The Futility Infielder

I watched most of the two Yankees-Angels series over the past couple ofweeks, and though the Yanks took four out of six, Anaheim certainly played them tough. Most memorably ,the two teams split a pair of series-opening extra-inning thrillers, and both Angel wins have come on the nights when the Yanks' personal rent-a-bitch, Aaron Sele (something like 5-15 lifetime against them coming in), faced Javier Vazquez.

On a team that's been missing Garrett Anderson (who was finally diagnosed with a form of arthritis that certainly doesn't bode well for that huge contract he recently signed), Darin Erstad (in an Office Space sense), Tim Salmon, and now Troy Glaus, one of the guys who's really stood out for the Halos is outfielder Jeff DaVanon. On the season, DaVanon's hitting .299/.398/.448, but he's been an even tougher out against the Yanks, .348/.444/.435 with 5 runs scored in 27 plate appearances. He killed them last year as well (.364/.417/.636 with a homer in 12 PA) on his way to a .282/.360/.445 season with 12 homers and 17 steals in 382 PA. This guy is a pest. He's listed as 6', but on a team with David Eckstein and Chone Figgins, he too looks like a member of the junior varsity thanks to his crouched batting stance. But with those kind of numbers, he's certainly earned his wings.

When he burst on the scene last year, I instantly recognized the DaVanon name; his father, Jerry DaVanon, was a card-carrying futility infielder in the 1970s. Digging into both players' pasts, I found an interesting parallel: neither of them had a decent big-league season until around age 30, but both seemed to turn a corner at that point.

Jerry DaVanon was a first round draft pick of the St. Louis Cardinals in 1966 out of Westmount College in Santa Barbara, California. Chosen by the San Diego Padres in the '68 expansion draft, he got his first taste of action early in 1969, playing second base for the Pads. In his short time in San Diego, he didn't hit, and I mean REALLY didn't hit: .136/.177/.163 in 62 plate appearances, with only one double among his 8 hits, and 0-for-3 in stealing bases. The Padres had seen enough, and shipped him back to St. Louis for two guys you've never heard of, including the most excellently named Sonny Ruberto. Finally getting a shot with the Cards, he didn't do too badly -- .300/.391/.450. But he saw only 11 games with the big club in St. Louis the next season, and at the end of the year was shipped off to the Baltimore Orioles for the legendary Moe Drabowski.

The 1971 Orioles were Earl Weaver's third straight pennant-winner, notching 101 victories but losing a seven-game World Series to Roberto Clemente and the Pittsburgh Pirates. DaVanon was the team's top infield reserve, but with Davey Johnson, Brooks Robinson and Mark Belanger (who put up a respectable .365 OBP that year) all playing 140-150 games, he only saw action in 38 contests, hitting .235/.340/296 in 94 PA, and didn't appear in the postseason. He didn't make the big-league squad the next year, was shipped to the Angels in June for Roger Repoz, and apparently spent the entire year in the minors (for which I don't have stats). He did see time with the Angels in '73, appearing in 41 games but getting only 52 trips to the plate, hitting .245/.288/.306. The Cardinals reacquired him at the end of the season and he saw action with them in 1974 but went only 6-for-40 in 30 games.

The winter of 1975 was an active one in the transaction column for DaVanon, as he passed through the hands of four teams in three months, from the Cardinals to the Tigers and then to the Indians before being finally being purchased by the Houston Astros in early April. Again seeing limited time (mired behind another futilityman, Larry Milbourne), DaVanon actually hit pretty well in a relatively inhospitable environment: .278 /.386/.392 in 114 PA and an impressive 16-to-7 walk-to-strikeout ratio. At this point, Davanon had played in parts of six major-league seasons for five different teams without ever reaching 100 at-bats, which has to be a record of sorts, and maxed out at 41 games played. In 1976, the Astros finally increased DaVanon's playing time; he appeared in 61 games, crossed the magic 100 at-bat threshold, and was a sparkplug, hitting .290/.408 /.402 on a team in which no regular posted an OBP higher than .375.

