Am I reading this wrong, or is ZR trying to tell us it thinks Gardner is below average?

Nope, you’re reading it right.  Zone rating shows him as a couple of runs below average, although that seems to be a recent development.  Looks like his UZR is still above average, which generally points to him possibly seeing more difficult chances, something that ZR would penalize him for (UZR adjusts for difficulty of chances, ZR treats them all the same).

The numbers lie.  Gardner is a budding star.  My buddy John told me.

SG,
Would it be possible to add what league average is for the pitching stats?

Checking Gardner’s ZR day by day, it looks like he peaked at a ZR of 0.911 on May 30, at which point he was on pace to be +5 for the season.  Since then, he’s made 39 plays out of 45 chances, a ZR of 0.867, which moved him from +1 to -1.  With sample sizes like this, one or two plays can make a big difference so I wouldn’t really read too much into him being slightly below or slightly above average statistically.

The numbers lie.  Gardner is a budding star.  My buddy John told me

I’d never doubt your buddy John.

Would it be possible to add what league average is for the pitching stats?

Sure, one minute and I’ll add it to the team chart.

OK, added.  Yanks are better than league average in Ks, but their walk rate is higher as well.  HR rate is higher too, although I think we know why that is…

SG:  Just curious - Is there any way to see what the Zone ratings would look like if Wang’s first three starts were taken out? Those three starts were such outliers and qualitatively he gave up one rocket after another.  Given how small the samples are for this season to date, I’m wondering if those balls in plays hit off Wang may be acting as extreme outliers with regards to their “fieldability” and skewing some of these results e.g. hit with disproportionate velocity through zones?  Cano’s looked terrific in the field to the eye but he’s below average both by UZR and Zone rating.  Tex has been great to the eye and Zone rating but UZR has him below average so far. Just wondering if that analysis is feasible.

Yeah, I can remove the Wang games, but I can’t remove just Wang’s BIP, I have to remove all chances in those games.  If we remove April 8, April 13, and April 18 from the data, we get this:

<u>Apr 8, 13, 18</u> 
Ch:  72
PM:  53
Avg PM:  61
Diff:  -8
 
<u>All Other Games</u> 
Ch:  1218
PM:  1025
Avg PM:  1025
Diff:  0

So at least according to ZR, the Yankees have played average defense except for those three Wang starts.

Thanks so much for the additional analysis.  Can’t attribute causality from thsi data and obviously taking out Wang’s games could just be setting up a selective end point, but 8 plays below average over 3 games is a large shortfall.  Those plays could also have come during innings when other pitchers were throwing, but Wang was really hammered in those starts and I can’t see the contact that resulted when he was throwing being of average velocity or difficulty.

It would be interesting to do the same with UZR.

Okay, back from vacation, and finally caught up enough with stuff to start posting again.  Lots of goings on while I was away, including a lot of moves in the minors.  For example, a LF named Richie Robnett (middle name Pryer) who apparently played for Trenton in the afternoon and made it to SWB in time to play the second game of the double-header.  Seems he was acquired only a couple of weeks ago…

Okay, SWB action.  I didn’t realize there was a double-header last night until I got to the game, so I pretty much missed the first game.  We ate dinner in the restaurant there and from my seat I couldn’t really see the pitcher.  Ivan Nova got promoted for the first game, and after I ordered I realized he had a no-hitter through 5.  I jinxed him because I told my son (trying to get him interested in what a no-hitter was), so he let up a single with 2 outs in the sixth (4 away from the complete game) and left after that.  I could tell he had a low-90’s FB (topped out at 93) and a pitch coming in around 78 I guess was a curve.  Remember I only saw his last few batters so he could have been throwing harder early on.  Alby came in after that and retired the last 4 for the save.  Only big hit I saw was Eric Duncan hit a HR in the 6th.  I think to RF; I knew he hit it when the crowd went insane.  To keep the posts from getting too long I’ll do the second game in another one.

Okay, 2nd game.  I got to see Romulo Sanchez for the first time.  He’s big, kinda in a Chris Britton kinda way but not *quite* as pudgy.  For those not familiar, he’s a reliever they got from Pittsburg who has spot-started some.  Throws hard.  Normally 94-95, touched 96 a few times.  Also had a pitch low-80’s, I think a slider.  Maybe a slurve.  Had some good downward movement.  Let up a few hard-hit balls (including a booming double on the 2nd pitch), but 2 of the hits he let up were on GB, no walks, and six K’s in 3.1 innings.  His last pitch he threw 97, but it was a LD single to RCF. 

