Oxy

Alright, so you have the "mean" which has been established through an incredibly large dataset with predictable variables. A small sample is occurring that deviates from that mean, so it can be reasonably assumed that it will not continue to be the case and the numbers will "regress to the mean." Someone smart but not stat savvy is watching that small sample as it is happening. He doesn't know the terms, and he doesn't know if the actual mean from the larger dataset, but he knows from experience that things are out of whack, and he says that it'll turn around by saying "he's due" I'll admit, they aren't EXACTLY the same thing, as saying "he's due" isn't based on data, it's based on experience, but concept behind the terms is exactly the same thing. Of course, when you get into the details of the number of variables involved in a given situation, you'll often find that data cannot (or at least has not yet) taken into account ALL of the variables that a very experienced person can take in. Now, if we can get over these differences and allow the experienced people to talk to the number nerds in order to test out those variables, then we really have something. We've seen that a lot in the last 10 years. Still, chicks dig the long ball.

It's the same thing. Obviously, nobody can predict what's going to happen in the next individual moment, but the concept of "he's due" and "regression to the mean" is exactly the same thing.

Or, you can use a term like "regression to the mean" and sound smrt, and everybody will nod their head. Stat heads hate it when people say "he's due," but LOVE regression to the mean.

I would have no problem with Francisco on the Roster and Green not on it. In fact the first thing I would do as a GM in the off season would be to remove Green from the 40 man roster. Prince is a better utility player than Green as he can play all of the OF positions plus SS, 2B, 3B, and even 1B though he doesn't really have the offense to play 1B. Prince has more value than Green does and I have no problem with him not being on the 40 man. Francisco would be a nice bench bat as he has some pop in his bat which I would prefer over what Green brings. Green has has two Minor League POY seasons separated by a significant injury/recovery period that each are better than anything Josh Prince has done except in last year's AZ Fall League (the equivalent of an in-season hot streak like Rickie Weeks' month of June). If Green can come back healthy and productive, he has Jeff Cirillo-like capabilities at the plate and is solid defensively at two positions (3B & 3B) and decent athleticism. Josh Prince has decent athleticism/speed and Bill Hall-like ability to play anywhere, but not necessarily great at any position because he's not proven with any consistency to be a capable hitter (only one BA above .260 above rookie ball (it was in high-A, never above .300), and only last year in AAA finally made it to double-digit HRs with 10). Granted, Green -- like Gamel -- is going to have to earn everything he gets at the MLB level until/if he's proven enough. But he has far more going for him than the punch-and-judy hitter Josh Prince is. P.S. I hope Francisco is in another organization next year if not sooner. I think the point is that Prince's versatility makes him a better option for the bench than Green. Green has a higher upside of being a regular 3b/2b, although if he maxes out his potential he'd still only be average. Prince will never be a regular, but he has enough tools to be more situationally valuable off the bench than Green does.

This will be an interesting off-season. A lot could happen or nothing could happen. One more pitcher and this could be a very good team. Or, we could just have a repeat of this year. Aging players makes injuries a lot more likely, so it's hard to count on anybody outside of the young core up the middle.

LaPorta Lawrie Jeffress Will Inman Jury is out on: Odorizzi, Cain, Brantley, Escobar. The latter 3 are fine players, but I don't think they've really added to their own trade value since they were traded, therefore they were traded at their peak. The point is that "peak" value often occurs when a player hits AAA.

Oh, I agree he is fine for a stop-gap. But we aren't talking about a stop-gap. We are talking about planning for him to be a regular, which I think is a bad plan. If it turns out that way, so be it, but don't plan for it.

I don't think so. I think he'd be great as the power bench bat and corner spot starter, but I'm not sure if he is a regular. If he played stellar defense then I could see it but I don't think that is the case.

Yeah, there is nothing wrong with saying he is losing velocity. It's just unorthodox. I could see a very experienced english speaker and writer using phrasing like that just to be a little different--yet when a novice uses that type of phrasing we chuckle a little bit. People are funny.

