With the baseball season rapidly approaching and recent posts by FanGraphs authors converting projected statistics into auction values, I thought I would share my approach towards valuation I have used in a long-standing A.L. league with 12 teams, 23 player rosters selected through auction (C, C, 1B, 3B, CI, 2B, SS, MI, 5 OF, 1 DH), a $260 budget, a 17-player reserve snake draft and the ability to keep up to 15 players from one year to the next, an attribute that inflates the value of the remaining pool and can further distort disparate talent across positions and categories.

We have traditionally used a 4×4 format, and while I have persuaded my co-owners to switch to a 5×5 for the coming year, what follows is my process for a 4×4 league.

There was a distant time when I was a whiz at math but my utter lack of a work ethic for advanced math collided with university-level calculus and I crumbled as surely as a weak-kneed lefty facing Randy Johnson. So my understanding of some key statistical processes is compromised. And by some I mean most.

But what I lack in math I hope I make up in approach:

(1) For categories over multiple years in this league, teams finish in a standard bell-shaped curve, with two or three teams well ahead, two or three well behind and six to eight clumped more closely together.

(2) In a 12-team league, a third-place finish in a category bets you 10 points. Across eight categories, averaging a third-place finish gets you 80 points, which is enough points to win out league between 80% and 90% of the time.

(3) Given both (1) and (2), my goal is to finish in third in every category, because doing do will far more often than not win my league, and because that target is a comfortable space above the pack in the middle, creating a margin for error within which I can still secure a win.

(4) I calculate what totals I need for each category to finish third based upon the specific history of our league, giving greater weight to more recent and relevant trends.

(5) I calculate the totals needed to finish dead middle in the pack for each category, again based upon the specific history of our league, giving greater weight to more recent and relevant trends.

(6) The difference between the third-place totals and the median totals become my spread, in a sense, the yardstick against which I then measure all projected player performance.

(7) I don’t weight pitchers and hitters evenly because my league does not – the marketplace of my league places significantly less value on pitchers, spending between $70 and $100 on them, and I adjust values to account for that. Perhaps that is also justified by either greater volatility or more injuries for pitchers. In any case, I divide the total value for hitters by 14 and for pitchers by 9 to come up with the average value for hitters or pitchers.

(8) I calculate what each of 14 hitters and 9 pitchers would need to contribute per player for each category for both the top and the bottom of the spread.

(9) For each category, I divide the median production per player by the difference in the gap to find the incremental value of each unit of production.

(10) For each player and for each category, I start with the median value of median production for all four categories, than add or subtract the incremental value depending upon if their projected production is above or below the median.

(11) I do the same for keepers to calculate inflation value, then list both the value and inflated value next to each player, broken down by position, so I can track both availability and the ebb and flow of inflation in real time.

(12) Finally, my league is mostly inelastic except for dumping trades. That means it is not easy to trade surplus categories for deficit categories. So I create a running tally of my projected production, starting with my keepers and adding players I gain in the auction with the goal or at least reaching each of the target levels needed for projected third-places finished in each category.

(13) I don’t adjust assigned value based on the position played but of course I consider position as I bid in order to reach my targets in an inelastic league. I may deliberately pay somewhat more than inflation cost for a good player if the likely alternatives is paying over inflation value for a poor player and being left with more money to spend then there is talent to spend it on. I do so knowing my keepers will produce to much surplus value that I can win simply getting players close to inflation value.

At least in my league, my projected values, adjusted for inflation, are pretty close to the mark notwithstanding the outliers that will come in any marketplace, both for individual players and for more systemic biases (my league overpays for closers, for example). I don’t win every year, but when I fall short, it is not because my valuations were off but because of too many failures in projecting specific players.

Is there a statistical basis for tossing replacement value as a baseline for creating auction values or statistical benefit to instead using league-specific gaps between middling and winning teams? Frankly, I don’t know, however intuitive my system seems to me. But I’d welcome feedback on my approach, statistical arguments for and against it, and whether it warrants further exploration.

While doing some work on my pre-season projections sheet, I came across a link to complete data from Razzball – complete full-season data for 48 12-team 5×5 fantasy baseball leagues[1]. I’ve been using this as a handy cross-reference in doing some SPG (Standings Points Gained) calculations, but I decided to try and use the data to do an exercise on something I’d been thinking about: are some categories more important than others?

First, I looked at the by-category scores for all 48 first place teams, then all the second place teams, etc:

The 48 first place teams, on average, scored 10.11 in the 5×5 categories. So basically a top-3 finish in all categories. Not that surprising.

Digging a bit deeper, I looked at the average score in each category for 1^st place teams, then for 2^nd place teams, and so on. I included the standard deviation (a measure of variability) and how often a team was in the top 3 for that category:

A quick glance seems to suggest that the most important categories were Runs on the batting side, and Ks on the pitching side: the average score for the team that won their league was highest – by quite a margin, and also varied less – for those two categories. Winning teams were also more likely to be at least in the top 3 in Runs and Ks compared to any of the other batting and pitching categories, respectively.

Conversely, Batting Average did not appear to be that important – less than half of the teams that won their league were in the top 3 in Batting Average, and it had the lowest average score for champion teams of all the 5×5 categories. It was also the most volatile – with a standard deviation of 2.9, around 67% of teams that won their league would have had a Batting Average score ranging from 11.2 down to as low as 5.3!

