I had two new pieces go up over at The Crawfish Boxes this week.
First was a follow-up to last week's playoff roster piece, this time focusing on pitchers.
Second was looking up at why the Indians might be an especially good Division Series opponent for the Astros.
A Baseball Blog - Scientific and Speculative Thoughts from Third Base
Friday, September 21, 2018
Thursday, September 13, 2018
Predicting the 2018 Astros' Postseason Roster
My first full piece over at The Crawfish Boxes is up. In it, I try and predict the position players who will make the Astros' postseason roster. Go check it out!
Wednesday, September 12, 2018
The Crawfish Boxes
Just as an update: I am now a writer over at The Crawfish Boxes (SB Nation's Astros site). My introduction post there is up, and I'll continue to post updates here when I have new stuff over there. If I have any non-Astros things that don't fit in there, it'll also stay over here.
Thursday, July 26, 2018
If Old-Age Success Is Key for Hall of Fame Induction, Which Current Starters Best Fit That Model? Part 2
In my last go-around, I looked at Hall of Fame pitchers and demonstrated just how important it is for a starter to be good in their mid-to-late-30s when it comes to the Hall of Fame. My entry point into the discussion, though, was looking at Cole Hamels and the possibility of him one day making it to Cooperstown. Now that we have the former framework in place, why not take a look at the latter question, and expand it to other players with Hall potential?
A quick refresher, for those have forgotten, the general factors we will be looking for are:
-A starter with more than about 56 Wins Above Replacement (Baseball-Reference’s version) before their age-33 season is basically in no matter what. Starters with more than 56 WAR in their total careers don’t always make it in, but guys who manage that mark this early in their career basically always do.
-Everyone else should probably be in the range of 30 to 56 Wins by then, at which point they will need a solid end to solidify their pitch to voters.
-For that group, 20+ WAR from age 33 on is pretty safe, 12+ WAR isn’t bad (especially depending on their pre-33 total), and other factors after that point (like Cy Young-type seasons or memorable postseason performances) don’t hurt.
-Starting pitchers with under 30 WAR before turning 33 aren’t totally without representation in the Hall, but you need to be one of the all-time great old-man pitchers (see Phil Niekro, or Randy Johnson for examples). As such, it’s worth keeping in mind, but probably not worth highlighting specific players unless they give us a reason to think they might be that type of guy (by, say, having a Cy Young-caliber year or two in their 30s already).
So, given those conditions, who’s in the conversation, and what would they need to do the rest of the way to punch their ticket? If I were drawing up a list, separated into different tiers based approximately on career, it would look roughly as follows (WAR totals accurate as of this week):
A quick refresher, for those have forgotten, the general factors we will be looking for are:
-A starter with more than about 56 Wins Above Replacement (Baseball-Reference’s version) before their age-33 season is basically in no matter what. Starters with more than 56 WAR in their total careers don’t always make it in, but guys who manage that mark this early in their career basically always do.
-Everyone else should probably be in the range of 30 to 56 Wins by then, at which point they will need a solid end to solidify their pitch to voters.
-For that group, 20+ WAR from age 33 on is pretty safe, 12+ WAR isn’t bad (especially depending on their pre-33 total), and other factors after that point (like Cy Young-type seasons or memorable postseason performances) don’t hurt.
-Starting pitchers with under 30 WAR before turning 33 aren’t totally without representation in the Hall, but you need to be one of the all-time great old-man pitchers (see Phil Niekro, or Randy Johnson for examples). As such, it’s worth keeping in mind, but probably not worth highlighting specific players unless they give us a reason to think they might be that type of guy (by, say, having a Cy Young-caliber year or two in their 30s already).
So, given those conditions, who’s in the conversation, and what would they need to do the rest of the way to punch their ticket? If I were drawing up a list, separated into different tiers based approximately on career, it would look roughly as follows (WAR totals accurate as of this week):
Tuesday, July 24, 2018
Old-Age Success Is Crucial for Starting Pitchers' Hall of Fame Candidacies: A Brief Study (Part 1)
Writing about one thing frequently leads me down a random path that can inspire my subsequent articles. For instance, in writing about Chase Utley, I began looking at other players on the 2008 Phillies. It’s rare for championship-winning teams to end up with no Hall of Famers, but that might be the case with them. Utley has the clearest case, but as I mentioned last time, is severely underrated by the body that is in charge of voting. Jimmy Rollins fizzled out shy of 3000 hits, his likeliest ticket to Cooperstown, while Ryan Howard’s body gave out before he could rack up an impressive-enough home run total to overcome the numerous weak points in his game.
But then I realized that there is one other possibility that I forgot. Cole Hamels has reliably shown up in my yearly Future Hall of Fame series, although I imagine that most people don’t think of him that way. It looks like he could possibly continue to beat the Hall median for pitchers too. That got me thinking about the difference between Hall of Fame starters and position players; if there’s one thing years of doing this has shown me, it’s that Hall of Fame pitchers aren’t clear anywhere as early as Hall of Fame hitters.
There’s an interesting reason for this; I think it was Joe Posnanski (although I can’t find the original article now) who once observed that Hall starters are made in their 30s. Essentially, there are too many false starts and career-wrecking injuries to trust early returns, like you can with hitters, but the best of the best starters, the ones who generally make it to Cooperstown, generally keep up with their stellar performance into their later years.
For a numerical example, there have been 40 liveball-era pitchers (post-1920) inducted into the Hall, 34 or 35 of which were starters, depending on how you want to count Dennis Eckersley. Of those 40, 23 of them were worth 12 or more WAR from their age 33 season on. That doesn’t seem like a high bar to clear, but only 96 Hall-eligible liveball pitchers have done that at all.
Think about that: knowing literally nothing else about their career, just knowing that a player managed 12 WAR from their age 33 season on, a total that’s maybe a fifth of what they’d need overall to even begin meriting Hall discussion, gives them about a 25% chance of being a Hall of Famer.* And of course, it’s ignoring that a lot of the Hall of Famers who didn’t make it to 12 WAR still had some interesting later seasons that contributed a lot to their induction case.**
But then I realized that there is one other possibility that I forgot. Cole Hamels has reliably shown up in my yearly Future Hall of Fame series, although I imagine that most people don’t think of him that way. It looks like he could possibly continue to beat the Hall median for pitchers too. That got me thinking about the difference between Hall of Fame starters and position players; if there’s one thing years of doing this has shown me, it’s that Hall of Fame pitchers aren’t clear anywhere as early as Hall of Fame hitters.
