Slugging or On Base Fueled OPS?

[Hairyducked Idiot]

For Fun:

My Team of 8 Sammy Sosa clones vs your Team of 8 John Olerud clones. We are playing in the NL.

 

8 Sammy Sosa would instantly produce 528 runs just by jacking the ball out the yard solo in 159 games.

8 John Oleruds would instantly produce 192 runs with his homeruns (24HRs to adjust for Sosas PA advantage).

the Sosa's have an advantage of 336 runs just by the solo home run alone.

 

Each Olerud adjusted to account for Sosa's 722 PA would make 429 outs with an OBP of .450. 55 less outs than every Sammy Sosa* 8 players = 440 extra outs. So John Oleruds guys have 440 'extra' outs to make up the 336 Sosa solo home runs advantage. For every out they roughly need to make up 3/4 a run they are losing to Sosa's solo HR advantage.

 

Want to put guys on base and see what happens?

Roughly for every 24 HR Olerud would have a runner on .450=11 2 run HRs.

Roughly for every 66 HR Sosa would have a runner on .370=24 2 run HRs

Sosa would have more 3 run HR and grand slams too.

 

There is more to the difference between Olerud and Sosa than "home run or not" and "out or not."

[Hairyducked Idiot]

for the sake of argument:

 

Assuming Olerud's number in 1998 were above his career norms, wouldn't a statistician say that given the extra plate appearances with runners on, etc., Olerud would be less likely to maintain his above-career numbers and more likely to regress towards the mean of his career numbers?

 

 

so would sosa.

 

i'm not talking about sosa. i'm talking about your citing that Sosa had more plate appearances than Olerud with runners in scoring position. Sosa is the control here, and you're adding the variable of Olerud getting extra hypothetical plate appearances to even out their opportunities. my question was do statisticians maintain that Olerud would continue his current season numbers over those additional plate appearances (small sample size) or regress towards his career numbers over those plate appearances (large sample size).

 

John Olerud would probably regress to the mean in the additional plate appearances.

 

But if you recall, the discussion was "98 Olerud" versus "98 Sosa." This clearly implies that we are discussing a theoretical Olerud and Sosa that both maintain their 98 rates.

[Derwood]

for the sake of argument:

 

Assuming Olerud's number in 1998 were above his career norms, wouldn't a statistician say that given the extra plate appearances with runners on, etc., Olerud would be less likely to maintain his above-career numbers and more likely to regress towards the mean of his career numbers?

 

 

so would sosa.

 

i'm not talking about sosa. i'm talking about your citing that Sosa had more plate appearances than Olerud with runners in scoring position. Sosa is the control here, and you're adding the variable of Olerud getting extra hypothetical plate appearances to even out their opportunities. my question was do statisticians maintain that Olerud would continue his current season numbers over those additional plate appearances (small sample size) or regress towards his career numbers over those plate appearances (large sample size).

 

John Olerud would probably regress to the mean in the additional plate appearances.

 

But if you recall, the discussion was "98 Olerud" versus "98 Sosa." This clearly implies that we are discussing a theoretical Olerud and Sosa that both maintain their 98 rates.

 

correct, so even mentioning more plate appearances for Olerud is moot

[Hairyducked Idiot]

for the sake of argument:

 

Assuming Olerud's number in 1998 were above his career norms, wouldn't a statistician say that given the extra plate appearances with runners on, etc., Olerud would be less likely to maintain his above-career numbers and more likely to regress towards the mean of his career numbers?

 

 

so would sosa.

 

i'm not talking about sosa. i'm talking about your citing that Sosa had more plate appearances than Olerud with runners in scoring position. Sosa is the control here, and you're adding the variable of Olerud getting extra hypothetical plate appearances to even out their opportunities. my question was do statisticians maintain that Olerud would continue his current season numbers over those additional plate appearances (small sample size) or regress towards his career numbers over those plate appearances (large sample size).

 

John Olerud would probably regress to the mean in the additional plate appearances.

 

But if you recall, the discussion was "98 Olerud" versus "98 Sosa." This clearly implies that we are discussing a theoretical Olerud and Sosa that both maintain their 98 rates.

 

correct, so even mentioning more plate appearances for Olerud is moot

 

No, because comparing their value means they would swap places.

 

Keeping dancing, though.

[Derwood]

what is the general opinion (among sabermetricians) of the following Runs Created formula:

 

AB's x OBP x SLG

 

:?:

[Transmogrified Tiger]

From what I remember, OBP * SLG is slightly better than straight OBP + SLG, but I don't think the increased utility was worth the effort in calculating it, since there are options better than both.

[Lefty]

From what I remember, OBP * SLG is slightly better than straight OBP + SLG, but I don't think the increased utility was worth the effort in calculating it, since there are options better than both.

 

But OBP*SLG*ABs approximates Runs. So it would seem easy to compare two players by adjusting Runs for outs used.

 

Two .800 OPS guys, one .400 OBP and one .300 OBP, the .400 guy would create more runs and would use fewer outs.

[Transmogrified Tiger]

From what I remember, OBP * SLG is slightly better than straight OBP + SLG, but I don't think the increased utility was worth the effort in calculating it, since there are options better than both.

