A number of articles came out today on Finley and most focused on his penchant for triples this season, 7 in total already, which is a good sum for 99% of the players FOR A SEASON, but May isn't even over yet, let alone the season. I was reading the article about Finley's attitude towards triples in the Chron and wondered what his splits looked like home vs. away for triples. Obviously, Giants' fans all know that it would be lopsided, but, man, it is really lopsided, he has about the same AB's H v. A, but 6 more triples at home.
Triples Big Boost to His Power Numbers
Given that his normal range in his career is 4-10 triples per year, 1-3 would be what he should have now, we could say that he normally have about 2 now, 1 home and 1 away. With 7 at home, that means that he was able to stretch 6 doubles into triples at home, which adds 95 points to his SLG, pushing it from .461 to .556 and his OPS from .813 to .908, making his performance move from OK (.813) to pretty good (.908).
He says in the interview on sfgiants.com that while he gets more triples this way, the RF configuration took away more in homers becoming outs. But taking a look at his hit chart, I see maybe one flyball that would have been a homer that became an out. And maybe 2 of the triples would have been HR in another park. That would cost him RBIs but the six extra bases/triples more than make up for the bases lost on missed HR (though possibly not for the out made, not sure what the value lost is for that extra out, but at least 3 extra bases seems to make up for me for me).
When His Numbers Otherwise Says "Fading Star"
Another clue is that he hasn't been able to show any power on the road either, with only 1 double, 1 triple, and 1 HR. It is down a lot from previous seasons, with lower SLG and lower ISO, he has lost about 100 points of OPS. Playing in SF has apparently rejuvenated his stats, boosting his SLG at home with all those extra triples, otherwise, he might be viewed now as a fading has-been right now, instead of an integral cog of the team.
Better Than Fallen Star And Can't Get Up
Of course, that's better than being viewed as the long-gone has-been that Alfonzo has been this season. Hallelujah that Sabean was able to trade Alfonzo to another team and let him be their offensive headache. Speaking of which, he was picked up Thursday (yesterday) by the Toronto Blue Jays on a minor league contract - AA - after he was unceremoniously dumped by the Los Angeles Angels of Anaheim, soon after he COMPLAINED about his playing time when his stat line read .100/.135/.120/.255. You are doing pretty bad when your OPS is near the Mendoza Line, which is the level of futility for a batter when his BATTING AVERAGE is that low, let alone your OPS, which should be at least double your batting average by definition
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