Jayhawk Bill

Speculation: 1) The only time I've suspected A-Rod of PED use was March-April of 2007. Testing is less rigorous in the offseason, and I really suspect that A-Rod did something beyond training to get the most out of his contract year. I doubt that whatever he did then--if anything--was sloppy enough that he'll make the report. 2) As a reminder, David Ortiz has already said that he drank milkshakes during his amateur training in the Dominican that he now believes to have contained steroids. Also, Mike Lowell used steroids while with the Marlins under doctor's orders but without MLB Theraputic Use Exemption (TUE). He asked for a TUE before testing started in 2005; it was denied, and his stats in 2005 declined terribly. 3) Yeah, I wouldn't be surprised to see Nomar on the list...or Trot, Tek or Millar. I'd be very surprised to find Youkilis there because they were testing in MiLB as he was coming through. Upon reflection, the almost-forgotten name I'm wondering if I'll see is Roberto Petagine, a guy from Venezuela who had way more power hitting ability than one would've expected from his scrawny little frame.

Dunno where to find that one. :dunno: As an aside, the concept of "unearned runs" itself is flawed. If such a metric were at all important, it would be better if the whole game, not just the inning, were completely reconstructed before assessing such things. Hypothetical example: Craig Hansen comes in for a two-inning save opportunity in the bottom of the eighth inning. He strikes out two batters, then fields a soft grounder back to the mound and throws to first base for the final out of the inning. Chris Carter, allegedly defending first base, spends so much time conceptualizing how the throw from Hansen relates to the meaning of life as described by Nietzsche and Kirkegaarde that the ball sails past Carter over to the tarp. The runner reaches second base on the error. Hansen then walks the next batter, allows a three-run home run from the following hitter, and finally gets the last hitter to pop up to the third baseman in foul ground. Pawtucket fails to score in the top of the ninth. The game is over, and the PawSox lose by two. Hansen is charged with zero earned runs. If Carter had fielded the throw but nothing else had changed, Hansen would have allowed two runs in the bottom of the ninth and still lost the game. Those runs would've been earned runs. *** Because of these flaws, a potentially better metric might be just knowing the normal run value of each event. One classic version of that is found here: http://www.tangotiger.net/runscreated.html where it assesses the value of reaching by error to be 0.478 runs, which should be coupled with the lost value of the out, another 0.265 runs. An error that permits a runner to reach base--which almost all errors by third basemen do allow--is worth 0.743 runs according to Tango. FWIW, that's almost exactly the value of a single...for quick conceptualization, I'd think of each error as roughly a single or roughly 3/4 of a run...3/4 of an unearned run, if you prefer. Tango used the period 1974-1990 for his research. The run environment is slightly higher today, so these figures would change very slightly were his work repeated. ORS summed up the issue well. Errors are as important as singles are, just as missed opportunities are roughly that important. Excepting, perhaps, catchers, differences in players' ranges dwarf differences in their error counts, even at first base where the difference is least. It's not that errors are unimportant--it's that fielding range is significantly more important.

It's late and I'm crashing, but yes, FRAR and FRAA definitely include outfield assists, and yes, Crisp's season was that good. And, FWIW, yes, I think that there were a lot of balls in play just barely to left field from the CF zone. What I don't think is that those balls in play were random: the Green Monster and the immobile outfielder patrolling the turf in front of it make LF at Fenway a target for opposing batters. Crisp took advantage of the situation. IMO...YMMV...

Down relative to 2006? I'm cool with that. Down with respect to his career? Nah...the higher number of errors is striking, but his value at third base was around that which we've come to expect from Lowell over the past several years. IMO...Your metrics may vary.

True, but if he had any balls he'd refuse MiLB assignment with the Yankees, get a buyout of his $12.95 million contract, and immediately ink a minor league deal with Boston. He'd be a high-risk signing, even at AAA, but he could be an instant hero in Red Sox Nation for having screwed the Evil Empire so completely. *** Seriously, there's no reason for him to waive his right under collective bargaining to refuse MiLB assignment.

