Offensive giants of 2022
Seven clubs (led by the Dodgers) earn five-star ratings for base production
The Dodgers didn’t win the big-league championship in 2022; they flamed out rather quickly (and unexpectedly) in the playoffs. But Los Angeles did earn a consolation prize — first place in my annual ratings of offensive firepower.
The key factor in my rankings is base value (BV), a statistical comparison of the actual number of bases that a team’s batters reached during the 2022 season and the number that their counterparts on an average club would have attained.
You can learn more about the BV formula by clicking here or by referring to the newly released print companion to this newsletter, Baseball’s Best (and Worst) 2023 Yearbook.
BV is just one of the 11 ratings that I’ve calculated for each of the 30 big-league teams. Today's installment focuses on the five categories that deal with offensive output and batting skill.
Teams have been rated on a five-star scale in each category. I’ll note the very best performers (the five-star teams) and the very worst (the one-star clubs) below. But there isn’t room for a full rundown, or for a full explanation of how the stars were allocated.
That information can be found in the new yearbook, which contains all of the stats you could possibly want: a total of 948 tables and graphs crammed into 418 pages.
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Base production
The Dodgers topped 2022’s most important set of offensive ratings with a value of plus-441, which means that their batters reached 441 more bases than those on a typical club would have accumulated under the same circumstances.
Los Angeles posted a collective ratio of .764 bases per out in the recent season, easily the best figure in the majors. The major-league average was more than 100 points lower: .660.
The Detroit Tigers finished last in the base-value standings. Their batters fell 456 bases short of the norm for 2022.
Five-star clubs (starting with the best): Los Angeles Dodgers, New York Yankees, Atlanta Braves, St. Louis Cardinals, Toronto Blue Jays, Houston Astros, New York Mets.
One-star clubs (starting with the worst): Detroit Tigers, Oakland Athletics, Pittsburgh Pirates, Miami Marlins, Cincinnati Reds.
Run production
Other sports keep track of individual scoring. Football tallies the points that each player scores by touchdowns and placekicks. Basketball adds baskets and free throws. Hockey does the same thing with goals and assists.
But not baseball. I try to redress the balance by adding runs scored and runs batted in, and then subtracting home runs, since a single HR counts in both the R and RBI columns. The result is a player’s scoring total, abbreviated as SC.
This category calculated the same number for each club as a whole, and then converted it to a scoring value (SCV).
The Dodgers, as you might have guessed, topped the majors in run production. Their SCV was 229 above the big-league average for 2022. Last place went to the Oakland Athletics, who finished with a scoring value of minus-175.
Five-star clubs (starting with the best): Los Angeles Dodgers, New York Mets, Toronto Blue Jays, New York Yankees, Atlanta Braves, St. Louis Cardinals.
One-star clubs (starting with the worst): Oakland Athletics, Detroit Tigers, Pittsburgh Pirates, Miami Marlins, Los Angeles Angels, Washington Nationals.
Power hitting
The Atlanta Braves accumulated 1,049 extra bases through hits in 2022. That total doesn’t include any trips to first base — no singles, and no initial bases touched on doubles, triples, and home runs.
The important word in this category is the adjective extra. A batter is credited with one XB for each double, two for each triple, and three for each homer.
The resulting value, XV, is an ideal indicator of power production. It shows that Atlanta’s total of extra bases was 211 higher than expected, the best performance by any club in this category. The Tigers again finished dead last with an XV of minus-199.
Five-star clubs (starting with the best): Atlanta Braves, Los Angeles Dodgers, New York Yankees, Houston Astros, Milwaukee Brewers, Philadelphia Phillies.
One-star clubs (starting with the worst): Detroit Tigers, Cleveland Guardians, Washington Nationals, Oakland Athletics, Chicago White Sox, Miami Marlins.
Contact hitting
No 2022 team was better than the Guardians at putting the bat on the ball. Cleveland led the majors in balls in play (4,436), contact rate (.798), and ball in play value, abbreviated as BPV (plus-266).
Contact rate (CT) is defined as the percentage of at-bats that don’t culminate in strikeouts. Cleveland’s CT of .798 translated to a strikeout rate of 20.2 percent. The typical big-league team posted a CT of .750 last season, indicating that its batters struck out in a quarter of all at-bats.
Batters for the Guardians suffered 266 fewer strikeouts than average, which means they put 266 more balls in play. Hence their BPV.
The Los Angeles Angels were the worst team for contact hitting, as reflected in their unhappy BPV of minus-185.
Five-star clubs (starting with the best): Cleveland Guardians, Houston Astros, New York Mets, St. Louis Cardinals, Toronto Blue Jays, Washington Nationals, Chicago White Sox.
One-star clubs (starting with the worst): Los Angeles Angels, Pittsburgh Pirates, Atlanta Braves, San Francisco Giants, Milwaukee Brewers.
Batting eye
Batting eye rate (EY) is calculated by tallying the unintentional walks a hitter draws, then dividing that figure by his number of plate appearances minus all intentional walks. EY serves as a strong indicator of a batter’s knowledge of the strike zone and his ability to work pitchers for walks.
Three clubs rose to the top of this category in 2022. The New York Yankees and Seattle Mariners tied for the EY lead at .095, well above the big-league average of .079. And the Los Angeles Dodgers drew the most unintentional walks, 585, one more than the Yanks did.
New York eked out a narrow win in the value calculations for this category. Batters for the Yankees drew 98 walks more than expected, taking first place in walk value (BBV). The Mariners (BBV of 96) and Dodgers (92) are close behind.
The Chicago White Sox seemed to have the worst comprehension of the strike zone. Their batters posted an anemic BBV of minus-105.
Five-star clubs (starting with the best): New York Yankees, Seattle Mariners, Los Angeles Dodgers, San Francisco Giants, Milwaukee Brewers, San Diego Padres.
One-star clubs (starting with the worst): Chicago White Sox, Detroit Tigers, Cleveland Guardians, Los Angeles Angels.
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