Thursday Afternoon Linkarooski

Like seemingly everyone on the Yankees, these links are day-to-day.

A recent calculation by Forbes determined that the Yankees have the most valuable brand of any sports franchise in the world. At least internationally, I think this has more to do with this association with New York than their history as a baseball team.

I'm sure others who have traveled abroad have had the similar experiences, but I've talked to a good amount of people in counties like China and South Africa who were wearing caps with the interlocking NY and had no idea what the Yankees even were. To them, the hat stands for New York City and not the Yankees as a baseball team.

On Monday, Curtis Granderson wrote about his road to recovery - which included a case of strep throat - at Big League Stew.

Thanks to everybody who sent this one in: the NC State baseball team's media guide had a fantastic misspelling of "Wolfpack" that us Fackers were all too happy to see.

Apparently Matt Garza hasn't stopped being a complete cock between last July and now.

Still down about last night's loss? The first comment on this page should cheer you up.

Both Larry from the Yankeeist and frequent commenter Jimmy suggested the same thing this morning: moving Derek Jeter out of the lead off spot. As Matt said in the comments, it wouldn't be worth the media backlash and given how many balls Jeter has hit on the ground, particularly to short, he would be on a record setting pace for double plays this year.

So it appears that Josh Beckett is really hurt, unless putting him on the 15 day DL is just another part of the Red Sox elaborate ruse.

The Yankees are purportedly interested in Yunesky Maya, a 28 year old, right handed Cuban pitcher who has recently been unblocked after defecting nine months ago.

Ross from NYYSI discovers the seedy underbelly of Yankee Stadium's Bat Day.

Here's a puff piece from USA Today about George Steinbrenner and his contributions to the city of Tampa.

Joe Posnanski wrote a post explaining his contention that it's "just barely above possible" that Derek Jeter will break Pete Rose's hit record and then made some more predictions about which career numbers players including A-Rod, CC Sabathia and Mariano Rivera will reach.

The WSJ says that Rivera is the best Yankee pitcher of all time. I don't agree with their methodology because Mo has a distinct advantage in categories like ERA and I'm not sure how they are isolating his "impact on attendance", but it's hard to argue with their conclusion. Mo is the man.

By now you know that Hanely Ramirez was benched for jogging after a ball that he booted into left field and was back in the lineup last night after apologizing to his team. Morgan Ensberg took him to task for it, David Ortiz told him to apologize, Bert Blyleven thinks how he dealt with it in the media was the real problem, and Posnanski mined some comments from his readers who imagined what Derek Jeter would have done in that situation, such as:

Jeter wouldn’t have chased the ball. The ball would have chased Jeter.

Plenty of words have been spilled about Ramriez think already, and it's basically over, but very quickly, I think it's kind of amazing amazing that we expect athletes to give maximum effort (or at least act like they are) on every single play, and for the most part, they do. We are imperfect as humans but we are capable of trying pretty damn hard.

Theo Epstein went to a Pearl Jam concert during a Red Sox game. Wearing a disguise. No big deal, Matt did the same thing when he saw them in Hartford. Gotta find a way to deflect all the attention from the roving hoards of Fack Youk Floozies, you know?

Ryan Wilkins explored what exactly the addition of historical WAR to Baseball-Reference.com means for the future of baseball history.

Angel Pagan hit and inside the park homer and started a triple play yesterday. And the Mets still lost.

Dave Cameron wonders why the respect for Ken Griffey Jr. is a one way street.

Ultimate Zone Rating just got a facelift. Over at FanGraphs, MGL lays out the updated primer and David Appelman announces the introduction of home/road splits for UZR (which unfortunately will be a small sample size minefield and probably only useful for outfielders).

Carson Cistulli's series at FanGraphs rolls on with Why Tommy Bennett Writes. It's both incredibly well-written and a veritable tour de force in one downsmanship. Here is Will Leitch's installment as well.

Bronx Native Randy Ruiz has been released by the Blue Jays and is heading straight for Japan.

Ben Jacobs from THT was at the game Stephen Strasburg started against the Rochester Red Wings last night and wrote about the phenom's performance.

Tuesday Afternoon Link-A-Roo

It's slow going on the Fack Youk factory floor today, as I prepare to be banished to Atlanta for the remainder of the week.

Here are a few links to hold you over until preview time:

Quick - if someone told you that a former Yankee pitcher would issue the first walkoff walk of 2010, who would your guess be? Yeah, mine too.

Over at RAB, Mike Axisa takes a further look at what I touched upon this morning: the under-utilization of David Robertson.

Staying in the bullpen, Mike also examines a minor tweak made by Boone Logan this year that may allow him to be more successful than he's been in the past.

Over at Fangraphs, RAB's Joe Pawlikowski extends upon what Steve Goldman and Rob Neyer have already commented upon: the unsustainability of Austin Jackson's early season success. If you thought AJax's BABIP was off the charts at Scranton last year, take a look at his 2010 numbers so far.

Neyer's ESPN colleague and former Major Leaguer Doug Glanville is transitioning nicely to his role in the media. Glanville reflects back upon his time with the Texas Rangers, and remembers when Mark Teixeira was an emerging third baseman.

So, Jason Bay isn't terrible defensively after all?

Via Bronx Banter, here's a nice look at Bob Sheppard.

In both the New York Post and his Hardball blog, Joel Sherman takes a look at the continued acrimony between Joe Torre and the Yankees' organization. I really, really hope they all bury the hatchet at some point in the not-too-distant future.

Via BBTF, comes a very worthwhile read from Faith and Fear in Flushing. If I am ever so unfortunate as to meet an untimely end, someone is going to have a lot of old baseball cards to sort through.

Late last week, the NCAA officially approved The New Era Pinstripe Bowl, issuing it a four year license rather than the customary three years.

Unfortunately, the existence of the Pinstripe Bowl comes at the expense of another potential bowl game, one dedicated to a cause far more worthy than wringing more money out of Yankee Stadium and printing more cash for the NCAA.

Meanwhile, as we mentioned last year, the existence of the Pinstripe Bowl all but assures that the inevitable New York-based NHL Winter Classic will not take place at Yankee Stadium.

Back with the preview in a bit.

[UPDATE 4:00 PM: Friend of the blog Matt on Earth weighs in with his thoughts on Curt Schilling's comments on Javy Vazquez.]

