Greene to Cards close

[erik316wttn]

I'm pretty sure the last time the Cardinals traded for a Padres shortstop, it worked out pretty well for them.

[rchap24]

There's going to be a lot of crying on NSBB about Greene next season.

 

I'm not going to lose sleep over it

[Colin Wyers]

Of the 71 players that BP lists as playing SS last year, Greene is 61st with a whopping -7.1 (yes, negative) VORP. Our li'l bitty gritty Riot was 10th out of 71 with a 27.9 rating.

 

What's VORP? I'm guessing it's a combination of stats, but which ones? Thanks.

 

VORP stands for "value over replacement player," and is the number of runs a player is expected to contribute on offense above a hypothetical replacement player at his position - like, say, a waiver-wire pickup, or a minor-league non-prospect, or a free agent available for the league minimum. (Yes, sometimes you get a guy off the trashheap and he does what Jim Edmonds did for us last season. Replacement level is the average of that - actual replacements will play above or below that rate from time to time.)

 

As for how those runs are estimated, it's using OBP and SLG. The full formula's a bit complex, but it's based on basic Runs Created, which is:

 

OBP * SLG * AB

 

Essentially, VORP estimates the run scoring of a typical team with the player in question, and then with his replacment, and then the player is credited with the difference.

 

And so long as I'm on the subject - VORP underrates players with high walk rates. It also overrates DHes. There are some other issues as well.

[Colin Wyers]

3 wins from one position = slight upgrade?

 

Yeah, no kidding, right? The way I figure marginal wins, 7-8 wins gives you Albert Pujols. So I have no idea what scale he's on.

[Mephistopheles]

and overrates a ton of players on good teams

[Mephistopheles]

What are the chances of this happening over 200 PA, given those numbers? It's not that large of a sample. He hit at home essentially like he always does.

 

Around 4%, give or take if we're assuming his true talent is at his career road line. I am not saying it was all attributed to luck last season, I'm merely saying that despite our updated value his true talent level has decreased, it hasn't decreased a ton. How much depends on the person. To think it's a complete collapse is a little hasty, for a guy with his track record of production. The most likely scenario is that he was trying to play through a wrist injury, or something of that nature, and it hampered his production significantly. Really, injuries are pretty much the most likely explanations.

 

Fire away with the anti-PECOTA rant if you must.

 

PECOTA is going to get Khalil Greene wrong. PECOTA isn't equipped to tackle cases like his.

 

Yeah, no kidding, right? The way I figure marginal wins, 7-8 wins gives you Albert Pujols. So I have no idea what scale he's on.

 

Again, I wasn't meaning 3 wins is marginal. I was merely using three as a whole number to explain my point about a team with wins around 90, each individual win has very high value, though a three win increase from Izturis/Slop to Greene has a pretty good chance of happening.

 

dude you said we had a 30% chance of making the playoffs last year and we won the division by like 30 games

 

No I didn't. I had us at like 90 wins or something. As for the rest of the difference. Sorry I didn't foresee Ryan Dempster becoming a bit of a pitching God and Mark DeRosa having the best year of his career by a significant margin. I can't be Nostradamus or anything. I didn't have us in the low 80s last season. I probably said we had a 30 percent chance going into 2007 though.

[Keener98]

But you did say JR Towels would win the rookie of the year.....

[sneakypower]

dude you said we had a 30% chance of making the playoffs last year and we won the division by like 30 games

 

No I didn't. I had us at like 90 wins or something. As for the rest of the difference. Sorry I didn't foresee Ryan Dempster becoming a bit of a pitching God and Mark DeRosa having the best year of his career by a significant margin. I can't be Nostradamus or anything. I didn't have us in the low 80s last season. I probably said we had a 30 percent chance going into 2007 though.

 

yes you did

 

I don't know? What's a 30% increase in expected playoff probability (ie DOUBLING OUR PLAYOFF CHANCES)?

 

emphasis yours

[Z38Cubs]

There's really no point in arguing with this guy. He's always right, and anyone who thinks differently is clueless. Seriously, this act has been going on for like 2 years, and it's getting old. Fortunately, he'll probably end up doing something to get banned again.

[Colin Wyers]

Yeah, no kidding, right? The way I figure marginal wins, 7-8 wins gives you Albert Pujols. So I have no idea what scale he's on.

 

Again, I wasn't meaning 3 wins is marginal. I was merely using three as a whole number to explain my point about a team with wins around 90, each individual win has very high value, though a three win increase from Izturis/Slop to Greene has a pretty good chance of happening.

