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Post by pedrofanforever45 on Nov 27, 2016 0:17:45 GMT -5
Well if the Giants had talks, they won't come right out and say it.
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Post by pedrofanforever45 on Nov 27, 2016 0:23:33 GMT -5
This kind of trade would open up the potential for a Justin Turner signing with Buchholz's salary being gone and the best part is that if the owners truly do give up the QO (as a part of the new CBA negotiations), Turner wouldn't even cost a first round pick, which is even better. Probably. It wouldn't kill them this year (we'll find out the new lux tax threshold), but it might be an issue next year. Though, at that point you would think that they could move either Turner (if Moncada were ready; or even keep Turner at 1b) or Shark. I have to think that, barring total disaster, someone would be interested in Samardzija on a 3/$54M deal. That's about market AAV on a 3/4 right now, and it'd be a short deal, which is attractive. Again, if Turner were a 4/$70M option, I think that's a reasonable plan. The deals aren't prohibitively long or expensive, and both players would probably retain reasonable trade value (I think Turner could be a steal). Turner's not all that less productive than Encarnación, and he would benefit from Fenway/AL East parks (except TB, of course). He also has much more defensive value, and is younger by several years. The Sox add offense, better 3b defense, Shaw becomes completely tradeable for a 'pen arm +/- a prospect (filling another hole), and the Sox get an innings-eater with some upside. Not a bad plan. Nice thinking. The best part is that you don't even need to trade Shaw in this scenario (which admittedly I have been pushing for). You can keep Shaw and make him the big target at first base. You could platoon Chris Young and Hanley at the DH position for the most part (Hanley at DH versus right handed pitchers and Chris Young at DH versus left handed pitchers and Hanley at first base). You gain a everyday third base option in Turner and you wouldn't need to think about a platoon like you do now at that position (adds flexibility).
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Post by jimed14 on Nov 27, 2016 8:06:14 GMT -5
The thing is, Pablo wasn't even that good to begin with (wRC+ of 118, 117, 110 in '12-'14) and has a good portion of his value is tied up in being average defensively at 3B which will be difficult to get back to. His hitting profile is awful with the lack of walks and his contact rate will likely decline quicker than most with how much of a free-swinger he is. And his baserunning will only decline and it's really bad now. He has to hit better than he did with the Giants to even be a 2 win player. I'll be shocked if he's above replacement level and way more shocked if he's as good as Shaw. There is very little upside there. His upside for me is that at best, he'll be no better than Shaw. At worst, he'll be unplayable at 3B and below replacement level as a 1B or DH. Hanley's upside was that he'd be one of the best hitters in the league. It's better to compare Sandoval to other 2-3 win players without any elite skills who collapse like Allen Craig or Daniel Nava. As an empirical matter, most players who precipitously drop off in their age 28 season do in fact bounce back to be productive MLB players. See, for instance, this analysis of Allen Craig comparables. Saying you'd be shocked if he was better than replacement level seems much more like a grudge against the specific player than sober analysis. He's probably not the above-average starter that they paid for going forward, but he's also probably not a DFA candidate. I bet you used that article to argue with me about how Allen Craig was going to rebound. I'm on the record now. Feel free to tell me I'm wrong later.
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Post by jodyreidnichols on Nov 27, 2016 8:46:13 GMT -5
There's a very common pattern of guys performing badly in the first year after free agency and then rebounding. 3.5, -1.3, 2.8. That's Hanley. 7.8, 2.9, 8.2. That's Carlos Beltran. I know there have been many others. It's common enough that you should never write off a player after his first post-free agency year. The thing is, Pablo wasn't even that good to begin with (wRC+ of 118, 117, 110 in '12-'14) and has a good portion of his value is tied up in being average defensively at 3B which will be difficult to get back to. His hitting profile is awful with the lack of walks and his contact rate will likely decline quicker than most with how much of a free-swinger he is. And his baserunning will only decline and it's really bad now. He has to hit better than he did with the Giants to even be a 2 win player. I'll be shocked if he's above replacement level and way more shocked if he's as good as Shaw. There is very little upside there. His upside for me is that at best, he'll be no better than Shaw. At worst, he'll be unplayable at 3B and below replacement level as a 1B or DH. Hanley's upside was that he'd be one of the best hitters in the league. It's better to compare Sandoval to other 2-3 win players without any elite skills who collapse like Allen Craig or Daniel Nava. I'm with you on this. I never saw the attraction to begin with. Post-season aside, which I'm not convinced is even a skill, he appeared to be a very average to slightly above average player.
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Post by umassgrad2005 on Nov 27, 2016 14:06:32 GMT -5
In reference to this article and the idea that Sandoval could go back to the Giants, what about this idea that was brought up in another forum that I visited- Pablo Sandoval and Clay Buchholz for Jeff Samardzija. -Nunez goes from third base to LF -Pablo goes to third for the Giants -San Francisco gets a replacement in the rotation for Shark -Boston gets rid of Sandoval and takes on a pitcher instead This sounds at least like a plausible idea to me. The Giants take on more payroll in 2017 while the Sox take on more payroll possibly by the last year of Shark's deal. Interesting idea. I really thought we should have signed Cueto or Shark to go along with Price last year, we would still have Espinoza. I just wonder why Giants would want to trade a guy that was clearly a #3 for them last year. I would do that trade in a second, I just don't see the Giants doing it. Sharks stuff hasn't declined, well at least his velocity hasn't, so I think he could bounce back. More and more I think Chicago team is such a mess that it brings out the worst in players. Even Sales last two years have been below his career norms. That team is a mess.
