The Lessson of the Royals

[stitchface]

The lesson of this postseason is not the value of contact, its the value of baserunning. You can live without power if you run the bases well. The marginal value of a home run decreases with the ability to take an extra base or steal a base. A base gained through a productive out also marginalizes the value of a home run although it is highly likely the cost of the out is not worth the base.

[Hairyducked Idiot]

The Royals lost. Why would I want to take lessons from them?

[Guest]

oh boy...here we go...

[Guest]

The lesson of this postseason is not the value of contact, its the value of baserunning. You can live without power if you run the bases well. The marginal value of a home run decreases with the ability to take an extra base or steal a base. A base gained through a productive out also marginalizes the value of a home run although it is highly likely the cost of the out is not worth the base.

 

The lesson of the Royals is nothing other than the playoffs really ARE a crapshoot.

 

I thought this thread was going to be about spending money on bullpens though.

 

Lessons should never be learned from a single postseason. This is how you wind up trying to copycat different teams every year.

[Hairyducked Idiot]

The lesson of the Royals is that you can be mediocre as hell, get some positive variance in the regular season and get hot in the playoffs.

[Guest]

The Royals lost. Why would I want to take lessons from them?

 

please post this in the offseason thread at psd

 

very relevant and excellent trolling material

[Guest]

The lesson of this postseason is not the value of contact, its the value of baserunning. You can live without power if you run the bases well. The marginal value of a home run decreases with the ability to take an extra base or steal a base. A base gained through a productive out also marginalizes the value of a home run although it is highly likely the cost of the out is not worth the base.

 

The lesson of the Royals is nothing other than the playoffs really ARE a crapshoot.

 

I thought this thread was going to be about spending money on bullpens though.

 

Lessons should never be learned from a single postseason. This is how you wind up trying to copycat different teams every year.

 

 

Oh, I wouldn't copycat the playoffs. The Royals also won a lot of regular season games. The closed-minded will call this variance and luck but that may not be the case. The hypothesis is that baserunning is a market inefficiency and should be used in player and transaction valuations.

[sneakypower]

The lesson of this postseason is not the value of contact

i actually do have a long-standing unfounded theory about teams comprised of high-contact players faring much better in the postseason, which is anecdotally supported by some of the successes that guys like Sandoval, Carpenter, Ortiz, Eckstein, Scutaro have had

 

but 2011 Texas sort of runs counter to that theory, some

[jersey cubs fan]

Lessons should never be learned from a single postseason. This is how you wind up trying to copycat different teams every year.

 

The Jim Hendry ethos.

[bukie]

Oh, I wouldn't copycat the playoffs. The Royals also won a lot of regular season games. The closed-minded will call this variance and luck but that may not be the case. The hypothesis is that baserunning is a market inefficiency and should be used in player and transaction valuations.

 

It'd be a more believable hypothesis had the Royals' baserunning actually provided more value than other teams, but they were actually in the middle of the pack.

 

It's akin to attributing the 2005 White Sox success to grinder ball even though they led the AL in homers.

[Guest]

Oh, I wouldn't copycat the playoffs. The Royals also won a lot of regular season games. The closed-minded will call this variance and luck but that may not be the case. The hypothesis is that baserunning is a market inefficiency and should be used in player and transaction valuations.

 

It'd be a more believable hypothesis had the Royals' baserunning actually provided more value than other teams, but they were actually in the middle of the pack.

 

It's akin to attributing the 2005 White Sox success to grinder ball even though they led the AL in homers.

 

was it 05 or 06 that we got pierre? after 05, right?

[Guest]

The lesson of this postseason is not the value of contact

i actually do have a long-standing unfounded theory about teams comprised of high-contact players faring much better in the postseason, which is anecdotally supported by some of the successes that guys like Sandoval, Carpenter, Ortiz, Eckstein, Scutaro have had

 

but 2011 Texas sort of runs counter to that theory, some

 

 

An exception never disproves anything especially in small sample baseball. My question to you is, have teams with more contact ability actually scored more runs, which would be the correlation that matters for that argument, or has it been the pitching?

