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The 2021 Cleveland Baseball Organization

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Honest question for those more in tuned here than I am: what is Franmil’s ceiling? Can he become a star - say .290-.310 with 40 HRs? Or will he always be a lower batting average streaky slugger who maxes out around .250 and 35 HRs?

My eye test says he has room to grow and what we’re seeing early this year would make him an all star type bat. But I’m not sure on his peripherals/advanced stats/scouting reports, etc.
 
Honest question for those more in tuned here than I am: what is Franmil’s ceiling? Can he become a star - say .290-.310 with 40 HRs? Or will he always be a lower batting average streaky slugger who maxes out around .250 and 35 HRs?

My eye test says he has room to grow and what we’re seeing early this year would make him an all star type bat. But I’m not sure on his peripherals/advanced stats/scouting reports, etc.
I think the days of guys hitting .300 consistently have gone by.

If you're hitting .270 nowadays, that's like .300 in the 90's.

I would not be surprised at all to see Franmil bat .260 with 40 HRs. That's also nowhere near what his "ceiling" could be. There's nothing stopping him from being David Ortiz, or "insert one of the top DHs of all time here."

You talk about maxing out at .250 and 35HRs... His batting average was .275 just last year, and he hit 37 HRs in the last full season of baseball. So, I don't think your "maxing out" levels are realistic at all.
 
Until Franmil starts to consistently draw walks, his ceiling is limited to not much more than what you've seen since he arrived in Cleveland.

That is what's ultimately separating him from a David Ortiz-type player.
 
Honest question for those more in tuned here than I am: what is Franmil’s ceiling? Can he become a star - say .290-.310 with 40 HRs? Or will he always be a lower batting average streaky slugger who maxes out around .250 and 35 HRs?

My eye test says he has room to grow and what we’re seeing early this year would make him an all star type bat. But I’m not sure on his peripherals/advanced stats/scouting reports, etc.

40ish HRs is definitely something he is capable of. Batting avg and OBP are what may stop him from being a David Ortiz type. He is showing good contact rate when he hits the ball the other way, but he doesn't like to walk at times. Right now I would label him as a streaky power hitter.

If he works on hitting the ball the other way and shows better patience at the plate, then he could be an all star DH without a doubt. The question is will he?
 
40ish HRs is definitely something he is capable of. Batting avg and OBP are what may stop him from being a David Ortiz type. He is showing good contact rate when he hits the ball the other way, but he doesn't like to walk at times. Right now I would label him as a streaky power hitter.

If he works on hitting the ball the other way and shows better patience at the plate, then he could be an all star DH without a doubt. The question is will he?
Which is not to say he is not a nice player to have even in his recent past/present iteration...

It was a relatively small data point, but I was mightily impressed that after hitting a near HR on a long foul ball the other way, he kept his opposite field approach and turned the next pitch into a homer. He recognized they were pitching him away, so he was comfortable hitting that way be design. Nice.
 
Until Franmil starts to consistently draw walks, his ceiling is limited to not much more than what you've seen since he arrived in Cleveland.

That is what's ultimately separating him from a David Ortiz-type player.

That will only happen if/when his 2-strike pitch recognition improves. He had a torrid start last year and then he started chasing low outside breaking stuff for strike three consistently. He says he's seeing the ball better now, so we'll see. But I remain unconvinced.
 
That will only happen if/when his 2-strike pitch recognition improves. He had a torrid start last year and then he started chasing low outside breaking stuff for strike three consistently. He says he's seeing the ball better now, so we'll see. But I remain unconvinced.
Small sample size, but his pitch recognition appears to have improved drastically. It just hasn't translated to walks. The rate at which he takes called strikes has been half of what it typically is.
 
As long as Reyes is spraying the ball around plus hitting the ball hard a high percentage of the time his batting average will be good. So far this year he only has seven K's in 30 at-bats or one K per 4.3 at bats. Last year is was one K every three at-bats.

He's striking out less, hitting the ball hard consistently, and using the entire field. I don't expect him to hit .333 the entire season but he could match or possibly exceed the .280 he hit as a rookie in 2018 and the .275 he hit last year.

He's also hitting behind Hosey and Eddie Rosario. When there is a runner on first base it opens up the whole right side and he'll go there like he did to drive in that run yesterday.

If Reyes continues to punish the ball his walk rate will go up. Pitchers will work around him and take their chances with Naylor and Bauers or Chang.
 
A tradition unlike any other. First version of the Indians 2016 draft class pitchers vs the rest of their draft.