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Post by umassgrad2005 on Nov 27, 2016 14:27:27 GMT -5
There's a very common pattern of guys performing badly in the first year after free agency and then rebounding. 3.5, -1.3, 2.8. That's Hanley. 7.8, 2.9, 8.2. That's Carlos Beltran. I know there have been many others. It's common enough that you should never write off a player after his first post-free agency year. The thing is, Pablo wasn't even that good to begin with (wRC+ of 118, 117, 110 in '12-'14) and has a good portion of his value is tied up in being average defensively at 3B which will be difficult to get back to. His hitting profile is awful with the lack of walks and his contact rate will likely decline quicker than most with how much of a free-swinger he is. And his baserunning will only decline and it's really bad now. He has to hit better than he did with the Giants to even be a 2 win player. I'll be shocked if he's above replacement level and way more shocked if he's as good as Shaw. There is very little upside there. His upside for me is that at best, he'll be no better than Shaw. At worst, he'll be unplayable at 3B and below replacement level as a 1B or DH. Hanley's upside was that he'd be one of the best hitters in the league. It's better to compare Sandoval to other 2-3 win players without any elite skills who collapse like Allen Craig or Daniel Nava. Offensive WARs 2012 2.4, 2013 3.0 and 2014 3.1. Defensive wars 2012 -.3, 2013 -.4, and 2014 .6. A don't see were a good portion of his value came from his D, it was his bat that provided his value. If he can get in shape, I see no reason he can't be slightly below average at 3B. His issue is all weight related in my opinion, not an erosion of skills. I wouldn't want to bet on him being above average for the next 3 years, but if he stays in shape next year I think he can easily be above average. I think our deep lineup will help him. By all accounts he has put in a massive amount of work to get in shape.
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Post by jimed14 on Nov 27, 2016 15:16:05 GMT -5
The thing is, Pablo wasn't even that good to begin with (wRC+ of 118, 117, 110 in '12-'14) and has a good portion of his value is tied up in being average defensively at 3B which will be difficult to get back to. His hitting profile is awful with the lack of walks and his contact rate will likely decline quicker than most with how much of a free-swinger he is. And his baserunning will only decline and it's really bad now. He has to hit better than he did with the Giants to even be a 2 win player. I'll be shocked if he's above replacement level and way more shocked if he's as good as Shaw. There is very little upside there. His upside for me is that at best, he'll be no better than Shaw. At worst, he'll be unplayable at 3B and below replacement level as a 1B or DH. Hanley's upside was that he'd be one of the best hitters in the league. It's better to compare Sandoval to other 2-3 win players without any elite skills who collapse like Allen Craig or Daniel Nava. Offensive WARs 2012 2.4, 2013 3.0 and 2014 3.1. Defensive wars 2012 -.3, 2013 -.4, and 2014 .6. A don't see were a good portion of his value came from his D, it was his bat that provided his value. If he can get in shape, I see no reason he can't be slightly below average at 3B. His issue is all weight related in my opinion, not an erosion of skills. I wouldn't want to bet on him being above average for the next 3 years, but if he stays in shape next year I think he can easily be above average. I think our deep lineup will help him. By all accounts he has put in a massive amount of work to get in shape. Offensive WAR is adjusted for position, so if he can't play 3B, he's worth a lot less. That's what I meant that a lot of his value was tied up in being average defensively at 3B. If he were at 1B or DH for those years, his offensive WAR would be very low or non-existent. He needs a huge rebound in both defense and hitting to even just be worthy of a roster spot.
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Post by umassgrad2005 on Nov 27, 2016 15:59:38 GMT -5
Offensive WARs 2012 2.4, 2013 3.0 and 2014 3.1. Defensive wars 2012 -.3, 2013 -.4, and 2014 .6. A don't see were a good portion of his value came from his D, it was his bat that provided his value. If he can get in shape, I see no reason he can't be slightly below average at 3B. His issue is all weight related in my opinion, not an erosion of skills. I wouldn't want to bet on him being above average for the next 3 years, but if he stays in shape next year I think he can easily be above average. I think our deep lineup will help him. By all accounts he has put in a massive amount of work to get in shape. Offensive WAR is adjusted for position, so if he can't play 3B, he's worth a lot less. That's what I meant that a lot of his value was tied up in being average defensively at 3B. If he were at 1B or DH for those years, his offensive WAR would be very low or non-existent. He needs a huge rebound in both defense and hitting to even just be worthy of a roster spot. We've seen him do just that in regards to his defense. It goes up and down along with his weight. Look at 2013 to 2014, he had a swing of 9 DRS as he got himself in shape for his contract year. Look at 2011 to 2012 he went from elite to below average due to weight, a swing of 20 DRS. By all accounts and from the pics I've seen he looks to have dropped at least 50 pounds if not more. He seems to be determined to salvage his career, which is huge for me. He could have just kept eating and cashing his checks, but he chose the hard path to get back in shape. In shape I see no reason he can't be at least slightly below average. Even in 2015, when he was so fat he was breaking his belt, he still wasn't even as close to as bad as Hanley was in OF. Red Sox need to hire the trainer he had with Giants and do the things the Giants did like not allowing him to order room service. The guy has a very bad eating disorder and needs a ton of help.
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Post by jodyreidnichols on Nov 27, 2016 17:37:12 GMT -5
Offensive WAR is adjusted for position, so if he can't play 3B, he's worth a lot less. That's what I meant that a lot of his value was tied up in being average defensively at 3B. If he were at 1B or DH for those years, his offensive WAR would be very low or non-existent. He needs a huge rebound in both defense and hitting to even just be worthy of a roster spot. We've seen him do just that in regards to his defense. It goes up and down along with his weight. Look at 2013 to 2014, he had a swing of 9 DRS as he got himself in shape for his contract year. Look at 2011 to 2012 he went from elite to below average due to weight, a swing of 20 DRS. By all accounts and from the pics I've seen he looks to have dropped at least 50 pounds if not more. He seems to be determined to salvage his career, which is huge for me. He could have just kept eating and cashing his checks, but he chose the hard path to get back in shape. In shape I see no reason he can't be at least slightly below average. Even in 2015, when he was so fat he was breaking his belt, he still wasn't even as close to as bad as Hanley was in OF. Red Sox need to hire the trainer he had with Giants and do the things the Giants did like not allowing him to order room service. The guy has a very bad eating disorder and needs a ton of help. There is that and chances are we only need about a half season out of him, because Moncada should be ready by then. So in many ways it would be good to play Sandoval at seasons start hoping that he show cases himself so we can trade him once Moncada forces his way up. By my estimate a good month to 6 weeks before the trade deadline where Yoan is brought up and Shaw is sent to AAA. Shaw is the backup at first and third.