 

Marginal wins means wins above X - average, replacement, Cesar Izturis, etc. And yeah, sure, if you ignore defense Izturis had a bad season in 2008. I don't see how ignoring shortstop defense is a credible way to evaluate baseball, though. Justin Inaz's TotalValue stats have Theriot and Izturis dead even in value in 2008, once defense is taken into account.

[Mephistopheles]

Cro Magnon, you know what i meant by that comment

[Mephistopheles]

Marginal wins means wins above X - average, replacement, Cesar Izturis, etc. And yeah, sure, if you ignore defense Izturis had a bad season in 2008. I don't see how ignoring shortstop defense is a credible way to evaluate baseball, though.

 

Really, I had no idea.

 

I am ignoring defense for a shortstop in my analysis, I'm pretty sure never mentioned anything of the like?

 

I'm pretty sure I have no idea why you're even mentioning marginal wins as X-average. I've used the word marginal once in this thread only because you brought it up. My point was that the value of the wins that Greene generates us over Theriot are worth a lot higher than your typical win. If you want to think of that difference as Greene's marginal wins over RP - Theriot's marginal wins over an RP or average or w/e level you want. Fine. It's a waste of time to calculate that stuff when you can calculate the difference between the two just as easily.

 

If someone really wants to know what I think Greene gives the Cubs over Theriot. I'd project Greene giving the Cubs a .280 or so EqA. I'd peg Ryan Theriot somewhere in the .255 range, give or take. Again, there's no need to be much more precise than ballparks on these sorts of things. That difference, over the course of 660 PAs, is going to be in the high teens for runs, precisely at .280 and .255 it'll be 19.3 or so. There's a few more hidden runs in there in Khalil's advantage that we can ignore for now. You know where they come from on the offensive side of the game. As for their difference in defense. Defensive stat's suck and are for the most part, nearly useless. I'll let you dictate their difference in defense. Let's, for the sake of simplicity, assume the Cubs are a 820/720 team with Theriot, which you can bitch about if you choose to. Any slight difference is irrelevant.

 

First column is defensive difference (+ means Greene is better)

+10 - +2.68 W

+05 - +2.18 W

+00 - +1.68 W

-05 - +1.18 W

-10 - +0.68 W

-17 - +0.00 W

 

I'd probably say the difference between the two is around two wins, for the Cubbies. I'd also say that the two wins at 88 or 90 wins or any total close to that is worth a lot more than $6.5m + decent RP prospects.

[BigbadB]

There's really no point in arguing with this guy. He's always right, and anyone who thinks differently is clueless. Seriously, this act has been going on for like 2 years, and it's getting old. Fortunately, he'll probably end up doing something to get banned again.

 

It really doesn't have to be an argument at all. Agree to disagree and move on. You won't ever hear me claim to be Meph's biggest fan, but if he believes Greene has the capacity to be a top ML shortstop, it's his fantasy, let him live it.

 

It's a discussion board. Differing opinions are the backbone of a discussion board. If we all held the same beliefs and values, there really wouldn't be much to discuss now, would there?

 

If nothing else, the merits of Khalil Greene's baseball abilities have at least detracted the constant page refreshments of the Jake Peavy thread, which is perfectly fine by me.

[Mephistopheles]

And all other things constant, this move would take the Cardinals from an 84 win team to an 87 win team, roughly, if the defense change was nothing. I'd say Greene would cost the Cardinals five or so runs on defense. So we're at, give or take 84.4-->86.6.

 

Given a the standard distribution of wins for a season. If the Cubbies are a true talent 90 win team and the Cardinals are a true talent 86.8 win team.

 

This increase gives the a 62.8% chance the Cubs finish ahead of the Cardinals 33.0% chance the Cardinals win outright.

Take away this increase, the Cardinals only have a 24.0% chance. So basically it took the Cardinals from about a 1 in 4 chance of winning the NL Central to a 1 in 3 chance of winning the NL Central. If Greene can duplicate the defense, which is probably pretty likely in the eyes of the Cardinals front office, the Cubs chances drop below 60%.

 

Is that increase worth seven million and a couple prospects for the Cardinals? You know, probably.

