Carpenter IS the best second basemen in the National League

The other day Mike Matheny said Carpenter was the best second basemen in the NL.  And that is more than just a manager sticking up for his player.  It is an observable fact.  For one, Carpenter leads among NL second basemen in WAR.

Name	Team	WAR
Matt Carpenter	STL	3.3
Marco Scutaro	SF	2.1
Jedd Gyorko	SD	1.8
Brandon Phillips	CIN	1.7
Daniel Murphy	NYM	1.6
Neil Walker	PIR	1.2
Dan Uggla	ATL	0.4
Darwin Barney	CHI	0.2
Rickie Weeks	MIL	-0.3
Martin Prado	ARI	-0.7

With 61% the value of Carpenter, Scutaro comes in second with 2.0 WAR.  Next is Jedd Gyorko having an impressive rookie year in San Diego posting a 1.8 WAR.  Phillips, in first place in All-Star voting for second base, is fourth in WAR at 1.7, or almost half the value of Carpenter.    And rounding out in Daniel Murphy for the Mets at 1.6.  It bears pointing out here that Carpenter also bests AL second basemen as well.  The leader in WAR among AL second basemen is Pedoira at 2.7 WAR. Carpenter also has the highest WAR among Cardinal position players. Wainwright is the only Cardinal beating him at 4.0

But isn't simply enough to show you Matt Carpenter has the best WAR.  Let’s look at some statistics.  Let’s start with one of a hitter’s most important stats, OBP.  Carpenter leads in OBP among NL second basemen:

Name	OBP
Matt Carpenter	.395
Marco Scutaro	.390
Neil Walker	.352
Jedd Gyorko	.341
Brandon Phillips	.324

Scutaro is the only man close. Third place falls all the way to .352 in Walker.

Let’s move on to another common stat, batting average.  This is the first category Carpenter isn’t first in, although he get’s the runner up:

Name	AVG
Marco Scutaro	0.335
Matt Carpenter	0.311
Jedd Gyorko	0.284
Daniel Murphy	0.279
Brandon Phillips	0.273

Scutaro takes first over Carpenter here.  The top 5 in BA is a reorganization of the top 5 in WAR.  Not a strong category for Phillips who is pretty far behind Scutaro and Carpenter.

Now let’s look at a stat that measures power.  For that, I prefer Isolated Slugging percentage. It takes your Slugging percentage minus your Batting Average to get a number that represents your ability to get doubles, triples, and home runs.  Carpenter slides down in this one to fourth:

Name	ISO
Dan Uggla	.206
Jedd Gyorko	.177
Brandon Phillips	.161
Matt Carpenter	.142
Daniel Murphy	.138

Carpenter has decent power numbers but not the best.  Dan Uggla for the Braves takes first which is good for him as his batting average is only .185.  But after that Gyorko and Phillips both beat Carpenter for the first time in a category.  Murphy is right behind Carpenter and rounds out the top 5.  Scutaro takes a hit in this category as he tied at 8th with a .110, pointing out the Giant second baseman’s weakness on offense.

Due to strong performances in both OBP and SLG, Carpenter gets back to first by winning on On base Plus Slugging (OPS).

Name	OPS
Matt Carpenter	.848
Marco Scutaro	.835
Jedd Gyorko	.802
Brandon Phillips	.759
Daniel Murphy	.736

So Carpenter leads in OBP and OPS, is second in BA, and fourth in ISO.  Carpenter definitely has the best batting numbers among second basemen, with Scutaro being the only other player coming close.  But the way Scutaro drops off in ISO hurts him enough that Carpenter takes it.

