clock menu more-arrow no yes mobile

Filed under:

Replacing Ryan Ludwick with Power Scores

Chances are you drafted him relatively late for HR and RBI’s so let us take a look in how to replace him by associating power scores/HR potential to available options.

Brett Davis-USA TODAY Sports

Yesterday, it was confirmed that Ryan Ludwick would be out for approximately 3 months. Chris Heisey should take over for him full-time, and he is worth grabbing in both NL-only and mixed leagues. According to Yahoo Sports, Ludwick was owned in less than 50% of leagues, but we'll assume because you are reading this, you smartly owned him.

Ludwick (with health) was a lock for 20+ homeruns and 75+ RBI's. One of the rare righty hitter/lefty throwers, Ludwick was a fly ball hitter (consistently under .75 GB/FB ratio) batting clean-up in an impressive Reds lineup with homerun weighted park factors.

Chances are you drafted him relatively late for HR and RBI's so let us take a look in how to replace him by associating power scores/HR potential to available options.

Sticking with Yahoo Sports, the following outfielders are still available in more than 50%, 25% and 15% of leagues respectively:

<50%

<25%

<15%

Dayan Viciedo

Colby Rasmus

Justin Maxwell

Matt Carpenter

Brandon Moss

Michael Brantley

Garret Jones

Drew Stubbs

Aaron Hicks

Domonic Brown

Yasiel Puig

Peter Bourjos

Starling Marte

Oscar Taveras

Gerardo Parra

Lorenzo Cain

Denard Span

Collin Gowgill

Jackie Bradley Jr.

Jon Jay

Matt Joyce

David Murphy

Chris Parmalee

Trevor Plouffe

Lucas Duda

Wil Myers

Cameron Maybin

Carlos Quentin

Justin Ruggiano

Naturally, if you are in keeper or dynasty leagues and guys like Oscar Taveras are somehow still available, then jump, but focusing on re-draft leagues, I will tunnel in on these relevant options ranked by my ‘power score' along with their 2012 Homerun and Fly Ball Average Distance according to Jeff Zimmerman's Batted Ball Leaderboard for reference as well as their Rotochamp's OF Projections:

Team

Age

FB%

IFFB%

HR/FB

Contact%

Power Score

Avg. HR&FB Dist.

Brandon Moss

Oak

28

45.80%

8.60%

25.90%

67.00%

6.46

#43 (294.08ft)

Justin Maxwell

Hou

28

39.30%

8.90%

22.80%

67.10%

4.65

#29 (297.34ft)

Garrett Jones

Pit

31

41.70%

6.30%

17.10%

76.70%

4.64

#30 (297.33ft)

Ryan Ludwick

Reds

33

43.10%

9.90%

18.40%

74.70%

4.56

#101 (285.71ft)

Justin Ruggiano

Mia

30

38.20%

5.10%

16.70%

71.70%

3.96

#3 (309.74ft)

Carlos Quentin

San

29

46.70%

10.40%

13.90%

77.90%

3.93

#20 (300.54ft)

Trevor Plouffe

Min

26

43.60%

15.30%

16.70%

80.90%

3.82

#77 (288.91ft)

Lucas Duda

NyM

26

42.30%

6.70%

12.50%

76.20%

3.39

#186 (276.76 ft)

Matt Joyce

Rays

27

43.20%

10.20%

13.30%

76.60%

3.36

#135 (282.56ft)

Colby Rasmus

Tor

25

42.20%

14.40%

13.20%

75.90%

2.79

#209 (273.47ft)

Dayan Viciedo

ChW

23

31.40%

16.40%

20.50%

75.40%

2.32

#112 (284.82ft)

Domonic Brown

Phl

24

32.90%

3.90%

9.80%

81.50%

2.32

David Murphy

Tex

30

35.40%

10.90%

10.90%

83.40%

2.23

#150 (280.72ft)

