How lucky are Colorado Rockies hitters actually getting?

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The common misconception among the biggest critics of Colorado Rockies hitters will always be that Coors Field leads to such profound effects in raw statistics that any player putting up an awesome stat line should attribute it more to luck than skill. Sabermetrics can help us better determine how effectively a hitter performs, but even those stats can be somewhat misleading if you’re not comprehending them the right way.

So let’s take a look at how lucky some Colorado Rockies hitters are actually getting this season. We’ll start by looking at things like wOBA and xwOBA, examining the gap between the two stats, then delineate how accurate that gap actually is by looking at other peripheral stats that can help explain each player’s performance. They’ll be broken down into categories of Lucky, Somewhat Lucky, Unlucky and “True” to their numbers.

Below is a bar graph showing each Rockies player with at least 100 PAs this season. This shows how their wOBA (gray) compares to their xwOBA (purple) and will be the starting point of all the analyzing we conduct here.

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Now, let’s dig into these numbers (all before play on Sunday) further:

Daniel Murphy: Lucky

Quite frankly, there is no one player who has been more lucky on the Rockies this season than Daniel Murphy. His wOBA is 46 points higher than his xwOBA, the second largest gap on the Rockies. Now some of that is Coors (since these stats aren’t park adjusted), but he’s been extremely fortunate. His Hard Hit Percentage of 30.5% is well below the league average of 38.0%. Furthermore, he’s only barreling up on 1.7% of all plate appearances (league average is 6.0%). That puts him above only Hampson (1.4%) and Wolters (0.0%) in terms of Rockies hitters. His saving grace is not hitting many ground balls (38.9% vs the league average of 42.9%).

His wRC+ is currently at 89. Players with a similar xwOBA vs wOBA gap are Alex Bregman (wRC+ of 165), Tim Anderson (wRC+ of 131) and Trevor Story (wRC+ of 119). The difference is all those hitters are getting more fortunate thanks to their raw power while Murphy is skating by with soft contact hits. He’s undoubtedly the luckiest Rockies hitter of 2019.

Raimel Tapia: Lucky

Tapia’s shown a bit of promise while up in the big leagues, but hitting has been a roller coaster with him. Among Rockies hitters with at least 100 PAs, he ranks in the bottom third with a wOBA of .312. He backs that up with a Hard Hit Percentage of 29.8%, edging out only Hampson and Wolters. You’ll also be shocked to know that Ian Desmond does not lead the Rockies in Ground Ball Percentage since Tapia’s hitting 52.3% of all balls straight into the dirt (also has the lowest Rockies Fly Ball Percentage at 25.6%).

His gap in wOBA and xwOBA isn’t relatively large for a Rockie (23 points) but how he’s gotten there is concerning. His speed helps him beat out those soft grounders he continually hits but, unless he starts hitting more balls into the air, he’ll continue to need some luck on his side to get on base.

Ryan McMahon: Somewhat Lucky

McMahon is a strange case when you breakdown the numbers. He’s certainly not a guy who’s getting lucky because of Coors Field (wOBA vs xwOBA gap of 13 points). It’s much more about how he’s gotten there.

His Soft/Medium/Hard % slash line is really solid (14.3% soft, 40.9% medium, 44.9% hard). That Hard Hit Percentage leads the Rockies and is well above the league average of 38.0%. However, his Line Drive/Ground Ball/Fly Ball percentage tells a strikingly different story. His LD% is 20.7%, GB% is 50.8% and FB% is 28.4%. That GB% is higher than Ian Desmond’s and his Barrel per PA% is lower than league average at 5.3%.

Ian Desmond: Unlucky

Now look, a lot of what Desmond’s done this season has been self-inflicted because of his continual love affair with ground balls. That GB% of 47.6% is still third-highest on the Rockies (100 PA minimum). What you’ll be surprised to hear, though, is he has the Rockies lowest xwOBA vs wOBA gap at -4 points (excluding Yonder Alonso, whose gap includes his time with the White Sox).

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To back this up: Ian Desmond’s Barrel per PA% sits at 6.7%. That ranks second-highest on the Rockies behind only David Dahl. He’s increased his Hard Hit Percentage to 38.4%, which is a career-high for Desmond (still just above the league average of 38.0%).

A good comparison based off Ian’s slash lines (Soft/Med/Hard%, LD/GB/FB%) would be Nick Ahmed of the Diamondbacks. While Ahmed’s barreling less balls than Desmond (4.7% vs Ian’s 6.7%), his wRC+ is 11 points higher even though he’s hitting the ball pretty similarly. Part of that’s going to be because Desmond’s hitting the ball hard but right at defenders, part is going to be how Coors affects wRC+. Regardless, the numbers show that Desmond has been getting at least a little bit unlucky (though if he could stop chopping the ball into the core of the earth in nearly half his ABs, that’d be great).

Side note: Yonder Alonso should also be considered “unlucky”, but given that Baseball Savant does not split up wOBA and xwOBA by team, rather just the season, he’s not included in this breakdown.

