30 March 2013

Predictions Guaranteed or Your Money Back

On a major sports radio show today the hosts filled two of the short segments that interrupt the endless flow of commercials, promotions and public service announcements with a discussion of the 2013 MLB season.

Specifically, they offered their predictions about division winners and Wild Card participants, earnestly and authoritatively, with scant acknowledgment that they might as well have been predicting the weather in Wilkes-Barre six Tuesdays from now.

The programming break concluded and the network returned to its regularly-scheduled ads before eventually meandering back through another reading of yesterday's scores to the hosts, who would have had time to shower, shave, compete in a bocce tournament and call home in the interim. They then preceded to predict playoff winners right up to the World Series.

Listeners realize intuitively that this is all just for fun, that the hosts have to talk about something to fill literally 24 hours of each day with sports, and that no one is taking these predictions seriously. On the other hand, playoff results in baseball are a coin-flip the day before they start, even if you know who's squaring off and under what conditions. Discussing playoff outcomes in March has every bit the validity of guessing the number of stars in the universe.

Moreover, people with a mere glancing knowledge of baseball, which describes most all sports talk hosts, tend to predict last year's results. Their bold prognostications included the Nationals, Braves, Reds, Giants and Dodgers in the NL. Hey, what a coincidence: four of those five made last year's post-season and the other emptied its piggy bank on imported talent.

Let's instead recognize that part of baseball's beauty is its rampant unpredictability, a function of tomorrow's starting pitcher and winning percentages that rarely top 62% or fall below 38%, not withstanding this year's Astros.

In that vein, here are some real predictions, real in the sense that they will actually come to pass.

1. A team currently lost in the weeds will shock us slowly over 162 games and bust your playoff prediction bubble.
2. The credit for their advance will be spread wide, mostly in the cracks and crevices that are hard to discern, like relief pitching, bench play and luck. The sports media, unable to see how small improvements add up to a better team, will pronounce teamwork, a great clubhouse and a motivating manager responsible, primarily because there's no way to dispute empty claims.
3. One of the big-name teams will crash and burn. Probably your team.
4. Reports of the Yankees' demise are greatly exaggerated. They will make the playoffs and the universe will remain in stasis.
5. Another hotshot young Royals phenom will fail to fulfill his potential and the universe will remain in stasis.
6. Some team will finish exactly where everyone thinks they will, except their three best players will scuffle while three guys you never heard of will carry the team. In other words, we'll get everything wrong about them except their place in the standings.
7. By roughly game 40, some batter will have already socked more homers than he's ever produced in a single season en route to a break-out performance.
8. By roughly game 40, some pitcher will have already scored more wins and quality starts than he's ever produced in a single season en route to a break-out performance.
9. A pitcher like Roy Halladay, Tim Lincecum, Dan Haren or Ervin Santana will struggle to get outs again in '13 and we'll realize he didn't have an off-year in 2012; his career is in decline.
10. An everyday player will suddenly improve his on-base skills, power, base-stealing and defense, and we'll all assume he's juicing. Because that never happened before there were steroids.
11. Vin Scully will announce Dodger games for the 73rd consecutive year and the universe will remain in stasis. The Dodgers are a contender this year, so there's a chance that Scully will raise his voice at some point.
12. A third-rate outfit like the Indians or Padres will burst from the gate and electrify their fans before folding like origami and losing 89 games.
13. Attendance in Miami will drop below the Mendoza line for a rainy Wednesday night game against the Brewers. Or Rockies.
14. One of the teams that signed Justin Verlander, Buster Posey, Adam Wainwright, Rafael Soriano or Allen Craig to a rich, long-term deal will regret their decision and you'll shake your head at the team's stupidity even though all five contracts made sense at the time.
15. By April 3 at the very latest, John Sterling will grate on your nerves with his contrived braying at Yankee home runs.
16. On May 17, NBC News will declare Houston the loser in the AL West race.
17. On the last day of the season, the sudden-death game pitting two teams tied for the final Wild Card spot will draw lower ratings than an exhibition NFL re-run from 2004. 
18. A giant sinkhole could open up beneath Busch Stadium but the St. Louis Cardinals will still compete this year because that's what they do every year. With Albert Pujols bolted and Chris Carpenter's cooked and Tony LaRussa retired and Stan Musial gone the Cards will still be in the mix.
19. And the Cubs won't be. Again.
20. Bold prediction: Miguel Cabrera will bat .300+ with 30+ home runs. There, I said it.
21. Baseball and I will renew our vows. We have never stopped loving each other.

