nilodnayr

I think theres a risk in using pythag over small samples. Games like the April 30th 19-5 walloping we put on the brewcrew (I was at the game and it was awesome), have such a significant skewing impact when you are just looking at an 11 game sample. Taking out that game, it drops us from +11 to -3, worth a couple games in the pythag standings. I'm sure there have been analyses done as to when pythag becomes credible...anyone know of any? There are sample size concerns, but Pythagorean W/L is supposed to be more reliable over small sample sizes (and remember, a full season is a small sample size - everything is technically a sample) than straight win-loss records; that's why it exists. That said, if you're worried about blowouts skewing the Pythag, check out this. It's a Pythagorean win estimator on a per game basis, and it's capped, so no one game skews the estimate too much. Yeah, I mean if you think about it, that 14 run differential gets spread out over the 11 games, you are only upping it slightly more than 1 run a game. Like I said, it has a couple run difference in the pythag. I like the capped idea as usually in a blow out a manager will throw out his slop hitters or force a pitcher to stay in a game to save the bullpen, etc which ends up resulting in a greater run differential than there should be.

Then at the same time you shouldn't look at his SLG in a vacuum considering he's stolen 7 bases. Exactly. You might want to look at EQA, which takes that into account. Theriot's EQA is .269, only marginally better than the .247 he put up a year ago. The CS's are killing him offensively. Cedeno, for a point of comparison, is sporting a .350 EQA. Which is Bonds-like. Gotta look at the sample size there. Ronny's had a nice 50 at bats. But I'm not about to call for Theriot's head when he's getting on base 2 times every 5 plate appearances. Pot meet Kettle How does that make any sense at all? It doesn't. My point (since you seem to be missing it) is that it's incredibly foolish to take a guy who's hitting .320 and getting on base 40% of the time he digs in, and say "hey, I know you're playing great but I think this guy could be better because he's younger and hit better in the minors three years ago." That's just stupid, and no manager in baseball will bench a guy who's hitting very well because there's a "prospect" on his bench that could do better. If Theriot starts to struggle, I'll want to see Cedeno get more playing time. I'm not some big Theriot fan or some big Cedeno hater. I'm just a realist who isn't going to bitch and moan because our backup SS isn't getting enough playing time when the starter is doing a just fine job. It gets tiring seeing the hate towards Theriot on this board. It makes sense because you appropriately cite sample size to take Cedeno's #s within context, yet don't apply them to Theriot. You are being hypocritical, hence, "pot meet kettle". I'm not missing anything, you are just using garbage to back up your point and don't seem to understand the opposing view. The opposing view is that Ronny Cedeno and Ryan Theriot are doing well, infact better than their true talent, but that Ronny Cedeno, based not only on the brief 2008 season, but moreso based on each player's body of work is a much better option to start at SS than Theriot. If you want to play the hot hand, fine, but that would mean Cedeno should be getting just as many, if not more start than Theriot. Your argument is that Theriot would be "wronged" by Cedeno starting over him because Theriot is hitting so well, but you fail to mention, or maybe notice, or maybe are ignoring that Cedeno is hitting better. "hey, I know you're playing great but I think this guy could be better because he's younger and hit better in the minors three years ago."---that kind of assenine comment doesn't help your cause...unless your cause is to make you look dumb. I know you know that Cedeno had a monster year last year.

Yeah, theres no way anyone could catch up to his heater up in the zone, but even if it looks good coming out of his hand, if he doesn't have a whole lot else to through, guys will guess it and lay off.

I've posted it before, but heres mgl's rant about how griffey is the worst full time player in baseball and possibly worst in the history of the game. http://www.insidethebook.com/ee/index.php/site/comments/sabermetric_moves_of_the_2008_pre_season/#158

And if you could add correctly you'd find that we actually went 2-8 after taking out the 19-5 game, making it all the more unlucky :D I like to be conservative and not assume that we'll win a game that we outscore an opponent by 14. :?: In our last 11 games we were 3-8. If you remove the 19-5 game, then we are 2-8, not 3-7.

