Monthly Archives: February 2006

2006 Season, Pitching, Statistics

Playing with PECOTA

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Baseball Prospectus has released their PECOTA player cards, and a half hour of clicking through all of the Detroit Tigers there are definitely some interesting highlights. But before we get into the neat stuff, a little bit about PECOTA. PECOTA is a projection system based on finding comparable players. Similarity is calculated based on performance, usage (playing time), and body similarities (handedness, body type). The system then uses the pool of comparable players (which could be as many as 100) to project what the player in question will do. One of the data points available is the similarity index. The higher the score, the better the pool of players matches the player in question. A score over 50 is pretty good, and less than 20 is pretty bad.

Now PECOTA is for BP subscribers only, so I won’t be laying out all the stats provided. I will just be hitting some highlights. (if you want to see what the cards look like, the White Sox are offered for free.

Jeremy Bonderman

PECOTA is pretty high on Bonderman, and a quick glance at his comparables shows why. Some of the pitchers on his list include Joe Coleman, John Smoltz, Jake Peavy, Tom Seaver, and Catfish Hunter. His improve rate for next year is 77%, with no discernible decline until 2010.

Franklyn German

PECOTA isn’t so enamored with the other pitcher in the Jeff Weaver deal. His attrition rate is as high as his improvement rate, and his collapse rate is higher than his breakout rate.
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Contracts

Tigers sign 8

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The Tigers signed 8 players today, bringing the total number of players signed to 25. Five of the eight are sporting their first big league contract. The players are:

  • Eulogio De La Cruz
  • Preston Larrison
  • Humberto Sanchez
  • Jordan Tata
  • Mark Woodyard
  • Joel Zumaya
  • Tony Giarratano
  • Brent Clevlen
Contracts, Defense, Statistics, Uncategorized

Quick Hits

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Some brief notes an links as I prepare to have 14 preschoolers over for a birthday party tomorrow…

Monroe Re-ups

The Detroit Tigers avoided arbitration hearings completely this year with Craig Monroe now under contract. He signed for one year and $2.8 million. A fair deal all around, and the two sides essentially split the difference from their initial offers.

Defensive Wrap-Ups

I’ve been doing quite a bit of defensive comparisons lately, and using a bunch of metrics. Coincidentally there were a couple of articles today summarizing the various measures. Jon Weisman of Dodger Thoughts did a piece for SI outlining the quest for the perfect defensive measure.

In the same vein, David Gassko of the Hardball Times compared the various metrics in articles located here and here. (via Baseball Musings)

Granderson goes home

A nice article about Curtis Granderson visiting his middle school alma mater.

Tiger Stadium rotting and rocking

With Tiger Stadium playing host to Bud Bowl (a big party/concert) over Super Bowl weekend there have been a couple articles about it’s current state. ESPN had a long piece about the Stadium, and the lack of events held since the final game.

The Bud Bowl is one proposal that the city did approve. Rottach said Detroit is charging Anheuser-Busch $40,000 to rent the stadium. More important than the money, though, was the thoroughness of Anheuser-Busch’s proposal, which included a commitment to return the stadium to the exact specifications it had before.

Earlier in the week the Free Press ran a story, complete with pictures, about how run down the stadium had become. It included a picture of a tree growing in the stands, and part of a wall crumbling.

detroit, detroit tigers, baseball, tiger stadium

Defense, Players, Statistics, Uncategorized

Shelton Game

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Remember when it seemed like Chris Shelton didn’t have a position? In fact one local columnist didn’t include Shelton in last year’s Top 10 Tiger prospects because:

Shelton does not have a position and is unathletic. Last season, when he did get to play in the major leagues and rehab assignment at Toledo, he did not sting the ball. He hit well in arizona, but the caliber of competition was down this year.

Well it turns out that Shelton can play first base. According to PMR, he was a pretty average fielder last year, and given his offensive production, average defense is quite sufficient. (While he made more outs than expected, he fell in the middle of the pack). What’s more is that he was a superior defender compared to Carlos Pena.

Player InPlay Actual Outs Predicted Outs DER Predicted DER Difference
Chris B Shelton 2337 152 146.52 0.065 0.063 0.00234
Carlos Pena 1363 98 105.67 0.072 0.078 -0.00563

Similar to what I did in the Granderson/Logan comparison post, the numbers were interesting enough that I wanted to compare range stats between the two.

Category Pena Shelton
Innings 429.1 738.1
Zone Rating .798 .857
Range Factor 9.50 10.21
FRAA -2 0

Shelton comes out on top is every category. I’m not sure if everyone was just flat wrong in Shelton’s ability, or if he improved his game through a ton of hard work, but the results are encouraging. Now what isn’t included in first basemen range is the footwork around the bag. I’m not sure how it could even be quantified, but just from watching that seems to be an area where Pena excels.

While I still want to see Pena get at-bats, it is becoming more and more difficult to find reasons to take Shelton out of the lineup.
detroit tigers, chris shelton, carlos pena, baseball