Saturday, March 8, 2008
Looking Ahead to 2008 - Position Player Wrapup
So now that I've gone through the position players, it's time to close out what the outlook is on a team level. To do that I've built depth charts on offense and defense which we can use as a rough gauge,Offensively, there's little question that the Yankees are probably the most talented team in baseball. The one question that could impact that is the health of their regulars given their ages. Projections of single players are for the most part objective, but when we try to roll them up into a team-wide performance we will run into subjective issues with playing time, so keep that in mind.
This is my projected lineup for the Yankees this year. I am basing the playing time on their projected playing time with some downward adjustments for potential injuries. I am allocating total playing time based on expected outs by each player, with the assumption that the team will have 27 outs per game minus about 80 outs to account for ninth innings in home victories, so a total of 4294 outs. I didn't subtract more outs than that to account for extra innings.
The projections below are the average of five systems (CHONE, MARCEL, PECOTA, ZiPS and CAIRO). The last column (BR) is batting runs by linear weights. There are no position adjustments or comparisons to average in the batting runs calculated here, since I am looking for a total number.
| Starters | POS | AVG | OBP | SLG | PA | Outs | BR |
| Johnny Damon | LF | .280 | .353 | .423 | 585 | 379 | 78 |
| Derek Jeter | SS | .307 | .379 | .438 | 600 | 373 | 86 |
| Bobby Abreu | RF | .277 | .383 | .439 | 600 | 370 | 89 |
| Alex Rodriguez | 3B | .300 | .406 | .574 | 650 | 386 | 123 |
| Jason Giambi | 1B | .245 | .387 | .474 | 300 | 184 | 46 |
| Jorge Posada | C | .286 | .380 | .469 | 500 | 310 | 76 |
| Hideki Matsui | DH | .287 | .367 | .477 | 500 | 316 | 74 |
| Robinson Cano | 2B | .308 | .348 | .482 | 585 | 381 | 84 |
| Melky Cabrera | CF | .282 | .344 | .406 | 550 | 361 | 68 |
| Starters Total | .289 | .372 | .465 | 4870 | 3060 | 724 |
I can't account for the event of catastrophic injury here, so I tried to spread the injury risk among everyone with the exception of Giambi, who I'm assuming will be restricted to around 300 plate appearances. Outs are just calculated as (1 - OBP) times PA.
Here's how the bench looks.
| Bench | POS | AVG | OBP | SLG | PA | Outs | BR |
| Wilson Betemit | 3B | .258 | .333 | .445 | 350 | 233 | 46 |
| Morgan Ensberg | 1B | .248 | .365 | .446 | 290 | 184 | 40 |
| Jose Molina | C | .243 | .280 | .360 | 250 | 180 | 23 |
| Shelley Duncan | 1B | .243 | .311 | .453 | 250 | 172 | 32 |
| Brett Gardner | OF | .253 | .325 | .327 | 150 | 101 | 15 |
| Alberto Gonzalez | SS | .253 | .301 | .348 | 140 | 98 | 13 |
| Nick Green | UT | .246 | .308 | .397 | 129 | 89 | 14 |
| Jason Lane | OF | .235 | .311 | .414 | 127 | 87 | 15 |
| Chris Woodward | UT | .234 | .294 | .339 | 125 | 88 | 11 |
| Bench Total | .247 | .312 | .404 | 1811 | 1234 | 209 |
I have no idea if any of Jason Lane, Nick Green or Chris Woodward will see any playing time but I figure they will be stashed at Scranton so there's at least some possibility of it. What should be obvious is that the Yankees have two potentially strong bench players in Betemit and Ensberg, who both project well enough to be starters at their respective positions. That helps mitigate any potential injuries in the infield with Betemit's ability to cover any position and with Ensberg presumably able to cover 3B and 1B.
Add it up, and here's what you get.
| Team Total | AVG | OBP | SLG | PA | Outs | BR |
| Starters + Bench | .277 | .355 | .448 | 6681 | 4294 | 933 |
The sigma on a team's runs scored in a season is around 30, so that puts the Yankees in a range of 903-963 runs scored this year on paper using the projections I'm using and the playing time assumptions I'm using.
