Ain't small sample sizes fun?

charlieoscar

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In spite of the attempt, the apparently successful attempt to build a ground-ball oriented staff (GB/FB = 1.27...AL = 0.76; AO/GO = 1.36...AL = 0.92), the club has yet to turn a double play.
 
In spite of hitting five home runs on opening day, the club's SLG is .385 and they have yet to hit a double (although I suspect that most of their five HR would have been doubles, at best, in Fenway Park and some outfielders might have handles Bogaerts' triple a bit better).
 
The only prediction that I'll make from this is that I don't think we will be seeing a lot of DPs involving Bogaerts at short. He tends to bring his glove hand back to his throwing hand and look at the transfer every time and it seems to cost a beat.
 

grimshaw

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Adrian Gonzalez has accumulated 1.1 WAR, and the top 13 players by defensive runs saved are all catchers.
 

pokey_reese

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grimshaw said:
Adrian Gonzalez has accumulated 1.1 WAR, and the top 13 players by defensive runs saved are all catchers.
This one might indicate a tweak to the calculation of catcher WAR with framing.
 

grimshaw

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pokey_reese said:
This one might indicate a tweak to the calculation of catcher WAR with framing.
That's exactly what I thought.  We're going to have a 5 way tie for catchers as MVPs by 2020. 
 

pokey_reese

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grimshaw said:
That's exactly what I thought.  We're going to have a 5 way tie for catchers as MVPs by 2020. 
It does make you wonder how convincing the numbers would have to be in order to get people to overcome the deeply ingrained feeling that catchers are basically role players, and that their excess value comes from their contributions at the plate over their peers. What if the sabermetrics community becomes more and more convinced by the data that pitch framing, controlling the running game, and game calling are way more valuable than we think. Could a guy who hits .250/.320/.375 ever win an MVP?
 

kieckeredinthehead

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grimshaw said:
That's exactly what I thought.  We're going to have a 5 way tie for catchers as MVPs by 2020. 
 
pokey_reese said:
It does make you wonder how convincing the numbers would have to be in order to get people to overcome the deeply ingrained feeling that catchers are basically role players, and that their excess value comes from their contributions at the plate over their peers. What if the sabermetrics community becomes more and more convinced by the data that pitch framing, controlling the running game, and game calling are way more valuable than we think. Could a guy who hits .250/.320/.375 ever win an MVP?
 
If and when the voters for the MVP become convinced that catcher framing ability is the greatest single impact on game outcome, we will have robot umpires by the following season.
 

charlieoscar

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kieckeredinthehead said:
 
 
If and when the voters for the MVP become convinced that catcher framing ability is the greatest single impact on game outcome, we will have robot umpires by the following season.
 
How about robot catchers?
 

charlieoscar

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pokey_reese said:
It does make you wonder how convincing the numbers would have to be in order to get people to overcome the deeply ingrained feeling that catchers are basically role players, and that their excess value comes from their contributions at the plate over their peers. What if the sabermetrics community becomes more and more convinced by the data that pitch framing, controlling the running game, and game calling are way more valuable than we think. Could a guy who hits .250/.320/.375 ever win an MVP?
 
Hughie (Ee-yah) Jennings, HoF'er who played the bulk of his career before 1900 once said, "You can forgive a catcher for not hitting, for he has so much else on his mind." Perceptions change.
 

Rice4HOF

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pokey_reese said:
It does make you wonder how convincing the numbers would have to be in order to get people to overcome the deeply ingrained feeling that catchers are basically role players, and that their excess value comes from their contributions at the plate over their peers. What if the sabermetrics community becomes more and more convinced by the data that pitch framing, controlling the running game, and game calling are way more valuable than we think. Could a guy who hits .250/.320/.375 ever win an MVP?
What bothers me is the opposite. Poor defensive catcher who really should be a DH or 1B but has good offensive stats and gets talked about as a great all time catcher. But if he was a 1B he'd be a good hitter for that position, but otherwise not lauded quite as much.  Yes, I'm looking at you, Mike Piazza.
 

Papelbon's Poutine

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Rice4HOF said:
What bothers me is the opposite. Poor defensive catcher who really should be a DH or 1B but has good offensive stats and gets talked about as a great all time catcher. But if he was a 1B he'd be a good hitter for that position, but otherwise not lauded quite as much.  Yes, I'm looking at you, Mike Piazza.
 
