Friday, August 13, 2010

Koby Clemens and luck

So when you take a surface-level look at Koby Clemens' numbers, how do you feel?

He's hitting .261/.372/.516 in 104 games at Double-A, with 23 HR, 18 doubles, and three triples. He has 122 strikeouts (33.5% of his ABs), but 59 walks.

Clemens has a .905 OPS against RHPs, and an .860 OPS against LHPs - getting groundballs 37.5% of the time against lefties, compared to a 29.7% GB rate against righties. He also has enjoyed a .326 BABIP (.351 in July, and .348 so far in August). But what happens if you neutralize his numbers for luck? Thanks to Minor League Splits we can find out.

With slash lines neutralized for luck, Clemens is a .283/.391/.543 hitter. He's been particularly unlucky against LHPs, with a luck-neutralized slash line of .289/.394/.562 - or an increase of almost 100 points in the OPS category.

I'm not sure how you want to take these stats, but it's still an interesting exercise on an otherwise uneventful Friday afternoon.