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2014 Sox Catching Tandem?
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Post by thelavarnwayguy on Sept 1, 2013 14:25:35 GMT -5
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Post by fenwaythehardway on Sept 1, 2013 14:35:19 GMT -5
Bill James hasn't personally done those projections for years and they are notoriously bullish on hitters with strong minor league track records (for instance, it projected Wieters to have a Pujols-esque rookie season). Yeah, the whole "Bill James projects this guy to hit..." thing is a pet peeve of mine. James doesn't do the projections, it's just a system that carries his name, and it's a pretty terrible system at that. Yet people continue to treat these things like James personally carried them down off Mount Sinai etched on stone tablets or something.
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Post by Chris Hatfield on Sept 1, 2013 14:41:53 GMT -5
Folks, before you post, if you're posting with a quote, can you PLEASE make sure that what you're typing is OUTSIDE of the "quote" brackets? It's not hard - just keep hitting the down arrow a bunch of times before you start typing.
It's incredibly difficult to tell what you're contributing if it looks like it's part of what you're quoting.
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Post by thelavarnwayguy on Sept 1, 2013 14:43:20 GMT -5
No one is saying Bill James is Moses but he is a paid employee of the Redsox last time I looked. He's not an insignificant source.
We don't know the situation with Lavarnway. There is a chance he remains with the organization and might even get more PT next year. He might even prove important this year if someone gets injured.
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Post by gregblossersbelly on Sept 1, 2013 14:48:30 GMT -5
I was hoping to get Salty on a 3/30m. If we can't do that. I'd do the QO and wish him well. Hope he signs with Philly. Would love to get Ruiz on a one year prove it deal. I think he's a better baseball player than Salty. He's a lot like Victorino. He is an outstanding defensive catcher who hits better than you think. He's had an off-year. No doubt. He was critical to that team on their 5 year run from 07-11 of div. titles. A pick and a better player would be highway robbery. Not sure about term though. For those wondering about his suspension last year. It was for taking greenies not steroids. We can give him that 5 hour energy stuff.
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Post by jmei on Sept 1, 2013 14:55:21 GMT -5
No one is saying Bill James is Moses but he is a paid employee of the Redsox last time I looked. He's not an insignificant source. I'm not sure you understand. Bill James hasn't been involved with that projection system in literally half a decade and BIS has updated it on their own. It just still carries his name, so folks take it more seriously than they ought to.
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Post by jmei on Sept 1, 2013 14:58:18 GMT -5
That's because someone messed up the quote system at some point. I think johnsilver wrote that. He (iakovos) did so inadvertently. Relax. No one on this board is going to blatantly make up quotes and ascribe them to you falsely.
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Post by iakovos11 on Sept 1, 2013 15:40:01 GMT -5
Sorry Lavarnway guy, that was inadvertent. I was trying to pare down the quoted part to keep the things relevant and prevent posts from getting too big - just a habit I developed - and apparently deleted something I shouldn't have. It was JohnSilver who said that. And as jmei points out, there's no benefit to blatantly misquoting anyone. I realize you you recognized it was probably in error.
Carry on.
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Post by thelavarnwayguy on Sept 1, 2013 16:33:20 GMT -5
My understanding is that the Bill James system is mathmatically projecting what mlb level players would do hypothetically based on their past year's numbers, the past 3 three years in particular if I remember. He even has incorporated guys from the minors, to project what they will probably do in a hypothetical season in the majors if given the chance.
People here have cited Lavarnway's SSS statistics right and left, after he put up great numbers year after year in the minors. Stated conclusions about why he is not playing much when we really don't know for sure why he hasn't been playing. It is not a foregone conclusion that he will be traded or will not be considered as a starter next year. We don't know for sure how they feel about him. We will see.
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Post by dewey1972 on Sept 1, 2013 16:43:36 GMT -5
Mod Note: This post was deleted because the quoting function was not used properly making it look like other posters said something they really didn't. Please be careful with this. If you want to make sure you are not doing this, click on "Preview".
