CF Rankings (August 22, 2003)
Interesting look, and subject to the following biases, among others:
- park configuration
- pitcher tendency to allow a different spread of balls
Should be easy enough to adjust for park.
Good stuff!
--posted by TangoTiger at 11:39 AM EDT
Posted 12:57 p.m.,
August 22, 2003
(#1) -
Dactyl
I live in Atlanta and have been a Braves fan for many years. Hence, I've seen a good bit of Andruw Jones. I think it's undeniable that he's put on some weight in the last few years. That leads one to assume that he must have lost some speed but that isn't necessarily the case. For the kinds of short sprints that an outfielder has to make a few extra pounds are not likely to have much effect.
Posted 1:40 p.m.,
August 22, 2003
(#2) -
Scoriano
I asked this elsewhere with no response--it must be a really stupid question but don't pitchers hitting in the NL affect the PO numbers in a way that make direct NL vs. AL comparisons less valuable. P's might make less contact meaning fewer PO opporuities and they may also hit less FBs even when they put it in play. Anyone heave any insights or data on my silly questions?
Posted 1:56 p.m.,
August 22, 2003
(#3) -
tangotiger
This is the number of putouts by OF, for each team. Feel free to come up with "league averages" (it sure seems as though you have alot of NL teams under 1000).
TOR 1088
TEX 1066
TBA 1215
SEA 1172
SLN 1093
SFN 1148
SDN 1014
PIT 907
PHI 940
OAK 976
NYN 1046
NYA 1031
MON 989
MIN 1202
MIL 1083
LAN 1017
KCA 1097
HOU 926
FLO 1051
DET 1150
COL 1062
CLE 1054
CIN 1065
CHN 973
CHA 1081
BOS 983
BAL 1069
ATL 1057
ARI 979
ANA 1182
Posted 2:12 p.m.,
August 22, 2003
(#4) -
KJOK(e-mail)
The DH does make a difference. When you adjust for league and park, Atlanta comes out on top. Interesting San Diego, with "old" Steve Finley, is near the top...
Posted 2:23 p.m.,
August 22, 2003
(#5) -
Scoriano
AL 1098
NL 1022
Difference of approx. 7%
Posted 2:29 p.m.,
August 22, 2003
(#6) -
Scoriano
When you adjust for league and park, Atlanta comes out on top.
Not sure what you mean. Did you take out FBs hit by DHs? Did you adjust for interleague play? What adjustments did you make for park?
Posted 8:45 p.m.,
August 22, 2003
(#7) -
FJM
KJOK: "Interesting San Diego, with "old" Steve Finley, is near the top..."
Old Steve has been in Arizona since 1999. According to Mong, he's slightly below average.
I have a hard time believing Torii Hunter is below average.
Posted 11:04 p.m.,
August 22, 2003
(#8) -
studes
(homepage)
Bob Mong's findings about Andruw Jones' is similar to Jones' Win Shares ranking (see link). There was a recent thread about this in Clutch Hits.
Posted 11:09 a.m.,
August 23, 2003
(#9) -
Amazonian
NL OF get about 7% less FB opportunities and seem to be converting them at a lower rate than AL CFs this year.
NL CFs have an average of 284 putouts to AL average of 310. 93% of 310 is 288. 4 putouts is not much and may just be a small unattributable difference, or an unusual result historically--I don't know I have not looked.
However, it may be that FB In Play to OF in the NL are less likely to be converted to outs for some reason relating to any number of factors, absence of DH, park factors, etc.
In any event the observed 7% difference must be impacting the available number of win shares to NL OFs taken as a whole. 9Am I wrong about this--does win shares account for the opportuinity differences on the defense and pitching side of things?)
In other words, if Cameron or Andruw Jones played for the Cubs or Dodgers they would have less win shares, but presumably roughly the same ability to contribute but not the same opportunities. I think we already knew this.
But what I do find interesting is that there are a number of places where cross-league Win Shares comparisons are inelegant because of the DH. Defensive opportunities varying by league may be one area. Another is offensive Win Shares, where in the AL, offesnive win shares are essentially available to be split among 9 regular offesnive rather than 8 offesnive weapons. Thus, given equal stats, an AL players contributions will be allocated relatively less win shares than equivalent perfromance in the NL. I suspect that over a long period of time that could skew career rankings and the like under James' system.
Posted 11:34 a.m.,
August 23, 2003
(#10) -
studes
(homepage)
In other words, if Cameron or Andruw Jones played for the Cubs or Dodgers they would have less win shares, but presumably roughly the same ability to contribute but not the same opportunities. I think we already knew this.
Actually, that's not right. Fielding Win Shares are not based on opportunities, in general. Outfielders receive fielding win shares based on the percentage of putouts caught by the outfielders. Thus it "corrects" for number of opportunities.