What about second-place teams? Ks and Runs were important here as well, but without the gaps seen for winning teams. The highest-scoring category on the pitching side was again Ks, but at 9.9, this was only 0.1 higher than the second category (Saves). On the hitting side, RBIs had the highest average score at 9.9, with Runs at 9.8

There’s another way to look at the data – if you were the leader in, say, Home Runs, how likely is it that you won your league? Here’s another breakdown:

This table tells us, for example, that once again, teams that finished tops in Runs or K’s, had an average overall finish of 2.1 and 2.2, respectively: basically, they finished 1st or 2nd overall in their league, and fully 75% of teams that were first in Runs or K’s had a top-3 overall finish. (15 teams were first in both Runs and Ks – of those, 14 won the league; the lone exception came in third).

Conversely, teams that had the best Batting Average only finished 5th on average, and only 30% of teams with the best batting average were in the top 3.

I’m not showing the data here, but the reverse was also true: of the teams that were in the bottom half in the league in Runs, or in K’s, exactly none of them won the league. None. Only four teams (for both Runs and K’s) even managed a 2^nd place overall finish!

On the flip side, there were 26 teams that were in the bottom half in Batting Average but 1^st or 2^nd overall, including 14 overall winners.

So the data appear to be telling us that we need to focus on Runs and Ks, and not worry quite as much about Batting Average. There may be some logic behind this: players scoring lots of runs are, perhaps, coming to bat more often, which means more opportunities for HRs, SBs and RBIs. Pitchers generating lots of Ks are perhaps more likely to be in position to pick up Wins and Saves and have better ratios.

While I don’t think anyone would recommend ignoring a category altogether – even Batting Average – I think the key takeaway is that in looking at roster construction, you might benefit by paying closer attention to Runs and K’s – for example, by letting those two categories be the tie-breaker if two players appear to be close in value.

Obviously, none of this is particularly new or revolutionary. And of course the usual caveats apply: 48 leagues from one particular year may or may not be a sufficient sample size to draw conclusions from. Results will almost certainly differ in some way or another for leagues with different settings (1 catcher leagues vs 2 catcher leagues, 5 outfielders & 1 util vs 3 OF and 2 util, etc). My knowledge (or lack thereof) of statistics and such could make the entire exercise completely worthless, etc.

But I, at least, found it interesting – that’s all that matters, really – and I am looking to incorporate this as I do my projections this year.

[1] 12-team, standard 5×5, 5 outfielders and one utility spot; max 180 games started for pitchers, and – at least according to Razzball – the Razzball leagues are supposed to be generally more competitive that more casual leagues.

The A’s winning the West after a huge offseason makeover in 2015 might seem like an unlikely achievement, but here are seven reasons why this is not at all unachievable:

1. The New-Look Infield

In 2015 the Athletics will be throwing out a fresh face at each of the four starting infield positions. Here’s a quick look:

Especially from an Athletics fan’s perspective, the left side of this chart looks very nice. The names Moss and Donaldson are very important and dear to you; however, the right side of this chart is actually more productive overall. While Moss and Donaldson have the highest wOBA of the eight players at .351 and .339 respectively, Jed Lowrie and Eric Sogard have the two lowest at .300 and .262 respectively. This averages out to be a wOBA of .313. The Average wOBA for 2015’s infield is .320.

You might be thinking that Lawrie does not compare to Donaldson, and you could be right. The fact of the matter is that Lawrie is a downgrade from Donaldson, but not by all that much, meanwhile, Zobrist is a huge upgrade from Sogard at 2B. And even Sogard is an upgrade from Punto as the UTIL infielder.

Other important categories that favor the 2015 infield are BB%, K%, FB%, Contact%, OPS, OBP, etc. Also, the new infield got quite a bit younger and faster.

The 2015 infield also has a higher average wRC+ at 104 in comparison to 2014’s 102.5. These aren’t huge differences, but the A’s are expecting better years from Lawrie, who was injured a lot in 2014, Davis, who hit 32 HR in 2012, and Semien, who hasn’t really had much of a chance in the majors yet. These moves were necessary, not only to save money, but because the 2014 team didn’t actually win the AL West. I’m now going to compare this new INF to a team that did win the West, the 2012 A’s.

The 2012 INF consisted of Josh Donaldson, Stephen Drew, Cliff Pennington and Brandon Moss. There were other guys in the mix earlier on in the season, i.e. Jemile Weeks, Brandon Inge, however, these were the guys that got it done down the home stretch.

These numbers are almost identical, however the 2015 team has a slight edge in every category. That is despite the fact that the A’s expect growth from the incoming players this season. Even after the significant losses of Josh Donaldson and Brandon Moss the A’s infield is more than capable of pushing them toward another Western division title.

2. The Designated Hitter

The Athletics’ DH numbers from 2014 are not where you want them to be. Yes, Melvin will still use this spot as a “half-rest” day for players like Crisp, Reddick and Lawrie, but the newcomer Billy Butler will most likely fill the spot the majority of the time. Butler is a huge upgrade from the A’s team DH numbers last season in which Callaspo, Moss, Norris, Jaso, Vogt, Dunn, among countless others had at bats. Let’s take a look at the 2014 A’s DH numbers vs. Billy Butler’s 2014 numbers. (he also had a down season):

This chart shows that Butler is a significant upgrade at the DH spot, as he will bring a lot more production to the middle of this lineup. I should also bring up his career numbers, which are a wOBA of .351 and wRC+ of 117. If Butler can get back to his career form, the A’s offense is looking at a huge boost, but even if he doesn’t and repeats his 2014 performance, the DH spot is still getting a nice upgrade.

3. The Rotation

The starting rotation for the A’s no longer consists of Jon Lester, Jeff Samardzija or Jason Hammel, but it is still a very strong group with huge potential. I’m going to compare the projected 2015 group to the 2012 and 2013 rotations that led the A’s to division titles.

