AL Central 2021 review
The White Sox emerged as the class of the division, but Cleveland’s Ramirez was MVP
It became clear in 2020 that the Chicago White Sox had evolved into a different team. The results in 2021 confirmed the trend.
The Sox had been miserable for years, posting seven straight losing seasons between 2013 and 2019. They hadn’t qualified for the playoffs since 2008.
That all changed two years ago, when Chicago burst to a 35-25 record in the Covid-shortened season. The Sox were quickly ousted in the first round of the expanded playoffs, but their fans were overjoyed simply to have been given a taste of the postseason.
But could they maintain the pace over a full 162-game schedule? Last year proved they could, as the White Sox won their first American League Central Division crown in 13 years.
And that’s where our attention will be fixed this week — squarely on the AL Central. We’ll be giving the 2021 season a quick review today, then we’ll turn on Friday to my divisional forecast for 2022.
At the center of this summary is team score (TS), a stat I’ve developed to measure each club’s performance on a 100-point scale. A team’s final mark is based on four factors: winning percentage, the differential between runs scored and allowed per game, the differential between bases per out (BPO) attained by batters and allowed by pitchers, and postseason success.
The Sox, as you would expect, were dominant in the AL Central last year. Their TS of 61.531 points was better than the corresponding marks for 81.2% of all big-league teams since 1961, putting them in the highest echelon — the top 20% — of the Expansion Era.
Everybody else in the division was far behind, as you can see in this breakdown of wins, losses, and team scores:
1. Chicago White Sox (93-69), 61.531 TS
2. Cleveland Indians (80-82), 43.352
3. Detroit Tigers (77-85), 37.951
4. Kansas City Royals (74-88), 35.262
5. Minnesota Twins (73-89), 35.010
Our look back at 2021 in the AL Central will delve into six categories below.
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Team batting
The White Sox were clearly the AL Central’s powerhouse at the plate. They easily led the division by scoring 4.91 runs per game (none of the other four teams was above 4.50), batting .256 (nobody else did better than .249), and posting an on-base percentage of .336 (the others were at .314 or below).
And here’s another way to look at it. Chicago batters reached 3,046 bases through hits, walks, hit batsmen, stolen bases, and sacrifices last season. The typical major-league club would have attained only 2,902 bases while making the same number of outs (4,206) as the White Sox.
How do I know that? The big-league average in 2021 was .690 bases per out (BPO), a benchmark the Sox easily topped at .724. Multiply 4,206 outs by .690, and you get 2,902.
If we take the club’s 3,046 bases and subtract the norm of 2,902, we win up with Chicago’s surplus, a base value (BV) of 144. The Twins were the only other club to reach more bases than might be expected, but their BV was far behind that of the Sox:
1. White Sox, 144 BV
2. Twins, 27
3. Indians, -74
4. Tigers, -120
5. Royals, -133
Individual batting (best)
Jose Ramirez had a somewhat quiet season for Cleveland’s Indians (now the Guardians), yet he still emerged as the Most Valuable Player of the AL Central.
The third baseman batted just .266, but he smashed 36 home runs, drove home 103 runs, and scored 111 times. He also topped the division in base value, piling up 408 bases against 427 outs. That was 113 bases more than the typical batter would have reached in the same circumstances, yielding the only three-figure BV among the division’s hitters.
Chicago’s Yasmani Grandal finished a distant second, as you can see in this list of 2021’s top five:
1. Jose Ramirez, Indians, 113 BV
2. Yasmani Grandal, White Sox, 80
3. Byron Buxton, Twins, 67
4. Salvador Perez, Royals, 59
5. Robbie Grossman, Tigers, 58
Individual batting (worst)
There is no doubt about Andrelton Simmons’s prowess in the field. The shortstop won four Gold Gloves with the Braves and Angels before signing with the Twins as a free agent in 2021.
As for his hitting? Simmons had always been reasonably proficient at the plate, posting batting averages as high as .292 in 2018 and .281 in 2016. But 2021 was a different story. He plummeted to .223 in Minnesota, easily the worst BA in his 10-year career.
The damage was reflected in his anemic total of 153 bases reached, falling 80 short of what an average batter would have produced. Simmons’s BV of minus-80 was easily the worst in the division. Here are the bottom five:
1. Andrelton Simmons, Twins, -80 BV
2. Austin Hedges, Indians, -59
3. Willi Castro, Tigers, -42
4. Owen Miller, Indians, -38
5. Michael A. Taylor, Royals, -37
Team pitching
Base value, as I have often noted, can also be used to grade pitchers. We simply need to reverse expectations. The goal now is to finish with the smallest number — preferably in negative territory, reflecting that a pitcher has surrendered fewer bases than normal.
The White Sox were blessed with the stingiest staff in the division in 2021. That was true in conventional terms: Chicago’s earned run average of 3.73 was far and away the best in the AL Central, with the Tigers a distant second at 4.32.
And it was true in base value. White Sox pitchers gave up 2,716 bases, while notching 4,238 outs. The typical club in such circumstances would have allowed 2,924 bases, leaving Chicago with an impressive BV of minus-208. Here’s how the five clubs ranked:
1. White Sox, -208 BV
2. Indians, -14
3. Royals, 68
4. Tigers, 104
5. Twins, 199
Individual pitching (best)
Two starters and a reliever battled for the divisional lead in pitching base value, with one of the former holding a slight lead at the end of the season.
Carlos Rodon, who started 24 games for the White Sox, allowed 68 bases fewer than normal. Right behind him was Indians closer Emmanuel Clase, who made 71 relief appearances. His BV was minus-66. Another Chicago starter, Lance Lynn, rounded out the three-man race at minus-65 bases.
It’s unusual for a reliever to finish near the top of the BV standings, simply because he has fewer opportunities to record outs. Rodon and Lynn both secured more than 400 outs in 2021, while Clase got just 218. Yet all three exceeded expectations by roughly the same amount, as you can see in the divisional top five:
1. Carlos Rodon, White Sox, -68 BV
2. Emmanuel Clase, Indians, -66
3. Lance Lynn, White Sox, -65
4. Liam Hendriks, White Sox, -52
5. Jose Berrios, Twins, -43
Individual pitching (worst)
The 2021 season didn’t go well at all for J.A. Happ in Minnesota. He was bombarded for a 6.77 ERA in 19 starts, putting him on the short end of a 5-6 record. His totals of bases allowed (267) and outs obtained (293) were uncomfortably close, saddling him with an astronomical BPO of .911. (The big-league average, you’ll recall, was .690.) His BV was a sad plus-65, the worst in the AL Central.
The good news for Happ is that he was traded at the end of July to St. Louis, where he went a respectable 5-2 the rest of the way. But his four bad months in Minnesota were still sufficient to put him at the head of this unfortunate top five:
1. J.A. Happ, Twins, 65 BV
2. Brad Keller, Royals, 52
3. Matt Shoemaker, Twins, 50
4. Griffin Jax, Twins, 49
5. Jackson Kowar, Royals, 41