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Post by dewey1972 on Sept 1, 2013 16:57:33 GMT -5
One thing that we have to keep in mind is that the Red Sox have 50+ million to spend on 3 medium/major holes and 2 minors holes for next season. Those are OF, 1B/OF and C. Then RP and util INF (the trade for McDonald makes it clear how thin they are). And in 2014 they will have more room for payroll and most of their SP coming off the books. So overpaying for Salty/McCann isn't likely to be a detriment unless they need long term contracts. But to be honest, I'm warming up to the idea of signing Ruiz to a 1-2 year deal until the kids are ready (let them steal the starting catcher job from him in my opinion) If you are a fan of the new defensive catching statistics, then he looks to be as good or better than Salty/McCann over the last 4 years: Ruiz (4 year WAR = 13.7) G PA HR R RBI SB BB% K% ISO BABIP AVG OBP SLG wOBA wRC+ Fld BsR WAR 121 433 8 43 53 0 12.7 % 12.5 % .146 .335 .302 .400 .447 .368 127 7.0 -3.5 4.1 132 472 6 49 40 1 10.2 % 10.2 % .100 .308 .283 .371 .383 .333 108 1.5 -2.0 2.9 114 421 16 56 68 4 6.9 % 11.9 % .215 .339 .325 .394 .540 .398 151 3.4 -0.1 5.2 73 263 5 24 21 1 3.8 % 12.2 % .108 .302 .279 .324 .388 .312 96 0.4 1.5 1.5 Salty (4 year WAR = 6 - with some time missed) G PA HR R RBI SB BB% K% ISO BABIP AVG OBP SLG wOBA wRC+ Fld BsR WAR 12 30 0 2 2 0 20.0 % 16.7 % .125 .211 .167 .333 .292 .297 76 0.3 0.2 0.1 103 386 16 52 56 1 6.2 % 30.8 % .215 .304 .235 .288 .450 .319 94 -3.0 0.3 1.5 121 448 25 55 59 0 8.5 % 31.0 % .232 .265 .222 .288 .454 .319 96 -0.3 -0.4 1.9 106 414 11 55 52 0 9.4 % 30.7 % .182 .376 .267 .336 .449 .341 110 -2.0 -0.5 2.5 McCann (4 year way = 13.6) G PA HR R RBI SB BB% K% ISO BABIP AVG OBP SLG wOBA wRC+ Fld BsR WAR 143 566 21 63 77 5 13.1 % 17.3 % .184 .297 .269 .375 .453 .362 123 11.0 -4.9 5.1 128 527 24 51 71 3 10.8 % 16.9 % .195 .287 .270 .351 .466 .350 122 1.8 -3.9 3.9 121 487 20 44 67 3 9.0 % 15.6 % .169 .234 .230 .300 .399 .300 87 2.5 -2.3 1.8 85 334 19 36 50 0 9.3 % 17.4 % .228 .278 .272 .344 .500 .364 134 1.6 -4.0 2.8 He may be old - but even in 2013 (a down year) he is much better than you would expect and the low numbers are more injury related quantitative numbers. With Ross, Lavarnway, Butler and Vasquez (on the horizon) this we be solid production and very strong depth at a reasonable cost and risk. Actually, UZR and defensive runs saved definitely don't capture the full range of defensive contributions from catchers very well. Guys at Fangraphs regularly cite catchers as the players for whom the defensive WAR contributions are most likely to be off. The big part that is now being measured, though there is debate about how much it is worth, is pitch framing. Both McCann and Saltalamacchia have been quite good, while Ruiz has been awful. Here's an article from a couple of years ago. I couldn't quickly find numbers from this year or last. www.baseballprospectus.com/article.php?articleid=15093 In addition, of course, is game planning and executing. I have no idea of the respective reputations of these three, but that's clearly something that is not captured in WAR. That's not to say that changes the whole argument, but it's worth noting.
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Post by johnsilver52 on Sept 1, 2013 17:05:05 GMT -5
I was hoping to get Salty on a 3/30m. If we can't do that. I'd do the QO and wish him well. Hope he signs with Philly. Would love to get Ruiz on a one year prove it deal. I think he's a better baseball player than Salty. He's a lot like Victorino. He is an outstanding defensive catcher who hits better than you think. He's had an off-year. No doubt. He was critical to that team on their 5 year run from 07-11 of div. titles. A pick and a better player would be highway robbery. Not sure about term though. For those wondering about his suspension last year. It was for taking greenies not steroids. We can give him that 5 hour energy stuff. Go back again to Russell Martin. he only got 2/17m last year and he didn't have to go head to head with anyone close to McCann. There wasn't another competitive FA guy out there really, plus he's way, way better defensive catcher than Salty is and his bat is at least as good. That said? Why would any team want to pay more for SaltyAAV, plus over more seasons? Age is the same. Not like Salty's switch hitting is any kind of advantage, since only from the LH side is he any good Power/production wise, leaving some (me at least) to wonder why he isn't platooned already.
