Andy Van Slyke's Impact on the Tigers

So, Andy Van Slyke has been asked not to return or is going to explore other opportunities. Who knows what the real reasoning is and who initiated the parting of ways, but the only coach leaving the coaching staff is Van Slyke.

As the Tigers 1st base coach, he handled the base running and the outfield positioning and defense. So, what has Detroit done under Van Slyke in those two categories? Let's find out, after the jump. . .

First, we'll go with the base running. We'll turn to Baseball Prospectus' Equivalent Base Running Runs (EQBRR) to judge how the Tigers have done since 2006 -- the first year for Jim Leyland and his staff, of which Van Slyke an original member. The Tigers have finished (runs are expressed against an average team on the base paths):

2006: -10.9 runs, 25th in the Majors
2007: +5.22, 5th
2008: -8.93, 23rd
2009: -3.29, 17th

So, the Tigers base running has been 17.9 runs below average since 2006 and an average of -4.5 runs. Now, how much of this is actually due to Andy Van Slyke or the personnel he's asked to work with? It's hard to know, really. That'd take a player-by-player look at their individual base running results through their careers -- both pre- and post-Van Slyke tutelage. I'm not going to explore it that much. Suffice it to say, though, that base running has cost the Tigers nearly 2 full wins in the last 4 years. Snagging those wins in either 2006 or 2009 would look good right about now, no?

Now, the outfield defense. We'll turn to Fangraphs and just take a quick-and-dirty look at the Tigers outfield defense since 2006. These are expressed in runs saved (or not saved) above/below average fielders at the same positions.

2006: +1.8
2007: +23.1
2008: -20.6
2009: +17.4

That's a cumulative total of 21.7 runs saved and averages out to +5.5 runs saved per season. Essentially, the bad base running over the last 4 seasons has been washed out by good outfield defense.

Again, I'm not sure how much of an affect Van Slyke has on the outfield defense. I highly doubt that he did much differently in 2007 than he did in 2008. Defense, particularly outfield defense, can be swayed by one great season. 2007 really gets boosted because Magglio Ordonez actually was a great defensive outfielder. I know anyone reading this automatically doesn't put stock in UZR from Fangraphs, but year-to-year it varies. You need 2-3-4+ seasons worth of data because fielding takes so long to stabilize. 1 year of defensive data is roughly equivalent to half a season of offensive data. So, you can't take it at face value if you want to predict defense in the future. Curtis Granderson had a great 2007 year defensively as well.

Conversely, in 2008, it gets dragged way down by Marcus Thames' -12.3 runs saved in just 513 innings in the outfield. Plus, Granderson dropped around 23 runs defensively from the middle-teens down to -9 in 2008.

What am I saying? Actually, I'm not saying much. The Tigers defense has been maligned, particularly in the outfield, but it's been pretty solid. The base running leaves much to be desired. It'll be interesting to see what the base running and outfield defense looks like for guys like Granderson and Ordonez who I suspect will still be patrolling outfield spots the majority of the time.

Andy Van Slyke was a great quote and seemed to be a guy that can keep the bench and clubhouse loose, while commanding respect at the same time. I'm not a huge believer in clubhouse chemistry being imperative to team success, but if it does exist, it took a bit of a ding today. I'll always miss this picture, however:

Tip-o-the-cap to Ian for posting it.