This has been a year to forget for the Brewers major-league team and several of its mainstays. Jonathan Lucroy is chief among them. He started the season poorly before hitting the disabled list for several weeks with a broken toe. By every major WAR calculation, Lucroy has been worth less than a win for the Brewers (0.2 rWAR, 0.5 fWAR, 0.9 WARP). This is far from what was expected from the catcher who had been one of the best players in baseball a season ago. But is this the new normal for Lucroy or just a year to forget?
BP Milwaukee’s Julien Assouline took a look at Lucroy’s declined pitch framing skill. It’s been a problem, though pitch framing is not currently a part of WAR calculations so that doesn’t help explain his decline this year. Other defensive metrics are involved in WAR including DRS and FRAA. Lucroy’s -5 DRS is a career low, but his -0.3 FRAA is one of his better marks.
It’s not just his defense that has suffered this year. His offense has been a career worst by both wRC+ (87) and TAv (.244). In 357 plate appearances, he’s hit .248/.315/.376. That slash line is rather bad overall, but that slugging percentage is startlingly bad. His previous low was .391 in his first full season at the major-league level. After that, his lowest slugging percentage was .455. Last year he had a .464 slugging percentage. So he’s seen a drop of 90 points from last year.
Combing his poor defense with his poor offense paints a dismal picture, but there is hope left to cling to. Here are Lucroy’s month-by-month splits:
| Month | AVG | OBP | SLG |
|---|---|---|---|
| April | .133 | .216 | .178 |
| May | Did Not Play | Did Not Play | Did Not Play |
| June | .278 | .319 | .352 |
| July | .283 | .350 | .424 |
| August | .230 | .326 | .473 |
Lucroy suffered his broken toe in the latter third of April and didn’t return to action until June 1. He only played in 12 games and made 51 plate appearances in April which is partly to blame for the extremity of his poor offensive numbers.
When he did return to action, he slowly began to improve on his numbers. His power numbers started to show up in July and have continued improving in August. Despite the poor batting average, August has been a solid offensive month for Lucroy. This upward trend is very encouraging.
I’m forced to wonder how much Lucroy’s broken toe affected his performance this year. April was horrendous. That happened before the toe, so we can’t blame it on that. But it was just 51 plate appearances. That’s less than two weeks of play. However, the first month back from the injury Lucroy’s slugging numbers were awful, too. It’s just important to recognize that the further we get from the injury the better those numbers get.
Unfortunately, I can’t look at Lucroy’s defensive numbers by the month. I don’t know if he’s statistically improved over the season in that regard. However, looking at his offensive numbers by the month has me hopeful that he hasn’t suddenly fallen off a cliff. I can’t know that the broken toe is to blame for his poor offense or by how much. But it doesn’t really matter if he can continue hitting like he has in July and August. And if he can, he should still be able to remain highly valuable and productive player.