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Post by dewey1972 on Sept 1, 2013 20:38:43 GMT -5
Yeah, line drive rate has very low year-to-year correlation (weaker than BABIP), so even if he's hit the ball on a line very hard this year, there's little reason to think he'll have the same results next year. Remember, if the angle of contact changes just a little, those line drives become fly balls with a much lower BABIP. Likewise, per the same link, the year-to-year correlation of doubles is also very low (again, weaker than BABIP), which is another reason I think Saltalamacchia's in store for some major regression. You're right, Eric, about Saltalamacchia probably trading some of those doubles for home runs. But the dip in batting average should more than offset that, and I'd project him as something like a .240/.300/.450 hitter (similar to 2011-12, but crediting him for a slight increase in walk rate). That's certainly valuable coming from your catcher, but with his low OBP and his mediocre defense, that's only about 2 WAR (over 120 games/450 PAs, a normalish season for a catcher). The year-to-year correlation between LD% in the BIS data is .293. You know what the correlation between the BIS scoring and the B-Ref scoring of Salatalamacchia's 2013 hard hit doubles is? .264. There are 13 that were scored as line drives by both, 7 scored as fly balls by both, 6 that were scored as line drives by BIS but fly balls at B-Ref, and 5 that were scored as fly balls by BIS but line drives at B-Ref. LD% has a lousy year-to-year correlation because, unlike nearly every other hitting stat, it's based on highly variable subjective judgments. I'm sure the correlation of very hard-hit balls is considerably better. Everything you said about LD and the sensitivity of contact applies to HRs as well, and yet the HR/Contact year-to-year correlation is .809. It doesn't make sense that the correlation for balls hit just as hard but not quite as high would be much lower. His % of hard-hit balls may revert all the way to 2011-12, but it won't be because of natural random variation. It would be because he's not hitting as well. And while he almost certainly won't hit as well, because this is a great season, a full reversion is, I think, unlikely. Sorry about the screw up before. Given the size of the quote, I was trying to make this a bit smaller. My bad. Eric, it's an interesting analysis, but I'm still not sure it makes the point that you are trying to make. In the end, we care about what we can expect next year. Given his lack of speed and the fact that he hits a fair amount of fly balls, he would have to be an exceptional hitter to even get a BABIP over .330. Over the last four years he's played over 300 games and had a BABIP of .291: to me it seems like expecting more than a .320 BABIP would be folly. Considering that's a 55 point drop from his current .376, that's a huge drop in production. Would you expect a significantly higher BABIP?
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Post by wcsoxfan on Sept 1, 2013 22:48:15 GMT -5
Actually, UZR and defensive runs saved definitely don't capture the full range of defensive contributions from catchers very well. Guys at Fangraphs regularly cite catchers as the players for whom the defensive WAR contributions are most likely to be off. The big part that is now being measured, though there is debate about how much it is worth, is pitch framing. Both McCann and Saltalamacchia have been quite good, while Ruiz has been awful. Here's an article from a couple of years ago. I couldn't quickly find numbers from this year or last. www.baseballprospectus.com/article.php?articleid=15093 In addition, of course, is game planning and executing. I have no idea of the respective reputations of these three, but that's clearly something that is not captured in WAR. That's not to say that changes the whole argument, but it's worth noting. I agree that we should look at more than what is currently registered in catcher UZR to evaluate defense. But even if you through the defensive UZR out entirely then I think my point of Ruiz being a more than sufficient plan 'C' is still valid. According the linked article (which is a good read) Saltalamacchia saves 4.6 more runs per year than average from 2007 - 2011 while Ruiz loses 4.6 runs per year; for a difference of 9.2 runs/year. The data you are using is from two years ago (while my data was over the course of the last 4 years). Here is a list of pitch framing data by fangraphs which shows that the Phillies catchers as a whole were about to get one more strike call, due to pitch framing, than Red Sox catchers over the course of 2012/2013. This would be far more useful if they had it separated by catcher rather than team (please note that it is unfair to judge a catcher from one team vs that of another team (in a vacuum) - because the pitchers are different) www.fangraphs.com/blogs/all-star-break-pitch-framing-update/Carlos Ruiz is on the low-end here - but Salty isn't mentioned. www.bsports.com/statsinsights/mlb/mlbs-best-and-worst-catchers-at-framing-pitchesHere are a couple of articles from hardball times of a couple of years ago which show how good McCann is at pitch framing (neither Salty or Ruiz are mentioned): www.hardballtimes.com/main/article/evaluating-catchers-framing-pitches-part-2/www.hardballtimes.com/main/article/evaluating-catchers-framing-pitches-part-3/Here is an article which rates Ruiz as being better than Saltalamacchia at framing pitches inside or outside of the strikezone from 2008 - 2012 (It shows McCann as being much better at both): www.baseballanalytics.org/baseball-analytics-blog/2013/3/9/jose-molina-ryan-doumit-and-snatching-strikes.html?utm_medium=twitter&utm_source=BaseballAnalytics.orgAll-in-all I would like the baseball prospectus article the most if it were up-to-date (unfortunately the writer seems to have gotten a job with the Astros - nice to see a writer rewarded). I'm not sure what to go by for sure with outdated information showing Salty being significantly better than Ruiz in pitch framing while some more recent (and different) information shows Ruiz to be slightly better than Salty at pitch framing. But if you are a fan of McCann - it seems that everyone agrees that he is QUITE good at pitch framing.
