Thinking about Corbin Carroll before writing this article mostly prompted feelings of disappointment. And then I decided to look at his season numbers, and things weren’t nearly as bad as I was making them out to be.
What makes a sophomore slump is not always clear. Some players struggle to readjust to the adjustments the league has made against them, while others simply set such a high standard that it’s difficult to follow up. That can happen due to the weight of expectations, maybe a bit of regression, and all sorts of things.
Few examples come to mind as obvious as Corbin Carroll in the 2024 season. The reigning NL Rookie of the Year has failed to match his outstanding 2023 campaign. While that statement is true and represents a disappointment for fantasy managers throughout the land, it’s time to pump the brakes and understand: he’s fine. And in that context, what does fine mean, and what can we expect out of such an intriguing player moving forward?
Corbin Carroll was a first-round stud in 2023, he provided value in every category, and did so showing outstanding athleticism, living up to lofty expectations as one of the top prospects in the sport. It’s one thing to be fast, and it’s another entirely to maximize that speed with terrific baserunning. Carroll did that as he stole 54 bags and was only caught five times in 645 PA.
Sure, stealing 50+ bags is great, but what lifted Carroll to the highest levels of hype was the fact he had those numbers as one of the better hitters in the National League. A .506 slugging percentage and .285 batting average created the platform for an easy top-of-the-first-round bat, and that’s precisely where he went this season.
For someone looking a bit more closely at his bat, it was easy to see that the 2023 campaign was nearly peak form for Carroll, and a .332 xwOBA – .370 wOBA comparison shows that there was plenty of room to regress.
At first glance, when you see an exciting rookie bat hit 25 homers in his first year, regardless of body build, it’s easy to take that as a building block. Maybe he can get to 30, 30+ if all breaks right when that might not necessarily be the case.
Moving over to the current campaign, Carroll’s slugging percentage is way down from .506 to .422. However, thanks to an outstanding second half, there is a very real chance he will hit more home runs than he did a year ago, and that is saying something for a player with a .635 OPS in the first half.
A topic often brought up when talking about Carroll’s issues was his shoulder injury late last year, which led to a dip in numbers at the end of that campaign. There is a very decent chance this could’ve been lingering through the beginning of 2024, but it’s purely speculative. Still, if we analyze his decision value and contact ability in 2023 and 2024, there isn’t a huge difference.
Decision Value:
Contact Ability:
Despite showing better contact ability in 2024, the batting average along with stolen bases are probably the two categories that have taken the biggest hit for Carroll. A .285 hitter in 2023, the D-backs outfielder has been down to .230 in 2024.
This lines up well to display why, although somewhat disappointing, Carroll’s 2024 numbers shouldn’t discourage you from pursuing him heavily. Let’s take a look at his production in the five categories, comparing this and last year.
One thing is very apparent there. The biggest issues with Carroll this year are related to relatively safe aspects of his performance, even if 2024 doesn’t necessarily show that to be the case.
The reigning NL Rookie of the Year ran a lot more last season, but all that speed is still there, and he remains as safe a bet as any to steal 30+ consistently. Carroll still possesses the tools to give that extra gear that we saw last year from him and are seeing now from the likes of Elly de la Cruz and Shohei Ohtani.
The struggles might have gotten to him, but then again, he stole eight in April and March and only 2 in a very hot August. It’s tough to know the exact reason why he is running less. It could be a team thing; even beyond Carroll, Arizona is running less as a whole. That being said, the projections we can make off his ability in that category are as promising as almost anyone in the bigs.
The other category with a significant downturn is batting average, and it also shouldn’t cause too much concern, as we saw with the contact ability charts of 2023 and 2024. Sometimes it isn’t that simple, but in other occasions, it is, here is a guy with a .325 BABIP in 2023 and a .254 in 2024. All signs point towards Carroll consistently putting up a BABIP around .300, which should lead to a decent average, even if he doesn’t hit 300+ consistently.
An underrated factor that has helped Carroll maintain and maybe even surpass the runs scored of 2023 is the ability of the D-Backs offense. A lineup that went from the middle of the pack to the best of the National League in 2024. Maybe that’s part of why Arizona is running less often, not as pressed to manufacture offense.
The big point of praise for Carroll in 2024 is that even through these struggles, he did some important things, chief among them was getting enough power to hover around 20 homers, possibly even beyond that depending on how September goes. Speed and contact established, he may not be the 134 wRC bat we all saw in 2023. For fantasy purposes, though, all the skills are there to provide enough production you won’t be upset at yourself on how you valued him this past offseason.
Carroll has shown basically nothing to indicate he can be the truly elite hitter we see from other top bats like Bobby Witt Jr., Ronald Acuña Jr., and Gunnar Henderson. That being said, maybe he shouldn’t be compared to those guys and more importantly, he doesn’t need to be that guy to be valuable given his rushing floor.
Agree with your assessment of Corbin. He just needs to get on base and destroy the calmness of the opposing team. Last year’s success was largely caused by the Backs creating a sense of almost panic from the opposition. This year the team is built more on power, not speed. The pitching is the one variable that will ultimately do in the team. Lovullo still fails in his pitcher decisions running thru relievers like crap thru a goose. He put in Puk to face one batter then replaced him the next inning with a questionable assortment or relievers only to lose the game. His jockeying of the lineup does not instill a sense of consistency or confidence in the players. Benching the guy with a hot bat under the guise of resting the player especially against top tier teams is just stupid and sure not conducive to a manager of the year award.