The season isn't over yet, but here is the current list of baseball's worst of the worst for 2007.
The list is compiled by position, with OPS+ as the metric of choice for position players and ERA+ as the metric of choice per pitchers.
OPS, which stands for on-base percentage + slugging percentage, is an excellent quick and dirty method for measuring the quality of somebody's offense. OPS+ just means what one's OPS is realtive to the league average. (I don't know if the National League and American Leagues are being separated in the quoted stats.)
ERA+ refers to what one's ERA (earned run average) is relative to the league average. ERA is computed by taking a pitcher's earned runs, multiplying by 9, and dividing by innings pitched. (That is, it measures how many runs does a pitcher allow during a full-length game that are determined to be his fault.)
Do you want to guess at which player is the worst in the Majors in center field? Here's a hint: he sucks! I can't believe we're going to end up paying this guy over $9 million a year for several years. Yuck. (By the way, Nomar Garciaparra isn't even close to worst among third baseman in terms of OPS+ because Nick Punto's stats are historically bad.) If Nomar were still playing first base as he was for about half of the year, then he would rank worst by a large margin. He currently has an OPS+ of 75 and the listed first baseman, Lyle Overbay, currently has an OPS+ of 85.)
Basically, this is a rather poignant reminder that the Dodgers have had two gaping holes in important spots in the lineup for the entire year. We have better players on the roster, and we should be playing them!
2 days ago
2 comments:
How many of these lousy hitters are still decent players overall due to defensive ability? One would think that would apply to certain positions (C, SS would be my guesses). Anecdotally, the Angels use a catcher who has awful hitting stats but a nice habit of picking guys off first base, for example.
I'm guessing Mr. Pierre is not among the defensive wizards in the league, though.
Has statistical wankery progressed to the point where one can compute a single number accurately reflecting the overall quality (offensive and defensive) of players at each position? That would be kind of interesting...
Some lousy hitters indeed do make up for their hitting woes with their defense. Moreover, this is more acceptable at certain "defensive" positions (such as shortstop and, especially, catcher) than at others.
Pierre is fast and makes up for some of his mistakes as a result, but he often takes horrible routes to flyballs (and doesn't make up for all of them) and is not a defensive whiz by any stretch.
Statistical wankery has indeed progressed that far. Probably the most famous of these stats is win shares, which was invented by Bill James. It purports to take all hitting, pitching, and defensive stats and come up with how much a player is contributing to wins.
I looked up the rankings for win shares and among National League outfielders with enough plate appearances to qualify for the batting title (there should be around 50 of those), he is something like 5th or 6th worst in win shares. Of the people below him, I believe that only 1 is within even 200 plate appearances of Pierre. Win shares is a counting stat, so he's had a lot of extra playing time in which to accumulate the win shares.
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