There’s an interesting reason for this; I think it was Joe Posnanski (although I can’t find the original article now) who once observed that Hall starters are made in their 30s. Essentially, there are too many false starts and career-wrecking injuries to trust early returns, like you can with hitters, but the best of the best starters, the ones who generally make it to Cooperstown, generally keep up with their stellar performance into their later years.
For a numerical example, there have been 40 liveball-era pitchers (post-1920) inducted into the Hall, 34 or 35 of which were starters, depending on how you want to count Dennis Eckersley. Of those 40, 23 of them were worth 12 or more WAR from their age 33 season on. That doesn’t seem like a high bar to clear, but only 96 Hall-eligible liveball pitchers have done that at all.
Think about that: knowing literally nothing else about their career, just knowing that a player managed 12 WAR from their age 33 season on, a total that’s maybe a fifth of what they’d need overall to even begin meriting Hall discussion, gives them about a 25% chance of being a Hall of Famer.* And of course, it’s ignoring that a lot of the Hall of Famers who didn’t make it to 12 WAR still had some interesting later seasons that contributed a lot to their induction case.**
Thursday, July 19, 2018
With Chase Utley's Retirement Announcement, an Early Look at His Cooperstown Case
Chase Utley announced on Friday that 2018 would be his last season, bringing his fantastic sixteen-year career to a close. Naturally, because I’m me, I decided to write about his Hall of Fame chances (and besides, the induction ceremony is coming up soon anyway, so it’s doubly-relevant!). Writing too-early Hall of Fame campaign pieces is kind of my thing.
I think it’s going to be pretty obvious where I fall on this issue, seeing as Utley makes regular appearances in my Future Hall of Fame pieces. But those are wide focuses that don’t allow me much time with each individual player, so let’s take a minute for me to break down why I think Chase Utley is a Hall of Famer in platonic sense, even if I think its likely voters will fail to make him one in the literal sense.
It’s pretty easy to see why the BBWAA would miss on him: he just doesn’t have the counting numbers, and for as much as the Hall claims to consider peak performance in addition to career totals, all evidence on the matter shows they have a harder time weighing good peaks equally to sustained success. The early-2000s Phillies were overly-cautious with their prospects, so Utley didn’t see a full season in the bigs until 2005 when he was already 26. There’s some pretty compelling arguments they waited a little too long there (Utley posted a 132 OPS+ and 2.3 WAR in 2004 in just 94 games, then had an MVP-type year the next season), but what’s done is done.
As a result of that decision, Utley’s career totals look nice but not overwhelming, with (to date) 259 homers, 153 stolen bases, 1025 RBI, and 1880 hits. That last number is probably the most damning to his cause; no position player to debut since the 1950s has made it to Cooperstown with less than 2000 hits. Utley would need to reach the 150 hit mark this year to make it to 2000, and he’s done that just once since 2009.
Of course, by WAR and other value-based stats, he looks like a no-brainer. Fangraphs has him at 63.2 WAR, twelfth all-time among second basemen. Baseball-Reference’s version is pretty similar, putting Utley at 65.6 and fourteenth overall. Something like JAWS, which takes peak into account, also comes out favorably for Chase; his 57.4 mark is just above the Hall average for the position, 57.0. And what’s more, he stacks up pretty well to the most recent Hall inductees in value (2006 inductee Frank Grant excluded due to incomplete Negro League stats):
I think it’s going to be pretty obvious where I fall on this issue, seeing as Utley makes regular appearances in my Future Hall of Fame pieces. But those are wide focuses that don’t allow me much time with each individual player, so let’s take a minute for me to break down why I think Chase Utley is a Hall of Famer in platonic sense, even if I think its likely voters will fail to make him one in the literal sense.
It’s pretty easy to see why the BBWAA would miss on him: he just doesn’t have the counting numbers, and for as much as the Hall claims to consider peak performance in addition to career totals, all evidence on the matter shows they have a harder time weighing good peaks equally to sustained success. The early-2000s Phillies were overly-cautious with their prospects, so Utley didn’t see a full season in the bigs until 2005 when he was already 26. There’s some pretty compelling arguments they waited a little too long there (Utley posted a 132 OPS+ and 2.3 WAR in 2004 in just 94 games, then had an MVP-type year the next season), but what’s done is done.
As a result of that decision, Utley’s career totals look nice but not overwhelming, with (to date) 259 homers, 153 stolen bases, 1025 RBI, and 1880 hits. That last number is probably the most damning to his cause; no position player to debut since the 1950s has made it to Cooperstown with less than 2000 hits. Utley would need to reach the 150 hit mark this year to make it to 2000, and he’s done that just once since 2009.
Of course, by WAR and other value-based stats, he looks like a no-brainer. Fangraphs has him at 63.2 WAR, twelfth all-time among second basemen. Baseball-Reference’s version is pretty similar, putting Utley at 65.6 and fourteenth overall. Something like JAWS, which takes peak into account, also comes out favorably for Chase; his 57.4 mark is just above the Hall average for the position, 57.0. And what’s more, he stacks up pretty well to the most recent Hall inductees in value (2006 inductee Frank Grant excluded due to incomplete Negro League stats):
Thursday, June 28, 2018
Out of the Park Baseball 19, and Recreating the Cleveland Spiders
To put it bluntly, the Baltimore Orioles this year are not good. With a sub-.300 winning percentage and their biggest star on the trading block, there just is not a lot to look forward to as a fan. And all of that has got me thinking of other bad teams, for instance, that for as bad as things are, they won’t be as bad as the Cleveland Spiders. The 1899 team went 20-134 (a .130 winning percentage), a monument to awfulness that will stand the ages.
It’s an interesting story about how they got that bad; the owners of the team, happy with the growing popularity of the sport, decided to double down in their investment, and so they purchased a second team in another market (a National League team in St. Louis that you may know of). Once they did that, they had an idea: wouldn’t one super team do better than two middling ones? So, deciding the St. Louis team had more upside, they transferred all of their stars (including several Hall of Famers, like Cy Young) to there and left the Spiders with whatever was left. The results were so dire that Cleveland folded the next year, and NL leadership banned any future owners from owning multiple teams.
