The Season that Was: Jose Reyes

Of all the players we picked up over the off-season, Jose Reyes was the one I was looking forward to watching. In his introduction press conference, Alex Anthopoulos called Reyes 'my favorite guy in the league to watch'. Reyes finally gave us a lead off hitter than couple both get on base and steal. We hadn't had that since....

He was fun to watch, until he slide badly into second on a steal attempt, on April 12th, just the 10th game of the season. At that time he was hitting .395/.465/.526. It might not have been the beginning of the end for our season, but it sure didn't help.

Our prediction thread was a pretty happy one. My guess:

.295/.360/.460 with 15 home runs, 15 triples, 105 runs and 55 stolen bases.

The triples guess makes me sad now.

Beyond the counting stats (and the triples), I wasn't so far off.

Fangraphs has him at a 2.2 WAR, giving him a value of $11 million to the Jays. Reyes had a BABIP of .315 not too much off his .298 in 2012 with the Marlins or his .312 career number.

Jose walked a little bit less than in 2012 (8.1%, down from 8.8) and struck out a bunch more (11.2% up from 7.8) His career strikeout rate is 10.2%.

He hit line drives at roughly the same rate as last year (21.2%, from 21.7). Ground balls (45.7% from 46.1) and fly balls (33.1% from 32.1) were much the same too. More of his fly balls left the park (9.0% up from 5.9). It must have felt nice to leave that huge park in Miami to come to a more homer friendly park.

A switch-hitter, Jose hit better as a lefty batter against RHP (.311/.368/.436), than as a righty against LHP (.247/.307/.398). He only stole one base against LHP, 14 against RHP.

He hit better at home (.296/.359/.485 with 7 home runs and 8 steals) than he did on the road (.296/.347/.366 with 3 home runs and 7 steals).

He was very good with RISP (.383/.475/.468).

By month Reyes hit:

April: .395/.465/.526 with 1 home run, 5 steals, 0 caught and 5 RBI in 10 games.

May: Injured.

June: .200/.261/.350 with 1 home run, 0 steals and 3 RBI in 5 games.

July: .312/.375/.477 with 4 home runs, 6 steals, 2 caught and 11 RBI in 26 games.

August: .264/.304/.364 with 3 home runs, 1 steal, 3 caught and 11 RBI in 27 games.

September: .295/.357/.419 with 1 home run, 3 steals, 1 caught and 7 RBI in 25 games.

The ankle injury slowed him down for a good part of the season.

His defense wasn't good, he seemed slowed by the ankle for a long time after he came back from the injury. He did look better in the field as the ankle got better. Fangraphs has him at a -8.0 UZR/150, much worse than the -3.1/150 in 2012. I'm thinking he'll be back in that range next year, which, I think, we can live with, especially if Lawrie plays the full season at third and we have a decent second baseman. He's got a good arm and that helps make up some for the lack of range. He made 9 errors for a .974 FA, right about the league average of .973.

Fangraphs has him at a slightly better than average base runner, 0.9 runs better than the average. That was pulled down by the sore ankle. 2012 he was 4.6 runs better than average.

His longest hitting steak of the season was 10 games, in early August. He had a 9 game streak going when he wrecked his ankle. His longest on base streak was 13. His longest stretch without a home runs was 27 games. The longest he went without a hit was 3 games.

His favorite team to play? Jose hit .407/.500/.593 in 7 games vs. the Astros. A close second was his .360/.385/.640 in 6 games against the Twins.

His least favorite? He hit .174/.296/.176 in 6 games vs. the Indians.

Someone on Twitter asked what the Jays' record was with Reyes in the lineup, figuring it would have been a much better season for the team, if he had played more. They were 39-54 with him in the lineup, for a .419 winning percentage. They were 35-34 without him, not that I think he was the cause of troubles, he just happened to be on the DL when we had our one little good streak.

I think that next year will be better if he plays more, especially if we have a decent second baseman to share the middle infield with him and if Lawrie can keep himself healthy too. That might be a lot to ask.

I did enjoy watching Reyes play, when he was healthy. To me, he came back from the injury too soon. He really couldn't play the field and wasn't the same offensive player, when he first came off the DL, but then, the guys playing in his place weren't great either.

His first year with the Blue Jays didn't turn out the way we hoped it would, maybe next year will.