Interesting amount of time spent discussing semantics regarding my choice of words for a light-hearted forum. Regarding why we care--and many here do care very much about their chosen baseball team and their opinions regarding their team, not just those who favor statistics--I'd speculate that love for the Red Sox is tied into the sociology of New England, with all of that Protestant work ethic and the background story that the Puritans left England because, in essence, they thought that the Anglicans were just having too much fun. There's something about a region that instituted blue laws to prevent people from having fun fanatically supporting a team that specialized in artful heartbreak from roughly 1939 to 2003, with each generation of players and fans finding creative ways to seize defeat from the jaws of victory. The two-time World Champion Twenty-First Century Red Sox may become just another winning baseball team. The Red Sox of Williams, Yaz, Boggs, Clemens and Nomar were something special, something reflecting the determination of New Englanders, and the fans of those teams are still the foundation of Red Sox Nation. IMVHO. YMMV. ***************************************************************** Example1, if I could get actual playing weights for Coco Crisp I'd be able to make a better guess. If one looks at his career, 2007 looks like an odd spike of FRAA. If he lost muscle weight, though--as his loss of power suggests--then he could be a faster and better CF. Add in the learning curve of switching from LF to CF and of learning Fenway's quirky outfield, and that spike might be sustainable. Over their respective obligated years, Ellsbury >> Crisp in value. Over a year or two, salary aside, I've got to side with TheKilo when he writes that playing Crisp rather than Ellsbury shouldn't cost the Red Sox too many games, if any.

Hi, RB. How so? I wasn't challenging anything that you had written. I wrote that Chris Carter wouldn't improve defensively. You chose to respond to my point regarding Carter: that's a criticism. You didn't say "He probably won't get better, but he might," or any such words to soften the point. You didn't ask why I thought that. You flat-out challenged my point. You then used the example of Wade Boggs, who was my favorite player through the 1980's and a player whose career I'm pretty familiar with, to back up your challenge of my point. From where I'm coming from, you challenged me on a player I've attempted to study, and you made the tactical error of choosing a player whose defense worsened while his reputation improved. Let's check those out, one at a time. For the Red Sox remarks, it's almost all a bunch of old-timers, almost all of whom knew Boggs in the minors or as a rookie, praising his work ethic on defense. Well, heck, what's Johnny Pesky gonna say? You speak well of the guy being honored, and you personally hit him 150 ground balls every day. Are you going to say that it didn't matter? There's something that a lot of those guys are referring to that you might be missing, though, if you knew Boggs only as an MLB player. Most of those quoted knew Boggs in his minor league days. Up until his rookie year Boggs was really bad defensively. Boggs is the only pro guy I ever saw do the Little League run-in-a-circle-around-where-the-fly-is-gonna-land-and-then-drop-it, back when he was playing AAA in 1980 or 1981 (I think that it was 1981.) Yes, he got much better in MiLB, and he worked hard to do that, but he pretty much peaked at age 24/25 with his arrival in MLB despite continuing his aggressive work on his fielding. Full AA/AAA basic fielding stats for Boggs can be found here: http://www.thebaseballcube.com/players/B/wade-boggs.shtml Check how his range at 3B peaked in 1982, his rookie year, as I'm describing. For grins, check out his fielding stats at SS and 2B in AA. Moving on to Boggs's speech, he thanks Johnny Pesky for improving his fielding. Again, what's he going to say? That Pesky didn't help? That the voting for his Gold Gloves was a farce, and that Yankees get an absurd edge in the system? He's got to say what he did. That's what you do if you're lucky enough to be enshrined: you thank those who got you there. Ignoring living legend Johnny Pesky would've been unthinkable. Finally, from the Sporting News blog link: Adam Godson evaluates fielding at third base by errors, not range; he considers Gold Gloves to be meaningful; he recites the work with Pesky anecdote as proof of meaningful result. It may not surprise one to learn that, although he's a free-lance writer regarding sports (especially Chicago sports), he's been in human resources as a profession. FWIW, he graduated college three years after Boggs retired: his memory of Boggs is that of a casual teenaged fan who knew him more for his national moments in the 1990's, not as an insider or a long-time Boston fan. Tony Perez peaked in FRAR at age 26 in his second full-time MLB season. His next-highest season was at age 27. The seasons you cite were after he converted from third base to first base, went through another learning curve, and established his second peak as a fielder. George Scott had his peak as a Red Sox player in his rookie year of 1966 with 23 FRAR. His highest four seasons were all with Milwaukee. That could be a result of his having to guard the line more at Fenway or bad infield grooming, as well as with his use at both first and third base...the double peak is interesting, though. Pujols, like Perez, was a converted first baseman. He played mostly LF/3B until 2004, and he then had a learning curve. Chris Carter is a first baseman. I have commented that his loss of two seasons at first in college might be a factor to consider, but except for the experiment to see if he was as bad in LF as he was at 1B (he was), Carter's been a first baseman throughout his career. There are exceptions to almost every rule. It is even possible for individuals who are not athletes to play in MLB (Tony Fossas is the exception to that rule ). Still, two of three exceptions you managed to find were guys who converted their defensive positions, and the third was a guy who had split time at two positions, one of which he really couldn't play, in what should've been his peak as a fielder. The BP article discusses Range Factor only in passing. The Diamond Mind Article is marketing for "Adjusted Range Factors," something one could buy from Diamond Mind in 1998. But there are three factors from the Diamond Mind article that bear mention: GB/FB ratio, LHP/RHP Team IP, and strikeouts. Each of these can influence the number of plays a third baseman would have a chance to make. The point is that they can each make a difference of maybe 10% at the extreme. In Boggs's case, he didn't go from a perfect storm as a rookie to progressively worse situations right through his last year with Tampa Bay: his Yankees teams achieved more strikeouts than his early Red Sox teams, but only enough to result in 140-odd fewer balls in play for ALL fielders over the course of a season. (1983 vs 1995 teams) That might be 15-20 plays a year at third base, tops, and Boggs had dropped by over 150 plays from his days with Boston. The moral: yes, there are factors that influence Range Factor, just as there are factors influencing batting, but we needn't throw out the stat, especially when we're looking at fielding in the days before ZR-based stats. As an aside, FRAA and FRAR address all three of those points cited. See, I guess that it's a matter of perception. From my chair, I was posting something and you were "shooting down" my idea. We had no difference until you raised a concern with my position. You claim to be concerned that I phrased my position as an absolute. Well, let's reflect for a moment: do you challenge every statement posted as an absolute? I look at the vernacular here and I see tons of things posted in the absolute that go unchallenged. Yet you thought it important enough to split hairs on, of all things, my passing comment regarding Carter's defense. Furthermore, before you resorted to actual research to support your cause, you'd already resorted to name-calling, regarded by some as the last bastion of the intellectually bankrupt. Do I see the future with perfect clarity? No; no, but I'm pretty sure of some things. Regarding Carter, I'll rephrase: I'm roughly 95% certain that there won't be an improvement from his complete value at first base, range and hands, that's significantly different at the 99% level from his established MiLB level. That's not much change from what I posted; I don't think that any other poster would've been challenged too much for saying what I'd said in a tangent to the Santana trade issue. Thank you, however, for coming through with actual research, and thank you for returning to the issues and ceasing the name-calling. I've tried to address your points.