2012

2013

Projected 2015 (2014 STATS)

As you can see, the 2015 rotation wins four out of the six categories. They won the majority of the categories already, but this 2015 staff has the potential to be better than these numbers show. In past years, the A’s success had a lot to do with their strong pitching staff — this is a big reason why I believe they will win the west in 2015 — however, we need to take a look at the projected rotations of the four other teams in the division to see how the A’s compare to each of them.

Here are the five teams’ projected rotations for 2015:

Angels

Mariners

Rangers

Astros

Athletics

The Mariners and the Athletics both have really solid pitching staffs. The Mariners have arguably the best pitcher in the American League in Felix Hernandez. The Angels also have a good young ace in Garrett Richards, but he is coming off an injury; it will be interesting to see how he bounces back. Sonny Gray proved that he is a true ace last season, going over 200 innings and pitching extremely well in big games. The numbers do give the A’s a slight edge; they won three of the six categories and the Mariners won two of them. King Felix, Iwakuma and the solid supporting cast are hard to bet against, but 1-5, the A’s have a better staff according to last year’s numbers.

4. Speedee Oil Change

Anytime manager Bob Melvin calls on the bullpen, the A’s should be confident. There are so many capable arms out there that it’s really not fair. Honestly, a starter could go four innings with a lead and that would be enough for this bullpen with Otero, Abad, Cook, O’Flaherty, Clippard and Doolittle in the mix. There are plenty of other options as well that might not get a shot because it’s already crowded with talent out there. The starters, however, are very capable of giving you six or seven innings consistently, which makes this bullpen even that much more deadly, allowing Melvin to create left-on-left matchups or vice versa. The fact of the matter is, if you can’t score, you can’t win. While the starting staff is very solid, getting to the bullpen might not be the opponent’s best option when facing the A’s. Another positive for the A’s has been their ability to fight their way back into ballgames the last few years. With a bullpen like this who can keep the deficit where it is, the probability of achieving a comeback is that much greater.

As shown by the Royals on the successful end and the Dodgers on the opposite end, the strength of your bullpen can make or break your season.

Let’s compare the A’s bullpen to the other teams in the division by highlighting the projected top six bullpen arms for each team:

Angels

Mariners

Rangers

Astros

Athletics

The Mariners and Athletics each won two out of the five categories. The Athletics also came in second in two other categories. Although this chart shows the Mariners and the A’s as pretty evenly matched, the Mariners have a lot of aging players in their pen, so we cannot be sure if they will keep up the good numbers. The Astros got a lot better by adding Luke Gregerson and Pat Neshek, but that still wasn’t enough to make them the best in the division, especially after the A’s went out and traded for the two time All-Star, Tyler Clippard. All of these teams except Texas have a very strong bullpen, so trying to come back from a deficit is going to be a tough feat in this division.

The A’s also have a lot of other options past these six players, probably more so than the other four teams, making injuries less of a factor for them.

5. Coco Crisp

When Coco Crisp is at the top of the lineup, the A’s are a better team. Over the past three seasons there’s no player who has had as much of an overall impact on this team than Coco. Whether it’s at the plate, in the field or in the clubhouse, Crisp’s impact is significant. Despite losing a lot of star players, the A’s will not take a step backward because they still have their most important piece in Crisp. If Crisp would have been traded away this offseason, I don’t believe the A’s would be ready to compete for the AL West title in 2015. There would be too long of an adjustment period, someone else would need to step up big time and fill his shoes. Luckily, the A’s don’t have to worry about that yet. Bottom line: the A’s need Coco Crisp.

6. Depth and Versatility

Having a deep roster is always important in a 162 game season. You will have players go on the DL, it is unavoidable. Being able to replace the injured players with capable major leaguers is key to a team’s success in the long run. Billy Beane has constructed a 40-man roster with tremendous depth, especially with pitching. The A’s have eight or nine guys capable of making the starting rotation, not to mention two others (Jarrod Parker and A.J. Griffin) due back this summer. There are upwards of ten players competing for a spot in the bullpen as well. It will be interesting to see who makes it on to the 25-man roster, but I wouldn’t be surprised if Triple-A Nashville has a stacked opening day roster. Having great options in the minor leagues is key for any team, and the A’s will definitely have that this season with Kendall Graveman, Chris Bassitt, Sean Nolin and Brad Mills, four starters likely to be starting in Triple-A. Also, RJ Alvarez, Eury De La Rosa and Evan Scriber, three above-average bullpen arms will likely be starting down there as well.

The A’s lineup is a very versatile group this season. Eric Sogard, A’s second baseman the last few seasons, has moved into a utility INF role; he plays excellent defense, and for a defensive replacement, he can handle the stick pretty well. Ben Zobrist is known for his ability to play all over the diamond with above-average defense, and also for getting the job done from both sides of the plate; his career wOBA is .344. Craig Gentry and Sam Fuld can play all three outfield positions with ease while providing speed off the bench in pinch running situations. Marcus Semien will likely be the everyday SS, but he can play all over the infield as well. Stephen Vogt will mostly catch, but he can play first base and corner outfield if the A’s need him to. The amount of options the A’s have, if injuries do occur, are limitless. It will be entertaining to see how Bob Melvin constructs his lineup card every day.

7. The Manager

Bob Melvin is the perfect manager for a team of misfits and players who have never played together previously. He will bring this group to play for each other, as a unit, one day at a time. Melvin is great at creating matchups that benefit the team and give them the best chance to succeed. The roster that has been assembled this season is perfect for just that. It is loaded with skilled, versatile players. Bob Melvin has done it before and he will do it again.

