Maybe the Snakes Are Better Than We Thought? Nah.

Entering 2017, one could be forgiven for looking kindly upon the chances of the team in Phoenix, anchored as it is by some real talent. Zack Greinke is a true rotation ace. Paul Goldschmidt is a quiet superstar -- maybe the best first baseman in the game. A.J. Pollack and Jake Lamb are stars and David Peralta is another good outfielder.

Unfortunately for the Diamondbacks, the measure of a team isn't its cleanup hitter or its ace, but its  #8 hitter, its fourth starter and its set-up guy. Thanks in large part to the disastrous front office tenure of Tony LaRussa and Dave Stewart, the Dbacks' cupboard is bare beyond those players named.

Coming into the season, the Dbacks were projected to field among the worst players in the game at catcher, second base, shortstop, and left field.  Add to that the worst bullpen in the Majors, and you have too much for Zack Greinke, Paul Goldschmidt, Jake Lamb and A.J. Pollack to overcome.

Well, we're 46 games into the season and Arizona has a .587 winning percentage, "on pace" for a 95-win campaign. The reason, in its entirety, is that players at the above-mentioned positions have performed better than league average. When you're expected to be the worst team in the league at your position, and instead your 12th or 13th our of 30, that's a big improvement.

And maybe the team is better than we thought they were. Maybe the kindly lookers were right about them. But probably not.

New research by Jeff Sullivan at Fangraphs shows that even though pre-season analytical projections don't have much of a track record, they are more than twice as predictive of a team's performance after Game 50 as a team's performance in the first 50 games of the season is. In other words, the first 50 games can be very deceptive and bear very little relationship to how good a team actually is.


What 's that telling us about the Diamondbacks? It's telling us to take them with a grain of salt. In fact, consider every team's start the same way. If you're a fan of the Giants, Mets and Blue Jays, that's good news. If you like the Brewers, Rockies and Twins, it's not so much.

Just remember one thing: the first 50 games do count. So if the Dbacks are 10 game over .500 and play a mere .500 the rest of the way, they will end the season at 86-76. And that could get them into the Wild Card.

Passing Along This Great Fangraphs Article

I have little to add to this amazing revelation about how Bryce Harper has remade himself even in the middle of his breakout season, so I will simply recommend it.  Jeff Sullivan of Fangraphs stands atop the pile of Internet sports writers.

By the way, on June 10 Harper finally faced a pitcher younger than him in his fifth year in the Majors when Yankee reliever Jacob Lindgren retired him on a fly ball. Lindgren, a rookie, is seven months younger than Harper.

OPS Is Dead; Long Live TAv!

Remember when those statistics geeks dragged their pencil necks out of the ooze of their mothers' basements and dropped their complicated nerd numbers on us, numbers like OPS and WAR? They made unreasonable demands on us, like understanding obtuse concepts: "getting on base is good" and "hitting for power is more than home runs."

And then, just when we picked up the spin on those knuckleballs they were throwing us, they began firing heat, telling us OPS wasn't the end-all. No, it turns out we could gloat that they were wrong all along, those Moneyball pocket protectors. We know that science should make a pronouncement and that should be The Truth forever, without any revisions or further inquiry. So now when they decide that wOBA is a more useful statistic, they're just admitting they were wrong.

So now we have wOBA, weighted on base average, which "combines all the different aspects of hitting into one metric, weighting each of them in proportion to their actual run value. While batting average, on-base percentage, and slugging percentage fall short in accuracy and scope, wOBA measures and captures offensive value more accurately and comprehensively," according to Fangraphs.