I'd suggest that, because we can differentiate the skills through available metrics, we don't need to include a comparable player with bad hands/great range. I think that MLB does tend to agree with you, ORS; I also think that it's changing, which is why Youkilis plays first base for the stats-savvy Boston Red Sox. First base range does matter, especially in Fenway with its difficult right field line. I think that it's easier to field than to hit, leaving very few players who can hit well enough to play first base but who can't field well enough to play it in their early 20's. Chris Carter, I feel, is one of those rare players. :dunno:

OK, got it. You're saying that lack of range is irrelevant, and that his poor fielding percentage might get better. My point is that range matters, and scouts and stats agree that Chris Carter has neither range nor "hands." Furthermore, my point is that range matters far more than "hands," and that range diminishes with age, more than offsetting any nominal improvement in "hands." Regarding improvement in "hands," though, in 2007 the average full-time MLB first baseman had a career MLB fielding percentage just .0036 higher than his career MiLB fielding percentage.* That's 3-6 fewer bobbled catches annually--and that might be what you could expect if Carter established himself in MLB as a starter (not what we might expect from him as a rookie). Four of the 21 players declined; the two biggest improvements were by players who moved from other positions to first base while in MiLB, giving them poor early stats at first base. Improvement isn't guaranteed, and the expected magnitude is small, and it doesn't begin to offset the loss of range normally associated with age. But "It's not as black and white as you make it?" C'mon, ORS, I ended my lengthy post to which you responded with, "I remain skeptical. YMMV." I'd thought that including YMMV was a clear acceptance of other perspectives...right? * All career fielding stats from BR.

Here's your earlier post: How does this post say that, "First basemen with horrendous hands don't exist, not at this level?" I don't necessarily disagree with your point--I just don't see how what you're saying either amplifies your first post, or how it displays anything regarding Carter's fielding or his potential ability to better his defense....nor do I yet understand why you feel the necessity to include a comparison to hypothetical first basemen who range well but bobble catches. You usually have good points...bear with me, I just don't see where you're going here. If you're trying to say that, "Because all MLB first basemen have good hands, if we promote Chris Carter then he'll have good hands," then I'm not too sure that I'd agree...but you haven't exactly said that. I do see that there are very few MLB players who can discern the velocity and break of MLB pitching well enough to hit those pitches hard with bats who can't reliably manage to catch balls thrown or hit to them in fairly straight paths, but his career thus far suggests that Carter is an exception to that tendency.