Jeff Zimmerman posted an interesting article on Friday. It prompted me to try to analyze the relationship between (i) an outfielder’s ability to make plays, and (ii) an outfielder’s ability to save runs. From my analysis below, the relationship is not as hand-in-glove as I initially would have thought.

From what I understood about Jeff’s article, he advanced a new defensive metric called “PMR,” which stands for Plays Made Ratio. Jeff calculated this ratio using data from Inside Edge, which categorizes every ball in play into one of six buckets. Jeff explains:

Most of the fielding data falls into two categories. The zero percentage plays are just that, impossible plays, and make up 23.2% of all the balls in play. Balls in this bucket are never caught and always have a 0% value. The other major range is the Routine Plays or the 90% to 100% bin. Defenders make outs on 97.9% of these plays, which make up 64.0% of all the plays in the field; the 2.1% which aren’t made are mostly errors. In total, 87.2% of all plays are graded out as either automatic hits or outs; it is the final ~13% which really determine if a defender is above or below average.

Between almost always and never, four categories remain. Even though each category has a defined range, like 40% to 60%, the average amount of plays made is not exactly in the middle of each range. Here are the actual percentage of plays made in each of the four ranges.

With these league average values and each individual player’s values, a ratio of number of plays made compared to the league average value can be calculated. To have the same output of stats like FIP- and wRC+, I put Plays Made Ratio on a 100 scale where a value like 125 is 25% better than the league average. Here is the long form formula and Jason Heyward’s value determined for an example.

Plays Made Ratio = ((Plays made from 1% to 90%)/((1% to 10% chances * .063%)+( 10% to 40% chances * .289)+ (40% to 60% chances * .576) + (60% to 90% chances * .805))) * 100

Heyward’s Plays Made Ratio = ((1+10+9+26)/((14*.063)+(16*.289)+(9*.576)+(27*.805)))*100

Heyward’s Plays Made Ratio = (46/32.4)*100

Heyward’s Plays Made Ratio = 142

Heyward had a heck of a season. Of the 66 playable balls hit to him, normally only 32 of them would have been caught for an out. Heyward was able to get to 46 of them, or 42% better than the league average. He has consistently had above league average values with a 133 value in 2012 and 125 in 2013.

Jeff posits that the new PFM metric gives us new insight that FanGraphs current go-to defensive metric (Ultimate Zone Rating) does not:

Now remember this stat [PMR] only looks at how often a fielder would have made the play considering their position on the field. The team could be playing its outfielders back to prevent a double or their infielders in for a bunt which could put the defender out of position. Additionally, it doesn’t look at the final results of the play (at least for now). If Sir Dive Alot is playing in the outfield and he loves to try to catch every ball hit his way, then he will get to a few extra flyballs by diving all the time, but those he doesn’t get to will pass him by for more doubles and triples. Also, an outfielder could be good at making plays while coming in versus going deep; balls which fall in over his head would be more damaging than those which fall for shallow singles. While his Plays Made Ratio may be high, the number of runs he saves, as seen by UZR or Defensive Runs Saved, may be lower by comparison.

This got me thinking about the relationship between a player’s PMR and his UZR, and, more specifically, his RngR. As I understand RngR, it is the component of UZR that estimates the number of runs a player saves, or surrenders, due to his range. RngR isolates the contribution a player’s range makes to his Ultimate Zone Rating by ignoring the contributions from his arm and his ability to limit errors.

Intuitively, it would make sense that a player’s PMR and his RngR would be strongly correlated. In other words, a player whose range allows him to make more plays than average would also be the same type of player whose range would allow him to save more runs than average. A simple two-by-two matrix, with RngR along the left side and PMR along the top would show the following quadrants:

My intuition is that players would fall in either quadrant (2) or quadrant (3). The interesting questions arise with players that would fall in quadrant (1) (those who exhibit poor range, but whose range saves runs), and in quadrant (4) (those who exhibit good range, but whose range does not save runs). There are several explanations for why a player may fall into quadrant (1) or (4).

Jeff noted three possible explanations.  First, a player may be overly aggressive, which would may lead to more outs (a higher PMR) but also more misplays resulting in doubles and triples (a lower RngR). Second, “an outfielder could be good at making plays while coming in versus going deep; balls which fall in over his head would be more damaging than those which fall for shallow singles. While his Plays Made Ratio may be high, the number of runs he saves, as seen by UZR or Defensive Runs Saved, may be lower by comparison.” Third, a player (or his team) may be particularly well adept at positioning himself, which would amplify his RngR rating, but not necessarily his PMR (as Jeff noted when discussing Nick Markakis).

How does the relationship between PMR and RngR look if it is applied to actual players? To find out, I looked at all center fielders who between 2012 and 2014 had at least 70 “total chances” (defined by Inside Edge as balls hit to that fielder where there is between a 1% and 90% likelihood that the ball is caught). That provided me a list of 18 center fielders. Next, I calculated each player’s rate-based RngR/150 (calculated by his total RngR divided by the innings he played in center field, multiplied by nine, multiplied by 150). That revealed the following table:

A scatter chart of this information looks like this. I also added a best-fit line to the scatter plot. My intuition that a player’s RngR/150 would be strongly correlated with his PMR is contradicted by this data. In fact, according to this data, (and based on my very limited skillset at statistical analysis, which may be completely incorrect), only 15% of the runs saved due to these 18 center fielders’ range can be explained by their Plays Made Ratio.

Even more interesting than the two-by-two matrix characterization introduced above, are the points on the scatter plot that are either way above (Juan Lagares and Lorenzo Cain) and way below (Dexter Fowler) the linear trendline.

