Angels

[stitchface]

Their success with RISP does make up for their other deficincies on offense. The success might not be attainable in future seasons but it is one of the main reasons they have been able to win with a below-average offense.

 

It was just an observation someone made. They hit well with RISP, thus why they were successful.

 

Why is this having to be dissected to the nth degree again?

 

Since they led the league in average, it makes sense they led the league in RISP average.

 

Boston: .281

New York: .276

Tampa Bay: .274

Detroit: .272

Cleveland: .271

LA Angels: .270 :-k

 

 

hmm, that is puzzling . . . :D

[burnt out cubbie fan]

Personally, I don't think Neifi got bashed enough until he really went off the deep end in the last quarter of the season, but that's just me.

[CubDad4Ever]

Again, my whole point in the nefi argument, is defense counts at critical positon. Mike Lewis undersold this argument in Moneyball. Bill James is well aware and values defense more and feels quantification is at an all time high , for example will carroll lauded nefis defense this year. He is not an all star :shock: However his misplacement in the lineup was not his fault he delivered a solid year. Defense and pitching will beat good hitting every time . That and a varity of offense will be necessary , because no team save the yankees has a stud ops guy at every positon , you would have to sacrifice defense. Ask the yankees if they wish they had a cf this morning. Its not easy shaping a roster, thats why its dangerous to not look at different values in players. I too realize the top of the order needs a huge obp boost , but i know we need to pitch and defend better to have a chance at the big prize. God Bless the new bleachers

[BigbadB]

I would agree that pitching and defense will win a lot of ball games. I would also argue that good OBP at the top of the line up helps you win games that the pitching may not be up to par.

 

The White Sox and Angels had good pitching and good defense. Anaheim had a .340 OBP from the lead off spot and a .333 OBP from the #2 spot. That decent OBP led to 117 RBI's from the 3 spot and 122 from the 4 spots in the order.

 

The White Sox got a .341 OBP from lead off and a .335 OBP from the #2 spot in the order. That led to 102 and 108 RBI's in the 3 and 4 spots.

 

The Cubs had a .299 OBP in the lead off spot, and a .317 OBP in the 2 spot. We got 93 RBI's from the 3 spot. The 3 spot was where one of the absolute best hitters in baseball camped out most of the season. Had the Cubs put guys with .335 or .340 OBP's in the top two spots, Lee's numbers should have been better than those put up by the Angels hitters in those same spots. The Cubs did get 114 RBI's from the clean up spot, but I think that probably had a lot more to do with Lee than the top two spots once again. The Cubs scored 122 runs from the #3 spot. They scored 83 from the lead off spot and 90 from the #2 spot. This is a direct correlation to the OBP being produced from those two spots in the line up.

 

The worst part is that this was a blatantly obvious problem, yet no one did anything to solve the problem. Matt Murton produced a .400 OBP most of the season, and he hit 6th or didn't play. Walker should have been hitting lead off, and Hairston and Murton should have been hitting 2nd. Neifi hit .305 as a 7 hole hitter this year, which was actually good production for that spot in the order.