The Unwritten Book is Finally Written!
An in-depth analysis of: The sacrifice bunt, batter/pitcher matchups, the intentional base on balls, optimizing a batting lineup, hot and cold streaks, clutch performance, platooning strategies, and much more. Read Excerpts & Customer Reviews
I like the list MGL, but which part of the Reds is a little bit sabermetric? (I realize your post was back of the envelope, so forgive my apparent hostility...)
The part that cites attitude and "wanting to win, not just compete" as the biggest problem facing the organization and says it will only raise payroll if and when fans come out to support the team? (Castellini)
The part that left past organizations because ownership wanted them to use more data, brought in more anti-saber folks, and signed Willy Taveras and Mike Lincoln to multi-year deals? (Jocketty, Bavasi)
Or the part that puts its lowest OBP guys at the top of the lineup, a .750 OPS bat at cleanup, sacrifices a guy to 2B with it's #2 hitter while down 2 in the 6th, considers 100 pitches a minimum for every starter in every appearance and only uses relievers in the strictest of predetermined roles dictated by the save stat? (Baker)
This is an organization built around an ignorance of, if not a hostility towards sabermetric principles. I cannot imagine that they are more sabermetrically inclined than half of the league.
Sent an email as well, but the Reds could use OF Laynce Nix and SP Justin Lehr added. Both are in the running for the 5th spots of the respective positions, but even if they don't make the 25 man there's a decent chance they see some time in the majors at some point this year.
Want to save time and increase accuracy? Eliminate on-field umpire conferences and the practice of leaving the field to review the video. Have a fifth umpire on the crew as part of the standard rotation who sits in the booth, serving as the official scorer and adjudicating disputed calls with the benefit of video. Give him a direct line to the home plate ump who can announce decisions on the field.
As for having robot umpires, why would that be a bad thing? Aren't 99% of their jobs simply applying black and white rules regarding physical occurrences? Why does the subjective application of objective rules need to be part of the game?
It seems the biggest inaccuracy with fan projections will be playing time. I would guess that most fans simply won't regress playing time sufficiently and will assume that most starters will play 150+ games leading to inflated counting stats across the board.
It seems some people are basing their assumptions of a run scoring just on the lead runner scoring, neglecting there's a second runner on base who can score and the batter himself that can score. I realize run expectancy factors in the trailing runner and batter to an extent, but some are phrasing their answer on just the lead runner scoring.
I think who is hitting after me is important in this question. If I'm batting right before the pitcher or a weak hitter/groundball hitter and there are one or two outs, I'm more likely to swing away and go for a crooked number, knowing that with the weak hitter coming up next, the chances of a double play are more likely. If there are no outs, I'd probably take the first pitch more often in hopes of a walk. If I'm further up in the order, I'm also more likely to take the first pitch.
In light of the current financial crisis, we would be quite irresponsible to fail to emphasize the enormous difference between having analysis done and actually using it to guide decisions. MGL made the point, but it really can't be overemphasized.
Most large organizations have an in house group of analysts. It is the rare organization that has executive leadership willing to not just let the analysts sit at the table, but rely on their advice.
I'd be shocked if an organization didn't have somebody, and likely multiple people, doing sabermetric work. But how many GM's, scouting directors, etc. understand it and utilize it as a core part of their decision making process? Many fewer, I'm sure. Juan Pierre. Luis Castillo. Tom Glavine. Livan Hernandez. Barry Zito. Carlos Silva.
I'm sure there's some amazing work being done in offices across the league. There seems to be many fewer GMs who are willing to listen to their employees.
Shouldn't we be concerned about the significance of the independent variables as much as the overall fit of the model? I have to believe there's some correlation between those variables and multicolinearity pretty much renders all of those coefficients (and thus significant tests against them) completely unreliable, right?
One topic which understandably came up on our Reds forum is "Should he (aka Dunn) swing?" It's probably the most common form of fan analysis after balls and strike calls themselves. But on what are they basing their internal calculus?
