Figuring Out Matt Kemp

      What if I told you that Matt Kemp was an MVP candidate, batting .313 with 17 homers through 99 games with the Los Angeles Dodgers? Follow-up question: what if I told you it isn't 2011? After four years split between San Diego and Atlanta, where he was more or less an average player, (.269/.310/470 and an OPS+ of 109) he's back in Dodger Stadium, at age 33, hitting like nothing's changed.

    Part of that can be explained somewhat easily. It's a little disappointing to point out, but Kemp's batting average on balls in play is higher this year than any other season of his career. At the moment, his BABIP is .369, above his career average. With that said, that career average is .340, so he's only 29 points above what might be expected of him. That may seem like a lot, but with all the mountains and valleys BABIP goes through, it's far less than lucky stretches others have had in just the last few years. A spike of over 50 points for a half isn't uncommon. To use a local example, Kurt Suzuki's average on balls in play was .328 in the first half of his all-star 2014 campaign. He is .273 for his career. Beyond that, Suzuki never had the same kind of track record that Kemp has had through his career before the last few years.

     Another trend that helps explain Kemp's season is his fly ball rate. Most of his career, it's hovered between 35 and 40 percent. Early in his career, that worked for him, but as he's gotten older things have been a little rockier. Following a solid 2014 campaign in Los Angeles, that rate held steady the next year in San Diego. But with Petco Park's notoriously cavernous outfield, his overall numbers dropped across the board. The next year was more of the same. Kemp hit .268/.304/.499 splitting the season between the Padres and Braves. In 2017, his only full year in Atlanta, Kemp got a few more hits (.276) and got on base slightly more often (.318) but his power numbers dwindled. Not coincidentally, that season his flyball rate was just 28 percent, his lowest in any full season of his career. 

     It was after that year the Braves dealt Kemp back to LA in what at the time was basically a salary dump for the Dodgers. They shed about $50 dollars worth of Adrian Gonzalez, Brandon McCarthy and Scott Kazmir and at the time it looked like there was going to be a new home for Kemp as well, with rumors swirling around of him potentially landing in Milwaukee.  

     He didn't go there, and now he's right back where he was in his prime, both literally and figuratively. Aside from the hiccup in 2017, Kemp's largely been the same player his entire career. He hits lots of fly balls, few grounders and for most of his career that's worked for him. His game was perfect for Dodger Stadium his near-MVP season and it still is now. In San Diego he was the same player but couldn't adjust to the deeper dimensions. Now that he's back, it's just more of the same.