2009 White Sox player review: Alexei Ramirez

October 26, 3:12 PMChicago White Sox ExaminerJJ Stankevitz

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A move to SS helped Alexei Ramirez' defense in 2009. (AP photo/Mark Duncan)

One of the big question marks coming into 2009 was where Alexei Ramirez would be defensively after moving from second base to his natural position of shortstop. Debates raged in the offseason as some Sox fans were concerned Ramirez' -8.3 2B UZR would carry over and/or get worse at shortstop. Others thought Ramirez would see a marked defensive improvement with a move to a position he was familiar with.

I was pretty much down the middle last February on the subject:

there's nothing close to an absolute answer on where Ramirez' defense will fall in 2009. There have been a lot of sabermetric reports that have written off Ramirez' defense as poor for this year, but the situation is far more complex than that. On the other side of the spectrum, Ramirez likely won't magically turn into a gold glove shortstop just because that's his natural position.

And, in the end, the mean of the extremes is exactly what happened with Ramirez' defense.

Key stats
GP: 148
PA: 606
AB: 542
Batting average: .277
OBP: .333
Slugging: .389
OPS: .723
OPS+: 86
wOBA: .319
2B: 14
3B: 1
HR: 15
BB/SO: 0.74
RBI: 68
SB/CS: 14/5
BABIP: .293
UZR: 3.1
WAR: 2.3

That UZR of 3.1 was pretty much in-between the defensive liability and gold glove projections that some had. However, Ramirez still didn't always look like an above-average defensive shortstop.

Ramirez displayed excellent range, but he was guilty of a good number of brain farts that led to him being out of position or making lazy throws. Some of those errors made you wonder if Ramirez was a little bit too comfortable playing in his natural position.

But I'm still going to trust UZR here because it doesn't have a response bias. We're more likely to remember those lazy throws that went wide of first than the plays Ramirez made look routine because of above-average range, so that 3.1 total is probably pretty accurate.

It's unlikely that Ramirez will develop into a gold glove-worthy shortstop, but if he can play out his contract with above-average defense, it'll be a major bonus to whatever offense he brings to the table.

In 2009, though, that offense took a bit of a step backward. While Ramirez' OBP was 16 points higher in '09 than in '08, his slugging percentage dropped from .475 to .389. Behind that was a significant dropoff in doubles (22 to 14) and home runs (21 to 15) despite having 62 more at-bats in 2009.

Ramirez was far more selective in swinging at pitches in '09, but that didn't lead to better contact. His swing percentage of 59.9 in '08 fell to 50.7 in '09, but his line drive rate actually fell about a full percent.

On top of that, Ramirez' strikeout percentage remained roughly the same in 2009 as it was 2008. So Ramirez was striking out at the same rate despite swinging at fewer pitches.

A lot of that can be explained by Ramirez' struggles with two strikes. While you're not going to find many players who hit very well behind in the count, Ramirez' problems in those spots were certainly noteworthy.

His triple slash with two strikes of .213/.259/.319 tells me that he's either frequently chasing bad pitches outside the strike zone, he's not shortening up his stroke, or both. That'll lead to a a lot of swings and misses at balls out of the zone or just plain bad contact.

I'm probably overstating Ramirez' offensive problems, though. Like 2008, Ramirez struggled in the season's first month and a half—but unlike 2008, Ramirez played through his struggles in 2009.

From April 7 to May 12, Ramirez had just one home run and a .501 OPS in 108 plate appearances. Then, from May 13 through the end of the season, Ramirez hit 14 home runs with a .772 OPS (.354 OPS, .419 slugging) in 498 plate appearances.

Ramirez is either a slow starter or has problems hitting in cold weather—or is a bad combination of both. Until Ramirez figures out how to hit in April and early May, he's not going to be able to put together a truly complete offensive season.

But as long as his above-average defense keeps up, the Sox certainly can live with paying $1.1 million a year for a 2.3-win player. Even if he doesn't ever hit 25+ home runs with an OPS above .800, for a shortstop with good defense, his offense isn't exactly detrimental.

Links:

• Larry at SouthSideSox passed along a note that Dayan Viciedo is injured and was removed from the AFL. I do like the prospect of Brent Morel getting some time in Arizona as a replacement, though.
• Another one of Sox Machine's readers submitted an offseason plan.
• Andrew remembers 2005 at 35th Street Review.