAR, guess who was the worst in all of baseball, Castellanos, who had a .700 OPS, at -2.7 yeah almost twice as bad as Chisenhall this year. Yes Castellanos is 22, but guess who had a .699 OPS at the ML level at the age of 22? Yeah, Chisenhall, who did it while having a .5 dWAR.
I was just using Asche as a comparison to show how bad a .931 FP is….not how bad he was by comparison. If he still had a -1.5 dWAR this year (sorry, didn’t take the time to go look it up)…that’s still bad, doesn’t matter how bad anyone else is.
Here, in essence, is the real question – can the Indians make the playoffs with Lonnie Chisenhall at third base?
This year, Lonnie hit .280 with an OBP of .343 and an OPS of .770. How does that compare with the third baseman for the Indians’ previous playoff teams?
In 2007, Casey Blake hit .270 with an OBP of .339 and an OPS of .776.
In 2001, Travis Fryman hit .263 with an OBP of .327 and an OPS of .662.
In 1999, Travis Fryman hit .255 with an OBP of .307 and an OPS of .719.
In 1998, Travis Fryman hit .287 with an OBP of .340 and an OPS of .845.
In 1997, Matt Williams hit . 263 with an OBP .307 and an OPS of .795.
In 1996, Jim Thome hit .311 with an OBP of .350 and an OPS of 1.062.
In 1995, Jim Thome hit .314 with an OBP of .348 and an OPS of .996.
For non-playoff teams, Casey Blake had a pretty good year in 2004 and 2009, while Travis Fryman had a good year in 2000.
In conclusion, since Jim Thome manned third base 18 years ago, Chisenhall’s 2014 season was the 5th best, after Casey Blake’s 2004 & 2009, and Travis Fryman’s 1998 and 2000. Even with the ups and downs, it was clearly above average, and the Indians have made the playoffs many times with guys who have performed worse than Chisenhall.
Yeah, but in those years in the 90’s we had Thome and Ramirez anchoring the lineup, so we didn’t need offensive production out of Fryman at third baseman. Sadly, someone like that is not walking through the door any time soon.
CAN they make the playoffs with Chisenhall? Absolutely. The Royals are on the verge of the World Series despite having Mike Moustakas at third (although he’s actually producing in the playoffs)…
The reason Chisenhall’s spot is up for debate is due to the fact that there’s no financial commitment to him. The Indians offense needs a boost and 3B is one of the few spots where they can reasonably get it…
C – Gomes, thru 2021
1B – Swish/Santana, both thru 2017
2B – Kipnins, thru 2018
SS – soon to be Lindor
3B – ?
LF – Brantley thru 2018
CF – Bourn thru 2017
RF – ?
DH – Swish/Santana
So there are only two positions that can be upgraded. Keeping Chisenhall and upgrading RF is certainly an option (actually, it’s probably the likely outcome of this offseason). But it’d be nice to get an offensive and defense boost from both spots.
The real question, then, isn’t whether Chisenhall has his flaws and a potential upside (I think both are true). The real question is whether there’s someone else out there who can provide that upgrade at a price the Indians can afford. The Indians FO doesn’t have a good record with free agent signings lately. I’m curious as to whom you (or other IPL writer) think is out there at 3B & RF that the Indians have a reasonable chance of signing.
If he was a replacement-level defensive 3rd baseman, the Indians would be offering Chisenhall a long-term deal about now…