Wow. Cano sucked and then he didn’t.

This doesn’t include defense by position?  How difficult would it be to add that?  Pretty sure that overall Yankees defense was better in 2009 than 2008, mostly in RF and 1B.

Frankly, that makes me a bit nervous.  Jeter’s line, for instance… can we suspend regression for next year?

25 fewer AB’s for Swisher, 1 more BR, and much, much better defense compared to Abreu.  Love that trade.

How is it that CF for 2009 has a higher OBP, SLG, and wOBA, and yet one less batting run? That’s the effect of 13 fewer at bats, yes? I remember Melky hitting in the top of the order sometimes in 2008. That might account for it, despite the better overall offense. It seems like a similar thing is happening in RF, only with 2009 still coming out ahead in BR, despite a larger gap in AB’s and a smaller one in wOBA. Mongo puzzled.

How is it that CF for 2009 has a higher OBP, SLG, and wOBA, and yet one less batting run? That’s the effect of 13 fewer at bats, yes?

Looks like there’s something screwy with Baseball References’s positional splits.  They show 2009 Yankee CF with 6 SB and 5 CS, and 2008 with 27 SB and 5 CS, which amounts to a five run difference.  Removing the impact of SB from the equation, you’d get 2009 CF at 77 BR and 2008 at 73.

Frankly, that makes me a bit nervous.  Jeter’s line, for instance… can we suspend regression for next year?

The good news is by adding Nick Johnson and Curtis Granderson, to ostensibly replaced Trader and Godzilla the Yankees got younger at two of the most likely positions for regression.  Both guys had very good years, but both guys were probably not good candidates to repeat them.

We should probably expect Jeter to decline some, and honestly it may be best if he does since it may lower his cost for re-signing.  Obviously you don’t want him to be bad, but if he has an MVP year he’s probably going to want MVP money.

This doesn’t include defense by position?  How difficult would it be to add that?  Pretty sure that overall Yankees defense was better in 2009 than 2008, mostly in RF and 1B.

Yeah, I was planning to put that up in a separate post in a bit, later today or tomorrow.  I think this year’s defense was about 15 runs better than last year’s in total, with 1B and RF the biggest improvements.

The FO’s decision to continue revamping the position players to get younger with Granderson and Johnson and deepening the run prevention with Vazquez looks particularly good given the divergence from 2008 and 2009.  We can hope for the best but there could be some regression related decline in production that the offense will have to deal with.

Does Johnson really count as “younger” considering his injury history? He is “cheaper”, but when I think of “younger”, I think spry & healthy.

[9] - Someone who is “alive” is always going to be “younger” than a zombie.

“but if anyone wants to ask them again in this thread go ahead. ”

Don’t mind if I do (from the “Happy Yankee Day!” post):

Has anyone here ever compared Ruth’s value as a pitcher + hitter versus his numbers as just a hitter. He pitched in over 30 games each year from 1915 to 1917 and had pretty good numbers (lead the league in ERA+ in 1916). Then I’m guessing it became clear that he was a monster at the plate and he was converted to a full time hitter over the course of 1918 and 1919.

Would those three years of being a very good pitcher and a very good hitter compare to his years as the best hitter in the game?

[9] If you’re talking about the risk of him getting injured as a function of age, a 36 year old Matsui and a 31 year old Johnson are probably not that different.

Where I think ‘younger’ comes in is how the players skills will erode. I expect Johnson, when healthy, to be a better bet to hit his projections than Matsui, when healthy. Obviously the ‘when healthy’ in each case is a huge gamble, but it’s probably a wash when comparing those two particular players.

[11] I think someone in the previous thread posted that Ruth didn’t want to pitch anymore, which was part of the reason he was traded.

[9]  Johnson and Matsui are both at significant risk for injury.  While risk for injury and age are related they also have independent impacts.  Older players are at increased risk for “falling off a cliff” due to degradation of skills and that’s a risk that Matsui would have that Johnson probably is less subject to.

