Yankees Sign Masahiro Tanaka

[Guest]

He's much better than any of those guys.

 

And the term fourth outfielder is about as worthless as talking about rotation spots. Even more so when you have multiple platoons.

 

Multiple platoons is not a good thing. Platoons just mean you don't have good enough players and are trying to mask a lot of weaknesses. They do not work out as well as we'd hope in theory.

 

That's a silly stigma. If you can get more production by platooning rather than having one guy you play against both sides, you should do it.

 

Multiple platoons is not a bad thing. Ask the A's.

[Guest]

But we got some crazy-lucky performances from scrapheap guys last year

You keep bringing this up, but don't balance it out with the pitiful scrap heap performances from others. If you add Lillibridge's 1-24 and Clevenger's 1-9 to Donnie Murphy and Cody Ransom, our scrap heap 3B don't look nearly as lucky.

 

If you balance Borbon + Sappelt + Hairston + Gillespie with McDonald and Bogusevic, our scrap heap OF don't look nearly so lucky.

 

On average, we got pretty much average bench performance from those combinations.

[Guest]

He's much better than any of those guys.

.

 

Is he? Why? He's had one year of 1+ WAR in his career, and that required a .401 BABIP.

 

He fits our roster nicely because of his handedness, but I see no reason to think he's better than those guys.

 

I was using "fourth outfielder" to describe his ability more than his role. We have four fourth outfielders and no starters, and that's being generous to Lake.

 

That's one way to paint it, I guess, even though he put up .9 in 120 games with a bad BABIP last year and that one year of 1+ is 2.6 in 91 games.

[Hairyducked Idiot]

Career fWAR/400 PAs

 

Ruggiano: 1.6

Bogusevic: 1.6

[jersey cubs fan]

He's much better than any of those guys.

 

And the term fourth outfielder is about as worthless as talking about rotation spots. Even more so when you have multiple platoons.

 

Multiple platoons is not a good thing. Platoons just mean you don't have good enough players and are trying to mask a lot of weaknesses. They do not work out as well as we'd hope in theory.

 

That's a silly stigma. If you can get more production by platooning rather than having one guy you play against both sides, you should do it.

 

Multiple platoons is not a bad thing. Ask the A's.

 

It's not a stigma, it's the situation the Cubs are in. They only have "platoons" because they don't have good enough players to fill positions.

[Hairyducked Idiot]

But we got some crazy-lucky performances from scrapheap guys last year

You keep bringing this up, but don't balance it out with the pitiful scrap heap performances from others. If you add Lillibridge's 1-24 and Clevenger's 1-9 to Donnie Murphy and Cody Ransom, our scrap heap 3B don't look nearly as lucky.

 

If you balance Borbon + Sappelt + Hairston + Gillespie with McDonald and Bogusevic, our scrap heap OF don't look nearly so lucky.

 

On average, we got pretty much average bench performance from those combinations.

 

In the outfield, it more or less balanced out.

 

In the infield, we got 3.2 wins from Valbuena/Murphy/Ransom/Clevenger/Lillibridge.

[Hairyducked Idiot]

I like platoons. They are the reason our offense will be bad next year and not like historically awful.

[Guest]

Career fWAR/400 PAs

 

Ruggiano: 1.6

Bogusevic: 1.6

 

I'm not gonna put too much effort into this but I would bet that Ruggiano has had a much higher percentage of his PA against same-handed pitching to get to that number.

[Guest]

He's much better than any of those guys.

 

And the term fourth outfielder is about as worthless as talking about rotation spots. Even more so when you have multiple platoons.

 

Multiple platoons is not a good thing. Platoons just mean you don't have good enough players and are trying to mask a lot of weaknesses. They do not work out as well as we'd hope in theory.

 

That's a silly stigma. If you can get more production by platooning rather than having one guy you play against both sides, you should do it.

 

Multiple platoons is not a bad thing. Ask the A's.

 

It's not a stigma, it's the situation the Cubs are in. They only have "platoons" because they don't have good enough players to fill positions.

 

I don't care how good the players they have are, if they have an option on the bench that is substantially better against lefties or righties, then there should be a platoon.

 

If Rizzo is really good, but we have a guy who can play 1B acceptably and OPS .950 against lefties while Rizzo's at .750 or something, then that guy should play for Rizzo against lefties.

[jersey cubs fan]

Okay, that's nice.

[Hairyducked Idiot]

Career fWAR/400 PAs

 

Ruggiano: 1.6

Bogusevic: 1.6

 

I'm not gonna put too much effort into this but I would bet that Ruggiano has had a much higher percentage of his PA against same-handed pitching to get to that number.

 

Well, yeah, he's right-handed and so are most pitchers. He'll be facing a lot of righties this year, too.

 

Career R/L PA percentage:

 

Ruggiano: 59/41

Bogusevic: 13/87

League average: 71/29

[Guest]

Career fWAR/400 PAs

 

Ruggiano: 1.6

Bogusevic: 1.6

 

I'm not gonna put too much effort into this but I would bet that Ruggiano has had a much higher percentage of his PA against same-handed pitching to get to that number.

 

Well, yeah, he's right-handed and so are most pitchers. He'll be facing a lot of righties this year, too.

 

Career R/L PA percentage:

 

Ruggiano: 59/41

Bogusevic: 13/87

League average: 71/29

 

I don't think he'll be facing all that many unless it's out of necessity.

[Guest]

Okay, that's nice.

 

Do you have a counterargument or are you just going to say that good players play everyday or something regardless of whether there may be a better option on a given day?

 

Mentalities like that lead to there being market inefficiencies.

