7 posts tagged “baseball”

AL 

A month ago or so, I posted something about my baseball stat, which I like to call OAR (or Offensive Ability Rating). I developed a formula that has a few different components to it, primarily one that measures how many bases a player generates as well as how many bases they steal (and the success rate they steal them at). So one component measures power, speed, and how successful they are (batting average is also included). The next nearly equal part of the component, which I call ELF (or Eye Luck Factor) measures how often a batter gets on base after hitting the ball into play (BABIP), how often a player walks or gets on base without getting a hit, while also counting against the hitter with how many times they strike out or ground into a double play. Another small component to the formula is pitches per plate appearance, but this is just added in as a tie-breaker more than anything else (also measures how "Gritty" a player is... could wear the starting pitcher down).

This is the third version of my stat, so it has become a bit refined over the past few months of working on the formula, and then tweaking it to get it as correct as possible, since we're rating a player's overall offensive value and want to be as accurate as possible. So, here's a top 50 hitters list (from 2008, I think I'm going to use this as a guide for my fantasy draft, heh):

1. Albert Pujols 130.68
2. Adam Dunn 127.59
3. Chipper Jones 123.27
4. Milton Bradley 121.98
5. Lance Berkman 118.33
6. Manny Ramirez 118.31
7. J.D. Drew 116.84
8. Alex Rodriguez 115.74
9. Chris Ianetta 114.34
10. Hanley Ramirez 113.76
11. Mark Texeira 113.27
12. Jason Giambi 113.11
13. Carlos Pena 112.26
14. Matt Holliday 112.12
15. Shin-soo Choo 110.3
16. Jack Cust 110.27
17. Carlos Quentin 110.02
18. Grady Sizemore 109.77
19. Ryan Ludwick 109.13
20. David Wright 108.95
21. Kevin Youkilis 108.82
22. Chase Utley 108.63
23. Pat Burrell 108.46
24. Jason Werth 107.99
25. Jason Bay 107.76
26. Carlos Beltran 105.71
27. Nick Markakis 105.56
28. Prince Fielder 105.12
29. Brad Hawpe 104.81
30. Aramis Ramirez 104.7
31. Jim Thome 104.25
32. David Ortiz 104.2
33. Mark Derosa 103.71
34. Dan Uggla 103.4
35. Elijah Dukes 103.35
36. Andre Ethier 102.57
37. Josh Hamilton 102.44
38. Nate McLouth 102.38
39. Evan Longoria 101.77
40. Ryan Howard 101.73
41. Brian Roberts 101.39
42. Troy Glaus 100.88
43. Curtis Granderson 100.7
44. Kelly Shoppach 100.55
45. Aubrey Huff 99.84
46. Carlos Lee 99.8
47. Geovany Soto 99.4
48. Ian Kinsler 99.17
49. Jim Edmonds 99
50. Carlos Delgado 98.76

For a fantasy baseball tip, it's not a bad idea to choose your hitters from the NL, since the NL has weaker pitching overall. Also, don't forget that a player shouldn't just be evaluated using solely offensive statistics... other factors are important too such as how healthy the player is, and if they are a defensive liability (Adam Dunn may be one of the best hitters in the game, but he is one of the worst at defense as well), and finally remember that there are not as many good hitters at positions like middle infield or catcher as there are in the outfield, etc.

...so I just calculated the American League teams' overall stats by Offensive Ability Rating... here's how they rank:

1. Boston Red Sox - 93.7
2. Texas Rangers - 93.52
3. Tampa Bay Rays - 90.04
4. Cleveland Indians - 88.54
5. Detroit Tigers - 88.16
6. NY Yankees - 87.14
7. Chicago White Sox - 86.99
8. Baltimore Orioles - 86.4
9. Minnesota Twins - 84.91
10. Toronto Blue Jays - 83.33
11. California Angels - 82.96
12. Oakland A's - 81.5
13. KC Royals - 77.99
14. Seattle Mariners - 77.76

So we have the 3 of the 4 playoff teams in the top half of the league... With the Angels thriving in a weak division despite their low offensive rating. 

