I agree. I don't think he looks like he needs a day off yet though even after last nights fuck up.
At this point, his defense is iffy overall, but if one's argument is his hitting outweighs whatever he does or doesn't do in CF, well. . . how do you prove that? Which games? Every game?
One could make the argument Pence!! has been on an offensive hot streak since he was called up at the end of April. Through last night, he was .342/.368/.580. Can't knock that.
Still, my main impressions of Pence!! offensively since he has come up are 1.) his batting average is
the main component of his offensive value, and 2.) he hits in spurts, looking like fucking Godzilla!! for a few games, and something more like the Geico gekko the next. I wanted to look at his game logs to see if I was missing something.
First of all, this is entirely arbitrary. One could group his games in sets however one wanted to. It is possible I indulged in some cherry-picking along the way, but I was trying not to. The two things I wanted to do were to look at his games in chronological order, and group them by when he was "hot", and when he wasn't. By "hot", I mean multi-hit games mostly, which have come in bunches for Pence!! so far. Mixed in with those might be a 1-for here and there, amidst the hot streak. Alternately, the other set I was going for was his streaks of 1-fors and 0-fors, which have also teneded to come in bunches for him to this point.
2 games -- 3-for-7 (Apr 28-29)
6 games -- 4-for-25 (May 1-6)
1 game -- 2-for-4 (May 7)
3 games -- 2-for-12 (May 8-9, 11)
8 games -- 17-for-29 (May 12-13, 15-20)
2 games -- 0-for-8 (May 21-22)
5 games -- 10-for-19 (May 23-27)
2 games -- 0-for-7 (May 29-30)
4 games -- 10-for-17 (May 31-Jun 3)
1 game -- 0-for-4 (Jun 5)
2 games -- 4-for-9 (Jun 6-7)
3 games -- 2-for-13 (Jun 8, injury, 11-12)
1 game -- 2-for-4 (Jun 13)
3 games -- 2-for-16 (Jun 14-16)
4 games -- 10-for-21 (Jun 17-20)
2 games -- 1-for-7 (Jun 22-23)
1 game -- 4-for-6 (Jun 24)
6 games -- 4-for-26 (Jun 25-30)
2 games -- 6-for-10 (Jul 1-2)
Some of the ups and downs have to do with Pence!! learning the league, and the league learning him. It may be the whole thing is too small a sample to get anything useful from.
One thing that jumps out at me -- Pence!! has racked up 82% of his hits (68) thus far in just 52% of his starts (30). Or to put it another way, in his non multi-hit games, nearly half the games he starts, remember, he hits .127. One-Two-Seven. Draw your own conclusions; I don't think it would be way out of line to say that, so far, Pence!! is a holy terror at the plate about half the time, and almost useless the other half. He may or may not become more consistent with experience. So far he isn't, and he hasn't shown much inclination to get on base any other way than by hits, either. And in your words his defense is bad to awful.
Given all that, would it not be wise to sit him (as opposed to "rest" him) from time to time when one has observed he appears to be in one of his down cycles? Wouldn't it be the opposite of giving up or even a bad idea to sit him in favor of a guy who is a better defensive player and might bring more offense on that night?
Re: The "letdown" hypothesis
May 1-6 - (60-for-199) 3-3
May 8-9, sit, 11 - (23-for-103) 1-2 (0-1)
May 21-22 - (12-for-63) 0-2
May 29-30 - (10-for-62) 0-2
Jun 5 - (6-for-31) 1-0
Jun 8, injury, injury, 11-12 - (39-for-169) 2-1 (1-1)
Jun 14-16 - (41-for-113) 2-1
Jun 22-23 - (13-for-67) 0-2
Jun 25-30 - (47-for-203) 2-4
In the twenty-eight games Pence!! made little offensive contribution, or rather was hitting .127, the Astros as a team were 11-17 a .393 winning percentage (against their .434 overall), and hit .249 (.261 in all games.) In the three games Pence!! has missed so far, the team was 1-2. All three games were road games, albeit against bad teams (Dickities, White Sox.) The team was 9-13 when Pence!! was called up, and have gone 29-32 since (28-30 in the games he has played in.)
It is pretty clear his addition offensively has been a plus; I doubt anyone would argue against that. I wouldn't go so far as to say that sitting him from time to time would be a huge letdown; hell, if done wisely, it might actually help him, and the team.
Personally, my favorite thing about Pence!! so far is watching him run the bases.
