THE BOOK--Playing The Percentages In Baseball

Carlos Lee and Justin Morneau are the two worst contracts?

Didn’t Juan Pierre get a 5 year/$44 million deal before the 2007 season? I know the money is significantly, less, but The King of Outs (who is being moved to left field) can’t be any better than a significant number of AAA players. There’s probably even quite a few AA players who could match his production.

Lee and Morneau are overpaid, but at least they are quality players. Pierre is overpaid and he’s not good at baseball. He gets my vote.

The monetary mistake of Pierre is small compared to the mistake they will be making if they play him in left field everyday, and keep either Andre Ethier or Matt Kemp on the bench.

That will cost them 3-4 wins.  I’ve said before that Joe Torre isn’t that stupid, but not everyone agrees with me.  I guess we’ll find out on opening day.

Tango: Gotcha. I guess I look at it this way, and maybe it’s wrong: Lee might cost more bad dollars, but, money notwithstanding, it’s worth having his bat in the lineup. So maybe you paid too much for that steak, but it’s still a steak. Pierre is like paying $20 for a White Castle burger and finding out there’s a severed finger in it.

Rally: I don’t think Torre is that stupid, and that’s probably why there’s talk of Pierre being shopped (I haven’t read anything solid, just hearing noise). I’m sure he realizes that there are better, younger, cheaper players out there. But if they can’t trade him, doesn’t he HAVE to play him sometime? You can’t let a guy like that get just 100 at bats. I don’t think the owner/GM would be too happy.

I ran Juan Pierre through my program that gives you the ideal position for each player (lefthandedness, as Pierre is, notwithstanding).

I thought that if he were righthanded that he’d make a good 2B.  But, his best position is LF or CF.  There’s really no other place to put him.

UZR sees him as a plus CF, while Fans see him as an average LEFT fielder.  We’re talking about a good 15 run difference in evaluation here.  Dewan sees him as half-way between the two (bit closer to the Fans).

Marcel has him as a -1.5 wins as a hitter.  At this point, Pierre is a bench player for sure, with at most 2 years of MLB play left.

I will guess that Joe Torre will treat Juan Pierre exactly like he treated Kenny Lofton.

JD, by your reasoning then, you could pay Justin Morneau (a steak) ARod dollars (filet mignon), and Pierre (a hamburger) will still be a worse signing.

Or, you could pay 250,000$ for an Accord, or pay 40,000$ for a Civic.  Even if the Civic stops running, you still have 210,000$ to get yourself an Accord, which should be pretty easy.

JD,

If they make him the 4th outfielder its still very likely that he gets 300 atbats or so.  Very few teams make it through a year with all 3 of their outfielders avaoiding injury.

Good point on Lofton.  Torre buried him even though he was (still is) a much better player than Pierre.

I think that Pierre gets an underserved bad rap among analysts and wannabee analysts.  He is a replacement level hitter, with above average defense (other than his arm) at a premium positon (CF).  And he runs extremely well (good baserunning and SB/CS lwts) of course.

Overall, I have him as .6 WAR.  That is for 08.  Last year and the year before, he was worth more.

His UZR in CF have been solid over the years.  And, his blazing speed makes it unlikely that he is NOT an above average center fielder.  Given his speed, it is almost impossible that he is only an average LF’er.

Not to talk about Pierre, but Roger Cedeno was one of the worst OF I ever saw. And Lonnie Smith wasn’t that good either.

It may make it unlikely, but certainly plausible.

As a Dodger fan, I was not too happy with the Pierre signing and he had a few blunders out there last year. But as the year went on, he seemed to improve defensively. Playing the OF in Dodger Stadium is tough at first, as Vin Scully likes to say the ball gets lost in the “wedding cake” (fans in light shirts and light color of the seats).

That said, was Pierre’s arm bad enough to negate his defensive value? I read a BP article that had him losing just over 8 runs in 2007. Did his 2007 UZR compensate for that?

And as for the Santana trade, the Twins didn’t get a whole lot in return.

MGL, reading your numbers it seems Pierre deserves his bad rap. 0.6 wins over replacement = 3 million, and he’s getting paid 9.  There’s place on a roster for a player of that quality, but its 4th outfielder, not a starter.