John Dewan, from MIT Sloan, tackled this topic a couple years ago for the Fielding Bible II and for Bill James' website. 
 
In short, outside of allowing a lot of SBs, not only was he not poor defensively, he was actually above average. Here's a couple snippets: 
 
If it was true that Piazza was not a good defensive catcher, I would be OK with him not getting into the Hall on the first ballot. I still think the best hitting catcher of all time should be in the Hall, but having to wait a few years wouldn’t be so bad. But, all the statistical measures suggest otherwise. In fact, they suggest that Piazza was an above-average defensive catcher. 
<snip>
The most important part of a catcher’s job is handling his pitchers and in this area Piazza was superb. Here is one of the most telling statistics. In his career behind the plate, pitchers had a 3.80 ERA when Piazza was catching. If you look at all the other catchers who caught the same pitchers in the same year that Piazza did, they allowed a 4.34 ERA. That’s a major difference, much more important than a few extra bases stolen. (In fact, Piazza’s catcher ERA of 3.81 includes the run value of any extra stolen bases he allowed.)
Craig Wright wrote an excellent article in The Hardball Times Baseball Annual 2009 called Piazza, Hall of Fame Catcher. He did a detailed sabermetric study that showed that hitters had a .723 OPS with Piazza behind the plate and a .748 OPS with other catchers. This 25-point differential is highly significant. In further studies that we did in The Fielding Bible—Volume II, we found that Piazza saved at least 20 to 70 runs more than an average catcher defensively, depending on the technique that we used.
<snip>
"Mike Piazza was not a defensive liability who made up for it with his bat. The greatest offensive catcher in the history of Major League Baseball was a good defensive catcher as well."
 
 
There's obviously the same debate as for any other defensive analysis, but I don't think it's fair to uphold the idea that he was a butcher or that as you said, he should be playing another position because he was hurting his team. 
 
(Here's the full article: http://www.billjamesonline.com/should_mike_piazza_be_in_the_hall_of_fame_/  If you do some googling, he's not the only analyst that maintains this opinion.) 
 

Rice4HOF

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Ok, I stand corrected and thank you for the links. I guess what bothers me is the reasoning that "I still think the best hitting catcher of all time should be in the Hall" which I assume means Dewan would believe that even if Piazza was a butcher.
 
I've always compared him to Carlos Delgado in my mind, who was simliar offensively and started out as a catcher but was so bad they moved him to 1B/DH, and he was never considered an elite player after that.  If HE had stayed as a catcher and avoided injury and had the same offensive numbers, he wouldn't have dropped off the HoF ballot after one season. But he'd have been LESS valuable to his teams. 
 

Papelbon's Poutine

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Rice4HOF said:
Ok, I stand corrected and thank you for the links. I guess what bothers me is the reasoning that "I still think the best hitting catcher of all time should be in the Hall" which I assume means Dewan would believe that even if Piazza was a butcher.
 
I've always compared him to Carlos Delgado in my mind, who was simliar offensively and started out as a catcher but was so bad they moved him to 1B/DH, and he was never considered an elite player after that.  If HE had stayed as a catcher and avoided injury and had the same offensive numbers, he wouldn't have dropped off the HoF ballot after one season. But he'd have been LESS valuable to his teams. 
 
I definitely think Delgado probably should have stayed on the ballot a little longer, but I don't see it as some egregious offense that he didn't get in and I think there's a much bigger argument made that his spending his best years in Toronto, playing in an era that had many contemporaries that were better (enhanced or not) is more to blame for that. He only made 2 All Star games in a 17 year career. 
 
As to the bolded quotee, I think you're conflating "not a good defensive catcher" with being a "butcher". I don't think Dewan is saying he would vote him in if he was a butcher (in which case he likely would have been moved, like Delgado was and we never would have had this discussion). He saying not only is he not a butcher, he was supplied positive defensive value; had he merely been average, he still should be in because he literally the best ever at the other 50% of his job. 
 