Especially for a 25 year old 1B at AA. I'm trying to figure out if a guy in that position could have worse numbers. Any other position on the field and I guess I could buy the "stop-gap" position, but at 1B think I'd rather sign a 54-year old Julio Franco for a year and enjoy the novelty.

Those guys have some value. I would consider their value pretty equal to the value of the expiring contracts of our veteran players--which means if Ramirez/Weeks/Hart would net us a Khris Davis type of player in return, when you add that type of player in to the "selling" team you should be able to up the return considerably. For a contending team, our veterans and bullpen arms have quite a bit of value in the here and now, and throwing in some young guys along with those veterans would offset the loss of a top prospect for a contending team quite a bit.

This will be anathema to this board, but would it be beneficial to package some of our marginal prospects along with our veterans in order to up the quality of return? I'd like to keep Braun, Gomez, Segura, Lucroy, Gallardo and Peralta. The problem, of course, is that nobody else's contract will garner a top prospect. Right now we are flush with AAAA type players who are at their peak value in terms of control, but don't project to be better than average at best. I know this "seems" like it would be going in the wrong direction, but if we can get a top 20 or 2 top 50 prospects back by trading away a veteran along with a few of our mediocre prospects I think it is the way to go. We don't need all of Schafer, Gindl, K Davis, Prince, and the dozen or so okay arms that have spent plenty of time in the minors. If a couple of those guys along with Weeks/Ramirez/Hart is what it will take to get a young front of the rotation pitcher I think it needs to be done.

I asked this question a couple of years ago in the stats forum. It is technology that already exists called FieldFX, but I think it is only in a couple of stadiums right now on an experimental basis. The knowledge gained from this technology is pretty powerful, so I don't know who has access to it--I think the powers that be are trying to figure out how best to use it before it is publicized.

Other than Oakland, even those small market builders lock up their studs though. Longoria, Mauer, Tulowitzki, etc.

I'll buy the outfield argument. Errors in the outfield tell you nothing about the quality of defense being played. Disagree on the IF though. You can't be a good infielder and have a lot of errors.

I hope not. 108 pitches is enough, and I'd rather him not sully an already dominant performance. Hit the showers and come back strong in his next start.

I at least agree on the second point. Also, I agree with Briggs in that you can't have a ton of errors and be a good defensive team. You can be a poor defensive team and have no errors, however.

Actually, if you have one of the best players in baseball under a very reasonable contract but won't be particularly competitive within the length of that contract, it only makes sense to trade him--particularly when you have a barren farm system (redundant, I guess, since you don't project to be competitive under his contract). It doesn't do a whole lot of good to have an MVP caliber season while your team wins 73 games. You need to either stockpile young talent by trading away your best contracts or re-evaluate what you have, trade a quantity of marginal prospects for proven players and sign free agents. We've been doing the latter for quite awhile. This season was the make or break point with the Lohse signing. It has proven to be a miserable failure, so it's time to trade in my mind. Gomez would be the most reasonable trade bait. His value is at it's peak right now. If we can get a nice haul of prospects it would totally be worth it. Aoki as well.

Yeah. This is the right way to look at it. The numbers are so close though in both of those situations that it is highly dependent upon situation, though. Basically, if you have an average or better hitter/matchup at the plate he should be swinging away. If you have a bad hitter at the plate he should be bunting.

BP agrees Runner on 1st, no out: .8302 (expected runs) Runner on 2nd, one out: .6574 Runner on 2nd, no out: 1.0657 Runner on 3rd, one out: .9125 That's not the right data. Expected runs takes ALL runs scored and averages them out into one number--this is valuable in the early innings. The expected runs is almost always going to go down when you give away an out--but for scoring ONE more run the percentage may go up depending on the situation. In the bottom of the ninth, you are looking for the % of times that 0 runs scores, and trying to minimize that percentage. Also, if I recall from previously looking up those run expectancy charts, some of the common ones that are used are based off of stats from the late 90s and early 2000s--which were the most offensively homer skewed numbers in the history of baseball. I'd imagine that moving runners over has become more important as the homer rate has gone down.