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ericmvan
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Post by ericmvan on Nov 27, 2016 20:22:35 GMT -5
There's a very common pattern of guys performing badly in the first year after free agency and then rebounding. 3.5, -1.3, 2.8. That's Hanley. 7.8, 2.9, 8.2. That's Carlos Beltran. I know there have been many others. It's common enough that you should never write off a player after his first post-free agency year. The thing is, Pablo wasn't even that good to begin with (wRC+ of 118, 117, 110 in '12-'14) and has a good portion of his value is tied up in being average defensively at 3B which will be difficult to get back to. His hitting profile is awful with the lack of walks and his contact rate will likely decline quicker than most with how much of a free-swinger he is. And his baserunning will only decline and it's really bad now. He has to hit better than he did with the Giants to even be a 2 win player. I'll be shocked if he's above replacement level and way more shocked if he's as good as Shaw. There is very little upside there. His upside for me is that at best, he'll be no better than Shaw. At worst, he'll be unplayable at 3B and below replacement level as a 1B or DH. Hanley's upside was that he'd be one of the best hitters in the league. It's better to compare Sandoval to other 2-3 win players without any elite skills who collapse like Allen Craig or Daniel Nava. As an empirical matter, most players who precipitously drop off in their age 28 season do in fact bounce back to be productive MLB players. See, for instance, this analysis of Allen Craig comparables. Saying you'd be shocked if he was better than replacement level seems much more like a grudge against the specific player than sober analysis. He's probably not the above-average starter that they paid for going forward, but he's also probably not a DFA candidate. I bet you used that article to argue with me about how Allen Craig was going to rebound. I'm on the record now. Feel free to tell me I'm wrong later. A couple of points. The first is relevant to Julio Lugo, Carl Crawford, and Hanley Ramirez in 2015 as well as Sandoval. The Red Sox are a very sophisticated analytical team -- probably not as much so as their reputation, but the analysis they do on any player dwarfs what gets done here on this board or elsewhere online. You can guarantee that every one of these acquisitions profiled attractively in terms of analytics. I still get mocked for saying this was true of Lugo (and I was one of the guys doing the work), but it's pretty self-evidently true. When folks argue otherwise, it reminds me of the people who go on IMDB to point out a supposed "plot hole" in an otherwise very good movie. Really? You just saw it once, and you spotted something the screenwriter, who worked on the script for years, missed? (In these cases it's always easy to explain why the hole isn't one.) No, your guess at a player's analytic profile is never better than the team's analysis. In Sandoval's case, I looked into your bolded claim and found the opposite to be true, if anything. Free swingers in my little study aged surprisingly well. You can bet that the Sox analytic department looked at the question in ten times as much detail. I also took a guess that he would be very well suited for Fenway, and you can bet that they studied the hell out of that as well. (Oh, and the statistics from 2015 suggest it's true, which is to say that his great fit for Fenway may have masked an even worse year than it seemed to be.) I know that there were a lot of people skeptical of all of these acquisitions after doing a cursory "analysis" (just a look, mostly) at the player stats. But these same people were just as skeptical of David Ortiz, Bill Mueller, Mark Bellhorn, and every other undervalued pickup who also, unbeknownst to them, aced their statistical profile. (The list includes Carlos Pena, whom we would have loved to have found a roster spot for, just before his breakout). The one thing you cannot project with analytics is how a player will react psychologically to playing in Boston, especially in the first year of a new contract, and how they will react if that goes badly. Theo's track record for this was simply not good. Lugo and Crawford were sick and hurt in their first years respectively, and for whatever reasons, didn't or couldn't do the work to get back to anything approaching their projected level (all the more frustrating in Lugo's case, because he actually got close to it in his first year's second half and was a key player on a WS winner, then went and apparently tanked another off-season). Hanley couldn't deal with the initial adversity of learning a new position and tanked on his effort to learn it, but proved a year later that he could work hard at acquiring new skills as long as they were a good fit to his existing talents. If Pablo Sandoval bounces back, it's going to be psychologically driven. We know he has the statistical profile to do so, even if you think otherwise. You can't pull an opposite conclusion out of thin air just to justify your gut feeling that he will be one of the exceptions to the tendency for guys to bounce back. And when we don't know what will happen but we do know what will likely happen, you get no credit for correctly predicting the unlikely outcome, unless you can give a credible reason for why this instance will be an exception.