Are they factoring in contact rate on given types of pitches? Are they factoring in batted ball quality and out conversion? Are the factoring in the value of simply seeing another pitch which could make for an easier swing choice and thus better result?
I had built a little swing calculator in excel based around these and other assumptions. It showed that with less than 2 strikes, Dunn was significantly better off not swinging unless he was sure the ball was a strike he was quite likely to hit well. Essentially, if he wasn't inclined to swing, he shouldn't. The argument of the value of putting the ball in play grossly underestimated the impact of swings and misses and poorly hit balls relative to the alternative of getting to see another pitch.
It seemed like the obvious conclusion, but it was very powerful to those who have trouble properly valuing the alternative.
In terms of an article, you could examine the cost benefit of certain types of players swinging at certain types of pitches in certain situations. Perhaps choose 2 or 3 common situations of interest (full count, start of the PA, bases empty/full) and 2 or 3 different player types (Dunn vs Pujols vs Polanco). Should they swing at that borderline pitch on 2-1?
1. Aging curve analysis for a broader variety of offensive skills including contact rate, plate discipline, and power - in so far as certain skills can be isolated from each other. HR totals are affected by both contact rate and power. But ISO presumably has less correlation.
2. The creation of a set of player archetypes capturing as many players as possible without going beyond roughly 10-12 types. This could be built around something like the classic five "tools" using a more sabermetric definition for each.
We've heard/read a lot comments like "guys like so-and-so" age well. So how does each archetype tend to age?
2. Same thing but with pitcher repitoires instead, perhaps including other descriptives including handedness, body type, and endurance(?) which may have a larger role for pitchers.
Tom, us saber-inclined Reds fans have been pushing that idea for years. It got a little play under Bob Boone, but not much since. Major league managers just can't seem to fathom the idea of putting a 40 HR guy with no speed at the top of their lineup.
His OBP, fly-ball tendencies (avoiding double plays), and low average all support it. Batting him 5th just exacerbates the disadvantage of his low AVG game. Meanwhile, guys like Brandon Phillips or Jacque Jones end up batting higher in the order because of their batting average and speed -- both of which are better leveraged lower in the order.
It just doesn't make any sense when you think about it.
Yeah, I realize that was just a quick slice of all of the possibilities, but hopefully somewhat instructive on what the distribution might look like across those two dimensions (base/out). Obviously game score is very influential as well.
Removing the IBB and PA, his 1B empty OBP drops to .373. It would definitely be interesting to see the leverage distribution for those IBB. Presumably those are coming in the highest leverage situations, particularly given the unfortunately reality that Dunn has often batted low in the order, with significantly worse hitters behind him.
By "situational", aren't we often talking about contact ability? While inning matters, most often situational is about converting base runners in to runs. In those situations, it would seem the value of a ball in play goes up, as a walk isn't likely to drive in runners -- even if it does up the RE for the inning.
Because Dunn struggles to put balls in play generally, and because pitchers have the option of pitching around him (and are encouraged to do so given Dunn's power), we would expect a decrease in AVG, a corresponding decrease in SLG and an increase in OBP due to the extra walks more than offsetting the drop in AVG.
We can really see this affect when we compare the different runners on base scenarios, focusing on the runner on 1B.
Bases Empty: .250/.357/.528
Any runners on Base: .243/.407/.507
Runner(s) on, including 1B : .259/.389/.537
Runner(s) on, but not on 1B: .201/.444/.438
We can also see the impact of the number of outs. With two outs and RISP, Dunn's AVG drops 30 points (from his career average) and his SLG drops a proportional 73 points. However, his OBP jumps 58 points to .438. (-.030/.058/-.073)
With just RISP, regardless of the out situation, the effect is somewhat muted (-.022/+.033/-.043), suggesting the additional leverage due to the out situation amplifies the affect.
When the value of getting a hit goes up in proportion to the value of merely getting on base, it appears Adam Dunn gets pitched around. (of course this is a differential diagnosis instead of looking directly at pitch data). Given Dunn's skill set, he's likely to take the walk if given the opportunity. He's not likely to find success in expanding his strike zone. I imagine we'd see similar results for most high SLG, low AVG hitters, with their OBP moving in proportion to their "natural" willingness to take a walk.