Looks like Kearns is crossed off the LF list.

SG:How does the Boston Beltre signing affect the AL East race to come?

[16] The Red Sox go from having a 100% of winning the AL East to a 101% chance.

How about their WS prospects given that they have about 8 aces and thus have an injury proof reserve of starting pitchers and the greatest rotation in modern history.

[14] Yes, but which is at higher risk for falling off an actual cliff?

Yeah, I was planning to put that up in a separate post in a bit, later today or tomorrow.  I think this year’s defense was about 15 runs better than last year’s in total, with 1B and RF the biggest improvements.

Fantastic!

The FO’s decision to continue revamping the position players to get younger with Granderson and Johnson and deepening the run prevention with Vazquez looks particularly good given the divergence from 2008 and 2009.

I don’t remember where - either Neyer or FanGraphs, or likely Neyer referencing FanGraphs - but there was an article about this I think late last week.  Cashman has been continually lowering the Yankees’s average age over the past several years. 

At the very least, I think that’s why he generally waits as long as possible on signing players past their early 30’s.  1) If player is on the team currently, he wants as much data as possible on how they are aging 2) with FA - including his own - he wants to see if he can get equivalent value (talent/$$) that is younger.

[20] I think it was Neyer referencing NoMaas.

[19]  Matsui.  He actually trained as a pearl diver when young.  Almost made a career of it, a la Bernie and the jazz guitar.  But that baseball money just couldn’t be ignored.  Still, there are nights when he looks out over a calm, mooonlit sea and wonders what might have been…

[20] It was Neyer referencing NoMaas, unbelievably. 

The response from Lombardi was something like, “Well, if you take out all the old guys on the roster those teams they weren’t that old.”

[21] Yep, you’re right.

[19] I’d say the most likely to fall off an actual cliff would be Swisher.  Seriously, if there’s one guy on the Yankees you could see driving a Harley at high-speeds on a cliff-side road…

[21] A moronic commenter on Neyer’s blog fatuously posted that the assertion that the Yankees had reduced the age of their starters was dumb because their top four starters would be at least 33. No, I’m serious.

[25] The first few weeks, I waded through some of the comments.  I believe you are 100% serious; and that was probably one of the better comments b/c he was 75% correct, as to most who are only 5% correct (they know the Yankees are in NY).  I’ve since given up.

[26] It’s actually even worse than I had recalled:

bpdean1677   (12/31/2009 at 6:01 AM) Report Violation

This is the dumbest thing I’ve ever read. Yes, the average age is lower for pitchers but the top 4 starters are 33 or older in 2010 and the closer is 40. That is like me saying, I’ve lowered the average age of financial contributors in my house because my daughter was born - even though she contributes nothing financially. Same with hitters. Jeter, Arod, Posada. If Cashman deserves a cookie for replacing Giambi by overpaying Texieria because he was the only team with means to do so fine but that is stretching it in my book.

The response from Lombardi was something like, “Well, if you take out all the old guys on the roster those teams they weren’t that old.”

I’m not sure what the problem here is. This is pretty sound logic. I used this rationale in high school all the time. “If you just take all my bad grades away, my average is good.”

[27] Rich, you should click on ‘Report Violation’ for that fellow. That sort of stupidity has to be against the law.

[29] It is kind of scary.

Other than getting the underlying facts incorrect, I can sort of see the logic in that post [ducks tomatoes].  I could see using some sort of “playing time weighted average age” as opposed to adding the ages of everyone on the 25 man roster and dividing by 25.

[31] That’s what NoMaas did. The ages are weighted by IP, and the trend is clear. Lombardi is just.. well, nevermind.

[27] Is that comment really that dumb?  I think what he is saying is that JUST looking at the average age of the roster doesn’t really tell you if the team is getting younger.  “Relying” on old guys is the problem, not whether your backup catcher is 19 or 36.  A lot of the Runs Scored/Prevented were done by older players, and if they fall off a cliff, that’s going to be a problem.