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Post by soxjim on Nov 27, 2016 22:30:59 GMT -5
The thing is, Pablo wasn't even that good to begin with (wRC+ of 118, 117, 110 in '12-'14) and has a good portion of his value is tied up in being average defensively at 3B which will be difficult to get back to. His hitting profile is awful with the lack of walks and his contact rate will likely decline quicker than most with how much of a free-swinger he is. And his baserunning will only decline and it's really bad now. He has to hit better than he did with the Giants to even be a 2 win player. I'll be shocked if he's above replacement level and way more shocked if he's as good as Shaw. There is very little upside there. His upside for me is that at best, he'll be no better than Shaw. At worst, he'll be unplayable at 3B and below replacement level as a 1B or DH. Hanley's upside was that he'd be one of the best hitters in the league. It's better to compare Sandoval to other 2-3 win players without any elite skills who collapse like Allen Craig or Daniel Nava. I bet you used that article to argue with me about how Allen Craig was going to rebound. I'm on the record now. Feel free to tell me I'm wrong later. A couple of points. The first is relevant to Julio Lugo, Carl Crawford, and Hanley Ramirez in 2015 as well as Sandoval. The Red Sox are a very sophisticated analytical team -- probably not as much so as their reputation, but the analysis they do on any player dwarfs what gets done here on this board or elsewhere online. You can guarantee that every one of these acquisitions profiled attractively in terms of analytics. I still get mocked for saying this was true of Lugo (and I was one of the guys doing the work), but it's pretty self-evidently true. When folks argue otherwise, it reminds me of the people who go on IMDB to point out a supposed "plot hole" in an otherwise very good movie. Really? You just saw it once, and you spotted something the screenwriter, who worked on the script for years, missed? (In these cases it's always easy to explain why the hole isn't one.) No, your guess at a player's analytic profile is never better than the team's analysis. In Sandoval's case, I looked into your bolded claim and found the opposite to be true, if anything. Free swingers in my little study aged surprisingly well. You can bet that the Sox analytic department looked at the question in ten times as much detail. I also took a guess that he would be very well suited for Fenway, and you can bet that they studied the hell out of that as well. (Oh, and the statistics from 2015 suggest it's true, which is to say that his great fit for Fenway may have masked an even worse year than it seemed to be.) I know that there were a lot of people skeptical of all of these acquisitions after doing a cursory "analysis" (just a look, mostly) at the player stats. But these same people were just as skeptical of David Ortiz, Bill Mueller, Mark Bellhorn, and every other undervalued pickup who also, unbeknownst to them, aced their statistical profile. (The list includes Carlos Pena, whom we would have loved to have found a roster spot for, just before his breakout). The one thing you cannot project with analytics is how a player will react psychologically to playing in Boston, especially in the first year of a new contract, and how they will react if that goes badly. Theo's track record for this was simply not good. Lugo and Crawford were sick and hurt in their first years respectively, and for whatever reasons, didn't or couldn't do the work to get back to anything approaching their projected level (all the more frustrating in Lugo's case, because he actually got close to it in his first year's second half and was a key player on a WS winner, then went and apparently tanked another off-season). Hanley couldn't deal with the initial adversity of learning a new position and tanked on his effort to learn it, but proved a year later that he could work hard at acquiring new skills as long as they were a good fit to his existing talents. If Pablo Sandoval bounces back, it's going to be psychologically driven. We know he has the statistical profile to do so, even if you think otherwise. You can't pull an opposite conclusion out of thin air just to justify your gut feeling that he will be one of the exceptions to the tendency for guys to bounce back. And when we don't know what will happen but we do know what will likely happen, you get no credit for correctly predicting the unlikely outcome, unless you can give a credible reason for why this instance will be an exception.
I don't believe a player with a very poor psychological makeup who has shown difficulty adjusting to a much more hostile environment (media/weather etc) who has a history of gaining weight over the course of a season which his weight does affect performance, with declining hitting should be given much of a chance to play 3rd everyday. I wouldn't mind a little to see what he has- but if management plays him consistently vs both lefty and righty bats then ti is they that also need a psychological profile. Everybody that is very wary of predicting a probable poor outcome should be given credit and should be in the right to mock management if management over uses him and the data/performance on the field shows he was lousy. Let's take a look at Pablo's career vs lefties - though his few years shouldn't be counted as much - I never understand why people want to use data from a guy's 1st few years when it is evident that the major leagues have adjusted to said player. But in this case other than 1 year he has basically proven he is bad though 2012 isn't that bad vs lefties but for his career anyways - so he should be thought of as nothing more than a platoon.
Anyhow let's look at ba/obp/slg/ops vs lefty pitchers:
2008 .237/.268/.289/.558 2009 .379/.428/.600/1028 2010 .227/.284/.305/.589 2011 .281/.296/.427/.723 2012 .299/.336/.409/.745 2013 .270/.341/.345/.686 2014 .199/.244/.319/.563 2015 .197/.234/.231/.465
IMO one can counter the bold and say "we do know what will likely happen, you get no credit for correctly predicting the unlikely outcome that he will hit "decent," unless you can give a credible reason for why this instance will be an exception." -- for anyone that expects Pablo to be anything more than a platoon player at 3rd.
This trend is "unacceptable" for an everyday 3b to go against lefty hitters, even if he "bumps" a bit, isn't it?
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Post by jodyreidnichols on Nov 27, 2016 22:42:09 GMT -5
Let's hope this is not true. I really do believe that Shaw is trade bait this off season and Moncada will need more time in AAA. It would be awesome if he slimmed down and reestablished his value to make him tradeable at some point again. Shaw is a valuable asset as he can play first and third fairly well. Now he's working out in the corner OF. Pablo's performance should have no bearing in a decision on Travis. That depends on if they add a players at DH/1B, the bench and what they are storing down in Pawtucket.
