Larnach's Challenge

[jkcarew]

Despite the nice start, Trevor Larnach is falling into a disturbing pattern that has marked his early career.

Mysteriously low extra-base power.

It's mystifying on the face of it....big guy, pretty swing...but it's very real. His career and current season SLG's are stunningly low. The OBP has been decent, but the high K%, and lack of extra-base production is killing his value. After 59 PA this year, he has exactly 2 xbh. Pacing toward about 25 xbh for a full season. Yikes. I'm sure he and the staff are working on this. But if the power doesn't show this season, it's hard to think his future with the club won't be impacted. What do you see as Larnach's issue with generating power...at least somewhat consistent power?

[farmerguychris]

Much of his career he's been playing hurt.  Lets see IF he can stay healthy on the roster this year long enough to give him a fair chance to show a real sample of what he can do when feeling good.

[ashbury]

You're not imagining things, jk. There's a stat, Isolated Power (ISO), which is just SLG minus BA, and Trevor's is hovering around the .100 mark so far this year, versus a MLB average more like .160ish.  Which doesn't say anything you didn't, just boils it down to a number.

His ISO last year was .175, above league average and among the core of the team, though Buxton was up there with .300 by comparison. Arraez by constrast was .104.

I expect his "issue" this year is something the batting coaches can try to tweak away.  Balancing his weight, whatever.  No clue.  But it could then be a tradeoff of making contact versus whiffing (even) more, and also maybe a lower BA on balls in play - his BABIP has been above league average and that's not an easy thing to maintain (*cough* Max Kepler *cough*). Everything's connected, and he didn't make it this far by having some outstanding flaw that can be fixed with "one weird trick" like they say on the Internet, I don't suppose.

[FlyingFinn]

Is Larnach a full-time player or is he mostly supposed to platoon and face RH's? Are the Twins being forced to use him against LH's now because of all the injuries? I know we haven't faced many LH's and I haven't checked his splits. He was projected to be in AAA at the start of the year if everyone was healthy. Fun to guess what the future holds.

[stringer bell]

I commented about Larnach in my blog entry today https://twinsdaily.com/blogs/entry/23568-a-deeper-dive-after-13-games/ 

He has had a rough go of it after coming out of spring training really hitting the ball well. With the injuries and all of the right handed pitching the Twins have seen, he has been a fixture. I wasn't the only one to say that he looked like a solid middle-of-the-order hitter. The lineup looks like pieces are coming back (never say for sure!) and he needs to produce to stay in the lineup (and maybe on the active roster). 

Larnach has shown more than enough power to reach the seats and hits the ball hard enough to hit the gaps for doubles. If he wants to maintain his position, he needs to do what he's capable of.

 

 

[chpettit19]

Larnach is an up-the-middle/left-center gap hitter. He's never been a huge power guy as it's not how he's developed his swing. They spent the first few years of his professional career attempting to turn him into more of a pull power hitter. This year he looks to have gone back to an up-the-middle/"big part of the field" type guy. His current swing reminds me a lot of Freddie Freeman, who's also an up-the-middle guy. Freeman hasn't typically been a big HR hitter (low 20s most years), and that's kind of how I see Larnach. He he's hitting in the high .200s with 20ish homers and a couple dozen doubles I'd be more than happy. I think that's the type of hitter we should hope he becomes for the next half dozen years.

[jkcarew]

1 hour ago, FlyingFinn said:

Is Larnach a full-time player or is he mostly supposed to platoon and face RH's? Are the Twins being forced to use him against LH's now because of all the injuries? I know we haven't faced many LH's and I haven't checked his splits. He was projected to be in AAA at the start of the year if everyone was healthy. Fun to guess what the future holds.

His career splits are not horrendous. I don't know if that's good or bad...as it means his SLG/ISO even against right-handed pitching has been underwhelming (particularly for corner outfielder that doesn't project as a plus defender). His one HR so far this year is against a lefty. However, I see he's out of today's lineup against a tough lefty.

It's a head-scratcher to me. Some guys look hopeless in the box, and then two months later you look at the numbers and the guy's a stud. Some guys look like they're always going to hit the ball and hit it hard, and then two months later you look at the numbers, and you question whether they should be playing. Unfortunately, early in his career, Larnach is the latter type. Although, as Farmerguy points out above, his career has consisted of a lot of fits and starts so far. Might just need to have a good long stretch where he can settle in.

[jkcarew]

1 hour ago, chpettit19 said:

Larnach is an up-the-middle/left-center gap hitter. He's never been a huge power guy as it's not how he's developed his swing. They spent the first few years of his professional career attempting to turn him into more of a pull power hitter. This year he looks to have gone back to an up-the-middle/"big part of the field" type guy. His current swing reminds me a lot of Freddie Freeman, who's also an up-the-middle guy. Freeman hasn't typically been a big HR hitter (low 20s most years), and that's kind of how I see Larnach. He he's hitting in the high .200s with 20ish homers and a couple dozen doubles I'd be more than happy. I think that's the type of hitter we should hope he becomes for the next half dozen years.