Lorenzo Cain

Kan

26

31.20%

11.30%

13.20%

74.50%

1.96

#198 (275.35ft)

Matt Carpenter

Stl

26

36.00%

3.50%

7.00%

83.00%

1.89

#145 (280.92ft)

Starling Marte

Pit

23

24.60%

10.70%

17.90%

72.30%

1.80

Gerardo Parra

Arz

25

24.40%

6.80%

9.50%

78.20%

1.31

Cameron Maybin

San

25

28.40%

8.10%

7.20%

80.20%

1.17

#79 (288.41ft)

How did I come up with the power score? I simply accounted for the three most important HR-related variables which correlate well year to year (outside of plate appearances and the quantity of balls they put in play): Fly Ball Percentage (FB%); Homerun Per Fly Ball ratio (HR/FB); and Contact Percentage (Ct%). I subtracted out Infield Fly Balls (IFFB%) because naturally those cannot possibly fall for home runs unless we're talking Angels In the Outfield here. The formula in short is ((FB%-IFFB%)*Ct%)*HR/FB*100. It's an arbitrary value for distinguishing the above list, but again, these three factors correlate relatively well year to year (especially Ct%) so we have a logical base. Keep in mind these are not homerun values.

Team

AB

R

HR

RBI

SB

AVG

OBP

SLG

OPS

Lineup Projection

Brandon Moss

OAK

429

60

21

67

3

0.245

0.318

0.452

0.77

5

Justin Maxwell

HOU

393

56

18

53

15

0.221

0.311

0.415

0.73

6

Garret Jones

PIT

453

61

20

69

4

0.26

0.322

0.461

0.78

5

Trevor Plouffe

MIN

432

56

19

57

3

0.245

0.308

0.435

0.74

8

Justin Ruggiano

MIA

384

51

13

52

14

0.258

0.323

0.427

0.75

5 (platooned)

Dayan Viciedo

CWS

470

59

21

67

2

0.268

0.319

0.449

0.77

6

Carlos Quentin

SD

404

61

20

68

1

0.252

0.351

0.465

0.82

4

Matt Joyce

TB

437

64

18

64

7

0.252

0.349

0.446

0.8

2

Colby Rasmus

TOR

489

69

21

68

5

0.243

0.316

0.436

0.75

5 to 7

Lucas Duda

NYM

441

57

17

63

1

0.252

0.34

0.424

0.76

6

Starling Marte

PIT

518

72

12

55

25

0.264

0.31

0.417

0.73

1

Lorenzo Cain

KAN

451

59

10

50

16

0.271

0.327

0.406

0.73

8

David Murphy

TEX

444

59

14

59

10

0.279

0.35

0.437

0.79

6

Domonic Brown

PHI

383

51

13

51

8

0.266

0.342

0.439

0.78

5 or 6

Matt Carpenter

STL

449

57

9

57

3

0.258

0.351

0.396

0.75

6

Gerardo Parra

ARI

353

48

6

36

9

0.278

0.339

0.402

0.74

1

Cameron Maybin

SD

499

65

10

53

23

0.255

0.322

0.383

0.71

6

Recommendation:

I am all for you picking up Lorenzo Cain and Starling Marte if they are available for one, and two you can use the supplemental speed/looking for potential - or Matt Carpenter if you like the positional flexibility and Gerardo Parra who is full time until at least Adam Eaton returns, but from a homerun and RBI perspective, if you can stomach the batting average, we would have to recommend Brandon Moss and Justin Maxwell while Garret Jones may be Ludwick's closest replacement. Dayan Viciedo and Carlos Quentin are also good options that can provide similar counting stats. All of these options (other than Viciedo) had an average home run and fly ball distance well farther than Ludwick which should offset the park factors.

Daniel Schwartz is the owner and contributor for Rotobanter - a site dedicated to hosting visitor requests and live discussion (rotobanter.com). You can follow him on Twitter at @rotobanter.