As Mike Emeigh has pointed out, there are some problems with this, particularly with groundball staffs. But the relative difference in flyballs between leagues shouldn't affect the rankings.
Regarding the offensive Win Shares: you're right, but Win Shares essentially is built to do this. A player who creates 100 runs in a league that scores 5.0 runs/game will receive less Win Shares than the one who creates 100 runs in a league that scores 4.5 runs/game. That's because the latter player's runs are more "valuable" within the league context.
Posted 7:28 p.m.,
August 23, 2003
(#11) -
Danny
It's interesting that the A's come in dead last.
1) They have one of the best defenses in baseball.
2) Singleton has been an average of 13 runs above average defensively over the last 3 years according to UZR.
3) Byrnes is 7th among all AL OF in defensive WIn Shares this year. Long is 5th, perhaps he's been ball-hogging.
4) Byrnes is 4th in the AL in Win Shares per 1000 innings, bheind Cameron, Beltran, and Erstad.
What gives?
Posted 7:30 p.m.,
August 23, 2003
(#12) -
Danny
Could it be that the large foul ground in Oakland allows the corner outfielders to catch a higher percentage of flyballs, regardless of who is in CF?
Posted 10:30 p.m.,
August 23, 2003
(#13) -
studes
(homepage)
One of the interesting/weird things that Win Shares does is allocate more fielding win shares to the outfield based on team park-adjsted DER. James' theory is that outfields should get the bulk of the credit for team DER. I really struggle with this part of Win Shares, and the A's are a great example.
The reason their outfielders rank so highly is because their defense leads the league in park-adjusted DER. Only Anaheim's outfield gets more claim points than Oakland's. But Oakland's outield zone rating is 11th of all major league teams. So something doesn't seem right.
Oakland's pitching GB/FB ratio is 1.35, vs. a league average of 1.18. I think that their infield may deserve a bit more of the credit for team DER. But I haven't really studied this further.
Posted 10:07 a.m.,
August 25, 2003
(#14) -
Scoriano
Regarding the offensive Win Shares: you're right, but Win Shares essentially is built to do this. A player who creates 100 runs in a league that scores 5.0 runs/game will receive less Win Shares than the one who creates 100 runs in a league that scores 4.5 runs/game. That's because the latter player's runs are more "valuable" within the league context.
I buy that, but if you are making cross-league player comparisons or even cross-era comparisons to AL or predominantly AL players you should see if an adjustment is necessary. I think you have to do this to be fair to the player. Irealize ARODs Win Shares may be reflective of his value in the AL, but if he were in the NL with the same performance, but only 8 real hitters, his Win Shares would be higher. I don't know what you would need to take into account to make the adjustment. Is there a magic bullet for this? My guess is that its pretty complicated since AL batters bat with more runners on base and other things that make it somewhat easier to have better numbers, so you not only have to ajust upwards for the lack of a 9th real hitter some of the time in the NL but you also have to adjust the AL down a bit for things like that.
Posted 4:54 p.m.,
August 25, 2003
(#15) -
studes
(homepage)
Win Shares probably isn't the right metric for what you're suggesting. You're better off with something like Base Runs, or even runs created for comparisons without team or league contexts. Team and league context is a big part of what Win Shares is about.
Posted 9:44 p.m.,
August 25, 2003
(#16) -
KJOK(e-mail)
"Old Steve has been in Arizona since 1999. According to Mong, he's slightly below average." - OK, what's the symbol for sheepishly stupid smiley...
Posted 9:46 p.m.,
August 25, 2003
(#17) -
KJOK(e-mail)
"When you adjust for league and park, Atlanta comes out on top.
Not sure what you mean. Did you take out FBs hit by DHs? Did you adjust for interleague play? What adjustments did you make for park?"
I adjusted for the 7% difference in leagues, and then applied the past 3 years run park factors as a proxy for "fielding park effects" which is probably not 100% valid.
Posted 3:11 a.m.,
August 29, 2003
(#18) -
Ken Arneson
(homepage)
Could it be that the large foul ground in Oakland allows the corner outfielders to catch a higher percentage of flyballs, regardless of who is in CF?
Oakland's foul territory isn't really that wide in the outfield. But the infielders catch way more popups than do those of other teams, I'm sure.
Does the definition of "fly balls" in this study include infield popups?
Posted 12:33 p.m.,
August 31, 2003
(#19) -
RossCW
I don't think outfield range is a zero sum game. If the left-fielder catches a ball that deosn't mean the center-fielder has less range - it may mean the left-fielder has more. That's probably part of the problem with Torii Hunter's ranking - he plays between outfielders with the range to play center.