But what if it wasn’t against the rules? How would a modern Cleveland Spiders experiment go? Thanks to the kind people at Out of the Park Developments, I was given the chance to play their powerful simulator, Out of the Park Baseball 19, and see for myself. (And if this game sounds up your alley, it’s currently on sale on Steam!)
Obviously, the Orioles would be my Spiders, as I need to do something to make myself feel less depressed about this season. For my second team, I decided I’d need a second-tier playoff contender, since just building up the Astros or Yankees would be boring. So why not just use the Cardinals again? With that decided, follow along with my documentation of this alternate 2018 universe:
It’s an interesting story about how they got that bad; the owners of the team, happy with the growing popularity of the sport, decided to double down in their investment, and so they purchased a second team in another market (a National League team in St. Louis that you may know of). Once they did that, they had an idea: wouldn’t one super team do better than two middling ones? So, deciding the St. Louis team had more upside, they transferred all of their stars (including several Hall of Famers, like Cy Young) to there and left the Spiders with whatever was left. The results were so dire that Cleveland folded the next year, and NL leadership banned any future owners from owning multiple teams.
But what if it wasn’t against the rules? How would a modern Cleveland Spiders experiment go? Thanks to the kind people at Out of the Park Developments, I was given the chance to play their powerful simulator, Out of the Park Baseball 19, and see for myself. (And if this game sounds up your alley, it’s currently on sale on Steam!)
Obviously, the Orioles would be my Spiders, as I need to do something to make myself feel less depressed about this season. For my second team, I decided I’d need a second-tier playoff contender, since just building up the Astros or Yankees would be boring. So why not just use the Cardinals again? With that decided, follow along with my documentation of this alternate 2018 universe:
Tuesday, May 15, 2018
Predicting the Future of the 3000 Hit Club, 2018 Edition
For the fourth year in a row, a player has reached the 3000 hit plateau. Albert Pujols, following Alex Rodriguez in 2015, Ichiro Suzuki in 2016, and Adrian Beltre last year, finally crossed the mark to become the fourth member of the 3000 Hit/600 home run club.
In honor of the occasion, I decided to update something I did back when A-Rod passed the milestone: which other active players have a shot at 3000? It’s a variation on my yearly predictions of which players have the best chances to make the Hall of Fame; I look at the median point of 3000 Hit Club members at each age throughout their careers, then look at how many players historically had that same total of hits or greater, then take a simple percentage to get rough odds of a players’ chances to hold on the rest of the way. For this one, I also did the same thing for the third quartile mark.
I took these measures from age 22 all the way to age 39 to get a full picture of the progression for an average 3000 Hit Club member. It takes an early start (28 of the 32 players to reach the mark debuted at age 22 or younger*) and some amazing peak years, but also good health and longevity; twelve players reached 3000 hits in their age 39 season, and another nine made it even later than that. That’s the type of rarified air we’re dealing with. As such, the odds of players making it are much lower than the ones I get for predicting future Hall of Famers (given that there are a couple hundred in Cooperstown already).
*Paul Waner and Honus Wagner debuted at 23, and Wade Boggs debuted at 24. Ichiro, being a freak of nature, pulled it off despite not playing in the majors until his age 27 season.
So, what does the current crop of talent look like?
In honor of the occasion, I decided to update something I did back when A-Rod passed the milestone: which other active players have a shot at 3000? It’s a variation on my yearly predictions of which players have the best chances to make the Hall of Fame; I look at the median point of 3000 Hit Club members at each age throughout their careers, then look at how many players historically had that same total of hits or greater, then take a simple percentage to get rough odds of a players’ chances to hold on the rest of the way. For this one, I also did the same thing for the third quartile mark.
I took these measures from age 22 all the way to age 39 to get a full picture of the progression for an average 3000 Hit Club member. It takes an early start (28 of the 32 players to reach the mark debuted at age 22 or younger*) and some amazing peak years, but also good health and longevity; twelve players reached 3000 hits in their age 39 season, and another nine made it even later than that. That’s the type of rarified air we’re dealing with. As such, the odds of players making it are much lower than the ones I get for predicting future Hall of Famers (given that there are a couple hundred in Cooperstown already).
*Paul Waner and Honus Wagner debuted at 23, and Wade Boggs debuted at 24. Ichiro, being a freak of nature, pulled it off despite not playing in the majors until his age 27 season.
So, what does the current crop of talent look like?
Wednesday, March 28, 2018
Is Tanking Still the Best Strategy for Teams to Get Ahead?
With the season about to start, one thing that struck me about this upcoming year when previewing it (and especially following the long, strange postseason that followed it) is how many teams are tanking. This especially became apparent when I was writing my most recent article and looking over last year’s last place teams. By my count, at least seven different teams (the White Sox, Tigers, Braves, Marlins, Phillies, Reds, and Padres) who are in various stages of a complete tear-down.
Some of them are further along in the process than others, to the point where several of them even made big signings this winter. But overall, these teams all stripped down their rosters recently in the hopes of rebuilding into a superteam in the near future, and almost all of them make no expectations about being able to compete for the playoffs in 2018.
In some ways, it’s not hard to see why they would decide to do that, with the last two World Series winners having gone through the process themselves. But for as good as that track record looks, I’m a little skeptical that it’ll work for all of these teams. Obviously, they won’t all win the World Series like the Cubs and Astros; that’s the absolute best case scenario, and since only one team a year does that well, it’s likely most of those teams won’t win a World Series. But I’m even not sure all or even most of those teams will see notable turnarounds, because I think the number of teams tanking has an adverse effect on the teams doing said tanking.
Basically, it comes down to the concepts behind Moneyball. While the term was for a long time understood to mean “using advanced statistics, looking for players that take a walk, and drafting safer, college pitchers”, that’s not really accurate. As many before me have noted, Moneyball is actually about looking for undervalued attributes in baseball; in layman’s terms, zigging when others are zagging. At the time, for the early-to-mid-2000s A’s and Red Sox, it was those things. For the late 2000s Rays, it was stockpiling young draft picks through the old draft system and locking up young players, among other things. For the recent Royals, it was a focus on defense and the bullpen when others had moved away from those things. And for the Cubs and Astros, it was tanking.
Some of them are further along in the process than others, to the point where several of them even made big signings this winter. But overall, these teams all stripped down their rosters recently in the hopes of rebuilding into a superteam in the near future, and almost all of them make no expectations about being able to compete for the playoffs in 2018.