Then at the same time you shouldn't look at his SLG in a vacuum considering he's stolen 7 bases. Exactly. You might want to look at EQA, which takes that into account. Theriot's EQA is .269, only marginally better than the .247 he put up a year ago. The CS's are killing him offensively. Cedeno, for a point of comparison, is sporting a .350 EQA. Which is Bonds-like. Gotta look at the sample size there. Ronny's had a nice 50 at bats. But I'm not about to call for Theriot's head when he's getting on base 2 times every 5 plate appearances. Pot meet Kettle

And if you could add correctly you'd find that we actually went 2-8 after taking out the 19-5 game, making it all the more unlucky :D

I think theres a risk in using pythag over small samples. Games like the April 30th 19-5 walloping we put on the brewcrew (I was at the game and it was awesome), have such a significant skewing impact when you are just looking at an 11 game sample. Taking out that game, it drops us from +11 to -3, worth a couple games in the pythag standings. I'm sure there have been analyses done as to when pythag becomes credible...anyone know of any? Yeah, that's why I said that it's not particularly meaningful - 11 games just isn't a large enough sample size. The overall point, though, is that this team is much better than they've showed of late, and I feel pretty confident that that's true. And I'm jealous that you were at the game. I've been taking classes and preparing for the MCAT pretty much all season (it's this Saturday!), and haven't been able to even watch a whole game yet (it also doesn't help that I'm in Los Angeles, don't have cable, and am too cheap to go to a bar). Good luck on the MCAT!! You probably shouldn't be going to bars if you know, you are trying to not ruin you future by donig well on the MCAT. And yeah, I can fairly safely say that the Cubs are worse than they were during their hot streak and better than they are during their cold streak. Unfortunately, on this board, I don't have much company in that thought. People just don't get that a .500 team doesnt alternate winning and losing games.

You, good sir, are an optimist.

Jeez, hes making Luis Hernandez look like Cal Ripken.

I think theres a risk in using pythag over small samples. Games like the April 30th 19-5 walloping we put on the brewcrew (I was at the game and it was awesome), have such a significant skewing impact when you are just looking at an 11 game sample. Taking out that game, it drops us from +11 to -3, worth a couple games in the pythag standings. I'm sure there have been analyses done as to when pythag becomes credible...anyone know of any?

I wouldn't either. I'm not a huge fan of Granderson given that he had a crazy BABIP last year and is basically a platoon player right now. But you can probably get better value for him. Fantasy players tend to be pretty reactionary, Connor Jackson was a guy you could have picked up on the waiver wire a month ago and Granderson was someone you used a top 10 pick on. Also, 1B is a crazy deep position. For example, a guy like Chris Duncan is probably on your waiver wire. In his career hes had slightly over a year's worth of stats vs RHP (692 PA) and has put up these numbers: 288 BA/ 42 HR/ 102 RBI/ 113 R/ 3 SB You'll only play him 2/3rds of the time, but in that time hes going to hit like Prince Fielder.

Does his FB have any movement? I assume hes not able to locate it really well given his BB totals, but does he appear to be purposefully wild (nibbling) or does he just have no clue where the ball is going after it leaves his hand? Is he hitting where the catcher is setting up?

Yes I do. Do YOU remember when Mike Schmidt hit .196 as a rookie? The Phillies obviously should have released that worthless bum. You just compared Ronny Cedeno to Mike Schmidt........................................../quote]Yes, to point out the absurdity of basing playing time decisions for THIS year based on a player's performance AS A ROOKIE TWO YEARS AGO. But its better to base how good a player is by 1 month of spot starts and pinch hitting? And I suppose Theriot has hit the magic number of plate appearances where his performance must be real? Every comparison that can be made between the two players favors Cedeno at this point. He's hitting for a higher average, drawing more walks, hitting for more power, playing better defense, running the bases well... and everybody is in agreement that his ceiling his higher anyways. What's the excuse for playing him over Cedeno? That he's the incumbent? That kind of risk-averse management is exactly the reason teams lose more games than their talent should. Seriously... somebody here needs to give me one legitimate point in Theriots favor versus Cedeno. I haven't heard any yet. Here is what Pizza Cutter has to say about when stats become significant.

