Apologies are due Dave Roberts and Howie Kendrick

Phil Gurnee ♦ August 17, 2016 ♦ 2 Comments

I have been hard on Dave Roberts in his stubbornness to make Howie Kendrick the starting left fielder and in my own stubbornness to acknowledge my ignorance I was wrong. Roberts was right in continuing to give Howie the at-bats in left field, and I was wrong that Howie wasn’t up to the task. Not just a little wrong, this was a huge whiff on my part.

I just never felt the elderly career 2nd baseman would hit enough to warrant playing in a position noted for offense. I particularly made fun of the fact that for one 100 at-bats, Howie only drove in one run, and that was himself with a home run. But I can’t deny that Howie has hit. and hit. and hit.

Baseball Reference gives us a snapshot for the whole year for Left fielders with at least 300 plate appearances:

Sure, he hasn’t been great compared to peers but he’s right smack in the middle which is pretty good for a 32-year-old second baseman playing LF. Left field only has two elite players right now in Braun and Yelich, with Marte knocking on the door. I’d have lost a lot of money if someone had bet me on May 1st the Howie Kendrick would be out hitting Michael Conforto.  I didn’t see that coming either way.

Yet that above chart is misleading because that involves the whole season, while Howie has been ripping since about May, we are going to use Fangraphs to tell how Howie is doing since the All-Star break compared to his peers:

BOOM

Yup, Howie is having a better second half than MVP candidate Kris Byrant, and folks, it ain’t even close.  Not only has Howe been adequate in LF, at this point, Howie Kendrick is one kick ass left fielder – again, my apologies to Howie and Dave Roberts for doubting them.