Rounding Out the Outfield

The Reds have signed veteran outfielder Ryan Ludwick to their 2012 efforts with a $2.5 million contract and a nominal mutual option for 2013. The contract has up to $500,000 in performance incentives and affordably adds much-needed depth to the Reds outfield. Ludwick can play either corner outfield spot, giving the Reds the flexibility to slide Chris Heisey to center to spell Drew Stubbs when needed without compromising depth behind Jay Bruce. With less severe lefty-righty hitting splits than the young Heisey, Ludwick adds a more consistent and versatile option to the outfield mix while adding very well-regarded veteran leadership to the clubhouse.

Ludwick spent most of his major league career with the Cardinals and had his career year with them in 2008, batting .299 with 37 homeruns and 113 runs batted in. It goes without saying, though, that hitting in front of Albert Pujols probably benefited the outfielder to a certain extent. Still, Ludwick is a career .261 hitter with power who, other than the last few years, was good for an OPS of at least .775. Sluggers who can power in 100+ or even 75+ RBIs a season don't typically go for $2.5 million, though, and his performance in recent seasons is the biggest factor in his diminished value.

Did Ludwick Lose his Pop?

Ludwick is coming off a few disappointing seasons, where he spent most of his time in San Diego's monstrous Petco Park. During that time, the traditionally slugging Ludwick had some potentially concerning trends with his isolated power numbers, which is a hitter's slugging percentage minus his batting average per at bat. The metric measures the extra base hits that a hitter averages per at bat and is a better measure of a batter's pure power than slugging percentage, which factors singles into the equation. Where Ludwick hovered around a respectable .200 ISO during his time with St. Louis, he never exceeded .135 in San Diego or in his cameo appearance for the Pirates during the second half of last year. The major league average, even taking soft-hitting shortstops into account, has hovered around .150 since 2002.

That decline is certainly not a good power trend to be coming off of. Still, it's difficult to isolate Ludwick's decline strictly to his power all of a sudden being sapped. The righty really didn't change his tendencies as a hitter during the last three years, posting consistent line drive, flyball, strike-out and walk rates even as his power numbers seemingly began to suffer.

A culprit worth noting in this decline was Ludwick's batting average on balls in play, which may be more of a symptom than a driver of his poor statistics in this case. Where the general league average is around .300, Ludwick never managed a BABIP above .277 since leaving Saint Louis, which isn't a fall off the cliff, necessarily, but isn't the norm for a 20% line drive hitter. The big contributor to that discrepancy may lie in what Ludwick does with the other 80% of his batted balls, namely his tendency to hit a lot of flyballs.

Petco Park has some of the deepest outfield dimensions in baseball and in addition to spending most of his last two seasons there, Ludwick spent a lot of time playing division games in also-cavernous Los Angeles and San Francisco. For a flyball hitter in a pitcher's park, good contact hits that may be homeruns in other parks most often turn into deep fly outs. In Petco's case, lefties are much more suppressed than righties like Ludwick on homeruns, but both are suppressed more in San Diego than most parks in the majors. If fewer balls are leaving the park and becoming outs instead, it not only will suppress the traditional average and slugging numbers, but it reduces the hitter's production in the true outcome events that are measured in BABIP.

Locations of all homeruns (blue) and fly outs (orange)
hit in Petco last year, overlayed on Great American Ballpark

Great American Ball Park is the antithesis to Petco and may, in fact, be a better fit for Ludwick's tendencies than even other hitter's parks. While Great American isn't necessarily shallow in left-center or center field where Ludwick hits many of his homeruns, it's much shorter down the line at 328 feet and more friendly in the gap at 379 feet. Great American Ball Park has one of the best homerun park factors for righties in baseball at 133, a pretty large jump from Petco's 95.

To partially illustrate some of these differences, take a look at the image to the right. This park map charts the locations of all homeruns (blue) and fly outs (orange) hit in Petco last season, overlayed against the dimensions of Great American Ballpark. While this doesn't tell the whole picture, it's worth noting that if you similarly chart just Ludwick's homeruns and fly outs from last season, two of his fly outs would have been homeruns in Great American's right field.

What to Actually Expect

It would be foolish to expect a heroic renaissance of epic proportions like the season Ludwick had in 2008, especially in the number of plate appearances he will likely get by comparison. It's hard to weigh the specific causes of some of Ludwick's issues in the last few years, so it's tough to lay his reduced numbers strictly at the feet of Petco's large outfield dimensions. That said, the switch of parks alone should make Ludwick a much more valuable contributor in 2012 considering his low price tag.

If he can hit close to his career average while maintaining a .775+ OPS and an .200+ ISO, Ludwick could easily add one or two wins to the Reds efforts in 2012. It will be interesting to see how time is divided between he, Heisey and Stubbs, though. While it's safe to say Bruce is anchored in right other than a day off here and there, Heisey may see some increased playing time in center based on matchups. It wouldn't be out of the question to see all three of Ludwick, Heisey and Stubbs seeing north of 400 plate apperances in 2012, but as always, player production will tell the tale.