Brewers' Tyrone Taylor may be the greatest bench player of al time

Tyrone Taylor should not start another game for the Brewers this year. He’s too valuable.

Counsell’s Year of Stubborness

I know Counsell seems to have strayed from the strategy of putting his players in a position to succeed this season, but there’s a chance he was just playing dead until Craigtember. For some reason the only bit of strategy CC was working with this year is the idea that right-handed hitters are better against left-handed pitchers, and left-handed hitters are better against right-handed pitchers. While in a broad sense that’s usually true, enough people banged their head against the wall long enough to get Keston Hiura regular starts against righties. 

He also eventually moved the powerless former MVPs out of their premium batting order positions. Since bumping Yelich up to the leadoff spot, where home runs are still nice but the key focus is to get on base, he could go back to the approach he’s more accustomed to and has been wildly successful at it. Of players with at least 200 plate appearances in the leadoff spot, Yelich has the second highest on-base percentage at .388, behind only Yandy Diaz of the Tampa Bay Rays.

He also finally took Andrew McCutchen out of the cleanup spot. While I think McCutchen was a good signing, a great guy, and having a pretty decent season, he’s not the guy you want batting fourth in your lineup. His .702 OPS on the season is 43 points below the league average for cleanup hitters this season. Offense overall is down this year, so a .702 OPS can still be valuable in a lineup, just not fourth. 

Centerfield

With the offensive struggles the Brewers have had in centerfield this year between Lorenzo Cain and Tyrone Taylor, I was hoping they would throw Cutch in centerfield. The Brewers have gotten a slashline of .207/.272/.319 from their centerfielders this season, so Cutch’s .702 OPS would be a drastic improvement there. 

However, instead of depending on 35 year old McCutchen to patrol centerfield they called up speedy prospects Garrett Mitchell and Esteury Ruiz. Finally bumping Tyrone Taylor out of the starting lineup. Taylor hasn’t exactly been awful this year, he has a 90 OPS+ and has a defensive WAR of 0.4. But just like Yelich batting third, Cutch batting fourth, and Hiura only starting against left-handed pitchers, he wasn’t being used in a spot he thrives in. 

The (Bench) G.O.A.T.

Hold onto your hats, because this is pretty shocking but…

Tyrone Taylor is the greatest pinch hitter in the history of Major League Baseball.

You can at least make that argument, anyway. Tyrone Taylor has the highest OPS of any pinch hitter with at least 40 pinch hit appearances. His 1.288 OPS is just ahead of Mark McGwire’s 1.264. Also in the top ten are big hitters like Bo Jackson and Hall-of-Famer Jeff Bagwell.

Taylor is 3 for 7 in pinch hit opportunities this season, with a double and a home run. You might think well 7 plate appearances is a pretty small sample size, matter of fact so is 40 so this could all just be luck skewed by sample size. To that say, you’re right! But that’s what pinch hitting is. It’s one try, the smallest sample size, done most likely with days in between each try. And of all the people that have accumulated at least 40 one-time-only attempts at hitting the ball, nobody has ever been as effective as Taylor. 

Playing around with the sample size, Taylor stays in the top spot all the way down to 28 plate appearances when Larry Wolfe finally edges him out. If you drop the minimum down to five, he drops all the way down to 56th, behind Braves’ pitcher Max Fried. If you set the minimum to 100 the record would be 1.019 by Morgan Ensberg. But generally, it’s difficult for a player of Taylor’s age to acquire that many pinch hit appearances because if guys his age are that good at hitting they’re usually not on the bench. 

Clutch Numbers

But that’s part of baseball. Baseball is one of if not the most individually specialized major sport in the world. Even more so since the introduction of the universal DH. If you can be good at one thing in baseball, you can be incredibly valuable. Some people can’t hit, but are great with the glove. Then some people can’t hit lefties, but crush righties. Some people can’t hit regularly, but given one pressure filled moment, they turn into Barry Bonds. That’s what Tyrone Taylor does.

It’s not only pinch hitting that Taylor excels at either, it’s intense situations. In high leverage situations this year he’s slashing .274/.343/.532. That .875 OPS is fifth best on the team, third if you exclude Pedro Severino and Garrett Mitchell. This isn’t unusual for Taylor either, he has a career slashline of .268/.343/.465 in high leverage situations. 

If used properly, Tyrone Taylor could be one of the most valuable players for the Brewers in the stretch run. With him they have a player who is arguably the greatest pinch hitter of all time and has excelled in high pressure situations not only this year but throughout his career. 

Don’t be surprised if you see Taylor win a game or two off the bench this month. But don’t let that fool you, he needs to be on the bench.