Reconsidering Outfield Alignment

In an unsurprising move, Curtis Granderson was officially named the Yankees' center fielder yesterday. Granderson made but one appearance in left field this spring, so there wasn't much question about where he would play.

That wasn't the story for much of the off-season. Once it became apparent that Brett Gardner would be amongst the starting outfielders, speculation ran rampant as to whether the Yankees would be better served with Gardner or Granderson patrolling center.

Through his first two Major League seasons, Brett Gardner has posted an asburd UZR of 16.7 through nearly 800 innings in center field. Granderson is no slouch defensively, with a UZR/150 of 4.9 in CF through four plus seasons, but recent scouting reports have been critical of his jumps and routes, and his UZRs over the past two years have been -8.9 and 1.6.

Initially, I was in favor of playing Gardner in center. However, with just 86 defensive games in center to his credit, he hasn't accumulated enough playing time to inspire full confidence in his impressive numbers. Further, people far smarter than I am explained that the difference between Gardner in left and Granderson in left was virtually infinitesimal.


In light of that, and knowing that it's no sure thing that Brett Gardner spends the entirety of 2010 as a starter, it's probably best to leave Granderson in center. It should keep him more comfortable as he settles into life as a Yankee and it saves him from having to switch positions again should the club choose to add another left fielder later this year (or in 2o11 since so many can't seem to stop talking about acquiring Jayson Werth or Carl Crawford next year even though not a single pitch has been thrown this year).

Going outside the box for a second here though, is the Yankees' outfield defense best off with Gardner in left? Last month, TYU took a closer look at the defensively maligned Nick Swisher, finding that he actually grades out above average from a range point of view, but his overall UZR is hindered by his poor arm rating. Gardner meanwhile, not only covers a lot of ground, but as we examined last year, he also has a plus arm thanks to his accuracy.

With that in mind, might the Yankees be better served to play Swisher in left where his poor arm won't be as much of a detriment and Gardner in right where his arm could be a greater asset?

Probably not. Gardner's defensive is still plagued by small sample size, particularly when it comes to his arm. Range is far more important than arm when it comes to outfield defense. Left field in the new Stadium isn't as expansive as it was in past incarnations, but it's still big for a corner field. Intuitively at least, the Yankees are probably better off with Gardner in left and Swisher in right, even if the numbers might suggest otherwise right now.

Kevin Youkilis Has A New Stat For You Fackin' Nerds: OBSTR

I don't think we should expect players to embrace statistics. It's probably unrealistic even to think they should understand them. Stats are for those of us who observe the game and would like to try to better understand the big picture. They aren't tailored for those on the field, playing in the moment.

There are limited situations wherein a player might be able to adjust their strategy thanks to stats, but as I mentioned yesterday, defense isn't one of those situations. But you'd hope that players would at least understand the impulse to quantify defense objectively. Youk? Not so much: (h/t BBTF)

I don’t know how they do it. How do you measure defense? You make an error, you make an error. You get to a ball, you don’t get to a ball. What if you have a bad hamstring and you can’t get to a ball up the line? I don’t know what they evaluate, but a good ballplayer is a good ballplayer.

Well, yes, that's exactly how they try to measure defense. By tracking who gets to balls and who doesn't. Just because you have a legitimate excuse - like an injury - for not getting to a ball doesn't mean it shouldn't count against you.

In that statement is exactly why we need objective stats. And yes a "good ballplayer is a good ballplayer", but part of being good involves defense. There is no universal truth that tells us who is good at defense. There isn't even a central source where scouts come to a consensus about who is or isn't good. UZR clearly has its flaws as a system, but it attempts to find a numerical representation of who is good and who isn't. When we get our hands on Field f/x data, UZR is likely to be left in the dust, but it's the best we have now.

Youkilis was in a jovial mood as he picked apart some of the stats of the day - particularly Ultimate Zone Rating, or UZR, which is used to measure how many runs above or below average a fielder allows.

“I don’t go off all those UZRs . . . is it UZR?” Youkilis said. “I don’t even know what it is. I hope my UZR is sick, along with my OBSTR.

OBSTR? I thought Jim Bowden had just raised the bar in the field of make-believe baseball statistics when he invented the cutting edge metric "OBPATUZXYZ". However, Kevin Youkilis has apparently just upped the ante by creating the Obligatory Bullshit Stat Trivializing Rationality. It may go down as the WAR of anti-stat dunderheads.

Anyhow, since Youk isn't a fan of UZR, we thought we'd create a few, more tangible stats that he might excel in and ultimately embrace:

HErBS - Homo-Erotic Batting Stances

OCFH - Obnoxious Configurations of Facial Hair

HFTASO - Hissy Fits Thrown After Striking Out

UPCOM - Unprompted Charges Of The Mound

ABRF20 - Ass Beatings Received From a 20 year old

GWwMOB - Gritty Walks With Men On Base

EHWotF - Embarrassing Hats Worn off the Field

BBwSG - Bats Broken With Sheer Guts

PEWFC - Products Endorsed With Fecal Connotations

WMFR - Washing Machines Fucked By Rhinoceri

Youk Zee Ahh

Via Pinto, it appears that Mr. Youkilis knows about the new frontier of defensive statistics:

Kevin Youkilis this morning when talking about the brave new world of defensive stats: "My UZR better be sick!"

"Ahh you fackin' kiddin me? It's wicked haahd to get a ball past the Youkstah!"

I think we might be dealing with a sort of Zack Grienke situation here, wherein a player knows about a stat and what it measures but doesn't really understand the metric. And for the most part, it really doesn't matter. Youk understanding the components Ultimate Zone Rating isn't going to make him a better defender. He already knows that he should try to get to every ball he possibly can. UZR isn't the type of metric that's going to lead to a strategic epiphany. It's just the best method we have for quantifying a very complex process in motion.

One small nitpick from Pinto's post. He says:

Kevin is in fact a very good fielder, much better at first than at third.

Actually, his UZR is slightly higher in his time at 3B. Granted he's logged more than twice as many innings at 1B, but he hasn't been "much better at first", despite the fact that conventional wisdom would suggest a player would perform more effectively at the "easier" defensive position.