 

There's also a pretty high chance that they also gained significant strides in the likelihood of winning the WC. The last few years the WC winner in the NL has been right around 89 wins. If we assume that 89 wins gets them the WC, and that either them or the Cubs win the NL central, then this move takes them from a 49% chance to a 56% chance of making the playoffs. If we further assume that if they get in the playoffs, they face a relatively standard schedule. Say an 90 win team in the first round, 92 win team in the second round and a 92 win team in the third, true talent of course.

 

Then if they're in the playoffs, this move gives them an increase from a 6.9% chance of winning the whole enchilada to a 8.4%.

 

So now let's estimate the entire increase on their probability of winning the World Series.

 

3.3% Before

4.7% After

 

It may not seem like much, but it's a VERY significant increase. Nearly forty percent increase based on the move. Didn't the Tigers alone make like $30something mil in extra revenue because of their WS run?

[davearm2]

You forgot the enormous 100-point font asterisk that discloses all of the above assumes Greene can boost his OPS back up to the .800 range.

[Colin Wyers]

Marginal wins means wins above X - average, replacement, Cesar Izturis, etc. And yeah, sure, if you ignore defense Izturis had a bad season in 2008. I don't see how ignoring shortstop defense is a credible way to evaluate baseball, though.

 

Really, I had no idea.

 

I am ignoring defense for a shortstop in my analysis, I'm pretty sure never mentioned anything of the like?

 

I'm pretty sure I have no idea why you're even mentioning marginal wins as X-average. I've used the word marginal once in this thread only because you brought it up. My point was that the value of the wins that Greene generates us over Theriot are worth a lot higher than your typical win. If you want to think of that difference as Greene's marginal wins over RP - Theriot's marginal wins over an RP or average or w/e level you want. Fine. It's a waste of time to calculate that stuff when you can calculate the difference between the two just as easily.

 

If someone really wants to know what I think Greene gives the Cubs over Theriot. I'd project Greene giving the Cubs a .280 or so EqA. I'd peg Ryan Theriot somewhere in the .255 range, give or take. Again, there's no need to be much more precise than ballparks on these sorts of things. That difference, over the course of 660 PAs, is going to be in the high teens for runs, precisely at .280 and .255 it'll be 19.3 or so. There's a few more hidden runs in there in Khalil's advantage that we can ignore for now. You know where they come from on the offensive side of the game. As for their difference in defense. Defensive stat's suck and are for the most part, nearly useless. I'll let you dictate their difference in defense. Let's, for the sake of simplicity, assume the Cubs are a 820/720 team with Theriot, which you can bitch about if you choose to. Any slight difference is irrelevant.

 

First column is defensive difference (+ means Greene is better)

+10 - +2.68 W

+05 - +2.18 W

+00 - +1.68 W

-05 - +1.18 W

-10 - +0.68 W

-17 - +0.00 W

 

I'd probably say the difference between the two is around two wins, for the Cubbies. I'd also say that the two wins at 88 or 90 wins or any total close to that is worth a lot more than $6.5m + decent RP prospects.

 

I really think you're handling the transition from R/O to R/PA wrong here, and that's giving you an inflated sense of what the difference between Theriot and Greene is on offense. If you want to step me through how you're getting those runs per 660 PA figures then we can have a discussion.

 

(And a .280 EqA for Greene? Really? That's interesting, if by interesting you mean "totally cracked." You really expect him to tie his career-high EqA next year? Remember - EqA is park-adjusted.)

 

I ran the figures real quick using the forecasted wOBA off Fangraphs, with a little park adjustment thrown in, and I'm coming up with a 7 run gap on offense in Greene's favor. Then a +12 for Greene over Theriot in defense (using Rally's projections), and you're looking at around 1.5-2 wins difference between them.

[Rob]

(And a .280 EqA for Greene? Really? That's interesting, if by interesting you mean "totally cracked." You really expect him to tie his career-high EqA next year? Remember - EqA is park-adjusted.)

 

Just to pick a fight... park-adjustments aren't specific enough to be of great use when you've got players on the extremes in flyball or groundball tendencies. It doesn't matter much if Juan Pierre is playing in Coors or Petco... but it sure as hell makes a difference for a guy like Khalil Greene.

[Colin Wyers]

(And a .280 EqA for Greene? Really? That's interesting, if by interesting you mean "totally cracked." You really expect him to tie his career-high EqA next year? Remember - EqA is park-adjusted.)

 

Just to pick a fight... park-adjustments aren't specific enough to be of great use when you've got players on the extremes in flyball or groundball tendencies. It doesn't matter much if Juan Pierre is playing in Coors or Petco... but it sure as hell makes a difference for a guy like Khalil Greene.

