Andrés Giménez: To Buy or Sell in 2024?.

Welcome back to the website. We will examine five players’ FanGraphs projection models over the course of the next few weeks, and we will conclude with a buying or selling recommendation for the entire season.

Once more, this depends on our decision to purchase or sell the prediction rather than the player overall.

We start with Andrés Giménez, a case that is generally quite interesting.

Andrés Giménez won a Platinum Glove in 2023 to cap off an All-Star and Second Team All-MLB 2022 season; however, his wRC+ fell from 142 to 97, three points below league average. Despite his offensive shortcomings, Giménez was a perfectly productive player, posting 3.6 fWAR; yet, his overall batted ball statistics raised serious questions. Giménez fell into the bottom ten of all second basemen with at least 300 plate appearances in 2023 as his hard hit percentage fell over 10%, from 37.6% to 27%, and his average exit velocity fell three miles per hour, from 87.7 to 84.7.

Few non-catchers can compensate for weaknesses like Giménez’s defense can. But because of the lineup’s general inconsistency, the Guardians sorely need his bat to return to being above league average. Let’s divide it down into thirds because the second baseman’s total numbers from the previous season also don’t reveal the complete story.

Giménez wasn’t nice during the season; from the first game to May 29, he was unforgiving. He cut.had just 11 extra-base hits in 50 games, enough for a 71 wRC+. 220/.289/.322/.611. What was worse were his surroundings. Giménez had appalling xwOBA and xSLG% values of.264 and.297, respectively. Giménez had incredibly low contact quality. Only Estuary Ruiz has a lower average exit velocity than him (82.0%) among of 283 players with at least 100 PA as of May 29. Giménez had the lowest hard hit rate of any batter at 19.9%; Andrés and Myles Straw were the only other batters with a rate lower than 21%.

Giménez started to click between June and the All-Star Break. Andrés hit more home runs in those 37 games than he had in his previous 50 games during the slump, and he had 25 RBI as opposed to just 9 earlier. In addition to having favorable peripherals, Giménez’s slash line of.287/.361/.481/.841 and 132 wRC+ were all indicative of his 2022 season. His barrels per batted ball event decreased from 1.4% to 9.3%, while his hard hit rate increased from 19.9% to 30.8%. His xwOBA and wOBA were essentially the same at.359 wOBA and.351 xwOBA.

After the All-Star Break, Giménez experienced yet another slump, hitting just.207/.268/.361/.629 in 42 games through the end of August. Giménez saw 41% of pitches outside the zone during this time, which is similar to the two previous game groups we’ve examined. The low point of his hot streak was 39.4%, while the season’s first slump was 40%. That percentage did, however, go below 35% to 34.4% during his scorching September that followed his post-All-Star Break slump. Giménez was brash and only went for three walks throughout the whole month. Giménez finished the last 13 games with six extra-base hits. He continued to chase a lot of pitches out of the zone, but when he did get within, he attacked them.

In 2024, that will be the primary distinction with Giménez. Will he be able to control pitches, particularly those that are high and over the zone, or will he continue to struggle? It won’t be for lack of effort, whether he does or doesn’t.