One year after trade, Lucas Duda continues to flourish

Saturday, April 18^th marked a significant anniversary for Mets first baseman Lucas Duda.  One year ago on that day, General Manager Sandy Alderson officially made the commitment that Duda was to be the undisputed Mets first baseman by shipping Ike Davis to the Pittsburgh Pirates for Zach Thornton and a Player To Be Named Later, eventually being left-handed pitcher Blake Taylor.

The decision to retain Duda over Davis has been one of the better personnel decisions in Alderson’s nearly five-year tenure with the club.  Entering Sunday’s series finale with the Miami Marlins, Duda has hit .263/.355/.491 with 28 home runs, 33 doubles and a 141 OPS+ since the trade.  Over the same period Davis is at .243/.349/.389 with 11 home runs, 21 doubles, a 95 OPS+ and has moved on to the Oakland Athletics.

Duda was so good in the 2014 season that he finished 22^nd in the National League Most Valuable Player voting.  Many thought for years that Duda had a breakout performance inside of him, and it finally manifested itself last year.  There was a lot of talk – sometimes more jokingly than others – of the exit velocity of the ball off Duda’s bat being a factor, but the reason for his success last year and in a small 53 plate appearance sample this year is simpler.

He’s swinging and missing – and therefore striking out – less.

It was a popular viewpoint early in Duda’s career that he was too passive in his approach at the plate, and that was leading to him racking up strikeouts in over 26 percent of his plate appearances between 2012 and 2013.  Part of the reason for Duda’s success last year and so far this year, these same people would say, is that he is being more aggressive.

The problem with this narrative is that it wasn’t entirely true.

While data compiled by Brooks Baseball show Duda has always been slightly passive in his approach at the plate, it is not to a degree that one would call extreme.  In 2014 Duda was in fact more aggressive against fastballs, but against offspeed and breaking pitches his approach barely changed from where it had been his entire career.  Even with the improvement against fastballs, his approach really was no different from where it was in the 2012 season (click to enlarge image).

It is also difficult to imagine that such a small adjustment could lead to Duda’s strikeout rate declining by nearly four full percentage points.  Let’s take a look at what happens when you sort the table by Whiffs per Swing (click to enlarge).

What we see is that Duda whiffed at significantly lower numbers of fastballs and breaking balls, while getting slightly worse against offspeed pitches.  When combined with an increase in the number of breaking balls he was thrown, we see Duda making more contact and striking out less.  Along with BABIP regression, the demonstrated benefit of playing his natural position and being in the lineup every day, the ingredients were all there for a monster year from Duda.

In 2015, after two consecutive two-strikeout games over the weekend Duda is only striking out in 20.8% of his plate appearances, down from 26.6% in 2013.  The next 12 games or will be telling for Duda, as strikeout percentage stabilizes at about 100 plate appearances.  If Duda continues to improve his strikeout numbers, there’s no reason to believe that he can’t at least repeat the kind of season he had in 2014.