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ericmvan
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Post by ericmvan on Sept 2, 2013 2:37:07 GMT -5
Eric, it's an interesting analysis, but I'm still not sure it makes the point that you are trying to make. In the end, we care about what we can expect next year. Given his lack of speed and the fact that he hits a fair amount of fly balls, he would have to be an exceptional hitter to even get a BABIP over .330. Over the last four years he's played over 300 games and had a BABIP of .291: to me it seems like expecting more than a .320 BABIP would be folly. Considering that's a 55 point drop from his current .376, that's a huge drop in production. Would you expect a significantly higher BABIP? You have to remember that hitter's BABIP is much more skill than luck. So much so that in this case I wouldn't worry about it separately, apart from the big picture. Obviously the guy is having a career year and will regress some. But this is an instance where the old-school way of looking at, and of projecting him, will be accurate enough. My gut instinct is to split the difference between his last two seasons. That would project him to be worth about $12M a year. Obviously, the Sox must have a much more sophisticated projection system than that! (Possibly one that Voros McCracken left behind.) But in terms of what he's worth overall, a big part of that is his ability to call a game, and that might be the single toughest thing to measure in baseball.
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Post by jmei on Sept 2, 2013 7:44:26 GMT -5
You have to remember that hitter's BABIP is much more skill than luck. So much so that in this case I wouldn't worry about it separately, apart from the big picture. Can you elaborate on this? I was always under the impression that single-season BABIP marks meant little to nothing in terms of projection and were highly variable season-to-season. What makes you think that we should "split the difference" rather than using his career marks or a Marcel-esque 3-2-1 regression?
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ericmvan
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Post by ericmvan on Sept 2, 2013 10:22:12 GMT -5
You have to remember that hitter's BABIP is much more skill than luck. So much so that in this case I wouldn't worry about it separately, apart from the big picture. Can you elaborate on this? I was always under the impression that single-season BABIP marks meant little to nothing in terms of projection and were highly variable season-to-season. Hitter's BABIP is as much a skill as BA, no more or less, and is just as predictive. There's some luck each year, but you don't see anyone cooking up a hitter's "FIB" analagous to FIP. And if a guy hits .290, no one's thinking that he's as likely to hit .250 next year as .340. Unlike pitchers' BABIP, the noise does not approach the signal in size. Like I said, it's all a matter of awesome five-bar chord progressions.
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Post by jmei on Sept 2, 2013 10:31:55 GMT -5
Hitter's BABIP is as much a skill as BA, no more or less, and is just as predictive. There's some luck each year, but you don't see anyone cooking up a hitter's "FIB" analagous to FIP. And if a guy hits .290, no one's thinking that he's as likely to hit .250 next year as .340. Unlike pitchers' BABIP, the noise does not approach the signal in size. I agree with this, but think that we should be using Saltalamachia's career .320 BABIP in projections going forward. I like ZiPS' .243/.310/.438 (.326 BABIP, 100 wRC+) RoS as a good semi-optimistic projection for 2014. That should put him well within QO range.
