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Yes on both counts…

Or 4’11” Andrew Vaughn. White Sox know they’re going nowhere and fire sales are inevitable. Many felt they wouldn’t even tender Vaughn arbitration. His $5.85 mill contract and his 48 OPS+ certainly make him available, and possibly available NOW, but his StatCast page actually isn’t that bad. https://baseballsavant.mlb.com/savant-player/andrew-vaughn-683734?stats=statcast-r-hitting-mlb BTV gives him a surplus value of -$4.2mill, suggesting he could be available for next to nothing as a salary dump…

True. Strikeouts in general also help because put outs are recorded with almost no chance of an error. I suppose an error could be charged on a dropped third strike resulting in an overthrow at first base. I’m sure it’s happened but that’s some rare air there…

Fun facts about team fielding percentage: Dropped third strikes actually help team fielding percentage. Ground outs to first base can hurt team fielding percentage if the pitcher is not involved…

Very loose definition of debunking. Not so sure acknowledging they exist but expressing distaste qualifies. By that logic, I’ve debunked split pea soup and “How I Met Your Mother”…

Team fielding percentage is very misleading. Three example scenarios, what is the team fielding percentage? 1. Three groundballs to SS. First two result in outs but the SS boots the third. 2. Pitcher strikes out 3 hitters. 3. Runner on first (walk). First batter hits a groundball to SS, they get the putout at 2b, but the second baseman throws it away and the runner is safe at first. Next two batters hit routine groundballs resulting in outs. The answer should be .667, no fielding percentage, and .667. But they’re not; they’re .800, 1.000 and 1.000…

The Red Sox are 29th in fielding percentage, 12th in DRS, and 18th in OAA…

Last two nights: 13 pitches, 2 saves…

Skenes isn’t arbitration eligible until after the 2026 season and isn’t a free agent until after the 2029 season…

If errors need technology to improve their accuracy, that also is a flaw in fielding percentage. It doesn’t measure anything else…

But you have repeatedly said it’s all about outs. Why is the fielder responsible for fewer outs better in your eyes? Remember, in this hypothetical example, each shortstop received 100 groundballs IDENTICAL to the other shortstop - same speed, same location, etc. No one is berating him for not getting to them. (Why you went there is beyond me.) In fact, the shortstop with 10 errors is far more likely to get the negative commentary, especially since it wasn’t established that he made the errors on all the 20 additional grounders he could reach, just that he made 10 errors. If it’s all about outs, as you have repeatedly said, than the player who gets more outs is the better fielder. Not the player who is perfect in his more limited sample. At the end of the day, letting more balls go for hits doesn’t make you the better fielder, which is exactly the flaw in fielding percentage I don’t like…

Players making more difficult plays isn’t a matter of good luck; it’s a defensive skill to have more range and that skill is completely ignored by fielding percentage. Players who cover more ground will have more opportunities to make plays. They may fail more often, but the player with less range will just watch those balls go past him for hits. Back to my hypothetical I posted earlier that several others answered but i didn’t see your response (did I miss it?) If you hit 100 identical ground balls to two shortstops, and Shortstop A only gets to 80 but makes all 80 plays (fielding percentage 1.000) and Shortstop B gets to all 100 but makes 10 errors ( fielding percentage .900), who is the better shortstop? The player with the higher fielding percentage made fewer outs (80 to 90), and if we assume worst case that all hits were singles and all errors were two so bases, each shortstop allowed the same number of bases (20). So how is the better fielding percentage better?

Roman Anthony is 3 years out of high school. Marcelo Mayer is 4 years out of high school. Both are one step away from MLB, and both are aware they are extremely likely to live their dream this year. I would be anything the fans are much, much embittered than the kids are…

The reason Devers has a .920 OPS is because he’s leading the AL with walks and has a .404 OBP. His SLG is .516, which is right around where it is every year. Romy entered the season with a career OPS of .658. I don’t think his current .785 is sustainable

As down as I am on Toro, no it won’t be. They’ll simply demote Sogard and keep the depth. Toro is safe until a spot needs to be cleared on the 40 man roster…

I didn’t like Devers original response, and still don’t. But I don’t hear anything about Cora trying to move him to 1b. So DH is his role for now. Getting Yoshida into the lineup over Abraham Toro makes all the sense in the world, but it’s clearly not in the Sox immediate plans. Yoshida isn’t even DHing in Worcester yet; no way they bring him right up to Boston. Reports earlier this week had Campbell working out at 1b. If Campbell is moving to 1b, this issue is dead. The fallout is obvious - Toro down (or out), Mayer up. The only question becomes does Mayer play 2nd or does Story move there?