Funny because I like guys who hit over .300 and get on base. Like the best short stop on the team, Ronny Cedeno? Oh but he hits for power in addition to those things, that must be why you don't like him. Remember when we gave Ronny a chance at short in 2006? Yeah we are trying to compete for a world series you don't have to big black holes (Pie/Johnson,Cedeno) in your lineup Oh, the irony. BTW, Pie's been very good since Dave Keller worked with him, but you wouldn't notice because Lou won't effing play him. Yeah and Theriot has been good basically all year but no one wants to admit he is the teams starting shortstop Everyone's admitting he's the starter. At issue is whether he should be (and he shouldn't) And why is that? Because he is the 2nd best player on the team at his position? It's not a hard concept to grasp, just try harder, I want to have faith that you can do this! Wrong. Right. So the fact that Cedeno is finally playing like he usually does in the minors and that Theriot is blowing away anything he has ever come close to in the minors doesn't even matter? If Cedeno had the same amount of playing time that our starting shortstop Ryan Theriot has I think you would be dissapointed by the result There are these things called minor leagues, and in them Cedeno did play nearly a full year last year. And in that full year he put up an MLE EQA of 292. Ryan Theriot put up an EQA of 247. Thats a gigantic difference. In case you are unfamiliar with EQA...

No. Its called regression to the mean, a concept that very few here seem to grasp. If you'd like to know more about it, look at Theriot's season last year. A full month or a half month's worth of stats should not dramaticly alter anyone's valuation of a player (except for injury).

Can you rank the best cubs hitters from best to worse in your opinion? I don't mean best yesterday, I don't mean best over the last 3 years. I mean best from today to the end of the season. Do you want to have a discussion about soriano and respond when people ask you questions or do you just want to rant...because you know we have a forum just for that. I suggest you check it out.

well at least church is doing well

blame drew

Adam Dunn is hiting 2 spots ahead of Paul Bako. Thats the funniest thing I've ever seen.

So that makes him what, 1 for 3? #-o 7-23. He was 4-26 prior to it. It takes a while to dig out of a sub-.200 hole before the overall averages start looking respectable. More than 5 starts at least. I know. It's just funny that they dedicated all of this extra attention to working with him, then have basically failed to even give him hardly any playing time to show it paid off. In what little he has gotten, as you noted, he hasn't done bad at all. Hopefully they are still agressively working with him inbetween games and we just haven't heard about it.

Chris Young caught lightening in a bottle for half a season last year. He is way overvalued as a result. I would be awfully surprised if he's ever able to repeat that level of performance for more than a month or so at a time. I'm no crazy fan of Young, but if you want to use ERA as a barometer, in the first half of 07 he posted a 2.00 ERA. In May of 05 he had a 1.42 ERA, and in June of 06 he had a 1.17 ERA. So he has done it before but then again the odds are that he will considering you only get 5 or so starts a month. Not too hard to string together a couple of good ones... But I agree, his May/June/July of last year were insane (now known as Cliff Lee-esque). In 91.6 innings he let up 1 HR, and had a 1.08 ERA. In 5 starts in June he allowed ZERO extra base hits. Thats pretty crazy. I don't know how overvalued he is though, he really is a guy who flies under the radar IMO.

I think I have Ozzie's nicest quote ever in my sig. Hes really obsessed with money, he seems to work that into every rant.

Milton Bradley. that would be so disgustingly Cub-like. We could have signed him for no compensation in the offseason but we feigned confidence in Pie. Give him 4 starts, panic at struggles and give up a really good prospect to obtain that guy. Matt Lawton revisited, eh? Not really...Lawton wasn't a FA the offseason before we traded for him. But even though I really like Bradley, I completely agree with the poor planning decisions that result in having to overpay for talent later on down the line. Especially when you set players up to fail.

What am I missing here? Are you still talking about Reggie Willits? He isn't in the minors. He is in Aneheim - or at least according to their roster he is. And he started Friday and Saturday. He was called back up about 5 minutes after Truffles post on Friday.