Padres Editorial: NL West 2015-Ranking the First Basemen

How Good Are the Padres?

The San Diego Padres are going to the World Series, right? Ok, ok. Maybe that’s a bit premature, but cut me some slack. They haven’t been to the playoffs in eight years, and they’ve just signed several players who are as good as any player they’ve had during this loooooong dry spell. We’re excited, and we have good reason to be.

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But before the team gets to the World Series, there’s a full season of games to be played, and success in the NL West will be critical in determining the Padres chances of seeing postseason play. The NL West is not a division of patsies. The Dodgers are loaded, the Giants are the defending World Series champs, and the Rockies will score mountains of runs. The Diamondbacks may not be the preseason favorites to win the division, but they will feature a middle of the lineup with the potential to be as good as any in the division. And the Padres are not the only team within the division to make some key off-season acquisitions.

To get a sense of where the Pads rank within their division, why don’t we do a position-by-position comparison of the NL West teams?  First up, first base.

Mandatory Credit: Stan Liu-USA TODAY Sports

San Diego Padres: Yonder Alonso

We’ll start this comparison with the Padres’ own Yonder Alonso. Unfortunately, the reason we’re starting with Alonso is that this is a countdown, and Alonso is the worst first baseman in the NL West. First base is one of the weaker spots on the 2015 Padres. That’s not to say that Alonso is one of the worst players on the Padres. It’s just that first base is primarily an offensive position. And last year, Alonso’s offense was, well, offensive.

He put up a triple-slash line of .240/.285/.397. That .285 on-base percentage was fifth worst among major league first basemen with at least 275 plate appearances. We’re aware of the fact that Alonso is not a power hitter, his career high in home runs being nine. So the Padres count on him making solid contact, driving the ball, and being productive with men on base. Otherwise, what is his value to the team on offense?

With runners in scoring position in 2014, Alonso slashed considerably worse: .203/.254/.271.

Now, to be fair, Alonso wasn’t healthy last year. Or the year before. But that just makes him a below-average hitter who can’t stay on the field.

The Padres backup at first base? Tommy Medica. Medica’s numbers are remarkably similar to Alonso’s last year, with each getting around 250 ABs, driving in 27 runs, and getting on base at a .285/.286 clip. Medica has more power than Alonso, but is such a streaky hitter at this point that keeping him in the lineup when he is cold is simply too painful to watch.

Unless the Padres decide to move Wil Myers to first base, the Padres are the weakest team in the NL West at this position. And even if they do, they still might not crack the top three.

Mandatory Credit: Denny Medley-USA TODAY Sports

San Francisco Giants: Brandon Belt

The only NL West first baseman injured more last year than Yonder Alonso was the Giants’ Brandon Belt. Belt played in only 64 games, first suffering a broken thumb on a hit-by-pitch, then sitting out for two stints with symptoms from a concussion. But when he was healthy, and particularly for the final 10 games of the season and the Giants’ postseason run through the World Series, Belt began producing at the level the Giants have been hoping for. 

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Belt was a potential breakout candidate last year, following his promising 2013, in which he hit .289 with 17 homers and 39 doubles. His power continued to blossom even with his injuries last year, improving his home run rate from once every 30 AB in 2013 to once every 18 AB last year. And in the postseason, he hit .295 and reached base at a .397 clip.

While he hit only .243 in the regular season, he was hitting .264 before the broken thumb, and didn’t play more than nine games in a row until late September following the injury. And his six home runs in April showed his potential to be a 30-home run guy. At 6-foot-5, 220, he’s got the build to drive the ball out of the park. And it wouldn’t surprise anyone to see him go .290 with 30 homers and 100 RBI this year. But he hasn’t put those numbers up yet, which is why he is still only ranked fourth in the NL West.

Mandatory Credit: Ron Chenoy-USA TODAY Sports

Colorado Rockies: Justin Morneau

The Rockies’ Justin Morneau won the National League batting crown last year and slugged nearly .500. He had the second best range factor and the second highest fielding percentage in the majors at his position. And he still only ranks as the third best first baseman in the NL West. That’s how good the players at this position are in this division. 