It's probably neither here nor there, but I also think you're both overestimating Delgado's place in history at his position and underrating Piazza's. Ranks at position for a couple advanced stats (for rate stats, let use 5000k PA): 
 
fWAR : Delgado (44.2/48th) - Piazza (62.5/6th)
wRC+ : Delgado (135/26th) - Piazza (140/1st)
wOBA+ : Delgado (.391/31st) - Piazza (.390/2nd) 
 
As to the change in position thing, I'm not really sure how you can play that game - hypotheticals don't really help the discussion. I have no idea how valuable Mariano Rivera would have been as a starter, nor do I have any idea how valuable Pedro would have been as a closer; so I don't see the point in raising the hypothetical. Delgado was that bad at C that his coaches moved him. When it comes to HoF that's all you can look at. 
 

PrometheusWakefield

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It's not a member of the Red Sox, but for next generation pitching stats in small sample sizes you can't get much better than Brandon McCarthy right now. 12 IP, 19 Ks, 1 BB, 6 HR. That's a 14.50 K/9, 0.75 BB/9 and 4.50 HR/9 - and 50% HR/FB. Good enough for a 6.75 ERA, 6.56 FIP and 1.39 xFIP.
 
He ranks third in baseball among qualified starters by xFIP, 75th (9th worst) by FIP.
 

soxhop411

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@TimBritton: Aaron Harang is the only starting pitcher to complete the sixth inning against the Red Sox so far this season.
 

OCST

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As much as I have enjoyed the start, there has to be a SSS alert re: the extent to which the Red Sox' hot start has been helped along by atrocious fielding by their adversaries.

Fully granting that good teams make their own luck, take advantage of opponents' mistakes, etc, unless Cherington and JF invented some sort of Jedi mind trick to make opposing fielders boot the ball all over the yard, they won't get as many gifts as they have so far.
 

Frank Castillo

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OilCanShotTupac said:
As much as I have enjoyed the start, there has to be a SSS alert re: the extent to which the Red Sox' hot start has been helped along by atrocious fielding by their adversaries.

Fully granting that good teams make their own luck, take advantage of opponents' mistakes, etc, unless Cherington and JF invented some sort of Jedi mind trick to make opposing fielders boot the ball all over the yard, they won't get as many gifts as they have so far.
 
True, but on the other hand, Boston's fielding hasn't been great either, and they've done well despite that. Eight errors in eight games.
 

Plympton91

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Rice4HOF said:
I've always compared him to Carlos Delgado in my mind, who was simliar offensively and started out as a catcher but was so bad they moved him to 1B/DH, and he was never considered an elite player after that.  If HE had stayed as a catcher and avoided injury and had the same offensive numbers, he wouldn't have dropped off the HoF ballot after one season. But he'd have been LESS valuable to his teams. 
Is it at all reasonable to assume that Delgado would have been able to maintain the same numbers as a catcher? Isn't it almost universal in history that players' offensive numbers improve after they move out from behind the plate, even when they do so late in their careers? Wouldn't it be reasonable to assume that had Piazza been a 1Bman, his offensive numbers would have been even more gaudy than they were at C, if only due to playing an extra 10 to 20 games a year? And, isn't it far easier to avoid injury as a 1B/DH than as a full-time catcher? Piazza's durability at the least durable position on the field is a point significantly in his favor, I'd think.
 

Soxfan in Fla

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Plympton91 said:
Is it at all reasonable to assume that Delgado would have been able to maintain the same numbers as a catcher? Isn't it almost universal in history that players' offensive numbers improve after they move out from behind the plate, even when they do so late in their careers? Wouldn't it be reasonable to assume that had Piazza been a 1Bman, his offensive numbers would have been even more gaudy than they were at C, if only due to playing an extra 10 to 20 games a year? And, isn't it far easier to avoid injury as a 1B/DH than as a full-time catcher? Piazza's durability at the least durable position on the field is a point significantly in his favor, I'd think.
Over a 7 year period from 96-02 he played 135-152 games all at catcher, including the first 3 seasons of that run being between 148-152. That's incredible durability at the C position.
 

DJnVa

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Soxfan in Fla said:
Over a 7 year period from 96-02 he played 135-152 games all at catcher, including the first 3 seasons of that run being between 148-152. That's incredible durability at the C position.
 
 
I think you need to check your "games played at catcher" numbers because in the middle of that run where you have him playing 135-152 games at catcher he was winning Silver Sluggers at 1B.
 
According to b-ref he played a total of 5 innings at catcher in the big leagues.
 
So, uh, no.
 