In some ways, it’s not hard to see why they would decide to do that, with the last two World Series winners having gone through the process themselves. But for as good as that track record looks, I’m a little skeptical that it’ll work for all of these teams. Obviously, they won’t all win the World Series like the Cubs and Astros; that’s the absolute best case scenario, and since only one team a year does that well, it’s likely most of those teams won’t win a World Series. But I’m even not sure all or even most of those teams will see notable turnarounds, because I think the number of teams tanking has an adverse effect on the teams doing said tanking.
Basically, it comes down to the concepts behind Moneyball. While the term was for a long time understood to mean “using advanced statistics, looking for players that take a walk, and drafting safer, college pitchers”, that’s not really accurate. As many before me have noted, Moneyball is actually about looking for undervalued attributes in baseball; in layman’s terms, zigging when others are zagging. At the time, for the early-to-mid-2000s A’s and Red Sox, it was those things. For the late 2000s Rays, it was stockpiling young draft picks through the old draft system and locking up young players, among other things. For the recent Royals, it was a focus on defense and the bullpen when others had moved away from those things. And for the Cubs and Astros, it was tanking.
Wednesday, March 21, 2018
Which 2017 Last Place Team Has the Best Chance to Turn Things Around and Make the 2018 Postseason?
As we stand at the start of the 2018, with Spring Training under way, it’s worth remembering the popular saying, “You can’t predict baseball”. The possible set of outcomes is just too vast to accurately call every little event that’s going to happen in the season.
That being said…we have some pretty good ideas of where uncertainty might come in. For example, there’s a good chance that a team that struggled in 2017 will see their fortunes reverse in 2018. After all, since 2011, every season except one has seen at least one team go from last in their division to in the playoffs the next year. Some years, like 2015, see multiple teams turn it around (the Cubs and Astros serving as that year’s worst-to-first stories, a sign of the good things to come for both long-struggling franchises). The one year that didn’t was 2014, but of course, that year’s champion Giants had finished second-to-last in their division in 2013, so it was still pretty close.
Given all of that, it’s probably not accurate to say that we’re guaranteed a massive turnaround, but it’s at least something worth thinking about going forward. And if we do see a last place team progressing leaps and bounds this year, who would it be?
First, let’s look at how each of those teams did last year, for an idea of what each one has to build off of:
Baltimore Orioles & Oakland Athletics: 75-87
Cincinnati Reds: 68-94
Philadelphia Phillies: 66-96
Detroit Tigers & San Francisco Giants: 64-98
The O’s and the A’s are starting off with a slight advantage over the other four; all other things being equal, starting seven to eleven wins higher is a big advantage for teams trying to turn things around fast.
Of course, 2018 isn’t 2017, and these teams all look very different from last year. Of course, we don’t have any hard-and-fast records yet, but projections are another good starting point to look at. In this case, Fangraphs is projecting those six to finish thusly:
Giants: 82-80
Athletics: 80-82
Orioles: 78-84
Phillies: 76-86
Reds: 71-91
Tigers: 70-92
Only two of these teams are predicted to repeat as cellar-dwellers (the Reds and Orioles*), which is a good enough start. And even the Orioles aren’t being predicted to finish any worse than they were 2017, so it’s not all bad news for them.
*With the Alex Cobb signing, the Orioles are now predicted to be tied for fourth with the Rays.
Still, it seems fair to say that the Reds and Tigers are on a different level from the other four; they’re both still deep in the throes of rebuilding, and will need a few massive surprises to make a serious run at competitiveness this year. The biggest offseason move for either of them was trading away Ian Kinsler, and most of the pieces they’ve brought in have been bit parts and depth pickups, meant to fill out a lineup until the prospects are ready. 2018 is probably just too soon for either of them.
As for the other four, it’s worth noting that two of them (the Giants and Orioles) were in the playoffs just a year ago. Record-from-two-years-ago maybe not as good of an indicator as last year’s record, or projections for this season, but it’s also not nothing, and at the very least, it demonstrates how quickly a team’s fortunes can turn around.
If we were to break down the case for why or why not these four teams might make the playoffs in 2018, I imagine it would look something like this:
That being said…we have some pretty good ideas of where uncertainty might come in. For example, there’s a good chance that a team that struggled in 2017 will see their fortunes reverse in 2018. After all, since 2011, every season except one has seen at least one team go from last in their division to in the playoffs the next year. Some years, like 2015, see multiple teams turn it around (the Cubs and Astros serving as that year’s worst-to-first stories, a sign of the good things to come for both long-struggling franchises). The one year that didn’t was 2014, but of course, that year’s champion Giants had finished second-to-last in their division in 2013, so it was still pretty close.
Given all of that, it’s probably not accurate to say that we’re guaranteed a massive turnaround, but it’s at least something worth thinking about going forward. And if we do see a last place team progressing leaps and bounds this year, who would it be?
First, let’s look at how each of those teams did last year, for an idea of what each one has to build off of:
Baltimore Orioles & Oakland Athletics: 75-87
Cincinnati Reds: 68-94
Philadelphia Phillies: 66-96
Detroit Tigers & San Francisco Giants: 64-98
The O’s and the A’s are starting off with a slight advantage over the other four; all other things being equal, starting seven to eleven wins higher is a big advantage for teams trying to turn things around fast.
Of course, 2018 isn’t 2017, and these teams all look very different from last year. Of course, we don’t have any hard-and-fast records yet, but projections are another good starting point to look at. In this case, Fangraphs is projecting those six to finish thusly:
Giants: 82-80
Athletics: 80-82
Orioles: 78-84
Phillies: 76-86
Reds: 71-91
Tigers: 70-92
Only two of these teams are predicted to repeat as cellar-dwellers (the Reds and Orioles*), which is a good enough start. And even the Orioles aren’t being predicted to finish any worse than they were 2017, so it’s not all bad news for them.
*With the Alex Cobb signing, the Orioles are now predicted to be tied for fourth with the Rays.
Still, it seems fair to say that the Reds and Tigers are on a different level from the other four; they’re both still deep in the throes of rebuilding, and will need a few massive surprises to make a serious run at competitiveness this year. The biggest offseason move for either of them was trading away Ian Kinsler, and most of the pieces they’ve brought in have been bit parts and depth pickups, meant to fill out a lineup until the prospects are ready. 2018 is probably just too soon for either of them.