Next up was Paul Bush (first time I saw him as well).  Threw 90-91 with his fastball, and also had a low-80’s pitch I think was a cutter.  Tough to tell; seemed to have more movement than a cutter, but not as much as a slider.  He had trouble with the leadoff batter in each of his 2 full innings walking them on 4 pitches, but other than that seemed to have decent control.  Not hits allowed off him, and I don’t recall anything well-hit to the OF; there were a few sharp grounders. 

Finally was Edwar came in for the 7th, and was so-so.  First batter he got ahead 1-2, but couldn’t put him away, and eventually let up a single on a 3-2 count.  Next batter same deal; ahead 1-2, batter battled back and eventually walked.  That followed by…not exactly a bloop hit, but a flare that fell between Curtis in CF and Jackon in RF.  Couldn’t score the runner.  Next batter he got on an IF fly.  Then he had what *should* have been an inning-ending DP, but when Russo was moving towards 2B to field the ball, it took a funny hop.  Russo made a nice play just to keep the ball in the IF, but couldn’t get an out.  Edwar responded by K’ing the next two batters though.  So for his supporters, he battled back and through some bad luck to close the game.  For his critics, he loaded the bases with no outs.

On offense, Yanks only had 3 hits but where actually MUCH better than that.  Against Jason Jones (with Trenton and SWB last year) they hit a LOT of balls hard, but either at-em balls or exceptional plays by IF to catch line-drives.  The big hit was an Austion Jackon HR to LCF.  He quite-literally hit his number in the “At-Bat” spot on the scoreboard.  I’d estimate the ball would have gone 390-400 ft.

On defense, the Duncans were both the good and bad.  Eric Duncan early (2nd inning?) made a diving stop going towards the 3B line, and made a strong throw to 1st for an out.  But later (I think the 4th) with a runner 2nd, he made a nice play to knock down a tough hop, but rushed the throw and it was in the dirt, glove side for Shelley.  Ball off Shelley’s glove, 1st and 3rd.  Ruled an error on Eric, which is the correct call, but Shelley should have had that.  Eric made up for it a couple of batters later by fielding a smashed one-hopper and making a strong throw to 1st to end the inning.  Later, Shelley with a runner on 1st leapt up to grab a high-hopper, and made a nice throw to 2nd to get the lead runner.  They *almost* turned the 3-6-3, but the runner beat the throw to 1st.  In the 5th what should have been an inning-ending DP the throw to 1st was off-line, but Duncan didn’t come of the bag and the ball got by him.  If he had come off he *should* have had time to make the tag.

Sorry for the long posts, but lot of stuff.  I have a MySpace account now, but not set up yet.  I’m going to figure how to use the blog there and probably post this stuff on my page.  I know some expressed an interest in just seeing it here, but I think it will be better if I put long stuff like this off-line (so to speak) and it will give me some more ability to add links and stuff.  Of course, it will probably take me months to get around to setting up my MySpace page.

Pie charts rule.  Bar graphs drool.

Yes, it would be instructional to see the same in UZR, even if it was only the last TEAM graph.

Just from watching games, I would guess:
Tex is well above average
Cano is above average at 2nd
Melky is a little above average in the corner OF spots
Brett is a little above average in CF
Swish is close or slightly below average in RF
ARod would usually be average, but with his bad hip, slightly below average at 3rd
Posada (don’t know how/if they rate catechers) but (somewhere) below average.
Jeter, slightly to well below average.

So basically, we are an average fielding team, as the graph shows (it looks like maybe 2% below average?). It could be worse if Cano and Jeter play worse, which is always possible. I think with the rest of the team, we pretty mcuh know what we’re getting. When you consider our team is primarily built around offense (with pitching help coming just this year), being average defensively isn’t bad… especially compared to all the post 2001 teams.

I just read this from Chad Jennings’s blog on the SWB game last night:

You don’t see this every day. The between innings entertainment was a race of little kids bouncing through foul territory along the third-base line. The kid in last place, but suddenly scooped up and carried to the finish line by… Reggie Jackson. The Hall of Famer is making his second trip through Scranton/Wilkes-Barre this season, but I’m pretty sure this is the first time he’s participated in one of the kids races.