Pierre’s bad arm is probably -2 to -3 runs a year.  Rally, yeah, he is probably overpaid, by a lot, but I am referring to those who say that he is barely a AAA (or even AA) player (see above).  He is a 4th outfielder, but not a replacement player.  And a lot of the “bad rap” started a year or two ago, when he was a 1 WAR player, not horrible by any means.

Also, I should add to the list of things that GM’s incorrectly or suboptimally value, is speed/excitement on the bases (and the perception of a player being a “leadoff-type hitter"), e.g. Pierre, and being left-handed.

MGL/484 - I think that fans and the media are more ameniable to overpaying a starter than they are a bench player like a fourth outfielder. In my opinion it’s a counterproductive attitude - the salary at this point is a sunk cost, and shouldn’t prevent you from using players in the roles best suited to them. But a lot of teams will refuse to bench players simply because of the amount of money they’re paying them, and people in the media are very quick to criticize teams that do, saying things like, “You have $4.5 million riding the bench.”

In Pierre’s particular case, I think it’s also attributable to a backlash factor - Pierre, as you noted, gets overvalued because of his percieved leadoff hitter skills, which leads to glowing press articles, which drives people with some command of things like OBP to get rather testy when the topic comes up. Maybe it’s not entirely fair that he gets dinged because of his press coverage, but that could partially explain it.

Colin: yes, those numbers are wins.  You said .05, but I’m sure you meant 0.5.

***

MGL: Endy Chavez is better than Pierre, isn’t he?  Better fielder, far better arm, both similar hitters?  While we agree that Chavez is way underappreciated, the backlash against Pierre is that he should be standing in line behind Chavez.

Tango/488: I have recurring nightmares of people asking if Pierre should be in the Hall of Fame. And I’m not sure it’s too absurd that someone ever comes up with that. He’s 29, therefore young, extremely durable and has played only 8 seasons in the Majors. He’s got a good chance to play for a long time and amass those counting stats (and milestones) that voters love. I’d like to see you shoot down this potential CV:
.300 BA
Very few strikeouts (voters hate strikeouts). In fact, he’s got more walks than strikeouts in his career for the moment.
800 SB (could easily enter the top 5 in SB)
3000 Hits (the big one, hopefully it will stop being a milestone by then)
Good fielder (I’m sure someone will argue “great")
Ring(s)
Durability
“Gives himself up”
“Intangibles”, “energy”, “baserunning pest”, “spark to the lineup”, “sets the tone”
“nobody with more hits and SBs than him, and eligible, is out of the Hall”
plus some other arbitrary nonsense

If he does play 10-12 more years, even factoring in quite a bit of decline, he’s got a huge chance to reach 800 SB and 3000 Hits (he’s at 389 and 1440 after 8 seasons and he’ll keep running - who looks at caught stealing anyway, aside from Raines supporters?).
I don’t hate him. He can play sufficiently well to stick in the Majors. In fact, there are worse regulars around the Majors, even though he would be best suited as fourth OF. But he’s definitely overpaid and he’s positioning himself to be one of the most overrated players ever (if he reaches some milestones). Of course he’s got a long way to go, but then again it’s just a nightmare for the moment.

His Marcel wOBA is .311.

I don’t think you can appreciate how horrible that is.  That’s a -1.5 hitting wins compared to a regular hitter in a full season.

He’s a great runner, but that cancels out his horrible arm.

He is at best (if you give him the high end for his fielding) a 1.5 WAR player right now, if he plays a full season.

He’s got at most 3 seasons to play in MLB, which really means he shouldn’t expect to get more than 1500 PA from now until the end of his MLB life.

Juan Pierre right now is not even at 1500 hits.  He should consider himself lucky if he ends his career at 2000 hits.

Tango, I think we’re on the same page on his assessment, but do you really think he won’t find some team willing to put him on the field because of all the value that is being attached to him?
There is talk of Torre putting him in left. If he doesn’t, I’m pretty sure he’ll find someone willing to put him in. I don’t know, Ozzie Guillen and the White Sox? I would be very surprised if he only player three more seasons in the Majors, regardless of his merits.

He has 4 years left on his current deal, I don’t see him being outright released....He could become a part time player pretty soon, but I think anything less than 1000 is just wishful thinking.