The data suggest that Lagares/Cain and Fowler have similar range in center field, but that the former use their range to save more runs than the latter. One possible implication of this information is that Fowler is not optimizing his ability and that through better decision-making (such as being more aggressive or less aggressive on fly balls) or better positioning he could save more runs. As discussed earlier, it could also mean that Fowler is not (relatively) adept at playing balls hit over his head or in the gap, which leads to more doubles and triples.

On a larger scale, a possible implication of this data is that teams could significantly improve the amount of runs their center fielders save by (i) coaching their center fielders to make optimal decisions regarding their aggressiveness and (ii) properly positioning their center fielders. I would be curious to analyze what is the optimal amount of aggression a center fielder would have in going after balls hit to the outfield, the optimal way to position himself. For example, is it better to play shallow and be aggressive in cutting off singles (which Lagares has a reputation of doing) or to play deep? Those questions are best answered in a follow-up post/article.

The Oakland Athletics may have finally completed their roster turnover on Wednesday with their most recent deal sending Yunel Escobar to Washington for RP Tyler Clippard. However, you can never know if Billy Beane is finished making moves. With that being said, I’d like to break down the roster from last year to this year and assess whether or not the team will actually regress in 2015. The fact is that the Athletics got quite a bit younger this offseason and acquired many players with a lot of team control remaining. The distant future appears brighter now than it did prior to this offseason, but the main question is, will the Athletics be able to compete in 2015 as well as they would have prior to the roster turnover? Lets take a look at the numbers:

STARTING LINEUP

I will start by comparing the most common nine players in the A’s lineup last year to their projected starting nine this year, using WAR and wRC+:

[All stats give on the chart will represent the 2014 season in the MLB only. In further commentary I may bring up career numbers or minor league numbers for some players.]

2014 AVG WAR = 2.1 / Total wRC+ = 929

2015 AVG WAR = 1.7 / Total wRC+ = 937

As shocking as it may seem, this displays that the A’s should in fact score more runs with their lineup in 2015 than they did with Donaldson, Moss and Cespedes in the heart of their lineup last season. Although, this chart only accounts for 2014 stats, in which Billy Butler (among others) had an off year. If the A’s can get him back to, or even near his 2012 form, in which his WAR was 2.9 and his wRC+ was 139, they could be in for a significant upgrade on offense as a whole. One of the reasons why this lineup has the potential to be more successful even after losing a guy like Donaldson is because of the acquisition of Ben Zobrist. While Brett Lawrie is -4.7 to Donaldson in WAR and -28 to Donaldson in wRC+, Zobrist is +5.4 to Sogard in WAR and +52 to Sogard in wRC+, more than making up for the loss of Donaldson. While the A’s did use a lot of other DH besides Callaspo in 2014, he totaled the greatest amount of plate appearances from that spot, which might lower the 2014 numbers a little.

The average WAR is down slightly from last season, but with Stephen Vogt behind the plate and Marcus Semien most likely getting the every day job at SS, the A’s feel they are upgrading defensively. Semien’s numbers represent his slim 255 plate appearances in the majors last season, but in TripleA his wRC+ was 142. You cannot expect that out of Semien at the major league level, but it shows that he has potential to improve in 2015. The A’s did use a lot of players at each position last season and they will again in 2015; that is why it is important to also take a look at the bench players from last year and the projected bench for this year.

BENCH

While the 25-man roster is not set in stone for 2015 just yet, here is last year’s most commonly used bench players versus next year’s projected bench.

2014 AVG WAR = 1.1 / TOTAL wRC+ = 344

2015 AVG WAR = .48 / TOTAL wRC+ = 367(407)

While these numbers are a bit skewed due to the fact that Canha has not yet reached the majors and also because Jaso was actually a starter while he was healthy, they do give a good idea of what to expect in 2015. Sogard takes over for Punto as the reserve infielder. Fuld and Gentry will most likely platoon in LF, same goes for Vogt and Phegley at C. Since Fuld and Vogt are LH, they will see more time in the starting lineup, leaving Gentry and Phegley on the list of bench players for 2015. Gentry and Phegley will see most their time against lefties, which will likely help their overall numbers. The A’s always do a great job shifting their lineup to create the match ups they want, expect more of the same with platoons and late pinch hitting in 2015.

STARTING ROTATION

The starting rotation is an area where a lot of people say they A’s have question marks. This may be due to the fact that they lost Jon Lester and Jason Hammel to free agency and traded away Jeff Samardzija to the White Sox earlier this off season. However, the A’s held the best record in baseball for months in 2014 with a rotation featuring Sonny Gray, Scott Kazmir, Jesse Chavez, Drew Pomeranz and Tommy Milone. Four of those guys will be returning in 2015, with a slew of other young arms fighting for a spot in the rotation. Anyone from Chris Bassitt, Jesse Hahn, Sean Nolin or Kendall Graveman would be an upgrade or at worst an equal replacement of Milone. Let’s take a look at the numbers for the five players who started the most games for the Athletics last season VS the A’s projected rotation for next season using ERA, WHIP and WAR from the 2014 season:

2014 AVG: ERA = 3.46 / WHIP = 1.22 / Avg WAR = 2.56

2015 AVG: ERA = 3.12 / WHIP = 1.18 / WAR = 1.96

Keep in mind that ERA and WHIP are better when they are lower and WAR is better if it is higher. While this list does not consist of Jon Lester, the A’s were at their best when they still had Chavez and Milone in their rotation. Also, it was a small sample size for Pomeranz, so we cannot expect numbers quite that solid again in 2015. However, with all that being said, the A’s, despite losing All-Stars, should not take more than a tiny step back in 2015. This rotation is still very solid and is in fact younger this year than last. Not only that, the A’s now have a lot more depth with three other pitchers not on this list that could fill a rotation spot, Chris Bassit, Sean Nolin and Kendall Graveman. Also, we cannot forget about the Tommy John rehabbers Jarrod Parker and AJ Griffin, who could make their way back into this rotation before the All-Star break. Both Parker and Griffin were huge contributors to the A’s success in both 2012 and 2013.

