What Do Allen Craig's Peripheral Stats Tell Us About the St. Louis Cardinals' RBI Machine?

On Sunday afternoon, Allen Craig dug into the batter's box at Busch Stadium with the Cardinals trailing the Padres 1-0 and runners at first and second base. Craig laced a frozen rope into center field that plated leadoff man extraordinaire Matt Carpenter. Craig's 77th RBI of the season made it a 1-1 ballgame as Dan McLaughlin declared that Craig "is the RBI machine."

"RBI machine" is a fitting title for Craig, even if the Cardinals lineup itself is the run-scoring machine with Matt Carpenter firing the device's ignition. Craig is there on the assembly line, dutifully whacking baseballs to the outfield grass so that another runner earns the label "Batted In" in the scorebook. Craig has been remarkably proficient this season at his spot in the Redbirds' offensive apparatus.

Today, I thought it would be interesting to take a look at how Craig has put up such gaudy offensive stats with men on base so far this season.

ALLEN CRAIG 2013 SITUATIONAL BATTING SPLITS

Craig's peripherals are pretty amazing. Craig cuts his strikeout rate (K%) from 19.1% with the bases empty to just 11.4% with RISP. MLB batters have struck out in 19.7% of their PAs in 2013. Buster Posey has struck out in 11.5% of his 2013 PAs, which the 22nd lowest in MLB this season. Essentially, Craig goes from striking out at an average rate with the bases empty to striking out at the same rate as the 2012 National League MVP with RISP.

When evaluating a player's BABIP, I always start at line drive rate (LD%). The rule of thumb for batted baseballs is that, the harder they are struck, the more likely they are to land for a hit. MLB players have the highest BABIP on line drives (.692), second highest on grounders (.231), and the lowest on fly balls (.223). So a player with an above-average LD% has earned a higher BABIP.

The league-average LD% is typically around 20% and 2013 is no different with MLB players hitting liners 20.9% of the time. The MLB average for GB% is 44.6% and FB% is 34.5%. IFFB% is the share of infield pop-ups a batter has hit; the 2013 league average is 9.5%. Lastly, the MLB's HR/FB rate is 10.8% this season.

Craig's peripherals are those of a skilled hitter. His LD% is above-average and his IFFB% is well below average. What's astounding about his 2013 season to date is that his LD% skyrockets with RISP and IFFB% falls off to nothing. Craig has not hit an infield pop-up with RISP this season. Craig's RISP LD% and IFFB% have been like Joey Votto's but with more line drives. That's incredible.

What should Craig's BABIP be, given his peripherals?

Jeff Zimmerman developed a Quick Calculator for Expected BABIP (xBABIP) that is available in a post at Fangraphs. Essentially, the spreadsheet takes into account a player's batted-ball profile and calculates what his BABIP should be; that is, his xBABIP. Despite Craig's impressive peripheral stats, he has still been quite lucky with men on base generally and RISP in particular.

ALLEN CRAIG SITUATIONAL xBABIP

It is unlikely that Craig will continue hitting at a .484/.495.877 clip with RISP. Of course it is. We all knew that already. Such a pace would be unsustainable even without factoring in BABIP luck evening out some. Even though Craig almost assuredly won't finish the season with the otherworldly batting line he currently has with RISP, it doesn't mean that his batting in such situations to date should not be celebrated. Craig's performance has been a lot of fun to watch.