Here we see the most successful teams in offense for 2008 by Offensive Ability Rating:

#1 Chicago Cubs - 91.77

#2 Philadelphia Phillies - 90.04

#3 New York Mets - 88.53

#4 Florida Marlins - 88.49

#5 Colorado Rockies - 87.48

#6 St. Louis Cardinals - 87.42

#7 Arizona Diamondbacks - 87.36

#8 Atlanta Braves - 85.94

#9 Milwaukee Brewers - 84.73

#10 Cincinnati Reds - 84.12

#11 Los Angeles Dodgers - 83.24

#12 Houston Astros - 82.67

#13 Pittsburgh Pirates - 82.33

#14 San Diego Padres - 81.3

#15 Washington D.C. - 79.77

#16 San Francisco - 78.82

The Cubs being the most well-rounded on offense, and also being in a tiny stadium improves their abilities greatly, making it easier to hit home runs... The Phillies became World Champions in '08 with the second highest OAR in the NL, which included bashers like Ryan Howard and Pat Burrell, and the best second baseman in the game in Chase Utley (usually one of the worst offensive positions)... The Marlins also were ranked rather highly with a waaaaaaaaay above average middle infield offense in Hanley Ramirez and Dan Uggla... the Rockies barely eeked it out over the Cardinals due to the perrennially batter-friendly confines of Coors Field... The Braves were bolstered by a great season by Chipper Jones... The Brewers despite their exceedingly above average power hitting landed in the middle of the pack due to their bad plate discipline... and the Reds rounded out the top 10 again due to being in a hitter's ballpark more than anything else. As expected, the SF Giants were last in offense, with the Padres somehow being better than the Nationals despite being in the most hitter neutralizing ballpark in the majors.

Next I'll publish the American League's top teams in OAR, and then next week I'll post the big one, with the top 100 hitters in baseball.

So for a few months I've been working on a new stat for baseball titled Offensive Ability Rating. This stat measures a player's overall offensive worth, encompassing stats including Total Bases, Stolen Bases, Caught Stealing, Hits, Batting Average, BABIP (or batting average on balls batted into play), Ground into Double Plays, Sacrifice Flies, Hit By Pitch, and to a lesser extent pitches per plate appearance (P/PA). So instead of looking at who's the best in one area of the game (or at bulk stats like RBI or HR), I'm attempting to wrap all of facets of the offensive part of the game of baseball into one tidy little package.

Basically, the stat sort of reads like a quarter back rating stat... it shows who are the players with not only the most power, but the players who combine power with speed and baserunning, their eye for the ball and plate discipline, and even how hard they hit the ball or wear a pitcher down.

This new stat has several components, or other stats that focus on certain areas, mainly Base Efficiency Factor, which is sort of like Power Factor (which just measures how many bases a player generates with one hit) but with stolen bases and caught stealing thrown into the equation. BEF is the most straightforward part of OAR; it is total bases + .8 times the number of stolen bases divided by hits plus number of times caught stealing. The formula being TB +.8*SB divided by H+CS. This component of offensive ability rating both tells you how powerful and how good at stealing a hitter is (so running speed is involved), measuring the efficiency in number of bases a hitter generates when getting a hit as well as if they can steal or not.

Related to BEF is Base Efficiency Average (or BEA), which is simply batting average multiplied by BEF... showing how often a player can pull off those total bases when actually getting a hit... players like Ryan Howard gets penalized here since they don't hit for average.

The next part of OAR is called RELF, or Raw Eye Luck Factor for lack of a better term. This part of the stat is a little more convoluted, measuring the amount of walks, hit by pitch, and to an extent sacrifice flies, which are penalized statistically speaking by the amount of ground into double plays the player generates as well as how often they strike out and do not at least put the ball into play (perhaps causing an error)...