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Post by telson13 on Nov 28, 2016 0:31:05 GMT -5
Offensive WAR is adjusted for position, so if he can't play 3B, he's worth a lot less. That's what I meant that a lot of his value was tied up in being average defensively at 3B. If he were at 1B or DH for those years, his offensive WAR would be very low or non-existent. He needs a huge rebound in both defense and hitting to even just be worthy of a roster spot. We've seen him do just that in regards to his defense. It goes up and down along with his weight. Look at 2013 to 2014, he had a swing of 9 DRS as he got himself in shape for his contract year. Look at 2011 to 2012 he went from elite to below average due to weight, a swing of 20 DRS. By all accounts and from the pics I've seen he looks to have dropped at least 50 pounds if not more. He seems to be determined to salvage his career, which is huge for me. He could have just kept eating and cashing his checks, but he chose the hard path to get back in shape. In shape I see no reason he can't be at least slightly below average. Even in 2015, when he was so fat he was breaking his belt, he still wasn't even as close to as bad as Hanley was in OF. Red Sox need to hire the trainer he had with Giants and do the things the Giants did like not allowing him to order room service. The guy has a very bad eating disorder and needs a ton of help. I think the best point you made is that he took the hard route. It says something, maybe a lot, about his character and current mindset. He certainly wouldn't be the first guy (or last) to take his career/position in life for granted. It's no guarantee that that translates to performance, but it certainly bodes well for it both in physical and psychological terms. Obviously, to reach the level these guys are at, there needs to be a great deal of pride (and not necessarily hubris), and as part of that, willingness to make sacrifices. I'm sure Hanley's rebound and embracement by fans isn't lost on Panda. He's still young enough that he can make and sustain those habits, and perform at a high level physically. He's got to still have that fire in his belly to do what he's done. If he's average or even strong defensively, and at least passable offensively, he's an average everyday player with a superb playoff pedigree. That has real value, and with Moncada maybe a year away (I'd hope July, but I don't think so) and Devers probably two years away, a revitalized Sandoval is a great stopgap, and a much more viable trade candidate. It certainly makes him a great option for a team like the Giants, should they be in it, come deadline time. Or, alternatively, he's a keeper (at least until Devers) if the team does something like move JBJ and put Mookie in CF and Moncada in RF. Sandoval doesn't need to be great, or even good, to help the team. "Not bad" may be a low standard, but I think it's well within reach. As far as food addiction, well...there's a range. I mean, I've been present for a 4'11", 298 lb woman in her early 40s having a heart procedure, so it's not like he's THAT far down the spectrum. Addiction is linked to compulsive behavior and impulsivity, but also to intense "willpower," for lack of a better term. Anorexia (and other intense ascetic behaviors) is actually being investigated as an atypical "addiction." So really, I think you're right in the sense that Pablo just needs the right "carrot" to lead him to self-productive and not self-destructive behaviors. And, to make sure that even "good" behaviors don't become destructive by being unhealthily obsessive. Which leads me to wondering, do teams have developed psychiatric/psychological services that deal with this stuff? I mean, why aren't there more Bob Tewksburys? I'd think players' mental health would be at least as important as physical, in terms of performance.
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Post by mredsox89 on Nov 28, 2016 0:46:52 GMT -5
It feels far more likely that if the Sox were to trade Sandoval, it would be in July, and only if Moncada and/or Shaw appeared ready/capable for a full time job.
If Sandoval is playing at a 2+ WAR/yr player at the AS break, you hope that someone else is ready to step in and someone else is willing to take on Sandoval at a reduced price.
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jimoh
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Post by jimoh on Nov 28, 2016 7:07:11 GMT -5
I know that there were a lot of people skeptical of all of these acquisitions after doing a cursory "analysis" (just a look, mostly) at the player stats. But these same people were just as skeptical of David Ortiz, Bill Mueller, Mark Bellhorn, and every other undervalued pickup who also, unbeknownst to them, aced their statistical profile. [...] The historical claim that "these same people were just as skeptical of David Ortiz, Bill Mueller, Mark Bellhorn" as people were a couple of years ago about Sandoval seems like complete nonsense to me, fitting the consistent patterns of delusional claims about how everyone in the past was wrong except you. All of those guys looked pretty interesting at quick, cursory glance, though none was guaranteed to thrive as they did. You must realize that all of your memories of what people thought in the past are consistently tainted with what you want to believe is true, even more than most people's.
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Post by jmei on Nov 28, 2016 10:19:48 GMT -5
A couple of points. The first is relevant to Julio Lugo, Carl Crawford, and Hanley Ramirez in 2015 as well as Sandoval. The Red Sox are a very sophisticated analytical team -- probably not as much so as their reputation, but the analysis they do on any player dwarfs what gets done here on this board or elsewhere online. You can guarantee that every one of these acquisitions profiled attractively in terms of analytics. I still get mocked for saying this was true of Lugo (and I was one of the guys doing the work), but it's pretty self-evidently true. When folks argue otherwise, it reminds me of the people who go on IMDB to point out a supposed "plot hole" in an otherwise very good movie. Really? You just saw it once, and you spotted something the screenwriter, who worked on the script for years, missed? (In these cases it's always easy to explain why the hole isn't one.) No, your guess at a player's analytic profile is never better than the team's analysis. In Sandoval's case, I looked into your bolded claim and found the opposite to be true, if anything. Free swingers in my little study aged surprisingly well. You can bet that the Sox analytic department looked at the question in ten times as much detail. I also took a guess that he would be very well suited for Fenway, and you can bet that they studied the hell out of that as well. (Oh, and the statistics from 2015 suggest it's true, which is to say that his great fit for Fenway may have masked an even worse year than it seemed to be.) I know that there were a lot of people skeptical of all of these acquisitions after doing a cursory "analysis" (just a look, mostly) at the player stats. But these same people were just as skeptical of David Ortiz, Bill Mueller, Mark Bellhorn, and every other undervalued pickup who also, unbeknownst to them, aced their statistical profile. (The list includes Carlos Pena, whom we would have loved to have found a roster spot for, just before his breakout). The one thing you cannot project with analytics is how a player will react psychologically to playing in Boston, especially in the first year of a new contract, and how they will react if that goes badly. Theo's track record for this was simply not good. Lugo and Crawford were sick and hurt in their first years respectively, and for whatever reasons, didn't or couldn't do the work to get back to anything approaching their projected level (all the more frustrating in Lugo's case, because he actually got close to it in his first year's second half and was a key player on a WS winner, then went and apparently tanked another off-season). Hanley couldn't deal with the initial adversity of learning a new position and tanked on his effort to learn it, but proved a year later that he could work hard at acquiring new skills as long as they were a good fit to his existing talents. If Pablo Sandoval bounces back, it's going