Toe Nash

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DrewDawg said:
 
 
I think you need to check your "games played at catcher" numbers because in the middle of that run where you have him playing 135-152 games at catcher he was winning Silver Sluggers at 1B.
 
According to b-ref he played a total of 5 innings at catcher in the big leagues.
 
So, uh, no.
He was talking about Piazza, not Delgado.
 
So, uh, no.
 
Though, it's not quite accurate, and while he played a lot of games at catcher, he didn't complete all those games, so it's not as impressive (though usual for NL catchers).
 
From 96-02, I get 938 games at catcher for Mike, 925 games started, and 744 complete games. Average 134 games, 132.1 GS, 106.2 CG.
 
7920 inning caught, or 8.44 per game.
 

Plympton91

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Back to small sample sizes, the small same size of this pitching rotation is doing nothing to convince me that this world class offense is going to have to fire on all cylinders in order for this team to win. Masterson is awful, Buchholz still maddening. Porcelo decidedly ordinary, and the bullpen positively frightening. I don't think they can continue to rely on scoring 6+ runs every night, though it'll be fun when then do.
 

DJnVa

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Toe Nash said:
He was talking about Piazza, not Delgado.
 
So, uh, no.
 

Well then. Carry on.
 
I blame my boss for interrupting and asking me about work assignments when I'm trying to avoid them.
 

Hank Scorpio

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Mike Napoli has scored twice as many runs (8) as he has hits (4).
 
He also has more stolen bases (1) and triples (1) than he has doubles, home runs and RBI combined (0).
 
Ryan Hanigan also has 4 runs vs 2 hits, and is among the top 40 players in the AL in OBP (.346) despite having the sixth worst batting average in the AL (.105).
 

Gunfighter 09

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Despite being in the top ten in MLB in most offensive categories, the Red Sox are last in doubles.
 
 In the last ten years, the Red Sox have finished first in doubles 6 times, second twice, 6th once and 9th the other time. 
 

charlieoscar

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In spite of ranking 4th or 5th in the league in lowest AVG/OPB/SLG/OPS/BABIP, the Red Sox are almost at the top of the league in runs allowed per game. Why? Well, they are tied for the fewest GDP turned, lead in most runs allowed  by error (ROE), and are tied for second in sac flies allowed. Also, they are second in the league in most times for a reliever entering the game in a high leverage situation.
 
Strangely, though, they have zero situations when the reliever came in in medium leverage situations.Is this a case of leaving starters in a batter, or so,  too long?
 

Fireball Fred

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The SSS issue that concerns me is X - he's hitting .395 and driving in game-winning runs, but that's with a .450 BABIP and one hard-hit ball. He's looking better in the field, but he's not necessarily hitting well at all, and certainly not using the power we know he has. Of course, SSS works both ways .... 
 

foulkehampshire

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Fireball Fred said:
The SSS issue that concerns me is X - he's hitting .395 and driving in game-winning runs, but that's with a .450 BABIP and one hard-hit ball. He's looking better in the field, but he's not necessarily hitting well at all, and certainly not using the power we know he has. Of course, SSS works both ways .... 
 
He's shaved his K% in half and is walking more.
 
The difference between his approach is night and day. The power will come at some point so I wouldn't necessarily worry about that. 
 

EllisTheRimMan

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foulkehampshire said:
 
He's shaved his K% in half and is walking more.
 
The difference between his approach is night and day. The power will come at some point so I wouldn't necessarily worry about that. 
He's going opp field a lot and with great success. I think this is a new approach and as he gets more comfortable at the plate and in the field I think we'll see him drive the ball more to left/left-center/center. I think/hope he's figuring things out and he is destined for a very good year.
 

Saints Rest

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EllisTheRimMan said:
He's going opp field a lot and with great success. I think this is a new approach and as he gets more comfortable at the plate and in the field I think we'll see him drive the ball more to left/left-center/center. I think/hope he's figuring things out and he is destined for a very good year.
Wasn't there a quote from or about Hanley in the middle of ST where he expressed confidence that hitting well the other way was the precursor to pulling?

There is also regular agreement that one can tell when Ortiz is hitting well when he's sending balls to LC.

Yet I also seem to recall a general sentiment, most recently expressed about Allen Craig last season, that hits to the opposite field were a harbinger of loss of bat speed.