It seems to me that the batting average issue is a little more fundamental. At it's core, baseball is a game of a batter trying to hit a ball as well as he can so that he may run around the basepath and score a run before being put out. And it's a game played for fun. Everything else flows from that.
Batting average, it follows, is an attempt to boil down that fundamental confrontation of pitcher and batter to a single, easily digestible number. Player A is better than player B at getting hits.
Now, as the game has developed around that basic core, as management has looked for competitive advantage, and as fans have looked for the next frontier of enjoyment, we've grown more nuanced in describing the ways a player can impact his team's run scoring. In accurately assessing that performance, we know now we need to include walks and bases acquired to get the full picture. So we use OBP, we use SLG and OBP. We use Eqa and VORP.
However, a kid doesn't pick up a stick and a ball and think about how fun it would be to jog to 1B after watching 4 pitches outside of the strike zone. The joy comes from the crack of the bat and the batter-turned-runner spring towards first looking to make a turn towards second. Batting average captures that in a way OBP, SLG, and OPS simply don't.
Unlike measurement systems, baseball isn't so utilitarian. It exists for the joy it produces.
I certainly understand the need to use better measures whenever we're actually trying to measure performance in a tangible sense. But performance and enjoyment aren't perfectly correlated and batting average lives in that inefficiency. Until you can replace that visceral, emotional connection between stat and enjoyment, the congregation at the church of batting average will be strong.
I advocate OBP instead of AVG and SLG instead of HR in all my 5x5 leagues -- it never flies. Fantasy baseball isn't about putting together the best team of the most productive players. It's about the fusion of the most enjoyable moments of the game with the fun and challenge of roster management.
All of that said, you might be right. While it may never be more fun to watch a walk than a high pop fly (even if it is more productive), it's more likely that fantasy baseball players will adopt OBP, as their bean-counter instincts compel them to the more meaningful statistic. It would be very interesting to see a wide-spread movement, though I fear that, like the sport, the supporting infrastructure may be too well developed to allow for it.
Is it really that dumb to acquire a replacement (or arguably a bit better) pitcher for virtually nothing? Anything can happen the last few months of a season. No team in the playoff race wants to start running out starters who have never pitched in the majors and may very well be sub-replacement.
Replacement level is a fine construct, but at the end of the day, you need to actually have such players available. Sure, if they pitch Byrd instead of young guy projected to do much better, that doesn't make a whole lot of sense. But it doesn't seem like their other options are significantly better and there's value in having as much depth as possible.
If we were going to include OPS in our league, how would you convert that into xOPS, similarly to the other rate stats (i.e. AVG, ERA, WHIP)?
Would you just do xOPS = (OPS_i * PA) - (OPS_lgavg * PA)?
Thanks.
Tango/30, don't be too quick to judge us Reds fans based on the opinions of those on the Sun Deck board....
http://www.redszone.com/forums/showthread.php?t=64885
Though certainly the topic ruffles feathers for everybody involved.
In light of this, how would one go about actually building a pitching staff? It appears that, because of the risk involved and the presence of optimum outcome bias in the marketplace, it is virtually impossible to sign a pitcher for a "reasonable" contract, that accounts for the likely outcomes of his career.
Are we to avoid giving any FA starters contracts? Are we to build a rotation on arb guys alone? I buy in to the idea that Mark Buehrle is overvalued. However, by that logic, I have to imagine that 95% of all pitchers are. At the end of the day, bottom line performance is more important than cost efficiency. How does a GM go about building a staff in light of this?