Is the Yankees Rotation “old”?  No, at least not by my standards.  But the theory behind his post is at least semi valid.

[22] I was impressed that Bernie was nominated for a Grammy.  Listening to him play, he definitely knows his chops.

[33] Given that he was already on the computer, and that he couldn’t take the time to do a quick search to discover CC’s age, yes, I think it’s dumb, and he’s wrong about the Yankees being the only team to be able to “overpay” Teix.

[35] oh, duh, i missed that part.

[34] Bernie plays guitar a lot like he played cf: softly, slowly, and tentatively.

You have to think that Gojira is most likely to fall off a cliff, probably while crushing buses in a scenic coastal village somewhere.  Of course, the fall isn’t going to hurt his performance as much as something like getting an airplane stuck in his eye will.

[37] One man’s tenative is another man’s deliberate.  I can’t say I’m a fan, but I can certainly appreciate that he’s talented.

Would be kind of cool to see him dive into some (old) Metallica or G&R though, wouldn’t it?

[39] Would it be as cool as Matsui diving into the limpid waters of the South China Sea in search of pearlescent treasure?

[34] In grad school I did a lot of (loud) ranting about how music was all too loud these days and all the guitars and voices were overloud and overcompressed (this was egged on by my advisor, and I thus composed several quiet pieces that are what I call difficult-listening).  Perhaps this is why I like it?

Aw, now Lombardi is talking about hanging up his spikes and I feel bad…

I have a question, what’s the fastet animal on earth?

[41] Are you referring to this?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Loudness_war

Don’t you have teh google, Schteeve?

[43] It is the goose.

[31],[33] Weighted averages make sense if you want to measure the age of a team, but I think it’s safe to say that that guy just felt like ranting. I would probably use projected WAR or something instead of innings.

Red Sox to move Ellsbury to LF, Cameron to CF

Holliday gets 7/120 from the Cards.  Will Don show up to rip them for bidding against themselves?

Red Sox on verge of trading Kotchman to Mariners for Bill Hall (among others).  Apparently they needed “flexibility” to sign Beltre.

“Will Don show up to rip them for bidding against themselves?”

Why not?  How did they get from 6/82.5 to 7/120 with no other suitors?  No one ever floated a number like this.  The 100-million mark has only been mentioned in the last couple days.  There is no other market for Holliday, why would the Cards go so high?

SG:How does the Boston Beltre signing affect the AL East race to come?

I should do a full post about Boston, but so far what they’ve done this offseason is majorly upgrade their defense. I’ve got them projected to be around 40 runs better than average defensively, assuming Cameron in CF and Ellsbury in LF.  They were something like 25 to 35 runs below average in 2008, depending on what metric you look at.

I haven’t done their pitching depth chart yet, but eyeballing it, it looks like they’ll project to be around a 97-98 win team, before adjusting them down a bit for the AL East.  That’s about two wins worse than the Yankees look right now, although obviously things can change.

Has anyone here ever compared Ruth’s value as a pitcher + hitter versus his numbers as just a hitter. He pitched in over 30 games each year from 1915 to 1917 and had pretty good numbers (lead the league in ERA+ in 1916). Then I’m guessing it became clear that he was a monster at the plate and he was converted to a full time hitter over the course of 1918 and 1919.

Looking at Sean Smith’s WAR data on Ruth, it looks like his best pitching season was worth about 7.4 WAR.  As a hitter from 1920 - 1934 he was worth almost 10 WAR a season.  Seems like moving him to the OF was the smart move.

Do those pitching wins above replacement exclude hitting?  Because otherwise he should have about 1/4 of his hitting WAR while a pitcher, which would even it out almost exactly.

otherwise -> if so

No one ever floated a number like this.

Scott Boras did.

