Cecil Cooper was not happy after today's loss to the Diamondbacks. The thing is, the blame sits pretty squarely on his shoulders. Perhaps it wasn't the best idea to take out Wesley Wright, who we've already noted as being a incredibly hard-nosed pitcher when it counts in favor of Dave Borkowski, who had logged 3 consecutive outings totaling 3 innings in three days from the 26th-28th, the last being a 1.2 inning affair. You have to know he's not going to be sharp, so why do it? Wright went an inning on Monday night, but it was a very quick outing, needing less than 10 pitches to get through it. Further, he's actually been more effective against Right-Handed hitters this year too (.167 BA against Righties with a 1.13 WHIP vs. .182 BA and 1.33 WHIP against lefties). Why take out Wright especially as Coop obviously thought that Owings wasn't a threat, as evidenced by his media rant, "'We can't get the stinking pitcher out, we're in trouble'". Coop goes on to denigrate just about everyone on the team, yet never considers that his shoddy managerial skills set his players up for failures. I'm not saying that he's entirely to blame for our loss, but I have tried to point out several times this season that he's made a lot of questionable calls this year. Some of them turned out alright, some not so good. Managers will make some bad calls during the course of the season, it's understandable. However, Coop's made a lot in a month's time and ranting and raving about how your players blew the game isn't the best managerial tactic either. I would have loved to hear a "the buck stops here" admission instead.
***On a separate, unrelated note: Does anyone think that the salsa music that FSN is incessantly playing during Miggy at bats is just a law suit waiting to happen?***
Wednesday, April 30, 2008
Coop Points Finger In the Wrong Direction
Tuesday, April 29, 2008
Avoiding a Rant
So the Spurs games could be broadcasted TWICE on basic cable, Evan and I couldn't watch the game on FSN. I went to a sports bar and caught the Rockets game (also not available on basic cable), but so douche bag Spurs fans could watch the game no matter what angle their heads were at, they refused to put 'Stros game on (the Rockets got one TV...out about 25).
Keeping with my "Glass Half Full" mentality, we have this to hang our hats on. We're guranteed to go .500 on this road trip, which is quite a feat for the Astros. And how 'bout them Rockets?!?!
That's all have, school is schlacking me. Maybe you can talk amongst yourself here are the topics:
1) Should Coop have pulled Cassel in the 5th, thereby robbing him of Major League W??
2) Most hated team if you're a Houston Fan: Jazz, Spurs, Cardinals, Braves, or the Mavs?
Monday, April 28, 2008
Wesley Wright for Cy Young
So we just dropped our 3rd straight, but I'll say this about tonight: I liked what I saw for the most part. Yeah, Chris struggled, but he was in a environment where the extremely dry air just about ensures he's going to struggle. We faced off against the best pitcher in baseball right now. Who completed a Hidden Perfect Game before surrendering 3 runs. Aside from Geary's utter lack of command, I'll say we had incredible relief pitching, especially my early consensus for the NL Cy Young: Wesley Wright.
Wesley Wright game into with 3 on and one out. The Run Expectancy in that game state is 2.254. Consider that for a moment. If Wesley Wright came in and gave up 1 run on a sac fly, he still saves 1.254 runs. But what does he do. He K's Stephen Drew and induces a Double-Play ball from Chris Snyder. This kid is 22 years old, and is less than six-months older than I am. He was a Rule V draft pick and is in his Rookie season. Cooper called him into that situation in the second most hitter friendly park in all of baseball and he saved 2.254 runs from scoring. Astounding.
If we play like we played tonight, tomorrow, we have a shot at winning and maybe we can get something working against Randy "The Man and His Mullet" Johnson. This was a game I was sure we'd lose, but we made it interesting. We stayed in it all game against the best pitcher and team in all of baseball right now. I'm going to ride this "The Glass is Half-Full" for as long as I can in this series, if nothing more than to lessen the blow of us probably getting swept.
Show Someone the Money (Astros Draft Preview)
We’re about to start a series against the best team in all of MLB right now, the Arizona Diamondbacks. Despite only having been in existence for a decade, the Arizona Diamondbacks should serve as a lesson to this team, which will soon be undergoing a rebuilding process that will spell success or dismal failure for this team for many years to come. After their meteoric rise to World Champions in 2001 and a second division title the following year (2002), the Diamondbacks declined to a awful 51-111 in 2004 to be THE worst team in MLB. The cause is one that should be all to familiar to Houston Astros fans at this point: being unable to get out from under free agent contracts that hamstrung the teams financial capabilities. However, after trading away most of their unwieldy contracts and maintaing one of the most fertile farm systems around, the Diamondbacks are poised for success for the next few years.