OPS values slugging as equal to on base percentage, when in fact getting on base safely is nearly twice as important to a team's ability to score runs as slugging is. That's why OPS always over-rated the big lugs who walk, strikeout and go yard and under-rated skeeters who Baltimore-chop their way aboard, steal second and score on a sac fly.

 wOBA is tuned to the pitch of average on-base percentage, or roughly .320. So if you see that Yan Gomes posted a wOBA of .340 last year, you know that the Indians' catcher was an above-average hitter. (He's also a quality backstop worth nearly five wins for the Tribe last year. He's an under-appreciated ballplayer.) Ordinary fans can't calculate wOBA because the formula is complicated and requires facility with the cosmic mysteries of multiplication and division.

For 2015, wOBA will be one of our go-to statistics for hitters. So will TAv, or True Average,  a similar measurement scaled to batting average (where average is .260) that accounts for park factors and league quality, but not for baserunning. It is also beyond the derivation powers of ordinary humans without green eyeshades and solved Rubic's cube puzzles. Potato tomahto.

Sometimes we want total value wrapped up in a single package with a nice ribbon. WAR, wins above replacement, wins the Oscar for best performance in The Theory of Everything, flawed though its performance is. WAR includes a defensive component, which still inspires chuckling, but does compare players to others at their position. An average defender in right field with a .340 wOBA is not nearly as valuable as an average defender with a .340 wOBA behind the plate.

WAR is becoming more popular, and not just because the deformed brains of Boko Haram and Daesh are on rampages that inspire war in their corners of the world. WAR provides one-stop shopping for a player's tangible value to his team in games won, taking into account offense and defense, park factors, league averages and replacement value. And it's becoming ubiquitous, which hikes its value as a statistic, as long as it's consumed with a grain of salt even by those with high blood pressure.

Look for wOBA, TAv and WAr in this space to replace OPS and OPS+, which once upon a time replaced batting average, home runs and RBIs. It's called "learning." Don't tell Boko Haram.

Statheads Have To Lighten Up About Their Projections

When a kid gets a shiny new toy he always wanted for Christmas, it's not surprising that he plays with it endlessly. And when it ceases to work, it's not surprising that he puts it away.

The seamheads turned out shiny new projection toys in the 2000s variously called PECOTA, Steamer, ZiPS, Marcel, FANS and Oliver, depending on whose proprietary system you prefer. (For example, Baseball Prospectus created PECOTA, Fangraphs introduced ZiPS and Tom Tango developed Marcel.) They all compare ballplayers of today to their counterparts in history to determine what awaits the current crop in the coming year. All that is then compiled into team projections.

These toys have some value for a couple of reasons: they are objective and they have built into them some simple rules that humans fail to recognize or choose to ignore when analyzing player performance. Beyond that, though, they offer little insight. Most significantly, they don't know anything about the people who play the game. They are blind to who learned a new pitch, is struggling through a wrenching divorce, picked up a hitch in his swing or is finally healthy.

As a result, they can never tell us who will suddenly break out, Jose Bautista style, or who will Dontrelle Willis all over himself. None of them could pinpoint the 2014 demise of the Red Sox or the Orioles' pre-eminence. And yet the sabermetric world talks about these tools as if they're atom splitters.

So, for example, Steamer predicts the top 10 players by WAR next year are Mike Trout, Andrew McCutcheon, Giancarlo Stanton, Troy Tulowitzki, Miguel Cabrera, Josh Donaldson, Evan Longoria, Adrian Beltre, Jose Bautista and Paul Goldschmidt. (Cano, Machado and Puig are right behind.) Well, duh. right? (Clayton Kershaw and Felix Hernandez are its top pitchers. Who knew?)

It says Joey Votto and Bryce Harper are stars with injury risks. You don't say. It projects Chris Davis bouncing about halfway back to 2013 with a .242 batting average and 30 home runs. About what you'd predict. It sees Justin Verlander returning to about league average pitching. And it's not really buying Rookie of the Year Jacob deGrom. Well, who outside of the outer boroughs is?

So the toys have some entertainment value, but the saber community plays with them as if they're iPads.  They quote chapter and verse on players, particularly when analyzing trades and signings. The truth is, exercise a few simple guiding principles, like Warren Buffet investor tips, and you too can lord over the average baseball fan.

