Pittsburgh Pirates: Making the Case for Ka’ai Tom to Bat Leadoff

With Ka’ai Tom looking like an on-base machine how can the Pittsburgh Pirates best utilize his skill set?

Most fans who tune into a game and get a look outfielder Ka’ai Tom’s base stat line will just think this was another bad addition by the Pittsburgh Pirates. After all, his .204 batting average with the Buccos and .169 overall between Oakland and Pittsburgh is very underwhelming.  But if we dig deeper Tom has some intriguing underlying value that has made him the second most productive outfielder this season for Pittsburgh behind Bryan Reynolds. Let’s take a look.

One look at the Rule 5 pick’s overall batting splits (with the Oakland A’s and Pittsburgh Pirates) do not paint a pretty picture. Overall he is hitting for a .169/.321/.277 slash line with a 78 wRC+. His stats with the Pirates however look better as he has posted a .204/.382/.347 line and an above league average 113 wRC+ in 68 plate appearances with Pittsburgh.

Yes, Tom has registered a nearly .400 on base percentage in limited time with the Pirates – how has he done this?

His .382 OBP has been fueled by a few things. His 4.18 pitches per plate appearance is 2nd behind Gregory Polanco (4.19) and by comparison the NL leader is Tommy Pham – who see an average of 4.43 pitches per plate appearance. Now there is not always a direct correlation among pitches seen and an ability to get on base – Polanco has just a .287 OBP. One of the differences I noticed is that while Polanco sees slightly more pitches, he is much more prone to swinging at the first pitch – as he does 31% of the time. Tom on the other hand swings at the first pitch just 17% of the time. While Tom has been better about finishing at bats  and drawing walks – it is worth noting he has a very high strikeout looking rate – at 28%. This is of course a completely wasted at bat with no opportunity to put the ball in play or move a runner – no not an ideal outcome, but considering Polanco has struck out way more then Tom (31% vs 20%) and walked significantly less (9.2% walk rate for Polanco, 14.3% for Tom) I am ok with Tom knowing his role as an on base guy and taking those borderline pitches.

Back to the statistic I mentioned above, wrc+. The OBP has contributed to a 113 WRC+ – one of many metrics used to evaluate a player’s overall production. wRC+ Stands for “weighted runs created” and take different factors into account such as the stadium a player is hitting at. Of Pirate batters have appeared in 20+ games Tom’s 113-mark ranks 4th on the team – and the only outfielder ahead of him is Bryan Reynolds. For comparisons sake Phillips Evans (95 wrc+), Polanco (81 wrc+) and Ben Gamel (54 wrc+) are the next highest players in this category that have logged outfield playing time for the Pittsburgh Pirates.

What is my point here? Tom has some work to do – including actually hitting the ball better as his average has been pulled down by an unsustainably low .196 batting average on balls in play (BAbip) – but the Pirates should highly consider keeping him in the upper half of the batting order, even with Ke’Bryan Hayes returning soon.

Tom’s ability to work counts and draw walks out of them could set the table. I know Adam Frazier is absolutely raking but what if the Pirates could place a nearly .400 OBP guy in front of him so Frazier can put his league leading 71 hits and 19 doubles to better use and drive in more runs. Assuming Tom’s wrist injury from Tuesday’s game isn’t significant, I would love to see Tom hit leadoff with Frazier two, then Hayes and Reynolds to follow. To me, that seems like a smart lineup to give a try.