Agree on the power profile. That would be a reasonable expectation.

But unfortuately...at least at this point...Larnach doesn't project to have anything close to Freeman's bat-to-ball skill. Freeman had a career K% of 19, Larnach is sitting at 33%. Maybe the K% can come way in? Maybe that's the way the issue should be viewed? Still, if the K% doesn't come in significantly, Larnach will NEED to hit more HR/XBH to have value. Hitting-wise, if you can't be more like Freddie Freeman, be more like Byron Buxton, where you K very much, but the HR/XBH rate (basically ISO) is high.

He's at 540 career PA...very much in the 'still adjusting' area of being a major leaguer. So, we'll see.

[jkcarew]

1 hour ago, stringer bell said:

I commented about Larnach in my blog entry today https://twinsdaily.com/blogs/entry/23568-a-deeper-dive-after-13-games/ 

He has had a rough go of it after coming out of spring training really hitting the ball well. With the injuries and all of the right handed pitching the Twins have seen, he has been a fixture. I wasn't the only one to say that he looked like a solid middle-of-the-order hitter. The lineup looks like pieces are coming back (never say for sure!) and he needs to produce to stay in the lineup (and maybe on the active roster). 

Larnach has shown more than enough power to reach the seats and hits the ball hard enough to hit the gaps for doubles. If he wants to maintain his position, he needs to do what he's capable of.

 

 

Yep...nice blog entry.

His numbers this year are very much in line with his previous major league seasons. In short...his ISO is significantly too low for a guy that K's as frequently as he does. That's if you project him to be a power-hitter.

If you project him to be a tall Louis Arraez...then his K% is way too high for a guy with a low ISO. 

Only has 540 big-league PA, so he's making adjustments we can be assured.

[chpettit19]

6 minutes ago, jkcarew said:

Agree on the power profile. That would be a reasonable expectation.

But unfortuately...at least at this point...Larnach doesn't project to have anything close to Freeman's bat-to-ball skill. Freeman had a career K% of 19, Larnach is sitting at 33%. Maybe the K% can come way in? Maybe that's the way the issue should be viewed? Still, if the K% doesn't come in significantly, Larnach will NEED to hit more HR/XBH to have value. Hitting-wise, if you can't be more like Freddie Freeman, be more like Byron Buxton, where you K very much, but the HR/XBH rate (basically ISO) is high.

He's at 540 career PA...very much in the 'still adjusting' area of being a major leaguer. So, we'll see.

Well of course he doesn't have Freeman's bat-to-ball skills. Freeman is a first ballot Hall of Famer. Just saying that's his general swing type, and approach. The K% is definitely a problem. He still has struggles with off-speed pitches, and that'll be the key to his career. Has to punish in zone, get-me-over breakers.

If he hits .280+ with only 10ish homeruns he'd still have value as a player, just not a star of any sort. I think that's what a lot of talk about players comes down to. Expectations and a view that certain guys are failures if they aren't stars (Sano being a poster boy). He's not a heart-of-the-order guy if he can't slug better, but he'd still be at, or slightly above, league average if he's at .280, 30% Ks, and 10 HRs. I mean he's currently at a 106 wRC+ with his .100 ISO. Not what you want out of a guy in the top 5 of your order, but 6-9 hole? You'll take that for sure. Can he maintain his batting average if he doesn't cut down the Ks and/or impact the ball better? That's a tougher task.

Larnach is really hard to judge because he's played hurt for a large chunk of his early MLB time. I don't know what to expect out of him, but there's definitely talent there. Will be interesting to see where his career goes. I'll be surprised if he ever turns into a true slugger, though. Just not how his swing is geared. Unless he's hitting a lot of bombs to CF. He's strong enough to, but not many guys slug that way. He gives good ABs, but needs to figure out those pesky off-speed pitches for things to really click.

[RpR]

  By ,June 28, 2022  Larnach played in 51 games for Minnesota, hitting .231/.306/.406 with 13 doubles ., 5 home runs and 18 RBI.

Right now he is lagging behind those numbers, except for BA.

[ashbury]

His first 4 games were epic, but the next nine have been anemic with an OPS of .452. If not for some walks his BA in this time would be a completely empty .177.  And it not even a particular kind of "bad luck" either, since his BA on balls in play is a league-typical .300.

'Nuff said really.  I withdraw my earlier sunnier outlook - it's only small sample size but he looks like he needs fixing, and not just on the power front.