Jose Bautista, who is only the greatest RH slugger in franchise history, is hitting .181/.287/.324 against left-handed pitchers this season.
That can't be right. Or at least, it can't be normal. While he's hitting a not-too-wonderful .220/.331/.406 against RH pitchers, you would expect that with a normal platoon split against the sinister fellows he'd at least be.... well, let's just say more useful than he's been this year.
What the hell is going on? Has he developed some weird blind spot, and he's not picking up the ball out of a left-hander's hand as well?
Anyway, I went back and looked at his career platoon splits. Partially in the Unending Quest for knowledge, and partially to see if I still knew how to make Data Tables (oh, you never forget that) or, even better, a pretty picture to illustrate what I've learned.
Here's the Data Table:
And against RH pitching
And as that's a whole lot of numbers to peruse, it's a good thing that I still know how to make a pretty picture (although it turned out to be a more complicated process than I remember.)
Bautista's a RH slugger - you should expect the pink line to ride comfortably atop the blue line. Which it actually did, back when he was a young Pirate. But it turns out that since he became Jose Bautista back in 2010, he's usually had a reverse platoon split.
In these last (almost) eight seasons he's hit .259/.381/.529 against RH pitching and .252/.373/.504 against southpaws. It's not a big split, although the only reason it's even as close as it is because Bautista absolutely destroyed LH pitching in two of those season, 2011 and 2014. Come to think of it, he destroyed pretty well everything in 2011.
It's just weird. When Cito Gaston decided to make him an everyday player in the spring of 2010, a lot of folks were dubious of that decision working out because... Bautista was a platoon hitter who wouldn't be able to hit RH pitching everyday. And that was actually true. Through 2009, Bautista had hit .265/.356/.478 against LH pitching but just .227/.312/.366 against RH pitchers.
It's weird, I say (over and over again, too. Sorry!) but in a way that makes its own kind of sense. Bautista's not at all a weird guy. He's certainly an emotional player, but when he's not between the white lines he seems a pretty thoughtful and somewhat soft-spoken type of fellow. Nevertheless, he's had one of the weirdest careers imaginable.
We're surely looking at the end of Bautista's run in Toronto - and it's been generally magnificent, for the most part - and we're quite possibly looking at the end of his time in the majors. I mean, look at those last three data points. It doesn't matter how high up the mountain you were - and Bautista was pretty high up the mountain in 2015 - when you're falling that fast and that steadily. It's hard to think any GM would want to find out what the fourth data points in that sequence would look like.
That can't be right. Or at least, it can't be normal. While he's hitting a not-too-wonderful .220/.331/.406 against RH pitchers, you would expect that with a normal platoon split against the sinister fellows he'd at least be.... well, let's just say more useful than he's been this year.
What the hell is going on? Has he developed some weird blind spot, and he's not picking up the ball out of a left-hander's hand as well?
Anyway, I went back and looked at his career platoon splits. Partially in the Unending Quest for knowledge, and partially to see if I still knew how to make Data Tables (oh, you never forget that) or, even better, a pretty picture to illustrate what I've learned.