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Post by jmei on Sept 2, 2013 10:33:26 GMT -5
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ericmvan
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Post by ericmvan on Sept 2, 2013 10:50:16 GMT -5
That's not analagous to FIP, it's analagous to the way FIP ought to be. Removing balls in play entirely is indefensible. Substituting an expected BABIP (or whatever BABIP you imagine) is a good idea. Incidentally, one thing that could be done, and should be done ... do xBABIP (expected BABIP) formulas work better with BIS data, with B-ref data, or with some combination of the two? I suspect that if you took every ball that was scored as a LD by either source, Salty's xBABIP would be pretty high this year. I may yet do that. By the way, the way to see which data source is better is not by seeing which provides xBABIPs that predict subsequent BABIPs better (although that would work), but which data source provides stronger correlations to begin with. We know that hitter's BABIP correlates to HR/Contact, for instance. So you find the data source that maximizes that.
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Post by larrycook on Sept 2, 2013 11:47:45 GMT -5
Hitter's BABIP is as much a skill as BA, no more or less, and is just as predictive. There's some luck each year, but you don't see anyone cooking up a hitter's "FIB" analagous to FIP. And if a guy hits .290, no one's thinking that he's as likely to hit .250 next year as .340. Unlike pitchers' BABIP, the noise does not approach the signal in size. I agree with this, but think that we should be using Saltalamachia's career .320 BABIP in projections going forward. I like ZiPS' .243/.310/.438 (.326 BABIP, 100 wRC+) RoS as a good semi-optimistic projection for 2014. That should put him well within QO range. So you think the Sox should give Salty a QO?
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Post by jmei on Sept 2, 2013 12:53:35 GMT -5
Yeah, I would give him the QO. If he accepts, try to negotiate something like 3 years, $35m, but don't go much beyond that. I would be happy to have him for one year, $14m if an extension can't be reached. If he doesn't accept, play him off McCann and see which one you can get on an acceptable deal. Ruiz is a fine buy-low backup option.
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Post by elguapo on Sept 2, 2013 16:28:31 GMT -5
Hitter's BABIP is as much a skill as BA, no more or less, and is just as predictive. There's some luck each year, but you don't see anyone cooking up a hitter's "FIB" analagous to FIP. And if a guy hits .290, no one's thinking that he's as likely to hit .250 next year as .340. This is gibberish. If a guy hits .290 one year, people will rightly expect him to hit close to his career average the following year, absent a clear and definable reason to the contrary (beginning/end of career arc, injury, etc).
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Post by dewey1972 on Sept 2, 2013 21:06:59 GMT -5
Eric, it's an interesting analysis, but I'm still not sure it makes the point that you are trying to make. In the end, we care about what we can expect next year. Given his lack of speed and the fact that he hits a fair amount of fly balls, he would have to be an exceptional hitter to even get a BABIP over .330. Over the last four years he's played over 300 games and had a BABIP of .291: to me it seems like expecting more than a .320 BABIP would be folly. Considering that's a 55 point drop from his current .376, that's a huge drop in production. Would you expect a significantly higher BABIP? You have to remember that hitter's BABIP is much more skill than luck. So much so that in this case I wouldn't worry about it separately, apart from the big picture. Obviously the guy is having a career year and will regress some. But this is an instance where the old-school way of looking at, and of projecting him, will be accurate enough. My gut instinct is to split the difference between his last two seasons. That would project him to be worth about $12M a year. Obviously, the Sox must have a much more sophisticated projection system than that! (Possibly one that Voros McCracken left behind.) But in terms of what he's worth overall, a big part of that is his ability to call a game, and that might be the single toughest thing to measure in baseball. I'm not sure what in my note gave you the impression I didn't realize that hitters' BABIP was more skill than luck (I'd prefer "random variation"). It seems odd that after going into such detail to look at his BABIP, you are now saying don't worry about it separately. As I thought you pointed out, it seems he's got a different approach, trading home runs for singles and doubles. If he keeps this approach, it's very relevant what his BABIP is. If he goes back to the prior approach, hopefully he can get that home run power back. In the end, though, I think we come to the same conclusion: he's about a two win player. It seems like a qualifying offer makes sense. I'd much rather have McCann going forward though. He's had six years (including this one) with wRC+ of 119 or above, whereas Saltalamacchia has only this year with a wRC+ above 100. I would hope they'd use the same strategy to sign McCann that they did with pretty much everyone last season: give a shorter (3, 4 year max) contract with a higher average annual value than anyone else is willing to pay. This especially makes sense in my mind because I don't see anyone at any of the other positions we're trying to fill who is at McCann's level.
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Post by fenwaythehardway on Sept 2, 2013 23:24:54 GMT -5
Well that's one thing we can agree on.
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