THE BOOK--Playing The Percentages In Baseball

David Cameron seems to make a career out of being wrong. I wish I could do that in my business (sales).

I wonder where the cutoff is in prospect status where you would NOT rather have the prospect than the free agent signed at the going free-agent rate.  I’d guess it’s about 200 deep before it gets too close to care.

LJ: how is Dave wrong?  He is right in principle.

He means that Dave makes a dozen of these lists (trade value, organizational rankings, etc.) and he’s going to be wrong (sometimes significantly) on many of the specific players/teams on the list.  He’s got a low batting average, but it’s high compared to other people trying to make these lists I guess.

I do two lists a year.  Two, a dozen, what’s the difference, right?

I meant a dozen in total.  You’ve been doing these for a few years, am I correct?

I think if you talked to a bunch of GMs and quoted these values, they’d laugh. Just flat out laugh. Keith Law made a comment about the Fangraphs values being so low that the replacement level was “well, Keith Law.”

LJ: only if it was that former GM that put Roy Oswalt (contract and all) ahead of Stephen Strasburg.

Otherwise, I don’t think you are right.

I have no idea if Dave Cameron’s lists are more or less accurate than other people who put lists on the internet.  I suppose somebody could track that compute a batting average or woba for listmakers.

But that is a lot of work for what to me is not a very interesting payoff.  I suppose it could be interesting to some people though.  If you (a team) finds a guy who ranks prospects and proves to be way better at it than Jim Callis, Kevin Goldstein, Keith Law, or the rest you might want to hire that guy and put him in a baseball analyst position.

But probably not.  He probably just got lucky, just like some stockbroker in any given time period will show results that are way better than the market.

Which values was Keith Law disparaging?

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I think Dave’s list is valuing pitchers too highly.  Hitter aging curves are much, much nicer, and most of these guys have 4-6 years left under team control.  A lot of the value comes from having multiple years at cheap rates, but when the years down the road tend to see hitters improve and pitcher hold steady at best, you’ve got to favor hitters, I think.

Not that Steve Sommer’s five-year forecasts were perfect, but he had only five pitchers in the top 50 in total WAR over the next five years.  (Strasburg omitted.)

If I were a GM, I’d trade guys like Hughes and Romero for any position player near them on Dave’s list, then stock up on B- pitching prospects.

Steve, right.  I was trying to remember who did a 5-yr WAR forecast over the past few weeks.  Did I link to that?  If not, feel free to post a link here.

I seem to remember thinking I had an issue with the PA component not dropping enough.  I don’t remember looking at the pitcher numbers.

Tango #11,

Agreed that the PA and IP “projections” need work.  I didn’t age them at all and clearly they should be.  I’d also want to re-evaluate my method of coming up with the year one estimate for each. 

Also, to be fair, if I used updated projections instead of pre-season I think that Ubaldo, Strasburg, and Wainwright may have been included.

Steve did not decrease the PAs or IPs over the years.

Here’s the top five article, which has links to the top fifty and the methodology.

http://www.beyondtheboxscore.com/2010/6/9/1509106/btbs-50-best-of-the-next-5-years

Lists are very popular on the internet.

Fred, I agree.  And here are five reasons why…

This series isn’t “projected WAR over the next x years”.  We know teams value things differently, and the prices for skills are different in the market.  When it comes to trade value, this matters. 

Pitchers, especially young, good ones with nasty stuff, get the biggest premium of all.  Whether or not they’re worth it, their price in the market is remarkably high.  I try to reflect actual market pricing in this series, so pitchers get a boost and defenders take a hit.

"I try to reflect actual market pricing in this series, so pitchers get a boost and defenders take a hit.”

Well that changes things.

Not sure if I see how Mauer is outside the Top 50, especially given Pujols at 21? But it seems like a futile question to be answering anyway when looking at guys like Mauer, essentially on a career contract with their current organization, because the only scenario in which he would be traded right now probably involve the folding of the Twins…