John Sickels' O's Top 20

[Stotle]

Hoosiers, I agree with you. In comparing teams (if I ever get through the individual top 20s) I came up with a formula to give added depth to the top of the system and the depth of the system.

The result is the top grades weighing more heavily than the middle levels and the lowest (depth) levels weighing the least. It does affect the rankings of the teams, as some get a bump due to elite talents despite little depth whereas some actually get bumps for having a high level of depth outside of the top 20 while lacking many true "impact" prospects.

To be clear, I don't understand critiquing Frobby at all for this discussion. Sickels makes clear (and I know I have to Frobby's occassional annoyance ) that Sickels's online rankings are preliminary and should not be heavily relied upon. I'd just point it out when someone throws them out there as evidence of value -- remind them of SIckels's value of the list himself.

I also agree with Frobby that while there is a difference in the weighting, you're slightly overstating that value.

Finally, I think Sickels is using the more general scouting scale regards to his grades:

A - 70-80

B - 60-69

C - 50-59

D - 40-49

Organizational - 38-39

Non-prospect - 20-37

Source - BA

[orioole28]

Hoosiers, I agree with you. In comparing teams (if I ever get through the individual top 20s) I came up with a formula to give added depth to the top of the system and the depth of the system.

The result is the top grades weighing more heavily than the middle levels and the lowest (depth) levels weighing the least. It does affect the rankings of the teams, as some get a bump due to elite talents despite little depth whereas some actually get bumps for having a high level of depth outside of the top 20 while lacking many true "impact" prospects.

To be clear, I don't understand critiquing Frobby at all for this discussion. Sickels makes clear (and I know I have to Frobby's occassional annoyance ) that Sickels's online rankings are preliminary and should not be heavily relied upon. I'd just point it out when someone throws them out there as evidence of value -- remind them of SIckels's value of the list himself.

I also agree with Frobby that while there is a difference in the weighting, you're slightly overstating that value.

Finally, I think Sickels is using the more general scouting scale regards to his grades:

A - 70-80

B - 60-69

C - 50-59

D - 40-49

Organizational - 38-39

Non-prospect - 20-37

Source - BA

The problem I was with Hoosier was that nobody said that Frobby's scale was THE SCALE, it was just a scale of many, it wasn't perfect so there was no need to blast Frobby. I agree with your assessment in grading an organization minor system.

[Enjoy Terror]

I am just saying that Frobby made something up and now people are relying on it.

If you want to rely on it, great, but it is made up.

Why don't you just add up all the prospects above B- and list the organizations that way? Or pick the organizations that have the most players with multiple vowels in their names? Or list the organizations alphabetically (for some here I assume that would result in the same list every year)?

First of all... chill out.

Second of all, his system reasonably grades the top 20 prospects of each organization based on the rankings of one critic. Of course it's flawed. However, you won't find many people arguing about where each system falls on the scale. We know the Tigers/Yankees/Houston/Cubs minor league systems are bad. We know that Texas/Tampa/Oakland/KCR have good teams. This is reflected pretty accurately by Frobby's GPA method. There's nothing of merit to nitpick here.

Third, there's no way to accurately judge a baseball player. You can't quantify something like "rawness", and statistics don't tell anywhere near a complete story about a player. Age, level of play, and makeup are big parts of a player's scouting report. As a result, some highly ranked players fizzle, some lowly ranked players go to the Hall of Fame.

[Frobby]

Just to be clear, hoosiers isn't hurting my feelings and I'm not offended at all. But I do want to point something out. When I went to high school and college, teachers graded on a curve. That meant there were more C's than B's and more B's than A's, etc. And yet, when they ranked us for purposes of class rank, they used the exact system I'm using here, where the point difference between a B and an A was the same as the difference between a C and a B. And I'd submit that the consequences of those rankings (admission into a good college or graduate school or presenting credentials for a job) were a lot more important than the consequences of this particular recreational activity. So let's not treat this like it's the BCS rankings or something!

I am very interested to see anyone else who would like to use whatever weighting system they want and rank these systems and present their results. I'm very interested. And I don't at all claim my system is the best, but it's far from arbitrary.