As for the other four, it’s worth noting that two of them (the Giants and Orioles) were in the playoffs just a year ago. Record-from-two-years-ago maybe not as good of an indicator as last year’s record, or projections for this season, but it’s also not nothing, and at the very least, it demonstrates how quickly a team’s fortunes can turn around.
If we were to break down the case for why or why not these four teams might make the playoffs in 2018, I imagine it would look something like this:
Sunday, February 25, 2018
What Makes a Dynasty in Baseball?
Spring Training is finally starting, bringing and end to the long, dull offseason. Naturally, this seemed like a good time to talk about the postseason.
Well, sort of. This was actually sort of inspired by the recent Super Bowl, the ongoing NHL and NBA seasons, and (of course) not having much baseball news to chew over in the offseason. Obviously, although they lost to the Philadelphia Eagles, the lead-up to the Super Bowl saw much talk of the NFL’s modern New England Patriots dynasty. At the same time, the NHL and NBA have seen their own share of dynasty-like teams as of late, including the Pittsburgh Penguins, Chicago Blackhawks, Golden State Warriors, San Antonio Spurs, and LeBron James & Co. Meanwhile, I’ve seen some people contrast this with baseball, with its relative lack of dynasties at the moment.
So, this seems like a good chance to discuss sports dynasties. I’ve always wanted to discuss it in some capacity, although I’ve never gotten a good chance to do so, so I may as well take advantage of the relative lull. Let’s start with the first question: what makes a dynasty?
The obvious is championships; you need some amount of titles in a short span of time, although we don’t really have a hard and fast number. I’d say there are other factors as well, though, like title game appearances, playoff appearances, and win totals. Also, I’d argue that those carry even more importance in baseball compared to other sports, since the baseball playoffs are easily the most random (which makes sense; all playoffs are of somewhat similar length, but baseball’s regular season is much, much longer, so the playoffs are a much less indicative sample size). This, in turn, means there are a lot more edge cases for what might make a run of years a dynasty or not. Helpfully, there are some recent National League teams that make for interesting demonstrations of this effect.
First, let’s look at the recent Giants. They fit the most conventional definition of a dynasty, with three World Series titles in five seasons (2010 to 2014, if you forgot). But you could also easily argue that they weren’t dominant in that stretch, either; they actually had fewer division titles than World Series titles in that stretch, they never won more than 94 games in any season, and the odd numbered years in that stretch were pretty mediocre, leading to an average record of just 87-75. Also, even if you think they’re a dynasty, does that span extend to 2016? While they only won 87 games that year, that’s just one win less than their 2014 total. And we’re already skipping mediocre odd years to count the even years, so why draw the line there? And what if they win it all in 2018? Would we extend that dynasty label then, even with their awful 2017 season in between? More on that in a bit, though.
The Cardinals of the 2000s also make for an interesting test case. They have two titles, in 2006 and 2011. They have two more pennants in that stretch as well, in 2004 and 2013, plus five more NLCS appearances and plenty of 95+ and 100+ win teams. You could easily break it into two successful runs, given that they missed the playoffs in 2007, 2008, and 2010. But at the same time, there was a good deal of continuity throughout, and that 2011 title year looks a lot more like the 2000-2010 period than the 2012-present period, given the departure of Tony La Russa and Albert Pujols that followed. Also, two of the years of missed playoffs in the middle (2008 and 2010) saw them win more games than their 2006 title run.
If the Giants are one extreme, the Braves run would be the other end of the spectrum. They appeared in every postseason between 1991 and 2005 and picked up five pennants in that span. They averaged a .606 winning percentage in that time, which translates to a little over 98 wins. But on the other hand, they only won one actual World Series in that time. Does that count against them enough to make them not a dynasty?
Ultimately, this is just going to come down to personal preference. Personally, I think all of those things should be a factor in determining a dynasty, and I’d count all three of those as examples. Of course, if someone thinks that ultimately titles outweigh the rest and only the Giants count…the definition is fuzzy enough that I don’t think I can really argue against it. Really, with any combination of those, it just comes down to personal preferences; as long as your reasoning is internally consistent, it is what it is.
The one other factor that’s harder to quantify is continuity; it’s sort of a mini Ship of Theseus paradox. As you continually replace players, the team eventually no longer looks like it once did. At what point is it just become a new “dynasty”. See the 1947-1964 Yankees for an example of this; sure, they appeared in all but three World Series in that span, but they also went through four managers in that time, and had enough roster turnover that the 22-year-old rookie catcher on the 1947 team was the manager of the 1964 team. Do you draw a line in there? If so, where? It’s another factor that just muddies the water some (more on this later).
Of course, the other thing about dynasties is that they’re really only clear in retrospect. We don’t really have many teams at that stage yet, but I’d argue that there are some teams that could become dynasties depending on how this year (and maybe the next couple after that) play out. Multiple dynasties seem like the starting place for determining a dynasty, so let’s play a game of hypotheticals: if the 2018 World Series winner is one of the most recent champions, would that make their run a dynasty?
Well, sort of. This was actually sort of inspired by the recent Super Bowl, the ongoing NHL and NBA seasons, and (of course) not having much baseball news to chew over in the offseason. Obviously, although they lost to the Philadelphia Eagles, the lead-up to the Super Bowl saw much talk of the NFL’s modern New England Patriots dynasty. At the same time, the NHL and NBA have seen their own share of dynasty-like teams as of late, including the Pittsburgh Penguins, Chicago Blackhawks, Golden State Warriors, San Antonio Spurs, and LeBron James & Co. Meanwhile, I’ve seen some people contrast this with baseball, with its relative lack of dynasties at the moment.
So, this seems like a good chance to discuss sports dynasties. I’ve always wanted to discuss it in some capacity, although I’ve never gotten a good chance to do so, so I may as well take advantage of the relative lull. Let’s start with the first question: what makes a dynasty?
The obvious is championships; you need some amount of titles in a short span of time, although we don’t really have a hard and fast number. I’d say there are other factors as well, though, like title game appearances, playoff appearances, and win totals. Also, I’d argue that those carry even more importance in baseball compared to other sports, since the baseball playoffs are easily the most random (which makes sense; all playoffs are of somewhat similar length, but baseball’s regular season is much, much longer, so the playoffs are a much less indicative sample size). This, in turn, means there are a lot more edge cases for what might make a run of years a dynasty or not. Helpfully, there are some recent National League teams that make for interesting demonstrations of this effect.
