AM lied when he said this season was about winning

[H0smash]

Defense is factored into WAR. Other than that, I think you have a good point.

Oh I know it is, but I think the DIFFERENCE in defense between Wigginton and Roberts has been somewhat significant. I'm pretty sure Wigginton's defense has cost us one or two games, on plays that I'm 99% sure a healthy Brian Roberts would have made, that's what I meant when I was talking about defense. Sorry for being unclear in the original post.

[Lucky Jim]

This is the reason I'm not crazy about the WAR statistic. Without Roberts (and Pie) we have not had a legitimate leadoff man, and I think that that has resulted in a chain reaction of other players (i.e. Markakis, Jones, Reimold) putting more pressure on themselves to perform. Add that to the fact that the defense at 2B has not been close to as good as what Roberts can do and I would say you can't put a firm number on how many wins losing Roberts has cost us. He's not the whole problem, but he might be a big part of it.

Statistics that isolate players are only heuristics. Incomplete, and inexact, and they don't represent any number of independent values. That doesn't mean they're bad - they limited, but those limits are known. What they tell us is useful, but not all-encompassing.

I agree that the loss of Roberts means more than the loss of his WAR. On the other hand, there's a cascade effect at work, and - BH noted - a lot of it has to do with the way in which players become more selfish (as in "trying to do too much") when they feel like the team is struggling. Each player's struggling increases in response to the struggling of others. It's really pretty remarkable to watch, because it really gives us insight into the relevance and influence of psychological factors, and the ways in which those pscyhological factors can influence the things we think of as "physical."

[Mackus]

snip

I think your frustrations towards MacPhail stem more from a disbelief in his ability to take us from average to contender. That's fine, there isn't anything real to go on in terms of what he'll do with us now given the current realities of the game's economics and our financial situation to have anything more than to strongly support that he either can or can not get that task accomplished. Its a matter of optimism v pessimism and gut feeling, really.

I think almost everybody was thrilled with the core he had put together coming into this year. Some people wanted big names to fill the immediate holes, others wanted stop gaps for a year to give the young guys a year to gel and then fill the holes in with bigger name targets. I thought the latter was the better option, given the lack of high quality FA and trade targets available last offseason.

What nobody is even remotely accepting of is the complete collapse and poor performance of the young core. And while that isn't directly MacPhail's fault, he'll be the fall guy if that core doesn't turn things around in time for next year, as a 2nd straight disappointing season next year would be the death knell for MacPhail, IMO. If the core of Roberts, Markakis, Wieters,Jones, Reimold, Pie, Bell, Matusz, Tillman, Arrieta, Britton, and Bergesen can't be our core, we're doomed in the foreseeable future no matter how many big time FAs we are capable of bringing in.

I think MacPhail is just as disgusted in the young players as we are. We have to have them be very good, they don't have to bring us to 90 wins themselves, but they have to be the foundation, and we'll add in 2-4 big time additions to get us over the top. But, if they flop, we're screwed.

[Dr. FLK]

I agree with only part of this. Pie started as depth to cover for Jones and Reimold. All three are injured or not performing well. How does any GM perpare for that? Only the Yankees with their $200M team can.

Wiggy was on the bench if Atkins didn't perform. But Roberts and Atkins are both injured or not performing. Markus is right. The injuries and non performance are more then what a GM can prepare for.

That part comes down to talent evaluation, no? I mean, do other GMs get let off the hook because they assembled a team they thought had good players...only to find out they didn't? Maybe all of these guys start living up to expectations, or maybe they just aren't very good. At this point, I'm losing confidence in more than a few of them.

You can't have adequate backups at every position, for sure. I thought OF was fine going into the season. I do like Wiggy as a backup. We had no one at 1B. We had 2 SS, neither of who can hit. We again have a backup C who is a complete liability with the bat. There is no one who can hit a baseball in AAA. My biggest problem is with the lack of hitters in the minors (as depth), not the initial major league roster. I just feel like - for yet another season - we do not adequately use our minor leagues to develop hitters.

[Lucky Jim]

That part comes down to talent evaluation, no? I mean, do other GMs get let off the hook because they assembled a team they thought had good players...only to find out they didn't? Maybe all of these guys start living up to expectations, or maybe they just aren't very good. At this point, I'm losing confidence in more than a few of them.