to be psychologically driven. We know he has the statistical profile to do so, even if you think otherwise. You can't pull an opposite conclusion out of thin air just to justify your gut feeling that he will be one of the exceptions to the tendency for guys to bounce back. And when we don't know what will happen but we do know what will likely happen, you get no credit for correctly predicting the unlikely outcome, unless you can give a credible reason for why this instance will be an exception. You're painting a far rosier picture of the role of analytics in team decision-making than actually exists. Front offices undoubtedly have access to more and better analysis than we do. However, that analysis does not necessarily play a leading role in team decision-making. Not even the most SABR-friendly front offices make free agent and trade decisions based solely on what their baseball ops department recommends. There are a slew of other stakeholders who have their voices heard (for instance, Dombrowski famously leans on his pro scouting staff), and team decision-makers inevitably bring their own mix of heuristics and biases into the picture. Moreover, the idea that psychology is "the one thing you cannot project with analytics" wildly exaggerates the predictive power of even the best proprietary analytics. Those guys will readily admit that despite their best efforts, they're not close to projecting player performance at a high enough degree of confidence to make a statement like that. There are a million things that you cannot project with any degree of accuracy with analytics. That's a long-winded way of saying that no, you cannot assume that all their acquisitions received the analytics department stamp of approval (recall, for instance, the report from Gammons that Dombrowski made the Kimbrel trade over the objections of Hazen and others in the front office), and even if an acquisition did receive the stamp of approval, you cannot assume that the analytics department will be proven right in the long-term. You have to justify that Sandoval will bounce back on its own merits; it's not enough to say "they signed him, they're smart, therefore he's probably going to bounce back."
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Post by umassgrad2005 on Nov 28, 2016 12:19:13 GMT -5
I disagree with a lot of Eric's post, but I think he's right on with this one. Ben signed Sandoval not Dave, huge difference. Knowing Ben they did in depth studies on every part of Sandoval's game. So I agree with the free swingers will age well part.
Do you really think that Ben Charington went against his analytics department? DD going against them does not surprise me one bit, but not Charington. I think Charington biggest fault was that he relied to heavily on analytics.
I also think Sandoval is a great example of why analytics isn't perfect my any means. It never took into account his eating disorder. Knowing the way Charington was, it still shocks me they didn't take a lot more steps to help Sandoval keep his weight under control. They had to have know the steps the Giants took.
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ericmvan
Veteran
Supposed to be working on something more important
Posts: 8,881
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Post by ericmvan on Nov 29, 2016 1:04:07 GMT -5
A couple of points. The first is relevant to Julio Lugo, Carl Crawford, and Hanley Ramirez in 2015 as well as Sandoval. The Red Sox are a very sophisticated analytical team -- probably not as much so as their reputation, but the analysis they do on any player dwarfs what gets done here on this board or elsewhere online. You can guarantee that every one of these acquisitions profiled attractively in terms of analytics. I still get mocked for saying this was true of Lugo (and I was one of the guys doing the work), but it's pretty self-evidently true. When folks argue otherwise, it reminds me of the people who go on IMDB to point out a supposed "plot hole" in an otherwise very good movie. Really? You just saw it once, and you spotted something the screenwriter, who worked on the script for years, missed? (In these cases it's always easy to explain why the hole isn't one.) No, your guess at a player's analytic profile is never better than the team's analysis. In Sandoval's case, I looked into your bolded claim and found the opposite to be true, if anything. Free swingers in my little study aged surprisingly well. You can bet that the Sox analytic department looked at the question in ten times as much detail. I also took a guess that he would be very well suited for Fenway, and you can bet that they studied the hell out of that as well. (Oh, and the statistics from 2015 suggest it's true, which is to say that his great fit for Fenway may have masked an even worse year than it seemed to be.) I know that there were a lot of people skeptical of all of these acquisitions after doing a cursory "analysis" (just a look, mostly) at the player stats. But these same people were just as skeptical of David Ortiz, Bill Mueller, Mark Bellhorn, and every other undervalued pickup who also, unbeknownst to them, aced their statistical profile. (The list includes Carlos Pena, whom we would have loved to have found a roster spot for, just before his breakout). The one thing you cannot project with analytics is how a player will react psychologically to playing in Boston, especially in the first year of a new contract, and how they will react if that goes badly. Theo's track record for this was simply not good. Lugo and Crawford were sick and hurt in their first years respectively, and for whatever reasons, didn't or couldn't do the work to get back to anything approaching their projected level (all the more frustrating in Lugo's case, because he actually got close to it in his first year's second half and was a key player on a WS winner, then went and apparently tanked another off-season). Hanley couldn't deal with the initial adversity of learning a new position and tanked on his effort to learn it, but proved a year later that he could work hard at acquiring new skills as long as they were a good fit to his existing talents. If Pablo Sandoval bounces back, it's going to be psychologically driven. We know he has the statistical profile to do so, even if you think otherwise. You can't pull an opposite conclusion out of thin air just to justify your gut feeling that he will be one of the exceptions to the tendency for guys to bounce back. And when we don't know what will happen but we do know what will likely happen, you get no credit for correctly predicting the unlikely outcome, unless you can give a credible reason for why this instance will be an exception. You're painting a far rosier picture of the role of analytics in team decision-making than actually exists. Front offices undoubtedly have access to more and better analysis than we do. However, that analysis does not necessarily play a leading role in team decision-making. Not even the most SABR-friendly front offices make free agent and trade decisions based solely on what their baseball ops department recommends. There are a slew of other stakeholders who have their voices heard (for instance, Dombrowski famously leans on his pro scouting staff), and team decision-makers inevitably bring their own mix of heuristics and biases into the picture. Moreover, the idea that psychology is "the one thing you cannot project with analytics" wildly exaggerates the predictive power of even the best proprietary analytics. Those guys will readily admit that despite their best efforts, they're not close to projecting player performance at a high enough degree of confidence to make a statement like that. There are a million things that you cannot project with any degree of accuracy with analytics. That's a long-winded way of saying that no, you cannot assume that all their acquisitions received the analytics department stamp of approval (recall, for instance, the report from Gammons that Dombrowski made the Kimbrel trade over the objections of Hazen and others in the front office), and even if an acquisition did receive the stamp of approval, you cannot assume that the analytics department will be proven right in the long-term. You have to justify that Sandoval will bounce back on its own merits; it's not enough to say "they signed him, they're