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ashbury

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Everything posted by ashbury

  1. ashbury
    What more proof of the conspiracy do you need, man?
  2. ashbury
    The good news may be that it's less important to be able to make the distinctions between good and so-so defense, for the same SSS reasons that make the analysis harder: Robbie Grossman in the outfield doesn't get a chance to affect the game's outcome as often as we sometimes think.
  3. ashbury
    Are shifts leaving third base uncovered common in that scenario?
  4. ashbury
    Understanding why they are different (and I offer no guarantee that I do) allows one to judge when and how much to trust the defensive stats we do have. It's not, for instance, all subjective on the defensive side - that's not the core problem.
  5. ashbury
    I concur with all that Spy wrote above, but want to add that defensive stats suffer from an inherent small sample size compared to batting stats. Each plate appearance consists on average of around 4 pitches, these days. Even though only outcomes are recorded, there is a richness in the experience being measured that goes far beyond the basic numbers. How well does the batter lay off bad pitches, how often does he whiff on good pitches - all these micro-results wind up contributing to what we know of as a plate appearance. By comparison, defensive stats suffer the opposite problem. There is less to the data than meets the eye. An awful lot of Total Chances are on plays like cans of corn to the outfield and routine grounders to the infielders. Separating the wheat from the chaff is the first task of the data analysis, and there is an awful lot of chaff. That's IMO why it takes multiple seasons for defensive stats to take on the same meaningfulness of their offensive counterparts.
  6. ashbury
    Traditional scouts don't usually net six-figures either. Are the teams just rolling the dice with them? Sure, in a sense, but they also treat the information with respect and as having value. Baseball doesn't pay much, compared to other industries, for pretty much any except the top-end jobs, for all the reasons you mention. You're setting an arbitrarily high bar there. If the goal is player evaluation, then data mining and analytics being considered on a par with traditional resources sounds pretty good to me.
  7. ashbury
    It's like George Carlin's observation about breaking a crumb in half. You don't have two half-crumbs, they're just two crumbs now, in seeming violation of the laws of physics. Similarly, putting together small sample sizes remain small sample sizes, no matter how long you keep doing it.
  8. ashbury
    And I don't know either, and if I had thoughts of Kubel being my #1 guy for the question posed here (I was just throwing him into the mix among other good candidates), I'm definitely backing off. At this point I'm just contemplating the what-ifs for 2006.
  9. ashbury
    I thought he was considered to have pretty good wheels, but I don't happen to have a pre-ACL Baseball Prospectus on my bookshelf to re-check that. The 2005 Prospectus certainly is, ahem, measured in its description of his defense - "adequate" is often a left-handed compliment. He DH'ed half his games in his September 2004 callup, pre-injury, but that's not unheard of when breaking in a young prospect in September. With his minor league progression, accounting for underperforming at Ft Myers and overperforming at New Britain, and the fact he didn't embarass himself when called up to the majors at age 22, and I don't think it's a stretch to imagine him as an offensive force two years later at age 24, and thereafter.
  10. ashbury
    Moderator's note: While meant in good fun I'm sure, this kind of tangent doesn't belong in the baseball threads.
  11. ashbury
    When we play the Rangers my runners have the green light rounding third every time on a ball hit to the outfield, Castro and Cron and Cruz included. / edit - OK, except for when it's hit to that Gallo guy
  12. ashbury
    And not just that. We're looking back at 2006? Imagine having Kubel in the batting order instead of Tyner/Nevin (our bizarro-world DHs). And his pre-injury wheels in the outfield instead of Rondell (slide him to DH where he belonged). I don't think Kubel is the one guy whose absence stopped a WS march, any more than Liriano. But oh my, that makes two coulda-woulda-shouldas.
  13. ashbury
    Let me toss Jason Kubel's name into the mix as well.
  14. ashbury
    Major League Baseball to rename disabled list as 'injured list' ICYMI.
  15. ashbury
    I don't recognize this song.
  16. ashbury
    Do we ever find out the magnitude of the cash considerations in a trade like this one with the Rangers? Probably it's not as high as $750K, but if it is, and thus matches up with the bonus pool space the Orioles sent, it would be an awesome instance of something resembling arbitrage, or at least the brokering of two transaction partners who don't line up well themselves.
  17. ashbury
    You probably want to change "Granite is" to "Granite was." From the article: "It incorporates age, offensive performance, defensive performance, and other characteristics from the past two seasons." I am going to stick my neck out and guess that incorporating 2018 stats into this methodology has dropped Zack's projection a little.
  18. ashbury
    Brian Navarreto sure put a charge in the ball when he hit it over the Southern Green Monster late in the game.
  19. ashbury
    "What was your favorite Xavier Moore moment?" Mine is that one time.
  20. ashbury
    Certainly no apologies are needed, and I could be wrong. I just didn't want someone getting excited over what is possibly a reporting anomaly. Buxton was quoted elsewhere as saying he was paying particular attention to being more selective on the first pitchh, making this statistic especially strange.
  21. ashbury
    Maybe someone will fill in the facts, but I think it was stated (last year?) that Gameday feeds are not with full detail in many cases, so a lot of plate appearances will look like they were of the 1-pitch variety.
  22. ashbury
    Probably. Although, it's unlikely he even gets the chance to bat "all spring" with the big club. A non-roster invitee, even a highly touted one, is usually one of the early cuts, for a variety of reasons. Currently .400 is his OPS, not his BA. So this eventuality isn't especially likely to come to pass anyway. Sincerely, Captain Buzzkilliroff
  23. ashbury
    Socialism? When the gubmint gets involved, I mean beyond the Antitrust Exemption to owners, I'll pay attention to the rest of your argument. This is a capitalistic negotiation between partners in an asymmetric business relationship. Somehow, you've bought the billionaires' story that the millionaires are the bad guys.
  24. ashbury
    Sounds a bit rushed. How about with men on base?
  25. ashbury
    Do you have corresponding growth rates for revenue, operating income, and franchise values?
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