In part twelve of my almost 50 part series "Better Know An Oriole" (otherwise known as 2009 Orioles Retrospective), I take a look at shortstop Robert Andino... THE FIGHTIN' NO-HIT ALL-GLOVER!
Andino came over the O's from Florida in an offseason trade, with Hayden Penn going to the Marlins. As a no-hit guy with a purportedly good glove, I projected Andino to hit .235/.281/.342 and play average defense - making him about a replacement level player.
With Cesar Izturis missing some time, Andino get into more games than I had expected, compiling 215 plate appearances with a .222/.274/.288 batting line. The Hardball Times PrOPS line, which normalizes his maybe slightly low .282 BABIP and 4.4% HR/FB rate, is at .247/.299/.341. That means Andino was almost exactly the (terrible*) hitter I expected him to be, but was probably a little unlucky.
* Andino had just 8 multi-hit games in 2009, knocking out 2 hits seven times and picking up 4 on May 27th against the Blue Jays. I was at that game, and it was pretty incredible. He went 3-3 against Roy Halladay (who kept the Jays ahead 8-3 through seven), and then drive in a run with a single in the O's 8th innings rally against reliever Jesse Carlson. Andino had a chance for a five-hit game, but struck out in extra innings. The O's would end up tying the game in the 8th, with Nolan Reimold (who pinch-hit in that inning - K'ed - and then struck out again later) hitting a walk-off three-run home run in the bottom of the 11th after Danys Baez had given the Jays a 10-8 lead in the top of the frame. It was really, really awesome. Here's the graph:
On the bright side, Andino did play plus defense at short - posting a +5.5 UZR/150 games and displaying some nice range (+4.7 runs total) if not the best fielding percentage (.968; -3.5 runs for errors in UZR).
Overall, Andino was a slightly below replacement player, coming in at -0.3 WAR. I don't think the 25 year-old is going to start hit too much better any time soon, but if he can maintain the quality defense he might be able to keep a job as a back-up infielder for a while. He's not a particularly import piece of the puzzle for the O's though.
Photo by Rob Tringali.
