MLB Rankings: Baseball’s Greatest Hits of Week-12 (June 15-22)

In week-12 of “MLB Rankings: Greatest Hits,” we rank the top 10 base hits in MLB from 6/15-6/22 based on their impact on Weighted Win Probability Added.

In this week’s “MLB Rankings: Baseball’s Greatest Hits,” It’s a five-team race in the fratricidal NL Central, where teams spent the past week closing ranks. In a week where opportunistic heroics were called for, would-be stars of three NL Central teams delivered.

The St. Louis Cardinals have been waiting on such heroics from their prime off-season acquisition, Paul Goldschmidt, all season. They finally got some when Goldschmidt struck a walk-off home run to beat the Miami Marlins in St. Louis.

The Milwaukee Brewers relied on Yasmani Grandal‘s power, but even that turned out not to be enough to produce a win. In Cincinnati, meanwhile, rookie Nick Senzel continued to breathe life into the Reds’ outside chances to stay in that tight divisional race.

In this week’s “MLB Rankings: Greatest Hit,” though, came from a distant locale, specifically Oakland, where the Athletics are pursuing an underdog dream of their own. In a cutthroat  series with the wild card leading Tampa Bay Rays, Oakland’s Matt Chapman chose the pivotal moment to touch all four bases.

This rating of the week’s greatest hits is based on the Win Probability Added by each hit. Win Probability Added is one of those Statcast-era statistics; it measures the percentage change in likely game outcome based on the result of the at bat. For example, the Win Probability Added for a walk-off home run would be the difference between the team’s Win Probability prior to the home run and 100  percent.

In the event of ties, they are broken by Weighted Winning Team Expectancy, which is the likelihood of a victory following the at bat’s outcome.

This week features the unusual circumstance of a flat tie in the top 10. That occurred because two players delivered walk-off hits with identical Win Probabilities Added.

Here are this week’s “MLB Rankings: Baseball’s Greatest Hits,”.

MLB Rankings: Greatest Hits in Week-12

10. Alex Verdugo, 42 percent

The Dodgers-Rockies game Saturday afternoon in Los Angeles was a back-and-forth affair. Three different times the Rockies assumed a lead only to see Los Angeles come back and tie matters.

With Hyun-Jin Ryu making the start, things looked favorable for the team with baseball’s best record. Ryu of course is 9-1 with  a 1.27 ERA. Still Colorado hitters got a piece of him Saturday, posting three runs by the third inning. Uncharacteristically, Ryu was gone after six, having managed nothing more productive than a 3-3 tie.

The Rockies took their third lead in the seventh on Raimel Tapia‘s home run off Ryu’s replacement, Caleb Ferguson. But Matt Beaty — more on him later — responded with a run-producing single in the bottom of the eighth to affix the game’s third tie.

Eventually, Beaty’s hit also moved the game into extra innings.

That’s where Verdugo comes in. He almost contributed to a Dodger win in the bottom of the ninth when his one-out single moved Joc Pederson into scoring position. But Justin Turner and Corey Bellinger both fanned.

In the 11th, Verdugo elected not to count on the guys behind him in the Dodger lineup. Facing Jesus Tinoco, he ripped a one-out, 1-1 pitch down the right field line and over the low wall for a walk-off winner.

The hit extended the Dodgers’ seeming invincibility at home, where they have a 33-9 record in 2019.

MLB Rankings: Greatest Hits in Week-12

9. Max Kepler, 43 percent

No matter what happens the rest of this season, the Minnesota Twins will remember their 17-inning, 4-3 victory over the Red Sox Tuesday night. They’ll also remember Max Kepler for winning it for them.

Kepler delivered three decisive shots that night, without any one of which the Twins don’t win. The first came in the bottom of the eighth with Boston holding a 2-1 lead. Kepler’s single drove in Mitch Garver with the tying run.

That sent the game into extra innings. In the top of the 13th, Mookie Betts homered to give Boston a 3-2 advantage. When Kepler led off the bottom of the 13th against Hector Velasquez, Minnesota’s chances of winning measured just 21 percent. He homered, improving the odds of a Twins victory by 43 percent, to 64 percent.

The game proceeded scoreless through the 14th, 15th and 16th innings. In the bottom of the 17th, Minnesota loaded the bases with one out on a single by Luis Arreaz, an Eddie Rosario double and an intentional walk to C J Cron. In a decisive moment, Kepler loomed again, this time facing Brian Johnson. He took the first pitch for a ball, then delivered the single that scored Arreaz with the game-ending run.

The total impact of Kepler’s three critical at bats? It was 91 percent.

MLB Rankings: Greatest Hits in Week-12

T-7. Matt Beaty, 43 percent

The Los Angeles Dodgers have the majors’ best record due in large measure to the team’s depth. Beaty, a rookie backup first baseman-outfielder, is an excellent illustration of that depth.

