from Amazon
Tuesday, April 03, 2007
Replacement Level Fielding
Using a process similar to that recently published by Chone and jinaz, I come up with each player’s plays made above average for each of the three years, 2004-2006. (Everett from 2004-2006 is +10, +40, +39).
I take the top 30 fielders at each position by balls in zone (i.e., opportunities), for each year. Those are my regulars. Everyone else is a bench player.
The bench 1B is a better fielder than the regular 1B, by 0.7 plays per 162 GP. Here are how the regulars fare relative to the bench player:
1B: -0.7
2B: -2.1
SS: +4.1
3B: +11.1
LF: -3.4
CF: 0.0
RF: +3.8
Overall, the average regular fielder is around +2 plays better than the average bench player. (Note that the bench player will include regulars playing out of position.)
The big standout is the 3B, as I’ve mentioned many times. Rolen, Chavez, Beltre, Crede, ARod (pre 2006), Inge, Zimmerman, Feliz, amongst others… when was the last time we had such a fantastic group of fielders among 3B?
This is yet even more indication that it is very foolish to treat the average 2B = average 3B, when looking at offense+defense.
When you see how the fans evaluate 3B:
http://www.tangotiger.net/scouting/pos2006_3B.html
and 2B:
http://www.tangotiger.net/scouting/pos2006_2B.html
You’ll be hard-pressed to say that the average fielding 2B is a better fielder than the average fielding 3B. And, the average offense at 3B is much higher than at 2B. There’s no question that, today, the average 3B is a better overall player than the average 2B. Any metric that treats them as equals is just fooling you.