Author Topic: Offense v. defense from the Span / Morse discussion  (Read 3103 times)

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Offline mimontero88

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Look at span's offensive war,  if you think war over values defense that's pretty atrocious.  Even with his glove,  his bat and running are so terrible that he needs to positional adjustment to even be positive
I don't believe WAR overvalues defense.  I think the eye test tends to greatly undervalue defense.

Offline TigerFan

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I don't believe WAR overvalues defense.  I think the eye test tends to greatly undervalue defense.

There is no way to back this.  To see the best proof read this great article on Cabrera v Machado:

http://www.fantasysp.com/player/mlb/Manny_Machado/2898135/machados-war-versus-cabreras-war

Offline mimontero88

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Re: Re: Better with Span? ALR? Morse?
« Reply #2: June 16, 2013, 05:06:00 PM »
There is no way to back this.  To see the best proof read this great article on Cabrera v Machado:

http://www.fantasysp.com/player/mlb/Manny_Machado/2898135/machados-war-versus-cabreras-war
This article supports what I said.

Offline TigerFan

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Re: Re: Better with Span? ALR? Morse?
« Reply #3: June 16, 2013, 05:17:34 PM »
This article supports what I said.

It clearly overvalues defense.  Cabrera is out hitting Machado in almost every way possible yet Machado has a better WAR due to his defense. 

Cabrera has 13 more HR, 36 more RBI, 9 more R, .042 better BA and is a worse WAR?  Only because of defense. 

Here is a better link: http://espn.go.com/blog/sweetspot/post/_/id/36908/machados-war-versus-cabreras-war

Offline mimontero88

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Re: Re: Better with Span? ALR? Morse?
« Reply #4: June 16, 2013, 05:24:06 PM »
It clearly overvalues defense.  Cabrera is out hitting Machado in almost every way possible yet Machado has a better WAR due to his defense. 

Cabrera has 13 more HR, 36 more RBI, 9 more R, .042 better BA and is a worse WAR?  Only because of defense. 

Here is a better link: http://espn.go.com/blog/sweetspot/post/_/id/36908/machados-war-versus-cabreras-war
One of the points your first article made is that Machado has been so good on defense that it's literally unsustainable.  That many runs prevented make up for the offensive difference.  Additionally the RBI numbers, which are the big difference here, are not relevant because they are comparing apples to oranges since Machado hits in the 2 hole and has far less RBI opportunities than does Cabrera.  WAR does not penalize Machado for that as standard statistics do - one of many ways WAR is a superior metric of value than standard statistics.

Offline Slateman

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Re: Re: Better with Span? ALR? Morse?
« Reply #5: June 16, 2013, 05:25:23 PM »
Shane avictorino is a perfect example of why WAR sucks for position players.

Offline mimontero88

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Re: Re: Better with Span? ALR? Morse?
« Reply #6: June 16, 2013, 05:29:26 PM »
Shane avictorino is a perfect example of why WAR sucks for position players.
WAR is not perfect.  It makes misleading judgments like any other statistical system and even the staunchest supporters of WAR will not deny that.  We only argue that it is the MOST accurate metric of a player's overall performance, not a 100% accurate system.

Offline Slateman

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Re: Re: Better with Span? ALR? Morse?
« Reply #7: June 16, 2013, 06:23:45 PM »
WAR is not perfect.  It makes misleading judgments like any other statistical system and even the staunchest supporters of WAR will not deny that.  We only argue that it is the MOST accurate metric of a player's overall performance, not a 100% accurate system.

Not really. Most feel it still over-values defense. Again, look at Victorino's hitting and then look at his WAR. He's a mediocre hitter. His defense is a distance second as he doesn't play catcher or center field.

Offline mimontero88

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Re: Re: Better with Span? ALR? Morse?
« Reply #8: June 16, 2013, 06:28:15 PM »
Not really. Most feel it still over-values defense. Again, look at Victorino's hitting and then look at his WAR. He's a mediocre hitter. His defense is a distance second as he doesn't play catcher or center field.
And again, I think the most people feel it overvalues defense because most people underrate defense.

Offline Slateman

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Re: Re: Better with Span? ALR? Morse?
« Reply #9: June 16, 2013, 06:31:13 PM »
And again, I think the most people feel it overvalues defense because most people underrate defense.
And they're wrong. This has been proven over and over again.

Hitting > defense

Right now we have a very good defensive outfield. Last year it was  poor. Yet, especially at the end of last year, it mashed. We won 98 games. This year, we're on pace for .500

Offline sph274

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Re: Re: Better with Span? ALR? Morse?
« Reply #10: June 16, 2013, 06:32:17 PM »
Not really. Most feel it still over-values defense. Again, look at Victorino's hitting and then look at his WAR. He's a mediocre hitter. His defense is a distance second as he doesn't play catcher or center field.