And be right 60% of the time.

In subsequent posts, we'll discuss those principles, examine some interesting player projections and the swim among the team projections. (Spoiler alert: the Phillies will suck.)

Will Mike Trout Be the Best Ever?

You can't write about Major League Baseball these days without writing repeatedly about Mike Trout. It would be like leaving out Mozart from a history of classical music. Trout, after all, has already in his young career reached heights no one else has seen in the game's 130-year history.

Mike Trout authored the greatest age-20 season of all time, batting .326 with 30 homers, scoring 129 runs, swiping 49 of 55 bases and intercepting everything in center field. He followed that with the greatest age-21 season of all time, somehow increasing his OPS 25 points. He was the world's most spectacular player (and the AL's most valuable, though not the Most Valuable) each of his first two seasons. He is the greatest player through age-21 ever to play the game.

Consider this: Before he's even celebrated his 22nd birthday, Mike Trout has produced 21 wins against replacement at the highest level of baseball on the planet. That's more than Carl Everett, a two-time All-Star who hit a commendable .271/.341/.462 with 202 homers and 107 stolen bases, produced in his entire career. Mike Trout has had Carl Everett's entire career before most great players even get a Major League call-up.

In fact, Dave Cameron of Fangraphs has determined that Mike Trout has had the greatest  career of all time through age-22 -- even though he hasn't played his age-22 season yet. He could literally play at replacement level for the Angels in 2014 -- we're talking something like .240/.300/.380 with average defense and 12 steals --  and still be considered the greatest 22-year-old ballplayer of all time. (We would re-assess him if he were that bad, but you get the point.)

Fortunately for us, nothing short of a season-ending injury in Spring Training will prevent Mike Trout from producing value in 2014. Fangraphs' Steamer projections system, which tends to be conservative with superstars, projects for Trout .306/.401/.522, 26 homers, a very pessimistic 31 of 43 steals, and about eight more wins above replacement. 

So Mike Trout is a certain Hall of Famer and is knocking on Babe Ruth's mansion to claim the Best of All Time trophy, right? In the words of the sage philosopher Quick Draw McGraw, "now just a doggone minute there, Babalooie."

Consider the plight of Cesar Cedeno, the Mike Trout of the '70s. Cedeno burst onto the scene from the Dominican at age 19 in 1970 flashing speed, power and potential. In 90 games in that rarely-mourned cavern called the Astrodome, Cedeno laid down a .310/.340/.451 with 17 steals in half a season for Houston. He regressed a bit at age-20, but then broke out the following two years, hitting .320, averaging 37 doubles, 23 homers, 55 steals and 7.7 wins against replacement. Entering the 1974 season, 23-year-old Cedeno was at the top of everyone's "next superstar" list, the top power/speed merchant since Mantle and Mays.

It's not as if Cedeno disappointed. Over the next four years he averaged .352 OBP, 35 doubles/triples, 18 homers, 56 steals and 5.2 wins against replacement. Through his age-26 season, he had collected four All-Star berths, five Gold Gloves, and 40 WAR. He was a star, just not quite a superstar.

And then the wheels came off -- or at least one wheel. Surgery following a bad knee injury cost him most of 1978 and limited his effectiveness thereafter. Cedeno never again stole 50 bases, never again hit even 11 homers, and missed at least a third of games in five of his remaining eight seasons. It's a cautionary tale for Trout and his fans.

Cedeno's tale of the tape is a study in excellence. He smacked 199 home runs, nearly 500 doubles/triples, added 550 steals and hit 23% above average while patrolling the vast center pasture. His 53 lifetime WAR ties him with Fred McGriff and places him a few spots above Lance Berkman, Mickey Cochran and Luis Gonzalez. 

Almost anyone would envy Cedeno's career, but not Mike Trout. Trout is aiming well-above 259th on the WAR list and so are his fans, which should include every baseball in North America. Now in year three, we'll be watching to see if he transitions from phenom to marvel and avoids the plight of players like Cesar Cedeno.

