Out of the Past

This is meaningless when both ERA figures suck ass. And that is ignoring that overrated value of CERA and the small sampling size. This disproves the assertion made by Ramp and Esam and others that Olivo is the cause for Dontrelle's poor pitching. This was not intended to prove anything else. It served its purpose well.

You misunderstand what people mean by luck. If Reggie Miller in his prime misses 20 three pointers in a row, does that mean he can no longer shoot the basketball? No, past performances show he's one of the grest three point shooters in the world, ergo future performances should be on line with past performances. If he misses 20 shots in a row it means he had a bad game. It doesn't mean he had bad luck. Good players can have bad games or bad years. Beckett last year allowed about 35 homers. He had a bad year. It wasn't bad luck.

So now homeruns allowed are bad luck. This is even more ridiculous than the differences in BABIP is luck nonsense. Believe what you want to believe but there's more to a pitcher than ERA. I know there is. I prefer OPS allowed and innings per start but I used ERA because this is what you and Ramp have used in the past to supposedly prove Olivo is the cause for the problems. I'm surpirsed you now attack ERA when you've used it time and time again.

I ahve no idea why you would look at '06 stats to prove a point regarding Dontrelle's '07 struggles but I guess if it helps prove your point and it muddles the issue then go ahead and knock yourself out. It comes as no surprise that in the end you conclude that Dontrelle has bad luck when Treanor catches him but when Olivo catches him he gets hit because Olivo sucks. So now homeruns allowed are bad luck. This is even more ridiculous than the differences in BABIP is luck nonsense. The things you learn on here are priceless. You really are just incredible, man. It's not so much bad luck as it is fluctuations in a players performance. The easiest way to describe it is by saying it is luck, but nobody is implying leprechauns and angels are affecting a players performance. But if a player who normally allows a low amount of home runs suddenly starts allowing a high amount of home runs, but everything else about him stays the same, it's pretty easy to see it's simply a bad trend, and that it will eventually trend back to his career norms. So just so I understand where you're coming from.. when the Braves hit four bombs off Dontrelle the other night on fat pitches was that bad luck? Was the bad luck that Dontrelle made fat pitches or was the bad luck that the Braves hit the crap out of the four balls or was the bad luck a combination of the two?

i have always been one to defend olivo and i do think he has great potential asa acatcher with his speed and his great arm. hsi power number are good for a catcher but i think that after those comments it is almost certain that he will be gone..i like him alot and i think that with the proper coaching he can be a great catcher Last year he had the proper coaching (Tuck) and he was fine behind the plate. This year, with no coaching, he has regressed.

I ahve no idea why you would look at '06 stats to prove a point regarding Dontrelle's '07 struggles but I guess if it helps prove your point and it muddles the issue then go ahead and knock yourself out. It comes as no surprise that in the end you conclude that Dontrelle has bad luck when Treanor catches him but when Olivo catches him he gets hit because Olivo sucks. So now homeruns allowed are bad luck. This is even more ridiculous than the differences in BABIP is luck nonsense. The things you learn on here are priceless.

Dontrelle's stats by catcher: Olivo: 110 innings / 60 ER / 4.91 ERA Treanor: 62.33 innings / 38 ER / 5.49 ERA If you remove the start vs the White Sox in which he left after one inning due to the forearm injury the numbers look like this: Olivo: 109 innings / 56 ER / 4.62 ERA Treanor: 62.33 innings / 38 ER / 5.49 ERA I'm no genius but I think 4.62 is lower than 5.49 or for that matter I think 4.91 is lower than 5.49 so I don't know how it is that certain people continue to blame Olivo for Dontrelle's struggles but I guess it's easier to hide your had in the sand or look for scapegoats rather than looking at problems head on.

another inning we score and Willis gives up another run f*** YOU and somebody please bean Diaz jesus christ Miguel hits just about every team better than Diaz hits us so every team should hit Miguel in the face. Don't be a loser like Hutton.

I like Hermida leading off but Jacobs hitting behind him would be a double play machine.

Just about every player is a Dombrowski guy. That says a lot.