There is no other market for Holliday, why would the Cards go so high?

Because the Orioles were lying in the weeds!

Anyway, my point was that the “bidding against yourself” stuff is just like the “buying a championship” stuff.  You only see it in reference to the Yankees.  The biggest “bid against yourself” contract ever was the one Hicks gave A-Rod.

We can hope for the best but there could be some regression related decline in production that the offense will have to deal with.

Right, I’d probably project around at least 40 fewer runs due to regression and aging offensively, even with the new additions.  If we had Damon/Matsui back instead of Johnson/Granderson it’d probably even more than that, maybe 50 or 60.

Does Johnson really count as “younger” considering his injury history? He is “cheaper”, but when I think of “younger”, I think spry & healthy.

31 < 36, so yes.  I generally think of younger as meaning closer to a typical player’s peak age of 27-28, but YMMV.

[43] teh katt. When cheese or poultry theft is needed.
[46]  I have 2 Gossage rookie cards. I’ll send you one just so I can be an enabler. Howard Hughes built an aeroplane you might appreciate.

  As a hitter from 1920 - 1934 he was worth almost 10 WAR a season.

So when Ruth said that he had a better year than Hoover, he was really the master of understatement.

Now that Holliday has signed, the Johnny Damon saga should end relatively soon.

Do those pitching wins above replacement exclude hitting?

Hmm, good point.  They are separated.  Here’s how they add up.

Year, pitching WAR, hitting WAR, total WAR
1914: -0.2 pWAR, 0.0 hWAR, -0.2 tWAR
1915: 2.5 pWAR, 1.8 hWAR, 4.3 tWAR
1916: 7.4 pWAR, 1.6 hWAR, 9.0 tWAR
1917: 5.8 pWAR, 2.0 hWAR, 7.8 tWAR
1918: 2.2 pWAR, 6.2 hWAR, 8.4 tWAR
1919: 0.6 pWAR, 10.6 hWAR, 11.2 tWAR
1920: -0.2 pWAR, 12.9 hWAR, 12.7 tWAR
1921: -0.4 pWAR, 14.0 hWAR, 13.6 tWAR
1922: 0.0 pWAR, 6.2 hWAR, 6.2 tWAR
1923: 0.0 pWAR, 14.7 hWAR, 14.7 tWAR
1924: 0.0 pWAR, 11.9 hWAR, 11.9 tWAR
1925: 0.0 pWAR, 2.9 hWAR, 2.9 tWAR
1926: 0.0 pWAR, 12.0 hWAR, 12.0 tWAR
1927: 0.0 pWAR, 12.8 hWAR, 12.8 tWAR
1928: 0.0 pWAR, 11.0 hWAR, 11.0 tWAR
1929: 0.0 pWAR, 8.2 hWAR, 8.2 tWAR
1930: 0.0 pWAR, 10.7 hWAR, 10.7 tWAR
1931: 0.3 pWAR, 11.4 hWAR, 11.7 tWAR
1932: 0.0 pWAR, 9.0 hWAR, 9.0 tWAR
1933: 0.0 pWAR, 6.9 hWAR, 6.9 tWAR
1934: 0.0 pWAR, 5.0 hWAR, 5.0 tWAR
1935: 0.0 pWAR, 0.2 hWAR, 0.2 tWAR
TOTALS : 18.0 pWAR, 172.0 hWAR, 190.0 tWAR

Sorting from high to low WAR.

Year   tWAR
1923   14.7
1921   13.6
1927   12.8
1920   12.7
1926   12
1924   11.9
1931   11.7
1919   11.2
1928   11
1930   10.7
1916   9
1932   9
1918   8.4
1929   8.2
1917   7.8
1933   6.9
1922   6.2
1934   5
1915   4.3
1925   2.9
1935   0.2
1914   -0.2

A lot closer, but still looks like his hitting was more valuable in most seasons.

[54]  OK, I get it.

