Brock Beauchamp

When I was guesstimating contracts, I expected more like $24m to buy out Dozier's arb seasons. $20m seems kinda low for a 27 year old coming off a 5 WAR season. It makes you wonder if Dozier was willing to take less in arb to avoid losing a FA season, all the while still getting a pile of guaranteed money.

I like rewarding Dozier for a good 2014 and from all accounts, being a good guy and teammate. But from a financial sense, I don't really get it... Especially without picking up any of his FA years. With that said, it's same yearly money the Twins gave Mike Pelfrey so who really gives a rat's ass.

I put little to no stock in plate discipline in Spring Training. The pitchers are hurling fastballs, the hitters are looking for pitches to hit. With that said, I doubt Santana is going to become some kind of walk machine once April rolls around... The question is whether his discipline has improved and Spring Training isn't going to tell us that one way or the other. Joe "I hate to swing the bat" Mauer has all of 2 BB this March.

Ahahahahahah, that's hilarious. Cruz is such a douche.

Except that expected run value has more correlation with offensive metrics. Couple that with the vastly expanded data points of offensive metrics and they're more reliable, especially over the course of a single season. I'm not dismissing defensive metrics, only stating that they haven't been shown great accuracy over short periods of time, which the creators of the metrics readily admit. Therefore, a player who derives a significant portion of his seasonal WAR from dWAR is suspect. That doesn't mean he's not worth three wins on defense, it merely means that the number cannot be trusted.

UZR doesn't do any of those things and that has been the topic of most of this thread. I specifically mentioned it in my post. There are other metrics that weight win probability but UZR doesn't measure it. Remember that this part of the conversation started with a mention of dWAR, which doesn't use weighted metrics on defense. Hence, dWAR is of limited use if you want to know "what happened" in a player season because the metrics used to calculate dWAR aren't meant to be used as a single-season metric. The very creators of UZR (and by default, dWAR) do not recommend the metric be used in that manner. I don't understand why this is even an argument. The creators admit that outlier fluctuations happen when the metric is used as a single-season valuator. By that very admission, dWAR over a single season is unreliable.

Yeah, I'm familiar with RC27 (was introduced to it during Bonds' hayday, which provided great amusement because the numbers were so off-the-charts absurd, a testament to Bonds' dominance) but I never read into RE24 before.

The catch the prevents a double is more valuable than a catch that prevents a single, yes. But UZR has absolutely no way to track the value of a catch in that manner. Yes, a failed difficult catch will more often result in additional bases but that is certainly not the case every time. The catch by Revere posted earlier in this thread is a good example of that. If Revere misses that extraordinarily difficult catch, the runner gets a single. Whereas a home run is always of greater value than a double and a double is always of equal or greater value than a single. Offense metrics track that difference. My point isn't that all catches are the same, my point is that offensive metrics can track varying degrees of success with measured results that are always true whereas defensive metrics have to assume certain things that may not be true. If you add up those assumptions made by defensive metrics over a long period of time, you'll reach an aggregate number that is reasonably accurate but in small doses, the variance can be misleading and don't necessarily reflect "what actually happened". To make a long story short, an offensive metric can track 6-7 different outcomes of a plate appearance and weight them in order of value. A defensive metric tracks a Boolean result. True or false. Assumptions have to be made about value in the aggregate, hoping that they will balance out in time. Tracking more outcomes and weighting them properly means more accuracy, especially in smaller sample sizes. Add that greater nuance to the vastly larger pool of opportunities tracked by offensive metrics and you have a much more reliable system to value a player (aka. "what really happened").

Ah, yes. I got my years mixed up. 2013 was the Triple Crown season. What's so weird about the Santana voting was that he was only boned by the win stat. It wasn't a "old school vs. new school argument", as Santana was better than Colon in every meaningful stat except the "win", whether you believe in sabremetrics or not. It was just a horrible decision. Even their win percentages were reasonably close. The old school guys should have seen his superior ERA, strikeouts, innings pitched, etc. and voted for Santana over Colon. It was, in a word, stupid.

That's a pretty great metric for this type of discussion. Either way, I just don't get that upset about MVP discussion. There are so many angles from which to look at MVP, including "did his team win or make the playoffs?" I don't agree with many of the angles but I won't begrudge people for looking at the award in that manner. Is MVP a "the best player in baseball" debate or a "the best player on a winning team" debate? Cabrera also won a Triple Crown, which hadn't been done in half a century. That's a pretty big deal to some folks. I'm not amongst their number but whatever. I just don't get worked up about it one way or the other. The last time I got riled up about an award was when Santana had a Cy flat-out stolen from him by an inferior pitcher and it wasn't particularly close (Johan didn't even finish second that year, which makes it all the more mind-blowing). The voting pendulum changed quite a bit after that bad choice so it was hard for me to even get too upset about that after the next year's voting went down.

