Daily Dodger in review: James Loney and the great divide
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JAMES LONEY, 26, first base
Final 2010 stats: .267 batting average, 10 home runs, 88 RBI, .329 on-base percentage, .395 slugging percentage in 588 at-bats.
Contract status: Arbitration eligible.
The good: Finished one RBI behind Matt Kemp for the team lead. Appeared in all but one game. Had only four errors and finished with a career-high .997 fielding percentage. Career-best 10 stolen bases. Well liked in clubhouse. Hit .309 with 63 RBI in the first half.
The bad: Seemed to quietly disappear in the second half. After the All-Star break, hit .211 with an OPS of just .616. Lowest home-run total of his full, four-year career. His on-base percentage was the worst of his career.
What’s next: As with most every other position, the Dodgers have no hot prospect putting heat on Loney. He made $3.1 million last season, so he’s looking at $4 million to $5 million in arbitration next season. That’s starting to become a decent amount of money for a first baseman without power.
The take: After Kemp, there is probably no Dodger who divides opinion more than Loney. Fittingly, their clubhouse lockers are next to each other.
When Loney first came up, his critics complained his lack of power made him a poor major-league prospect. The Dodgers countered that young players with such a sweet swing often developed power later. And when he came up in the middle of the 2007 season, he seemed to deliver on that promise, hitting 15 home runs in 344 at-bats.
As a power hitter, however, he had peaked. His slugging percentage has gone down in each of his succeeding three seasons. That natural development has failed to happen. Research by Mike Petriello at MikeSciosciasTragicIllness.com, identified only 11 first basemen in the last 30 years who have had as many plate appearances in a single season as Loney (648 last season) and hit fewer than 10 home runs.
Three of those seasons were turned in by Mark Grace, to whom Loney is often favorably compared. Grace, of course, spent his first 13 years with the Cubs and knew only three winning seasons.
And that’s the rub right now; unlike the Diamondback clubs Grace spent his final three seasons with, those Cubs teams lacked overall power. Just like these Dodgers, which makes Loney’s power deficiency a growing problem. First base is a position teams normally look to for pop.
If Loney were on a team otherwise stacked with decent power, his numbers would not be such a hot-button issue. But with only Andre Ethier and Kemp currently providing 25-plus home runs, Loney’s lack of production has to be a growing concern. Particularly when most of his numbers are edging backward.
There are worse problems for a team to have than a smooth-fielding first baseman who’s averaged 89 RBI the last three years. At this point, Loney is what he is. The Dodgers’ best solution is to surround him with enough power bats that his lack of home-run production isn’t such an issue. But currently, the only real lineup opening is in left field.
-- Steve Dilbeck