This raw version of the component (RELF) is then averaged into the next component, called Eye Luck Factor, or ELF for short which is also factored in with BABIP... which measures how often a player gets on base because they hit the ball really really hard, are really fast, how lucky the player is, etc. This is usually higher than the player's batting average, and is another way of determining how good a player is at getting onto base. Players with good plate discipline, hitters that are feared or hit tons of line drives, and hitters that just get on base a lot in general and play smart baseball are good at this stat... two good examples would be Albert Pujols and Adam Dunn.

So once I do the calculations, Offensive Ability Rating is Base Efficiency Average plus Eye Luck Factor plus pitches per plate appearance divided by 30, then multiplied by 100 (BEA + ELF + P/PA/30 * 100).

In the next few weeks I'll be doing posts showing how individuals as well as teams did in 2008 offensively, using this stat to illustrate. Tomorrow I'll be doing a rundown of the National League and which teams were the best at hitting.

Is anyone on here?

I developed a new baseball stat called Offensive Ability Rating, or OAR for short. It's too late tonight to write too much about it, other than that Albert Pujols easily deserved the NL MVP, and that Dustin Pedroia didn't deserve the AL one.

And that Miguel Tejada is horrible, horibble at hitting. The guy must be half blind, or something. The guy has an on-base percentage of 31.4%, and will strike out 3 times before he walks on average. Not to mention, he grounded into 32, yes thirty-two, double plays last year, erasing many a rally. Just how sucky can you be, while making millions a year? I guess, just ask Hollywood or Washington about being overpaid...

Don't get me started on the filthy rich...

Another baseball season went by, even faster than usual this time. It seems like not so long ago that I was so happy that spring training had begun, and to see who would win out positions on the competitive St. Louis Cardinals spring training camp. The team had a lot of question marks at the beginning of the season, so spring training was almost as exciting as the rest of the season; actually, it was more interesting than the end of the Cardinals' season. The team had worked itself up into a foaming rabid beast flying out of the gates, but unfortunately, the first game of the season was rained out despite a great opening performance from the pitching and an Albert Pujols home run, and a lethargic looking Rockies still suffering from World Series hangover.

That rainout sort of predicted the way the season would go, close but no cigar. The Cardinals pretty much outperformed most people's predictions, both sportswriter and hyper-informed fan, but not mine. I picked the team to win about 90 games, which they came very near to doing. The team finished half a game out of third place, due to a bizarre late season surge by the Houston Astros (should we be surprised by this any longer? It seems to be their MO in recent history). The half game lead from the Astros was caused by the Big Hurricane of '08, which threatened Houston and flooded the area with surging waters and fearsome winds. They would have had to play the Cubs if necessary, so I think we can agree the Cardinals tied for 3rd place. Not to mention the ridiculousness of playing Adam Kennedy in the outfield more than a couple of games... avoiding that alone would have remedied the problem.

One of the real problems with the Cardinals remained, alongside previous years, the injury problem. Who knows why this is, but maybe it has something to do with stubborness. Cardinals fans watched as key players such as Adam Wainwright and Chris Carpenter sat by on the sidelines, subdued by injury problems that may have been avoided, if they weren't the team's main go to guys for winning games. Both of these guys could be the ace of some team's pitching staffs. Surely we couldn't have expected much from Chris Carpenter, coming back from a long term surgery recovery... but maybe, just maybe, he should have waited a little longer for that return. I'm just glad that he didn't push it any more than he did. And the freak injury of Adam Wainwright tearing his tendon in his middle finger is hard to explain. But maybe it has something to do with a situation like the one surrounding Rick Ankiel.

