MIKE OLT!

[Quality Start Machine]

OLTIMATE WARRIOR

[PenFoe]

OLTIMATE WARRIOR

Seconded, I'm on board.

[Powdered Toast Man]

OLTIMATE WARRIOR

Seconded, I'm on board.

Thirded, brother.

[Tony]

OLTIMATE WARRIOR

Seconded, I'm on board.

Thirded, brother.

I've been waiting for him to do something good to bring that one out. It took too damn long.

[Chuck to Chuck]

The clapping pairs nicely with Allison Brie.

[Powdered Toast Man]

The clapping pairs nicely with Allison Brie.

[J. Walter Weatherman]

I'm going to view his at-bat prior to the grand slam as his nadir, and hope to never see those depths again.  The schlub filling in for Chris Sale was on the ropes, and any pitch near the strike zone was getting rocked that inning.  Olt came up with the bases juiced and was ahead 2-0 before popping out.  Christ, even Junior Lake drew a bases loaded walk after that.

A dude behind me last night dubbed him "Babe Olt", saying he saw him call his shot during that AB.

The weird part this anecdote is that you weren't even at the game.

You watch a 36-inch standard def TV with the window open, you learn to expect some looky-loos.

[Eli]

The clapping Everything pairs nicely with Allison Brie.

Further edited.

[Bort]

OLTIMATE WARRIOR

Seconded, I'm on board.

Thirded, brother.

Fourthed. Even if y'all are a bunch of filthy Snork apologists.

[Saul Goodman]

The clapping pairs nicely with Allison Brie.

So does BEING INCREDIBLY FAT

[Tony]

The clapping Everything pairs nicely with Allison Brie.

Further edited.

Everything except NBC apparently.

[J. Walter Weatherman]

Can we talk about Olt's batted ball numbers, Mac? I've been dying to talk about Olt's batted ball numbers with you all day.

Namely, that it's a story of extremes...

      BABIP  GB/FB   LD%    GB%    FB%   IFFB%  HR/FB  IFH%  BUH%
Olt   .167   0.72   10.1%  37.7%  52.2%  13.9%  25.0%  3.8%  0.0%
MLB   .298   1.33   20.2%  45.6%  34.2%   9.7%  10.1%  6.3% 27.6%

Among batters with 100+ PA in 2014, Olt ranks 5th in the majors in FB%, 8th in HR/FB and 2nd to last in both BABIP and LD%.

For starters, a 25% HR/FB ratio is pretty ridiculous. That's Barry Bonds territory (25.1% career).

MLB leaders in HR/FB the past five seasons:

2013: Chris Davis 29.6%
2012: Adam Dunn 29.3%
2011: Giancarlo Stanton 24.8%
2010: Joey Votto 25.0%
2009: Mark Reynolds 26.0%

And an FB rate north of 50% is exceptionally high, too. Season leaders:

2013: Brandon Moss 51.8%
2012: Mike Moustakas 49.8%
2011: Alfonso Soriano 51.1%
2010: Aramis Ramirez 56.8%
2009: Carlos Pena 54.1%

Put those together and, by the time Olt puts a ball into play, he's more than 13% of the way toward hitting it out of the park already. That is absolutely staggering. (And no doubt due for regression.)

At the same time, a line drive rate of 10.1% is retarded low. Olt's squared up just 7 total line drives on the season.

For context, the worst full-season LD rates from the past five years:

2013: Dan Uggla 13.2%
2012: Drew Stubbs 14.9%
2011: Vernon Wells 12.3%
2010: Aaron Hill 10.6%
2009: Hunter Pence 14.6%

And, given that, as LD% goes, largely so does BABIP, it stands to reason that his BABIP would be really low, too. And it is. But it's even lower than might be expected from his raw batted ball numbers if this formula is anything to go by:

xBABIP = 0.392 + (LD% x 0.287709436) + ((GB% – (GB% * IFH%)) x -0.152 ) + ((FB% – (FB% x HR/FB%) – (FB% x IFFB%)) x -0.188) + ((IFFB% * FB%) x -0.835) + ((IFH% * GB%) x 0.500)

Assuming all my Excel jiggerdypoop is in order, I have Olt at an xBABIP of .253 (versus .167 actual).

Surely Olt's LD rate is ready to regress as well. This time upwards. (Particularly insofar as his retarded high HR rate suggests that his lack of liners doesn't speak to a fundamental power deficit.)

So... Lucky in jimmies, unlucky in love and liners. What's the upshot?

He's hit 26 ground balls, 36 fly balls and 7 line drives this season. Had he put the same number of balls into play but at the league average rates for each batted ball type, he'd instead have 31.5 ground balls, 23.6 fly balls and 13.9 line drives.

Had those 23.6 fly balls left the park at the league average rate instead of his Bonds- or Stanton-esque clip, he'd have just 2.4 homers (versus his team-leading 9).

All else being equal, this would be good for an xBABIP of .312 and, in turn, a batting average of .217 and OBP of .293 (versus .183/.263 actual).

Conclusion? Hell if I know. I'm just some nerd with a laptop.

[R-V]

Put those together and, by the time Olt puts a ball into play, he's more than 13% of the way toward hitting it out of the park already. That is absolutely staggering.

It's too bad Gil didn't live to see his elegant prose get the respect it deserved.

[World's #1 Astros Fan]

Nice work by Thrill.  I'm more confused than I was at the beginning but at LEAST SOMEBODY CARES.

It's a shitty team that, at nearly 1/4 of the season through, is led in homeruns and RBI (*ducks*) by their rookie third baseman.

Would it improve matters for the team (and even more for him) if Olt was batting nearer to the Rizzstro duo or does that not matter at all?  I'm asking for a friend.

[J. Walter Weatherman]

It's a shitty team that, at nearly 1/4 of the season through, is led in homeruns and RBI (*ducks*) by their rookie third baseman.

Led in HR and RBI by their rookie third baseman who has just 20 total hits on the season. He has more RBIs than hits.

In fact, per B-R's play index tool, his season RBI total to date (24) is tied for 21st among all MLB player seasons with RBI > H. Tied with, among the others, Julio Zuleta's 49-game campaign here in 2001 (24/23).

Related.