2 Days Until Spring Training: Derek Jeter

At this time last year, Derek Jeter was in a vastly different spot than he is in today. During the final season at the Old Yankee Stadium, Jeter had put up his worst wOBA in a full season since he became a regular Major Leaguer in 1996. Scouts and defensive metrics alike had identified him as one of the worst defensive shortstops in the league and with his offensive production slipping dangerously close to league average, his overall value looked to be in sharp decline. Ramiro Pena was supposedly right on his heels to take over at short.

When a 34 year old player has a down year, regardless of how skilled they are, it's tough not to interpret that as a sign of an imminent decline. As the years of an athlete's career add up, it becomes increasingly unlikely that they will rebound from a sub par campaign; even a player as good as Jeter was up until that point has to see their skills erode eventually. Foretelling his impending demise was the obvious conclusion to come to, but luckily, what seems obvious isn't always right.

At a point in his career when player's defensive abilities are only supposed to deteriorate, Jeter posted his best and only significantly positive UZR rating since 2002, which is as far back as the data goes. It might have been the finest season as a fielder of his career. Partly due to an offseason conditioning program that was designed to increase his lateral range and partly because of Mick Kelleher's assistance with Jeter's positioning, the Captain enjoyed a late career defensive renaissance that is all but unheard of in baseball.

Joe Girardi's decision to bat Jeter lead-off coincided with a resurgent offensive year as well. Jeter increased his batting average, on-base percentage and slugging percentage by 34, 44 and 57 points, respectively. He hit 18 home runs, his highest total in 5 years. Granted he hit 11 of those over the short porch in right field at the New Yankee Stadium, but we can't really hold that against him since he'll be playing the same amount of regular season games there in 2010 as he did in 2009.

If we learn any lesson from Jeter's rebound in 2009, it should be that trying to divine a player's career trajectory on a season by season basis as they age is a fool's errand. Jeter's status as a historical outlier makes predicting what the future holds even more unreliable. So just as 2008 didn't foreshadow an imminent demise, nor does 2009 promise a run at Pete Rose's record.

While it's true that few shortstops have ever maintained above average offensive production while playing shortstop in the mid-to-late 30's, it's also true that Jeter is fairly like to do so considering that he was historically elite at age 35. But at the same time, Jeter's closest comparable according to Baseball-Reference, Barry Larkin, had a bad year when he was 35, bounced back when he was 36 and was essentially washed up by age 37.

What happens this year will have tremendous implications on Jeter's impending contract negotiations as well. Tyler Kepner of the New York Times wondered if Jeter will aim for a contract that takes him through his age 42 season like the one the Yankees gave to Alex Rodriguez. Even if Jeter continues to produce at an excellent level, a six year deal seems ridiculous and unnecessary and it would be uncharacteristically petty and selfish of Jeter to make such demands.

If the Yankees are serious about having a budget going forward, they can't afford to commit huge amounts of money to Jeter over the long term, regardless of what they are paying Rodriguez. They should be more concerned with what other teams might be willing to give Jeter. Contracts signed in the past are sunk costs and although there are personalities and egos involved, the bottom line is that money spent on Jeter is money that can't be spent on talent to surround him.

Additionally, the market for aging free agents is changing and Brain Cashman seems well aware of that fact:

The industry the last two free agent markets seems to be going downward and the player's ages are going upward. It makes more sense to be patient. My attitude is if this is the place you want to be, you will make it happen. Johnny Damon professed his love for the Yankees, wanted to be here and was given every chance to be here. He's not here anymore and I don't feel that is the Yankees' fault. They have to reconcile why they are not here, not me.

The comment was aimed at Johnny Damon (and by extension, Scott Boras) but I think it tells you something about the tack he will take with Jeter. Cashman understands the free agent market as well as anyone and although the Yanks might give Jeter more than he's worth on the field, it won't be by much.

The media will surely take Jeter's side regardless of how much he wants from the Yankees but the reality is that he has the power to make the negotiations easy or make them difficult. Ask for 6 year deal and a raise in terms of annual value and it will get ugly. Take 3 years at $20M, the deal is done overnight and the Yanks have more money to use towards building a team that can win World Series, which has always been Jeter's singular focus. But let's not put the cart ahead of the horse. There will be plenty of time to watch this topic get senselessly beaten into the ground over the course of the season.

We've been incredibly lucky to watch Jeter's career unfold and we've been even luckier to watch him continue his excellent production into his mid-30's. Let's hope he goes the way of Honus Wagner or Luke Appling and plays shortstop into his 40's, but even if he doesn't, the Yanks have had their best stretch at the shortstop position in the history of the franchise and one of the very best in baseball. Although it will hurt terribly when Jeter is gone, the Yankees are essentially playing with house money at this point. With any luck, though, we'll be able to see this image a few more times before he goes.

Yankees Sign Randy Winn, Lose

According to Joel Sherman on Twitter, the Yankees have come to terms with Randy Winn for one year for just about the elusive $2M Brian Cashman was dangling in front perspective free agents.

Last year for the Giants, Winn was nothing short of dreadful at the plate, racking up a smooth .262/.318/.353. He's going to turn 36 this season so he's less likely than a younger player to rebound from such a poor effort.

Here is the first positive thing: he's a good defender. Winn put up some gaudy UZR totals in the corner outfield positions over the last few years so even if those are overstated, he's still likely to be quite a bit better than average.

Last year he was atrocious against left handed pitching. Like real atrocious. Which is fine because he's going to be platooning with Brett Gardner and facing primarily... wait. Fuck.

He could probably still play centerfield in a pinch, but so can Gardner and Jamie Hoffmann. What the Yankees needed was a bat and what they got a glove that's not any sort of an improvement over the two they already have.

Whatever, it's only $2M dollars - 1% of the payroll. But as Matt mentioned to me on GChat, with the power of hindsight, the Yankees could have had Jim Thome DH for $2.2M and then had enough to bring Johnny Damon back instead. Without having to go back in time, the Yanks could have just inked Reed Johnson who mashes lefties and is no defensive slouch himself. I don't really get it.

The best part about this? It will be at least a year until we have to read another article talking about Johnny Damon coming to the Yankees. That and the endless amount of puns we will be able to make using Winn's last name when he inevitably sucks.

Anyway, that just about rounds out the 2010 Yankees aside from the few bench spots that will be up for grabs in Spring Training. We'll probably have more on this tomorrow, but what do you Fackers think?

25 Days Until Spring Training: Mark Teixeira

There are 25 days until pitchers and catchers are due to report to George M. Steinbrenner Field in Tampa so we begin our countdown to Spring Training, as we did last year, with Mark Teixeira.