As I mentioned before, I had high expectations for the 2008 season, since the Cardinals had some decent starting pitching anchored by the last minute addition of one Kyle Lohse. And of course someone named Pujols. But I was banking on a dark horse: a breakout season by Rick Ankiel. The ex-pitcher converted to power hitting rocket-armed outfielder emerged as a legitimate offensive threat in late 2007, but was sidelined by an irresponsible news story thrown out there by ESPN for some ratings I suppose (the non-scandal was blown far out of proportion by the media and some baseball fans; during the time Ankiel used small amounts of human growth hormone, it was not banned from major league baseball, and it has not yet been proven that it actually helps with hitting). Instead, we were pleasantly surprised by a scorching season from out of nowhere by Ryan Ludwick, but back to those injuries....

Ankiel basically played with a sports hernia for a few weeks, maybe around a month. He was given a few more off-days to rest, and didn't play for a while, but was never designated for the disabled list. A very bad move really, since the Cardinals suffer from the strange problem of having too many good outfielders. Actually, it's a nice problem to have; but alas, the Cardinals didn't use it to their advantage. And if it was Rick Ankiel saying he could play when he was badly injured, the team needs to learn something about the tough-guy attitude. It's happened too much to this team. This was one of the many things I am at a loss to explain about the '08 Cardinals season, but nothing was as bad as the fall of Jason Isringhausen.

I really don't know what happened to the guy, except that he's had so many injuries and is getting too old and worn out to compete at the major league level anymore. The problem being is that he is such a competitor he doesn't know when to stop, and the team were too stubborn to take him out of his traditional role (which he is handsomely paid for). Had the organization acted faster in realizing that Isringhausen, or Izzy for short, was costing them wins the team would have been the story of the year... but cost them he did; I think it's safe to say that his performance cost them playoff berth. And he had the tantrums and damaged finger to show it, after punching a tv screen I believe. There's just no excuse for this, other than avoidable drama that can somehow happen to anyone, human error I guess...

But onto the more positive aspects of the 2008 season: Albert Pujols' absolute domination of The Art of Hitting. Pujols is by far the most complete hitter in the major leagues, and 2008 was possibly his greatest season, pretty much guaranteeing him a spot in the Hall of Fame, arguably even before he has hit his peak. Pujols, like much of the team, was injured during the season (he pulled his calf muscle) and played through pain in his elbow (at least in part due to ligaments with small tears in them) as he has done since 2003. No hitter can match the combination of plate discipline (the guy hardly ever strikes out), power (he's hit well over 30 home runs every year in his short career), and constistency that Pujols exemplifies. And let it not be an afterthought that Albert Pujols is one of the best defenders in the major leagues, playing arguably better defense at first base than anyone in the game. Very few players have deserved the MVP Award as much as Pujols deserved his in '08. I wonder how much better a season he would have had if he wasn't hurt for a few weeks? Unbelievable. And oh yeah, he even played a little second base.

Ryan Ludwick's breakthrough season was a close second in good stories from the Cardinal's 2008. Ludwick's Slugging Percentage was second to only MVP Albert Pujols', both leading the majors. He hit just as many home runs, and while he didn't hit for quite the batting average as Albert, he absolutely tore the cover off the ball, blasting line drive after line drive after homerun all season long. He also played a decent outfield and even filled in in CF. To wrap things up, Troy Glaus impressed over at third base, aptly replacing Scott Rolen at the hot corner while outhitting the guy by quite a fair margin. Had Ankiel stayed healthy (as well as Glaus towards the end of the season), the Cardinals would have had a fearsome foursome for their opponents to contend with all season long. But the (sort of) late decision to start playing Ludwick every day multiplied by Ankiel and to a lesser extent, Pujols, being injured, really made it difficult for the Cardinals to reach their goals. The team could easily have won over 90 games if it weren't for all the setbacks and slowly-adapting managerial decisions regarding all the aforementioned reasons...

But oh well, it was a helluva season and I loved it. One of the most entertaining season's in memory, I was happy to follow along with the team, as well as converse with my fellow bloggers over at Viva El Birdos, the best baseball blog on the internet.