 

But OBP*SLG*ABs approximates Runs. So it would seem easy to compare two players by adjusting Runs for outs used.

 

Two .800 OPS guys, one .400 OBP and one .300 OBP, the .400 guy would create more runs and would use fewer outs.

 

At that point though you might as well just use one of the more accurate Runs Created formulas. That's what I was getting at. It's slightly better than the widely available OPS, but not as good as the still widely available better RC formulas, EqA, etc.

[Derwood]

From what I remember, OBP * SLG is slightly better than straight OBP + SLG, but I don't think the increased utility was worth the effort in calculating it, since there are options better than both.

 

But OBP*SLG*ABs approximates Runs. So it would seem easy to compare two players by adjusting Runs for outs used.

 

Two .800 OPS guys, one .400 OBP and one .300 OBP, the .400 guy would create more runs and would use fewer outs.

 

At that point though you might as well just use one of the more accurate Runs Created formulas. That's what I was getting at. It's slightly better than the widely available OPS, but not as good as the still widely available better RC formulas, EqA, etc.

 

how accurate is it compared to the more complicated formulas?

[Transmogrified Tiger]

From what I remember, OBP * SLG is slightly better than straight OBP + SLG, but I don't think the increased utility was worth the effort in calculating it, since there are options better than both.

 

But OBP*SLG*ABs approximates Runs. So it would seem easy to compare two players by adjusting Runs for outs used.

 

Two .800 OPS guys, one .400 OBP and one .300 OBP, the .400 guy would create more runs and would use fewer outs.

 

At that point though you might as well just use one of the more accurate Runs Created formulas. That's what I was getting at. It's slightly better than the widely available OPS, but not as good as the still widely available better RC formulas, EqA, etc.

 

how accurate is it compared to the more complicated formulas?

 

I can't remember off hand. If you google some combination of "correlation" "runs" "OPS", etc. you should find something. That's how I found a table that had run a bunch of different metrics.

 

Or we could wait for Meph to get here.

[Derwood]

FWIW, using AB*OBP*SLG,

 

Sosa = 156.8 RC

Olerud = 137.1 RC

 

for that reason alone, I expect Meph to completely discredit the formula ;)

[Lefty]

FWIW, using AB*OBP*SLG,

 

Sosa = 156.8 RC

Olerud = 137.1 RC

 

for that reason alone, I expect Meph to completely discredit the formula ;)

 

We are using 1998 for both, right? Olerud made 385 outs, creating 9.61 runs per 27 outs. Sosa 480 and 8.82. And Sosa's OPS was slightly higher.

 

The runs created formulas are what should be used. But most of us don't tote those around with us or can quickly calculate them on the spot. When confronted with OPS your response must be quick. SLG*OBP is something most of us can handle.

[Derwood]

FWIW, using AB*OBP*SLG,

 

Sosa = 156.8 RC

Olerud = 137.1 RC

 

for that reason alone, I expect Meph to completely discredit the formula ;)

 

We are using 1998 for both, right? Olerud made 385 outs, creating 9.61 runs per 27 outs. Sosa 480 and 8.82. And Sosa's OPS was slightly higher.

 

The runs created formulas are what should be used. But most of us don't tote those around with us or can quickly calculate them on the spot. When confronted with OPS your response must be quick. SLG*OBP is something most of us can handle.

 

lest I sound too much like a Sosa homer (which I'm not):

 

Sosa (1998 MVP) = 156.8 RC

McGwire = 179.9 RC

[ConstableRabbit]

FWIW, using AB*OBP*SLG,

 

Sosa = 156.8 RC

Olerud = 137.1 RC

 

for that reason alone, I expect Meph to completely discredit the formula ;)

 

We are using 1998 for both, right? Olerud made 385 outs, creating 9.61 runs per 27 outs. Sosa 480 and 8.82. And Sosa's OPS was slightly higher.

 

The runs created formulas are what should be used. But most of us don't tote those around with us or can quickly calculate them on the spot. When confronted with OPS your response must be quick. SLG*OBP is something most of us can handle.

 

lest I sound too much like a Sosa homer (which I'm not):

 

Sosa (1998 MVP) = 156.8 RC

McGwire = 179.9 RC

 

Sosa's team went the playoffs (albeit barely), while McGwire's did not.

 

Not that those who vote for MVP look at runs created anyway, but we all know that, despite a few exceptions, MVPs play on playoff teams.

[Mephistopheles]

FWIW, using AB*OBP*SLG,

 

Sosa = 156.8 RC

Olerud = 137.1 RC

 

for that reason alone, I expect Meph to completely discredit the formula ;)

 

that's not the only reason...

 

I mean I could say that RC doesn't look at park effects, which it should. His EqA and MLVr were higher.

[Derwood]

for the sake of nit-picking, are you basing Olerud's (or anyone's) "not making outs" solely on his OBP? (ie a .447 OBP = not making outs 44.7% of the time)? Edited August 8, 2007 by Derwood

[Soul]

From a player's perspective, I'd take SLG-based OPS. It puts more bread on the table.