Look at Messenger's game log. He's had only a handful of 1-2-3 innings all season. He's just getting lucky. With our defense (yes, bad defense can allow earned runs as well), his ERA would likely be much higher. It sure can. We have the worst DER (balls put in play turned into outs) in the NL since the '99 Rockies but I guess from what I've learned on here the past few weeks that must be bad luck or something but in any case it doesn't really matter because I've also learned that defense is just so overrated.

1) I cant imagine Fredi thinks that, but you would know best what he is thinking. He looks more like on of those people that make you think, too bad he was saddled with a terrible team, maybe he couldve been a good manager otherwise. I don't know what he's thinking but I know he has a terrible defensive team and his response to the poor defensive play is to cut back of defensive drills compared to '06. How would you explain his response? It boggles my mind.

The offense should be top 3 or 4 and could be even better if the holes at C, CF and 1B are filled. I assume the rotation will include Mitre, Olsen and Willis along with Nolasco. Willis should bounce back but I would expect the other 3 to end up with a combined ERA in the 4.75 to 5.00 range and that's bad. Anibal could help but I don't know when he'll be back.

Last year we did a lot more defensive drills than what we're doing this year and the defense has regressed so I blame I blame Fredi for that. It looks like Fredi is one of those people who thinks that defense, errors and unerarned runs don't really matter.

yelling and screaming wont do anything for this team...a healthy pitching staff would do a hell of a lot though If the three healthy starters pitched well maybe our record would be a just a tad better, I think.

Unless some of the pitching comes back around, more of the same. If Willis and Olsen duplicate their horrific seasons more of the same even if Nolasco and Sanchez come back.

Runs creates/27 outs. It's on every players Baseball reference page. Is this park adjusted? Either way I like this bettwer than Runs Created because it takes the counting stat portion out of it. To answer my own question about a way to get runs created per AB all you have to do is multiply OBP x SLG and you get runs created per AB.

By moving Uggla to 3rd his errors will go through the roof because of the longer throws and his inaccurate arm. I hate the way people always want to move good hitting 2B and SS to other positions. There's no reason whatsoever to move Uggla out of 2B.

I know I say this alot by now, but if any game has shown why Treanor should start infront of Olivo, this is it. Olivo f***s up the game and then comes out, Treanor comes in cold and gets a hit. 2 for 4 on the night. Yes, Olivo sucks but I think Treanor also sucks but I agree he should get more playing time but I guess Fredi sees it otherwise. I wonder why. BTW, nice job by Treanor popping up the bunt in the 9th. Your basis on why Treanor sucks this year is based on? I'm assuming not his numbers in limited AB's this season? Dude is just a more fundamentally better hitter. As get plays more I think his numbers will come down to his career averages but I agree Fredi should use him more while he's playing well and Olivo is struggling.

I know I say this alot by now, but if any game has shown why Treanor should start infront of Olivo, this is it. Olivo f***s up the game and then comes out, Treanor comes in cold and gets a hit. 2 for 4 on the night. Yes, Olivo sucks but I think Treanor also sucks but I agree he should get more playing time but I guess Fredi sees it otherwise. I wonder why. BTW, nice job by Treanor popping up the bunt in the 9th.

The clubs aren't nonsense, but creating like 8 different categories to make a player seem more special is a bit unnecesary. It's impressive that Barry Bonds hit 40 home runs and stole 40 bases in a single year. No need to "stick with OBP and SLG"(and not just because their are better ways to judge a player). 40-40 is an impressive category because it shows you two distinct skills that a player excels at. By listing BA, SB, Doubles, HR, singles, Runs, Hits, and times he took a dump, basically, you are saying "This guy is really good at baseball, and I need to cite every stat to prove it". A guy could have 40 doubles and 40 stolen bases and still suck. Last year Juan Pierre was a member of the 200 hits, 30 doubles, 10 triples, 50 stolen bases and 10 sac bunts club and he sucked.

