The San Francisco Giants' Lee Jung-hoo (25) is predicted to have a successful debut season.
American baseball statistics site FanGraphs released the projected performance of San Francisco players using the ZiPS projection system on the 21st (below). Lee Jung-hoo was rated as the best player on the team.
Lee is one of the best hitters in South Korea with a career batting average of .344 (3476-for-1181), 65 home runs, 515 RBIs, and an OPS of .898 in 884 career KBO games. Last year, he batted .349 (193-for-553) with 23 home runs, 113 RBIs and a .996 OPS in 142 games, winning five batting titles (batting average, slugging percentage, on-base percentage, RBIs and runs scored) and the league MVP. In his first year in the majors, he had surgery on an ankle injury that kept him out of the lineup, but he still managed to hit .861 with six home runs, 45 RBI, and an OPS of .861 in 86 games (330 at-bats, 105 hits).
After hitting the major league free agent market, Lee was pursued by a number of teams, but he surprised everyone by signing a six-year, $113 million contract with San Francisco on July 13. It is the largest contract ever for a player from the KBO to the major leagues, and the largest contract for a baseball player in all of Asia.
San Francisco has high hopes for Lee. San Francisco President of Baseball Operations Farhan Zaidi said, "We believe the addition of Jung-Hoo Lee is a perfect fit. Offensively, our goal this offseason was to get the whole team moving, make more contact, and play the kind of baseball that is trending around the league. He'll be the starting center fielder from the start of next season. We're looking forward to having him as our starting center fielder," said Giants president of baseball operations and general manager Derek Jeter.
Lee's contract ranks fifth on the Giants' all-time list. Only Buster Posey (nine years, $167 million), Johnny Cueto (six years, $130 million), Matt Cain (six years, $127.5 million), and Barry Zito (seven years, $126 million) have signed bigger contracts in San Francisco history. It's pretty unusual to give a player this much money who hasn't played a single game in the majors. It shows that San Francisco has high hopes for him.카지노사이트가이드
The FanGraphs ZiPS projection system projects Lee to hit .288 (476-for-137) with eight home runs, 62 RBI, 56 runs scored, six doubles, and a .762 OPS in 524 at-bats. The projected slash line was .288/.346/.416 with a WAR (wins above replacement) of 2.5, good for first on the team and second overall (Logan Webb at 4.4).FanGraphs writes, "Barring any additional moves this offseason, San Francisco will enter 2024 with no serious holes in the lineup and decent depth. The problem is that there isn't a high ceiling at the plate. It would be different if the Giants had brought in hitters like Aaron Judge (Yankees) or Shohei Ohtani (Dodgers) last offseason, but the result is a lack of impact talent at the plate."
"Jung-Hoo Lee and Patrick Bailey are the most projectable players overall," FanGraphs said, "but most of their value comes from their defense. The player with the best slash line is Wilmer Flores (.265/.337/.446)." "The biggest disappointment is that there are no batting additions in free agency right now. The only way the Giants can bolster their batting is by acquiring a star player via trade."
Lee's projections are pretty good considering this is his rookie season in the majors. Masataka Yoshida, who signed a five-year, $90 million contract with Boston this year, finished sixth in American League Rookie of the Year voting after batting .288 with 15 home runs, 72 RBIs and an OPS of .783 in 140 games (537 at-bats, 155 hits). These are better than Lee's projected batting numbers, but not by much. However, Yoshida was negative in defense and on the basepaths, resulting in a WAR of just 0.6 per FanGraphs. Lee has a lot of room to improve on Yoshida's WAR, as his defense and baserunning are positive.