The Projections System Got It All -- Right?!!

Remember this?



And this?

 
They were Baseball Prospectus's projected standings for 2016 last March. At the time, I made sport of the sabermetric community for continuing to expose themselves to ridicule. BP can no more predict next season's results than can any nominally educated fan .

Want proof? Look at that very first line. They have the 68-94 Tampa Bay Rays winning the East, while tabbing the Baltimore Orioles, a Wild Card entry, as the worst team in the AL. With projection systems like this, why not just throw darts, right?

But Wait, There's More...
Well, keep looking. BP pretty much nailed the rest of Baseball. Sure, the Rangers won the West, but there's lots of evidence that their level of play was much more like a lucky .500 team. The rest of the AL is dead on. As projected, the World Champion Royals did stumble. The Indians did indeed run away with the Central. The Angels, with Mike Trout and Albert Pujols, did in fact stink.

Take a gander at their NL projections. Nationals, Mets, Cubs, Dodgers and Giants in the playoffs. Spot on, but for the Nats and Mets switching places. The new and improved Dbacks? Correctly unimpressed. The 98-win Pirates? Stumbled even worse than projected. The Braves' tear down? BP nailed their record.

PECOTA's High BABIP
We could analyze what happened in the game that led to this unlikely result. The big spending teams in Chicago, Boston and Los Angeles delivered. The bad teams lived down to expectations. There's no evidence that the projection system, called PECOTA, learned any new tricks.

If you were projecting BP's projections for 2017, you would regress them to the mean and peg them for largely on target but for some big misses. But BP had a high BABIP last year and avoided the injury bug. They outplayed their third-order Pythagorean record.  I project that BP's 2017 projections -- and everyone else's -- will stumble about like Andy Capp, with some home runs and some big whiffs, no better than a semi-educated fan's best guesses. They won't nail all the playoff teams in either league, but they'll get the Cubs and Dodgers right, maybe the Astros too.

Next year this time, we can review my projection of BP's projection and determine who the bigger dope is. I'm betting that baseball's unpredictability vindicates me.

The "Stick a Knitting Needle in Your Eye" Bowl

For those still trapped in the argument that college football is about "student athletes" engaged in "amateur athletics" rather than a money grab by educational institutions, I present contrary evidence exhibit #736, today's Zaxby's Heart of Dallas Bowl.

Did you catch that irony? Zaxby's, purveyors of fried chicken, fried potatoes and 20-ounce cups of liquid sugar, is sponsoring a bowl game with the word "heart" in it. As in, you'll need a new one if we manage to convince you that our product constitutes a meal.

Meet the Mighty Contestants
That's a mere quibble to the two contestants, Army and the
University of North Texas, each of which will receive $1,100,000 for its trouble. For the Army, that will buy a wrench or two. North Texas, which won't have to pay for transportation or lodging to the Cotton Bowl stadium 43 miles away, pockets the cash and gets what amounts to another home game.

The game itself? Well, let's start by noting that Army is an independent Division 1 team that fattened up on Division 1A meatballs Lafayette and Morgan State in order to notch 7 wins in 12 games, and already prevailed in its rivalry game over Navy a couple of weeks ago. For the Black Knight players, this bowl has to constitute a massive letdown. But you follow orders when the people making the decisions will be your superiors for the rest of your college career and then for at least another four years after that.

UNT plays in a second-rate conference (Conference USA) where it went 3-5, en route to a 5-7 record overall, including beatdowns by mighty Western Kentucky (45-7) and Texas-El Paso (52-24).

A Showdown We've Been Waiting For -- Since October
If you think that a 5-7 team shouldn't be rewarded with a post-season berth, wait, the plot thickens. One of North Texas's victories this year came against ... this very same Army squad. Followers of these middling programs have already had their eyeballs scorched by this pathetic match-up back in late October. (After which UNT lost four of five contests before "earning" this bowl game, one of 40 being played by 80 Division 1 teams, 20 of which failed to win more games than they lost.)

