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The answers in the outfield are becoming clearer than the Astros hoped

The answers in the outfield are becoming clearer than the Astros hoped

*Note: Some Advanced Statistics, courtesy of Baseball Savant, do not include Thursday night's game against the Diamondbacks. Others, courtesy of Fangraphs, do include Thursday night's game*

The Corpus Christi Hooks Twitter account confirmed that Yordan Alvarez is alive and able to take swings, meaning the slugger's return to the Astros lineup is getting closer. Alvarez will get a bulk of the DH at-bats. With Springer being the primary center fielder, and Brantley being the primary left fielder, Dusty Baker will have to choose between Josh Reddick and Kyle Tucker for his primary right fielder. Who should he choose?

How do you boil down picking between two players to one question? What is the most important thing to judge a hitter on? The answer

The better player is the player that does the most damage consistently.

Sounds easy, right? But how do you judge that?

  1. Hard Hit %
  2. BB:K
  3. Contact %

Why these three? Well, hitting the ball hard usually leads to damage, so it is good to hit the ball hard. A player that walks and strikes out roughly the same amount is generally pretty consistent, so BB:K ratios closer to 1:1 (this is extremely rare, and a vast majority of MLB hitters are worse than 1:2) are good. Lastly, players that make contact a lot not only can generally do more of the little things like moving runners over, lifting a ball with a runner on third, or executing a hit & run, but also they generally don't swing and miss at their pitch when they get it. Action happens.

Kyle Tucker has a hard hit % of 38.5% so far in 2020. That is 55th in MLB amongst players with at least 25 batted balls (Tucker has 26). For context, Padres star third baseman Manny Machado is ranked 54th with 38.9%, thorn-in-the-Astros-side Kole Calhoun is t-58th at 37.9%, and Padres star shortstop Fernando Tatis leads the big leagues at 66.7% (wow).

So, more than 1/3rd of the time Tucker makes contact, he hits it hard. That's pretty good...But how often does he make contact?

Tucker has a contact % of 75.6%, meaning he makes contact with the baseball three out of every four times he swings the bat. That is 88th amongst qualified hitters. He is 1% worse than the slumping Jose Altuve, tied with that guy Kole Calhoun again, and about 1% better than the also-slumping George Springer. Tucker is far from elite at putting the bat on the ball, but he isn't terrible either.

However, despite hitting baseball's hard one-third of the time and making contact three-thirds of the time, Tucker strikes out entirely too much. His 29.3% K-rate is the 35th worst in baseball, and he doesn't offset the strikeouts with a lot of walks either. Tucker walks just 7.3% of the time, which is the 62nd lowest. Ultimately, Tucker has a BB:K ratio of 0.25, which is 49th in MLB right now.

Lastly, while it isn't part of the criteria above, Tucker doesn't have a very diverse batted ball portfolio. Tucker hits the ball to the pull side 65% of the time, and he's hit it on the ground 50% of the time. Eventually, teams will start placing heavy shifts on him, and those balls that have snuck through holes in the early parts of the year won't anymore.

But, is Josh Reddick any better? While none of Tucker's numbers blow you away, they aren't terrible, and he's a young prospect that needs playing time to develop.

Reddick has a 31.3% hard hit % so far in 2020, about seven percentage points below Tucker. 31.3% places Reddick in 96th place, between players like Marcus Semien and Yuli Gurriel. So, Tucker has Reddick beat here, but it isn't by a landslide.

Reddick has a contact % of 80.5%, which is 50th in MLB right now. He's better than Tucker by 5%, and he's in the top quartile in baseball. Reddick also sprays the ball around when he makes contact, hitting the ball to center field 43.8% of the time, right field 37.5% of the time, and left field 18.8% of the time. His ground ball rate is also 31%, almost 20% lower than Tucker's. That would explain why Reddick and Tucker's Barrel % (hard hit baseballs hit in the most desired exit velocity) are within a percentage point of one another despite Tucker having a seven point hard hit advantage.

Lastly, Reddick doesn't strike out very much. He strikes out 14% of the time, which is the 34th best K% in baseball (funny enough, Gurriel and Brantley are 33rd and 32nd). While Reddick doesn't walk a ton either, he walks more than Tucker, clocking in four percentage points better at 11.6%. That results in a BB:K ratio of 0.83, which is tied with Bryce Harper and Freddie Freeman for the 30th best in MLB.

Throw in the fact that Reddick plays significantly better defense, and it's really a no-brainer who should play. Astros fans might want the sexier and newer model in Tucker, but it isn't time to trade in old reliable just yet. When Yordan Alvarez returns, Josh Reddick is the right answer in right field.

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The Texans are the class of the division. Photo by Tim Warner/Getty Images.

The Houston Texans received a lot of praise for their moves in free agency across various outlets. And for good reason, most people believe the team got significantly better with the additions of Danielle Hunter, Azeez Al-Shaair, and Denico Autry among others.

But there's another factor to consider this offseason. How much have the other teams in the AFC South improved?

When looking at the PFF grades in free agency, the Colts received a B-minus. Most of the Colts moves this offseason involved spending a lot of money re-signing their own players. Which is great in theory, but it's hard to improve the overall quality of your roster when you're bringing back players that were already there to begin with. A lot will be riding on player development for the Colts to see a big jump this season. A healthy quarterback wouldn't hurt either.

The Jaguars have made some big additions financially this offseason by signing receiver Gabe Davis and defensive tackle Arik Armstead. They also lost the top receiver on the market, Calvin Ridley, to the Titans. Gabe Davis wasn't able to establish himself as a reliable No. 2 receiver with Josh Allen throwing him the ball in Buffalo. So it's hard to believe he'll take the next step in Jacksonville. Their best move of the offseason might have been retaining edge rusher Josh Allen by using the franchise tag on him. So what did PFF think of Jacksonville's offseason? They received a B-minus, just like the Colts.

The Titans have a lot of turnover heading into the 2024 season, and not just on the roster. They have a new head coach in Brian Callahan, who's looking to revamp Tennessee's offense. Early in free agency, they agreed to terms with former Cowboys running back Tony Pollard, signing him to a 3-year deal at $8 million per season. Which is more money than the Ravens are paying for Derrick Henry, who left the Titans in free agency. Calvin Ridley was the most notable addition to the squad, he received a 4-year, $92 million deal. And while this could be viewed as an overpay, at least he gives the Titans' offense some upside. Their receiving corps looks a lot more dangerous with Ridley added to DeAndre Hopkins and Treylon Burks.

They also spent big at the center position, adding Lloyd Cushenberry on a 4-year, $50 million contract.

Because the Titans spent a lot of money on some highly coveted players, PFF gave them a B.

Now that brings us to the Texans. The Texans re-signed some of their own players like Dalton Schultz and Noah Brown. But they also made some big splashes with Hunter, Autry, Al-Shaair, and Joe Mixon. But the Texans spent their money in a more conservative way by not handing out many contracts over two years in length.

The Texans managed to add the best pass rusher in free agency with Hunter, but it's only a two-year deal. The overall talent level is going up on this roster, and GM Nick Caserio isn't having to sign players to long contracts that could come back and haunt him.

That's why we're seeing post-free agency power rankings coming out with Houston in the Top 10. And that's also why PFF gave the Texans an A for their moves in free agency.

Be sure to check out the video above as Craig from Sports Talk Extra takes an in-depth look at PFF's grades for the AFC South, and much more!

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