29 March 2013

A Bunch of Lohsers

Here's my theory: Milwaukee Brewer management is so enamored with its crackling-smart win-now strategy of 2011 -- during which they leveraged acquisitions of Zack Greinke and Shaun Marcum for the last year of Prince Fielder's tenure in Wisconsin to a division title -- that they decided to reprise the approach this year.

That would explain why they've paid $33 million and their top draft pick for three years of 34-year-old flash-in-the-pan Kyle Lohse.  If Lohse is a number two starter, as his contract suggests, then I'm a number two pencil.

Last year, Lohse pitched the most innings, won the most games, lost the fewest, struck out the most, had the most quality starts, the best K/BB rate, the lowest WHIP and by far the lowest ERA of his journeyman career. After 10 seasons of 88-98, 4.80, Lohse has responded to Dave Duncan's tutelage in St. Louis for a pair of 30-11, 3.10 seasons.

So he's a new pitcher, right? Yeah, not so much. Lady luck has escorted the California righty the last two years, and left him in the care of good Cardinal defense when she's been unavailable. Whether she returns for a third year is up to her, and no one ever accused Milwaukee's fielding of aptitude.

Moreover, and sadly for the team's faithful, it's not 2011 anymore. Fielder, Greinke and Marcum are gone and the Brewers are making a beeline for the basement in the NL Central. Even if Lohse's second act continues, and that's not the way to bet, he might catapult them to .500 in 2013. But he'll cost them in future years, because signing a free agent offered a deal by his incumbent team costs a first-round pick, something the Brews' barren system could little afford to sacrifice.

A lot of mediocre teams are acting as if there are eight extra Wild Cards instead of one and flipping the future for a very uncertain present. It's going to work for someone someday and maybe this is the Brewers' year. But probably not, and Lohse's signing reduces the odds that the next few will be their years either.

23 March 2013

Peeking In the Record Book


Twenty-thirteen could be a big year for Jim Thome, if he manages to make an MLB team and get in games. With 50 more strikeouts, Thome will become the sport's all-time Whiffer King, passing Reggie Jackson with 2,598 futilities.

Bobby Abreu also has his sights set on posterity. If the 38-year-old outfielder can get into 59 games this season, he'll move into the Top 10 for games played without a World Series appearance, with 2,406. (Fittingly, Rafael Palmeiro is first with 2,831.)

Sadly, Thome and Abreu have entered involuntary retirement mode. The Twins have allegedly kicked Thome's tires and found him wanting at 42, while the Orioles have suggested they might bring in Abreu if the alternatives gag them in Spring Training.

But there are others who can look up the history's ledger and see opportunities to climb into the top reaches. Alex Rodriguez, for example, is seventh of the home run list, but can pass Willie Mays for fourth with just 14 more jacks. He's also within 99 hits of 3,000 and 47 RBIs of fourth place (passing Barry Bonds). The price for all that is five more Ks, which would move him ahead of Sammy Sosa (2036) to third all-time. But there's good news in that regard. Adam Dunn, a much more prolific fanning machine, sits just one strikeout behind ARod and figures to play fulltime for the White Sox, who owe him $30 mil over the next two years.

His teammate is 12 hits from 10th place on the all-time list. Where Derek Jeter has an advantage is that last year's injury -- a broken ankle -- isn't keeping him off the field in 2013. ARod could be out all season with his hip woes, and will almost certainly miss most of the first half. With 132 more safeties Jeter clips Cap Anson for sixth place, after accumulating 216 last year. Jeter can also move up to 15th on the strikeout list ahead of Manny Ramirez with 70 more strike-threes. He fanned 90 times last year.

