Attention Mauer Haters - Part 2

[Fire Dan Gladden]

I see a lot of people saying that the Fan Graphs formula of what a player is worth is pointless or worthless, but nobody really saying why. Anybody care to shed some light on what makes this such a poor resource? Could it be that it is poor because it doesn't fit your opinion that Joe Mauer is overpaid?

[Brock Beauchamp]

What's your evidence for this claim?

Because it has virtually no relevance to real-world salaries. Some years, a guy is "worth" $45 million. The next, he's "worth" $30 million. Yet no one in baseball has actually approached the $30m barrier in a season.

 

As Dave said, it's a novelty formula that can sometimes be used to compared players to one another... Except that WAR already does that and does a better job of it, along with a host of other player "value" metrics that gauge any number of things.

 

So, basically, it's useless. It's not grounded in any kind of reality and there are other metrics out there that do a better job of what it's trying to do.

[Shane Wahl]

Because it has virtually no relevance to real-world salaries. Some years, a guy is "worth" $45 million. The next, he's "worth" $30 million. Yet no one in baseball has actually approached the $30m barrier in a season.

 

As Dave said, it's a novelty formula that can sometimes be used to compared players to one another... Except that WAR already does that and does a better job of it, along with a host of other player "value" metrics that gauge any number of things.

 

So, basically, it's useless. It's not grounded in any kind of reality and there are other metrics out there that do a better job of what it's trying to do.

That isn't an argument against it at all. If you actually point out how it is flawed in the calculation, that would be different. It's not like it has nothing to do with WAR or anything . . . .

[Brock Beauchamp]

That isn't an argument against it at all. If you actually point out how it is flawed in the calculation, that would be different. It's not like it has nothing to do with WAR or anything . . . .

It's "flawed" in its calculations because some players are "worth" nearly $50m using its calculations. It has very little real-world application and other player metrics do a better job of explaining a player's overall value, both independently and relative to other players.

 

There is no reason to affix an arbitrary dollar number to a player if it doesn't reflect actual player salaries, doubly so when there are a host of other metrics that do a much better job of determining how many wins a player is worth, how he got to that number both offensively and defensively, and how he compares to his peers.

 

PS. How is "there are other metrics that do a better job" not a valid argument against something?

[nokomismod]

Would the Mauer haters be Santana, Hunter, and Cuddyer haters if the Twins had resigned those players to the huge contracts they got from other teams? I agree enough is enough. He's a postive and extremely productive player (except for last season).

[DaveW]

He is still overpaid and overrated!!http://www.facebook.com/JoeMauerIsMostOverratedPlayerInBaseball

Reported for Spam.

[Shane Wahl]

It's "flawed" in its calculations because some players are "worth" nearly $50m using its calculations. It has very little real-world application and other player metrics do a better job of explaining a player's overall value, both independently and relative to other players.

 

There is no reason to affix an arbitrary dollar number to a player if it doesn't reflect actual player salaries, doubly so when there are a host of other metrics that do a much better job of determining how many wins a player is worth, how he got to that number both offensively and defensively, and how he compares to his peers.

 

PS. How is "there are other metrics that do a better job" not a valid argument against something?

I doubt that Gleeman and those who actually assign such values believe it is arbitrary, especially with its connection to WAR. Anyway, your argument seems to be that no one could be worth more than the top paid player? Albert Pujols HAS been worth more than the highest paid player for years. Making the connection to actual existing contracts seems like the arbitrary part of this. Oh well.

[Brock Beauchamp]

He is still overpaid and overrated!!http://www.facebook.com/JoeMauerIsMostOverratedPlayerInBaseball

We do not allow multiple accounts, especially those designed to start a flamewar. I will be deleting this account in an hour after you have a chance to read my PM.

[notoriousgod71]

Would the Mauer haters be Santana, Hunter, and Cuddyer haters if the Twins had resigned those players to the huge contracts they got from other teams? I agree enough is enough. He's a postive and extremely productive player (except for last season).

I was all for resigning Santana and Hunter (not Cuddyer).

 

The difference would have been that Santana and Hunter have remained relatively consistent with what their established normal seasons were, whereas signing Mauer after his huge outlier season got many people into the mindset that 2009 would be his new career norm... at least that's what we're paying him like.

 

I think 2009 was the worst thing that could have happened to Mauer. Unreasonable expectations were now built in ("If he did it before, why can't he do it again" etc). If he had hit 320/400/450 like he always did we'd probably be much more content with the production we're getting from him now.