[Frobby]

Interesting. I just looked at the weighting system used by the guy in the minorleagueball.com system, which makes the difference between A and A- worth 5 points, between A- and B+ is 4 points, etc. So more like what hoosiers and Stotle are saying. Here is my method's top 11:

Top 20

(1)TEX -- 1 A, 2 A-, 1 B+, 5 B, 2 B-, 9 C+ ----- Top 20: 2.80

(2)OAK -- 2 A-, 6 B, 7 B-, 5 C+ ----------------Top 20: 2.78

(3)ATL -- 1 A-, 3 B+, 3 B, 6 B-, 7 C+ ---------- Top 20: 2.75

(4)FLA -- 2 A-, 3 B+, 3 B, 3 B-, 6 C+, 4 C ------ Top 20: 2.70

(5)BOS -- 1 A-, 1 B+, 3 B, 8 B-, 7 C+ ----------Top 20: 2.68

(6)TAM -- 1 A, 3 B+, 1 B, 4 B-, 11 C+ --------- Top 20: 2.67

(7)KCR -- 1 A-, 1 B+, 6 B, 1 B-, 10 C+, 1 C -----Top 20: 2.65

(8)CLE -- 2 B+, 4 B, 3 B-, 11 C+ ----------------Top 20: 2.62

(9)BAL -- 1 A, 3 B+, 1 B, 4 B-, 7 C+, 4 C -------Top 20: 2.60

(10)SFG -- 1 A, 1 A-,1 B+,1 B, 3 B-, 12 C+, 1 C --Top 20: 2.60

(11)STL -- 2 A-, 1 B+, 1 B, 2 B-, 14 C+-------- Top 20: 2.58

Now here's the other system's top 11.

1 Texas 91

2 Florida 83

3 Atlanta 79

4 Oakland 77

5 Tampa Bay 72

6 San Fransisco 70

7 Boston 70

8 Kansas City 69

9 St. Louis 69

10 Baltimore 69

11 Cleveland 64

There are differences, but the top 11 teams are the same, and they are not that far off in terms of order. We're ranked tied for 9th in my system and in a three way tie for 8th in the other system, only one point behind 6/7. Pretty close.

[hoosiers]

The problem I was with Hoosier was that nobody said that Frobby's scale was THE SCALE, it was just a scale of many, it wasn't perfect so there was no need to blast Frobby. I agree with your assessment in grading an organization minor system.

First, I never blasted or attacked Frobby in this thread or anywhere - it's not nice to say that I did. 99% of the time Frobby has posts with tremendous substance and, if there were a vote, I have little doubt that he is considered the best poster at the Hangout.

Second, that others accept and justify this made up system only reinforces my original concerns. IMO, the only positive about the system is that it is directionally correct because it assigns higher grades to higher prospects. As I mentioned in a previous post, however, the system does not appear to pass a quick smell test based on eyeballing the relative value of one prospect to another.

It seems to me that Sickels is pretty responsive and might shed some light on the relative value of his ratings.

[Stotle]

Interesting. I just looked at the weighting system used by the guy in the minorleagueball.com system, which makes the difference between A and A- worth 5 points, between A- and B+ is 4 points, etc. So more like what hoosiers and Stotle are saying. Here is my method's top 11:

Top 20

(1)TEX -- 1 A, 2 A-, 1 B+, 5 B, 2 B-, 9 C+ ----- Top 20: 2.80

(2)OAK -- 2 A-, 6 B, 7 B-, 5 C+ ----------------Top 20: 2.78

(3)ATL -- 1 A-, 3 B+, 3 B, 6 B-, 7 C+ ---------- Top 20: 2.75

(4)FLA -- 2 A-, 3 B+, 3 B, 3 B-, 6 C+, 4 C ------ Top 20: 2.70

(5)BOS -- 1 A-, 1 B+, 3 B, 8 B-, 7 C+ ----------Top 20: 2.68

(6)TAM -- 1 A, 3 B+, 1 B, 4 B-, 11 C+ --------- Top 20: 2.67

(7)KCR -- 1 A-, 1 B+, 6 B, 1 B-, 10 C+, 1 C -----Top 20: 2.65

(8)CLE -- 2 B+, 4 B, 3 B-, 11 C+ ----------------Top 20: 2.62

(9)BAL -- 1 A, 3 B+, 1 B, 4 B-, 7 C+, 4 C -------Top 20: 2.60

(10)SFG -- 1 A, 1 A-,1 B+,1 B, 3 B-, 12 C+, 1 C --Top 20: 2.60

(11)STL -- 2 A-, 1 B+, 1 B, 2 B-, 14 C+-------- Top 20: 2.58

Now here's the other system's top 11.

