NUMB3RS: Simmer Down on Overbay and Wallace

Lyle Overbay (2009, MLB) - .265/.372/.466, 16 HR, 64 RBIs
Brett Wallace (2009, AA/AAA) .293/.367/.455, 20 HR, 63 RBIs

As one of the most unflinching Lyle Overbay supporters out there, I can't find it in me to say the haters are wrong so far in 2010. I mean, I suppose I could point to the fact that his line drive percentage (.122) and batting average on balls in play (.171) are close enough to suggest he may be getting unlucky (traditionally BABIP tends to be about .120 higher than LD%, in this case just .049). I could also point to his usage against left handed pitching this year, against whom he has yet to reach base in 16 plate appearances while grounding out 7 times and racking up 4 strike outs. But no matter how far I may reach, the truth is that Lyle Overbay has been pretty damn bad at the plate in 2010.

Meanwhile one of the players who came to Toronto as an indirect result of the Doc Deal, Brett Wallace, is tearing it up in Las Vegas. Through the first 15 games of the PCL season, Wallace has hit 6 home runs, compiling a batting line of .269/.367/.635. If the move to a new ball club or position is bothering him, you couldn't tell from his statistics.

Unsurprisingly, the calls for Overbay to be replaced with Wallace have started to pop up. Far be it from me to even acknowledge an article that suggests Alex Gonzalez and his career .294 on base percentage (only slightly better at .319 in 2010 thus far) should be hitting lead-off, but it is an acknowledgment of a growing feeling in Toronto. And hey, there is no doubt whatsoever that this is the long-term plan, maybe even not so long-term. But for a number of reasons, an April switcheroo is both reckless and potentially harmful.

For one, it would involve essentially abandoning any attempt to return any sort of value for Lyle Overbay. Lyle, in his 5th and presumably final season with the club, has always had value as a well disciplined, defensively sound first baseman who could be counted on to reach base at a pretty much clockwork on-base-percentage of .360-.370. He entered the season with a .275/.356/.449 line over his time with the club. His varied skills, as both a righty masher (.282/.379/.463 against them in his career) and an above average defensive corner man could make him useful trade-bait come the July trade deadline, when most of the 7 million due him has been doled out.

So let's say they play the hot hand (albeit one that's been hot over 15 games, hardly a large sample size) and bring up Wallace to start at first. The glut of players who can literally only play first necessitates that either Ruiz or Overbay come off the 25 man roster. I'm not sure what's the worst outcome here: a 7 million dollar bench player in the big leagues or a 7 million dollar starter in Las Vegas. Of course you could also release him and eat the remaining 6.3 million or so due to him this year. But with these options, you negate any return on a 33 year old who has been a been a well above average major leaguer for the majority of his career and as recently as last year, all because of a slow start over 16 games (the most recent 3 of which he put up a line of .333/.500/.556).

As BJ Ryan/Frank Thomasian as the Overbay scenario sounds, the risk is even greater for Brett Wallace. Yes Wallace's numbers look great. They also look very different from the player he's been projected as. Originally thought of as an excellent contact hitter with plus discipline and home run power in the low to mid 20s, he's put up a lower than career normal batting average of .269, getting on base at about the same clip as last year but with much higher power numbers. Kevin Youkilis doesn't become Adam Dunn overnight. As much as I like Brett Wallace and expect him to be an excellent hitter for years to come, I'm also not chomping at the bit to start the clock on his major league service time based on a 15 game sample size that may be a total outlier.

And what of the service time question? Were they to hold off until May 1st to make the move, Wallace would accumulate 156 days of service time were he to remain with the club through the season, 16 days short of the 172 that constitute an entire year of MLB service. That being said, while he would not have 3 years of service time at the end of the 2012 season he would have 2.156, which would make him a likely candidate for Super 2 arbitration eligibility. Super 2 takes all the players with 2 years of service time and at least 86 days the year prior, the top 17 percent of which in terms of playing time become eligible for arbitration a year early. Were Wallace to come up to replace Overbay as the starting first baseman and stick, he'd be a virtual lock as a Super 2. If Wallace hits like we all hope he's going to hit, that's a swing in the millions of dollars. All for a season where this team has been forecast to finish no higher than 4th. In a division where we need to be almost perfect financially to compete with the two-headed monster of the Red Sox and Yankees.

Don't get me wrong, we're going to see Brett Wallace this year. If he weren't up by August 1st I'd be shocked. I'm as excited as anyone to see the future that involves guys like Kyle Drabek, Travis D'Arnaud, Brett Wallace and Adeiny Hechavarria get here. But bringing up Wallace early won't get it here early, and not at least giving Overbay the chance to return to the asset he was merely a month ago is the kind of short sighted thinking that this team's GM is trying to avoid.