Colvin to start taking grounders at 1B

[Sammy Sofa]

productive offensive player? sure. but with the team as it is constructed now, adding him in is worthless when the defense is this bad. if we fielded a better defense, dunn even at first base is worth it for the runs he would give up. i'm not opposed to the idea. but i think and i think you would agree, there are higher priorities that need to be taken care of first, the defense being one of them. if you can improve the defense AND get adam dunn, go for it.

 

I don't agree at all that "fixing" the defense is a higher priority than addressing the team's offensive needs.

[SouthSideRyan]

When did our defense become an issue?

[Sammy Sofa]

I have no idea.

[ConstableRabbit]

FWIW, the Cubs are 28th in Defensive Efficiency this season. In 2007, they were 1st. In 2008, they were 2nd. In 2009, they were 5th.

 

Is our pitching staff giving up enough line drives to make that significant of a difference?

[Sammy Sofa]

That strikes me as some bizarre fluctuation. You see a trend, and then suddenly everything plummets like that? Why?

[SouthSideRyan]

That's crazy considering the defensive changes that have been made from '09 to '10. Where's the downgrade coming from?

 

Ramirez I suppose. Theriot at 2B?

[Sammy Sofa]

That's crazy considering the defensive changes that have been made from '09 to '10. Where's the downgrade coming from?

 

Ramirez I suppose. Theriot at 2B?

 

Yeah, this is really surprising. I wouldn't have been surprise to see a continuing decline, but that drop is insane. You had Byrd taking over in CF, which is a plus. You had Fukudome moving back to RF which is a plus. Is it the number of errors?

[Guest]

When talking about defensive efficiency, it doesn't necessarily have to be a player or couple players that are causing the year to year difference. Looking at UZR/150, the Cubs have moved from -1.8 last year to -1.5 this year. They were +13.5 in 2007 and +4.8 in 2008.

[Sammy Sofa]

I guess I'm just very confused then. What would typically account for such significant variation?

[lumafia]

Maybe that is a flawed statistic. Maybe we should create a statistic that verifies the statistical merits of certain statistics.

[loukycub]

That's crazy considering the defensive changes that have been made from '09 to '10. Where's the downgrade coming from?

 

Ramirez I suppose. Theriot at 2B?

 

Yeah, this is really surprising. I wouldn't have been surprise to see a continuing decline, but that drop is insane. You had Byrd taking over in CF, which is a plus. You had Fukudome moving back to RF which is a plus. Is it the number of errors?

 

it may be. aren't we tops in both unearned runs and errors? i have no idea what happened to the defense either. but it has become an issue that needs to be fixed.

[lumafia]

I guess I'm just very confused then. What would typically account for such significant variation?

 

The Cubs have 97 errors already this year compared to the 08 team that had 99 and the 09 team that had 105.

 

We've already had 24 errors at 3B, 21 at SS and 13 at 2B. Impressive.

[Hairyducked Idiot]

It might be blasphemy, but Castro wouldn't be a bad place to look.

[Rob]

I guess I'm just very confused then. What would typically account for such significant variation?

 

Tons of factors. Age, bench players, injuries, etc...

 

Also worth noting is that Defensive Efficiency is simply the reverse of batting average on balls in play. It just keeps track of whether or not the play was made... not whether it should have been made. So it is possible the opposing teams had a disproportionate number of times where they simply managed to "hit em where they aint," so to speak. I would caution against chalking the whole thing up to bad luck though, we've definitely gotten a bit worse in the field the last few years.

[Sammy Sofa]

That's crazy considering the defensive changes that have been made from '09 to '10. Where's the downgrade coming from?

 

Ramirez I suppose. Theriot at 2B?

 

Yeah, this is really surprising. I wouldn't have been surprise to see a continuing decline, but that drop is insane. You had Byrd taking over in CF, which is a plus. You had Fukudome moving back to RF which is a plus. Is it the number of errors?

 

it may be. aren't we tops in both unearned runs and errors? i have no idea what happened to the defense either. but it has become an issue that needs to be fixed.

 

The errors seem to be the issue, but is it really something that can or should be "fixed?" If you end up looking to fix defense uber alles you tend to end up with some really underwhelming offense. It seems a ton of it can be attributed to to Aramis and Castro and Theriot. Aramis is definitely having an off year, and it seems to be a pretty safe bet that Castro will improve plus Theriot is gone, so there doesn't really seem to be a pressing need to "fix" the defense over the offense.

[lumafia]

It might be blasphemy, but Castro wouldn't be a bad place to look.

 

Fortunately for Castro, the defense at SS has been bad for a long time. Even in 07 when the Cub defense was considered good, they had 19 errors at SS.

[SouthSideRyan]

I guess I'm just very confused then. What would typically account for such significant variation?

 

Tons of factors. Age, bench players, injuries, etc...

 

Also worth noting is that Defensive Efficiency is simply the reverse of batting average on balls in play. It just keeps track of whether or not the play was made... not whether it should have been made. So it is possible the opposing teams had a disproportionate number of times where they simply managed to "hit em where they aint," so to speak. I would caution against chalking the whole thing up to bad luck though, we've definitely gotten a bit worse in the field the last few years.

 

UZR would take into account the factors listed in your first line. It would also taken into account whether we've gotten worse in the field from '09 to '10.

[Rob]

I guess I'm just very confused then. What would typically account for such significant variation?

 

Tons of factors. Age, bench players, injuries, etc...

 

Also worth noting is that Defensive Efficiency is simply the reverse of batting average on balls in play. It just keeps track of whether or not the play was made... not whether it should have been made. So it is possible the opposing teams had a disproportionate number of times where they simply managed to "hit em where they aint," so to speak. I would caution against chalking the whole thing up to bad luck though, we've definitely gotten a bit worse in the field the last few years.