He is pretty versatile. He can play center and is quite good at it when he does. He is a pretty solid defensive OF and he can steal a  few bases. He is pretty much an older more versatile denard span

Offline mimontero88

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Re: Re: Better with Span? ALR? Morse?
« Reply #11: June 16, 2013, 06:34:36 PM »
And they're wrong. This has been proven over and over again.

Hitting > defense

Right now we have a very good defensive outfield. Last year it was  poor. Yet, especially at the end of last year, it mashed. We won 98 games. This year, we're on pace for .500
And if you want to focus on results isn't it amazing that a team that ranks 28th in OBP in all of baseball still somehow maintains a .500 record?  Defense - good crap.

EDIT:  Although when you consider that we have the 2nd highest error total in all of baseball it's frankly incredible that we have allowed the 8th fewest runs in all of baseball.  Imagine how much better we'd be without the errors.  We would actually have a winning record on defense alone.

Offline PC

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Re: Re: Better with Span? ALR? Morse?
« Reply #12: June 16, 2013, 06:36:02 PM »
It's easier to outhit below average defense than to outdefend below average offense because you have to score at least one run to win.  You can still win if you give up 8 or 10 runs whereas you will lose 100% of the time in you score zero runs.

Offline mimontero88

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Re: Re: Better with Span? ALR? Morse?
« Reply #13: June 16, 2013, 06:44:03 PM »
It's easier to outhit below average defense than to outdefend below average offense because you have to score at least one run to win.  You can still win if you give up 8 or 10 runs whereas you will lose 100% of the time in you score zero runs.
Here is the thing.  WAR is based on the concept that a run prevented has the same value as a run scored.  Since the game is based on runs that is a perfectly sensible inference.  However, when a run is prevented it doesn't generate the same excitement as when a run is scored.  You notice a 2 RBI double much more than you think about the fact that a great defensive play just prevented it.  The two events are weighted differently in your mind but they actually provide the exact same value in contributing to wins.  Because we are drawn much more to hitting than to defense, especially in the instances that a defensive player is so far superior to a replacement level player at their position that they make a play a replacement level player couldn't make at all look routine (ie. a lot of Ian Desmond's plays), we are much more likely to overlook that defensive value provided than we are to overlook a 2 run double.  WAR does not discriminate in this regard and treats runs produced and runs prevented equally.

Offline TigerFan

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Re: Re: Better with Span? ALR? Morse?
« Reply #14: June 16, 2013, 06:49:41 PM »
One of the points your first article made is that Machado has been so good on defense that it's literally unsustainable.  That many runs prevented make up for the offensive difference.  Additionally the RBI numbers, which are the big difference here, are not relevant because they are comparing apples to oranges since Machado hits in the 2 hole and has far less RBI opportunities than does Cabrera.  WAR does not penalize Machado for that as standard statistics do - one of many ways WAR is a superior metric of value than standard statistics.

So by your own words the reason Machado is at Miggy's level is due to his runs prevented, which is defense.  How else could you explain Machado above Miggy in WAR?

Offline mimontero88

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Re: Re: Better with Span? ALR? Morse?
« Reply #15: June 16, 2013, 06:52:25 PM »
So by your own words the reason Machado is at Miggy's level is due to his runs prevented, which is defense.  How else could you explain Machado above Miggy in WAR?
Yes.  Another way of saying that is that Manny Machado has prevented more runs over Miguel Cabrera than Miguel Cabrera has produced runs over Manny Machado.  Thus Manny Machado has the higher WAR.

Offline HalfSmokes

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Re: Re: Better with Span? ALR? Morse?
« Reply #16: June 16, 2013, 10:53:09 PM »
And again, I think the most people feel it overvalues defense because most people underrate defense.

then you're calling major league gms idiots- how many $100 million contracts have gone to great Fielding short stops who cant hit, and how many have gone to power hitters at first who can barely field. I dont think war necessarily overrates defense so much as it underrated the defended of a replacement player- the difference between a replacement short stop and the best Fielding short stop is a lot less than the offensive difference between a replacement first baseman and prince fielder. there is a reason a great Fielding first baseman like laroche couldn't get a long term deal- no gms valued a glove at first

