The San Diego Padres traded two middling prospects to the Chicago White Sox for oft-injured, power-heavy outfielder Carlos Quentin. This shouldn’t come as much surprise, but this move immediately decreases Quentin’s fantasy value.
First, while San Diego does have a reputation as a pitcher-friendly park (and it is) it plays as a 95 for right-handed home run power according to Statcorner.com versus an astoundingly low 59 for left-handed batters (100 is league average). If Quentin wasn’t coming from the homer haven that is U.S. Cellular (126 for LHB, 138 for RHB) then this wouldn’t really be as much of an issue.
Take a look at the field dimensions below for both his old home and his new home (with all batted ball’s from 2011 at U.S. Cellular included).
Images courtesy of Fox Sports. Click to enlarge.
Remember how we said Petco Park was a lot more difficult for left-handed hitters? Check out that anti-power alley in right-center. To hit a homer there you’ll only need a solid 411-foot poke. No big deal. Down in left field it’s not so bad, only a little bit further than we see at U.S. Cellular.
Quentin hit 24 homers last season, but just seven of them came at home. Just eyeballing those home homers from the images above, it looks like Petco would have robbed him of maybe one of those seven homers (the one in the bottom-right corner on the U.S. Cellular chart was a foul-poll homer and thus difficult to gauge). In Quentin’s other three seasons with the White Sox he’s hit the vast majority of his homers at home (52 HR) while struggling on the road (31 HR). If nothing else, leaving the home he’s felt so comfortable with worries me.
How difficult are the other parks in the AL Central and NL West? Using those right-handed homer park factors from Statcorner.com we see that the average park factor for the other four parks in the AL Central is a 98.8 versus a 102.5 for the NL West. That’s a small difference but he will play nearly 40 games (almost 25% of his season schedule) in those other parks.
All things said, San Diego represents a more difficult home venue and a poorer overall lineup. For a player who’s value is derived solely from his power totals, this is a disappointing move and one that would prevent me from drafting him in fantasy leagues this season.