[bukie]

On the other hand, one thing the Royals did excel at was fielding and defense (along with the Cardinals), which would actually provide reasoning for some of the positive variance they (and the Cards, actually) had vs their third order win %.

[jersey cubs fan]

Oh, I wouldn't copycat the playoffs. The Royals also won a lot of regular season games. The closed-minded will call this variance and luck but that may not be the case. The hypothesis is that baserunning is a market inefficiency and should be used in player and transaction valuations.

 

It'd be a more believable hypothesis had the Royals' baserunning actually provided more value than other teams, but they were actually in the middle of the pack.

 

It's akin to attributing the 2005 White Sox success to grinder ball even though they led the AL in homers.

 

was it 05 or 06 that we got pierre? after 05, right?

It was after 05, but specifically because of 03.

[Guest]

Oh, I wouldn't copycat the playoffs. The Royals also won a lot of regular season games. The closed-minded will call this variance and luck but that may not be the case. The hypothesis is that baserunning is a market inefficiency and should be used in player and transaction valuations.

 

It'd be a more believable hypothesis had the Royals' baserunning actually provided more value than other teams, but they were actually in the middle of the pack.

 

It's akin to attributing the 2005 White Sox success to grinder ball even though they led the AL in homers.

 

 

Per BP, KC led the MLB in baserunning runs by a wide margin. What metric are you using?

[bukie]

Oh, I wouldn't copycat the playoffs. The Royals also won a lot of regular season games. The closed-minded will call this variance and luck but that may not be the case. The hypothesis is that baserunning is a market inefficiency and should be used in player and transaction valuations.

 

It'd be a more believable hypothesis had the Royals' baserunning actually provided more value than other teams, but they were actually in the middle of the pack.

 

It's akin to attributing the 2005 White Sox success to grinder ball even though they led the AL in homers.

 

 

Per BP, KC led the MLB in baserunning runs by a wide margin. What metric are you using?

FG's Base Running Runs Above Average. They were 1.2 runs above average, while the Nats, Indians and Twins were over 10. (Cubs were basically neutral here).

[Guest]

On the other hand, one thing the Royals did excel at was fielding and defense (along with the Cardinals), which would actually provide reasoning for some of the positive variance they (and the Cards, actually) had vs their third order win %.

 

 

And a big part of defense, that is likely ignored, is not giving up extra bases. I don't know the differences between the baserunning metrics, so I will have to look that up. That's a big difference.

[jersey cubs fan]

And a big part of defense, that is likely ignored, is not giving up extra bases.

 

I question some of the assumptions are make. Why is that likely ignored?

[Guest]

Has BP ever replaced all the smart people that left there?

[Hairyducked Idiot]

On the other hand, one thing the Royals did excel at was fielding and defense (along with the Cardinals), which would actually provide reasoning for some of the positive variance they (and the Cards, actually) had vs their third order win %.

 

 

And a big part of defense, that is likely ignored, is not giving up extra bases. I don't know the differences between the baserunning metrics, so I will have to look that up. That's a big difference.

 

It isn't ignored at all. You can look it up on OF's Baseball-Reference page.

[Guest]

Has BP ever replaced all the smart people that left there?

 

 

No, it has really deteriorated - I've dropped my subscription. The statistical metrics haven't changed though.

[Guest]

And a big part of defense, that is likely ignored, is not giving up extra bases.

 

I question some of the assumptions are make. Why is that likely ignored?

 

I didn't make any assumptions here other than in the statement that is unrelated to the hypothesis. I am not questioning the value of defense in any way. A lot of the defensive metrics were based on range and number of plays made that wouldn't have captured extra bases. I'm sure there are better values out there but its not really germane to the baserunning hypothesis (aside from being able to counter it).

[SouthSideRyan]

The hypothesis is that baserunning is a market inefficiency and should be used in player and transaction valuations.

 

I'm pretty sure it is.