If you needed any more convincing that Carpenter had the best bat among NL second basemen you would just look at .  For those unfamiliar, wRC takes your singles, doubles, triples, home runs, walks, strikeouts, and hit by pitches, and then weighs your performance to calculate how many runs your stats added to your team on average.  Carpenter wins it pretty easily:

Name	wRC
Matt Carpenter	48
Marco Scutaro	40
Brandon Phillips	36
Jedd Gyorko	35
Daniel Murphy	34

Carpenter has created more runs than any other NL team’s second basemen.  Some will wonder why I’m not citing RBIs or runs.  That’s because those totals are highly skewed by the people batting in front of you (RBIs) and behind you (runs).  It is also skewed based on your position in the order.  Batting leadoff means you get a lot of runs but not many RBIs.  Batting cleanup means the opposite. wRC sums up your contribution to runs by removing those biases.  For anyone confused as to why Phillips beats Gyorko in RC despite Gorkyo beind in front of him on a lot stats, that is because Phillips has had more plate appearances in which to accumulate runs created.  Thus Phillips eeks out a small lead over Gyorko.

Anyways, let’s move on defense.  Here’s fielding percentage:

Name	FP
Darwin Barney	1.000
Jedd Gyorko	0.996
Matt Carpenter	0.991
Brandon Phillips	0.985
Daniel Murphy	0.985

Barney,not even mentioned on offense, has yet to commit an error.  Behind him in second is Gyorko at .996.  Carpenter get’s third though, a huge upset when you consider this is his first season at the position.  Uggla and Scutaro lose a lot of points here, getting 8th and 9th.  

Now let’s look at a more advanced metrics.  Here’s Defensive Runs Saved (DRS).  This number represents the amount of runs the player has saved compared to an average second baseman.

Name	DRS
Matt Carpenter	6
Brandon Phillips	3
Darwin Barney	1
Neil Walker	0
Daniel Murphy	-1

Carpenter wins it, saving the Cardinals six runs more than the average second baseman.  This means that while Barney hasn’t committed an error, he also hasn’t made very many exceptional plays in the field either.

So all in all, Carpenter is strong in every aspect of hitting, and has performed well on defense as well.  Okay, let’s recap.  We’ve mentioned 8 players, and those all happen to be the top 8 in WAR.  Let’s look at all the stats we’ve discussed:

Name	WAR	wRC	OBP	AVG	OPS	DRS	FP
Matt Carpenter	3.3	48	.395	.311	.848	6	0.991
Marco Scutaro	2.1	40	.390	.335	.835	-3	0.964
Jedd Gyorko	1.8	35	.341	.284	.802	-1	0.996
Brandon Phillips	1.7	36	.324	.273	.759	3	0.985
Daniel Murphy	1.6	34	.319	.279	.736	-1	0.985
Neil Walker	1.2	28	.352	.249	.733	0	0.983
Dan Uggla	0.4	31	.320	.193	.719	-10	0.967
Darwin Barney	0.2	16	.282	.215	.607	1	1.000

Carpenter wins in a few categories and performs admirably in the rest.  While Scutaro does well at getting on base and not striking out, he is way below average in power and did poorly fielding.  Uggla was the opposite, putting up the best power numbers but not much else.  Gorko showed his potential by placing well in numerous categories but not winning any.

Phillips, the leading vote getter, also didn’t win any category although he too placed well in many categories.  However his stats compared to Carpenter shows who is the better overall player between the two.

It’s closer with Scutaro.  Scutaro takes a small lead over Carpenter with average that Carpenter mostly makes up for with a slightly smaller lead in OBP.  But it separates from there as Scutaro takes a decent loss in ISO, leading to Carpenter winning on OPS as well.  This gives Carpenter the win on offense.  Scutaro however played very subpar defense compared to Carpenter, giving the Cardinal a larger margin of victory overall.

The icing on the cake for Carpenter is that he is still 27, much younger than Phillips who is about to turn 32 and Scutaro at 37.  Scutaro is reaching retirement and Phillips is reaching the point in a career where you start to decline.  Gyorko, only 24, will be the player to watch in the future.  But one thing’s for sure, Carpenter deserves to be the starting second baseman for the National League this year.  Now go vote for him 35 times. Thanks for reading.