Kiley McDaniel Article on Drafting Pitchers

[Hrbowski]

This was a great read:

 

http://www.fangraphs.com/blogs/the-black-swan-theory-of-drafting-pitchers/

[Mike Sixel]

If I wasn't married, I'd marry that article I love it so much.

[jimmer]

Kiley is great at what he does. Thanks for posting this.

[terencemann]

This is a really thoughtful article. I enjoy that McDaniel can bring in different references to what he does. It really keeps me going back. He's so thorough...

[nicksaviking]

 

This was a great read:

 

http://www.fangraphs.com/blogs/the-black-swan-theory-of-drafting-pitchers/

 

Thanks for posting.  I was going to do so but I'm glad I saw your post first, as five words and a link were about the best summary one could do with this article.  I likely would have rambled on for paragraphs on end trying to do this peice justice.  Commence rambling:

 

McDaniel didn't explain it quite the way I now envision the theory, but it makes a lot of sense.  There is always a bias against small right-handers, and the ones that are still considered top 20 talent or so are no doubt moved down the board a bit due to their size.  However since these guys already have this preconcieved prejudice against them, it stands to reason that minus the prejudice, they are highly under-valued. 

 

For those that didn't read the article, the theory ended with discovery that recently the only right-handers 6' or less with no injury concerns AND with a predraft top 25 ranking were Marcus Stromen, Sunny Gray, Tim Lincicum, Mike Leake, Ian Kennedy, Trevor Bauer, Brad Lincoln and Aaron Nola.  With Brad Lincoln being the worst of the bunch, and maybe the only true disappointment, that's a pretty astounding success rate.

 

I'm starting to warm to Carson Fulmer, particularly with the success of non-top 25 prospect Jose Berrios doing so well.

[Willihammer]

I hope the Twins are at least open-minded about him. Maybe Berrios' success will nudge them in that direction.

[markos]

This was a good article, and I definitely think that their are blind spots in how players are ranked and drafted. However, the analytic part of me thinks his theory may just be an example of the "Elderly Hispanic Women Effect" or this comic - if one creates enough subgroups in a sample of data, one of the subgroups is bound to be interesting just by chance. So looking back over the past 10 years of drafts and the top roughly 200 players drafted, he created a subgroup with only 8 members, and it happened to have good results. Well, the 200 players could be divided 25 random 8-member subgroups. Even if each of the 200 players had an identical 50-50 chance of making it, the odds are pretty good that at least one of the 25 subgroups would have 7 of the 8 making it just by chance. So I really don't know if the sample-size is large enough to make sweeping statements about the success rate of this type of pitcher.

[Mike Sixel]

 

This was a good article, and I definitely think that their are blind spots in how players are ranked and drafted. However, the analytic part of me thinks his theory may just be an example of the "Elderly Hispanic Women Effect" or this comic - if one creates enough subgroups in a sample of data, one of the subgroups is bound to be interesting just by chance. So looking back over the past 10 years of drafts and the top roughly 200 players drafted, he created a subgroup with only 8 members, and it happened to have good results. Well, the 200 players could be divided 25 random 8-member subgroups. Even if each of the 200 players had an identical 50-50 chance of making it, the odds are pretty good that at least one of the 25 subgroups would have 7 of the 8 making it just by chance. So I really don't know if the sample-size is large enough to make sweeping statements about the success rate of this type of pitcher.

 

Isn't that the entire point of the article? Outliers that defy the standard are more likely to have meaning (or value, or whatever) than "standard" types that appear to succeed. By math, there won't be much sample to work from.

[markos]

 

Isn't that the entire point of the article? Outliers that defy the standard are more likely to have meaning (or value, or whatever) than "standard" types that appear to succeed. By math, there won't be much sample to work from.

My point was that this outlier could just be the byproduct of randomness (and therefore has zero predictive value) rather than being an actual thing based on the characteristics of these specific pitchers. And given the small subgroup size relative to the population, it is almost a given than SOME outlier subgroup(s) will exist purely by chance. This specific subgroup (short, healthy right-handed pitchers) lends itself to a good narrative to explain why it has meaning (or value, or whatever) - in my view that was the entire point of the article. But I'm not convinced that in reality it is any more meaningful than a more ridiculous subgroup (say, right-handed college position players born in April) that would happen to have a similar success rate.

 

I'm not saying that McDaniel's theory is definitely incorrect. It very well could be that this outlier group is legitimate and predictive going forward. I'm just skeptical right now because I don't think there is enough evidence in his sample to distinguish his theory from random chance.

[Mike Sixel]

Agreed, but by definition, a black swan will never have a big sample size, will it?

 

That's why you can get wealthy, either by luck, or by finding a pattern in a SSS that is predictive (which, I agree, seems counter to all of our math talk, but I'd guess at higher levels of math, there are theories about this).

[drjim]

I want to add another thought to this article. Is it possible that mlb teams scout/draft this type of player (short RH starter) optimally?

 

The two analogies that I would think of for baseball is someone who hits very well on first pitches but rarely swings, or someone who steals at a very high rate but rarely attempts a steal.

 

If they would swing more or attempt more steals their success rates would drop, but probably stay within what would be considered a success (ie higher OPS than usual or a SB % still higher than 70). However, the marginal success of an additional steal attempt or first pitch swing would be much lower than the elevated rate.

 

Perhaps it is the same for short RH starters? The ones that are actually drafted generally do well, but the lesson isn't necessarily to draft more. Drafting additional players of this subset would still result in a better than average "hit" rate compared to other player demographics, but the "hit" rate on those marginal players drafted would be lower.

 

I would interested to know the success of short RH starters ranked just outside the top 25. This would tell us if perhaps this is a market inefficiency. I doubt it is.

 

Two other potential "black swans" could be prep Cs and college corner bats. Teams generally avoid those types of players early in the draft.

[maxisagod]

 

 

Two other potential "black swans" could be prep Cs and college corner bats. Teams generally avoid those types of players early in the draft.

Prep Catchers are interesting. The results are not many come out as successful, everyday MLB catchers... but some switch positions and are successful that way (like Justin Morneau). Maybe drafting with the plan to switch them over might be a good strategy to maximize their worth. 

[AlwaysinModeration]

Great article. Is one lesson from this article (and Berrios is a great example that fits the theory) that the Twins should have taken Nola over Gordon?

[drivlikejehu]

 

I would interested to know the success of short RH starters ranked just outside the top 25. This would tell us if perhaps this is a market inefficiency. I doubt it is.

 

 

Agreed, that would really be the empirical test (it would still suffer from a small sample size). I'm skeptical that there's anything to this.