It's as real as Grit Index and the Intangi-Scale (used to rate a player's intangibles, course). For the record, even though he's missed almost half of the season, Eckstein leads the majors in LORP, GI, and Intangi-Scale by a 2 to 1 margin over the next closest. He's amazing. I'll bet Juan Pierre gets to the stadium earlier than Eckstein.

It is the numbers involved. If you make the numbers arbitrary enough, anything can sound impressive. Total agreement. Personally I even think this 40/40 club stuff is nonsense. All these clubs are nonsense. Like Psycho said stick to OBP and SLG.

I think the 15 runs would be more than the 1 win but I was just trying to quantify the impact of lineup configuration on one player's OPS using some of the numbers that have been used on here. I'll take your word on the 10 runs = 1 win but will pass on the explanation as I would probably end up with a headache. Even going with your revised differential (.250 OPS points) you're lookign at the difference between a Miguel Cabrera and a Joe Blow. That's pretty big, I think. I think you might just be devaluing how much a 1 win difference in performance can be or overvaluing how much a single player can do. A .250 OPS difference is basically substituting Miguel Cabrera for Jose Bautista. Now, Bautista is a good player to use for comparison because he doesn't steal bases or play great defense, and walks about as much, so Miguel Cabrera is, for the most part, a MUCH better hitting Jose Bautista. WARP (Wins Above Replacement Player) tells you how many more wins a player is worth to their team than if he were to be replaced by a AAA call-up. So, let's compare Bautista and Cabrera's WARP figures. - Bautista 2007 WARP: 3.1 - Cabrera 2007 WARP: 7.9 Thats a little less than a 5 win difference. When I said I was taking your word on the 10 runs = 1 win I meant what I said. I guess maybe it came through as if I was dismissing it but I wasn't. Which one is the stat that's similar to WARP but excludes the defensive portion? Is it runs created or was it another one? In runs created Miguel has created 60 more runs than Bautista. Some of it, about 11, is because Miguel has more ABs. Is there a way to to get runs created per AB? Isn't that basically OPS? A probelm with runs created is what's happening with Hermida now. He's was hitting well but has become a part-time player through no fault of his own and because of it his run created number suffers because he's not accumulating ABs... the higher the ABs the higher your runs created number.

I'll post a quick response for now, and see if I can hopefully add some more insight after I've had some time to dissect this a bit more. For starters, 15 runs does not equate to 1 win. ~10 runs = 1 win. The number 10 comes up ALOT in baseball statistics attempting to calculate wins. A number very close to 10 comes up whether you use more advanced math like Markov chains or simple algebra playing around with the Pythagorean Win Percentage formula. If you'd like more of an explanation, let me know, and I'll try to explain to describe as much of the math as I can via a message board post. (The algebra way isn't all too intensive) Next, some issues arise with the way you're conceiving the Runs Created formula. The formula is OBP*SLG*AB. Therefore, you can't say .010 OPS different equals 1 run. The value differs depending on how the player's OPS value breaks down. If he's OBP heavy, he generates more runs than a SLG heavy guy with the same OPS figure. Also, the closer the OBP value is to the SLG value the higher the number of runs created, keeping OPS constant. An example: - Player A: 0.340 OBP / 0.415 SLG = 70.55 Runs Created. - Player B: 0.345 OBP / 0.420 SLG = 72.45 Runs Created (That's a .010 OPS difference and 2 runs) So, let's reexamine the lineup configuration argument. 5 wins = 50 runs. If you try to create some sort of OPS Differential:Run Ratio and you use the .010:2 runs ratio from the stats I cited, you get the OPS difference drops from .750 to .250, which is much more reasonable to the 5 wins argument. (Mind you, I think the ratio thing is a bad way of using the Runs Created formula, but I'm trying to follow your same line of thinking with more precise stats) I think the 15 runs would be more than the 1 win but I was just trying to quantify the impact of lineup configuration on one player's OPS using some of the numbers that have been used on here. I'll take your word on the 10 runs = 1 win but will pass on the explanation as I would probably end up with a headache. Even going with your revised differential (.250 OPS points) you're lookign at the difference between a Miguel Cabrera and a Joe Blow. That's pretty big, I think.