by Daniel Gettinger

If you think I gush too much about Chad Gaudin, you should have heard me discussing Russell Branyan a few years back.  He batted 0.197 for the Padres in ‘07, but I liked to point out the very reasonable (at least for that batting average) 0.748 OPS.  I told everyone who would listen that all Russ needed was consistent playing time.  Most thought I was crazy.  To this day, I am still heckled by my friends about my weird Russell Branyan obsession.

This year though, it is me doing the laughing.  Branyan is having a career year, and the media has picked up on it.  The thing is, Branyan is not doing all that much differently.  For his career, Branyan has walked 12.4% of the time.  This year: 13.3%.  His line drive, ground ball, and fly ball rates are all almost exactly the same as his career numbers.  So is his HR/FB rate.  The only noticeable difference is a K% that is significantly lower than his career mark, but almost identical to his 2008 mark.

This season, Branyan has an OPS 1.009, a high mark for sure, but not one that is all that shocking to me.  He has only been to the plate 263 times.  Branyan has a career OPS of 0.832.  We expect players with a 0.832 OPS to occasionally string together a couple hundred great plate appearances.

Nick Swisher is one of Branyan’s closest comparable according to Baseball Reference.  Swisher’s career OPS is 0.812.  His best season was in 2007, when he finished with an OPS of 0.836.  He started that season much like Branyan has in 2009.  In Swisher’s first 204 plate appearances (I am using 204 just because the numbers are easily accessible via split data), he had a 0.433 OBP and a 0.536 SLG, for an OPS of 0.969, not too different from Branyan’s 263 plate appearances in 2009.

Players do not play at their true talent levels at all time.  In 2007, Nick Swisher had a great two months before regressing.  Russell Branyan is probably in store for a similar fate.  The thing is, based on his career performance, we should not be surprised Branyan has hit as well as he has.  Performance is highly variable. Sometimes good hitters have a great year.  Even more often, good hitters have great half years.