While Jason Giambi was a valuable player during his career with the Yankees, the franchise made a major upgrade by replacing him with Mark Teixiera last winter. Better both defensively and at the plate, the Maryland native and Georgia Tech alum started of the Pinstriped portion of his career on the right foot.

Teixeira cleaned up the postseason awards by finishing second in the MVP vote, and being awarded both the Gold Glove and Silver Slugger among American League first baseman. Depsite the accolades, Teixeira's first season in the Bronx didn't quite measure up to the two previous ones he split between in Texas, Atlanta and Anaheim. However, being shuttled between the AL and NL midseason prevented him from getting credit for his robust production in the award voting.

In both 2007 and 2008 he batted over .300 and got on base at better than a 40% clip but in 2009 he did neither - hitting .292/.383/.565 - but did record a slugging percentage 20 points above his career average. He tied for the AL lead in home runs with 39 and led the Yanks in slugging percentage and OPS (.948) but he by no means reached his ceiling last year.

Part of this can be attributed to an an awful April which put him in a hole that took until the end of May to climb out. However, even in that terrible month, he walked 17 times in 90 plate appearances and had a respectable on-base percentage of .367.

Teixiera's defense is well-regarded by fans, broadcasters and scouts alike, but it doesn't seem to show up in UZR. He posted a below average rating last season and his defense over the the previous three comes out to be almost exactly neutral. Tom Tango acknowledges that there is likely something that UZR might be missing about Teixeira's defense. What might that be? Well for one, infield line drives aren't counted by UZR, and those go a long way in determining who the best defensive first basemen are.

Teixiera hit for a higher batting average and on-base percentage from the right side of the plate while slugging better as a lefty in 2009, which could be attributed to playing half of his games in the Bronx if it wasn't a patten that has been evident over his entire career. Of course, Yankee Stadium probably enhanced those splits, as 24 of his 39 long balls were hit at home and his numbers were better there across the board.

Partially lost in the Yankees' World Series victory was the fact that Teixeira struggled during the postseason. He made some sparkling defensive plays including one that helped David Robertson wriggle out of an 11th inning jam in Game 2 of the ALDS which he followed with a game-winning home run in the bottom half of the inning. But his overall line was .182/.282/.311, walking only 6 times in 71 plate appearances.

Similar to his funk at the beginning of the season, Teixeira could have been rusty from all the days off that the Yanks had during the postseason. He's said in the past that batting from both sides of the plate makes it harder to find his rhytym. While many players didn't seem to mind it, the inactivity might mess with Teix's timing more than it does with other players'. He's a notoriously slow starter, so there is likely some truth to that notion.

Odds are, Teixeira will have many more Aprils and Octobers in Pinstripes to try to sort these problems out.

Would Hairston Be "Perfect" For The Yankees?

As mentioned earlier this morning, the Yankees are rumored to be "in serious talks" to bring back Jerry Hairston, Jr. Rob Neyer contends that he would be the "perfect Yankee", but I'm not so sure.

The source of that rumor was a tweet by ESPN's Chris Singleton, who added that the Yankees would use the 33 year old utility man to "spell Jeter and Rodriguez and platoon in left possibly". Hairston is capable of playing every position 3-9, but the problem is that he's not particularly well-suited to any of the three tasks Singleton listed.

Although he's right handed, Hairston doesn't make much sense as a platoon partner for Brett Gardner. In his career against left handers, Hairston has put up a weak line of .264/.323/.386, which is better than Gardner but much worse than Reed Johnson (.313/.378/.463) who is also available. Hairston does figure to be an asset defensively, but just how much of one is largely up to your imagination. His 37.7 UZR/150 in LF is simply too good to be true considering it's based on only 132 games and 594 innings there.

Hairston has similar sample size issues with his defense on the left side of the infield, but not the same encouraging results. He's started only 46 games at 3B (40 of them last year) and made 10 errors in that time. Shortstop is a relatively new position to him as well, having logged only 533 career innings there with almost all of them coming in the last two years. The initial numbers say his range isn't great at either position.

Additionally, the Yankees already have four utility infielders on the 40 man roster - Ramiro Pena, Eduardo Nunez, Kevin Russo & Reegie Corona. Hairston figures to contribute more offensively than any of them, but Pena in particular is a far superior defender at both short and third.

Joe from River Ave. Blues explained how Hairston, acting as a back up infielder and outfielder, would free up a spot on the bench. Since the Yankees 12 man pitching staff affords room for only four extra position players, flexibility is at a premium. But production is the end goal, not flexibility.

While Hairston could play a number of positions, he doesn't excel at any of them - at least not in the capacity the Yankees would utilize him. The upshot is that he might save a roster spot by performing multiple functions for the Yanks, but that would only be useful if they could fill that spot with a player who can offer something that Hairston can't. Are the Yanks willing to spend a couple million dollars on a guy who is a bridge to signing another bench player? Because that's the only way it would make sense to bring him back.

Thrifty Red Sox Finally Land Another Third Baseman

In what can only be described as another brilliant bargain basement signing, the always-frugal Boston Red Sox signed Adrian Beltre to a one year, $9M contract with a $5M player option for 2011. The deal, which also includes a $1M buyout, comfortably lifts the scrappy small town underdogs over the luxury tax threshold.

Beltre apparently came down a bit from his initial contract demands of 5 years and $65M which was analogous to me applying for a job and asking for the corner office, a secretary and a wet bar. He settled for a temp job in a cubicle with easy access to the water cooler. However, what the deal sacrifices in luxury, it attempts to make up for in flexibility. It offers Beltre the chance to redeem himself coming off a miserable year in which he hit .265/.304/.379 and played in only 111 games, missing significant time due to a... um... well... how do I say this... an injury.

The Sox are banking on last year being an anomaly and Beltre's defensive abilities being all they are cracked up to be, which is to say pretty damn impressive. His average UZR/150 over the last 4 years has been 12.3, which makes up for the fact that his on-base percentage over that same time period has been .321.

While Beltre supposedly turned down longer deals worth more money from other teams let's wait and see how it turns out before declaring it a "steal" or anything of the sort like I sarcastically did in the first paragraph. Fire Brand of the American League lists his home/road splits over the last three years to show that his production was suppressed by playing in Seattle:

2007: (H) .264/.319/.426 (R) .288/.320/.538
2008: (H) .230/.303/.400 (R) .292/.349/.512
2009: (H) .250/.283/.364 (R) .279/.324/.393

But do you notice another trend? His slugging percentage has been declining over the past three years regardless of where he was hitting.