BULLPEN

There are a lot of similar faces coming back to the Athletics’ bullpen in 2015. So, instead of continuing with the format I’ve used for position players and the starting rotation I’m quickly going to compare Luke Gregerson and Tyler Clippard, the one main difference in the bullpen for 2015.

Player ERA / WHIP / WAR

Luke Gregerson 2.12 / 1.01 / 0.9

Tyler Clippard 2.18 / 1.00 / 1.5

These numbers are very similar, making Clippard a perfect replacement for Gregerson, taking over the 8th inning duties in front of incumbent closer Sean Doolittle. I don’t think many people expected the A’s to make a move to acquire another back end of the bullpen piece. Even after losing Gregerson, they seemed to have a very solid bullpen, but now it is even more solidified with a proven set-up man in Tyler Clippard. Another important thing to note about Clippard is his ability to create fly balls. His FB% in 2014 was 49.4% also, his IFFB% was 19.3% and that will likely increase mightily with him now pitching in Oakland. He is the perfect pitcher for the o.Co Coliseum. The A’s will pay Clippard more than they would have paid Escobar in 2015, but they are saving money in the long run due to the fact the Escobar is owed 14 million over the next two seasons and Clippard becomes a free agent after this season (in which he will make around 9 million).

Now let’s take a look at 12 potential options for the Athletics bullpen in 2015. Some of them are locks, but the others will either gain a spot due to the fact that they did not make it into the rotation or if they have a solid showing in spring training.

There are a lot of very solid options for the A’s bullpen in 2015. I’d expect to see, Doolittle, Clippard, O’Flaherty, Cook, Otero and Abad for sure, but I expect all of these guys to make an impact at some point, if not this season then in 2016.

TAKEAWAY

The Athletics have a very deep pitching staff. With Sonny Gray and Scott Kazmir headlining the rotation, they have a plethora of options to fill the remaining three spots. Pomeranz, Hahn and Chavez look to be the leading candidates, although Billy Beane himself has mentioned Kendall Graveman as someone he sees making the rotation out of spring training. The A’s also have a very strong bullpen, especially after the recent acquisition of All-Star set-up man Tyler Clippard. After losing Josh Donaldson, Brandon Moss, Yoenis Cespedes and Derek Norris (four All-Stars), the A’s lineup for 2015, according to wRC+ actually got better. It’s not always the big name All-Stars that make a team successful. Oakland has proven this many times in the past, most recently in 2012, right after an offseason makeover similar to this year’s. The one piece that has remained since before the 2012 makeover and after this 2015 makeover, is Coco Crisp. There cannot be enough said about the value of Crisp to the A’s organization. With Crisp healthy in CF and the newly acquired pieces filling in around him, I expect the A’s to be back competing for another American League West division title in 2015.

I got caught up in an interesting Twitter debate Friday afternoon regarding Astros 2B Jose Altuve with FantasyAlarm.Com’s Ray Flowers that prompted a detailed response from Flowers about our Altuve dispute where he doubled down on his assertion that Altuve’s ADP of 10th overall is huge mistake.

The main crux of his argument is that Altuve is not an across-the-board contributor. He claims Altuve’s lack of power in this current environment makes him a terrible choice at the end of the 1st round.  In this article I’m going to demonstrate why this shouldn’t be a major concern for you.

Hitting Your Marks

In 5×5 rotisserie leagues, the goal is to construct a lineup that gives you a chance to accumulate as many points as possible in the various categories. In NFBC 15-team leagues, I’ve come up with these target numbers for each category.

Hitting each of these five offensive targets should put you in the Top 3 of each category, accumulating at least 65 of the maximum possible 75 points. There are 14 hitting positions to fill, so you are looking for these averages per active roster spot:

Value Is Value

The key to winning fantasy baseball leagues is to constantly find the best value in each of your picks no matter what round you are in. Getting power-happy in the early portion of the draft has been a trendy tactic over the past couple years as power has declined in baseball. Let’s look at a couple of the players Flowers suggested he’d rather pick over Jose Altuve in the 1st round and their Steamer projections:

NFBC has a player rating system that compares a player’s statistics to league average and creates a score to show what their true 5×5 Roto value is. Based on the above 2015 Steamer projections, here is where each of these players would have finished last season:

Altuve is the more valuable player based on 2015 Steamer projections (and most likely more valuable based on any credible projection system).

And now we get to Flowers’ main point. He says that “Power is harder to find than ever before.”  He is absolutely right but that does not mean there isn’t an island of misfit power bats available in the middle rounds. You should not be worried about missing out on power in the early rounds because THERE IS home run pop that you can add later in the draft.

In a recent NFBC draft of my own – where I took Altuve 12th overall – I had the powerful but flawed Chris Carter land right in my lap in the 10th round, 139th overall. Let’s look at his projection:

Carter, a source of tremendous power, has been scaring the daylights out of fantasy owners for the past couple of years. Nobody wants to take on his treacherous batting average as it will surely drag their team average into oblivion. Well because we took the proper value in the first round (Altuve), we are now in a position where Chris Carter is worth significantly more to us than to the guy who took Anthony Rendon or Adam Jones. We get extra value from Carter because we can absorb his batting average better than they can!