A third baseman makes, at most, roughly 500 plays a season. A fifteen-point improvement in fielding percentage equates to, at most, seven or eight balls in play turned into outs instead of errors. Wade Boggs stopped pushing himself to make plays. That saved one or two errors a month, but his decision to avoid risk--and his slowing in the field with age, as almost all players do--cost him around 150 plays a year. That's 150 outs that became hits...that's 200 points of batting average in 750 plate appearances. You're right, his fielding percentage improved slightly. My point is that he was a much less valuable fielder. OK...I agree with the bolded statement as written. I don't agree, however, that the biggest discriminating factor between first basemen defensively is fielding percentage or "hands." Let's look at the two best full-time AL first basemen in 2007 by fielding percentage, Kevin Youkilis and Kevin Millar. Youkilis made no errors; Millar made one. Is that the difference between the two defensively? No, we watch the games. Millar seemed nearly immobile at first base, while Youkilis has considerable lateral range. Stats can confirm our observations: Youkilis fielded 83.5% of the balls hit into his zone; Millar fielded only 70.7%. If Youkilis had possessed Millar's range, he would've made roughly 20 fewer plays this season. No full-time AL first baseman made over eight "hands" errors (fielding errors vice throwing errors) this year. While botching eight catches is perhaps enough to earn Carlos Pena a continued rep as a bad fielder, it's less than half the difference between Youkilis and Millar caused by their fielding ranges. But that written, now let's look at Chris Carter. Is it just bad hands? http://www.soxprospects.com/players/carter-chris.htm http://www.baseballprospectus.com/article.php?articleid=5273 http://www.baseballamerica.com/today/majors/news/264692.html http://www.baseballprospectus.com/pecota/CARTER19820916A.php How does one earn a -15 FRAA in only 118 games? I checked: that's the average FRAA of Dr. Strangeglove, Dick Stuart, when he played first base for Boston, but Stuart played over 150 games a year to be that bad. Stuart had roughly a .980 fielding percentage at first base, roughly three times worse than the worst full-time AL first baseman in 2007, and roughly comparable to Chris Carter's fielding percentage. Stuart didn't budge to play defense: he had practically zero range. Chris Carter is worse per game defending first base than Dr. Strangeglove. Can Carter get better? Maybe...researching today, I learned he was so bad on defense that Stanford didn't use him on defense at all his last two years there, so he missed a couple of developmental seasons. http://gostanford.cstv.com/sports/m-basebl/stats/2003-2004/histcarr.html But the peak for defense comes early, and Soxprospects writes that he's already improved, but that it's not enough. I remain skeptical. YMMV. Glad that I could offer you a laugh to brighten a wintry December day!

My position was, and remains, that 25-year-old Carter is unlikely to improve at first base. Is Wade Boggs's ability to decline in fielding range four consecutive years from ages 25 to 28, never again to regain his performance level of the third of those four years, your strongest argument? If so, then maybe we can agree that Carter isn't going to get better.

By what metric was Wade Boggs's fielding improved? [table]AGE | YEAR | FRAR 24 | 1982 | 25 25 | 1983 | 32 26 | 1984 | 32 27 | 1985 | 25 28 | 1986 | 22 29 | 1987 | 21 30 | 1988 | 16 31 | 1989 | 34 32 | 1990 | -3 33 | 1991 | 24 34 | 1992 | 8 35 | 1993 | 32 36 | 1994 | 14 37 | 1995 | 11 38 | 1996 | 13 39 | 1997 | 13 40 | 1998 | 10 41 | 1999 | 0[/table] http://www.baseballprospectus.com/dt/boggswa01.php By FRAR, his best two years were his second and third year; his best four were his first four. His peak in 1989 was clearly a variance from his average level of 6.5 the surrounding two years. Don't like FRAA? We can't check ZR-based stats that far back, but let's check Range Factor per Game: [table]Year | Age | RFg 1982 | 24 | 3.34 1983 | 25 | 3.18 1984 | 26 | 3.02 1985 | 27 | 2.91 1986 | 28 | 2.60 1987 | 29 | 2.68 1988 | 30 | 2.46 1989 | 31 | 2.55 1990 | 32 | 2.30 1991 | 33 | 2.61 1992 | 34 | 2.56 1993 | 35 | 2.88 1994 | 36 | 2.73 1995 | 37 | 2.24 1996 | 38 | 2.14 1997 | 39 | 2.39 1998 | 40 | 2.35 1999 | 41 | 1.96[/table] http://www.baseball-reference.com/b/boggswa01.shtml Now Wade Boggs's peak was his rookie year, and his first four years were, again, clearly his best. Defense peaks early. I'm sure that there are exceptions, although I can't think of one. I'm just pointing out that your chosen, cited exception to that rule isn't an exception in any way but one: Gold Gloves: 1994, 1995 Sometimes it helps to play for the Yankees.* In any case, I expect Carter not to learn to field any better than he does today. YMMV. *Ask Derek Jeter about his Gold Gloves.