First, let’s look at the recent Giants. They fit the most conventional definition of a dynasty, with three World Series titles in five seasons (2010 to 2014, if you forgot). But you could also easily argue that they weren’t dominant in that stretch, either; they actually had fewer division titles than World Series titles in that stretch, they never won more than 94 games in any season, and the odd numbered years in that stretch were pretty mediocre, leading to an average record of just 87-75. Also, even if you think they’re a dynasty, does that span extend to 2016? While they only won 87 games that year, that’s just one win less than their 2014 total. And we’re already skipping mediocre odd years to count the even years, so why draw the line there? And what if they win it all in 2018? Would we extend that dynasty label then, even with their awful 2017 season in between? More on that in a bit, though.
The Cardinals of the 2000s also make for an interesting test case. They have two titles, in 2006 and 2011. They have two more pennants in that stretch as well, in 2004 and 2013, plus five more NLCS appearances and plenty of 95+ and 100+ win teams. You could easily break it into two successful runs, given that they missed the playoffs in 2007, 2008, and 2010. But at the same time, there was a good deal of continuity throughout, and that 2011 title year looks a lot more like the 2000-2010 period than the 2012-present period, given the departure of Tony La Russa and Albert Pujols that followed. Also, two of the years of missed playoffs in the middle (2008 and 2010) saw them win more games than their 2006 title run.
If the Giants are one extreme, the Braves run would be the other end of the spectrum. They appeared in every postseason between 1991 and 2005 and picked up five pennants in that span. They averaged a .606 winning percentage in that time, which translates to a little over 98 wins. But on the other hand, they only won one actual World Series in that time. Does that count against them enough to make them not a dynasty?
Ultimately, this is just going to come down to personal preference. Personally, I think all of those things should be a factor in determining a dynasty, and I’d count all three of those as examples. Of course, if someone thinks that ultimately titles outweigh the rest and only the Giants count…the definition is fuzzy enough that I don’t think I can really argue against it. Really, with any combination of those, it just comes down to personal preferences; as long as your reasoning is internally consistent, it is what it is.
The one other factor that’s harder to quantify is continuity; it’s sort of a mini Ship of Theseus paradox. As you continually replace players, the team eventually no longer looks like it once did. At what point is it just become a new “dynasty”. See the 1947-1964 Yankees for an example of this; sure, they appeared in all but three World Series in that span, but they also went through four managers in that time, and had enough roster turnover that the 22-year-old rookie catcher on the 1947 team was the manager of the 1964 team. Do you draw a line in there? If so, where? It’s another factor that just muddies the water some (more on this later).
Of course, the other thing about dynasties is that they’re really only clear in retrospect. We don’t really have many teams at that stage yet, but I’d argue that there are some teams that could become dynasties depending on how this year (and maybe the next couple after that) play out. Multiple dynasties seem like the starting place for determining a dynasty, so let’s play a game of hypotheticals: if the 2018 World Series winner is one of the most recent champions, would that make their run a dynasty?
Monday, February 19, 2018
Predicting Today's Future Hall of Fame Starting Pitchers, 2018 Edition
And finally, we have the second part of my annual series predicting active players’ chances of one day making the Hall of Fame. If you missed the first article focusing on position players, you can find it here.
As a quick recap of the methodology: first, I find the median Wins Above Replacement among Hall of Famers for each age (that is, the median WAR for Hall of Fame careers at age 20, then age 21, and so on) up until it matches the overall median for Hall of Famers. Then, I look at how many players in history have matched that total at that same age, and take a simple percentage: how many of the players who hit that Hall of Fame median would go on to make the Hall of Fame?
So, if for example (to pick easy numbers to work with), there were forty Hall of Fame starters, exactly half of them had 10 or more WAR at 24, and twenty-five total players had 10 or more WAR at that age, we’d use (20 Hall of Famers)/(25 total at the median)=80% chance of making the Hall. It may not be exact, but it’s a good starting point to visualize the odds, especially for young stars.
There are the normal caveats with this, too. Since Hall status is still up to voters, using precedent assumes that the standards the voting body uses won’t change. Players who aren’t in might be inducted by the Veterans Committee later. And of course, since I’m using medians, half of all Hall members didn’t hit these marks themselves, so no one is totally out of the running. This is more focused on finding early favorites. Pitchers have a few extra things to note: I’m focused on just starting pitchers, not relievers, since there aren’t really that many of them to be trying to compute a hard “Hall standard” for. This means I focused on pitchers who started 10% of their games when I was drawing historical standards, to cover young starters while being eased into the roll from the bullpen while ruling out straight-up reliever. Also, I limited my study to post-1920 pitchers, because I needed to separate “modern” pitchers from the very-different early days of the sport, and the start of the Liveball Era seemed like a good place to do that.
With all of that out of the way, let’s move on to looking at the modern aces:
As a quick recap of the methodology: first, I find the median Wins Above Replacement among Hall of Famers for each age (that is, the median WAR for Hall of Fame careers at age 20, then age 21, and so on) up until it matches the overall median for Hall of Famers. Then, I look at how many players in history have matched that total at that same age, and take a simple percentage: how many of the players who hit that Hall of Fame median would go on to make the Hall of Fame?
So, if for example (to pick easy numbers to work with), there were forty Hall of Fame starters, exactly half of them had 10 or more WAR at 24, and twenty-five total players had 10 or more WAR at that age, we’d use (20 Hall of Famers)/(25 total at the median)=80% chance of making the Hall. It may not be exact, but it’s a good starting point to visualize the odds, especially for young stars.
There are the normal caveats with this, too. Since Hall status is still up to voters, using precedent assumes that the standards the voting body uses won’t change. Players who aren’t in might be inducted by the Veterans Committee later. And of course, since I’m using medians, half of all Hall members didn’t hit these marks themselves, so no one is totally out of the running. This is more focused on finding early favorites. Pitchers have a few extra things to note: I’m focused on just starting pitchers, not relievers, since there aren’t really that many of them to be trying to compute a hard “Hall standard” for. This means I focused on pitchers who started 10% of their games when I was drawing historical standards, to cover young starters while being eased into the roll from the bullpen while ruling out straight-up reliever. Also, I limited my study to post-1920 pitchers, because I needed to separate “modern” pitchers from the very-different early days of the sport, and the start of the Liveball Era seemed like a good place to do that.