Here is what our first round pick, combined with Carter would look like as a composite player. Remember, we need 18 HRs, 66 Runs, 66 RBIs, 11 SBs, and .270 Avg to crack the Top 3 of those categories.

If we were to have chosen Rendon or Jones in the first round, Carter would be a terrible fit for us in the 10th round. We’d be in solid shape in three categories, but face crippling deficits in stolen bases and batting average. But because we chose Altuve (the most valuable of the 3 players), it allowed us to spend some of our excess batting average and stolen bases to acquire a middle-round power bat that nobody else wants to touch. With Altuve+Carter, we exceed our minimum requirements in FOUR categories and are not very far behind in a 5th.

A NFBC Draft Champions league that I won in 2013 stands out in my memory. The early rounds of the draft provided me a surplus of batting average and stolen bases, and I continued to take the best player available each round after that. The brutish Adam Dunn, who was coming off a terrible .159, 11 HR season, was getting drafted around 185th overall that year as people feared the damage his average would do. Because of the excess wealth I accumulated in other categories, Dunn was worth more to me than everybody else. I determined that if Dunn were to bounce back to the .220 range, I could absorb his average and bet that his home run power would return. After all, he did average 40 HRs a year for seven straight years prior to his 2012 abomination. I ended up being able to reach above his ADP and take him in the 11th round, 165th overall. He provided me with 41 HRs, 96 RBIs, and 87 runs in 2014 and was a key cog in winning the league.

Finding Speed

I suppose the counter argument to this approach would be, “Well we don’t need batting average lagging Chris Carter or Adam Dunn in the 10th round. Since we accumulated the extra power with Rendon or Jones, we can go after a speed merchant in these rounds. Perfectly reasonable case to state. You should be trying to balance your roster out. But does it work better than Altuve+Carter? Let’s look at the speedy Ben Revere, who went late in the 8th round of my draft, 118th overall. Under this scenario, since we took more power early, let’s grab this high average/stolen base machine from the Phillies and make up the ground we lost, right?

And our new composite player:

Revere is a light hitting lead off man with virtually zero pop. You have now elevated your composite player into the upper echelon in stolen bases and batting average at the expense of HRs, runs, and RBIs. Despite Revere getting drafted a round or two earlier than Carter, the combinations with Rendon or Jones are worse in those three categories compared to Altuve+Carter.

There’s a myth going around that cheap steals are always available late in the draft. While it’s true you can occasionally hit the jackpot on a Dee Gordon from time to time, it is a very risky play to ignoring steals early in hopes of finding one of these guys late. These players are also dangerous to the health of your power categories as you can see from the Revere example. It just seems like an unnecessary strategic risk to plan on these guys delivering for you. Other owners plot this same strategy and often they reach above ADP to grab one of the speedsters you were also planning on supplementing your power with. Roster construction? Out the window.

Also, Chris Carter is not your only option to complement your team in these middle rounds. There are several very good targets to keep an eye for if you’re lucky enough for Altuve to land in your lap at the end of the 1st round. Lucas Duda (.234, 24 HR) and Marcell Ozuna (.255, 22 HR) were both available in the 9th round. I personally drafted Brandon Moss (.248, 28 HR) in the 12th round. Pedro Alvarez (.242, 26 HR), I got in the 14th round. Again, I could absorb these averages because I repeatedly took the best player available earlier in the draft, often players with overlooked batting averages. I constantly kept an eye on my roster construction to ensure I could absorb these lower batting averages and lack of stolen bases.

In 2014, there were 56 hitters drafted between selections 201-to-300. 16 of these hitters would hit at least 18 home runs. Meanwhile, 15 of the 56 managed 11 steals.

Back to my particular draft this year, after choosing Altuve 12th, I took Jacoby Ellsbury with my 2nd round pick, 19th overall. Between these two players, Steamer projects only 24 home runs between them. Even though I happened to not grab any huge raw power bats in the first two rounds, I still managed to construct a 14-man lineup that is projected to hit the magical 250 HR mark without falling behind in the other categories.

Altuve and .300

A repeated argument was also made that Jose Altuve “is not lock to hit .300 this year”. I believe this is a very pessimistic position to take and I haven’t heard a sensible reason for it. This is a player who hit .286 over his first 1300 PAs as a 22-23 year old youngster. Despite increasing his Swing% rate to over 50% last year, he made more contact than ever (4.4% SwStr) with an uptick of power on his way to a ridiculous .343 average.  This is an elite hit tool.

Not even the most bullish Altuve supporter would think he’s going to hit .343 again. That would be a very unfair expectation. However, not a single person who is bearish on Altuve has made a compelling argument why this 24-year-old can’t hit .300 again. Of course Altuve is “not a lock to hit .300”. By that argument there is no player who is a lock to hit any of their projections, including Mike Trout.

Yes, HR power has declined over the years. But so has batting average. Over the last six years the league average has fallen from .264 to .251. You are not going to find too many players past the 10th round who are going to give you 600+ PAs of near .300 average to complement your sluggers, and if they do hit those numbers they are tremendously weak in other categories.

To wrap this up, I’m telling you not to buy into the hysterics that there is no power available after the early rounds. Do not buy into the major regression talk. You should have no fear in drafting Jose Altuve with your first selection if he’s the best value on the board.

Starting pitching is half of the fantasy baseball equation and when you take them in the early rounds you cannot afford to strike out.  Here are three starting pitchers you should be letting others draft along with seven other names you should consider as alternatives.

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The key to winning at fantasy baseball is finding players who will outperform their draft position.  This will be the first of a series of articles addressing undervalued and overvalued players that you should be targeting in your draft.