And then just like that, he was gone. DaVanon was traded to the Cardinals (his third re-acquisition by them) in the same deal which exiled Houston's former ace and future manager, Larry Dierker. He went 0-for-8 in nine games, was released in May, and never again played in the big leagues, done at 31. In parts of eight seasons he only got 574 plate appearances -- about one year's worth - hitting .234/.331/.315 with 3 homers but drawing 68 walks.

How far over his head had DaVanon played in Houston? Here's a quick look at his OPS+ numbers, which compare his combined OBP and SLG to the park-adjusted league average:

       PA   OPS+

1969  108    54

1970   20    -1

1971   94    83

1973   52    74

1974   47    23

1975  114   124

1976  130   141

1977    9   -67

TOT   574    86

Basically, he was a solidly below-average hitter except for those two years in Houston, when he turned into a rainbow-covered on-base machine. Why did he do so well? Why did he disappear so suddenly? I really don't know. Such are the random mysteries of the futility infielder -- usually he's got "retirement" thrust upon him in the form of a pink slip, a departure without ceremony. In DaVanon's case, the Cardinals' depth may have had something to do with it; at various times in the 1977 season they had Don Kessinger, Ken Oberkfel, Mike Phillips and Joel Youngblood off the bench and Mike Tyson (no, not that one), Ken Reitz and a 21-year-old Garry Templeton in the starting lineup.

That's about all I can find out on DaVanon the elder. DaVanon the younger appears to have a lot more natural ability than his father. Interestingly, he's a switch hitter, as are the sons of other former major leaguers such as Scott Spiezio and Jose Cruz, Jr. After playing for three years at San Diego State University, DaVanon was drafted by the Oakland A's in the 26th round. He languished in the A's system despite hitting well: .272/.387/.376 for four different A-ball teams over four seasons, and then .342/.425/.567 at AA Midland, where he made the league's All-Star Team (as he had in the California League the year before). Even though he was already 25, you'd think Billy Beane might have noticed this bargain basement batter, but apparently not.

DaVanon finally caught a break when the A's included him in the '99 trading-deadline deal which sent Randy Velarde to Oakland, and after tearing up AAA pitching at Edmonton (.326/.416/.568), he got his first cup of coffee with the Angels, going 4-for-20 with a triple and a homer. He missed all of 2000 with an injury (what kind I don't know), but returned to the Pacific Coast League in 2001, tearing up pitching at Salt Lake City (.313/.390/.566) and earning another stint with the Angels. Unfortunately, he hit only .193/.280/.409 in 100 PA, though he did stroke 5 homers. He got a shorter stay in the bigs during the Angels' World Championship season in '02, getting only 5 hits, four of which were for extra bases.

Going into the 2003 season, DaVanon looked like a classic AAAA player, a Ken Phelps All-Star type who was 29 years old, sporting a sub-Mendoza .188/.265/.406 career line in about 150 big-league plate appearances, and trying to earn a roster spot on the defending World Champions. But Darin Erstad's hamstring injury and Tim Salmon's infirmity opened up playing time in the Angel outfield, and as mentioned before, he had an impressive season on a lackluster team. He had an incredible three days in early June, back-to-back-to-back two-homer games (two of those in the Expos Puerto Rico bandbox) and a total of 10 hits and 10 RBI, and had about a two-month string where his batting average never fell below .329.

Still, Baseball Prospectus was relatively unimpressed by his performance. Here's what they had to say in BP 2004:

DaVanon is a useful fourth outfielder who had to play a bit too much last year. His performance did validate the decision to non-tender Orlando Palmeiro, who'd played a similar role with the angels from 1999-2002. The power numbers he displayed in '03 were out of line, and mostly reflect three days in June in which he turned into Jim Thome in the bandbox of San Juan's Hiram Bithorn Stadium. given his age, even projecting a Stan Javier future is optimistic.

BP's weighted mean PECOTA projection for him this year is a measly .247/.328/.410 line and a .253 EQA in about 370 PA -- this after an excellent .293 EQA last year, pretty decent for a guy who supposedly got too much exposure. I gather that the main reason for the pessimistic projection is his age; relatively unproven fourth outfielder types rarely show so much improvement after 30. But thus far, he's picked up where he left off, and with Erstad down again, it looks as though our man DaVanon will continue to be a part of the Angels' lineup. I, for one, am pulling for him. Except when he plays the Yanks, of course.