With all of that out of the way, let’s move on to looking at the modern aces:
Wednesday, February 14, 2018
Predicting Today's Future Hall of Fame Hitters, 2018 Edition
We’ve reached the point in the offseason where it’s time for my annual Predicting Future Hall of Famers article. For those who haven’t read one before (past entries can be found here), this is my attempt to try and determine which players are on track for a Hall of Fame career. Instead of focusing just on players who are already in the homestretch of their careers, though, I extend my analysis to even the youngest of players.
I do this in a pretty straightforward mathematical way. First, I look at the sample set of Hall of Famers (divided into position players and starters). Then, I use Baseball-Reference’s Play Index to look at their Wins Above Replacement at every age during their careers. Next, I take note of the median WAR total for Hall of Famers who were active at that age.
Once I have this Median WAR (which will be noted for each age group in this article), I also look at the total number of players in history who have met this marker, Hall of Fame or not. Then, I take a simple percentage: how many of the total players who have hit this mark went on to make the Hall of Fame? I also remove players not yet eligible or still on the ballot, as their Hall fates are still uncertain. In the end, though, the result is a rough guideline to what a Hall of Fame player’s career looks like, as well as odds that even the youngest players in the league will see the inside of Cooperstown.
Of course, there are some other disclaimers necessary here. This is strictly descriptive of what has happened, and can’t really foresee changing standards in voting. Similarly, it doesn’t factor in non-numerical arguments. Though it’s also worth noting that, by definition, half of all Hall of Famers didn’t hit these standards, so a current player missing them doesn’t mean all is lost.
And of course, the Hall itself has some rather amorphous standards, so players who hit these cutoffs may not make the Hall anyway, even if they end up with deserving careers. Conversely, players who are currently not in the Hall may eventually be added via the Veterans Committee. So maybe these odds actually underestimate players’ chances, in the long view of things.
With all of that preamble out of the way, let’s look at which active position players appear to be on pace for Cooperstown!
I do this in a pretty straightforward mathematical way. First, I look at the sample set of Hall of Famers (divided into position players and starters). Then, I use Baseball-Reference’s Play Index to look at their Wins Above Replacement at every age during their careers. Next, I take note of the median WAR total for Hall of Famers who were active at that age.
Once I have this Median WAR (which will be noted for each age group in this article), I also look at the total number of players in history who have met this marker, Hall of Fame or not. Then, I take a simple percentage: how many of the total players who have hit this mark went on to make the Hall of Fame? I also remove players not yet eligible or still on the ballot, as their Hall fates are still uncertain. In the end, though, the result is a rough guideline to what a Hall of Fame player’s career looks like, as well as odds that even the youngest players in the league will see the inside of Cooperstown.
Of course, there are some other disclaimers necessary here. This is strictly descriptive of what has happened, and can’t really foresee changing standards in voting. Similarly, it doesn’t factor in non-numerical arguments. Though it’s also worth noting that, by definition, half of all Hall of Famers didn’t hit these standards, so a current player missing them doesn’t mean all is lost.
And of course, the Hall itself has some rather amorphous standards, so players who hit these cutoffs may not make the Hall anyway, even if they end up with deserving careers. Conversely, players who are currently not in the Hall may eventually be added via the Veterans Committee. So maybe these odds actually underestimate players’ chances, in the long view of things.
With all of that preamble out of the way, let’s look at which active position players appear to be on pace for Cooperstown!
Monday, February 12, 2018
International Baseball Representation in the Hall of Fame, Now and in the Future
An interesting bit of trivia about recent Hall of Fame inductee Vladimir Guerrero is that he is just the third Hall of Famer from the Dominican Republic, which seems almost surprising considering how dominant players from the island have been for years now. A friend asked me about the potential future members of this club, and it was an interesting question that lead me to do some research on baseball’s history and make some future projections.
First, though, let’s go through the history of international players in the Hall of Fame. As is, there are a dozen players who have been voted into the Hall of Fame by either the Baseball Writers or Veterans Committee* who were born outside of the 50 states. Overall, they represent six nations and Puerto Rico.**
*There are a few other international inductees from other groups like the Early Game Committee and Negro League Committee, but those groups aren’t really my area of expertise (and some of those aren’t inducted as players anyway, complicating comparisons further). But, for reference, those inductees are: Harry Wright, Henry Chadwick, Tommy Connolly (all born in the United Kingdom), Martin Dihigo, Jose Mendez, Cristobal Torriente (all three born in Cuba), and Barney Dreyfuss (Germany).
**Puerto Rico is a tricky case. It is part of the United States, even if it isn’t itself a state. But it has a notably different history with Major League Baseball than the rest of the US. Puerto Ricans were for the most part kept out of the league by the color line, although the light-skinned Hi Bithorn and a few others like him managed to debut a few years before the league began allowing Negro League stars to play. Players from the island were signed rather than drafted like young stars from the states until 1989 (just two years before Canada was added, interestingly enough), and even to this day, there are usually Puerto Rican teams separate from US teams in international competitions like the World Baseball Classic, the Little League World Series and the Baseball World Cup.
The first of these dozen players inducted into the Hall was Roberto Clemente, fittingly. Following his untimely death of the Puerto Rican star on New Year’s Eve 1972, he was inducted into the Hall in a special election the next year. It would be more than a decade before the next inductee, Dominican Republic native Juan Marichal, in 1983, followed by Venezuelan-born Luis Aparicio the next year. 1991 saw the first double-induction of international stars, with Fergie Jenkins (Canada) and Rod Carew (Panama). The Veterans Committee elected Orlando Cepeda (Puerto Rico) in 1999, while Tony Perez (Cuba) was inducted the following year by the BBWAA on his ninth try.
We’ve really seen the rate pick up the last few years, though. 2011 saw another dual-induction, between Roberto Alomar (Puerto Rico) and Bert Blyleven (born in the Netherlands). In 2015, Pedro Martinez became the second Dominican Republic native in the Hall. Last year, Ivan Rodriguez became the fourth Puerto Rican in the Hall*, and that brings us to Guerrero this year.
*Fun fact: if you’ve been wondering what he’s up to these days, Rodriguez was recently named a member of Puerto Rico’s five-person shadow delegation to the House of Representatives.