The Eight-Man Rotation

"Too much of a good thing is . . . wonderful." --Mae West

One might eyeball the Red Sox rotation going into the 2014 season and consider trading one of their six quality starters for an outfield asset or an upgrade at third. But new research by Fangraphs' Jeff Sullivan suggests that this would be a bad idea.

You are officially discouraged from linking to his fine article because if you do there will be little reason to read this. Let's instead review his work on the fallacy of the five-man rotation and then draw the obvious conclusions.

First, a disclaimer: when you read the conclusions you're going to think they are so obvious they weren't worth the trouble. Everyone knows that pitchers get hurt or otherwise become ineffective, giving rise to the cliche that "you can never have too much pitching." Yet we all act as if his findings are unknown and focus all out attention on each team's starting five. You'll read many articles in fine publications during Spring Training about this team or that's fifth-starter competition, as if the battle is for an Olympic spot that's never relinquished.

Here's the upshot of the research: A quick and easy review of the five pitchers who made the most starts on each team reveals that the fill-ins amount, on average, to a whole other rotation spot. They averaged 32 starts and 170 innings per team. In other words, the average team uses the equivalent of six starters.

And that understates the issue. In many cases, the five hurlers with the most innings on a given team were not the five comprising the rotation on April 1. For example, the Dodgers entered the season with a first-rate quintet of Clayton Kershaw, Zack Greinke, Hyun-jin Ryu, Chad Billingsly and Josh Beckett. Greinke sustained a separated shoulder in a fight, Billingsly lost the season to injury, Beckett to injury and general uselessness. They brought in Chris Capuano and Ted Lilly, but Capuano got hurt, requiring a parade of plug-ins until trading for Ricky Nolasco. L.A. got 101 starts out of their planned rotation and needed help for the other 61. Even then, a Plan C was required for 36 of the 61 they thought they had replaced.

Which brings us to the Red Sox. They feature a starting rotation of Jon Lester, John Lackey, Jake Peavey, Clay Bucholz, Felix Doubront and Ryan Dempter. Six square pegs and only five square holes. The obvious temptation is to swap out Dempster, the weak link in the group, to fill a hole elsewhere. Ah, but not so fast, grasshopper.

Consider how the Pirates made the playoffs last year. Their starting rotation made just 82 starts, 60 of them out of A.J. Burnett and Jeff Locke. Wandy Rodriguez was effective -- for all 63 innings he contributed. James MacDonald made six desultory starts and the Bucs invoked the mercy rule on Jonathan Sanchez after 13 tightly-packed frames that included seven jacks and 18 runs.

The aces of the staff turned out to be lefty back-up plan, Francisco Liriano (16-8, 3.02), and rookie call-up Gerrit Cole (10-7, 3.22). Another emergency starter, Charlie Morton, contributed 20 starts of 7-4, 3.26, while young reliever Jeanmar Gomez chipped in eight solid starts and ended up 3-0, 3.35. The Pirates coaxed 94 wins out of eight pitchers they had on the depth chart at season's commencement.

That's no guarantee that Boston will ever need Dempster to start this year. In 2012, the Cincinnati rotation made all but one start for the season. (The following season, Johnny Cueto, Homer Bailey, Mike Leake and Mat Latos all blew up. Only the indestructable Bronson Arroyo made every start in '13.) But that's the exception that proves the rule and is so unusual that the previous team to do likewise was the Curse-busting Sox of 2004.

Where does Boston stash Dempster if he's not going to start until needed? Conveniently, the same place the Cubs put him from '04-'07 when he came out of the pen to save 87 games. He's not closer material -- he wasn't then, for that matter -- but he can keep the arm loose in long relief while the rotation sorts itself out. Lester, Lackey and Bucholz are all well-acquainted with the Disabled List.