So you can imagine the excitement, the build-up, the anticipation...that Zaxby's must feel for the advertising opportunities it will have when ESPN 23 presents the game at 11 a.m. Dallas time on the Tuesday after Christmas. Because, as you were saying, college sports are all about amateur athletes (who were done with their semester two weeks ago) and not college revenues.

Revisiting Jayson Stark and Captain Underpants

Back on the Ides of February I paid homage to the special talent of writer Jayson Stark, admired for excavating baseball's obscure and confounding in a whimsical way.

One tradition of his is to identify players who have surpassed previous season or career norms just days into the season. In my post, I went Jayson one better, predicting which players that might be in 2016.

I thought it'd be fun to take a spin through the picks and see how they turned out. (Spoiler alert: about what you'd expect.)

First the mundane: i predicted Tanner Roark would surpass four pitching wins -- his total output in a sorry 2015 -- in quick order. Despite a winless April, Roark earned his fifth victory on Memorial Day en route to a 16-10, 2.83 season that placed him 10th in Cy voting and increased his WAR eightfold to 5.5.

Likewise for Nick Markakis and Anthony Rendon in homers and RBI. Markakis endured a quirky power outage for the Braves in '15, recording just three homers, all in the second half. He mashed 13 in '16. Rendon, stubbed by injuries last year, rebounded from a 5 HR, 25 RBI season to 20 and 85 in 2016.

No insight was necessary to observe that Jake Arrieta would allow more runs in a couple of bad outings in 2016 than the seven he held opponents to in the last two months of 2015. Sure enough, in three starts covering the end of June and beginning of July, the Reds, Mets and Pirates touched him up for 15 runs over 16 innings. For the season, Arrieta crashed to earth from his 22-6, 1.77 Cy Young campaign to 18-8, 3.10 -- still good enough for ninth in the Cy voting.

Shelby Miller endured a brutal 2015 with Atlanta where he won just once after May despite pitching well. So predicting he'd earn more W's in Arizona was like shooting fish in a barrel. Ha! Fish one, shooter nothing! Miller pitched like snake poop in 2016 and his W-L record reflected it. He won exactly zero games in April, one game in May and one in June. Injury curtailed the 3-12, 6.15 torture that cost the D-backs their #1 pick and two pitching prospects.

Likewise, I thought Captain Underpants, the reliable Hunter Pence, would crush the nine homers and 30 runs scored he produced in the injury-sacked 2015 season. Alas, Pence missed 50 games in June and July of 2016 and authored just 13 homers and 58 runs scored, many of them in a red hot September. Put him on the 2017 list!

To cover just this kind of contingency, I included Corey Seager on the list. The 2016 Rookie of the Year enjoyed a productive cup of coffee with the Dodgers in 2015, tallying 17 times after his September 1 call-up. They don't call us smart asses for being dumb asses: Seager crossed the plate for his 18th run in early May of 2016 and continued crossing it, to the tune of .308/.367/512 and MVP votes. I bet you've forgotten Shelby Miller already.

The Cardinals all but forgot Jon Jay in their outfield last year, so his trade to San Diego and the starting centerfield job offered him the opportunity to top the six doubles and one stolen base he achieved in all of 2015. He did rip 26 doubles, but swiped just two bags all season -- surpassing both previous marks by May.

Dee Gordon and A.J. Pierzynski delighted their employers in 2015 with anomalous seasons they couldn't possibly duplicate in 2016, so I threw them on the prediction wagon. And they didn't -- not even close! Pierzynski's .300/.339/.430 was the best age-38 season for anyone spending most of their time behind the plate and one of the best of his 18-year career. I said he wouldn't even duplicate his 2015's April, when he socked three homers and knocked in 14 runs. And in a desultory .219/.243/.304 campaign that is likely his last, Pierzynski never made it to three home runs and pushed across just 23 runs the entire season.

Gordon led the league in batting average and hits in 2015, legging out 78 of them in April alone. Thanks to a doping suspension, he didn't produce his 78th safety until September and lost 65 points of batting average and 135 points of OPS.

