Prince Fielder, Jeff Francis, and January's transactions

Berkman was 1 year, and then he extended in 2012 for one year. And the Furcal deal is a two-year one, so it seems the organization is factoring in the downside by minimize the contract length with the mid-30s guys.

Games played 407 to 334
WAR 9.8 to 8.2
both in favor of Scutaro

Even if Scutaro is slightly worse, not having to guarantee $7 million in 2013 makes up for it and then some…

1) Just use the same average FIP for everyone. Relievers get penalised (rightly) for throwing fewer innings, but they also have to live up to a lower replacement level FIP, which seems to me to be penalising them twice. I’d use total average FIP as the baseline for both starters AND relievers and calculate the baseline of replacement level from there.

In that way, a 70IP reliever with a FIP of 3.00 would be one third as valuable as a 210IP starter with a FIP of 3.00. My only slight concern with this is that, intuitively, it feels like it’s going to lead to starters being undervalued (because the reduced replacement-level FIP means that it’s going to be harder to be a league average starter) but there is probably some way of solving this by weighting IP etc.

I really feel that the way fWAR works for relievers is totally arbitrary, in that it attempts to take WPA/leverage index into account to some extent but then does NOT do that for any other players, and it also (by the means of chaining) uses a replacement level that is effectively above the real replacement level.

If Lance Berkman can’t play next year, he’s not replaced by a replacement-level guy. Likely at least 300 or so of his PAs are taken by Allen Craig (who is probably above-average) and the rest might be Matt Adams or whoever (who will likely be above replacement) yet for some reason we credit Berkman with ALL his value above replacement level; we don’t do that for relievers, as chaining means they only get a portion of their weighted leveraged value above the next reliever in the chain, and that’s hugely inconsistent. There are more better-than-replacement-level players in existence than there are roster spots in baseball, which is the reason that it’s unfair to use the chaining calculation for relievers, so that leads me on to suggestion #2:

2) Fix replacement level. By elevating replacement level (which is arbitrarily defined as 2 wins below average production IIRC), you make a “replacement level team” (i.e. a bunch of AAAA guys) slightly stronger, and reduce the WAR value of every player in baseball. This better reflects the likelihood of replacing an injured player (as with my Berkman example above) with a cromulent backup. Relievers, meanwhile, still get the value multiplier from the average leverage of their innings, BUT don’t get hurt as badly by the chaining adjustment, as every other player in baseball is being (to a slightly greater extent) “chained” against the likelihood of being replaced by a player who is above what we currently define as replacement-level, if you follow.

Basically, the system needs to be changed to reflect that penalising a reliever for the fact that he will be replaced by an above-replacement player is not applied universally across all the positions.

A third option would be to include some sort of leverage calculation for ALL pitchers, but I feel that would be overly complex. In all honesty, I’d rather take leverage out of it altogether, and merely express that the innings relievers throw are often more valuable (per inning) than for starters, and I think some means of applying #1 with some multipliers might do that.

I think the whole situation is hugely complex but I HATE the presumption that WAR perfectly captures and expresses all the complexity and granularity of reliever value. I think we can say, pretty solidly, that a 4-WAR shortstop is worth $Xm, but I just don’t think that we can do that with the same certainty for relievers simply because the system that values them is complex, arbitrary and somewhat flawed (IMO) and a better way to do it is simply to recognise that it likely includes a higher degree of error (and possibly under-rates relievers somewhat because of the problems I have with the application of leverage multipliers and chaining).

FWIW, I’ve asked several SABR luminaries about these questions over the years, including the likes of Tom Tango, and to date have never had a satisfactory response. So, until I do, I’m going to take reliever WAR with a massive pinch of salt.

like a certain person with a polish name

and yes, given the previous contract was made in the past, and GMs have now observed his decline os he wouldn’t/definitely shouldn’t get the same contract as a result. He hasn’t performed as well as Pujols or Fielder (yes younger) during the interim, so I wouldn’t think anyone would be willing to give him more than the 6/100 like you suggest as the high.

Also, interesting to take a look back on Pujols/Fielder contract in say 3/4 years as a contrast

they really reached far into the future and didn’t even get any kind of a discount.

in comparison to the rest of the league, it seems like Pujols just had a down year. We are just more worried because of the beginning of last year, the injury concerns,and his possible age. I wouldn’t downplay those concerns completely, but it does seem a little more promising for the Angels than I would have thought.

Which is crazy. 1992 was the last year before offense exploded, and Bonds was at a 200 OPS+. Then offense went way up in 1993 and Bonds did the exact same thing.

that absurdly above league average ever again. his career ops+ is very good, at 133. it’s just that 258 is insane.

and he pulled a hamstring in spring training.

barry bonds didn’t make an out 61% of the time.

I believe it was Nate Silver that wrote it, but it essentially attempted to put each player in the other’s era so that they could project their stats.

I think the result was that Ruth would’ have been a colossal power hitter (65+ HR a season over a long time) while Bonds would’ve been a near .400 hitter with extreme OBP values, but with reduced (still excellent) power.

linkage

But, I was going with movies involving music genres, all diff, and dancing. His movies led to 3 huge music/clothing/dancing fads