Looking at baserunning using Lee Panas's bases gained above average, here's how the players that Lee had data for did last year:
| Player | Team | BGAA Hits | BGAA Ground | BGAA Air | BGAA Other | BGAA Total |
| Damon | NYA | 3.7 | 2.3 | 12.3 | 15.3 | 33.6 |
| Rodriguez | NYA | 11.8 | 2.7 | 2.5 | 11.1 | 28.1 |
| Abreu | NYA | 1.1 | 1.2 | 5.7 | 0.7 | 8.7 |
| Jeter | NYA | 9 | -3.6 | 1.3 | -3 | 3.7 |
| Matsui | NYA | 4.5 | 1.5 | -2.3 | -2.8 | 0.9 |
| Cabrera | NYA | 4.9 | 2.6 | -6.9 | -1.4 | -0.8 |
| Cano | NYA | 4.6 | 6 | -5.3 | -8.7 | -3.4 |
| Giambi | NYA | -9.1 | 0.5 | -1 | -0.6 | -10.3 |
| Posada | NYA | -7.5 | -5 | -5.1 | -0.6 | -18.2 |
| Ensberg | NYA | -6.3 | 2.8 | -2.4 | -0.2 | -6.1 |
| 16.7 | 11 | -1.2 | 9.8 | 36.2 |
A team total of 36 would be worth an additional 10 runs, but we should regress that towards average since we only have one year of data. Let's assume the Yankees will be about 5 runs better than average on the bases this year.
So we've got 933 runs at the plate and another 5 on the bases, but unfortunately, we're not quite done yet.
Projecting defense is tricky, but I'm going to take a stab at it anyway. Using zone rating projections and defensive depth charts, here's how that looks.
First up, the expected starters. A full season is about 1450 defensive innings.
| Starters | POS | Inn | Proj CH | Proj ZR | Proj PM | Avg ZR | Avg PM | PMAA | RSAA |
| Jason Giambi | 1B | 500 | 96 | .796 | 77 | .841 | 81 | -4 | -3 |
| Robinson Cano | 2B | 1300 | 479 | .833 | 399 | .823 | 394 | 5 | 4 |
| Alex Rodriguez | 3B | 1300 | 392 | .758 | 298 | .761 | 298 | -1 | -1 |
| Derek Jeter | SS | 1300 | 487 | .806 | 392 | .825 | 402 | -9 | -7 |
| Johnny Damon | LF | 1000 | 257 | .869 | 223 | .862 | 222 | 2 | 1 |
| Melky Cabrera | CF | 1100 | 361 | .898 | 324 | .885 | 320 | 5 | 4 |
| Bobby Abreu | RF | 1300 | 325 | .864 | 280 | .868 | 282 | -1 | -1 |
| Total | 13050 | 2397 | 1993 | 1999 | -5 | -4 |
POS: Position
Inn: Defensive innings
Proj CH: Projected chances
Proj ZR: Projected zone rating
Proj PM: Projected plays made
Avg ZR: Average projected ZR at POS
Avg PM: Average plays made
PMAA: Plays made above average
RSAA: Runs saved above average
That looks like the best defensive team the Yankees have run out there in a while, with only Giambi and Jeter as big minuses. In Giambi's case he probably won't play enough to really hurt the team, and in Jeter's case the more he plays the more he bats so I guess it's not really all that bad.
Filling in the remaining innings with bench guys, here's what I get.