You can't have adequate backups at every position, for sure. I thought OF was fine going into the season. I do like Wiggy as a backup. We had no one at 1B. We had 2 SS, neither of who can hit. We again have a backup C who is a complete liability with the bat. There is no one who can hit a baseball in AAA. My biggest problem is with the lack of hitters in the minors (as depth), not the initial major league roster. I just feel like - for yet another season - we do not adequately use our minor leagues to develop hitters.

My confidence has wavered, too. But I don't think it likely that we misfired on all of these guys. It just remains to be seen which once bounce back.

I'm on board w/ the Atkins criticisms: it seems to me that even w/o advanced analysis, simply watching him on tape shows that he doesn't have batspeed anymore.

[H0smash]

Statistics that isolate players are only heuristics. Incomplete, and inexact, and they don't represent any number of independent values. That doesn't mean they're bad - they limited, but those limits are known. What they tell us is useful, but not all-encompassing.

I agree that the loss of Roberts means more than the loss of his WAR. On the other hand, there's a cascade effect at work, and - BH noted - a lot of it has to do with the way in which players become more selfish (as in "trying to do too much") when they feel like the team is struggling. Each player's struggling increases in response to the struggling of others. It's really pretty remarkable to watch, because it really gives us insight into the relevance and influence of psychological factors, and the ways in which those pscyhological factors can influence the things we think of as "physical."

I guess I should have worded my first sentence better, I'm not crazy about the way Trea used the WAR statistic. I think saying player X has a WAR of 3 on a good year, so since he's missed 1/4 of the season he's only cost us .75 wins, is a bad habit because there are other factors, as both you and I have pointed out, attributed to losing a player that could affect the team in a negative way.

As to the bolded part, I think it's interesting to look at the situation, and then look at players individually and notice that they are swinging at more pitches out of the zone (O-Swing), if their Swing% has increased in total, etc. to see how their pressing may be creating bad habits. If you look at Sizemore with the Indians, his plate discipline has just fallen off a cliff and some people are attributing that to him being the expected "big bat" in that lineup. Acta moved him down from the leadoff spot, and now he has changed his approach at the plate. Similar to Adam Jones, he wants to drive in runs every time instead of just getting on base.

[DrungoHazewood]

Bingo! And the bonus being that player could slide over to SS when Roberts came back.

And I was being facetious...

This isn't true at all.

The overall message of needing our core to produce or we won't win is correct.

However, who is to say that we can't replace Tillman and Britton relatively quickly and put their replacements with MCab?

Saying that we need those 2 pitchers specifically to win is just flat out wrong.

The Orioles have plenty of players they can trade from...Now, they can't trade all of them but they can trade a few of them for a real bat, especially one that is a bargain like MCab.

That being said, I am not sure he was really available and I am not sure a trade for him would have made sense for us because they would have wanted more than the moon and we probably would have been competing with Boston to get it.

I didn't mean specifically those two guys. I meant the overall strategy/idea/philosophy of a resource-limited team coming off a 64-win year going to compete long-term with the Yanks and Sox regularly trading off young, cheap, good, controlled players for single $20M/year veterans.

Maybe the O's can do that once in a while when the situation is right. But Trea advocates that as a major, regular, recurring cog of the organizational philosophy. He only would grow young players to trade for much more expensive ones.

It's my belief that that would be suicidal for the franchise.

[Sports Guy]

And I was being facetious...

I didn't mean specifically those two guys. I meant the overall strategy/idea/philosophy of a resource-limited team coming off a 64-win year going to compete long-term with the Yanks and Sox regularly trading off young, cheap, good, controlled players for single $20M/year veterans.

Maybe the O's can do that once in a while when the situation is right. But Trea advocates that as a major, regular, recurring cog of the organizational philosophy. He only would grow young players to trade for much more expensive ones.

It's my belief that that would be suicidal for the franchise.

I pretty much agree with this.

I certainly believe MCab is one of those players though and i think it is wrong to sit back and wait until contention is there before making a move like this.

[waroriole]

I guess I should have worded my first sentence better, I'm not crazy about the way Trea used the WAR statistic. I think saying player X has a WAR of 3 on a good year, so since he's missed 1/4 of the season he's only cost us .75 wins, is a bad habit because there are other factors, as both you and I have pointed out, attributed to losing a player that could affect the team in a negative way.