This June, the newly remolded front office will conduct its first amateur draft and it has a lucrative #10 pick, followed by the #52 pick (click to see the full draft board). The draft marks an important step in trying to rebuild our utterly barren farm system and it’s our highest draft pick since Chris Burke in 2001. There is already a lot of speculation going on about the draft (though thank God it’s not the asinine degree to which ESPN hypes the NFL draft...). Jim Callis of Baseball America recently answered a mailbag question about how the Astros should utilize their first two picks and I liked what he had to say (if you actually click the link, you’re going to have to scroll down to the bottom). Essentially he said take the highest available talent with the 10th pick and then try to find a value college-pitcher with the 52nd. I like this for two reasons: By taking the top talent, we’d add some value to our farm system, which could be used to produce home-grown talent or as a trade chip later down the line. Secondly, by taking a undervalued college pitcher in the second round, we’d be getting an arm for our team that is far more proven and seasoned than a high school pitcher -- also much less cost then the high school pitcher. Meaning we’d hopefully get a talented arm up to the majors in as little as 2 1/2 to 3 years (if he can survive the injury nexus that is). Callis feels that Drayton will not break with the MLB’s slotting guidelines and as such will not pay big money to sign talent that falls due to its asking price. I cannot think of a worse mistake we could make in the draft than to let the best available talent go because of some gentlemen’s agreement and a few hundred-thousand dollars. Hopefully Ed Wade, et al., will be able to persuade Drayton to pony up some cash and step on some feet, or else we could be in for a long five-six years.
As you see the likes of Justin Upton, Stephen Drew, Conor Jackson, and Chris Young take the field over the next few days, pray that our farm system can produce such talent in the next three to four years. June 5th, 2008 will be a monumental date in the Astros’ franchise history, it can either be for good reasons or utterly depressing reasons; let hope the next three days might be a preview of our future.
Sunday, April 27, 2008
Coop, You're Blowing It
At the risk of sounding like a whiny bitch, I'm going to criticize Coop's management decisions yet again. I'm justing to limit myself to the bottom of the ninth inning. As we rolled back from commercials, my stomach turned to see Dave Borkowski atop the mound and I thought "Jesus, does Coop just want to lose this game?" Brocail had just sailed through the 8th inning in which he had faced Duncan, Glaus, and Kennedy. Kennedy is somewhat a schlub, yes, but the other two are by no means easy outs, and Brocail just looked automatic. However, I guess Coop didn't mind that TLR was going for the win so much so, that he left his starter in to amass over 120 pitches this start to go the Complete Game. Coop just simply countered with sending out the 6th inning/mop-up guy, from last year...brilliant. As JD and Brownie rolled off Borkowski's stats and the camera's panned around, I kept waiting to hear/see a Carlos Lee defensive replacement. Lee was 8th up in the 10th if we made it and the game HAD to make it out of this inning for our bats to even factor back into the game. Alas, Coop chose to take out Brocail for a worse pitcher AND left Shamoo out there to try to keep the game tied.
Now some of you might be thinking, "Stephen, this is a little harsh" and maybe even, "Carlos Lee isn't that bad at LF." So I'll give you this, Carlos Lee is the second worse LFer in the National League. That's right, you just about cannot get worse than he is.
We all know what happened, but I'll give you a little visual courtesy of FanGraphs to drive the point home:
That Skip Schumaker single, which was preceded by some absolutely piss poor pitching by Dave Borkowski, allowed Carlos Lee's "defense" to lose the game for us. Look at the impact of that single. Think about that single to left that Carlos couldn't handle the hop on/get to at all because he's to BIG to be quick or agile enough to make the play. Then consider that Jose Cruz Jr, was just sitting on the bench. It's rare that management decisions win or lose games, my SB% article is a clear example of how manager's decisions can help or hurt their teams chances of winning, but the impact isn't a hugely significant amount. Yesterday, Cecil Cooper set this team up to lose, while TLR was doing everything he could to get his team win. Instead of being 1 over .500, we go into today's game a game under .500. Instead of having an opportunity to pull even with the Cardinals with the series sweep, we're simply trying to win the rubber game. All of it, chaps my ass. Something has got to be done about the train-wreck we have lumbering around in left-field. Evan and I will once again present our Modest Proposal as a possible solution.
