I'd rather have Trout on my team than Cabrera. I'd venture most of the MVP voters would feel the same.
I'd rather have Trout on my team than Cabrera. I'd venture most of the MVP voters would feel the same.
"I prefer books and movies where the conflict isn't of the extreme cannibal apocalypse variety I guess." Redsfaithful
jojo (08-12-2013)
Quick thought on defensive stat flux, the flux isn't the problem so much as potentially why the flux occurs.
Batting and pitching, mechanically, defy consistency. Slight variations can make or break you in those pursuits. Fielding, especially in the OF, is based much more on gross motor functions. Players aren't getting appreciably faster or slower year to year. It's not like you get locked-in out in the field and suddenly you're faster.
So the flux may have more to do with circumstance than with anything the player is doing. If so, then we've got to figure out whether there's actually a baby in that bathwater.
I'm not a system player. I am a system.
1. I think the team matters to me because bad teams appear to get more chances - this is maybe not a good example but bad teams get more opps to make plays in all manner of areas. I'm not real sure UZR takes that into account.
2. i think the proprietary systems that each team has is good stuff -but you still have to have the ability and insight into how to interpret those numbers and i wonder if that's out there. i think that's what's missing in sabermetrics these days -- it's data over interpetive analysis.
There appears to be a huge amount of data collected -but what's missing is someone who can make sense of the numbers and communicate the story. Imho, that's what's missing with sabermetrics recent generation - they have no one who can analyze and present the data in a way that makes good sense. When i see this i tend to think they are working at the margins without understanding the big picture....and that's this .....defensive numbers can only be understood if you know how they relate to the overall teams numbers, thus making sabr defensive numbers skewed.
Currently, Jose Altuve has the best double play percentage -he plays on the worst team in the league by a long shot - i have a sneaky suspicion that his numbers are skewed because he plays on the worst team in baseball- maybe this is a poor example - i think we are about 50% of the way there in evaluating ind defense.
We just have a different definition for value, which is a subjective concept. From my perspective, your value is relative to what your team accomplished. If your team was third with or without you (as the Angels would have been sans-Trout) you don't have the same kind of value as a guy whose team made the playoffs. Doesn't mean I think any less of Trout's game. He's great. Just not better, er, more valuable, than Miggy last year.
Rounding third and heading for home...
Barry On Baseball Also blogging at Banished to the Pen.
Just to make sure I understand your perspective:
Miguel Cabrera was more deserving of the MVP in large part because the Oakland Athletics and Texas Rangers were better than the Chicago White Sox and Kansas City Royals, meaning that Detroit's 88 wins won a division while the Angel's 89 finished 3rd.
Similarly, if Cabrera had better teammates, such that the Tigers ran away with the AL Central instead of squeaking by with 88 wins, he would have been less valuable, perhaps making Trout more deserving.
Or, if Trout had better teammates, such that the Angels finished ahead of Texas and won the wild card, Trout would have been more deserving.
Is any of that inconsistent with you view of value? If yes, please clarify.
Games are won on run differential -- scoring more than your opponent. Runs are runs, scored or prevented they all count the same. Worry about scoring more and allowing fewer, not which positions contribute to which side of the equation or how "consistent" you are at your current level of performance.
Tom Servo (08-13-2013)
First, because baseball players are human (this by the way is a favortite refrain by those who lecture staheads about their metrics) and second, they also often have nicks and cuts from a grind of a season that can be unique to a season that impacts various aspects of their game.
So it's because it is and by the way, current metrics reflect this too.
"This isn’t stats vs scouts - this is stats and scouts working together, building an organization that blends the best of both worlds. This is the blueprint for how a baseball organization should be run. And, whether the baseball men of the 20th century like it or not, this is where baseball is going."---Dave Cameron, U.S.S. Mariner
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