Agree with this, and I'm sure almost everyone on here would agree.

[JTrea81]

This just shows that you're not interested in having a logical conversation. You're only interested in beating the same drum.

Also, do you have an answer for Lucky Jim as to the small sample size of Aviles' UZR?

91 games is a small sample size? The guy has only been in the majors for 1 full season so there isn't much more to go on.

If you want something small you can look at his 81.0 UZR/150 this season at the position.

And the fact that you are ignoring anything I am saying lets me know that you won't care about any evidence I put up because you think I'm wrong regardless.

[Lucky Jim]

91 games is a small sample size? The guy has only been in the majors for 1 full season so there isn't much more to go on.

If you want something small you can look at his 81.0 UZR/150 this season at the position.

And the fact that you are ignoring anything I am saying lets me know that you won't care about any evidence I put up because you think I'm wrong regardless.

For the eight-millionth time, YES. 81 games is a insufficient sample for UZR. You don't have to be able to do the math to use statistics, but you should at least know the limits of the stats that you rely upon.

How Many Games Do We Need?

Tom Tango, co-author of Inside the Book, believes that 200 Plate Appearances (PA) equals 400 Balls in Play (BIP). He has also found that different defensive positions receive a different number of chances in a game. His research shows that SS and 2B get on average 5 BIP per 9 innings, 3B and CF get 4 BIP/9 Innings, and LF, RF, and 1B get 3 BIP per nine innings. Think about that. If Adam Dunn plays 150 games at 1B for the Nats this year, he will only see 450 BIP, or the equivalent of 225 PA. We would never judge a player’s offensive abilities on 225 PAs. We shouldn’t judge a player’s defensive abilities on 450 BIP. In reality, our defensive statistics sample size doesn’t reach critical mass until roughly 3 seasons of data have been entered.

http://natsstats.wordpress.com/uzr/

[JTrea81]

For the eight-millionth time, YES. 81 games is a insufficient sample for UZR. You don't have to be able to do the math to use statistics, but you should at least know the limits of the stats that you rely upon.

Okay let's go with the conventional route:

"I asked one of our developmental people if they could identify our most fundamentally sound infielder. Its Mike Aviles far as textbook fielding a ground ball, approaching a ground ball and doing it right all the time. One of the staff guys grabbed me the other day and said that's as good as it gets."

http://www.sportingnews.com/mlb/article/2010-02-28/royals-infielder-mike-aviles-making-progress-after-tommy-john-surgery

[Lucky Jim]

Okay let's go with the conventional route:

http://www.sportingnews.com/mlb/article/2010-02-28/royals-infielder-mike-aviles-making-progress-after-tommy-john-surgery

That tells us virtually nothing. Less, in fact, than your shoddy UZR.

He may be a good fielder, btw.

My original issue was regarding your argument that Lugo is beyond horrible. He had a very bad 2009, but his numbers - to me - seem reasonable for a back-up infielder.

[waroriole]

91 games is a small sample size? The guy has only been in the majors for 1 full season so there isn't much more to go on.

If you want something small you can look at his 81.0 UZR/150 this season at the position.

And the fact that you are ignoring anything I am saying lets me know that you won't care about any evidence I put up because you think I'm wrong regardless.

What have I ignored? What evidence have you offered?

[Sanfran327]

I pretty much agree with this.

I certainly believe MCab is one of those players though and i think it is wrong to sit back and wait until contention is there before making a move like this.

To put a negaitve spin on it, the longer a prospect hangs around an organization, the more time he has to bomb. Part of the value of a prospect is his hype and his "ceiling". And nobody should know more about a prospect than his organization. We should be able to evaluate a pitcher (guys like Daniel Cabrera and Liz resonate with me) and conclude that he's not likely to harness his raw ability: let's deal him while his skills are still tantilizing to the rest of the league.

Same thing applies for Tillman & Co. As much as I'd rather have them pan out and turn into HOF pitchers, there's a greater possibility that he'll stink and never win 25 games. If we can get a player of Miguel Cabrera's caliber for the likes of Tillman +1 or 2, then I think you make that move in your sleep. If we don't have to give up any major-league talent (i.e., anyone on our current 25-man roster) for a big bat, I'd say do it.