Dempster might not even be number six on the Fenway depth chart. He's contributed at roughly replacement-level the last two seasons and might be slotted behind some youngster(s) who can retire batters more efficiently. Where the 37-year-old Canadian might be able to contribute is by eating innings, which he accomplished 171 times without complaint last year. Anyway, there's not much market for an aging, replacement-level, $13 million, number-six starter. Whatever the Red Sox could squeeze out of a trade partner probably isn't worth the insurance he provides on the mound.

So, the research is clear: you can never have too much pitching. Teams need six starters -- at least.

Lifting the Veil of Luck

It's appropriate on the weekend of Black Friday to discuss shopping frenzies. To some extent, every team is in one now as they kick the tires on free agents who might help them win in 2014 and beyond.

One of the most important advances in the world of baseball analytics is the ability of franchise brass to evaluate personnel realistically. When baseball GMs determine which free agents might help their teams in 2014, they will view 37-year-old Bruce Chen with a jaundiced eye.

Teams will know that Chen's 9-4, 3.27 effort for Kansas City in 2013 was a chimera. Nothing in his pitching profile suggested that he had a special season except the ultimate results. In 121 innings he fanned just 78. He relinquished just 107 hits, primarily because opponents batted only .255 on balls in play (BABIP) against him, 25 points lower than his career rate and 40 notches lower than league average. The chasm opens wider when examining only Chen's 15 starts; he made 19 relief appearances to begin the season before the Royals summoned him back into the rotation.

In addition, Chen  stranded 78% of runners who reached base against him, significantly above his lifetime and league average rates. Strand rates are rarely a matter of skill. Finally, an unusually low percentage of fly balls against him left the park, often a sign that a pitcher got lucky with wind, field configuration, and the like.  Taken together, the snapshot of Chen's results provides strong evidence that regression troops are arraying on the border and preparing to attack next season. Caveat emptor.

Likewise, Cubs brass won't be relying on Travis Wood to deliver another stellar (literally: he made the All-Star team) 3.29 ERA season in 2014. Wood also enjoyed a low BABIP (.248), high strand rate (77%) and low fly ball/HR ratio. Advanced statistical models suggest his actual performance looked more like a 4.50 ERA.

Instead, Cubs management might hope for bounce-back from Edwin Jackson. Despite an 8-18, 4.98 campaign in '13, Jackson was actually a strong performer. A .322 BABIP against and a frighteningly low (63%) strand rate conspired to denigrate his work. Fangraphs estimates Jackson was worth two wins above replacement, something an ERA of nearly-five would not suggest.

And don't look now, but 2014's Tiger pitching phenom could be Rick Porcello. The 25-year-old righty managed a 13-8, 4.32 line when everything was going against him; it'll be interesting to see what happens when he basks in the sunshine of serendipity. Like Jackson, Porcello suffered a high BABIP and low strand rate in '13, but big flies are what really did him in. One of every seven balls in the air against him cleared the fences, a miserable rate for which he might not be completely responsible. Fangraphs thinks Porcello was more like a 3.50 ERA hurler who was worth 3.5 wins last year.
Over the last four years, Porcello's strikeout rate has risen while his walk rate has held steady. If he can keep the ball in the park just a little better he has a chance to to some damage in 2014.

Remember, regression is a trend, not a guarantee. Jackson could stink up the joint again and Wood could again leave the bases full of runners. It's just not the way to bet.
 

This Bryce Harper Guy Is Pretty Good

In his first 162 games, Bryce Harper, now a grizzled veteran of 20, has been one of the 10 best everyday players in the majors.   

He's soon to eclipse the record for home runs before age 21, currently held by Mel Ott. See the whole Fangraphs article.

This Punchline Is No Joke

Since the Cubs unwisely signed him into his dotage as if he'd win them an election, Alfonso Soriano has been a punchline. The 8-year/$136 million debacle shone a spotlight on Soriano's poor plate discipline, lackadaisical approach and underwhelming defense, all of which undermined the high batting average and big home run totals.