smart, therefore he's probably going to bounce back." Mostly terrific points that result from my characteristic overstating of my true point. Which is, if you have a player the Sox obtained at a high price, and think he clearly has a negative analytics profile, and you don't back that up at all, in any way, that holds zero credibility. I mean, after all, I excoriated the Cherington regime for being analytically awful in their reliever evaluation! So it's not a widespread principle. But in the cases I cited, I stand by my assertions. I don't believe that Crawford, Sandoval, or Hanley would have been signed if they had the analytic red flags that posters have claimed for them. In Sandoval's case, I think the good-fit-for-Fenway thing is pretty obvious. Whether free swingers age well is an obvious question to ask and the sort of question that would be examined independently by Bill James and by Tom Tippett / Zack Scott and their crew, with different methodologies. And you can't compare signing a guy that seemed questionable for obvious reasons like his weight and approach at the plate, with acquiring a guy like Kimbrel who was a superstar coming off a down year. The analytics are going to play a make-or-break role in signing a guy like Sandoval, but it's easy to see them going after Kimbrel even if the analytics were meh. Nor, BTW, am I claiming he'll bounce back, for any reason. I'm just saying that the argument that he likely won't bounce back because you've identified a supposed red flag in his analytic profile holds no water. Finally, the whole paragraph about "the one thing you cannot project with analytics," while containing some truths, is based on a fundamental mis-reading. "Cannot project" means just that -- this sort of thing is not in the realm of analytic analysis. It does not remotely mean "the one thing you cannot project accurately with analytics," nor do I think that's a normal reading of the English language. (And "the one thing" meant "the one thing that's really crucially important to Red Sox free agent signings," although admittedly that could have been made explicit rather than left implied by the context.)
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Post by soxjim on Nov 29, 2016 8:49:03 GMT -5
Stats show Sandoval is platoon player. No analytics would warrant paying that much for Pablo. Overall stats show he is awful vs lefties. You can't hide away from that. They couldn't have used analytics here. , As for his defense, don't expect it to improve with age. What did Theo say when he left? He said something to the effect that they made a mistake going for the big name. That's what probably happened here.
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Post by jimed14 on Nov 29, 2016 8:52:19 GMT -5
After finishing last in 2014, Cherington was under pressure to improve. Sandoval was the biggest 3B name on the market and 3B was the biggest position of need. I don't think it was all analytics making the decision.
Furthermore, what analysis was there of extra heavy players' aging curve? To this day, it still looks like Sandoval has been in steady decline since age 24. I remain skeptical that he's supposedly going to show up looking 50 pounds lighter and that he'll keep it off, because that's what it's probably going to take for him to be playable defensively at 3B, which is the only place he has any value at all.
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Post by ryan24 on Nov 29, 2016 9:05:35 GMT -5
The thing is, Pablo wasn't even that good to begin with (wRC+ of 118, 117, 110 in '12-'14) and has a good portion of his value is tied up in being average defensively at 3B which will be difficult to get back to. His hitting profile is awful with the lack of walks and his contact rate will likely decline quicker than most with how much of a free-swinger he is. And his baserunning will only decline and it's really bad now. He has to hit better than he did with the Giants to even be a 2 win player. I'll be shocked if he's above replacement level and way more shocked if he's as good as Shaw. There is very little upside there. His upside for me is that at best, he'll be no better than Shaw. At worst, he'll be unplayable at 3B and below replacement level as a 1B or DH. Hanley's upside was that he'd be one of the best hitters in the league. It's better to compare Sandoval to other 2-3 win players without any elite skills who collapse like Allen Craig or Daniel Nava. I bet you used that article to argue with me about how Allen Craig was going to rebound. I'm on the record now. Feel free to tell me I'm wrong later. A couple of points. The first is relevant to Julio Lugo, Carl Crawford, and Hanley Ramirez in 2015 as well as Sandoval. The Red Sox are a very sophisticated analytical team -- probably not as much so as their reputation, but the analysis they do on any player dwarfs what gets done here on this board or elsewhere online. You can guarantee that every one of these acquisitions profiled attractively in terms of analytics. I still get mocked for saying this was true of Lugo (and I was one of the guys doing the work), but it's pretty self-evidently true. When folks argue otherwise, it reminds me of the people who go on IMDB to point out a supposed "plot hole" in an otherwise very good movie. Really? You just saw it once, and you spotted something the screenwriter, who worked on the script for years, missed? (In these cases it's always easy to explain why the hole isn't one.) No, your guess at a player's analytic profile is never better than the team's analysis. In Sandoval's case, I looked into your bolded claim and found the opposite to be true, if anything. Free swingers in my little study aged surprisingly well. You can bet that the Sox analytic department looked at the question in ten times as much detail. I also took a guess that he would be very well suited for Fenway, and you can bet that they studied the hell out of that as well. (Oh, and the statistics from 2015 suggest it's true, which is to say that his great fit for Fenway may have masked an even worse year than it seemed to be.) I know that there were a lot of people skeptical of all of these acquisitions after doing a cursory "analysis" (just a look, mostly) at the player stats. But these same people were just as skeptical of David Ortiz, Bill Mueller, Mark Bellhorn, and every other undervalued pickup who also, unbeknownst to them, aced their statistical profile. (The list includes Carlos Pena, whom we would have loved to have found a roster spot for, just before his breakout). The one thing you cannot project with analytics is how a player will react psychologically to playing in Boston, especially in the first year of a new contract, and how they will react if that goes badly. Theo's track record for this was simply not good. Lugo and Crawford were sick and hurt in their first years respectively, and for whatever reasons, didn't or couldn't do the work to get back to anything approaching their projected level (all the more frustrating in Lugo's case, because he actually got close to it in his first year's second half and was a key player on a WS winner, then went and apparently tanked another off-season). Hanley couldn't deal with the initial adversity of learning a new position and tanked on his effort to learn it, but proved a year later that he could work hard at acquiring new skills as long as they were a good fit to his existing talents. If Pablo Sandoval bounces back, it's going to be psychologically driven. We know he has the statistical profile to do so, even if you think otherwise. You can't pull an opposite conclusion out of thin air just to justify your gut feeling that he will be one of the exceptions to the tendency for guys to bounce back. And when we don't know what will happen but we do know what will likely happen, you get no credit for correctly predicting the unlikely outcome, unless you can give a credible reason for why this instance will be an exception. WOW Eric right on. I get frustrated at times with some of your analysis being over the top, BUT, what you just said is spot on. A HUGE amount of a major league players success rests in between their ears. Having spent time in both philly and ny I would have to say Boston is the second toughest place to play there is. Porcello found that out. Price and Kimbrel went thru it this year.