Albert Pujols is starting to introduce himself to the record books. With 25 more dingers, he becomes the 26th member of the 500 Club. Another five puts him in the top 25, ahead of Eddie Murray. 

On the hill, Mariano Rivera's next save breaks the all-time save record of 608, currently held by Mariano Rivera. Aside from Trevor Hoffman's 601, Rivera is already 130 saves ahead of anyone else, pending his last season in 2013. With 31 more saves, Jason Isringhausen can move into 11th place with 331. Joe Nathan is two behind Izzy.

Andy Pettitte leads all MLB pitchers in career wins with 245, good for 51st in history. Two more cracks the top 50 and 15 more gets him to 41st place. Roy Halladay leads active pitchers in finishing what he started with 66 complete games, nearly twice as many as second-place CC Sabatha (35). That slots him in at 644th on the all time list, just 683 behind Cy Young.

Some other active players will move up the hierarchy in their particular specialties. Todd Helton is four doubles from the top 20. Carl Crawford cracks the top 100 with four more triples, and gets to 49th in stolen bases with 24 more thefts. Ichiro, now at 51st in steals, gets to 41st with 30 more. Juan Pierre, now 19th all-time, needs 32 to swipe 15th place from Kenny Lofton, with 623.

Finally, there is the fine work of Paul Konerko, who can pass Frank Robinson for 20th all-time by grounding into eight more double plays. Don't laugh: 12 of the ballers in front of him are Hall of Famers. Nonetheless, he's probably more focused on the 78 home runs he needs for 500. At 37, and with 96 in his last three seasons, it seems likely. Go Paulie.

18 March 2013

Getting Hosed: A Short Hoops Interval

When the NCAA men's basketball brackets were first revealed on CBS last night, Oregon's shocking 12 seed jumped off the screen. A top 25 team, the Ducks were among the Pac-13's (or whatever number it is now) elite and swept the league tournament, defeating UCLA, a team given a six seed, in its home city.

Analyst Doug Gotlieb, a former Oklahoma State star and current college hoops savant, jumped down the throat of the selection committee chair, bluntly demanding an explanation (which he didn't get.)

March madness, indeed! In a rational universe, Oregon almost certainly merits an eight seed, maybe a nine. Dropping them four lines means the NCAA sachems rated them 16 teams lower than the rest of America did. The irony is that the committee did the Ducks a favor. The eight-nine line is the tournament death star because the winner draws a nearly unbeatable #1 seed everytime.

As I've documented before, there's virtually no difference between a six seed and a seven, eight, nine, or even a 10 or 11. Everyone from six to 11 is talented but flawed and it doesn't take a lot going right for an 11 or wrong for a six, to produce an upset, as we've seen repeatedly in the tournament.
This line of reasoning fails at the top of the bracket. There are discernible gaps between the top seeds and teams just a little bit lower. 

What this adds up to is: an eight seed has no advantage whatsoever in the first round and a giant hill to climb in the second. A 12 seed is just slightly less likely to survive the first round but significantly more likely to defeat a four-seed -- or the 13 -- in the second round.

I assume the Oregon coach is smart enough to zip his team's lips publicly but to deal the disrespect card privately every chance he gets.

Which means the team that really got hosed was Oklahoma State, a fifth seed with a win-or-go-home first-round contest against an angry #8 in the 12 spot.

17 March 2013

And Now for Something Completely Different

Today we're going to talk about pop-up rate and Z-contact, their inverse correlation to BABIP and their effect on DIPS projections.

Ha! Just kidding! I mean, that's what we'll be discussing , but you won't know it. What you will know is that we've engaged in a new and fascinating discussion that might help you win your fantasy baseball league.

Ha! If anything in this blog were actually fascinating, Braindrizzling would be positively thrumming with annoying but remunerative pop-up ads and flashing banners. Far more likely, you'll find it mildly relevant if you manage to read to the end.

First things first: this blog post owes everything to Dave Cameron and Voros McCracken. It is a recapitulation of this fine post by Cameron at Fangraphs.

Fourth things second: there will be no math and you won't be quizzed on it next week. However, there will be a wee bit of trailblazing that will help us understand yet a skooch better how pitchers succeed or fail.

