Jason Kubel has hit left-handed pitching about as well as Jacque Jones
Posted by ubelmann on Sunday, July 20th, 2008 at 2:17 am
.217/.305/.319 -- Jason Kubel vs. LHP, career
.230/.278/.350 -- Jacque Jones vs. LHP, career
Kubel's line is slightly less awful than Jacque's line, but both lines are still awful.
I like Jason Kubel. I think he can hit right-handed pitching and this team could use a cheap DH/OF to use against RHP. However, Kubel hasn't done anything to convince me that he's special, and most left-handed hitters have bigger platoon splits than right-handed hitters. (Even special hitters can have big platoon splits, though.)
It drove me mad when Gardy wouldn't platoon Jacque Jones, so I'm going to have to say that, at this point, I think it's reasonable to sit Kubel against LHP. If nothing else, it helps protect his knees even more and gives Gardy a good left-handed pinch hitter on the bench. Forcing the other team to burn a LOOGY on Kubel means one fewer LOOGY for them to use against Mauer and Morneau, and that has value, too.
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It seems to Moss that Kubel isn't that great against a true fastball pitcher (even if RHP) either. Moss doesn't have data to back it up, though.
Luckily M&M are pulling up the slack a bit against LHP, though.
according to b-r, his career splits are
206/293/382 vs "power" pitchers (225 PA)
284/341/460 vs "average" (539)
275/317/443 vs "finesse" (313)
Kubel has 190 career plate appearances against lefties. How many do you give him beofre you can definitely say he'll be Jacque Jones?
Is there any splits data available from the minors?
Unfortunately, minor league splits has temporarily dumped all their pre-2008 stats. But you can go look at current minor leaguers' splits. So you can find out quirky stats like Ben Revere is hitting .680 in the 7th inning this year.
I don't even know that the minor league data is that reliable. Good left-handed pitchers tend to get promoted fast and there are probably a lot of crap soft-tossing lefties in the minors that could distort the stats.
I don't know that we really need to give him that many more PA. I mean, we shouldn't do everything possible to keep him away from LHP, but if there's a reasonable right-handed option around, it's as much about putting that right-handed hitter in a good spot to succeed as it is getting Kubel out of a spot where he's less likely to succeed.
And there doesn't seem to be any scouting reason that Kubel would be good against lefties. Scouts/traditionalists are not perfect, but they're not in Kubel's corner on this issue, and I think that matters, too. (If someone has a reason that they think Kubel should be able to hit lefties, I'm willing to listen, though.)