He is poised to become the third rookie in the last 50 years to have 15 HR 20 2B and 50 RBI by the All-Star Break. Is it possible that he is underrated right now?

As hard as it is to believe I think the answer is yes. I have been reading a lot of concerns about his batting average, and today heard the opinion that he is a far better real baseball player than a fantasy player because of his defense. He is one hell of a fantasy player, and could easily be a top 20 player in the second half.

Longoria is turning into what we all thought Jay Bruce would be. He has a good eye with an 11% walk rate, but only a 74% contact rate, which is marginal. So one might think that his .268 batting average is an accurate reflection of his batting average skill. This is true in a general sense; a low contact rate makes it very difficult to have a high batting average. Longoria has a .299 BABIP, right at the norm. So given that plus his contact rate one can be forgiven for thinking that his batting average has little upside, and they may be right. 

However, the tantalizing tidbit here is his .300 expected batting average. If a .300 batting average is legit we are looking at a rookie performance that makes him a top five round pick, without the aid of good fortune. This would catapult Longoria into the upper echelon of players next year.

His contact rate has been improving ever so slightly each month. He started out at 72% in April, then 73% in May and 75% in June. If this trend continues then the batting average will come up. Furthermore, his power is a driving factor behind the expected batting average. Guys with great power will often outperform the .300 BABIP benchmark because they just hit the ball so hard and drive a lot more fly balls over the fence and into the gaps than the typical player.

Here, his linear weighted power score is 184, or 84% better than average. His line drive rate is at 20%, which should result in a BABIP of approximately .320. So despite the fact that he appears to be at the league average in BABIP he also has upside in that department.

Some players vault into the stratosphere off of one lucky month, and once the inevitable regression occurs their stock drops. Here Longoria’s April (with limited at-bats) and June were both similar, and May looks like the outlier.  In April and June he had an OPS over .900 and OBP over .380. May was a bit of a washout, with a .695 OPS and a .234 BA.

To be fair I can be accused here of falling into a small sample size trap. On the other hand his skills back up his performance, and this is not a situation where a player is lucky for a month and because of his luck we fall into the small sample size trap. Longoria’s performance does not appear to be out of the ordinary of what would be expected for a player of his skills, and he may be underperforming what should be expected.

Even more tantalizing are some of his comps according to PECOTA: Frank Robinson, Ron Santo, Cal Ripken, Manny Ramirez, Rusty Staub, Johnny Bench. Nice company indeed.

The Core Of A Championship Team?