1) Crisp as a fourth outfielder: agree. Crisp might not like it, but that's where he's needed if Boston retains him. As a fourth outfielder, he's available for pinch running, a skill needed more often by Boston than pinch hitting. Also, Ellsbury hasn't demonstrated that he won't need a platoon partner: his MLB sample is small, and he had trouble at times with LHP in MiLB, including a 129-point OPS split with Boston, a 170-point split at AAA and a much bigger split in his small sample at AA. 2) Kielty appears to have been a fit with Boston, and it might be his best offer. I'd take him back. 3) I really like Jed Lowrie, but I'd keep Alex Cora and start Lowrie at AAA, moving him around to get him used to a utility role. It's hard gauging minor league players' defense, but Lowrie's range factor as a SS at AA was terrible in 2007--we're talking 2004 Nomar Garciaparra bad. I don't doubt that Lowrie can hit .260/.350/.400 in MLB, even after his recent struggles this offseason. What worries me is that he can't field his position. 4) Chris Carter is ready for MLB. He'll never field better than he can today, but at least he's playing first base, not shortstop.

Except that it was the other way around. Gagne had eight ER with Texas. Seven were in non-save situations.

I don't know. If the foundation's director is an attractive woman previously employed as an escort, he might often take a hands-on role. Seriously, charities that don't return even half of their donations to those they're intended to benefit are usually being run for the opportunity to pay their employees. Follow the money, and you'll get a better answer.

How is taking every save opportunity on one side and every non-save opportunity on the other side cherry picking? Suppose someone wrote, "Mike Lowell is a better hitter at Fenway, because he hits .373 at Fenway and only .276 on the road." Would you all that cherry-picking? Eric Gagne had a very weird save vs. non-save split with Boston after his debacle in early August. While I appreciate that you watch the games, even in a small sample size the stats are compelling.

An interesting trivia question: who won more games in 2007, Johan Santana or Tim Wakefield? Look, we know that Santana's the better pitcher of the two. I'm just sayin' that Tim Wakefield isn't necessarily entering his last--or next-to-last--season next spring.

http://www.bostonherald.com/blogs/sports/rob_bradford/index.php/2007/12/06/lobby-blogging-the-gagne-watch/ Hmmm...Juan Apodaca is a 21-year-old catcher from Venezuela. In 229 MiLB games he's hit .254/.322/.397, and he was about that good this year in Single A. BP has a PECOTA card for Apodaca. He didn't surprise in 2007, so it may still have merit. His top comparables include Giovany Soto (4th), Yorvit Torrealba (6th), Russ Martin (14th), Josh Phelps (17th), and John Buck (18th). He's got pretty good IsoD for a Venezuelan prospect. BP considered his defense to be significantly below-average through 2006, though. Juan Apodaca isn't a bad acquisition for an organization short on catchers. He'll probably wash out at AA/AAA, but he might develop into a power-hitting catcher over the next few years.

http://www.baseballamerica.com/blog/prospects/?p=680 It didn't seem to hurt his game much. From this spring: http://www.baseballamerica.com/today/prospects/features/263799.html Barton had 41 SB in 2006 despite the injury, and 21 in 2007. I think that the issue with Barton is that he didn't "fit in" because of his intelligence. His reputation isn't too dissimilar to that of Mike Marshall in his time, and Marshall could pitch, it turned out, despite being panned by many scouts with IQs forty points lower than his own. Certainly Barton might be a mistake hitter, given his age relative to others in his leagues, but he didn't start pro baseball 'til age 23, either. In his two years with Miami, his stats weren't too far off from those of teammate Ryan Braun, suggesting that he might have a little talent. Barton would've fit with the Padres--he would fit with Boston, too, I'd bet--but I'm looking forward to Barton and Tony LaRussa. LaRussa is a vert smart man. If he benches Barton or gives him back, it won't be because LaRussa was intimidated.