 

UZR would take into account the factors listed in your first line. It would also taken into account whether we've gotten worse in the field from '09 to '10.

 

I'm aware. I was just responding to (what I interpreted to be) mojo asking how our defensive efficiency could have tanked so quickly.

 

Now that I'm rereading it, it seems he's wondering about the discrepancy between UZR and DE.

[lumafia]

Cubs are 4-18 in their last 22 games. Just throwing that out there. I'd put Colvin at 3B at this point, even if he is LH. Who cares.

[Sammy Sofa]

I guess I'm just very confused then. What would typically account for such significant variation?

 

Tons of factors. Age, bench players, injuries, etc...

 

Also worth noting is that Defensive Efficiency is simply the reverse of batting average on balls in play. It just keeps track of whether or not the play was made... not whether it should have been made. So it is possible the opposing teams had a disproportionate number of times where they simply managed to "hit em where they aint," so to speak. I would caution against chalking the whole thing up to bad luck though, we've definitely gotten a bit worse in the field the last few years.

 

UZR would take into account the factors listed in your first line. It would also taken into account whether we've gotten worse in the field from '09 to '10.

 

I'm aware. I was just responding to (what I interpreted to be) mojo asking how our defensive efficiency could have tanked so quickly.

 

Now that I'm rereading it, it seems he's wondering about the discrepancy between UZR and DE.

 

Both, actually. I'm genuinely curious.

[loukycub]

That's crazy considering the defensive changes that have been made from '09 to '10. Where's the downgrade coming from?

 

Ramirez I suppose. Theriot at 2B?

 

Yeah, this is really surprising. I wouldn't have been surprise to see a continuing decline, but that drop is insane. You had Byrd taking over in CF, which is a plus. You had Fukudome moving back to RF which is a plus. Is it the number of errors?

 

it may be. aren't we tops in both unearned runs and errors? i have no idea what happened to the defense either. but it has become an issue that needs to be fixed.

 

The errors seem to be the issue, but is it really something that can or should be "fixed?" If you end up looking to fix defense uber alles you tend to end up with some really underwhelming offense. It seems a ton of it can be attributed to to Aramis and Castro and Theriot. Aramis is definitely having an off year, and it seems to be a pretty safe bet that Castro will improve plus Theriot is gone, so there doesn't really seem to be a pressing need to "fix" the defense over the offense.

 

i will grant you trades may have helped in that getting some of that bad defense out. i think it may be better when a new manager comes in, because i don't think fundamentals were addressed very well though the season or in spring training.

 

but i also know that d-lee saved a bunch of errors too. how many errors do you think we pick up now that he's gone? no bs serious question.

 

personally i would rather have players who can catch the ball rather than hit the ball. and if a player can do both well its a bonus. i don't think having dunn at first base nets a positive runs produced/runs given up and dunn is in his 30s now. i don't think his defense is likely to improve much more.

[Sammy Sofa]

Does anyone have a breakdown as to a prediction as to the difference in 1B defense in regards to Dunn vs. Lee? I honestly think at this point there's not a significant enough difference to make someone decide to opt not to sign Dunn.

 

Again, 1B is traditionally where you dump guys who can't play defense. It's arguably the least important defensive position on the field, and a ton of the Cubs' errors seem to have not come from throws but from miscues and mistakes on the part of 3B, SS and 2B in regards to fielding and not their throws to 1st. If you were really focused on "catching the ball better" (which is a Hendry-ism) if there ever was one then the issue isn't at 1B.

 

It just seems incredibly backwards to focus on defense given everything else that desperately needs work when it comes to this team.

[Rob]

Does anyone have a breakdown as to a prediction as to the difference in 1B defense in regards to Dunn vs. Lee? I honestly think at this point there's not a significant enough difference to make someone decide to opt not to sign Dunn.

 

Again, 1B is traditionally where you dump guys who can't play defense. It's arguably the least important defensive position on the field, and a ton of the Cubs' errors seem to have not come from throws but from miscues and mistakes on the part of 3B, SS and 2B in regards to fielding and not their throws to 1st. If you were really focused on "catching the ball better" (which is a Hendry-ism) if there ever was one then the issue isn't at 1B.

 

It just seems incredibly backwards to focus on defense given everything else that desperately needs work when it comes to this team.

 

Weirdly enough, 1B is really hard to get a good read on with defensive metrics. I mean, we can figure out how good somebody is at fielding grounders, pop flys, and line shots around the bag... but being able to scoop throws out of the dirt? That's tougher. And I haven't seen enough of Dunn's glovework at 1B to feel comfortable speculating.

[dew1679666265]

personally i would rather have players who can catch the ball rather than hit the ball.

 

I don't want to downplay defense that much, but I value offense a lot more in baseball. It doesn't matter how good your defense is, if you can't score runs, you're not going to win games. I can't back this up statistically (somebody else might be able to prove me right or wrong on this), but it seems far more likely that a team with awful defense and great hitting would win more games than a team with awful hitting and great defense.

 

The thinking being that with great defense and no offense, you're relying on luck for the most difficult part of the game - scoring. With a great offense, however, you'll have to outslug some teams, but you are good at the most difficult part of the game. Defense can be patched far more easily than offense and good defensive players are much, much cheaper than good offensive players.

[Magnetic Curses]

 

personally i would rather have players who can catch the ball rather than hit the ball. and if a player can do both well its a bonus. i don't think having dunn at first base nets a positive runs produced/runs given up and dunn is in his 30s now. i don't think his defense is likely to improve much more.

 

i'll take "cezar izturis and ronnie cedeno as the cubs middle infield tandem for the next decade" for 500, alex.