Second things third: the abridged version of the back story. Sabermetricians, led by McCracken in '99, realized that pitchers can control Ks, BBs, HBP and HRs, and not much else. Fielding, ballpark and luck are much more relevant than pitcher aptitude to whether a grounder punches through for a single or gets gobbled up by the shortstop for a 6-4-3. Their BABIP-against, that is, the batting average on all those other balls put into play, tends to be random. Sort of. Hurlers with high BABIP one year often have low ones the next and vice versa. Not all and not always, but more or less. Void where prohibited by law.

Except: flyball pitchers give up fewer safeties than worm killers. On the other hand, those fly ball hits more often fall in as doubles and triples and those four hoppers through the infield rarely push the hitter past first.

So when the SABR dudes attempt to project pitching ERAs, they don't look at a pitcher's previous ERA but at the constituent parts -- HR, K, BB, HBP -- and assume an average BABIP going forward. These projections have bested projections using just previous ERA by a significant and consistent amount over the last decade, particularly as further refinements -- like ground ball and fly ball proclivities -- have helped salt the projections.

In English, if you want a prediction of Johnny Cueto's ERA in 2013 because you're considering making a bid on him in your fantasy league, his 2012 ERA of 2.78 says GO! But his constituent parts whisper FLUKE! They project a 3.74 ERA in 2013, assuming a league-average BABIP.

And now for something completely different: Suppose Dave Cameron tells you that he has a formula that's NEW AND IMPROVED! It can account 15% better for the batting average against a pitcher on balls put in play. That means he can get you a better idea of the pitcher's ERA and WHIP, and give you a leg up on the innumerate competition. Has Dave Cameron ever lied to you before?

In a nutshell, what Cameron found is that pitchers who induce a lot of pop-ups and who get batters to swing and miss on more pitches in the strike zone, reduce their BABIPs. It's partly why consistently good pitchers, like Justin Verlander and Jared Weaver, post consistently low BABIPs. In other words, we've found another way that BABIP is not entirely random for pitchers. (It's not random at all for batters, as anyone who's watched Ichiro knows intuitively.)

If Cameron's conclusion is supported by more research -- because this is how science advances -- pitching projections will get 15% better. How big a deal is that? Five advances of 15% each double the accuracy of projections. (Trust me on the math; I stayed in a Holiday Inn near MIT.) But even without four more Eureka moments among the seamheads, you can look up a pitcher's pop-up rate last year and squeeze out an edge on the competition in your fantasy league.

The naysayers will still neigh because advances of these stripe -- small and complicated -- are hard to see. The projections still won't identify the lucky dogs, the breakthroughs and the cliff divers. They won't be able to predict which pitcher tamed his control tiger, altered his mechanics and added 4 mph to his heater, or just figured something out. Truth is, luck is still way too big a factor in baseball to overcome with science. But if science can help you win your fantasy league you probably want to listen to the scientists.

16 March 2013

The Meaning of "Spring Training"


Spring Training is a Dominican phrase meaning "people being idiots." ("Ring" = thing people wear, +"p" = just the people + "s" = plural, so Spring = many people; "training" = hoping to know something someday, but currently quite stupid.)

This is borne out by a report from the Grapefruit and Cactus Leagues I read yesterday, written by a veteran journalist not heretofore known to be a moron. It said, among other things, the following:

This spring, scouts are raving about how much Bryce Harper has improved. He is hitting .444/.459/.806 with three home runs in 37 plate appearances this spring.

It seemed like the Indians were really reaching when they signed lefthander Scott Kazmir as a minor-league free agent over the winter. Kazmir has not pitched in the major leagues since the first week of the 2011 season, and he posted a 5.34 ERA in 64 innings for the Sugar Land Skeeters in the independent Atlantic League last season.  However, Kazmir has yet to allow a run in eight Cactus League innings this spring and also pitched three scoreless innings in a B game. In his eight official innings, he has given up just five hits and one walk while striking out eight. 

(In the same article, the author refers to a player who couldn't master the game's "basic fundamentals." The writer could use a lesson in mastering the "basic fundamentals" of covering Spring Training.)