[CubsWin]

I posted this in a different thread, but thought it may apply to this discussion.

 

A very interesting article by Mark Simon of ESPN.com involving a new stat (at least one that I've never heard of) on the Cubs signing of one Justin Ruggiano. The stat is WHAV or well-hit average.

 

One of the proprietary figures that major league teams have at their disposal is information from video-scouting services -- such as Inside Edge, Baseball Info Solutions and Stats LLC -- related to a stat known in the industry as "well-hit average," which is abbreviated as WHAV.

 

WHAV is pretty much what it sounds like -- how often a player ended an at-bat with a hard-hit ball, regardless of whether it resulted in a hit.

 

The video trackers at these companies rate each batted ball. In the case of Inside Edge, they use hard, medium and soft as their three categories for classifying contact.

To sum up the article, Simon provides a pretty strong statistical argument for why Justin Ruggiano will have a rebound season and may be more than just the short end of a RF platoon.

[SouthSideRyan]

But we got some crazy-lucky performances from scrapheap guys last year

You keep bringing this up, but don't balance it out with the pitiful scrap heap performances from others. If you add Lillibridge's 1-24 and Clevenger's 1-9 to Donnie Murphy and Cody Ransom, our scrap heap 3B don't look nearly as lucky.

 

If you balance Borbon + Sappelt + Hairston + Gillespie with McDonald and Bogusevic, our scrap heap OF don't look nearly so lucky.

 

On average, we got pretty much average bench performance from those combinations.

 

Scrap heap guys are supposed to be terrible

[jersey cubs fan]

Okay, that's nice.

 

Do you have a counterargument or are you just going to say that good players play everyday or something regardless of whether there may be a better option on a given day?

 

Mentalities like that lead to there being market inefficiencies.

 

No, you went in a completely different direction from what I was talking about and didn't feel like going down the rabbit hole with you.

[Hairyducked Idiot]

Is there a historic correlation between WHAV and future performance?

[CubsWin]

Is there a historic correlation between WHAV and future performance?

I don't think it's been in existence long enough for there to be a long history to check it against. The stat is dependent upon watching a ton of video and grading the type of contact the player makes with the ball whether it is hit on the ground, on a line or higher in the air. It's essentially a better indicator of luck vs. hard contact than BABIP and presents a more accurate, personalized baseline to judge whether the players ability to hit safely was inflated or deflated by luck. In that sense, it shouldn't predict anything to do with likely future development of a player but should speak to their likelihood to return to the norm in a coming season.

[Guest]

Is there a historic correlation between WHAV and future performance?

I don't think it's been in existence long enough for there to be a long history to check it against. The stat is dependent upon watching a ton of video and grading the type of contact the player makes with the ball whether it is hit on the ground, on a line or higher in the air. It's essentially a better indicator of luck vs. hard contact than BABIP and presents a more accurate, personalized baseline to judge whether the players ability to hit safely was inflated or deflated by luck. In that sense, it shouldn't predict anything to do with likely future development of a player but should speak to their likelihood to return to the norm in a coming season.

Introducing judgment in measurement is not good. Can't they get ball speed off the bat? That seems a valid and more accurate way to measure how hard a ball is hit.

[Guest]

Hit f/x is supposed to tackle that sort of thing, but since it's been black box from the start, I have no idea if it's reliable or if the people behind WHAV even have access to it. Maybe more to the point, by introducing judgment you can also get greater insight. Neither speed off the bat nor WHAV will be comprehensive, so in this case more is more.

[Hairyducked Idiot]

The subjectivity bothers me a little, but the assumption that WHAV is persistent from year to year without any study to the effect bothers me more.

[mul21]

The subjectivity bothers me a little, but the assumption that WHAV is persistent from year to year without any study to the effect bothers me more.

 

That seems like a really, really bad assumption to make without some historical data to back it up, which I'm sure there isn't yet since it's pretty new.

[Guest]

Maybe more to the point, by introducing judgment you can also get greater insight. Neither speed off the bat nor WHAV will be comprehensive, so in this case more is more.

I don't follow you. Insight has nothing to do with measurement. What you seem to be validating is simply part of the reification fallacy that is so common in baseball (e.g.,WAR).

[Guest]

Maybe more to the point, by introducing judgment you can also get greater insight. Neither speed off the bat nor WHAV will be comprehensive, so in this case more is more.

I don't follow you. Insight has nothing to do with measurement. What you seem to be validating is simply part of the reification fallacy that is so common in baseball (e.g.,WAR).

 

Batted ball speed won't be truly indicative of a well hit ball in all cases, just like subjective determinations of "well hit" will have a margin for error in determining the frequency of how well people are truly squaring the ball up. If I have to have one, I'd rather have speed off the bat, but having both is better for being confident in that information. Since as fans all we can get is what's given to us, I'll take WHAV even though it's not a perfect indicator.

[jersey cubs fan]

Maybe more to the point, by introducing judgment you can also get greater insight. Neither speed off the bat nor WHAV will be comprehensive, so in this case more is more.

I don't follow you. Insight has nothing to do with measurement. What you seem to be validating is simply part of the reification fallacy that is so common in baseball (e.g.,WAR).

 

Batted ball speed won't be truly indicative of a well hit ball in all cases, just like subjective determinations of "well hit" will have a margin for error in determining the frequency of how well people are truly squaring the ball up. If I have to have one, I'd rather have speed off the bat, but having both is better for being confident in that information. Since as fans all we can get is what's given to us, I'll take WHAV even though it's not a perfect indicator.

 

What kind of situation would involve a lower batted ball speed but a human being describing it as well hit and having that subjective description be more accurate?