| Bench | POS | Inn | Proj CH | Proj ZR | Proj PM | Avg ZR | Avg PM | PMAA | RSAA |
| Wilson Betemit | 1B | 400 | 77 | .816 | 63 | .841 | 65 | -2 | -2 |
| Wilson Betemit | 2B | 80 | 29 | .813 | 24 | .823 | 24 | 0 | 0 |
| Wilson Betemit | 3B | 50 | 15 | .786 | 12 | .761 | 11 | 0 | 0 |
| Wilson Betemit | SS | 100 | 37 | .793 | 30 | .825 | 31 | -1 | -1 |
| Shelley Duncan | 1B | 100 | 19 | .834 | 16 | .841 | 16 | 0 | 0 |
| Shelley Duncan | LF | 50 | 13 | .871 | 11 | .862 | 11 | 0 | 0 |
| Shelley Duncan | RF | 50 | 12 | .875 | 11 | .868 | 11 | 0 | 0 |
| Jason Lane | LF | 50 | 13 | .869 | 11 | .862 | 11 | 0 | 0 |
| Jason Lane | CF | 200 | 66 | .833 | 55 | .885 | 58 | -3 | -3 |
| Jason Lane | RF | 100 | 25 | .828 | 21 | .868 | 22 | -1 | -1 |
| Morgan Ensberg | 1B | 450 | 87 | .816 | 71 | .841 | 73 | -2 | -2 |
| Morgan Ensberg | 3B | 90 | 27 | .791 | 21 | .761 | 21 | 1 | 1 |
| Nick Green | 2B | 40 | 15 | .804 | 12 | .823 | 12 | 0 | 0 |
| Nick Green | SS | 40 | 15 | .825 | 12 | .825 | 12 | 0 | 0 |
| Chris Woodward | 2B | 30 | 11 | .807 | 9 | .823 | 9 | 0 | 0 |
| Chris Woodward | 3B | 10 | 3 | .846 | 3 | .761 | 2 | 0 | 0 |
| Chris Woodward | SS | 10 | 4 | .842 | 3 | .825 | 3 | 0 | 0 |
| Hideki Matsui | LF | 350 | 90 | .833 | 75 | .862 | 78 | -3 | -2 |
| Johnny Damon | CF | 150 | 49 | .881 | 43 | .885 | 44 | 0 | 0 |
The Yankee bench may end up hitting pretty well for a bench, but they don't look to field particularly well.
Let's add in the catchers:
| Catchers | Inn | SB | CS | CS% | PBWPR | TER | FER | Tot R | R/140 |
| Posada | 1022 | 83 | 31 | 27% | -2 | 1 | 0 | -4 | -4 |
| Molina | 428 | 20 | 14 | 40% | -2 | 0 | 0 | -3 | -8 |
And let's then add it all up.
| Pos | Inn | Proj CH | Proj ZR | Proj PM | Avg ZR | Avg PM | PMAA | RS |
| 1B | 1450 | 279 | .810 | 226 | .841 | 235 | -9 | -7 |
| 2B | 1450 | 534 | .831 | 443 | .823 | 439 | 4 | 3 |
| 3B | 1450 | 438 | .762 | 333 | .761 | 333 | 1 | 0 |
| SS | 1450 | 543 | .806 | 438 | .825 | 448 | -10 | -8 |
| LF | 1450 | 373 | .860 | 321 | .862 | 321 | -1 | -1 |
| CF | 1450 | 476 | .887 | 423 | .885 | 422 | 1 | 1 |
| RF | 1450 | 362 | .862 | 312 | .868 | 314 | -2 | -2 |
| C | 1450 | -7 | ||||||
| Total | 11600 | 3005 | .831 | 2496 | .836 | 2513 | -17 | -13 |
So overall, the Yankees are projecting to be about 13 runs worse than an average team defensively, which seems bad but for them is pretty good considering some of the teams that they've run out there recently.
So what do all these dorky numbers really mean? The Yankee position players project to score about 938 runs and allow 13 runs more than an average team. According to my Diamond Mind projections which should be released sometime around March 24, the average non-Yankee AL team projects to score 786 runs and be average defensively (shocking, I realize).
938 - 13 - 786 = 139
So the Yankee position players project to be about 14 wins better than an average (81 win team). Now injury or a bigger decline than projected could certainly affect those numbers, but then again a meteor could hit earth and make it all moot too. 81 + 14 = 95 wins. The next question will be whether the pitching staff is going to be able to do their part, which I'll try and answer over the next couple of weeks.
Update: In case any one wants to mess around with different playing times, I've made a spreadsheet that you can use. You can download it here. You can change the players and plate appearances on offense, and on defense you can mess around with innings and positions.
For offense, the projected outs should = the expected outs, you'll have to adjust the plate appearances to get to that. On defense, defensive innings at a position should sum up to 1450.
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