Soriano has slipped in general estimation from 40/40 superstar keystoner to utterly worthless outfielder in just a few years.The pendulum, has swung farther than is warranted, in large part due to weak performances at the plate in 2009 and 2011. Because he's never walked and no longer runs, Soriano must hit at least .260 with his usual power to have any value.

This year, at age 36 and with two more seasons on his lottery ticket, Soriano has contributed. He's hitting .271/.321/.494 with 19 homers and 22 doubles in less than two-thirds of a season. His contribution, however, has been wasted on the last place Cubs, who are not positioned to exploit his skills even if they have the bankroll to cut his checks.

It has been an annual August exercise for Chicago to place Soriano's name on the waiver wire and for general managers everywhere to yawn. Or giggle. This year, though, several contenders light on the lumber might want to consider placing a claim. This was not originally my idea; I stole it from Jack Moore at Fangraphs.

Imagine you're the Tampa Rays. You're desperate for a decent outfield or DH bat, like one that posts an OPS 18% above league average. You're wallowing in the Wild Card rumble with the league's second-best pitching but a punchless offense weighed down by the offensive floundering of Desmond Jennings, BJ Upton and Luke Scott.

There's no way you're paying the king's ransom, or even a princely portion, for Soriano this year and the two following. Good news: Cubs GM Theo Epstein will be glad to oblige. Chicago will pay most of the tab for someone to take Soriano so they can free up a few drachma while grooming their next pennant-winning team. It will take a couple of prospects to consummate the deal, but Tampa has that in abundance.

If another team is willing to pay nearly full freight on Soriano, they can probably land him without skimming any cream off the minor league system. But more likely, a team with an outfield hole can get the the righthanded Dominican for a 50 centavos on the dollar.

We're probably a year ahead of ourselves. There might still be too much time and money left on Soriano's contract for anyone to deal. When the tipping point arrives, teams should be careful not to dismiss out of hand a guy with 350 homers and 420 doubles on his ledger even if the defense and other skills don't quite add up.

WAR! What Is It Good For?

In another sign that the apocalypse may be delayed, ESPN has officially adopted Wins Against Replacement, Baseball-Reference.com's all encompassing measure of a player's value compared to a whatever his team might be able to find trolling the waiver wire or Triple-A. 

WAR is a simple concept, trenchantly summarized here by David Schoenfield at ESPN. It's nice to see that the people who are adopting the statistic understand what it means and how it's used.

If you just skipped the link, I encourage you to go back and click it. Schoenfield both describes and demonstrates how WAR can be useful. He also employs it to illustrate what a spectacular rookie year Mike Trout is having at age 20. Of the seven players on the list of best 20-year-olds whose careers are complete, six are all-time greats. The other is Vada Pinson, who was a terrific player in his 20s but tailed off severely thereafter. 

Schoenfield also describes the limits of WAR, and while generally on target, he misses the mark in two places.

First, he is right that WAR is not the be all and end all statistic. It is comprehensive, but imperfect. Some have used this as a knock against sabermetrics, this inability to produce a statistical singularity. But it comes a lot closer than anything that preceded it, and no doubt it will improve.

On the other hand, WAR strips out all the noise -- era, field effects, position -- and helps us make comparisons that standard statistics miss. Schoenfield describes how right fielder Josh Reddick and his .880 OPS for Oakland has been twice as valuable to his team as Prince Fielder and his .888 OPS has been to Detroit.

Schoenfield makes an interesting observation, but also stubs his toe here: 

One, it's my opinion that WAR shortchanges pitchers with durability...take, for example, Roy Halladay. When figuring his WAR, you're calculating his value over a replacement-level pitcher, maybe a pitcher with a 5.00 ERA or whatever that level is these days. But a Triple-A pitcher isn't going to give you seven or eight innings every start like Halladay does, and certainly not 233 innings like Halladay gave the Phillies in 2011. But WAR, the way I understand it, sort of assumes that's the case.