A couple important distinction- Range Factor, despite its name, doesn’t measure range. It measures how many players a player makes per game regardless of how easy or difficult they are. It can be heavily influenced by pitchers and park, as well. An infielder with more groundball pitchers on his team is likely to have a higher range factor than a similar player on a staff loaded with strikeout and flyball pitchers. I don’t know why they chose the name Range Factor, but it’s no more a measure of range than slugging percentage is a percentage or batting average is an average. It’s false to say dWAR doesn’t incorporate errors. It absolutely does. It just doesn’t use them as the sole method of determining defense. Stats like DRS, UZR and OAA do not treat all groundballs and flyballs equally like fielding percentage does. It adds or subtracts points on each play based on degree of difficulty. So if a player makes a catch on a ball where players in his position are only successful 10% of the time, he is awarded 0.90 points. If he fails, he loses 0.10 points. Not every play is treated equal. Because they’re not all equal anywhere except in fielding pct. Fielding percentage only takes into account balls the player can touch (per Rule 9.12, an error is only charged if the player touches the ball with few exceptions, like grounders between his legs). And doesn’t take into consideration how easy or difficult any play not made is. No metrics incorporate hustle or motivation on their own. They’re all batted ball vs play made, and each play has its own intrinsic degree of difficulty. These metrics also have adjustments for position, because not every position is as easy to field as any other one. It’s easier to play LF than it is to play SS. But most left fielders will have much higher fielding percentages than most shortstops. Does that mean left fielders are better fielders than shortstops?

What exactly did Breslow say to “paint Devers as an unworthy teammate”? Are you sure you’re not embellishing this a bit?

So you’re righting off range because sometimes it doesn’t lead to outs? Please tell me I’m reading that incorrectly. Please. Because it obviously does lead to more outs. Im perfectly happy engaging with you on this subject, but honestly, you raise more questions than answers. Nothing you write makes me think you grasp metrics , their purpose, or their usage. But I do agree on one point - they’re not stats, which are a historical record of specific events. But when you say stuff like “range doesn’t matter if a ball hit farther out doesn’t generate an out”, it raises way more questions than answers. First one being the obvious “ok, well what about when it DOES lead to an out?” Doesn’t range matter then? And the notion of posting about how you dissected some metric and found it to be pure fiction, but when asked say “do the work yourself.” Obviously my first thought is that do that, I’ll be the only one of us that did it. (And if I did, I would share. Done it before.) So right now, I want a serious conversation. Not some guy who throws around unsupported garbage buried in long sentences and can name Cal Ripken. Despite this seemingly like an insulting task it isn’t meant to be but I need you to define fielding percentage. Because you and I are clearly not using the same definition. And I don’t doubt mine…

That tracks. I also would have accepted “a million miles away”…

Yep. Supposedly Cora wants him to throw, but how far down is he in the OF depth charts anyway?

It would make sense if he wanted to get Yoshida into the lineup over Abraham Toro. I can support that. And outside of Abraham Toro himself, who wouldn’t?

The statement about range not mattering if the rate of success falls off doesn’t make sense. More range still means more chances, which means more outs, even if it does mean more errors. In fact, every single point you try to make about metrics being wrong applies much better to fielding percentage. The statement about players like Jeter, Dever being Teflon as a reason to not use metrics is actually a really good argument against fielding percentage, which only concerns itself with errors. Metrics take many other factors into account. What metric did you dissect and what were the findings? Can’t just drop stuff like that and think people should accept it. I expect every metric to have flaws. I also think in most cases, those flaws are less significant than the glaring ones in fielding percentage, including the ones you inadvertently reminded me of in this treatise…

I’m not as convinced of Breslow’s dedication to Yoshida as you clearly are. But there’s nothing wrong with trying to get your best lineup together. If Aaron Judge can move to CF to get Alex Verdugo into the lineup I see nothing wrong with Devers moving to accommodate Yoshida, especially since, unlike Judge’s move, this one is covering for an injury. No one would be asking Devers to move again if Casas didn’t get hurt…

Unless you thought he would play like last year…