I like the list MGL, but which part of the Reds is a little bit sabermetric? (I realize your post was back of the envelope, so forgive my apparent hostility...) The part that cites attitude and "wanting to win, not just compete" as the biggest problem facing the organization and says it will only raise payroll if and when fans come out to support the team? (Castellini) The part that left past organizations because ownership wanted them to use more data, brought in more anti-saber folks, and signed Willy Taveras and Mike Lincoln to multi-year deals? (Jocketty, Bavasi) Or the part that puts its lowest OBP guys at the top of the lineup, a .750 OPS bat at cleanup, sacrifices a guy to 2B with it's #2 hitter while down 2 in the 6th, considers 100 pitches a minimum for every starter in every appearance and only uses relievers in the strictest of predetermined roles dictated by the save stat? (Baker) This is an organization built around an ignorance of, if not a hostility towards sabermetric principles. I cannot imagine that they are more sabermetrically inclined than half of the league.
Community Forecasts - Playing Time (Rick) —
Sent an email as well, but the Reds could use OF Laynce Nix and SP Justin Lehr added. Both are in the running for the 5th spots of the respective positions, but even if they don't make the 25 man there's a decent chance they see some time in the majors at some point this year.
Rules Changes panel (Rick) —
Want to save time and increase accuracy? Eliminate on-field umpire conferences and the practice of leaving the field to review the video. Have a fifth umpire on the crew as part of the standard rotation who sits in the booth, serving as the official scorer and adjudicating disputed calls with the benefit of video. Give him a direct line to the home plate ump who can announce decisions on the field. As for having robot umpires, why would that be a bad thing? Aren't 99% of their jobs simply applying black and white rules regarding physical occurrences? Why does the subjective application of objective rules need to be part of the game?
Fan Forecasts at Fangraphs (Rick) —
It seems the biggest inaccuracy with fan projections will be playing time. I would guess that most fans simply won't regress playing time sufficiently and will assume that most starters will play 150+ games leading to inflated counting stats across the board.
Question of the Day, 05/29 (Rick) —
It seems some people are basing their assumptions of a run scoring just on the lead runner scoring, neglecting there's a second runner on base who can score and the batter himself that can score. I realize run expectancy factors in the trailing runner and batter to an extent, but some are phrasing their answer on just the lead runner scoring.
Question of the Day, 05/29 (Rick) —
Don't forget the run expectancies that the trailing runner and yourself might also score if you get an extra base hit (or a home run).
Question of the Day (Rick) —
I think who is hitting after me is important in this question. If I'm batting right before the pitcher or a weak hitter/groundball hitter and there are one or two outs, I'm more likely to swing away and go for a crooked number, knowing that with the weak hitter coming up next, the chances of a double play are more likely. If there are no outs, I'd probably take the first pitch more often in hopes of a walk. If I'm further up in the order, I'm also more likely to take the first pitch.
The state of fielding sabermetrics in MLB (Rick) —
In light of the current financial crisis, we would be quite irresponsible to fail to emphasize the enormous difference between having analysis done and actually using it to guide decisions. MGL made the point, but it really can't be overemphasized. Most large organizations have an in house group of analysts. It is the rare organization that has executive leadership willing to not just let the analysts sit at the table, but rely on their advice. I'd be shocked if an organization didn't have somebody, and likely multiple people, doing sabermetric work. But how many GM's, scouting directors, etc. understand it and utilize it as a core part of their decision making process? Many fewer, I'm sure. Juan Pierre. Luis Castillo. Tom Glavine. Livan Hernandez. Barry Zito. Carlos Silva. I'm sure there's some amazing work being done in offices across the league. There seems to be many fewer GMs who are willing to listen to their employees.
Estimating BABIP (Rick) —
Shouldn't we be concerned about the significance of the independent variables as much as the overall fit of the model? I have to believe there's some correlation between those variables and multicolinearity pretty much renders all of those coefficients (and thus significant tests against them) completely unreliable, right?
PSA for Victor Wang (Rick) —
Given the number of BP folks in the Chicago area, that's a route worth trying as well (though I imagine you've already gone down that road).