Overall, it’s a really solid batch of players right now, but it also looks like we’ll begin to see the membership in the group expand rapidly. Baseball has become increasingly international over the years, and now that we’re three decades out from the big jump in international players we saw in the late eighties and into the nineties, the best players from that period are finally hitting the Hall ballot.
Let’s start with the next few years of voting. Next year, Mariano Rivera will join the ballot and almost certainly get above 95% of the vote. That would make him just the second Panamanian Hall member after Rod Carew. Also, Edgar Martinez finished about 20 votes shy of induction and will almost certainly make it in 2019. Although Martinez was born in New York City, his family returned to Puerto Rico when he was just two years old, and he grew up on the island.
First, though, let’s go through the history of international players in the Hall of Fame. As is, there are a dozen players who have been voted into the Hall of Fame by either the Baseball Writers or Veterans Committee* who were born outside of the 50 states. Overall, they represent six nations and Puerto Rico.**
*There are a few other international inductees from other groups like the Early Game Committee and Negro League Committee, but those groups aren’t really my area of expertise (and some of those aren’t inducted as players anyway, complicating comparisons further). But, for reference, those inductees are: Harry Wright, Henry Chadwick, Tommy Connolly (all born in the United Kingdom), Martin Dihigo, Jose Mendez, Cristobal Torriente (all three born in Cuba), and Barney Dreyfuss (Germany).
**Puerto Rico is a tricky case. It is part of the United States, even if it isn’t itself a state. But it has a notably different history with Major League Baseball than the rest of the US. Puerto Ricans were for the most part kept out of the league by the color line, although the light-skinned Hi Bithorn and a few others like him managed to debut a few years before the league began allowing Negro League stars to play. Players from the island were signed rather than drafted like young stars from the states until 1989 (just two years before Canada was added, interestingly enough), and even to this day, there are usually Puerto Rican teams separate from US teams in international competitions like the World Baseball Classic, the Little League World Series and the Baseball World Cup.
The first of these dozen players inducted into the Hall was Roberto Clemente, fittingly. Following his untimely death of the Puerto Rican star on New Year’s Eve 1972, he was inducted into the Hall in a special election the next year. It would be more than a decade before the next inductee, Dominican Republic native Juan Marichal, in 1983, followed by Venezuelan-born Luis Aparicio the next year. 1991 saw the first double-induction of international stars, with Fergie Jenkins (Canada) and Rod Carew (Panama). The Veterans Committee elected Orlando Cepeda (Puerto Rico) in 1999, while Tony Perez (Cuba) was inducted the following year by the BBWAA on his ninth try.
We’ve really seen the rate pick up the last few years, though. 2011 saw another dual-induction, between Roberto Alomar (Puerto Rico) and Bert Blyleven (born in the Netherlands). In 2015, Pedro Martinez became the second Dominican Republic native in the Hall. Last year, Ivan Rodriguez became the fourth Puerto Rican in the Hall*, and that brings us to Guerrero this year.
*Fun fact: if you’ve been wondering what he’s up to these days, Rodriguez was recently named a member of Puerto Rico’s five-person shadow delegation to the House of Representatives.
Overall, it’s a really solid batch of players right now, but it also looks like we’ll begin to see the membership in the group expand rapidly. Baseball has become increasingly international over the years, and now that we’re three decades out from the big jump in international players we saw in the late eighties and into the nineties, the best players from that period are finally hitting the Hall ballot.
Let’s start with the next few years of voting. Next year, Mariano Rivera will join the ballot and almost certainly get above 95% of the vote. That would make him just the second Panamanian Hall member after Rod Carew. Also, Edgar Martinez finished about 20 votes shy of induction and will almost certainly make it in 2019. Although Martinez was born in New York City, his family returned to Puerto Rico when he was just two years old, and he grew up on the island.
Tuesday, February 6, 2018
Op-Ed: Baseball Teams Should Retire More Numbers
The Giants announced on Tuesday that they will be retiring number 25 for Barry Bonds. They’ve held the number out of circulation since he retired (or forced out of the league, depending on your view of things) after the 2007 season, but will formalize the whole thing now, after over a decade in a sort of limbo.
This makes Bonds the third confirmed player to see their number retired this coming season, after the Tigers announced that they’d be honoring both Alan Trammell and Jack Morris follow the Veterans Committee electing both of those players into the Hall of Fame.* Like Bonds, both had seen their numbers unofficially removed from circulation following their retirements (although Trammell’s #3 found its way back into use a few times in the meantime).
*I expect we’ll see a few more announcements on this front soon. The Indians still haven’t announced anything about Jim Thome’s #25 since his induction was announced. Ditto the Angels and Vladimir Guerrero, who will be the first player with an Angels logo on his plaque, but his case is maybe more complicated given that his #27 has since been reissued to Mike Trout. We’ll see how that plays out. Also, I wouldn’t be shocked to see one other announcement; there always seems to be a wild card or two in the mix.**
**Edit, February 12: This year's wild card is Roy Halladay .
All of these points factor in to a couple of my strong opinions on baseball teams retiring uniform numbers; I guess writing a couple hundred pages on the topic will give you some of those. Namely, I think teams are making some errors in their judgment of what makes someone worthy of getting a number retired, and this is manifesting in a couple of notable ways that could best be summarized as “teams are being a little too cautious in their decisions”.
This makes Bonds the third confirmed player to see their number retired this coming season, after the Tigers announced that they’d be honoring both Alan Trammell and Jack Morris follow the Veterans Committee electing both of those players into the Hall of Fame.* Like Bonds, both had seen their numbers unofficially removed from circulation following their retirements (although Trammell’s #3 found its way back into use a few times in the meantime).
*I expect we’ll see a few more announcements on this front soon. The Indians still haven’t announced anything about Jim Thome’s #25 since his induction was announced. Ditto the Angels and Vladimir Guerrero, who will be the first player with an Angels logo on his plaque, but his case is maybe more complicated given that his #27 has since been reissued to Mike Trout. We’ll see how that plays out. Also, I wouldn’t be shocked to see one other announcement; there always seems to be a wild card or two in the mix.**
**Edit, February 12: This year's wild card is Roy Halladay .
All of these points factor in to a couple of my strong opinions on baseball teams retiring uniform numbers; I guess writing a couple hundred pages on the topic will give you some of those. Namely, I think teams are making some errors in their judgment of what makes someone worthy of getting a number retired, and this is manifesting in a couple of notable ways that could best be summarized as “teams are being a little too cautious in their decisions”.
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