Friday, April 25, 2008
How Not to "Manufacture" Runs: The Cecil Cooper Story
Earlier this week, I lambasted Cecil Cooper for calling on JR Towles to sac bunt in the 8th inning against Brian Fuentes. To make my case I utilized a statistic known as Run Expectancy (along with Win Expectancy, but I won’t be using that today). Well, today I’m going to pick on Cecil again. This time for his over aggressive base running and will try to make my case with Run Expectancy.
Courtesy of ESPN, the Astros have a SB% of 80% (24/30) which, on the whole doesn’t seem that bad. But lets break that down a little bit to get at what is bugging me. Michael Bourn is 13/13 in steals this year, so if you exclude him, we’re suddenly 64.7% (11/17) in SB%. Not so good. If we want to get really crazy, we can exclude Lance Berkman who some how is 4/4 in SB this year, which further reduces the Astros SB% to 53.8% (7/13). That’s not good.
All this begs the question, how bad has this been or how bad is this really? If you read the first article I wrote, we saw the sheer value of the out as far as Run Expectancy is concerned (or at least I hope I made my case). However, aside from quoting numbers from certain game states, the famed sabermetrician Tom Tango, has expounded upon the concept of Run Expectancy, devising linear weights. Tangotiger, as he is affectionately known, has done a lot of work looking into how runs are created utilizing linear weights and most of it is stuff I won’t ever pretend to really understand. However, he has provided general measurements for the run creating effects of every single offensive outcome in baseball. Using this data, we can come up with an approximation for just how bad our 53.8% SB% for non-Bourn/Berkman Astros has been for the team, as well as what the continued costs to run production could be if such aggressive base running tactics are pursued.
A stolen base (SB), according to TangoTiger, is valued at .19 of run, purely because it moves the runner over. This the marginal effect that a stolen base has on run expectations. The flip side, getting caught stealing (CS) has a value of -.44, meaning that it marginally reduces the run expectation by .44. We can break the CS run value up further, by looking at how it reduces the run expectations. It has an “inning-killing effect” of -.16 and a “moving the runner over effect” of -.02. The other -.26 is the "getting on effect" because creating that out reduces the likelihood that the next batter gets on, given that he has less outs to work it.
At face value, we can see that stealing bases is a bad proposition because the marginal benefit exceeds the marginal costs -- unless you have a “sure thing.” Like Michael Bourn. But back to what has our SB% for non-Bourn/Berkman players done to the team in terms of run-production.
Doing so simple multiplication, we discover that so far this season, when Cecil Cooper has called for a non-Bourn/Berkman Astro to steal a base, he’s reduced run expectations by 1.31. runs (1..33 for SB + -2.64 CS). While that -1.31 marginal run value doesn’t seem all that important, think of it this way: I’ve already projected the Astros to score about 5.1 runs/game on average through out the season, which means we’ll average about .6 runs per-inning (5.1/8.5 for the consideration that that last half inning isn’t played often times). If .6 runs per inning is what we expected to produce, then losing .10 runs (the -1.31 run value divided by the 13 attempts at stealing) on shoddy base running cannot be afforded, because that’s is a 1/6 our offensive production per inning right there.
I say run Michael Bourn up and down the field, he has the kind of speed and acceleration that track stars dream of so he’s a low-risk, high-reward baserunner. The rest of the team (except for the Big Puma, who’s decided to exhibit puma-like traits on the base paths this year) hasn’t done so well. I can’t say whether it’s ability or bad play calling, so I’ll assume it’s some combination thereof. Thus if the Astros are going to continue to score runs, they can’t survive on some how producing 52 2-out RBI’s in 22 games. Instead, their manager will have to be a little more prudent in how he gets his team to manufacture runs.
Wednesday, April 23, 2008
2nd 10 Game Recap: Finding Solid Ground
Since we waited an extra day, you guys get a bonus 11 Game Recap...that also means we get to do less work the next time around (9 games).
In this eleven game span, we’ve been 6-5, a marked improvement from the last time we reported in this fashion. Our XW-L is 10-11 on the season, while we really stand at 9-12. Things seem to have evened out in the luck department -- just slightly the opposite of what we’d hoped for, but hey, we should still be a win better than we are. AND if you look at the NL Central’s XW-L record, we’re only trailing the Cubs by 3.5 games (Cubs XW-L 13-7). So, 21 games in, we’re still in the thick of it -- in theory.
Aside from XW-L records, what can the numbers tell us about our team and how they’ve been playing 21 games into the season.