What should I research? (Rick) —
One topic which understandably came up on our Reds forum is "Should he (aka Dunn) swing?" It's probably the most common form of fan analysis after balls and strike calls themselves. But on what are they basing their internal calculus? Are they factoring in contact rate on given types of pitches? Are they factoring in batted ball quality and out conversion? Are the factoring in the value of simply seeing another pitch which could make for an easier swing choice and thus better result? I had built a little swing calculator in excel based around these and other assumptions. It showed that with less than 2 strikes, Dunn was significantly better off not swinging unless he was sure the ball was a strike he was quite likely to hit well. Essentially, if he wasn't inclined to swing, he shouldn't. The argument of the value of putting the ball in play grossly underestimated the impact of swings and misses and poorly hit balls relative to the alternative of getting to see another pitch. It seemed like the obvious conclusion, but it was very powerful to those who have trouble properly valuing the alternative. In terms of an article, you could examine the cost benefit of certain types of players swinging at certain types of pitches in certain situations. Perhaps choose 2 or 3 common situations of interest (full count, start of the PA, bases empty/full) and 2 or 3 different player types (Dunn vs Pujols vs Polanco). Should they swing at that borderline pitch on 2-1?
What should I research? (Rick) —
1. Aging curve analysis for a broader variety of offensive skills including contact rate, plate discipline, and power - in so far as certain skills can be isolated from each other. HR totals are affected by both contact rate and power. But ISO presumably has less correlation. 2. The creation of a set of player archetypes capturing as many players as possible without going beyond roughly 10-12 types. This could be built around something like the classic five "tools" using a more sabermetric definition for each. We've heard/read a lot comments like "guys like so-and-so" age well. So how does each archetype tend to age? 2. Same thing but with pitcher repitoires instead, perhaps including other descriptives including handedness, body type, and endurance(?) which may have a larger role for pitchers.
Situational Hitting and Adam Dunn (Rick) —
Tom, us saber-inclined Reds fans have been pushing that idea for years. It got a little play under Bob Boone, but not much since. Major league managers just can't seem to fathom the idea of putting a 40 HR guy with no speed at the top of their lineup. His OBP, fly-ball tendencies (avoiding double plays), and low average all support it. Batting him 5th just exacerbates the disadvantage of his low AVG game. Meanwhile, guys like Brandon Phillips or Jacque Jones end up batting higher in the order because of their batting average and speed -- both of which are better leveraged lower in the order. It just doesn't make any sense when you think about it.
Situational Hitting and Adam Dunn (Rick) —
Yeah, I realize that was just a quick slice of all of the possibilities, but hopefully somewhat instructive on what the distribution might look like across those two dimensions (base/out). Obviously game score is very influential as well. Removing the IBB and PA, his 1B empty OBP drops to .373. It would definitely be interesting to see the leverage distribution for those IBB. Presumably those are coming in the highest leverage situations, particularly given the unfortunately reality that Dunn has often batted low in the order, with significantly worse hitters behind him.
Situational Hitting and Adam Dunn (Rick) —
By "situational", aren't we often talking about contact ability? While inning matters, most often situational is about converting base runners in to runs. In those situations, it would seem the value of a ball in play goes up, as a walk isn't likely to drive in runners -- even if it does up the RE for the inning. Because Dunn struggles to put balls in play generally, and because pitchers have the option of pitching around him (and are encouraged to do so given Dunn's power), we would expect a decrease in AVG, a corresponding decrease in SLG and an increase in OBP due to the extra walks more than offsetting the drop in AVG. We can really see this affect when we compare the different runners on base scenarios, focusing on the runner on 1B. Bases Empty: .250/.357/.528 Any runners on Base: .243/.407/.507 Runner(s) on, including 1B : .259/.389/.537 Runner(s) on, but not on 1B: .201/.444/.438 We can also see the impact of the number of outs. With two outs and RISP, Dunn's AVG drops 30 points (from his career average) and his SLG drops a proportional 73 points. However, his OBP jumps 58 points to .438. (-.030/.058/-.073) With just RISP, regardless of the out situation, the effect is somewhat muted (-.022/+.033/-.043), suggesting the additional leverage due to the out situation amplifies the affect. When the value of getting a hit goes up in proportion to the value of merely getting on base, it appears Adam Dunn gets pitched around. (of course this is a differential diagnosis instead of looking directly at pitch data). Given Dunn's skill set, he's likely to take the walk if given the opportunity. He's not likely to find success in expanding his strike zone. I imagine we'd see similar results for most high SLG, low AVG hitters, with their OBP moving in proportion to their "natural" willingness to take a walk.