Have I mentioned that I turned the leftovers of goose #1 into a tasty casserole?

A Red Sox fan from Mars—hell, a Yankee fan from mars—who dropped in on this thread would be sorely vexed and confused.

SG, I had asked for possible analysis of the Trammell vs. Ripken vs. Larkin vs. Jeter thing that’s been going around.

Checking out Teddy Ballgames BBref page. Holy pelican beaks. Amazing numbers.
More than amazing. Factor in the “lost war years” and it wade boggles the mind.

Clay- I’m taking some friends from New Hampsha to BAR saturday for an apizza lunch. 1 to 3.
Yes, they are Sox fans. Nice SUV driving yuppies. I still like them.
If you in da hood I’ll spot you a pint or 3. Lemme know.

The biggest “bid against yourself” contract ever was the one Hicks gave A-Rod.

In typical fashion, the Yankees were angered they couldn’t bid against themselves and took some of that contract off Hicks hands, then Boras opted out of the last three years of it since he is such a nice fellow.

It appears it ended up only costing the Rangers $97M for 3 years of ARod, which doesn’t seem so bad now does it?

it ended up only costing the Rangers $97M for 3 years of ARod, which doesn’t seem so bad now does it?

I dunno, that’s still about $15M more than the second best offer he had.

“sorely vexed and confused” would make a pretty good screen name.

Make that “vext” and you’re in business.  “Sore vext” is also nice.

Thurm, IMHO The Splendid Splintsicle is the second-best position player in the history of the game.  Bonds, Cobb (and perhaps eventually Pujols) might have something to say about it, but Teddy Ballgame’s skill with the bat - when he wasn’t flying a fighter plane, that is - boggles the mind.

The biggest “bid against yourself” contract ever was the one Hicks gave A-Rod.

The funny thing is Boras usually floats out and obscene number in the beginning knowing that he’ll never get it just to set the tone of negotiations.  How can anyone go from that initial offer and settle on 25% more? 

Boras: We are looking for $20M/year for Alex.
Hicks: We’re not willing to do it for a penny less than $22M!
Boras: Done!
Hicks: That was too easy.  What are you trying to pull?  $25M!  Take it or leave it!
Boras: I’ve got a pen right here.
Hicks: Just for that, we’re doing this over 10 years!

[56] That plane has been reassembled and put on display about 25 miles from here. You can walk around in it, right next to an SR-71 (and if I remember correctly, a Titan).

With regard to bidding against yourself, that had to be how George ended up grossly overpaying in some of the worst trades he made in the ‘80s. How else can one explain Fred McGriff for Dale Murray, or the infamous Buhner for Phelps trades?

“Babe Ruth The Pitcher” (free content)

http://baseballprospectus.com/article.php?articleid=9092

“Ruth famously quit pitching so he could hit every day, but his would not be a memorable pitching career whether or not it had continued.”

[69] Do you live near the new museum out by Dulles? I’m pretty close as well.

[67]
Compensate for the dead ball era and Honus Wagner is better than Cobb or Williams at the bat… and then add the fact that he was a legendary defensive shortstop.  There’s an article on this somewhere.

This was linked to at the THT:

Is Javier Vazquez Unclutch?

Wagner was a legendary defensive shortstop who never played shortstop until he was 27 and didn’t play the position regularly until he was 29.  Things were a bit different back then.

I think there is a lot of danger in putting too much stock in UZR when building a team. 

Over the last two years Cameron is a 21 runs over average on offense and 21.3 runs over average on defense.  Bay is 65.9 runs over average on offense and 31.4 runs under average on defense.  On the surface you can say the Red Sox are up 3.9 runs a year (less than half a win) however they are down 22.45 runs a year on offense an up 26.35 runs a year on defense. 

The Red Sox are being smart about it and going for short term deals but still, that is pretty big risk no?

The Red Sox are being smart about it and going for short term deals but still, that is pretty big risk no?