He is right that Halladay, by taking the ball every fifth day and pitching deep into games, provides added value to the rest of the pitching staff beyond the strong results he produces. WAR doesn't calculate the value of keeping relief arms fresh, anymore than it figures the cost that a DH imposes on his team's lineup by forcing the manager to play a lesser hitter in order to cover the defensive position the DH vacates. But WAR does account for Halladay's continued excellence over 233 innings. Compared to a pitcher of exactly equal performance over 117 innings, Halladay's WAR is double.

The core weakness of WAR is the weakness of its constituent parts. Most salient is the defensive component, which is still a mere approximation of actual defensive ability. Indeed, Baseball Reference, Baseball Prospectus and Fangraphs all have their own proprietary defensive metrics and they often vary widely on the same player. (One vivid exception is the glovework of Derek Jeter, upon which they all similarly cast aspersions.) Because we have so little confidence in those defensive formulae, it makes a goodly chunk of WAR highly suspect.

Consequently, you will rarely see WAR (or its Baseball Prospectus equivalent, WARP) quoted here.  Defensive calculations will one day provide more insight, but today, they are still too unsteady to lean on. I prefer VORP or oWAR, which calculate only offensive value over a replacement player.

Still, it's another advance for the general understanding of the game that the corporate behemoth agenda setter in sports coverage sees the value in, and offers to the public, a new and revealing tool in player evaluation.

(Thanks to Dick in Charlotte for bringing this to my attention.)

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Attention Met Fans: Is Wright Best Ever?

I commend to your attention, if you live and die with the ballers in Flushing, this article by Alex Remington and published by the excellent site Fangraphs. 

On the occasion of David Wright's ascension to alltime Met RBI king, Remington notes that Wright was already the greatest Met position player of all time. (Tom Seaver, of course, is the best player ever and will be for a long time. As Remington also points out, the history of the team is thick with pitchers but not so much with hitters.)

I've co-opted this graph to support Remington's case. It shows that while Hall of Famers have passed through, Wright's time as a Met is first for overall value as a Met.

Name	G	PA	HR	RBI	SB	triple slash		Fld	BsR	WAR
David Wright	1121	4849	186	735	151	.301/.381/.508		-26.6	7.5	40.2
Darryl Strawberry	1103	4549	252	733	191	.263/.359/.520		7		36.6
Jose Reyes	1050	4840	81	423	370	.292/.341/.441		15.4	18.5	33.4
Carlos Beltran	839	3640	149	559	100	.280/.369/.500		12.4	17.3	30.9
Edgardo Alfonzo	1075	4449	120	538	45	.292/.367/.445		44.9		30.7
Mike Piazza	970	3941	220	655	7	.296/.373/.542		-48.9	-7.2	30.2
Keith Hernandez	875	3684	80	468	17	.297/.387/.429		52		27.0
Howard Johnson	1149	4591	192	629	202	.251/.341/.459		-81		24.0

 

WAR=Wins Against Replacement

The fielding numbers are calculated in runs, not in wins, so Piazza loses about five wins, not 49, for his ineptitude as a backstop. Also remember that WAR is adjusted for position. Wright's hitting prowess is remarkable compared to other hot cornermen while Hernandez lacked the punch of most first basemen and Straw was being measured against other corner outfielders.

Your mileage may vary when it comes to who the greatest everyday Met has been, but if he stays with the team, by next year David Wright should be #1 alltime in hits, walks, doubles, runs, RBIs and batting average (for players with more than 500 at bats) as a Met.

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HI: I Wish I'd Thought of It

I love Jayson Stark. I think he's a really good writer who sees the trees through the forest. He's positive and temperate and loves the game of baseball.

But he deserved this. I highly recommend this article, and Fangraphs in general, for anyone who wants to understand baseball better.