Oh, and there's also the small consideration of Mike Lowell's contract which the Sox will either have to eat or exchange him for a player equally as useless/overpaid. They could hold on to him but given that both he and Beltre are right handed, there's no platoon option. I suppose he could be a fall back DH if Ortiz struggles again, but that's a waste of a roster spot.

The signing of Beltre certainly makes the Sox better next year, but how many teams can afford to replace a player that was making $12M this coming season (and who should be able to play come opening day) with a guy who is making $9M?

The spendthrift ways of last season have been jettisoned in favor of big budget acquisitions in Boston this year. Apparently the items on the sale rack weren't all they were cracked up to be.

'Tis The Season For Analysis And Reason

Good morning Fackers. One of the positive things about the slow news cycle that we are going through in the baseball world at the moment is that it gives some very smart writers the chance to do long-form pieces that don't get done when the offseason news is reaching its peak. While some may yearn for the heat of the hot stove, a whole lot of writing and thought gets expended on the the same signings and trade with a relatively small amount getting added to the discussion. Without many rumors flying, some have been using their time well and posting tremendously interesting analytical pieces that have in some cases taken on a life of their own.

Joe Posnanski recently cranked out 5,000 words comparing the Baseball Hall of Fame with the Baseball Think Factory Hall of Merit. Larry from Wezen-ball explored the illogical nature of the voting process for Cooperstown. There was an interesting discussion yesterday about putting a third team in New York which began with a piece on SI.com by Tim Marchman, and was picked up by Craig Calcaterra of Circling the Bases and Kevin Kaduk of Big League Stew (among others) before Marchman responded to the responses. Dave Cameron of FanGraphs discussed the diminishing value of a marginal win for the Yankees which was further explored by River Ave. Blues and Rob Neyer. Cameron's colleague R.J. Anderson used a quote from Peter Gammons to explain the Time Value of Money as it relates to Jason Bay's contract.

Perhaps the best example of this analytical collaboration are the Mike Silva Chronicles that Tom Tango is currently posting over at The Book Blog. Silva is notoriously suspicious of advanced statistics while Tango is responsible for creating a great many of them and inspiring still more. Recently, Silva compared the necessity for the newly-created stat wRC+ (just like OPS+ but based on wOBA) from FanGraphs to "Cool Ranch Doritos, New Coke, or a colorful cover for the iPod". Tango replied in the comment section, "As I keep saying on my blog time and time again, summary opinion without evidence is the very definition of bullsh!t. And Mike’s statement here is pure bullsh!t."

What might have spiraled into a war of words has instead turned into something productive. Tango agreed to answer ten of Silva's questions about advanced metrics, ranging from the accuracy and utility of UZR to the concepts of replacement level and win shares, pulling back the curtain a bit in attempt assuage some of the doubts that many have about newer stats.

Although these two guys are coming from ends of the statistical spectrum, they are meeting at an important common ground. One of the reasons old school baseball thinkers like Silva distrust advanced metrics is because they doubt their accuracy. The people who understand these measures the best understand their limits because they created them. It could be argued that the people who use UZR and WAR without understanding their blindspots are just as bad as those who refuse to acknowledge their utility at all.

Even if you aren't a stathead, I'd recommend stopping by The Book Blog and taking a look at Silva's questions and Tango's responses. They did five questions yesterday and I believe the next 5 should be coming soon. Although the names of some of the newer stats make them seem vague and complex, I think you'll find that hearing someone explain what they are and why they were created while simultaneously acknowledging their limitations to be quite interesting.

Parsing The AL MVP Vote

Good morning, Fackers. To the surprise of essentially no one who followed the 2009 Major League Baseball season, Joe Mauer won the A.L. MVP yesterday. He led the league in batting average, on base percentage, slugging percentage, runs created, wOBA, wRAA, VORP and would have in WAR if Ben Zobrist's UZR's wasn't propped up by small sample sizes or the stat gave any credit for a catcher's defense behind the plate.

With the exception of one writer from a Japanese newspaper based in Seattle (who inexplicably voted for Miguel Cabrera), Mauer was the unanimous choice. He didn't have 30 HR or 100 RBI, but the man from Minnesota was close on both counts. He didn't play in a game until May 1st, but at bat for at bat, he was the best hitter in the American League by a country mile.

While credit should go to the BBWAA for another award winner properly selected, the reality is that, even if you don't understand the concept of positional adjustment, there's no one else that had a legitimate case. And judging by the respective finishes of Derek Jeter and Mark Teixeira, it's apparent that many writers still don't grasp that concept.

Teixeira received 15 second place votes with only 3 voters ranking him lower than 4th. Nine voters ranked Jeter second, 16 others placed him between 3rd and 6th with the remaining three identifying him as the 8th, 9th or 10th most valuable player in the league. In other words, the general consensus was that Teix was a notch above Jeter.

According to Weighted On Base Average or wOBA, the statistic that most accurately measures a hitter's ability to get on base and hit for power, Teixeira (.402) led Jeter (.390) by fairly slim margin. However, wOBA doesn't take into account that Jeter played a much more difficult defensive position and, at least according to UZR, had a much better year in the field.

Perhaps UZR is selling Teixeira short, which most observers would argue is the case. Maybe Teixeira even saved Jeter a few errors by scooping balls in the dirt, although John Dewan's research doesn't seem to indicate that. But even if you grant both of those assumptions, it's unlikely they close the gap from Teixeira's 5.1 wins to Jeter's 7.4.

Of course, most voters don't care about players' wOBA or WAR. The biggest reason that Jeter finished lower than Teixeira on the majority of the ballots was that he only drove in 66 runs while Teix led the AL with 122. Runs Batted In are to the MVP vote what pitcher's wins are to the Cy Young: a context-driven, luck-determinant counting stat that depends largely on the production of one's teammates.

What was the biggest reason that Teixeira was able to drive in 122 runs despite a batting average (.264) and a slugging percentage (.471) with runners in scoring position well below his season marks (.292 & .565)? Derek Jeter and Johnny Damon's on base percentages of .406 and .365, respectively. The same thing happened to Mauer in 2006 when his .429 OBP teed up Justin Morneau for a huge amount of his 130 RBIs. That total was second in the league to David Ortiz and Morneau won the MVP award but Mauer ended up finishing 6th and was behind his teammate on every single ballot.