Yes. Given the current bullpen options, I think it's time to see if some of the guys in the upper minors can miss MLB bats.

If Santana posts an OPS over .700 this year and does it at SS, his value is higher in eight months than it is today. He doesn't need to blow .700 out of the water... a .710 OPS will attract buyers. If you can see a "sell high" candidate, so can the 29 other general managers in baseball. Nobody is going to loot the farm for Danny Santana right now for the same reason that Twins fans want to trade him. That's not "sell high". That's just "sell".

Ah, good catch. Still not fond of UZR/150 but I suppose it does have some use in that context.

Depends on what you want from the metrics. My post is in response to this statement about defensive metrics: "It still tells us what happened (within the measurement accuracy, which is better than it gets credit for)" For the reasons listed above, defensive metrics don't actually tell what happened because they're weighting difficulty with the expectation that the result is repeatable. Offensive metrics weight result like home run, walk, single, etc. To draw a comparison, it'd be like OPS giving extra points to the 500 ft home run over its 400 ft counterpart with the expectation that a hitter who can rip a 500 ft home run is stronger and will hit more of them. Probably true but not result-based and not a reliable way to weight an event over a few data points.

But at their core, all catches are the same. The end result is a single out. A triple is not the same as a single. One advances the runner three bases every time. The other advances the runner a single base every time. There is inherent value in advancing more bases and a single is never more valuable than a triple. And that's why UZR needs a lot of data to be accurate. It's rewarding difficulty. It's assuming that the "run across the field, making the spectacular diving catch" is inherently more valuable than the "stand there, don't screw up catch". That's not necessarily the case. They're both outs... But one nets the defender a 1-2 RAR and the other barely moves the needle. To counteract that problem, UZR needs a lot of data because in the aggregate, those spectacular diving catches indicate ability so the metric assumes the defender is routinely making spectacular diving catches and that some of those catches are super-valuable. The best way to put it is this way: Defensive metrics rely on a Boolean result every play. Offensive metrics can have a multitude of results in an AB and weight them on value. Home run is best, triple next, etc. In no situation is a walk a better result than a single or a double better than a home run. Over the course of a season, the weighted metric with multiple results is going to be more accurate when valuing a player.

Nope, still different. A catch is a catch. It counts for one out no matter whether the fielder stood there and made the catch or whether he ran 200 ft to make the most spectacular catch in baseball history but UZR grades them differently. Defensive metrics assume that making a hard catch is inherently more valuable than an easy catch because it's a repeatable skill based on a single event. That's not necessarily the case. On the other hand, a walk is nice but it only advances everyone a single base... But a triple advances everyone three bases. When counted in the aggregate, a triple is far more valuable and the metrics count it as such. There's no defensive equivalent to a triple because after a triple, the bases are cleared and a guy is standing on third base. That actually happened. There are no instances where a single is more valuable than a triple but there are plenty of cases where making a hard catch is far less critical than making an easy one. The offensive metric weights those two events correctly but the defensive metric might not.

But it doesn't actually tell what happened. It said he made some hard catches. It's not a given that those catches were terribly valuable to the team. They were valuable, like all catches... But a home run is more valuable than a double. Every. Single. Time.

In no way did I imply that 2015 Brian Dozier is a 5 WAR player. It was implied that he was a 5 WAR player in 2014, as in "5 Wins Above Replacement". I can't say the same about Gordon, who was a decent bat that derived around half his WAR from defense. It's possible he was a 6 WAR player but because of the inconsistencies with defensive metrics, it's also possible he's closer to a 4 WAR player.

Yep, just accidentally hit submit before I typed anything.

I'd have to read up on the details - I've only glanced at the rules - but teams can now trade international bonus space. I think you trade the slot and the receiving team then receives X number of additional dollars to their signing pool.

I believe diehard was saying that Milone could be traded for cap space, not that just trading him would automatically clear cap space.

And before anyone writes in Milone or Pelfrey, remember last season. A good portion of this board had written Gibson out of the rotation because the Twins soooo love their veterans. Personally, I'm pulling for May to get the job. I felt that way last September and nothing has changed.

International signing cap space. With the Twins rumored to be in on what's-his-face (DR SS), they could use more international cap space.

I'd have to double-check but I'm almost certain I only counted years where UZR data was available.

Nothing, if that's what you're trying to do as a pitcher... Scott Baker thrived on a rising fastball that was missed or popped up weakly. If the pitcher isn't trying to elevate but does it on accident, that usually means he's throwing it right down the pipe.