Does Success For Bryan Reynolds Correlate to the Team’s Success?

02/23/2024 – Ethan Smith – @mvp_EtHaN

I always love correlation, especially when it comes to sports.

Does me matching the jerseys that the Pirates wear on any specific day correlate to them winning more often? I don’t know. I mean the answer is probably no, but I truly don’t know.

One thing I do know is that statistical analysis in baseball can lead to fun questions, questions like the title of this piece.

If you listened to my episode of Locked On Pirates on Reynolds as part of my 2024 Player Preview Series (which you totally should), you may have noticed that I made specific points, with statistical backing, to the potential that Bryan Reynolds and his success directly correlates to the success of the team, and that’s what we’re diving into today.

It is hard to argue that a player has been more consistently productive as a Pirate over the past few years than Bryan Reynolds. Since his arrival with the Pirates, he’s hit .277 in his career and was an All-Star in 2021 while finishing 11th in NL MVP voting.

Although Reynolds hasn’t quite returned to that form from 2021, he’s been a steady presence in the lineup that the Pirates have very much needed, even if they weren’t a good baseball team.

Now, Reynolds has real players in the lineup alongside him, but it stills begs the question: Is he the engine that keeps the train rolling?

Take 2023 for instance: It’s a season many of you look at in three parts – part one being the strong month of April, part two, the fall from grace and part three being the relatively solid finish to the campaign.

When you break Reynolds 2023 season down into those three parts, tell me if it sounds as familiar as the last paragraph when I outline his statistics.

In April, when the Pirates led the National League in wins, Reynolds slashed .323/.351/.586 (.937 OPS) with 5 home runs and 22 RBIs. In May, a month that saw the Pirates go 8-18 with a -42 run differential, Reynolds slashed .242/.312/.414 (.726 OPS) with just two home runs and 13 RBIs.

Before I continue, keep in mind many other factors obviously come into play for the Pirates and their success outside of just Bryan Reynolds. For example, losing Vince Velasquez and trading Rich Hill last season had an impact on the rotation – if you even want to call it a rotation – and the team’s ability to be competitive.

You move on to June, a month that was a slight bounce-back from May for Pittsburgh with an 11-15 record. And, although he dealt with injuries during that month, Reynolds brought his numbers back up, posting his third highest OPS in a month of the season at .799.

Then comes July, another dreadful 8-win month for Pittsburgh, and, you guesses it, another dreadful month for Reynolds. In July, Reynolds slashed a paltry .200/.240/.337 (.557 OPS) which were all his lowest monthly totals of the year last year. He added 4 home runs and 9 RBIs, which was his 2nd lowest monthly total for RBI last season.

Then, you get to part three of the season last year, when the Pirates finished 29-28 in the final months. In August, Reynolds, as he’s been known to do, turned it on, having his second best statistical month of the year with a .288/.339/.559 (.898 OPS) line, knocking 7 homers, his most in any month, and 16 RBIs, his third most in any month.

This was mirrored by the team’s success as August and September were tied for the second highest win total months for Pittsburgh last year with 14. As September began, Reynolds didn’t slow down. A .252/.345/.427/.772 slash line with five home runs and 19 RBIs, with the RBIs being his second highest total in a month last year, would be how Reynolds would end the season while helping lead the Pirates to one of their two winning record months and also helping Pittsburgh improve by 14 wins from 2022.

From May 1 through July 30, the Pirates went 27-49 while Reynolds posted a .232/.309/.380 line with 7 home runs. The rest of the year? .288/.348/.525 with 17 home runs.

So now that you’ve seen all of these statistics and correlations, you may be wondering, was this just last year or has this happened before?

Going back to 2022, the Pirates’ only double-digit winning months came when Bryan Reynolds hit 5+ homers. If his OPS was above .758+ in a given month that season, they won 10+ games.

Go even further back to 2021 – when the team was dreadful at best while Reynolds was elite – the team only won double-digit games in the 3 months (April, July and September). In those months, Reynolds had 25 or more hits, which he also did in May and June, which were terrible months for a terrible team. Sometimes, he’s good and the team just doesn’t pull its weight.

The team has been rebuilding and now is better than it has been for quite awhile. Reynolds may not be asked to carry as much water as he has had to in previous years, but there is a correlation between his success and putting wins up in the standings. It may not be as direct as one may think, but it is clear that as Reynolds continues to perform well, the team seems to follow suit, and that could cook up a Gordon Ramsay-type recipe for success in 2024 not only for No. 10, but for the Pirates as a whole.