There were some other oddities within the voting aside from Miguel Cabrera getting a vote for first place but 3 votes for 10th and Teix topping Jeter. Mariano Rivera placed ahead of Zack Greinke although he didn't receive one Cy Young vote and Greinke won the award. Robinson Cano got three votes - all for 7th place. A-Rod netted a third place vote despite being left off 3/4 of the ballots all together.

A commenter over at BBTF took the liberty of compiling a "bizarro ballot", made up of actual selections writers submitted:

1. Miguel Cabrera
2. Kevin Youkilis
3. Alex Rodriguez
4. Jason Bay
5. Aaron Hill
6. Chone Figgins
7. Jason Kubel
8. Michael Cuddyer
9. Placido Polanco
10. Ian Kinsler

Sure, I'm nitpicking a little bit here. The writers have thus far got the 3 major award winners right, but with the exception of Tim Lincecum, they have been absolute no-brainers. When people have to list out 10 players, there are going to be some perceived sleights, but how many of those 10 actual placements do you think you could legitimately justify with statistical evidence?

Maybe we're not quite as far along the road to statistical enlightenment as we thought after Lincecum won the NL Cy Young. Perhaps, as Moshe Mandel from The Yankee Universe contends, we aren't seeing the voters wise up but the ability of sabermetricians (or at least those who are stat savvy) to influence the "buzz" surrounding players. And make no mistake, this is in large part due to the increasing influence of the internet which has given people like Rob Neyer and Joe Posnanski a national voice.

Is anyone going to remember who finished second or third in the voting when next year rolls around? Probably not. But that doesn't negate the fact that many voters (ostensibly "journalists") who have the privilege of voting for these awards are so severely lacking in objective analytical skills when that is one of the most important parts of their job description.

Enthusiasm For Derek Jeter Can Not Be Curbed

I'm guessing that everyone reading this blog was watching the World Series last night, but there was an interesting discussion about Derek Jeter taking place on another channel sometime between 9 and 9:30. And unlike the last time we talked about a baseball player in conjunction with a TV show, this one is true.

FanGraphs has the transcript:

Stonemason: “That guy [Derek Jeter] sucks.”

Larry David: “Who sucks?”

Stonemason: “Derek Jeter, he’s the most overrated player in baseball.”

Larry David: “What did you say?”

Stonemason: “I can’t stand Derek Jeter, you know he’s the worst defensive shortstop in baseball statistically?”

Larry David: “Oh Bullshit! He’s a great clutch hitter, he’s a great clutch player!”

Stonemason: “There’s no way he deserves that kind of money he’s making.”

And then Larry David changes the subject.

Later in the episode, Larry David starts talking about the stonemason’s Jeter hating and says, “…starts telling me how Jeter’s overrated. What an ignorant moron. My God, please, give me a break. There’s not one person who has ever said that except this asshole, honestly.”

FanGraphs takes special pride in this little snippet of conversation because the implication is that the statistical justification the stonemason is referring to is Ultimate Zone Rating. The assaults on Jeter's defense are familiar to those of us in the baseball blogosphere but I heard plenty of people react the way Larry David did when confronted with what UZR says about Jeter. I don't think you'll hear too many people complaining about his salary of his defense this year, however.

On a related note, this is my favorite Curb episode with a Yankees-related plot line. Here's the best I could do for a clip. Skip to the 1:13 mark (and beware of the strong language).

Late Links

Sorry, I'm a little (lot) late with this post. I got a chance to play Albany Country Club this afternoon and bailed on my bloggerly duties. It's a fantastic track, measuring 7054 yards from the tips with a lot of elevation changes, tough tee shots and beautifully undulated greens. We got caught in a bit of a storm but I was able to snap this picture when it cleared up.

Double rainbow, suckas. That means you can take two shots off your score, in which case I kept it under 80. Boom.

On to the links:

Jason is officially live over at ESPN. You can find him in the same place as always, but's he's now ESPN Certified©. Also be sure to check out Jason, Will and Tamar's respective favorite moments from the season.

Is Mariano Rivera's other fastball a one seamer?

Zell's Pinstripe Blog compiled every Yankees Sports Illustrated cover.

Will Leitch on Jeter. He also penned a playoff preview for the Yanks on Deadspin.

Does UZR really fluctuate wildly from year to year?

A-Rod accomplished a 30-100 season in the 10th fewest games played of all-time and the least since 2002.

The Yankees can make life a little more difficult on the Red Sox by not announcing which series they want to take until after tomorrow's play-in game. That way, the Sox won't know what day they are starting in Anaheim until Tuesday night. If the Yanks unexpectedly take the shorter series, the Sox might have to rush out to L.A.

Happy Birthday, Bill James.

If you must subject yourself to the unlimited and unbearable Brett Favrery, at least you'll have this drinking game.

Until tomorrow, y'all...

Mitch Williams Is An Idiot

You probably knew that already anyway. If you don't recall as such from his playing days, perhaps you've listened to him trip over his own tongue repeatedly on the MLB Network this year. If not, simply refer to the picture below.

"I cut the sleeves off because it looks awesome, now get your head in the game!"

Last night, after finishing the recap, I checked a few other Yankee sites and had MLBN on in the background. I was only half listening. I noticed that recently DFA'd former Yankee and all-around good guy Tony Clark had joined the studio team - good for him. Combined with Sean Casey, last night's panel had two of the most well-liked Big Leaguers of the past twenty years or so.

But for all the goodwill that The Mayor and Tony the former Tiger can generate, one meandering argument from The Wild Thing ruined it all for me.

I'm not even quite sure what point Williams was trying to make. Maybe that's because I wasn't dedicating my full attention, or maybe it's because Williams hasn't made a lucid argument in his entire time with the fledgling network.

Regardless, the conversation started with the increasingly tiresome AL MVP debate. Williams stated that Mauer is at a disadvantage because he's a catcher and his legs are going to go on him at some point before the season's over. Except then Mitch said that Mauer is at an advantage because he missed the first month of the season, so he's fresher than he would be. Ok, advantage: push.

Then Derek Jeter came up. And Mitch made some point about batting average being an overvalued statistic. "Wow," I thought, "Mitch Williams is making a salient point."