That was in between the 2nd and 3rd innings…when I was standing in line with my son to get ice cream!  Of all the things to miss!

Cano rates out as just barely below average by UZR.  In fact, he’d be significantly below average but he’s made almost no errors, which boosts him back up to basically average.  His range number is poor.  My eyes tell me he’s got pretty good range.

UZR loves Gardner, though his numbers have dropped a bit lately.  Jeter was, last I checked, in positive territory.  I haven’t looked in a couple of weeks, though.

I think you’re right on the rest, OYF.

“Yanks are better than league average in Ks, but their walk rate is higher as well.  HR rate is higher too, although I think we know why that is… “

Didn’t Eiland try to attribute the high walk rate to the stadium as well?

In an article in which I think Sherman tries to make a spurious comparison between Hughes and Rivera, there is this note:

“Yes, I want to be a starter still,” Hughes said, sounding quite like Rivera 13 years ago. “But it wouldn’t be bad to have Mariano Rivera’s career. I want to be pitching in the major leagues. That is what is important to me. I think too many guys are too picky.”

General manager Brian Cashman said the plan is to still have Hughes eventually return to the rotation. But, for now, “our goal is to win as many games in 2009 as possible and make the playoffs.” Translation: If Hughes could be an impact set-up man, like Rivera was in 1996, then Hughes will stay in that role, and the Yankees will deal with building up his innings again next year.

Cashman actually believes that pitching out of the bullpen will help Hughes when he returns to the rotation because “before [as a starter] he was nibbling too much away from contact. Now he is challenging guys.”

UZR loves Gardner, though his numbers have dropped a bit lately.  Jeter was, last I checked, in positive territory.  I haven’t looked in a couple of weeks, though.

This is accurate as of yesterday morning.  Interesting that Teix is rated so low.  Obviously, UZR doesn’t (yet) include a 1B ability to handle poor throws (though there may be a little of that in DPR) which Teix is outstanding at.  Also of course a 1B doesn’t see all that many plays (relative to other IF) so at this point in the season he could have missed a few that went under the radar.

That was in between the 2nd and 3rd innings…when I was standing in line with my son to get ice cream!

No monitors around the concession area?  Did you remember hearing a roar by the crowd? 

Good ice cream?

Yeah, too bad you weren’t around for Brett’s 5 hit night, Mike. Your handle came up.

Pie charts rule.  Bar graphs drool.

I agree.  Only problem is pie charts don’t work for some types of data.  Rest assured that I am constantly thinking of ways to work in gratuitous pie charts though.

OK, I added a bar chart for AL team UZRs.

And Mike, no worries about the long posts.  It’s good stuff.

Why not just throw up something on blogger or blogspot, Mike? I guess I don’t associate MySpace with text based blogging.

So they still haven’t figured out what to do about Nady?

To me, the best part of Sherman’s article was:

Because everyone has long assumed that Chamberlain is really, in temperament and style, a late-inning reliever, and that Hughes, poker-faced and more cerebral, is a starter.

Apart from the writing mechanics, which need work, it’s nice to see Joel’s take on the emotional side of baseball.  Because I have long assumed that Rivera, poker-faced, stolid and more cerebral, is secretly a starter, whereas Carlos Zambrano, in temperament and style, is better suited to be a one-man specialist late inning lockdown reliever.

I think Sherman nails it.  It has nothing to do with the fact that Hughes debuted as a starter and took a no-hitter into the seventh in his second start, or that Joba debuted as reliever and dominated, and that since a lot of fans don’t follow the minors they knew nothing about them until those exposures to them.  It’s all about the temperament and style.

Coming into the season the Sox looked to have a significant advantage in run prevention due to their defense compared to the yanks.  Interesting how things have played out - the sox defense has been very bad both by ZR and UZR.  And it’s not Nick Green that’s driving that performance.  Lowell’s hip has really hurt his defense - he’s -8 by UZR already.  Bay is -7 (who knows with LF in Fenway but Bay was bad defensively in Pittsburgh).  Lugo, even with his limited playing time is -6.9.  UZR even has Ellsbury as far below average at -5.6 (injury?  Though UZR dings him a lot for his arm).  Wouldn’t have guess the yanks defense would have been better than the Sox close to the break.

