Meghan Montemurro|The News Journal
PHILADELPHIA– Phillies bench coach Larry Bowa couldn't believe the numbers.
First base coach Mickey Morandini and third base coach Juan Samuel were just as shocked.
For anyone who's watched Phillies shortstop Freddy Galvis on a daily basis, the eye test says he's one of the best defensively at his position in Major League Baseball and a front runner to win a National League Gold Glove Award. Defensive advanced metrics for Galvis, however, don't exactly agree with that assessment.
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Galvis' defensive performances presents a complicated case between the relianceofsabermetrics in the game today and trusting people within the sport based on what they see and evaluate on a day-to-day basis.
"That makes me wonder about defense because I've looked at some of the sabermetrics on Freddy and they don't jive to me," manager Pete Mackanin said."I've seen him play every game – and I've seen a lot of shortstops over 49 years. He's as good as anybody I've ever seen. Somebody asked [Bowa] to compare him and Freddy, who do you think is better? And he had to think about it. He was pretty darn good.”
Galvis fares well in traditional defensive statistics.
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His .988 fielding percentage is tied for firstamong 19 qualified MLB shortstops while his 89 double plays are sixth most in the majors and rank third in the NL. Galvis has also committed justseven errors. Only Detroit's Jose Iglesias has fewer (six), though he's reached that mark on 109 fewer chances.
Yet defensive sabermetrics don't seem to like Galvis' play this season.
Galvis' range at shortstop, with his uncanny ability to make tough plays in the hole appear routine, is one of his best attributes.
FanGraphs' advanced stats don't support what the eyes see, though: while his 100 Out of Zone plays are third best in MLB, his Range Runs, which measures whether a player gets to more balls than average, rank 31st out of 35 MLB players who have logged at least 500 innings at shortstop.
Galvis has 0 Defensive Runs Saved, ranking 15th in the majors and eighth in the NL. However, the metric highlights an inherent problem with these advanced defensive statistics: the volatility in a one-year sample size.
Nine days ago, Galvis had -5 DRSand has started only six games in the span. Yet he improved dramatically in that metric. For comparison, he finished with 5 DRS in 2016 when he was a finalist for the NL Gold Glove Award at shortstop.
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Another commonly used defensive metric Ultimate Zone Rating (UZR), which tries to quantify how many runs a player saved or gave up through their fielding ability, puts Galvis 10th in MLB and fifth in the NL at 3.5. But it's again a dramatic drop from last year (15.1).
One component that could be hurting Galvis' metrics is the data relies on numbers that do not factor in outside influences.
So, for example, if Galvis is shifted behind second base and the ball was hit to his typical zone at shortstop, UZR doesn't account for him being moved out of his normal position. Or if the Phillies' pitching staff allowsa lot of hard-hit balls to his zone that Galvis can't field, that will not be represented in the metrics. Instead, it's considered a play he did not make.
General manager Matt Klentak is aware defensive metrics haven't been favorable for Galvis this season. Hecautioned against relying on one metric or evaluation tool when assessing a player's performance.
"What is difficult to quantify is the confidence [Galvis' range] brings to a pitching staff, to a manager, to an entire team that if I make the pitch I need to make right here and get the ground ball I want, with 100 percent confidence it's going to be an out," Klentak said. "Freddy's as good as anybody in the game at turning those balls into outs. That's why it's not quite fair to look at one tool and make a sweeping conclusion.
"Anybody who wants to quibble with Freddy Galvis' defense is probably barking up the wrong tree."
Defensive metrics have evolved over the last few years thanks to technological advances.
Statcast data has allowed for more publicly available information. But behind the scenes, teams, including the Phillies, are utilizing Statcast and other tools to create a better picture of what a player offers defensively. When scouts would be relied on toreport on a player's great first step or quick hands, there's now data teams can use to confirm the analysis.
It's still a work in progress, though, and it's why teams are trying to get an edge in developing tools that can accurately quantify the once unquantifiable.
"I think it's important not to overlook the obvious, and the obvious is if you watch this guy every day, you know he's an elite shortstop," Klentak said."We will look behind the scenes and behind the numbers and talk to our scouts and paint a total picture. In Freddy Galvis' case, he is without question one of the top defensive shortstops in baseball."
Ask any Phillies coach, pitcher or teammate of Galvis' and they're in agreement that his defense is even better than last season when he nearly won a Gold Glove.As to whether Galvis looks at any defensive sabermetrics, he laughed: "No, nothing like that. You see it at the end of the season. Off the field I just watch TV."
While his defensive metrics remain inexplicably unfavorable, the eyes don't lie – Galvis' performance at shortstop this season should make him a front runner to win the NL Gold Glove Award.
Contact Meghan Montemurro atmmontemurro@delawareonline.com. Follow her on Twitter at @M_Montemurro.