Saving the best for last, there's former South Carolina star Jackie Bradley Jr. JBJ found his mojo toiling in the Minors in 2015 waiting to showcase his transformation in August and September. Consequently, it wasn't until the eighth month that he produced his sixth hit, first double, second homer, first stolen base, fourth run scored and fourth RBI of the season.

And this year? Jackie got his seventh hit on April 20th, and completed the entire Bingo card by May 7th. On that date, his batting line included 28 hits, six doubles, three homers, two steals, 15 runs scored and 14 RBI.

That's a pretty good batting average on the predictions, though, of course, they were all a bunch of hanging curves. Then again, I could never hit a curve, hanging or otherwise.

More Answers To Questions You Didn't Ask

You may have been wondering -- or maybe you haven't. Someone in the last week has posed each of these questions and so I answer them here:

Q. Where will Jose Bautista and Mark Trumbo end up?
A. After years of slamming its finger in the same door, the market is now properly valuing aging, immobile sluggers, and it isn't pretty for their agents. I believed one of the former Blue Jays would wind up back with Toronto because they obviously have a hole to fill at that position. With the parrot carrier now poised to bash homers in Cleveland for millions less than he was seeking, I wouldn't be surprised if Joey Bats re-ups at a discount with the Jays. He isn't exactly winning Miss Congeniality votes from other teams. And Baltimore seems to be in hottest pursuit of Trumbo, but also at pennies on his expected dollar.

Q. What are the Mets going to do with their outfield situation?
A. Give Terry Collins headaches? Best guess, unless something dramatic happens: rotate Cespedes and Granderson through centerfield, giving Lagares spot starts and and shuffling him in as a defensive replacement late in games. Send the non-CF Cespedes/Grandy to right and leave Comforto in left to show he can hit. Jay Bruce is a righty bat off the bench. Lots of options if someone gets hurt or doesn't pan out.

Q. Who are your World Series favorites right now?
A. Answering this question is a fool's errand, but I'm game. The World Champion Cubs are the same team as last year, flipping Dexter Fowler for Kyle Schwarber and Aroldis Chapman for Wade Davis. In the AL, the Red Sox are poised to allow about 400 runs next year. The Cy Young winner is their #3 starter.


Q. Now that Bud Selig, who presided over the Steroid Era, is in the Hall of Fame, shouldn't we vote in guys like Bonds, Clemens and McGwire?
A. I don't really see that logic. Selig didn't cheat. That said, I've always been in favor of putting those guys in the Hall.

Here's the problem: you've got Bowie Kuhn in the Hall of Fame, a guy who had an 0-162 record fighting the players' union and who could hardly name a single accomplishment as the commissioner. You've got Gaylord Perry in the Hall, an inveterate cheater who got caught on the field altering baseballs. You've got Lloyd Waner, a thoroughly average Major Leaguer, in the Hall because he batted .316 for his career even though that was his signature skill and team batting averages topped .300 in the '30s. But you want to exclude the top player and pitcher of their era because there's evidence they took an unfair advantage during a portion of their career. It makes no sense.


Q. With the Braves signing all these old former stars, do they really think they have a chance this year?
A. Puff you're inhaler, Braves fans. These guys are just filler. They're signed to one-year deals. If they play well they'll be shipped out mid-season for more prospects.

Q. What do you make of the Diamondbacks?
A. Much like the United States of America, they hired a pair of amateur hacks to run the organization with predictable results. Now they've gotten professional management in there and find themselves with some promising young assets across the infield. Their task going forward will be to acquire some rotation pieces behind Zack Grienke or they'll never contend. Easier said than done.

Q.Not a baseball question, but what do you think of star college football players skipping their bowl games to prepare for the draft?
A. How dare they act in their own best interest! Major college football is about amateur athletics, not about some money grab, says the Buffalo Wild Wings Citrus Bowl.

Q. If Mike Trout played at replacement level for five more years and then retired after the requisite 10-year career, would he get into the Hall of Fame? How about if he was average over the next five years?
A. No and no, because you need more than five stellar seasons to make the Hall of Fame. But the premise of your question is correct. Mike Trout is the greatest player in baseball history over his first five seasons. (He was also the greatest over his first one, two, three and four.) Give him three more Trout seasons and then five bad or mediocre years and he's in.