Here's the Data Table:
Split G AB R H 2B 3B HR RBI SB CS BB SO BAVG OBP SLG OPS
2004 vs LHP 24 53 2 11 1 0 0 0 0 0 1 24 .208 .222 .226 .449
2005 vs LHP 6 11 1 3 1 0 0 1 0 0 2 2 .273 .385 .364 .748
2006 vs LHP 51 113 23 32 4 2 7 15 0 1 16 29 .283 .404 .540 .944
2007 vs LHP 56 121 23 31 8 0 4 14 3 1 21 21 .256 .366 .421 .788
2008 vs LHP 60 108 19 27 5 0 9 18 0 1 16 27 .250 .339 .546 .885
2009 vs LHP 64 123 17 36 8 2 6 18 1 0 19 21 .293 .382 .537 .919
2010 vs LHP 51 108 18 24 7 0 8 17 1 1 17 24 .222 .333 .509 .843
2011 vs LHP 63 119 24 40 7 0 11 21 1 1 33 24 .336 .484 .672 1.156
2012 vs LHP 43 85 16 17 3 0 5 14 2 0 12 13 .200 .306 .412 .718
2013 vs LHP 44 92 24 23 6 0 7 20 4 0 17 12 .250 .366 .543 .910
2014 vs LHP 60 116 22 40 3 0 10 19 0 0 21 19 .345 .449 .629 1.079
2015 vs LHP 61 104 16 24 6 1 5 20 2 0 26 19 .231 .382 .452 .834
2016 vs LHP 42 91 15 20 4 0 5 12 1 1 14 16 .220 .324 .429 .752
2017 vs LHP 53 105 17 19 6 0 3 7 0 1 15 33 .181 .287 .324 .611
And against RH pitching
Split G AB R H 2B 3B HR RBI SB CS BB SO BAVG OBP SLG OPS
2004 vs RHP 29 35 4 7 2 0 0 2 0 1 6 16 .200 .317 .257 .574
2005 vs RHP 9 17 2 1 0 0 0 0 1 0 1 5 .059 .111 .059 .170
2006 vs RHP 109 287 35 62 16 1 9 36 2 3 30 81 .216 .306 .373 .679
2007 vs RHP 135 411 52 104 28 2 11 49 3 2 47 80 .253 .331 .411 .742
2008 vs RHP 113 262 26 61 12 0 6 36 1 0 24 64 .233 .301 .347 .648
2009 vs RHP 91 213 37 43 5 1 7 22 3 0 37 64 .202 .331 .333 .664
2010 vs RHP 154 461 91 124 28 3 46 107 8 1 83 92 .269 .388 .642 1.030
2011 vs RHP 137 394 81 115 17 2 32 82 8 4 99 87 .292 .436 .589 1.025
2012 vs RHP 90 247 48 63 11 0 22 51 3 2 47 50 .255 .375 .567 .942
2013 vs RHP 112 360 58 94 18 0 21 53 3 2 52 72 .261 .356 .486 .842
2014 vs RHP 150 437 79 118 24 0 25 84 6 2 83 77 .270 .391 .497 .888
2015 vs RHP 148 439 92 112 23 2 35 94 6 2 84 87 .255 .376 .556 .932
2016 vs RHP 114 332 53 79 20 1 17 57 1 1 73 87 .238 .376 .458 .834
2017 vs RHP 116 355 59 78 15 0 17 47 6 2 56 96 .220 .331 .406 .737
And as that's a whole lot of numbers to peruse, it's a good thing that I still know how to make a pretty picture (although it turned out to be a more complicated process than I remember.)
Bautista's a RH slugger - you should expect the pink line to ride comfortably atop the blue line. Which it actually did, back when he was a young Pirate. But it turns out that since he became Jose Bautista back in 2010, he's usually had a reverse platoon split.
In these last (almost) eight seasons he's hit .259/.381/.529 against RH pitching and .252/.373/.504 against southpaws. It's not a big split, although the only reason it's even as close as it is because Bautista absolutely destroyed LH pitching in two of those season, 2011 and 2014. Come to think of it, he destroyed pretty well everything in 2011.
It's just weird. When Cito Gaston decided to make him an everyday player in the spring of 2010, a lot of folks were dubious of that decision working out because... Bautista was a platoon hitter who wouldn't be able to hit RH pitching everyday. And that was actually true. Through 2009, Bautista had hit .265/.356/.478 against LH pitching but just .227/.312/.366 against RH pitchers.
It's weird, I say (over and over again, too. Sorry!) but in a way that makes its own kind of sense. Bautista's not at all a weird guy. He's certainly an emotional player, but when he's not between the white lines he seems a pretty thoughtful and somewhat soft-spoken type of fellow. Nevertheless, he's had one of the weirdest careers imaginable.
We're surely looking at the end of Bautista's run in Toronto - and it's been generally magnificent, for the most part - and we're quite possibly looking at the end of his time in the majors. I mean, look at those last three data points. It doesn't matter how high up the mountain you were - and Bautista was pretty high up the mountain in 2015 - when you're falling that fast and that steadily. It's hard to think any GM would want to find out what the fourth data points in that sequence would look like.