So is hitting the other way a positive indicator or a negative one? Or if it can be either, which applies to X at the moment?
 

benhogan

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Saints Rest said:
Wasn't there a quote from or about Hanley in the middle of ST where he expressed confidence that hitting well the other way was the precursor to pulling?

There is also regular agreement that one can tell when Ortiz is hitting well when he's sending balls to LC.

Yet I also seem to recall a general sentiment, most recently expressed about Allen Craig last season, that hits to the opposite field were a harbinger of loss of bat speed.

So is hitting the other way a positive indicator or a negative one? Or if it can be either, which applies to X at the moment?
Its positive, usually indicates a hitter is keeping his hands inside the ball and he is not trying to pull the outside pitch (which leads to infield grounders)
 
Think of Gwynn, Boggs, and Jeter as guys hat kept their hands inside and sprayed hits to the opposite side of the field.
 

rodderick

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Saints Rest said:
Wasn't there a quote from or about Hanley in the middle of ST where he expressed confidence that hitting well the other way was the precursor to pulling?

There is also regular agreement that one can tell when Ortiz is hitting well when he's sending balls to LC.

Yet I also seem to recall a general sentiment, most recently expressed about Allen Craig last season, that hits to the opposite field were a harbinger of loss of bat speed.

So is hitting the other way a positive indicator or a negative one? Or if it can be either, which applies to X at the moment?
 
Considering Xander is 22 years old and isn't recovering from an injury, I wouldn't be concerned about a loss of bat speed.
 

Red(s)HawksFan

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Saints Rest said:
Wasn't there a quote from or about Hanley in the middle of ST where he expressed confidence that hitting well the other way was the precursor to pulling?

There is also regular agreement that one can tell when Ortiz is hitting well when he's sending balls to LC.

Yet I also seem to recall a general sentiment, most recently expressed about Allen Craig last season, that hits to the opposite field were a harbinger of loss of bat speed.

So is hitting the other way a positive indicator or a negative one? Or if it can be either, which applies to X at the moment?
 
It's positive if the player is driving the ball to the opposite field as it demonstrates that the player is letting the ball get deep on him before pulling the trigger (he's seeing it longer, basically).  I remember numerous times when Manny would starting hitting the ball with authority to right and right center and Remy would mention that it was a sign he was about to go on a tear.  He was usually correct.
 

EllisTheRimMan

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I think as a 22 yo who struggled mightily in his rookie campaign he's just trying to put the bat on the ball. Going oppo is a good way to increase the likelihood that this will happen. He's also walking more, striking out less (SSS warning) so I'm relatively bullish about this season and future ones. I don't know if he's doing this on his own, being coached or some combination of the two. Regardless, it's working so far and as the weather heats up, I believe the raw power will come around.
 

grimshaw

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Zack Cozart, he of the .268/.300 slash line last year, has tied his HR total from last year already and is 7th in MLB in slugging.
 

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Bud Norris, with his 17.42 ERA, has a strand rate of 22% through his first three starts.
 

curly2

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Stephen Drew has more homers than David Ortiz, Mike Napoli, Pablo Sandoval, Xander Bogaerts and Daniel Nava combined.
 

curly2

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It still applies even if you only count his road homers (3 out of his 4 so far).
 

DJnVa

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SSS, but good lord, I can't wait until Mookie Betts' BABIP rises from the anemic .213 it's sitting at now.
 

mikeford

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The entire team is hitting a combined .230 to open the season.

I coulda sworn the FO spent roughly the GDP of a small African nation to fix the offense but here we are.
 

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mikeford said:
The entire team is hitting a combined .230 to open the season.

I coulda sworn the FO spent roughly the GDP of a small African nation to fix the offense but here we are.
The vaunted offense is slumping/sucking/unlucky at the feet of the BABIP gods/underperforming/whatever, the pitching is off to a terrible start, yet they are in first place and on a 91-win pace.

Bizarre.
 

grimshaw

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Ian Desmond has a fielding % of .890
 
Manuel Margot has yet to K in 50 PA.  The leader in MLB is Ender Inciarte with 3 k's in 61 PA.  He's also only walked once.
 
Napoli and Papi are 12th and 10th worst in baseball out of 193 in LD%.  They are both still beating Andrew McCutchen though.