MLB: Ryon Healy, Seattle Mariners
- 559 PA, .267/.305/.441, .746 OPS—Average of all
- 531 PA, .280/.322/.474, .796 OPS—Best projection (Marcels)
- 619 PA, .256/.291/.421, .7212 OPS—Worst projection (ZiPS)
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Healy is one of the many injured Mariners and may not be ready to go when the season starts. He was acquired by Seattle in an offseason trade with the A’s for pitcher Emilio Pagan and minor leaguer Alexander Campos. He hit 25 homers last season, which would have been impressive three years ago but not so much in the big home run season of 2017.
Back in the deader ball year of 2014, 25 home runs were good for tied for 21st in all of baseball. Last season, Healy’s 25 home runs were tied for 67th. The times they are a-changing.
Healy’s best projection is from Marcels, a system that works better with more major league playing time, preferably three full seasons. Healy only has one-and-a-half years in the big leagues, so Marcels regresses his numbers towards league average.
Other systems use minor league data for their projections. Marcels and Clay Davenport project Healy to have a .322 on-base percentage. Steamer and ZiPs come in nearly 30 points lower, at .295 and .291, respectively. Marcels has Healy with a .474 slugging percentage, which is more than 50 points higher than the ZiPS projection of .421.
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The Mariners are hoping Healy hits like Marcels projects because he won’t provide much value in the field or running the bases. The low projection from ZiPS would make Healy below replacement-level (-0.3 WAR at Fangraphs). Adding insult to injury, ZiPS projects the player the Mariners traded away to get Healy, Emilio Pagan, to be worth 0.4 WAR.