1 Texas 91

2 Florida 83

3 Atlanta 79

4 Oakland 77

5 Tampa Bay 72

6 San Fransisco 70

7 Boston 70

8 Kansas City 69

9 St. Louis 69

10 Baltimore 69

11 Cleveland 64

There are differences, but the top 11 teams are the same, and they are not that far off in terms of order. We're ranked tied for 9th in my system and in a three way tie for 8th in the other system, only one point behind 6/7. Pretty close.

I've found similar subtle differences in the formula I'm using. Thanks for running this out there.

[Frobby]

the system does not appear to pass a quick smell test based on eyeballing the relative value of one prospect to another.

It seems to me that Sickels is pretty responsive and might shed some light on the relative value of his ratings.

Let me just say, as I've said many times, that there are several posters like you, Stotle, NoVa, Lucky Jim and others who know far more about the pluses and minuses of the various minor league prospects and systems than I do. So, I am curious -- which teams you think are ranked too high or low using the numbering system I adopted? How would you rank them 1-30? And does Sickels publish his own 1-30 rankings of the systems like BA does?

[Stotle]

Let me just say, as I've said many times, that there are several posters like you, Stotle, NoVa, Lucky Jim and others who know far more about the pluses and minuses of the various minor league prospects and systems than I do. So, I am curious -- which teams you think are ranked too high or low using the numbering system I adopted? How would you rank them 1-30? And does Sickels publish his own 1-30 rankings of the systems like BA does?

Well, my complaint would be the following:

Team A

A - 1

B - 3

C - 0

D - 6

Total = 4 + 9 + 6 = 19

Team B

A - 0

B - 0

C - 10

D - 0

Total = 20

So Team B would rate higher than Team A, but I'd clearly rather have Team A, and Team A has the more valuable group of prospects. That's what made me examine my ranking system (when comparing teams). I don't think the discrepencies are huge. In fact, I think that "generally" the ratings will be pretty close. But it is apparent that the straight weighting has some philosophical shortcomings that make comparisons problematic.

[Frobby]

I don't think the discrepencies are huge. In fact, I think that "generally" the ratings will be pretty close. But it is apparent that the straight weighting has some philosophical shortcomings that make comparisons problematic.

I don't disagree. All my system was intended to do was give a quick and dirty look at where the Orioles ranked in the grand scheme of things. It would take a lot of thought to decide exactly how much the difference is between A and A- compared to the difference between B and B-, etc. etc. And frankly, to me it wasn't worth it to go into that level of thinking for two reasons: (1) Sickels is just one guy and his rankings aren't the gospel, and (2) his letter grade system equates the 20th best player with the 60th best player, so it's not that fine-tuned to begin with.

[Stotle]

I don't disagree. All my system was intended to do was give a quick and dirty look at where the Orioles ranked in the grand scheme of things. It would take a lot of thought to decide exactly how much the difference is between A and A- compared to the difference between B and B-, etc. etc. And frankly, to me it wasn't worth it to go into that level of thinking for two reasons: (1) Sickels is just one guy and his rankings aren't the gospel, and (2) his letter grade system equates the 20th best player with the 60th best player, so it's not that fine-tuned to begin with.

Agreed. But that won't stop posters from making declarative statements about organizational strength based on this thread (not your fault, obviously, but a reality).

[Frobby]

Agreed. But that won't stop posters from making declarative statements about organizational strength based on this thread (not your fault, obviously, but a reality).

That problem will be solved ~ February 1 when BA comes out with its rankings, which will then be treated as the new gospel.

[Stotle]

That problem will be solved ~ February 1 when BA comes out with its rankings, which will then be treated as the new gospel.

Hahaha. Fair enough.

[PaulFolk]

First, I never blasted or attacked Frobby in this thread or anywhere - it's not nice to say that I did. 99% of the time Frobby has posts with tremendous substance and, if there were a vote, I have little doubt that he is considered the best poster at the Hangout.

Actually, there was a vote-- and you're right, Frobby won.

[Frobby]

Actually, there was a vote-- and you're right, Frobby won.

Now you've gone and embarassed me. As I said at the time:

I had been following the "MVP" threads, but hadn't voted or commented, because quite honestly I feel there is no such thing as a "most valuable poster." To the extent my posts have any value at all, it is because of the responses they provoke from the many insightful posters on the board. Without someone to read, criticize, support or elaborate on what I post, my posts have no value at all.

http://forum.orioleshangout.com/forums/showpost.php?p=1445387&postcount=1

That thought certainly is apt in this thread.