Nolan Arenado: True

Your average fan is going to look at the gap between Nolan’s wOBA and xwOBA, notice that it’s a full 59 points apart (fifth-highest in MLB) and tell you that’s all you need to know about whether he’s getting lucky or not and whether Coors is affecting that. Well, given the width of that gap, it’s hard to argue. But there are a few things that need to be pointed out before appropriately understanding that gap:

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First, his wOBA of .398 leads all Rockies hitters. His xwOBA of .339 ranks second for the Rockies. His Hard Hit Percentage of 42.1% ranks 3rd on the Rockies and is 4.1% above the league average of 38.0%. His Barrels per PA % is 6.0%, right at league average. And his wRC+ sits at 128, so everything he’s done has been fairly effective.

What may help Arenado too is his approach against the shift. Per FanGraphs, his BA jumps up to .342 against the shift (normal BA of .316) and according to Baseball Savant his wOBA vs the shift is .476 while he has a wOBA of .391 against traditional defensive positioning. The weak contact finding its way through holes may play into how xwOBA is calculated, thus hurting him more than it should.

A lot of Arenado’s stats are true to their numbers and he’s probably getting penalized by taking a smarter approach against the shift. He’s honestly lucky teams continue to shift against him for whatever reason. That helps to explain a bit of the gap between wOBA and xwOBA. And while that gap is fifth-largest in MLB, it’s misleading to assume he’s lucky because of it. The underlying numbers show more that Nolan’s true to his stats. And if you try to look at his park adjusted splits to say he’s the hitter he is because of Coors, you’ll be disappointed when you find out he has a wRC+ above 100 both on the road and at home, showing he can be just as effective wherever he’s hitting.

DENVER, CO – AUGUST 17: Trevor Story #27 of the Colorado Rockies follows the flight of a second inning two-run homer against the Miami Marlins at Coors Field on August 17, 2019 in Denver, Colorado. (Photo by Dustin Bradford/Getty Images) /

Trevor Story: True

Story has the 3rd highest wOBA vs xwOBA gap on the team sitting at 44 points. It’s 21st-largest in MLB. That gap is also extremely misleading to those who aren’t looking closer at the numbers.

For starters, Story doesn’t hit the ball soft. He has the lowest Soft Hit Percentage on the Rockies at 12.6% (league average is 17.0%). The rest of that translates well into his Hard Hit Percentage of 43.6%, second on the Rockies. He hits a little bit below league average in terms of Barrels per PA %, but where he really excels is not hitting the ball on the ground. His GB% of 33.3% is nearly 10% below league average. When you play in a park like Coors, it’s a fantastic idea to hit the ball in the air and to hit it hard. Story does both and does it well.

Story’s gap is more related to him hitting for power, not due to Coors. His numbers are more true than xwOBA would have you believe.

DENVER, COLORADO – JUNE 15: David Dahl #26 of the Colorado Rockies hits a triple in the seventh inning against the San Diego Padres at Coors Field on June 15, 2019 in Denver, Colorado. (Photo by Matthew Stockman/Getty Images) /

David Dahl: True

Dahl’s wOBA vs xwOBA gap of 32 points is a little above average for the Rockies (the average Rockies gap is about 24 points while the league average is 5). However, his numbers are more true for a lot of the same reasons that Trevor Story’s are.

He doesn’t hit the ball soft. Only 13.3% of his hits this season have been deemed “soft” per FanGraphs. On top of that, his Line Drive Percentage of 26.1% is well above the league average of 21.4%. And while he hits fewer fly balls than you’d probably like to see, he’s still barreling up the ball on 6.8% of all plate appearances (leads all Rockies).

There’s still work to be done with Dahl in terms of consistency, but as long as Dahl keeps barreling up the ball we’ll see his numbers continue to rise.

Charlie Blackmon: True

So Chuck Nazty always seems to be everyone’s favorite “Coors Merchant” because they like to point at his Home/Road splits. I’ve always advocated that using Home/Road splits to evaluate Rockies players is incorrect for a multitude of reasons and that looking at the whole picture is the more appropriate method. So let’s take a look at how Blackmon’s gotten to his wOBA of .392.

First and foremost, Blackmon’s wOBA of .392 ranks second on the Rockies behind only Arenado. His xwOBA of .357 ranks first. That gap of 35 points ranks 38th in MLB.

Blackmon’s Soft/Medium/Hard hit line reads very similarly to the league averages, though he hits it just a bit harder than league average. He’s also barreling up the ball at a slightly higher rate than league average (6.3%), good enough for third best on the Rockies.

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I noted earlier about how Arenado has been better against the shift than when facing a traditional defense alignment. Blackmon is no stranger to the shift either as he gets shifted on 51.9% of the time. Maybe teams should stop, though, because Blackmon’s wOBA is .417 against the shift while it’s only .367 without it. Any weak contact away is going to negatively impact his xwOBA. It’s still impressive to see such a positive jump when he’s facing the shift, though.

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