Peace in the MidEast, the Metric System in America, or OBP over BA? (Rick) —
It seems to me that the batting average issue is a little more fundamental. At it's core, baseball is a game of a batter trying to hit a ball as well as he can so that he may run around the basepath and score a run before being put out. And it's a game played for fun. Everything else flows from that. Batting average, it follows, is an attempt to boil down that fundamental confrontation of pitcher and batter to a single, easily digestible number. Player A is better than player B at getting hits. Now, as the game has developed around that basic core, as management has looked for competitive advantage, and as fans have looked for the next frontier of enjoyment, we've grown more nuanced in describing the ways a player can impact his team's run scoring. In accurately assessing that performance, we know now we need to include walks and bases acquired to get the full picture. So we use OBP, we use SLG and OBP. We use Eqa and VORP. However, a kid doesn't pick up a stick and a ball and think about how fun it would be to jog to 1B after watching 4 pitches outside of the strike zone. The joy comes from the crack of the bat and the batter-turned-runner spring towards first looking to make a turn towards second. Batting average captures that in a way OBP, SLG, and OPS simply don't. Unlike measurement systems, baseball isn't so utilitarian. It exists for the joy it produces. I certainly understand the need to use better measures whenever we're actually trying to measure performance in a tangible sense. But performance and enjoyment aren't perfectly correlated and batting average lives in that inefficiency. Until you can replace that visceral, emotional connection between stat and enjoyment, the congregation at the church of batting average will be strong. I advocate OBP instead of AVG and SLG instead of HR in all my 5x5 leagues -- it never flies. Fantasy baseball isn't about putting together the best team of the most productive players. It's about the fusion of the most enjoyable moments of the game with the fun and challenge of roster management. All of that said, you might be right. While it may never be more fun to watch a walk than a high pop fly (even if it is more productive), it's more likely that fantasy baseball players will adopt OBP, as their bean-counter instincts compel them to the more meaningful statistic. It would be very interesting to see a wide-spread movement, though I fear that, like the sport, the supporting infrastructure may be too well developed to allow for it.
Even supposedly smart people (teams) can do dumb things... (Rick) —
Is it really that dumb to acquire a replacement (or arguably a bit better) pitcher for virtually nothing? Anything can happen the last few months of a season. No team in the playoff race wants to start running out starters who have never pitched in the majors and may very well be sub-replacement. Replacement level is a fine construct, but at the end of the day, you need to actually have such players available. Sure, if they pitch Byrd instead of young guy projected to do much better, that doesn't make a whole lot of sense. But it doesn't seem like their other options are significantly better and there's value in having as much depth as possible.
The worth of SB, HR, and all other categories, in Fantasy Baseball (Rick) —
If we were going to include OPS in our league, how would you convert that into xOPS, similarly to the other rate stats (i.e. AVG, ERA, WHIP)? Would you just do xOPS = (OPS_i * PA) - (OPS_lgavg * PA)? Thanks.
The Clutch Project (Rick) —
Tango/30, don't be too quick to judge us Reds fans based on the opinions of those on the Sun Deck board.... http://www.redszone.com/forums/showthread.php?t=64885 Though certainly the topic ruffles feathers for everybody involved.
Buehrle (Rick) —
In light of this, how would one go about actually building a pitching staff? It appears that, because of the risk involved and the presence of optimum outcome bias in the marketplace, it is virtually impossible to sign a pitcher for a "reasonable" contract, that accounts for the likely outcomes of his career. Are we to avoid giving any FA starters contracts? Are we to build a rotation on arb guys alone? I buy in to the idea that Mark Buehrle is overvalued. However, by that logic, I have to imagine that 95% of all pitchers are. At the end of the day, bottom line performance is more important than cost efficiency. How does a GM go about building a staff in light of this?