Offline mimontero88

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Re: Re: Better with Span? ALR? Morse?
« Reply #17: June 17, 2013, 12:09:29 AM »
then you're calling major league gms idiots- how many $100 million contracts have gone to great Fielding short stops who cant hit, and how many have gone to power hitters at first who can barely field. I dont think war necessarily overrates defense so much as it underrated the defended of a replacement player- the difference between a replacement short stop and the best Fielding short stop is a lot less than the offensive difference between a replacement first baseman and prince fielder. there is a reason a great Fielding first baseman like laroche couldn't get a long term deal- no gms valued a glove at first
This post makes my point.  You actually don't think there's a huge difference between a replacement level shortstop and the best fielding shortstop when there is a WORLD of difference even between major league caliber shortstops in terms of range, how soft the glove is, and accuracy on the arm.  WAR accounts for what you didn't see with your eyes.  Bad defense can sink teams regardless of how good their hitters are.  When Austin Jackson was struggling at the beginning of the season his bad defense along with that of Cabrera and Fielder were causing them to lose games they should have won.  And yet they had Fielder, Cabrera, and several other quality hitters hitting in their lineup.  So why were they struggling early on?  The defense was awful and thus a team that, by your logic, should be winning games regardless of defense was losing games.  That's why WAR is so valuable.  It rates runs prevented versus runs provided and when you add up WAR totals of players on any given team and compare it to that team's wins WAR has proven to be strikingly accurate.

Offline HalfSmokes

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Re: Re: Better with Span? ALR? Morse?
« Reply #18: June 17, 2013, 12:46:08 AM »
This post makes my point.  You actually don't think there's a huge difference between a replacement level shortstop and the best fielding shortstop when there is a WORLD of difference even between major league caliber shortstops in terms of range, how soft the glove is, and accuracy on the arm.  WAR accounts for what you didn't see with your eyes.  Bad defense can sink teams regardless of how good their hitters are.  When Austin Jackson was struggling at the beginning of the season his bad defense along with that of Cabrera and Fielder were causing them to lose games they should have won.  And yet they had Fielder, Cabrera, and several other quality hitters hitting in their lineup.  So why were they struggling early on?  The defense was awful and thus a team that, by your logic, should be winning games regardless an idioy of defense was losing games.  That's why WAR is so valuable.  It rates runs prevented versus runs provided and  when you add up WAR totals of players on any given team and compare it to that team's wins WAR has proven to be strikingly accurate.

then please point out one elite defensively player without a good bat with a mega contract,  (there are several batters who cant field with those deals), or are you calling every major league gm (I say every since none chose to bid up defensive players) an idiot?

Offline mimontero88

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Re: Re: Better with Span? ALR? Morse?
« Reply #19: June 17, 2013, 12:52:40 AM »
then please point out one elite defensively player without a good bat with a mega contract,  (there are several batters who cant field with those deals), or are you calling every major league gm (I say every since none chose to bid up defensive players) an idiot?
Big bats get the big bucks.  We all know that.  I don't think every major league GM is an idiot at all.  Sabermetrics are only about 15 years old.  Baseball is a slow changing sport and the sport as a whole has not adjusted to the use of sabermetrics yet.  So, being that baseball still largely operates without as much emphasis on sabermetric stats as the old school stats (see Miguel Cabrera wins MVP over Mike Trout), of course the big bats still get the big contracts even though when they can't play defense their value degenerates much faster (see Prince Fielder in 3 years) than it does when they can play defense.  So no I don't think all GMs are idiots.  I think they simply still operate on the old school mentality of statistics.  I mean no one in baseball has really tried using a saber lineup yet even though they tend to be about a full run better on average than a non-saber lineup.  Does that make all managers stupid?  No.  It just reflects how slowly the game changes when confronted with new information.

Offline Vega

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Re: Re: Better with Span? ALR? Morse?
« Reply #20: June 17, 2013, 12:57:56 AM »
then please point out one elite defensively player without a good bat with a mega contract,
Not a mega contract, but Clint Barmes is paid far more than someone with as bad a bat as he has normally would get.

Offline HalfSmokes

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Re: Re: Better with Span? ALR? Morse?
« Reply #21: June 17, 2013, 12:58:08 AM »
So GMs with millions on the line,  some of whom are employed by owners who made billions in the financial markets (a job line that seems open to math),  are just overlooking what you seem to feel is so patently obvious because 'old school'?

Offline mimontero88

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Re: Re: Better with Span? ALR? Morse?
« Reply #22: June 17, 2013, 01:14:12 AM »
So GMs with millions on the line,  some of whom are employed by owners who made billions in the financial markets (a job line that seems open to math),  are just overlooking what you seem to feel is so patently obvious because 'old school'?

Yes.

Offline sph274

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Re: Re: Better with Span? ALR? Morse?
« Reply #23: June 17, 2013, 01:37:48 AM »
then please point out one elite defensively player without a good bat with a mega contract,  (there are several batters who cant field with those deals), or are you calling every major league gm (I say every since none chose to bid up defensive players) an idiot?

Elvis Andrus 8/118

Offline HalfSmokes

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Re: Re: Better with Span? ALR? Morse?
« Reply #24: June 17, 2013, 07:14:47 AM »
Elvis Andrus 8/118

High obp when he signed,  and gets steals