AVG

Christian Guzman Sweet Stroke?

During my injury induced hiatus, Washington Nationals’ super-shortstop Christian Guzman did the impossible: Christian Guzman took a walk, actually two walks!

In back-to-back games against the Pittsburgh Pirates, Guzman took a base on balls in each game.  Unfortunately, his On-Base Percentage (.382) no longer matches his batting average (.373) Read more

AVG

Christopher Davis Vs. Carlos Pena

Continuing the trend of answering random Google search queries that bring people to this site, I’ll now attempt to answer the question: Chris Davis vs. Carlos Pena.

Chris Davis and Carlos Pena really aren’t that different.  In 1998, the Texas Rangers made Carlos Pena the 10th overall pick.  Skip ahead 8 years to 2006 and the Rangers select Chris Davis in round 5.

Pena’s enjoyed a roller-coaster career, ranking as high as the fifth overall prospect by Baseball America in 2002. That same year he began his free-fall, as he hit .218 for the Athletics before they shipped him off to the Tigers.  Thus began Carlos Pena’s jet-setting ways, where in 2007 he landed in his 6th city, Tampa Bay.

Chris Davis has been on the fast track to the bigs after being drafted out of Navarro Junior College. Davis has been ranked as high as Texas’ second overall prospect, and the 65th overall prospect in all of baseball.

Both Davis and Pena started their careers as 20-year olds who smashed minor league pitching, but lacked contact skills. Davis possessed a higher slugging percentage while Pena had an incredibly superior walk-rate.

We’re not comparing Davis and Pena as 20-year olds though, we’re comparing 23-year old Christopher Davis with nearly 31-year old Carlos Pena.

The Art Of Hitting: Batting Average And On-Base-Percentage

Some things never change though:  Christopher Davis has made a habit of striking out too much and is predicted to strike-out around 30 percent of the time in 2008.  Carlos Pena, strangely enough is also predicted to strike-out, you guessed it: 30 percent of the time.

Comparing Carlos Pena and Chris Davis ends up being pretty interesting because of this. Christopher Davis is predicted to walk about 7 percent of the time and post a .25-.30 BB:K ratio in 2009. Regardless of his lack of plate discipline, he should have a superior batting average to Carlos Pena.   Pena, who has at least a respectable 15% BB-Rate, will end up batting almost 25 points less then Davis.  Obviously, if you’re in an OBP league rather than an AVG league things change.

According to MARCEL, Davis’ .288 batting average becomes a .345 OBP and Pena’s .261 average becomes a .379 OBP. Keep in mind, Pena does have the potential to post a respectable batting average, as seen by the .282 he posted in 2007.

The Art Of Smash-Killing Home Runs

The variance in Davis’ projections is ridiculous; he’s predicted to hit between 16 and 40 HR which puts him somewhere between waiver-wire bait, and second round pick.  While the computers disagree on how many HR he’ll hit, they’re all pretty certain he’ll continue his smash-killing ways with a SLG of over .500 and an ISO of about .230.

Carlos Pena on the other hand is projected by all but one computer to hit 31 HR.  Oliver, the odd projection system out, predicts a mind-boggling 32 HR. Yet I still can’t help but recall Pena’s 46 HR 2007 season.

Odds are this is going to be pretty close to a wash.  Chris Davis could well blow up and hit 36 HR, but that’s probably only going to best Carlos Pena by five or so HR.

If pitchers adapt to Davis’ free-swinging ways though, he could be on his way to becoming the next Carlos Pena.

The Art of Knockin’ ‘em in, and Scoring ‘em Yourself.

I never bet against the Ball Park in Arlington when it comes to counting stats.  Even marginal players start posting ridiculous totals when they play in Texas.  Josh Hamilton, Micheal Young and Ian Kinsler are the only givens, but Nelson Cruz, David Murphy, Elvis Andrus, Hank Blalock and the combination of Salty/Teagarden add a lot of intrigue to this lineup.

Christopher Davis has a very legitimate shot at posting at least 100 of both runs batted in, and runs scored.

Carlos Pena on the other hand should sit fairly comfortably in the middle of a young and talented Tampa Bay Rays line-up.  With the addition of Burrell, Pena’s runs scored should also improve. It once again comes down to which version of Carlos Pena we’ll get though.  The 2007 version hit for a solid average, got on base, and in turn scored almost 100 runs while driving in 121. In 2008 he remained a solid run producer, driving in 102 but his runs scored fell off drastically to 76.  With Burrell and Joyce added to the equation, you’d have to expect a return to the 90-100 Runs scored region.

The Art of the Stolen Base

Neither Davis nor Pena will steal enough bases to warrant any added value.

The Conclusion:

Davis is coming off the board at 65th overall, which is essentially a round before Pena at 77th overall. Realistically, this is probably due to Davis’ multi-position eligibility and the perceived value of third base eligibility.

I’m honestly worried about both of these two though.  Davis’ lack of plate discipline could spell disaster if pitchers ever adapt to his incredible power and Pena’s lack of consistency was showcased last year.

Both of these sluggers are coming off the board fairly early considering the talent that’s around them, and I’ll be implimenting draft and trade strategies with both of them.

There’s really no clear cut winner in this competition.  Davis’ average notches him ahead of Pena, but the risk of immense failure negates this advantage.

In shallow leagues, it pays to take extremely large risks because you could fill Davis’ spot with a solid but not spectacular third basemen, should Davis fall flat on his face.

In deeper leagues, I’d wait the 30 picks and take a safe bet like Garrett Atkins who has most of the potential, but not nearly the risk.

Unfortunately Pena belongs to a large group of first basemen with  some variety of risk.  You can’t just wait a while and take the safe pick, so you’re going to have to pick what type of risk you want to incur: Votto’s inexperience, Delgado’s age, LaRoche’s slow-stars, or Conor Jackson’s lack of power.

I’d have to go with 10 teams and under, pick Chris Davis.  14 Teams and over is Carlos Pena Time.