He has had 700+ PA in each of his last 5 seasons and has played at least 150 games in his last 7 (all his full seasons). He might be a part-time player this season if Torre recognizes his value (not a given, by any means, even though I think it’s likely). He’s still young and there are teams that really value that kind of player so he’s going to get, in my opinion, at least 3 full years (not necessarily now, but even later… he’s still young) and a lot of spare PA’s from here to the end of his career. Averaging a conservative 650 PA’s in his 3 full seasons and giving him at least 400 in all his others combined, I think he’s definitely going beyond 2000 and is a solid bet to crack 2500. If I had to lean toward an extreme, I would unfortunately go for 3000+. I think he’s got a decent chance.

If he gets more PA’s than Matt Kemp or Andre Ethier this year, I’d be pretty pissed. However, I do think some team out there will overvalue his speed and “ability to play every day,” just as Colletti did and give him a starting gig.

I don’t see the White Sox being a great fit after they acquired Swisher and Carlos Quentin. Alexei Ramirez is also a contender to start in CF. No good fits right now, but as the season goes on and injuries hit, there’ll likely be someone out there who’d be desperate enough to take him.

Renè/2

If past experience is any indication, Torre will play him regularly for as long as he can.

As much as I don’t like Pierre - not for any reason other than he’s bad and it bugs me when bad players, or bad “types” of players are treated as good - I agree with everybody else. He’ll get another 2000 Major League PA.

"Everybody else” is not voting like that.  The median is around 1700.

I fail to see any advantage for Juan Pierre over Endy Chavez (today).  Chone and Marcel have them even on the hitting.  Chavez is 6 months younger.  He’s got a far better arm. And Chavez is at least as good a fielder, if not far better.  Pierre is probably the better baserunner.

Note that some posts here were moved from the Offseason thread.  You’ll see strange things like Tango/488, etc.  Roll with it.

Pierre and Endy are very similar players.  I have Endy more than .5 wins better than Pierre (I have Endy as a worse hitter by 3 runs, but a much better fielder and of course a better arm), including everything, and Endy is younger.  That is kind of a joke.

Exactly my point.  No one says one peep about Endy (or Michael Bourn or any other poor-hitting good-fielding CF), clearly not appreciating his fielding properly (like Everett).  For some reason, Pierre is thought of differently (by MLB).

The two reasons Pierre is thought of differently = playing every day and stealing 50-60 bases. Those are the only two things Colletti talks about when Pierre comes up.

After 268 votes, the median is exactly 1500 PA.

http://www.pe.com/sports/baseball/breakout/stories/PE_Sports_Local_D_dodgers_25.40a9eea.html

Ah, Joe Torre, ever the ambassador:

“Ethier and Kemp are talented, but you don’t know what the 600-at-bat result is,” Torre said. “You don’t have a history of what it will be.”

Ethier has 946 MLB PA.  His Marcel wOBA is .354.
Matt Kemp has 477 MLB PA.  His Marcel wOBA is .363.  Together they have more than TWO 600-at-bat careers; so split the difference, and they each have one.

Juan Pierre’s Marcel wOBA is .311, making him one of the worst hitters in baseball.

I don’t think there’s much to choose from fielding-wise.

I will be shocked and disappointed if Pierre starts even one game for the Dodgers when summer rolls around.

And, I think the over/under of Pierre’s MLB career as 1500 PA is still valid.

This is the worst possible OF for Pierre to find himself in, and there’s no question that he will get traded, and that the Dodgers will eat half his contract.

Looks like the Dodgers took a page right out of the Angels play book (or is it the other way around)?

I love it when MLB rights itself: Juan Pierre is not part of the starting lineup.

Who do the Brewers have while Cameron is out in April?  Corey Hart?  Juan Pierre is a good stop-gap for any team that needs an OF. He should sign contracts month-to-month.

At the start of the season, you guys said that Juan Pierre’s life remaining in MLB was 1500 PA (I think that’s what I said too in an earlier thread).  In 2008, he had 406 PA.  That means we think he has roughly 1094 PA remaining in his MLB career.

I also said:

I will be shocked and disappointed if Pierre starts even one game for the Dodgers when summer rolls around.

His month-to-month starts:
Apr: 13
May: 28
Jun: 26
Jul: 6
Aug: 6
Sep: 7

Now, I guess I am shocked and disappointed that he managed to start 19 games in the last 3 months, since that’s more than 1.  However, that is quite a turnaround.

I will be very proud of you guys if Pierre retires following the 2011 season, with 1500 PA since the 2008 season.  Somebody put Oct 1, 2011 on their reminder list please.