Then Mitch took a turn for the inane. For some reason, Williams started comparing Jeter to Jimmy Rollins, who while a shortstop, plays in an entirely different league - so I'm not quite sure what any of it had to do with the AL MVP discussion.

That said, Williams, again emphasizing that batting average is an overvalued statistic, illustrated this by pointing out that despite a cavernous gap between them in batting average, Jimmy Rollins has 10 more doubles than Derek Jeter and has a fielding percentage that is superior by .007. End of story.

Well that's just great Mitch. Now let's finish the discussion. A .007 advantage in fielding percentage is nearly meaningless. The average Major League shortstop last year fielded 728 chances. A .007 difference in fielding percentage means that over the course of a season Rollins would turn roughly five more chances into outs. Five. That's less than one per month over the course of the season.

Of course, since Mitch is so plugged in to which stats are overvalued, he probably knows that fielding percentage is not a very accurate method of measuring a player's defensive value. A more advanced metric would be UZR/150. Now there's no denying that over the course of their respective careers, Jimmy Rollins has been a much, much, much better defensive player than Derek Jeter, holding a career edge in UZR/150 of 10.2 runs. However, this year, Derek Jeter's UZR/150 is 6.8 as opposed to Rollins' 5.9. So for 2009 at least, advantage Jeter.

How about offense? Well yes Mitch, Rollins does have a whopping 10 double lead. How about the other three types of hits a batter can get? 2009 slugging percentage Jimmy Rollins: .415. 2009 slugging percentage Derek Jeter: .482. And before anyone mentions a word about the new Yankee Stadium, let's remember that Citizens Bank Park is also very hitter friendly. Its one year park factors (102/101) are only slightly less offensive than Yankee Stadium's (103/103), and its multiyear factors (103/102) are nearly identical to how the Stadium has played in its brief history.

But, offense is more than just doubles. As Mitch knows, batting average is overrated. On base percentage is probably the best single measure of offensive value. 2009 OBP Rollins: .290. 2009 OBP Jeter: .398. Huge, huge, huge advantage Jeter. Both men bat leadoff. Over the course of a full season, Jeter will be on base roughly 83 more times based on their current OBPs. Jimmy Rollins' OBP is the absolute lowest of any Major Leaguer with at least 450 plate appearances this year. There are but six American Leaguers with a better OBP than Jeter.

How about something really advanced and all-encompassing: 2009 Wins Above Replacement Rollins: 1.8. 2009 Wins Above Replacement Jeter: 5.9. Once again, huge advantage Jeter. He's been worth more than three times as much to his team this year.

I'm not trying to bag on Jimmy Rollins. I'm not trying to suggest that Jeter is or isn't the AL MVP. But I am absolutely stupefied as to what point Mitch Williams was trying to make. That Joe Mauer has legs? That Jeter's not the MVP? That Jeter hits for average and that's all he's good for? That Jimmy Rollins isn't having an absolutely abysmal season? I don't know. I'm not sure Mitch knows. But, by virtue of his employment at MLBN, the guy is supposed to be a national authority on the sport. Whatever point he was trying to make, it was poorly, poorly constructed and its delivery was even worse.

In summary:
Joe Mauer's legs = a blessing and a curse, he may want to hedge his bets and cut one off
Batting average = overrated
Doubles = underrated
Fielding percentage = just right
UZR/150, OBP, WAR = non-existent
Mitch Williams = rivaling John Kruk for dumbest '93 Phillie turned analyst

Damon Stayin'?

To be honest, I hated the fact that the Yankees signed Johnny Damon when it first happened. It didn't have much to do with the fact that he was 32 years old and was already declining pretty steeply as a defensive center fielder. It wasn't just that the Yanks passed on Carlos Beltran the year before, who, with respect to the five tools, was better than Damon in every way. I couldn't wrap my head around being forced to root for a play that I had spent so much time deeply despising.

There was his impossibly weak throwing arm that make me wonder if he was actually right handed but never figured it out. It was so easy to hate his faux-Jesusy look, the "Idiots" and "Cowboy Up" bullshit and the goofy speech impediment he used to talk about it all. Above all, the grand slam he hit off Javier Vasquez in the 2004 ALCS was far too painful for me to acknowledge the possibility of ever actively rooting for him at the time.

I certainly never thought I would be in favor of the Yankees offering him another contract at the end of this year. However, nearly four years later, Damon has been one of the most durable players on the Yankees and has continued to pull his weight offensively, even after being shifted to left field.

Tyler Kepner talked to Damon yesterday and Johnny had this to say about his impending free agency:

I don’t know where else I would want to go to. Obviously, that’s not the right thing to say when you’re about ready to approach free agency, but I’m very happy with playing in New York, and my family’s happy I play for New York. There’s no bigger place to go. If you play well here, you’re going to get paid. New York has the resources.

It's important to note that Scott Boras is still his agent and if Damon is anything like the other capitalist robots manufactured by the Boras Corporation, you can take that quote with a grain of salt. In fact, if Damon is anything like the 2005 version of himself, we probably shouldn't put too much stock in his stated intentions, either (h/t NoMaas):

There's no way I can go play for the Yankees, but I know they are going to come after me hard. It's definitely not the most important thing to go out there for the top dollar, which the Yankees are going to offer me. It's not what I need.

As with any contractual negotiation, I'd be in favor of bringing back Damon at the right price. UZR doesn't think too highly of his defense this year, but I'm not ready to relegate Damon solely to DH status. Just last year his UZR/150 was 11.6 and this year it's -9.6. Has he really fallen of that sharply? Even with his below average defensive, Johnny has been so good with the bat that he projects to be worth $14.8M over the course of the season, comfortably more than the $13M he's making.

Damon's already knocked 22 homers this year, just two off his career high. True, 15 of those have come at home and every one has been to right field, but that's not an inherently bad thing. If the Yanks sign him again next year he'll be playing half of his games in the same park.

With Hideki Matsui likely moving on after this season, the Yanks won't have someone plugging up the DH slot who can't play another position. The Yanks have stated that they want to keep that position open to be able to rest other position players, which keeps the line up flexible, but Damon is still a somewhat competent left fielder, even if he doesn't rebound next year. His bat more than makes up for his defensive short-comings.