Beaty is batting .300 since being called up in late April. Limited to just 15 starts, he’s nonetheless batting .350 in June with his first two home runs. One of those shots played a pivotal role in Friday’s victory over the Colorado Rockies.

Beaty got a rare start in left field, contributing an unproductive single to a 2-2 tie game entering the bottom of the ninth. To that point, the story had been Dodger starter Walker Buehler’s 16-strikeout, three-hit complete game.

Jairo Diaz replaced Rockies starter German Marquez to begin the ninth, and retired the first two batters easily. But Diaz walked Max Muncy on a 3-2 pitch, giving Beaty a chance.

With the runner on first and two out in a tie game, the odds of a Dodger victory were 57 percent, favorable to the home team but not overpowering. Beaty improved them to them to the maximum level, homering to dead center on a 1-0 pitch.

The victory was LA’s fourth straight, and ran the Dodgers’ June record to 13-6.

MLB Rankings: Greatest Hits in Week-12

6. Yordan Alvarez, 45 percent

The 2017  champs are slumping, no doubt of that. Saturday in New York they lost their seventh consecutive game 7-5, capping a winless week that has seen their once double-digit lead over Texas in the AL West reduced to 6.5 games.

Slowed by injuries to stars of the calibre of Carlos Correa and George Springer, the Astros recently called up 22-year-old outfielder Yordan Alvarez to see whether he could help.

He has, as testified to by his .326 average and six home runs in 51 plate appearances. That 7-5 defeat to the Yankees Saturday occurred despite what Alvarez did, not because of it.

Batting in the cleanup position, Alvarez went 2-for-4 with three RBIs and he also drew a walk. His sixth inning single turned into two runs and a 2-2 tie when Josh Reddick followed with a home run.

But New York responded with two runs of its own in the inning’s bottom half, carrying a 4-2 advantage into the seventh.  That’s when Alvarez really got to work.

After Jonathan Holder retired the first two Astro batters, Alex Bregman and Michael Brantley both singled, putting the tying runs on base. Alvarez was next up. He worked the count to 2-2, then drove Holder’s next pitch into the right field seats for a home run.

The hit gave Houston a 5-4 lead entering the bottom of the seventh, and improved the Astros’ chances of winning by 45 percent, from 18 percent to 63 percent.

Had Alvarez been able to pitch, Houston’s skid might have ended then and there. But in the bottom of the inning, the Yankees combined three hits for three more runs, leading to  a 7-5 win.

That meant Alvarez would have to wait at least one more game to lead his new team to victory.

MLB Rankings: Greatest Hits in Week-12

5. Nick Senzel, 46 percent

The NL Central race has become so tight that even the fourth place Cincinnati Reds, at 36-38, are solidly in it. Facing the NL West leading Houston Astros Wednesday in Cincinnati, the Reds improved their chances.

They did so thanks to their rookie star, Senzel.

Houston led 2-1 entering the bottom of the ninth. Astros starter Gerrit Cole had given the visitors six strong innings, turning the game over to Will Harris and Ryan Pressly for a scoreless inning each. Against the trio, the Reds had amassed only that single run on eight hits. Yasiel Puig accounted for the only two extra base hits, a second inning homer and an eighth inning double.

Then Astros manager A.J. Hinch went to his closer, Roberto Osuna, seeking his 18th save against the bottom of the Cincinnati order. The leadoff hitter, Jose Peraza, bounced a ground rule double over the wall in left center, but Osuna devalued that hit by fanning pinch hitters Tucker Barnhart and Joey Votto.

With Senzel due next, the strikeouts had reduced the Reds’ chances of victory to just 15 percent…less when you factor that Osuna was on the mound and less still considering that Senzel was hitless in three official at bats.

Burt Senzel turned all those numbers around with a first pitch, game-tying RBI single into left field, taking second on Michael Brantley’s bad throw. That hit tied the game and improved Cincinnati’s chances by 46 percent to 61 percent. Moments later, Jesse Winker finished the comeback with a game-ending single to right.

MLB Rankings: Greatest Hits in Week-12

4. Paul Goldschmidt, 46 percent

Since June 1, the Milwaukee Brewers and Chicago Cubs are a combined 19-21, opening the way for mid-pack teams in that ultra-competitive division.

The result is a race in which all five teams are separated by only six and one-half games. On Wednesday, Paul Goldschmidt gave the third place St. Louis Cardinals a turbo boost.

They needed it. The Cardinals haven’t exactly taken advantage of the Cubs and Brewers both throwing it into neutral, playing just two games over .500 themselves since June 4. The ennui that seems to have gripped the NL Central race was apparent when the Cardinals barely eked out a split against the woeful Miami Marlins in St. Louis.

Goldschmidt was the difference.