Obviously, OPS is flawed--but it does provide for wonderful "benchmark" type stats- .700=not good .800=good .900=all-star 1.000=MVP. It's pretty smooth that way.

I didn't enjoy 2011 at all from a fan standpoint, we had nothing in the minors behind the MLB team and I spent the entire year fearing it would all come tumbling down. The Marcum and Greinke trades were my low point as a Brewer fan, I was so optimistic in the early to mid 2000s but then when I realized how wrong I had been because the organization didn't have the pitching. I kept hoping Melvin would make trades for young pitching to extend the competitive window but he just continually went with short term solutions which ensured the window was closing much quicker than it needed to. I'm not really any happier now that 2012 and 2013 have happened, I've just made my peace with the FO strategy and I prefer to focus elsewhere. The only way to be competitive year in and year out with our current FO is change the trades the organization is wiling to make. We aren't going to draft better, we aren't going to develop better, we aren't going to sign more impact players internationally, and young pitching would save the Brewers from themselves as there would not be a need to sign the continual stream of averagish aging starting pitching in Free Agency. Everyone in the front office has an established track record now, they are who they are, either Melvin needs to change his organization philosophy, which I sincerely doubt he will, or we'll need to clean house if we want to reach that next level as a franchise. If people are happy making the playoffs here and there by acquiring some short term pitching solutions and having seasons like 2009, 2010, 2012, and 2013 in between I guess we'll just have to agree to disagree. I've always been aiming higher and wanted more than that. I'm old enough to remember 82 and everything between then and 08, I know the pain of being a yearly doormat, but being psuedo competitive is just a small step up in my opinion. We're in the middle slowly sliding backwards, stuck in neutral, whatever other adjective you'd like to use... They won 96 games in '11, and easily had the talent to win the World Series. I'm genuinely sorry that you couldn't enjoy that. Anticipation is great and all, but the real thing is better. It sounds like you had more satisfaction following the team from '99 to '04 than you did enjoying the realization of the anticipation of those years. Which is a little bizarre, I have to say.

That is a Doug Melvin kind of guy. A free swinger with pop. Besides Prince Fielder who have we had in recent memory who was a high OBP type of guy? Weeks--at least relative to his batting avg. Is there nomenclature for that stat? ISO is the difference between BA and slugging--what do you call the difference between BA and OBP? There is walk rate, but that is always displayed as a percentage--which I think is odd since most other stats are displayed as a decimal. Also--walk rate doesn't account for HBP, and Rickie racks those up at a decent rate.

?? The core is Segura, Lucroy, Gomez and Braun--filling THE 3 most important positions on the field with young, above average talent (and possibility well above-average talent), along with a HOF caliber player in his prime. It really doesn't get a whole lot better than that as far as a core to build around. The starting pitching is bad, and is a big problem. That's really the only thing people can possibly complain about though.

I haven't read much of this thread, but I can't imagine a whole lot of new territory is being breached that hasn't been discussed in the last year. The way I see it, they only have two options-either continue with the "plugging holes" mentality of the last 5-7 years, or trade Ryan Braun. Braun is the only contract on the team that would bring back enough quantity and quality in young prospects to actually be worth it. If Gomez and Segura are the real deal, we already have an OUTSTANDING young core at C, SS, and CF. We have Logan Schafer, a possible "replacement" for Braun. Aoki is fine. So, trade Braun and completely re-stock the starting rotation, or continue to make a Ramirez/Lohse type of signing every off-season. Anything in-between those two options is just going to lengthen the mediocrity. We won't get much of a return for anybody except for Braun (and Gomez/Segura/Lucroy of course).