 

That's a broad generalization of what park factors are and how they work. Specific park factors - like the BB-Ref park factors - sure, you can say that. But we have component park factors and batted ball park factors available to us if we want them.

[Rob]

(And a .280 EqA for Greene? Really? That's interesting, if by interesting you mean "totally cracked." You really expect him to tie his career-high EqA next year? Remember - EqA is park-adjusted.)

 

Just to pick a fight... park-adjustments aren't specific enough to be of great use when you've got players on the extremes in flyball or groundball tendencies. It doesn't matter much if Juan Pierre is playing in Coors or Petco... but it sure as hell makes a difference for a guy like Khalil Greene.

 

That's a broad generalization of what park factors are and how they work. Specific park factors - like the BB-Ref park factors - sure, you can say that. But we have component park factors and batted ball park factors available to us if we want them.

 

I was under the impression EqA is calculated with broad park factors, and no regard to specific BB data.

[Mephistopheles]

I was under the impression EqA is calculated with broad park factors, and no regard to specific BB data.

 

You would be correct. Colin would be incorrect. I've recovered the park factors that Baseball Prospectus has used in EqA for the last ten years. It's constant for each player on a team, with a few exceptions. It's actually scaled as to what percentage each player had in each park, which of course is better. It makes no finer tune adjustments.

 

I really think you're handling the transition from R/O to R/PA wrong here, and that's giving you an inflated sense of what the difference between Theriot and Greene is on offense. If you want to step me through how you're getting those runs per 660 PA figures then we can have a discussion.

 

(And a .280 EqA for Greene? Really? That's interesting, if by interesting you mean "totally cracked." You really expect him to tie his career-high EqA next year? Remember - EqA is park-adjusted.)

 

I ran the figures real quick using the forecasted wOBA off Fangraphs, with a little park adjustment thrown in, and I'm coming up with a 7 run gap on offense in Greene's favor. Then a +12 for Greene over Theriot in defense (using Rally's projections), and you're looking at around 1.5-2 wins difference between them.

 

Well 1.5 to 2 wins isn't really different than what I am projecting, with the exception of me being a little more optimistic on the offensive side of the equation. As for how I calculated runs. I reconstructed the EqR based on 660 PAs so that would be 5.2*outs*eqa^2.5. I also have to make a side adjustment for OBP%, what in my actual analysis I ignored it for the reason that the two OBP%'s were close and we're talking about a small hand full of outs that Theriot used. Even in accounting the difference, as 10 outs, all of this will be negated by Ryan Theriot's caught stealing, and one vital thing that my DRA uses that EqA should but does not, GIDPs. Because Theriot is a groundball first hitter, as you know, he hits into a lot more GIDPs than your typical hitter. Greene, being an extreme flyball hitter, doesn't hit into quite as many as Theriot. It's only a small handful extra per year, but couple those with outs made on the bases and you close the gap, at least in my eyes, of the OBP difference between the two with respect to outs. FWIW: I'm expecting Theriot to OBP around .350 and I would expect Greene to OBP around .330. Over 660 PAs, that's 13 outs. I'd expect Theriot to ground into about 4 more GIDPs and get caught about 6 more times on base. So we're really only looking at an extra inning with respect to that 20 point OBP difference. You may think I am a little too optimistic with my OBP projection of Greene, but that's all we're differing on. There's nothing wrong with my analysis on how his .330/.280 projection gets the difference over 19 wins.

 

EqA is park adjusted from a value standpoint. As I mentioned above it makes no adjustments further than that. Are there other ways that are better to make more accurate translations for a player, yes. But from a value standpoint, the way they do it would be correct. We are answering an entirely different question.

 

Actually, my .280 EqA isn't really that far out of the blue. His road EqA the three previous seasons were .285, .282, .280 and the season prior to those three he nearly OPS'd 900 so he was up around that mark too.

 

Anyways, component factors aren't perfect.

[17 Seconds]

The part that sucks for Meph is that even if Greene has a good season next year (and I think he will), he'll never get credit for being right because everyone will just be all "blah blah blah Cardinal pxie dust blah blah"

[Mephistopheles]

I don't want to be right.

[imb]

I don't want to be right.

 

why start now, anyway

[Mephistopheles]

The Gods would just be toying with me if Greene really did go .280/.340/.520 or so this season.

[OleMissCub]

The Gods would just be toying with me if Greene really did go .280/.340/.520 or so this season.

 

in AAA