Q. What about Sandy Koufax? He was a below average pitcher who made the Hall of Fame with five great seasons.
A. Good point. Koufax got extrapolated credit for all the years he didn't pitch after retiring early. Had he pitched at replacement level for three seasons following that unbelievable run I doubt he gets in.

Q. Will the Red Sox regret trading Clay Bucholz? You can never have too much pitching right?
A. They won't regret getting $10 million closer to the luxury tax cap.

Q. Should the Mets trade Jay Bruce?
A. Okay, you're the GM of another team who could use a big bat. The Mets offer you a 30-year-old .250 hitter with 30-homer pop and mediocre defensive skills. What would you give up to get that? For now, I think the Mets should be glad that they have some hitting options to back that pitching staff.

Q. What do you see from the vantage point of San Diego?
A. The ocean.

Q. Come on, I mean what are the Padres' prospects for 2017.
A. At least they have the ocean.

Happy holidays to all!

Rethinking Lou Brock's Hall of Fame Career

Lou Brock was a gentleman and a scholar. And a slap-hitting base thief. He is on the right side of one of the most lopsided trades in MLB history. As part of that second wave of black players to join the Majors -- his rookie season came 14 years after Jackie Robinson threw open the gates -- Brock brought style and panache to a 19-year career.

A stalwart of three World Series teams, Brock led the NL in base swipes eight times and at one point held the record for steals in a season with 118. He scored 100+ runs seven times and batted over .300 in eight seasons, finishing within three points or less three more times. 

For all this, Lou Brock's likeness smiles brightly upon visitors to Cooperstown, voted that honor in his second year of eligibility.

Tim Raines stands on the precipice of Hall induction in his last

year of eligibility. Raines and Brock had nearly identical batting averages, and while Raines swiped 30 fewer bases he also slugged 15 points higher. Like Brock, Raines was a left fielder not particularly known for his defense despite the burning rubber.

But here's the difference:

Lou Brock didn't walk much. That's a problem for a punch-and-judy leadoff hitter. His lifetime .343 OBP was good, better than average, but not table-setting material. For his career, Brock sported an OPS nine percent better than average. Keeping in mind that average includes all the weak-hitting middle infielders and backstops in baseball, Lou Brock was barely an average left fielder.

Rock Raines earned almost twice as many free passes as Brock in fewer plate appearances, giving him a .385 OBP.  His OPS, despite playing half his career in knee-killing Stade Olympique, shone 23% above the median.

Defense!
I glossed over their fielding ability earlier. The metrics suggest Raines was about average in the pull corner for his entire career, about where Brock measured until he turned 30. For half his career, he rated in the butcher category. Brock lost twice as much value from his glove as Raines. (Baseball Prospectus even less sanguine on Brock.)

Then there's the matter of steals. Raines ran into outs 161 fewer times than Brock. That's a huge difference -- about 10 wins against replacement over the course of their careers.

Even without those 10 runs, Raines was still the vastly better player. According to Baseball Reference, Raines earned 69 WAR over his career and Brock just 45 -- about the same as Amos Otis. That 53% gap is the difference between surpassing the average left fielder's Hall of Fame WAR (65) and falling well short.

Why Is Lou Brock a HOFer?
We value what we measure -- in baseball and in life. Because we measured this relatively insignificant skill -- base stealing -- baseball observers in the 60s and 70s vastly over-rated Lou Brock. In addition, we didn't know how to leaven batting average with on base percentage, so Brock's pedestrian OBP was overshadowed by his excellent batting average.

We know better now, and that's why Raines's Hall support rocketed up to 70% in his penultimate year on the ballot. He has none of the milestones like 3,000 hits (he was too busy walking) or an MVP. He's simply the second best leadoff hitter of all time.

Lou Brock was nothing like that. If he were on the ballot today he wouldn't sniff the Hall.