From his comments in Kepner's story, it's safe to say that Damon will be looking for at least 2 years. Should the Yanks bring him back for 2 years/$20M? Would that be enough? Who is going to give him more than that? Given the way the New Stadium plays, it seems that he would be worth more to the Yanks than anyone else. I wouldn't be surprised at all if Cash & Co. cut ties with Damon, but if they keep him around, I wouldn't be surprised to see him lift another twenty-something homers over the short porch in right field next year, either.

Jays Jettison Rios

Since the Jays are in town and this move effects both the White Sox' playoff chances this year and the direction of the Blue Jays going forward, I figured I would take some time to examine the decision to acquire Yankee Killer Alex Rios off the waiver wire by the White Sox.

Coupled with the Jake Peavy trade, ChiSox GM Kenny Williams has taken on roughly $115M in future salary over the past two weeks. The Sox are one game over .500, so they don't figure to factor into the Wild Card mix, but are still just 3 games in back of the Tigers in the AL Central. Peavy is still on the disabled list and won't make his first minor league start until later this week at the earliest so he probably won't make more than 4 or 5 starts for the Big League club before the end of the regular season.

Rios', on the other hand, will make an immediate impact if used optimally. In his career with the Jays, Rios has primarily held down RF while Vernon Wells played CF. Jermaine Dye and Carlos Quentin are holding down the starting corner outfield jobs for the Sox, which would be a problem were it not for the fact that Rios is a more than capable CF as well. He's much better than Wells, actually. In 106 games in CF, Rios has a UZR/150 of 12.8 whereas Wells' is -6.8. The Sox started Ken Griffey, Jr. in CF for 32 games last year, so they obviously aren't too concerned with shifting someone from a corner spot to center.

Considering the meager production the Sox are getting out of their current center fielders (.224/.281/.313), Rios' line of .264/.338/.383 is a significant upgrade, even before you consider the boost he'll be getting from playing at US Cellular Field. He's also a base stealing threat with 32 last year and 19 already this season.

Despite being in his physical prime at 28 years old, Rios is having a down year, which is the major reason the Blue Jays decided to let the White Sox walk away with him for nothing more than the required $20,000 transfer fee. The two teams engaged in negotiations before the trade deadline, meaning the Sox would have actually had to give up something at that point, but they waited it out, were the only team to make a waiver claim and got him for essentially nothing.

From the Blue Jays' perspective, they shed a major chunk of salary (not the one they really wanted to, though), but also parted with Rios at his lowest value thus far in his career. Even still, he will come close to equaling his contract value this year and has far exceeded even the $12.5M he is due in 2014 in both 2007 and 2008 according to FanGraphs. And those numbers calculate his value mostly as a RF, not a CF.

Does this move foreshadow a Roy Halladay trade this offseason? Dumping a productive player with a long term deal like Rios for salary reasons and getting nothing in return doesn't exactly signal the desire to compete now. This is a step beyond the Scott Rolen move. By dealing Halladay, they could save themselves a significant amount of money and net some good prospects in return, if they are indeed moving towards rebuilding. I'd be willing to be that the Jays would have tried harder to find a place for Halladay if they knew they could dump Rios after the deadline.

It's possible that Rios' offensive production will continue to decline and the Jays are thrilled with their decision in a few years, but I think it's more likely that they watch him become a solid contributor for the White Sox and regret the fact that it made financial sense at the time to get rid of him. If Rios were to hit the free agent market this offseason, he almost surely wouldn't get the kind of contract he is signed to, but the way that the baseball economy moves from here through 2014 could make the deal look very shrewd or very foolish on either side.

Out Of Left Field

(AP/ESPN)

Thus says our muse:

"You're being a little critical. What do you want me to tell you? You want me to tell you I took a bad route to the ball on the second one? OK, I took a bad route. I don't know what to tell you ... I'm not an outfielder. I'm an infielder." (source)

Yes Youk, you did take a bad route. But hey, at least it wasn't an E7 like the first one.

Kevin Youkilis' UZR/150 for LF in 2009: -81.7

Kevin Youkilis' UZR/150 for LF for his career: -21.9

Saturday might be the last time we see the Youkstah in the OF.

It Ain't The Scoops

We all knew Mark Teixeria was going to be a gigantic improvement over Jason Giambi in a number of ways when the Yankees signed him just before Christmas. He figured to hit for a higher average, have an equal or better OBP, hit as many home runs or more, run the bases more effectively and perhaps most obviously, be able to play first base almost daily and field the position well.

In my post about Derek Jeter's defensive improvements this year, here is what I said about Teixeira's positive impact on him:

Teixeria's glove probably helps, but Jeter has never made many throwing errors. He is on pace for 5 this year and has averaged 6.5 per season since 2001.

It was a pretty blunt measurement, and it turns out I might have actually oversold Teix's influence on fielding throws to first.

John Dewan, author of The Fielding Bible II, contends that there isn't much evidence to suggest that Teixeira is better at rounding up errant throws than the Big G: (h/t BBTF)

In fact, in 2008, Giambi's 29 scoops for the Yankees were good for 0.26 scoops per game started, while Teixeira's 2009 scoops for the Yankees are only 0.23 per game.

Dewan's Plus/Minus System keeps track of positive and negative fielding plays made by each player in every game and recently added "scoops" by a first baseman which would have prevented an error by an infielder as a positive play. These stats are tallied by actual people watching the games, so there is a human element involved, but on the whole would figure to be pretty accurate.

The only thing I can think of which would skew the results is that Teixeira can cover more territory with his foot on the bag than Giambi, and this extended range allows his to field balls Giambi would have had to reach for without scooping them. But I don't think that could occur often enough to make much of an impact.

So where does Teixeira surpass Giambi?

The true difference between Gold Glover Mark Teixeira and Jason Giambi is in handling grounders. In the last two years Teixeira has saved his teams 18 runs fielding grounders, while Giambi has cost his team 18, a 36-run difference in Defensive Runs Saved.

Keep in mind those numbers are over the course of two years, but that is a massive gap in terms of fielding ability. To put it another way, Teixeira's career UZR/150 (Ultimate Zone Rating averaged over 150 games) is 2.2 while Giambi's is -7.2. Giambi might think he's a great defender, but that's obviously not what the numbers say.

Defensive performance is never going to be as easy to put a numerical value on as offensive production, but this should at least help us appreciate what Teix brings to the table on both sides of the ball.