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The 2018 MLB season was one in which stolen base numbers were down across the board, from 2,527 total steals in 2017 to 2,474 this year.
Even the league's most prolific thieves were affected, as the highest individual stolen base total in 2017 was 60, while 45 was tops in all of baseball this year.
While the decline in stolen bases was obviously a pervasive issue, some offenders were worse than others. Let's take a look at the players who had the sharpest drop in stolen bases this past season.
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Stolen Base Fallers
Dee Gordon (2B/SS/OF, SEA)
In 2017, Dee Gordon returned from his PED suspension and wasted no time showing off his speed. Gordon stole 60 bases in 2017 and was caught just 16 times. Gordon put himself in position for lots of steals by getting on base at a .341 clip that year, but despite his solid season, he was shipped to the Mariners in the offseason as part of the massive overhaul in Miami.
2018 was a very different story for Gordon, who cut his SB total in half with just 30 steals on 42 attempts. Gordon's speed is not in question, but his bat certainly is. Gordon saw a dramatic decrease in OBP, posting a .288 in that category. It's not uncommon for a player's numbers to fall off when switching leagues; add in the fact that the Mariners were below league average as a team in terms of SB and it's not too difficult to see why there was a significant dip. The good news for fantasy owners looking to Gordon for steals is that he isn't likely to repeat this lackluster campaign. Gordon made hard contact 20.4% of the time in 2018, the highest rate of his career, but still posted a .304 BABIP, his lowest since 2013, while walking a career-low 1.5% of the time. As Gordon learns the pitchers in the AL and begins to see his OBP numbers come back toward their career averages, Gordon will once again find himself atop the SB leaderboard.
Billy Hamilton (OF, CIN)
In four straight seasons from 2014 to 2017, Billy Hamilton never stole fewer than 56 bases. But in 2018, he fell off a cliff (not literally, though that would explain the sharp decline in stolen base numbers) and swiped just 34 bases. This one is a little harder to figure out than Gordon, though. Hamilton has never been an OBP machine and actually stole more bases in 2015 (57) with a .274 OBP in 114 games than he did this year with a .299 OBP over 153 games.
The answer is simply that the Reds didn't let Hamilton loose nearly as often as they have in the past. His 43 total attempts were a ridiculous decrease, and the Reds as a team attempted 49 fewer steals in 2018 than they did the year before. The question, though, is why? Cincinnati was terrible in just about every offensive category in 2018, so it's surprising that they didn't unleash one of the very few offensive weapons they possessed more often. Hamilton is among the fastest players in all of MLB and will be a free agent at the end of the 2019 campaign, so the Reds would be silly not to let him run wild to try and maximize his trade value at the deadline. He's still got the speed to steal over 50 bags, if someone will just let him run.
Cameron Maybin (OF, SEA)
In 2017, Cameron Maybin had his second-best year on the basepaths, swiping 33 bases in 41 attempts across 114 games split between the Angels and the Astros. In 2018, that total dropped all the way to 10 steals in just 15 attempts across 129 games split between the Marlins and the Mariners. Despite appearing in more games in 2018 than in 2017, he started in 20 fewer and saw 66 fewer plate appearances. On top of that, he played the 2017 season with two teams that ranked 1st (LAA) and 8th (HOU) in stolen bases, as opposed to 2018 in which the teams he played for were 14th (SEA) and 29th (MIA) overall.
Maybin's future output really depends on how he's used, and by whom. The 32-year-old outfielder is a free agent this offseason, and if he lands somewhere he can start frequently or with a proclivity for stealing via pinch runners, it's not unreasonable to think that Maybin could turn in 25 or more steals. It's not likely, however, that Maybin will ever top the 30-SB mark again, as his legs aren't getting any younger and, aside from his 2016 campaign with Detroit, he's never been one to hit for much average. He probably won't be a target on too many draft boards for 2019.
Byron Buxton (OF, MIN)
No list of 2018's biggest disappointments would be complete without mentioning Byron Buxton. Still just 24 years of age, the youngster appeared in 140 games in 2017 and stole 29 bases while being caught just once. Fantasy owners bet big on Buxton in 2018, looking to capitalize on a young talent coming into his own, and his consensus ADP heading into the year was 59. Hindsight is always 20-20, but what a bust that turned out to be.
Buxton appeared in just 28 games for the Twins in 2018 before suffering a wrist injury that landed him on the DL. It wasn't the end of the world, but when his DL stint was up, the Twins optioned Buxton to Triple-A, and he remained in the minors for the rest of the season. He finished with just five stolen bases and a miserable .156/.183/.200 slash line through his first 90 AB. Despite the disappointment that was 2018, there is still a silver lining. If Buxton had remained in the Majors and continued at the exact same pace, he still would have finished the season with around 25 steals (given seeing the same number of AB he did the previous season). Buxton's speed is real, but he'll need to put the nagging wrist injury behind him and find a way to hit for average at the MLB level if he intends to use it.
Elvis Andrus (SS, TEX)
Since his rookie campaign in 2009, Elvis Andrus had stolen at least 21 bases every year. Through the 2017 campaign, he had stolen over 30 bases on four separate occasions, and his highest season total was 42 SB back in 2013. In 2018? Five steals.
We can certainly point to Andrus' broken elbow--which he suffered in April and which kept him out of action until mid-June--as the main cause for the drop in numbers, but that doesn't tell the whole story. In 2017, Andrus reached base 229 times and stole 25 bags, which means he stole successfully in about 11% of the times he found himself on base. This past year, those numbers were much different. Andrus reached base 129 times and stole successfully just five times, just under a 4% rate. It could be that the Rangers were being careful with Andrus, who had never appeared in fewer than 145 games prior to 2018, or that Andrus himself was feeling hesitant. History tells us that if the perennially-durable Andrus can bounce back health in 2019 he'll be a lock for another 20 SB season, but he's on the wrong side of 30 now, and we all know that nothing is a lock once a player reaches that age.