There's actually only one "basic fundamental" about Spring Training: it rarely matters. Bryce Harper is hitting .444 in 37 plate appearances against fellow 20-year-olds whose training wheels are being adjusted so they can be successful for the Double-A West Tennessee Diamond Jaxx this year.

Scott Kazmir threw 11 good innings spread over three starts, at least one of which was against ball boys and hot dog vendors. That is supposed to have more weight than two years of evidence that he's no longer among the top 400 best hurlers in the world.

Dear writer, here's how you know when Bryce Harper and Scott Kazmir are ready to break out: when they blow off Spring Training. When they use it to master a mechanical change or experiment with a new grip -- that's when they've really made it.

That theory, however, does not apply to Roy Halladay. Phillie fans should be creasing brows about his first Spring Training start. It's not that Halladay got lit up like doobie at a hipster party; it's that his velocity, which has dipped each of the past two seasons, ebbed again below 90. That is portentious in two ways:

1. There is a point at which a lack of fastball velocity can sap the value of every other pitch. If your heater is 89 and your change is 85, no one's getting fooled, not even Adam Dunn and Mark Reynolds.
2. The Phillies are already little more than three great starters and the cast from Jurassic Park. If Halladay is no longer effective, Philadelphia's quest for a .500 season is in jeopardy.

So okay, Spring Training can mean something. Halladay's next two starts will determine whether the first one was another sign of the apocalypse or just a fissure in Doc's space-time continuum. But before more of those Kazmir stories get written, can we please use a little judgment?

07 March 2013

Gays and Ballplayers and Locker Rooms, Oh My!

Let's suppose you're a narrow-minded, ignorant homophobe (to be doubly redundant) baseball player and you feel you'd be uncomfortable with a gay teammate in the locker room with you. Allow me to make three small observations:

1. Boy are you in for a shock.  5%-15% of population x 25 guys on a team = 1-4 gays per squad.
2. Substitute "black" for "gay" and go back 60 years. Fun with racism!
3. Which would you prefer, showering in the stall next to a naked gay teammate hitting .360 or
showering in the stall next to a naked straight teammate hitting .190?

See? Turns out you're not such a narrow-minded, ignorant homophobe after-all.

06 March 2013

Mike Trout's Getting Rooked (Or He's Not)

Shortly after Marvin Miller took command of the baseball players' union he discovered to his horror that the baseball card companies -- well, company: Topps -- were inducing rookies and minor leaguers to essentially give away the rights to their likeness by offering  a handful of coins and Major League blandishment. Miller proposed to Topps that they negotiate a deal that would more fairly compensate the players for the millions that Topps was reaping.

Topps told Miller they had no reason to negotiate with him. "We don't see your muscle," they told him.

So Miller visited every MLB camp the following spring and exhorted the players not to sign the deals no matter their affinity for baseball cards. In return, he promised the players he would get them a better deal.

When Topps ran into a series of brick walls, they called Miller. Seeing his "muscle," they worked out a new deal that doubled player royalties and earned their union hundreds of thousands of dollars.

Hundreds of thousands of dollars, specifically 510 of them, is the amount that Mike Trout will "earn" in 2013, thanks to a four percent raise from his employer. That is his reward for one of the most extraordinary seasons in baseball history. Trout will take home $20K above the minimum salary for second-year players.

Mike Trout's MVP-level season was worth roughly $60 million on open-market last year, based on his 12+ WARP and a market value of nearly $5 million per win. For that performance, he earned the MLB minimum of $480,000.

Trout is unlikely to come close to repeating that in his sophomore season, but even if he's half as valuable, he's still outperforming his salary by $29.5 million.

What Angel management understands is that he has no "muscle." The Collective Bargaining Agreement signed by the league and the union gives teams total control of players until they reach salary arbitration in year three. This is designed to compensate teams for the substantial investments they make in player development.

Angel owner Arte Moreno is hardly known for austerity. He's made Google-sized investments in Albert Pujols and Josh Hamilton, and has a Lehman Brothers deal with Vernon Wells. He could have thrown Trout an extra hundred grand -- couch cushion change for the franchise -- to reward him for propelling the team to contention and ingratiate the franchise to the player come free agent time. But he didn't have to. And so, Trout will earn all year what Alex Rodriguez will "earn" in three games -- three games, that is, that ARod won't play. 