Morneau hit a stellar .319 in his first year enjoying the benefits of playing at altitude, adding 17 homers and 32 doubles to finish with a SLG of .496. I’ll admit it, I didn’t expect him to hit that well. Last year, in my very first column for Friars on Base, I ranked him behind Yonder Alonso. Morneau had averaged .256 and 13 homers the previous three seasons, and seemed far removed from the perennial MVP candidate he was for the Twins mid-last decade. But there’s nothing like that clean, thin mountain air to put a little life back into the bat, is there!

Morneau’s home and road splits show that he certainly favored hitting at Coors Field, with 11 of his 17 homers and 52 of his 82 RBI coming in Denver. But Morneau hit more doubles on the road than at home (19 to 13), and still managed to hit .309 in road games. And at 33-years old, just a year older than Adrian Gonzalez, he could certainly continue to hit for several more years. I’m not sure there’s another batting title in that Louisville Slugger, but then, I didn’t think so last year either.

Mandatory Credit: Gary A. Vasquez-USA TODAY Sports

Los Angeles Dodgers: Adrian Gonzalez

Darn it, it still hurts to see Adrian playing for the Dodgers. But then, I suppose Dodgers fans will feel the same way about Matt Kemp for the next few years.

Gonzalez is hard to categorize as a hitter. With the Padres, he was a slugger, a lock for 30+ homers and 100 RBI, while hitting around .280. With the Red Sox, he was a contact hitter with some power, hitting as high as .338 and leading the AL in hits, but with home runs totals in the teens and 20s. With the Dodgers, the average has come down a bit and the homers have settled in the mid-20s, but he’s driving in tons of runs in a loaded lineup. In fact, he led the NL in RBI last year with 116.

But no matter what style of hitter Gonzalez is from year to year, he is always a hitter. His career slash line is .292/.364./499. He has hit 262 homers and driven in close to 1000 runs. He has received MVP votes in seven different seasons, but has never finished higher than fourth. He is consistently very, very good.

What sets Gonzalez further apart from those ranked below him is his defense. Gonzalez led all major league first basemen in assists last year with 118, the fourth time in his career he has topped that category. Padres fans remember how he made the 3-6-3 double play look easy, how he anticipated and fielded bunts so well that he frequently was able to throw out the lead runner. Fans of teams with average fielding first baseman tend not to notice first base defense too much, unless it’s really bad. Fans of teams with excellent defensive first baseman like Gonzalez realize that they have something special.

Mandatory Credit: Matt Kartozian-USA TODAY Sports

Arizona Diamondbacks: Paul Goldschmidt

Paul Goldschmidt is the best first baseman in the National League West. Paul Goldschmidt may very well be the best first baseman in baseball.

After playing in all but one of the Diamondbacks first 110 games in 2014, the 2013 National League MVP runner-up ran into some bad luck in the form of an Ernesto Frieri fastball, and missed the final eight weeks of the season with a fractured wrist. At that point, he was hitting .300, getting on base at a rate of .396, and slugging .542.

These numbers were almost exactly in line with his 2013 figures.

Despite playing for only two-thirds of a season, he finished eighth among first baseman in extra-base hits with 59, collecting 39 doubles and 19 homers.  His 75 runs scored were good for seventh place. His batting average was fourth, his SLG third, and his OBP was the best in the majors among first sackers. He also led all first baseman in stolen bases with nine, while nobody else had more than five. And that was after stealing 18 and 15 the two previous years, in which he played a full season.

In other words, most of the first baseman who played a full season wish they finished with the numbers that Goldschmidt put up in two-thirds of a season.

And like Gonzalez, Goldschmidt is one of the top fielders at his position. His range factor last year was top five, and his 80 assists put him on a pace to rival Gonzalez for the major league lead if he had not been injured.

They don’t talk much about first baseman being five tool guys. But when they do, Goldschmidt’s name is likely to come up. The man is the complete package.