Read the rest of this entry »

When the Yankees signed Mark Teixeira to an 8-year, $180 million contract in the 2008-2009 offseason, they knew fully well that they were getting a hitter who liked to pull the ball. Like Jason Giambi, his predecessor at first base, it was believed that his superb power would make up for a batting average that was likely to decline throughout the deal, especially with the short porch in right field at Yankee Stadium. However, Teixeira’s 2014 line of .215/.305/.413 against righties was probably not what they had in mind for their switch-hitting first baseman.

Naturally, many have jumped to blame Teixeira’s woes on the drastic defensive shift that is employed when he hits left-handed. But the shift was there in 2009, when Teixeira finished 2^nd in the AL MVP voting with a .292/.383/.565 line and 39 home runs. The fact is Mark Teixeira, spray chart included, was once good enough of a hitter to earn a $180 million contract. Defenses could basically know where he was going to hit the ball and still shook in their boots when he came up to bat.

However, one factor has not remained constant: Teixeira’s production against fastballs. In his prime, Teixeira wasn’t just good against heaters: from 2003-2012, his wFB/C of 1.70 ranks 16^th among qualified hitters. But his numbers against fastballs has consistently diminished during his Yankee years. Brooks Baseball gives some additional information (note: wFB/C is from FanGraphs and is not against RHP only):

2014 saw Teixeira whiffing on more fastballs then ever before and hitting more grounders when he did make contact. Even more alarming is the fact that his wFB/C is negative, suggesting that he was a liability against what was once his favorite pitch. Baseball Savant shows a similar downward trend against righties throwing four seam fastballs, two seam fastballs, cutters, or sinkers:

Teixeira’s decreasing offensive value makes sense when one considers the fact that what was once his greatest strength as a hitter is now a weakness. And considering the fact that FanGraphs has had pitchers throwing 57.8% fastballs to Teixeira throughout his career, it is definitely not a problem that can be avoided by trying to do damage against other pitches. However, this trend also suggests that Teixeira, who put up wRC+’s of 142, 128, 124, and 116 in the first 4 years of his deal, can become a force on offense again if he can start hitting heaters like he used to.

Unfortunately, I have very little no expertise that can assuredly help Teixeira regain his prowess against fastballs. The only “shot in the dark” idea I have for Teixeira is for him to level out his notorious uppercut swing. The fact that Teixiera is whiffing on more fastballs and hitting more groundballs suggests that his ability to make solid contact has diminished with age and injury. Straightening the path of his swing would give him more of a margin for error.

He could maintain his power by guessing on more pitches, which is what I believe fellow Yankee Brett Gardner did in 2014, when he hit 17 of his 40 career home runs. According to Baseball Savant, 15 of his 17 home runs came from four seam fastballs, two seam fastballs, sinkers or cutters. The fact that all of them were pulled to right field, despite greater velocity, leads me to believe that Gardner was sitting on them more often than not.

Alternatively Teixeira’s lingering wrist injury (which is why I left his 15-game 2013 season off the tables above) might be making it harder for him to turn on pitches with high velocity. Conversely, Teixeira could be correct in suggesting that a full offseason workout program could allow him to return to form. In any case, Teixeira needs to regain his ability to destroy fastballs if he has any hope of being a force on offense again.

2014 wasn’t a good year to be a starting pitcher on the New York Yankees. With injuries to CC Sabathia, Masahiro Tanaka, Michael Pineda, Ivan Nova and David Phelps, jokes about Andy Pettitte coming back from retirement again started to find “but really though” tacked on at the end. Out of the rotation vacuum emerged Shane Greene, an unlikely success story from Daytona Beach Community College. If the Yankees manage to put together a healthy starting rotation for opening day, Greene will likely be shifted to the bullpen, where I believe he will flourish.

In 78.1 IP as a starter, he posted a 3.79 ERA, a 3.64 FIP, a WHIP of 1.37, and K/9 and BB/9 rates of 9.19 and 2.99 respectively. His WHIP would lead many to think he overachieved, but aside from that and his walk rate, he was an above average pitcher.

What stands out specifically about Greene is his 2-seam fastball. To make a long story short, Pitch f/x would suggest that it is very hard to hit:

Note that while his scouting report does not specifically mention him as throwing a sinker, Pitch f/x occasionally registered his 2-seamer as one. While this is pretty common (Kelvin Herrera’s 90 mph changeup routinely registers as a 4-seamer), I believe that it is a telling sign when it comes to the life on Greene’s fastball.

Unsurprisingly, his fastball is harder to hit with increasing velocity. Hitters put up a mere .136 BA and SLG% in an admittedly small sample size against Greene’s 2-seamers above 94 mph. Those slower than 94 mph were hit to the tune of a .340 BA and a .447 SLG%. It is well known that pitchers experience an increase in velocity after a starting rotation to bullpen transition. Greene’s 2-seam fastball, which averaged at 92.8 mph, could easily creep up to the mid 90’s if he were put in the bullpen.

Of course, one reason why he might not ever succeed out of the bullpen is because he could remain a starter. He showed flashes of dominance in 2014, the most noteworthy being his shutout of the potent Tigers lineup. But even if the Yankees do pencil Greene into the 5^th spot of their rotation, something will have to give when Ivan Nova comes back from Tommy John surgery.

Like Joba Chamberlain when he became a starter in 2009, those few extra miles per hour on his fastball could make a huge impact on Greene’s numbers. As a fan, I appreciate David Robertson both as an excellent pitcher and a superb role model. But if the Yankees do not want to pay him the closer money he will deservedly get on the free agent market, Greene might be a cost-effective late-inning option.

Note: Stats not taken from FanGraphs are from baseballsavant.com