Sandoval is going thru it now. I see Dave giving him a shot until june or july and then making a decision. By then everyone thinks Moncada will be ready. Moncada's strikeout ratio is a big issue. Pitch recognition and hitting off speed stuff is critical. Right now he needs to prove he can and no metrics or charts are going to get him there. He is going thru failure or adversity for the first time. Big wall to get over especially in Boston. Pablo is trying right now to get over his own wall. Time will tell whether he makes it.
Stats and metrics are VERY important in the total process and I respect and admire all of eric's hard work. I think some people on this site, not eric, get very emotional about their fav prospect and hide behind metrics to justify their feelings. The sox have 4 or 5 top level prospects that DO NOT need to be rushed to the bigs. Kopech needs to learn to be a pitcher not a thrower. He is no way ready for the bigs yet, inspite of the small data base we have. I already mentioned moncada. Beni looks like he is pretty close, but now he will have to make the adjustments to the book the pitchers have on him and live up to the expectations the fans have on him after last year. Devers and groome are very young and growing. Salem is a lot different than fenway.
I think there is ALOT of good stuff on this site and enjoy reading other people's thoughts and see their excitement talking about a kopech. Thanks Eric I have learned a lot from you.
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Post by umassgrad2005 on Nov 29, 2016 12:50:38 GMT -5
Stats show Sandoval is platoon player. No analytics would warrant paying that much for Pablo. Overall stats show he is awful vs lefties. You can't hide away from that. They couldn't have used analytics here. , As for his defense, don't expect it to improve with age. What did Theo say when he left? He said something to the effect that they made a mistake going for the big name. That's what probably happened here.
He doesn't have a very good OPS against lefties, but he's still a .259 hitter for his career. It's not like that's going to kill your lineup. He basically becomes Brock Holt against lefties, decent average no power.
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Post by jimed14 on Nov 29, 2016 13:01:07 GMT -5
Stats show Sandoval is platoon player. No analytics would warrant paying that much for Pablo. Overall stats show he is awful vs lefties. You can't hide away from that. They couldn't have used analytics here. , As for his defense, don't expect it to improve with age. What did Theo say when he left? He said something to the effect that they made a mistake going for the big name. That's what probably happened here.
He doesn't have a very good OPS against lefties, but he's still a .259 hitter for his career. It's not like that's going to kill your lineup. He basically becomes Brock Holt against lefties, decent average no power. In the last 3 years, he has OPSes of .563, .465 and n/a. Not sure how valuable 2008-2013 data is now. Plus, his surgery was on his left shoulder, which will make it even more difficult to hit RH until his strength returns which seems to take more than a year. I guess one area of hope would be that his hurt shoulder was holding him back for years while hitting RH so there is a possible area of improvement.
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Post by umassgrad2005 on Nov 29, 2016 13:10:15 GMT -5
After finishing last in 2014, Cherington was under pressure to improve. Sandoval was the biggest 3B name on the market and 3B was the biggest position of need. I don't think it was all analytics making the decision. Furthermore, what analysis was there of extra heavy players' aging curve? To this day, it still looks like Sandoval has been in steady decline since age 24. I remain skeptical that he's supposedly going to show up looking 50 pounds lighter and that he'll keep it off, because that's what it's probably going to take for him to be playable defensively at 3B, which is the only place he has any value at all. Bwar totals last 3 years before we signed him 2.1, 2.3 and 3.4. You seem to be only looking at OPS+, which did go down for 3 straight years, but offense has been going down for years in Baseball. I know it's hard to except watching our team, but with no steroids offense keeps going down across Baseball. Your also not looking at his huge playoff showings in 2012 and 2014, were he was awesome. If you watched the NLDS and WS in 2014, I don't think anyone thought Sandoval had declined. The problem here is that Charington didn't take Pablo's weight problems seriously. After reading the article about what the Giants did to keep his weight in check, I'm just shocked the Red Sox didn't do more to help him. He is the definition of a high maintenance player.
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Post by James Dunne on Nov 29, 2016 13:12:56 GMT -5
OPS+ is measured relative to the league - so if Sandoval's drop in raw production had mirrored that of the league in general, his OPS+ would have stayed the same. His strong WAR totals were because of his defense.
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