Yeah, I remember being surprised by Bay’s poor career ZRs, although he supposedly rated OK by UZR prior this year.  Fenway does funky things with LF and to a degree CF, which I think the metrics don’t handle entirely correctly even with whatever adjustements you make, but yeah, the Sox defense hasn’t been all that good.  Pedroia’s their only clearly plus defender right now according to ZR.

Bay’s defense really took a nose dive in Pittsburgh after he had those significant knee injuries in 2006.  The numbers seem to back up those reports.  By UZR he was terrible in 2007 and in 2008 even before the trade.

Let’s hope Jeter and Cano don’t decline defensively as the season goes on as they did last year.  The other uncertainty I suppose is how ARod’s hip holds up.

No monitors around the concession area?  Did you remember hearing a roar by the crowd? 

Good ice cream?

We may have actually been in the bathrooms when he was out there.  Ben and Jerry’s Cookie Dough.  I didn’t actually get any.

And Mike, no worries about the long posts.  It’s good stuff.

Thank you!

Why not just throw up something on blogger or blogspot, Mike? I guess I don’t associate MySpace with text based blogging.

I thought about doing that in the past.  I actually needed the MySpace account for something completely different, but they have a section for “blogs” so I am going to look into using that…sometime.  Maybe.

So they still haven’t figured out what to do about Nady?

Waiting until he has the surgery?  Is it actually 100% that he is going to have Tommy John or are they going to first do something exploratory?  I guess if it is 100% he is out for the year they may do something different than if he is “just” going to be out until August.  E.g. out for another month maybe promote Shelley, while out for year make a trade.

According to WFAN, the Yankees traded two prospects for Eric Hinske.

Someone on Ham’s blog says they are Eric Freyer and Casey Erickson.

“E.g. out for another month maybe promote Shelley, while out for year make a trade.”

I’m a little surprised they didn’t make a run at DeRosa.  He would fit this team perfectly.

I thought Nady was going to see Yocum today.  It doesn’t surprise me that they aren’t doing anything until after they see how that goes.  I imagine they’ll move him to the 60-man DL to free up a roster spot once the bad news is confirmed.  That would put them down to 38, so they can either add from within the organization or make trades without having to send roster players the other way or DFA somebody.

I’m a little surprised they didn’t make a run at DeRosa.  He would fit this team perfectly.

Of course, DeRosa would fit almost any team perfectly.

I’m a little surprised they didn’t make a run at DeRosa.  He would fit this team perfectly.

Yeah, maybe Cleveland asked too much.  FanGraphs had an article about the trade, and I think the way they put it if the pitcher Cleveland got (Chris Perez) cuts down on his walks a little it is a clear win for them.  Knowing the way most teams treat the Yankees recently for trades of anyone good and not uber-expensive, Cleveland probably asked for Hughes.

Someone on Ham’s blog says they are Eric Freyer and Casey Erickson.

I don’t know much about them except they are low-minors guys.  I don’t pretend to be an MiL expert, but I usually have *some* knowledge of guys with even a little hype in the minors.  Hmm…looking at FanGraphs Hinkse looks like he can at least *play* first and third, and the corner OF spots, and can still hit a little.  He may provide enough insurance they are happy sending Pena down, and would provide a LH bat off the bench.

Neither of the guys the Yanks traded for Hinske is any great shakes.  It appears that Pittsburgh was trying to save a bit of money - although they are paying half of Hinske’s salary as well.  But to a team like Pittsburgh, saving $400,000 means something.

The bummer is that I’ve long found Sherman to be the most enlightened and logical MSM writer in NY.  Even more sadly, the tripe he’s proferring as referenced above doesn’t strip him of the title.

I had some direct input into the Stats playable chances numbers while covering Yankee games this season.  Maybe I was too hard on them?

The bummer is that I’ve long found Sherman to be the most enlightened and logical MSM writer in NY.  Even more sadly, the tripe he’s proferring as referenced above doesn’t strip him of the title.

That’s the most maddening thing about Sherman IMO.  I think he knows a good amount about statistical analysis and he’s fairly intelligent, but he plays down to his audience.  Then again, maybe that’s the best way for him to go career-wise.