Coming into 2013, fans and baseball experts alike held little hope for Pedro Florimon to develop into a viable Major League player. He was viewed more as a short term “filler” for a Twins team with a void at short stop. His great range and solid defense worthy of the cost of his anemic bat.
Most of these projections were based off of his call-up in the last quarter of the 2012 season. In 150 plate appearances in 2012, Florimon posted a triple slash of .219/.272/.307 with 5 doubles, 3 triples, 1 home run, 10 RBI, 3 stolen bases and 10 walks while striking out 30 times (once every 5 at bats). At 25 years old, many assumed his .272 OBP and relatively poor plate discipline were a reflection on the player he was going to be. The Twins, desperate for a middle infielder who could make the routine play on a consistent basis, would gladly trade the poor bat for his defensive boost.
Funny thing, in 2013 Pedro Florimon has decided to shake off those early season projections and develop into a solid hitter. In 126 plate appearances (basically 5 games short of the same length he posted in 2012) Florimon has a triple slash of: .255/.331/.364 with 6 doubles, 2 home runs, 17 RBI, 5 stolen bases and 25 strikeouts.
While he’s still averaging one strikeout for every five at bats, Florimon has improved in nearly every other aspect of his offensive game. The largest difference can be seen in his platoon splits. In 2012, Florimon, who is a switch hitter, posted a decent .239/.302/.307 against right handed starters, but a meager .184/.216/.306 against left handed starters. Essentially, when Florimon was moved to the right hand side of the plate, his meager offense diminished greatly.
In 2013, Florimon is hitting .261/.333/.380 against right handed starters, an improvement from last season, but he’s also boosted his lefty splits to .222/.318/.278. Those numbers are not much to write home about, but they’re still almost 40 points better than the year prior and are an early indicator that Florimon is improving at the plate. Everything is still marked with a “small sample size” asterisk, even his 150 PA in 2012 are not really enough to develop concrete opinions on his abilities at the plate. What data we do have, however, shows some form of improvement from Florimon. Whether that improvement is as dramatic as it looks right now remains to be seen, but given the Twins’ needs at short stop, any improvement has to be taken as a victory.
Defense had always been Flormion’s strong suit and the Twins were thrilled with his efforts in 2012. Early numbers had him as an average, if not slightly below average short stop, but the Twins felt he would grow into the position if given the opportunity. They were right, Florimon has improved his defense in 2013 by leaps and bounds.
In 2012, he posted a fielding percentage of .965 and committed 7 errors in 42 games at short stop. He finished 2012 with a UZR of -2.6, meaning his defensive range was slightly below average. This put him slightly below league average for all short stops.
In 2013, Florimon has improved his fielding percentage to .980 and only has 4 errors in 38 games at short stop. He’s also seen his UZR improve to 2.5, making him a slightly above average short stop.
In 2012, Florimon finished with a -.2 WAR, effectively making him slightly worse that “replacement level”. Essentially, he was roster filler, a spot holder until a real starter came along. That’s how many Twins fans saw Pedro coming into 2013 – a warm body who was supposed to make all of the routine plays and try not to ruin too many rallies at the plate.
2013 has seen Flormion post an early season WAR of 1.0 (meaning he is worth exactly one win above an average infielder for the Twins). The numbers are still early, but if he continues to play at this level, he could easily post a WAR closer to 2 or 3. For a Twins team that only saw positive WAR from Josh Willingham, Justin Morneau and Joe Mauer last season, this contribution is a massive improvement.
2013 has been an odd season for the Twins. They’ve played better then expected for much of the season before simply falling apart over the past two weeks against very good competition. They’re sill building for 2014-2015 and are merely hoping to “compete” in 2013. Players like Pedro Florimon developing into pleasant surprises will be the reason they are able to do just that.
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