Bieber, Plesac, Civale:

15.6 rWAR, 56-34, 749 IP, 3.41 ERA, 805 K, 174 BB, 4.62 K:BB ratio, 9.7 K/9

Rest of the 2016 draft class combined (76 pitchers):

18.3 rWAR, 177-156, 3066.1 IP, 4.49 ERA, 2945 K, 1297 BB, 2.27 K:BB ratio, 8.6 K/9

Gets even better when you take into account 2 other draftees from 2016 are now on the Indians, Quantrill and Stephan, and account for a combined .9 rWAR. Gives the Indians 16.5 rWAR of the 33.9 rWAR total produced by the pitchers from this draft to this point. Ridiculous.

This draft class will be hilarious to look back on, especially once Nolan Jones is up. Getting 3/5ths of your starting rotation and a consensus top 100 prospect in a single draft is an absolute homerun of a draft.

Handful of other guys who can potentially make it too, between Benson, Capel (St. Louis), Ray Burgos, Skylar Arias, and Ryder Ryan (Texas). On top of one (Wil Crowe) who they drafted but couldn't sign that has made it to the league.
 
A tradition unlike any other. First version of the Indians 2016 draft class pitchers vs the rest of their draft.

Bieber, Plesac, Civale:

15.6 rWAR, 56-34, 749 IP, 3.41 ERA, 805 K, 174 BB, 4.62 K:BB ratio, 9.7 K/9

Rest of the 2016 draft class combined (76 pitchers):

18.3 rWAR, 177-156, 3066.1 IP, 4.49 ERA, 2945 K, 1297 BB, 2.27 K:BB ratio, 8.6 K/9

Gets even better when you take into account 2 other draftees from 2016 are now on the Indians, Quantrill and Stephan, and account for a combined .9 rWAR. Gives the Indians 16.5 rWAR of the 33.9 rWAR total produced by the pitchers from this draft to this point. Ridiculous.

This draft class will be hilarious to look back on, especially once Nolan Jones is up. Getting 3/5ths of your starting rotation and a consensus top 100 prospect in a single draft is an absolute homerun of a draft.

Handful of other guys who can potentially make it too, between Benson, Capel (St. Louis), Ray Burgos, Skylar Arias, and Ryder Ryan (Texas). On top of one (Wil Crowe) who they drafted but couldn't sign that has made it to the league.
Don't forget that Daniel Johnson was also part of the 2016 draft for Washington...

As for the rest of the "field" - its not exactly devoid of talent
Pete Alonso / Cavan Biggio / Alex Kirilloff / Gavin Lux / Brandon Marsh among the position player.
Corbin Burnes / AJ Puk / Dustin May / Zac Gallen / Jesus Luzardo among the pitchers.
 
Don't care about batting average at all really.

Would love if Franmil can turn into a consistent .880+ OPS guy. That's Stanton, Freeman, Goldschmidt-level offensive production. If he can hit that mantle, that's a huge win for us.
I may be archaic but I do still care about batting average. Obviously OPS is more important but I want my middle of the order guys to be able to drive in runs consistently, and that comes in a variety of ways including base hits. The oppo single yesterday from Reyes is the perfect example of the approach I want to see in RBI situations.

Juan Gonzalez was great at that throughout his career. He’d choose situations and counts to swing for homeruns, but would change his approach to go for base hits and sacrifice flies when the situation called for it.

You could be a high OPS guy from walking a lot and slugging a bunch of doubles and homeruns, but miss tons of RBIs from swinging through hitable pitches with runners on (see Francisco Lindor).
 
I may be archaic but I do still care about batting average. Obviously OPS is more important but I want my middle of the order guys to be able to drive in runs consistently, and that comes in a variety of ways including base hits. The oppo single yesterday from Reyes is the perfect example of the approach I want to see in RBI situations.

Juan Gonzalez was great at that throughout his career. He’d choose situations and counts to swing for homeruns, but would change his approach to go for base hits and sacrifice flies when the situation called for it.

You could be a high OPS guy from walking a lot and slugging a bunch of doubles and homeruns, but miss tons of RBIs from swinging through hitable pitches with runners on (see Francisco Lindor).

That's more than fair.

Probably safe to say that if Reyes turns into an .880-.900 OPS guy, he'd have a BA at least over .265-.270.
 
I may be archaic but I do still care about batting average. Obviously OPS is more important but I want my middle of the order guys to be able to drive in runs consistently, and that comes in a variety of ways including base hits. The oppo single yesterday from Reyes is the perfect example of the approach I want to see in RBI situations.

Juan Gonzalez was great at that throughout his career. He’d choose situations and counts to swing for homeruns, but would change his approach to go for base hits and sacrifice flies when the situation called for it.

You could be a high OPS guy from walking a lot and slugging a bunch of doubles and homeruns, but miss tons of RBIs from swinging through hitable pitches with runners on (see Francisco Lindor).
That's how I am. Some of these metrics are so confusing and over my head I instinctively go back to basic stats when I'm looking at players. Just easier for me to digest without having to read paragraphs of information to explain all the new stats.
 

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