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Thursday, April 22, 2010
Fielding spectrum in college
Jeff:
Sure enough, there’s some weirdness on display. Here is the defensive spectrum for all of 2009 Division One:
Split OPS % Diff
C 0.828 -1.8%SS 0.821 -2.7%
2B 0.826 -2.1%
3B 0.858 +1.8%
CF 0.857 +1.6%LF 0.847 +0.4%
RF 0.858 +1.7%1B 0.895 +6.2%
DH 0.819 -2.9%
Setting the overall value(off+def) of each position to be 0 MIGHT make some sense if you use a large number of years at the highest levels. But, as we can see, the fewer the years, and the lower the level, and it makes no sense. In college ball, the CF is both a better hitter and a better fielder than LF. To then create a system that sets the average at each of those positions to “0” is misguided in the least.
If there’s one legacy that I’ll be glad to have left is that the idea to make the fielding spectrum the opposite of the hitting spectrum is not a truism. They may be related, especially at the highest levels, but even then, it doesn’t always work out. It has happened in MLB history that even if you take a 5-yr range, that the average CF hit better than the average 1B, that the average SS hit better than the average 2B. Things that would totally shake the very core of this fielding = opposite of hitting theory. Not to mention that the average hitting 1B is always a better hitter than the average DH, and naturally provides more fielding value.
The reality is that we have pools of positions:
p
C + above pool
IF (2b,ss,3b) + above pool
OF + above pool
1B + above pool
DH + above pool
And a model of positional adjustments should adhere to this reality, not to the fabricated 0 = average = all positions.
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