Definitely a big risk, but they seem to be in ‘stop gap’ mode. I’m not familiar enough with their farm system, but maybe it’s some combination of in house promotions and free agents to be (Gonzalez, possibly Mauer, possibly Pujols) on the horizon.

You could also say that they had two options this offseason - punt and try to reload for later or try to build the best possible team without losing a ton of financial flexibility. I think they did that in signing Cameron, Scutaro, and Beltre. But, as you say, in trying to avoid a lot of the financial inflexibility in the future, they had to go with guys whose value is tied up in defense, which has an inherent risk.

We won’t really know until 10 or so months from now, I guess.

My general impression is that defensive projections come with bigger error bars, so yeah I’d say that building a defense first team entails more risk.  OTOH, even the best hitters can have an off-year now and then, so who knows?

I’m guessing that the way the Red Sox were able to get Cameron was by giving him the CF job, also. Then they waited several weeks and told Ellsbury that decided he’d be moving to LF.

[78] - It’s not just error bars in projections that I’m talking about.  The numbers used to calculate the value of offense have been kept track of for close to 100 years so there is a great deal of history behind them. You even new statistics you can run through a large history and see how well they correlate to winning.

It’s my understanding that the numbers used to calculate UZR have been around for less than 10 and depend more on value judgments from individuals and don’t take into account things like defensive positions which can have a real effect on the numbers.  Furthermore positioning can be more of a product of a certain teams scouting reports and preparation.  I mean if there is that short of a history and they are still working out kinks on things like that (and adjusting for the odd left field in Fenway) wouldn’t the numbers themselves be less reliable?

It’s my understanding that the numbers used to calculate UZR have been around for less than 10 and depend more on value judgments from individuals and don’t take into account things like defensive positions which can have a real effect on the numbers.

Well Zone Rating has been around since 1987.  UZR is built on top of ZR, but with several refinements - more data added suchs as velocity data.  There are adjustments made for positioning, but perhaps not as finite as we would like.  E.g. if it is a LH batter, or there is a runner on 1st and 2nd is empty, the infielders are typically positioned differently.  And MGL has stated on several occasions that he does adjust for LF in Fenway; I don’t know if he’s ever published the adjustment.  Finally, though there is some subjectivity to it (since stringers record the zones, GB/FB/LD, etc), I believe there are 3 stringers at each game, positioned differently.  After the game they compare notes, and try to determine a consensus, to minimize bias/human error.

UZR is a tool.  It should be used in conjunction with other tools.  For example, if scouts say a player is an elite defender, fans (e.g. Tom Tango’s Fans Scouting) say he is an elite defender, and UZR says he is +45 over a 3 year period, you’re pretty sure he is elite.  If Fans and scouts say he isn’t good, but UZR does, that doesn’t mean UZR is wrong, and also doesn’t mean fans/scouts are right.  I think it means you should take a closer look at the player. 

When hit-f/x has enough data to be analyzed, it may help.  Especially as if we get confident in that, we can compare its results to UZR and see how they stack up, and also if there are particular places UZR has problems.

[72] www.sprucegoose.org

Thanks for the Ruth numbers, SG. Just goes to show that the best way to get a question answered is to bide your time lurking on the site for about 3 years and then at the perfect moment, STRIKE.

You could also say that they had two options this offseason - punt and try to reload for later or try to build the best possible team without losing a ton of financial flexibility. I think they did that in signing Cameron, Scutaro, and Beltre.

I agree. The RS have yet to replace Manny and Ortiz (in his prime). Although they may have been interested in Holliday at pre-determined price, it appears that their preference is to try to do it with Adrian Gonzalez and Mauer. Obviously, their chances of acquiring the former is a lot better than getting the latter.

Oh man, I just wrote 3500 words on this same subject, and your article is way easier to comprehend. Oh well. My article has way more sarcasm, so take that!