But even a 21-year-old knows that "my time will come," and possibly soon. L.A. brass of Anaheim may already be working on a deal with Trout's representatives to buy out arbitration and a year or two of free agency. It may be wise to lowball his current compensation to create an incentive to sign a long-term deal. Arte Moreno didn't turn a half-million dollar ad agency into an $8 billion asset by making bad business decisions.

And when Trout gets his consolation prize -- whether he's 21 or 23 when it happens -- it will be in the Powerball range. In the meantime, he's the highest-paid 21-year-old this side of ... well, Bryce Harper, whose leverage is apparently greater. Harper earns $2 million this year, a mere $23 million below his value.

03 March 2013

Just One More Good Year

Sandy Koufax's bifurcated Major League career would have made Henry Jekyll proud: the mediocre first half (seven years, 36-40, 4.06, six wins against replacement) and the spectacular second half (six years, 129-47, 2.24, 44 wins against replacement.) 

Considering the totality of his career achievements, Koufax is a pale shadow of the average Hall of Fame hurler. Yet omitting the Left Arm of God from Cooperstown is unthinkable. His peak years, in which he posted ERAs an astonishing 43%, 59%, 86%, 60% and 90% better than league average, were the equal of anyone's, ever.

Where Koufax's career was an avalanche, Don Sutton's was the inexorable drip, drip, drip of a waterfall in drought. Sutton truly excelled in just three seasons, but his reliably good performance across 23 years earned him a bust in the Hall as well.

Thus the premise for the widely used "JAWS" rankings for Hall of Fame contenders: both full career value and peak value are relevant. Whereas some players earn their ceremony for sustained excellence, others get in with bursts of greatness.

This is why 2013 is so important for Robinson Cano's Hall of Fame resume. Cano has not played nearly long enough to accumulate the career numbers for the Hall, but another eight-win season catapults him to average peak WARP for Hall of Fame second basemen. After that, it would just be a matter of accumulating the remaining 30 WARP or so over the second half of his career. That feat is accomplished by playing well, if not spectacularly, for another six-seven years before tailing off in his late 30s.

It's not quite fair to say Cano's age-30 season is a make-or-break campaign for his Hall of Fame resume. He's young enough, after all, to slip for a year or two before rebounding in another season. The Hall is filled with gentlemen who were absent from the discussion at age 30 but sprang into it thereafter. Paul Molitor jumps to mind: although he was a seriously fine player in his first nine seasons, he'd never cracked .842 in OPS before his age-30 campaign. In his 30s, he perenially batted above .300, crossing .850 OPS six times, including three seasons above .900. Molitor also contributed value to the Brewers - and then Toronto and Minnesota -- every year through his age-40 season.

More numerous are the meteors who start their career on fire but flame out just when this discussion might have begun. Dwight Gooden found his cliff at age 25, but Fred Lynn posted five 4+-win seasons in his first seven years, then starting after age-30 never reached that height again.

So it's premature to place the burden of Robby Cano's Hall of Fame case on the shoulders of 2013. But another performance like last year's, or the year before or the year before that, begins to put him in the rarefied air that is breathed only along Otsego Lake.

Injuries limited Roy Halladay to 156 innings and a 4.49 ERA in 2012, adding almost nothing to his Hall pass. A bounce-back 2013 would really solidify the case for old Harry Leroy, because he's right at the standards on both career and peak. He owes some of his voluminous value to durability -- 220 innings or more in each of the six years previous to last -- which Hall voters and the general public seem to esteem less than actual greatness. Another top-five pitching performance this year would make it difficult to deny Halladay entrance in 2020, or whenever. The question is whether at 36 he possesses the might to once again throw 230 frames of sub-3.00 ERA. (There is this hope: it's a contract year for Halladay.)

The noodle just began wrapping around this question and these two names emerged from the goo. If you are thinking of a player whose ticket might be one more good year from getting punched, put his name in the comment section and we'll dig in.