Players are skeptical about Adam Jones' defensive metrics

[Frobby]

5 hours ago, weams said:

We also do not know how much of Jones' defense is adversely affected by trying to go left and right for Joey, Trumbo, Cruz, Delmon, Reimold and Kim.

This point was mentioned in connection with Fowler in the article.   Put Heyward next to him and suddenly Fowler's numbers look better.    Coincidence?

[Can_of_corn]

6 hours ago, Ruzious said:

I disagree with that19 games comment and would go as far to say that any decent baseball person should be able to get a good basis for judgment on the quality of a CFer after watching him for 19 full games in a season.  

Is Kiermaier watching Jones for a full 19 games?

Or is he on second base for some at bats, in the bathroom for some others, in the dugout looking at his last at bat on a tablet, talking to his hitting coach?  Maybe he's watching the pitcher, or Manny?

[weams]

2 hours ago, Can_of_corn said:

Is Kiermaier watching Jones for a full 19 games?

Or is he on second base for some at bats, in the bathroom for some others, in the dugout looking at his last at bat on a tablet, talking to his hitting coach?  Maybe he's watching the pitcher, or Manny?

Maybe he watches some baseball, or baseball highlights in his free time. Or while in the gym.

[weams]

2 hours ago, Can_of_corn said:

Is Kiermaier watching Jones for a full 19 games?

Or is he on second base for some at bats, in the bathroom for some others, in the dugout looking at his last at bat on a tablet, talking to his hitting coach?  Maybe he's watching the pitcher, or Manny?

I only found it to be surprising because unlike Joey Votto, Kiermaier seems to be diminishing that which is his major claim to fame in the MLB. 

[Chavez Ravine]

9 hours ago, DrungoHazewood said:

Why is that a good point?  No metric is perfect.  A yardstick is a flawed, imperfect way to measure your height.  A cesium clock, although it only loses a second every billion years or so, is imperfect.

No one should let imperfection get in the way of making use of good metrics.  This imperfection in defensive metrics seems to be an excuse to throw out systematic approaches and fall back on even more flawed subjective observations.

I agree, but I think the presentation of baseball metrics in general suffers from a lack of acknowledgement of the uncertainties involved (in the very broad sense), whether they be an arcane defensive metric or an expert opinion. Partly, this is because the uncertainties/errors/limitations/etc. are hard to quantify and even harder to explain/understand. The more data and analytical power you have, the worse the problem gets, partly because people's expectations increase.  Weather prediction suffers from a similar problem.  It is not immediately clear to me how much more understanding I get from a quantitative description of Adam Jones' defense than I would from just hearing a bench coach's evaluation.

[crissfan172]

With Statcast, don't you think defensive metrics should be more accurate now? Reaction speed, route efficiency, top speed, distance covered, etc. You would think these things could be quantified in a way to better judge defense. 

[Can_of_corn]

5 minutes ago, crissfan172 said:

With Statcast, don't you think defensive metrics should be more accurate now? Reaction speed, route efficiency, top speed, distance covered, etc. You would think these things could be quantified in a way to better judge defense. 

I think they will be soon.  I'd rather they not rush it.  I'm sure the teams have better stuff than we see.

[Hallas]

10 hours ago, DrungoHazewood said:

After 19 games you should have a reasonable take on whether a guy is a major league CFer.  Maybe some concept as to whether he appears above or below average.

But the difference between Kiermaier and Jones is maybe a run every five games or so.  Between most any other CFers it's going to be a run every 10 or 20 or 40 games.  No one can quantify something like that with 19 games of kind of paying attention to the CFer.

I think that, with how long it takes defensive metrics to stabilize, you have to look at the plays individually and verify that the metrics pass the eye test.  There are a lot of people in and around baseball that are saying that Adam Jones is a good CFer, including Joe Maddon, who tends to embrace the numbers.  I think it's worth at least entertaining the idea that maybe public defensive metrics are somehow biased against Adam.

also, I remember DD saying something about how their internal metrics rated Jones higher than publicly available ones.

[Larry18]

I once heard a major leaguer describe Dan Uggla as a "great defensive player".

[Hallas]

9 hours ago, DrungoHazewood said:

Wouldn't playing alongside inferior fielders make your own metrics look better?  He's going after any ball halfway plausible he can reach, nobody's taking anything from him.  I'd think playing next to Trumbo and Kim would give him more opportunities.

So for the outfield, the metrics I've seen disregard balls caught in your zone by another fielder.  In theory, if a superior defender is catching a lot of balls in your zone that you wouldn't have gotten to if an inferior defender were there, your defensive numbers can get propped up by having a superior defender adjacent to you, catching balls in your zone.

 

its worth noting that if you're a good defender, having a good defender next to you might be a negative because both players are hogging chances.

[Frobby]

14 hours ago, Can_of_corn said:

I think they will be soon.  I'd rather they not rush it.  I'm sure the teams have better stuff than we see.

I think so too.   

[weams]

19 hours ago, Frobby said:

This point was mentioned in connection with Fowler in the article.   Put Heyward next to him and suddenly Fowler's numbers look better.    Coincidence?

Good Point