That Balls Outta Here
FanSided

Ryan Howard’s Not Bad, Just OK Season

By Ethan Witte

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Admit it. You thought Ryan Howard was finished. When you saw the Phillies 1st baseman crumple to the ground on making the final out of the 2011 NLDS vs. the Cardinals, you thought that the end was at hand for the man who was possibly the most feared hitter in the team’s 2007-2011 glory years.

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You even felt vindicated in your disdain for him when he was a below average regular the following 3 years, even though he was playing on one leg. You gave him up for dead, and booed along with the rest of the stadium as he struck out seemingly every time he saw a lefty on the mound.

Well, I’ve got a news flash for you, in case you hadn’t already noticed: Howard hasn’t been all that bad in this lost 2015 Phillies season.

Now, this won’t be about his defense. He doesn’t pass either the eye test, or the defensive stats test (-6 DRS, -3.8 UZR/150). Instead, let’s focus on the part of the game for which he is actually being paid – power.

Coming into 2015, Howard wasn’t expected to perform well by most. PECOTA wasn’t high on him at all, projecting a .234/.312/.415 slash line, with 19 home runs and 64 RBI, and finishing with 0.4 WARP. Even his 90th percentile projection was just okay (.262/.345/.464 with 23 HR and 76 RBI).

Looking at such a projection back in Clearwater in March, I’m sure that most Phillies fans would have killed for that type of production from ‘The Big Piece’, as it most likely would have meant some other team would see the production and acquire him, assuming the Phillies ate a lot of contract money. Even had he stayed, most fans would have been fine with that production.

Well, don’t look now folks, but as I write this on Monday evening, Howard has hit his 20th home run and knocked in his 70th run. At the conclusion of Monday evening, he was hitting for a .240/.285/.457 slash line. Is it the greatest line in the world? No, but there are two positives I’d like to point out.

1) The ‘Slugging Percentage’: It seems that Howard’s power, while noticeably diminished, has come back, at least somewhat. We all knew that the likelihood of his getting traded was basically nil, so we had to cling to the hope that he’d hit for enough power for it to be worth sending him back out there day after day.

With the run-suppressing environment of today’s MLB, that kind of power has value, especially on the Phillies, who have very little power in their lineup. His slugging percentage ranks Howard as 51st in the league among 154 qualified batters, nothing to sneeze at.

Sure, his K% (28.3%) is 8th in baseball, but Phillies fans certainly have come to accept the fact that Howard is a TTO (Three True Outcomes) player at this point in his career. You accept the strikeouts with the power. Prior to this year, there was no power, so the strikeouts were unacceptable. Now, he’s hitting enough home runs to somewhat compensate for that “flaw” in his game.

2) The ‘Platoon’: This is where Ryne Sandberg and Pete Mackanin deserve a lot of credit. It’s difficult to sit a player down when they are making $25 million in salary. However, the two managers, for all their flaws, had finally realized that Howard’s exposure to same-handed pitching needs to be limited as much as possible.

Prior to Monday, Howard has only had 96 plate appearances against LHP, on pace for the fewest he’s had against southpaws in a non-injury season in his career. We all see the struggles. The numbers bear them out. Even this year, in those 96 PA, he owns a .135/.188/.258 line against lefties. For his career, it “goes up” to .220/.297/.421, numbers that have been trending downward almost his whole career.

Of course, it took a complete rebuild for the team to realize it, but at least it was finally done. Darin Ruf is playing more and more when the team is facing a left-handed pitcher to start the game. It makes total sense.

With a Phillies team that entered the season projecting to have difficulty scoring runs, they needed to trot out the most optimized lineup possible. When facing lefties, at this point in his career, that lineup doesn’t include Howard. There are also moments such as happened last night, when Howard just simply gave up on hustling to 1st base.

Fairly or unfairly, Howard has been looked upon differently by the home fan base than Chase Utley, Jimmy Rollins, or even Cole Hamels during the team’s latest era of dominance. It always seemed that fans were angry at what Howard wasn’t doing well rather than focus on what he could do well. On a play such as above, for instance, Utley would have been safe at 1st every time (though perhaps not Rollins.)

That situation and disconnect from many fans got even worse when Howard signed that ludicrous contract extension. However, as that extension runs out next year, let’s start to realize that Howard has become a mildly productive hitter again. He may not be the best player on the team, he may no longer be ‘The Big Piece’ on a Phillies contender, but he is far from their worst piece.

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