The Overbay Black Hole

by Mike Z

Over the last 3 game series against the Orioles, Clint Hurdle decided to sit Lyle Overbay to help try and "reignite" him for the remainder of the season. By "reignite" him, I'm fairly sure he means to help him show up for the season. The decision came because he's now hitting .227, well below his .271 career average, as well as an OBP of .306 and SLG of .351, all being his career worsts by far. I don't think even the most optimistic fan thought he was going to hit much more than his .243 last year, but the main reason for the signing was for his his defense, with the Pirates hoping his bat would be adequate. In this post, I'm going to determine how bad his bat has been, and whether his defense good enough to keep him on the roster.

First going over his hitting, it really solidifies how bad he's been. His BABIP is .269, slightly low, but normalizing by to near .300 would only bring his average up around his .243 batting average of last year. His batted ball info indicates that he just isn't making good contact anymore, so the low BABIP may be expected. His line drive percentage is 16%, lowest of his career, and well below his 21.5% career average. His ground ball percentage is 2 percent higher than his career average and his fly ball percentage is about 4 percent higher than his career average. An inflated ground ball percentage is a great indicator that a player is no longer having good at-bats or making good contact, often a telltale sign of an aging player losing his ability.

While his hitting stats are looking horrible, his defense, the reason for his contract, has been abysmal. While he only has 6 errors for a fielding percentage of .991, this stat (like always, in my opinion) tells us nothing of how he's performed. It seems that he has little range anymore, and his UZR (Ultimate Zone Rating) seems to indicate that too. While most defensive metrics have their flaws, there is such huge drop here that it is very telling. His UZR/150 (divided by 150 to project over 150 games) is -14.1, meaning he's cost the team 14 runs, more than double his career worst, and 1 of 3 season in which it's been negative. Remember, this is a cumulative stat, so he's on pace to cost the team 24 runs. He's been a butcher in the field, and really did earn this benching.

Combining his offense and defense, his WAR (Wins Above Replacement, meaning playing a AAA player instead) for the season is -0.7. Sure that sounds bad, and for reference, that WAR is lowest in the league for all 1B, and only 4 players are worse in the entire league. So what do you you do with him? Here's a couple ideas I've thought of that are plausible.

1. Keep him on the team, but platoon him.
I don't really see this happening, and this would have been more likely if Steve Pearce were healthy. Pearce (right handed) is a career .300 hitter against lefties, and Overbay (left handed) hit .190 and .220 each of the last 2 years against righties.

2. Cut him, call up Matt Hague
I think this would be a nice move to make, but not sure how likely it really would be. Hague isn't really considered a prospect, as he's already almost 26, but he's been hitting well. His triple slash line is .312/.361/.435 this year in AAA, with 5 HR and 35 RBI in 70 games. Not too much going on there with the bat slugging wise, but he'd likely hit much better than Overbay and the Pirates will be able to find out what they have in the player.

3. Cut him, move Garrett Jones to 1B and call up Alex Presley
I listed this last because I feel like this would be the most likely to happen, and would be my preference. Sure Presley is 26, but he has flat out hit the past 2 years in AAA. This year, he's hitting an impressive .332 and slugging .506, along with 15 stolen bases. If they want to protect Presley, he's a lefty so the Pirates can continue their RF platoon if desired. Garrett Jones isn't the ideal glove at 1B, but he showed enough in the Orioles series that he could be serviceable there.

Any scenario with Overbay being cut will probably be a few weeks down the line at the earliest. They didn't cut Aki Iwamura until late June, about a month after it was obvious he couldn't play anymore and let Brendan Donnelly linger in the bullpen until the end of July. It's amazing to think how well the Pirates are doing now in the past few week having 4 or 5 automatic outs in their lineup (Overbay, Cedeno, Wood, Brown/Toreagas/McKenry) The Pirates need production from 1B if they want to continue hovering around .500 and cutting bait with Lyle Overbay will go a long way, as well as let the Pirates know in some of their younger players.