Brandon Phillips and Runs Batted In

RBI Machine. Photo courtesy of Dylan Moody.

At the time of this writing, Brandon Phillips has 74 RBI*, good for a 2nd place tie with Allen Craig in the National League and behind only first bases hoss, Paul Goldschmidt. While batting in runs was to be expected from Goldy and Craig (does that sound like a duo from Boogie Nights, or is it just me?), Phillips had 77 total RBI last year and has averaged 85 per 162 games in his 12 year career.

So thank you, Joey Votto and Shin-Soo Choo.

Second baseman Brandon Phillips, atop the NL leader board in RBI is a half-a-season factoid, a simple piece of anecdotal evidence, but I’m going to parse it out and use it to illustrate the fickle nature of the RBI and how they can be a etherial beast in fantasy baseball. A few RBI principles can be teased out from the fact that the 32-year-old two bagger for the Reds is challenging for the league RBI lead:

You can’t knock in runs if there aren’t players on base.

Well, you can pull a Ginacarlo Stanton and drill a solo home run, but you get my meaning. Runs batted in is often criticized as a statistic because it measures opportunity as much as it measures performance. It can be a tough category to prepare for in fantasy baseball. A RBI depends as much on the context as it does the skill of the hitter. In our context today, Shin-Soo Choo and Joey Votto are on base machines. Brandon Phillips, hitting behind them, simply knocks them around.

But can you roster players that make the most out of the opportunities they have? Of course. Some players excel when given the opportunity, while others are less impressive in the same context. Just look at Brandon Phillips.

Batting order matters.

Speaking of lineup spots, which are the best for producing RBI? Well, it’s the middle of the order guys, which is logical as they are the team’s best hitters, like Brandon Phillips is for the Reds. This is especially true if the team has some solid on base guys setting the table, as we see in Choo and Votto.

I’ll take this a step forward though and give you a formula you can use to get a rough projection of RBI production, but you’ll need the team’s OBP (Baseball-Reference can give you this) and the individual’s Total Bases (double, triples, etc.).

"3 – 4 – 5 Hitters:(0.7 x Games Played x Team OBP) + (0.3 x Total Bases) + (0.275 x HR) – (0.2 x GP)6 – 7 – 8 Hitters:(0.6 x Games Played x Team OBP) + (0.27 x Total Bases) + (0.25 x HR) – (0.2 x GP)9 – 1 – 2 Hitters:(0.55 x Games Played x Team OBP) + (0.24 x Total Bases) + (0.225 x HR) – (0.2 x GP)"

Obviously, there is no need to go to this amount of trouble unless you have a serious nerdy streak (guilty), but just reading through this simple formula gives you a sense of the factors at play when talking RBI. How well the team gets on base matters, an individual player’s extra base hits matter, as does position in the lineup.

A hard-working fantasy baseball player could apply this formula mid-season and get an idea if a player’s second half should track higher or lower in terms of RBI.

Hit for extra bases.

Speaking of the formulas above and extra base hits. Those extra base hits clear the bases.

Often your home run hitters are known as the league’s best RBI guys and this is usually true. But you can tally RBI without hitting homers – it’s all in the extra base hits. Alex Gordon spent the majority of 2012 in the leadoff position, yet he knocked in 72 runners, despite hitting only 14 home runs. That was possible because he had over 50 doubles. Manny Machado is doing the same thing with his doubles this season.

Joe Mauer is similar in that he doesn’t hit many homers, but he’ll knock in more than his fair share of runs (and score them as well). Brandon Phillips is posting a great RBI total despite a lack of serious home runs.

Be familiar with the doubles leader board because they’ll give you an uptick in RBI, despite potentially hitting in a poor lineup spot for RBI production.

Final Thoughts

So there are some thoughts on RBI pulled from one factoid. Being one fifth or your offensive scoring in standard 5×5 leagues, it’s important that you don’t just scan down RBI leaders sheets, but instead you should give real thought to the factors behind the ribbies.

*RBI is short for runs batted in so it’s a pet peeve of many to see it pluralized as RBIs or RBI’s, as that would to them be redundant as runs is already plural. But both RBI and RBIs is considered acceptable, pet peeve or not.