With two out in the bottom of the 11th inning of a 1-1 tie, Goldschmidt faced Marlins reliever Adam Conley. It was for just such moments that the Cardinals acquired Goldschmidt from Arizona over the winter. He has, however, only infrequently cashed in, batting just .256 with 31 RBIs in his first 75 games.

So ordinary had Goldschmidt’s production been that Cardinal manager Mike Shildt gave him the night off, starting rookie Rangel Ravelo in his place. Goldschmidt only entered the game as part of a double switch in the top of the ninth.

This time, however, Goldschmidt delivered. On a 2-2 count, he took Conley’s fastball deep into the left field seats for a no-doubt game-winner.

MLB Rankings: Greatest Hits in Week-12

3. Yasmani Grandal, 49 percent

The Milwaukee Brewers are swooning through June, and not even Grandal’s heroics can rescue them.

The Brewers have lost five of six and eight of their last 11, in the process falling out of the NL Central lead, albeit only by percentage points. In Wednesday’s 8-7 defeat at the hands of the San Diego Padres, Grandal did everything he could to reverse that trend.

The Padres scored five times in the first three innings off Brewer starter Zach Davies and led 5-4 entering the seventh. But Milwaukee sent up the best it had, beginning with pinch hitter Ben Gamel, who singled.

Lorenzo Cain followed with a base hit of his own, and after Brad Wieck got Christian Yelich on a fly ball Wieck left in favor of Gerardo Reyes. He set down Ryan Braun on a second fly. Grandal was next.

In that two-on, two-out situation, the prospects of a Brewers victory measured just 30 percent. But there was a way to fix those odds, and Grandal delivered it. His three-run home run down the right field line gave Milwaukee a 7-5 advantage, and shifted the likelihood of a Milwaukee win to 80 percent.

But the magic that lifted Milwaukee to the NL Central title last year has been missing lately. Franmil Reyes reversed the impact of Grandal’s homer with one of his own in the bottom of the inning, sending the Brewers to another defeat.

MLB Rankings: Greatest Hits in Week-12

2 Jorge Soler, 52 percent

Soler is only batting .248 this year, but it is a prodigious .248.

He already has 21 home runs, and they are traveling excursion-rate distances. Fifteen have carried more than 400 feet, eight flew 430 or more, and the longest topping out at 462 feet.

By those measurements, his 396-footer off Anthony Bass in the eighth inning Monday night was nothing remarkable. In the context of the game, however, it was everything.

Soler came to bat with the Royals trailing 4-3. This obviously has not been a productive season for Kansas City, condemned to a solid last in the AL Central and on a .342 winning pace that would be baseball’s worst if the Orioles didn’t exist. They’re still, however, trying to win.

The prospect of that outcome seemed slim as usual entering the top of the eighth. The Mariners led 4-3 and Bass retired the first two batters, one on strikes and the other on an easy groundout. The third hitter, Alex Gordon, produced a ground single between short and third that reduced the issue to a showdown between Bass and Soler.

On a 1-1 pitch, Soler’s home run turned the score from a 4-3 deficit to a 5-4 advantage. The Royals added a run in the top of the ninth and walked away with a 6-4 victory. It also keyed what has turned out to be a winning week for the Royals, the team’s first of the 2019 season.

MLB Rankings: Greatest Hits in Week-12

1. Matt Chapman, 85 percent

This weekend’s series between the Rays and Athletics in Oakland is a mid-season battle for position in the American League wild-card chase.

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The Rays entered the four-game series positioned first in that race, owning a 43-31 record and the first wild-card spot. Oakland’s position is more precarious. The A’s came in at 39-36 and battling Boston, Cleveland and Texas for the second wild card.

Through eight innings of virtual shutdown pitching by Charlie Morton and Frankie Montas, there was no movement. The only scoring, a solo home run for each team, had come off the bats of Jurickson Profar and Tommy Pham.

In the top of the ninth, though, A’s manager Bob Melvin lifted Montas in favor of Blake Treinen. The Rays pounced, cobbling two walks, three steals and two base hits into a three-run inning. Rays manager Kevin Cash turned the 4-1 lead over to Diego Castilla for the wrapup.

Teams holding a three-run lead with three outs remaining win about 97 percent of the time. But there are exceptions. In the bottom of the ninth, Castillo sandwiched a pair of walks around a groundout, bringing Oakland’s tying run to the plate in the person of Beau Taylor. He took a called third rike, reducing the odds of an Oakland comeback to just 4 percent.

The next hitter was Marcus Semien, and he delivered a game-extending base hit to center field. Robbie Grossman, who had received the first walk, scored and Chapman came up as the potential winning run.

With two on but two out, the odds of an Oakland win still remained only 15 percent. Chapman, however, turned them around with a 1-0 walk-off home run over the left-center field wall. Oakland still trailed Boston by two games for that second wild card, but at least they didn’t lose any ground.