We’ll shake things up this time and lead-off with:
| Starting Pitching | ||||||||||||
| Stats | IP | W | L | K | BB | K/9 | K/BB | ERA | BABIP | GB% | E(W) | E(L) |
| Last 11 Games | 58.7 | 4 | 3 | 45 | 22 | 6.90 | 2.05 | 4.76 | .290 | 44% | 3.9 | 3.8 |
| 1st 10 Games | 58 | 0 | 4 | 36 | 18 | 5.59 | 2 | 4.03 | .303 | 44% | 1.9 | 3.7 |
| 2008 | 116.7 | 4 | 7 | 81 | 40 | 6.25 | 2.03> | 4.40 | .305 | 44% | 7 | 7 |
In the last 11 games, we’ve seen our starters BABIP fall right in line with the league average, which is good, however, it is important to note that in that time frame, Backe’s BABIP in this was .327, which is easily explained by/explains his poor outing in Philly. It is frustrating to have an overall record of 4-7 for your starters, when they’ve pitched well enough to be 7-7, but we’ll leave much of that analysis for the bull pen. Our peripherals have been remarkably consistent, which is an early indicator that what we’re seeing so far, is probably what we’re going to get, with the exception. Of course, with the exception of Roy who should continue averaging out his poor start with performances more in line with his talent, as we mentioned earlier.
| Relief Pitching | ||||||||||||
| Stats | IP | W | L | SV | K | BB | K/9 | K/BB | ERA | BABIP | BB/9 | H/9 |
| Last 11 Games | 37.7 | 2 | 2 | 2 | 35 | 12 | 8.36 | 2.91 | 4.78 | .293 | 2.87 | 9.8 |
| 1st 10 Games | 27 | 3 | 3 | 1 | 19 | 12 | 6.33 | 2.03 | 5.67 | .379 | 4 | 12.33 |
| 2008 | 64.7 | 5 | 5 | 3 | 54 | 24 | 7.52 | 2.25 | 5.15 | .328 | 3.34 | 10.86 |
The W, L, and Saves columns are pretty straight forward, if you’ve been watching the games. The two columns that should give every Astros fan hope is the BABIP, K/9, and K/BB. Our peripherals have improved dramatically in the last 11 games compared to the first and the BABIP has dropped to a very sustainable level. While a 4.76 ERA is certainly not what everyone was hoping from this bull pen, it is necessary to note that if you take away Brocail’s shelling last night, the ERA probably isn’t all that bad. What I am trying to say is, things seem to be stabilizing and at this stable state, the Astros’ bull pen looks solid.
| Hitting | |||||||||||
| Stats | PA | R | HR | RBI | BB | SO | AVG | OBP | OPS | ISO | K:BB |
| Last 12 Games | 426 | 66 | 13 | 61 | 41 | 62 | .286 | .357 | .809 | .167 | 1.51 |
| 1st 10 Games | 339 | 36 | 11 | 34 | 22 | 56 | .232 | .286 | .707 | .190 | 3.65 |
| 2008 | 765 | 102 | 24 | 95 | 63 | 118 | .261 | .325 | .764 | .177 | 1.87 |
For those who've been keeping up, sorry that it took an extra day to get the hitting data in. Due to our ineptitude, we're giving you a bonus game in the hitting because the method we're using to get the stats can't spit out specific game sets...our bad. But in the end, it's probably good because it gives us a chance to see what the Astros have been doing as they began to heat up. The stat that immediately pops out is the .OBP which is a tremendous .357 -- for a team OBP that's outstanding. The leading indicator, if you're going to simply choose a single stat, for run production is OBP, because you can't score anyone if they're not on base -- unless Adam Dunn is all nine of your hitters and just crushing solo shots. While that team OBP seems high, in reality it shouldn't fall too much. Last time, we reported that our projected team OBP is .344, meaning we shouldn't see too much of a drop off in run production. While it correlates to OBP, our vastly decreased K:BB ratio for our hitters is also a number that portends to more good things, because it indicates that our hitters are being very patient and selective -- hopefully that holds. There is reason to believe that it will as the number of PA our team has is inching close to most of these stats becoming statistically significant. Run production during this period has averaged 5.5 runs a game, which, again, utilizing an RC/27 formula, we predicted the line-up should produce about 5.1 runs/per game. So all in all, it appears that our hitters are beginning to settle in and perform at their true talent levels. Thus, while it is improbable to believe that the team will keep notching 8+ runs a game, we should see a steady stream of 5-6 run games as we move forward, which as the pitchers find their grove should put us in the position to stay in contention in the NL Central. Sphere: Related Content
Tuesday, April 22, 2008
LiveBlog #2
Well, we're out of the basement in the NL Central after last night's routing. Tonight Brandon Backe squares off against the insanely dominant Jake Peavy.
Monday, April 21, 2008
Playing by "The Book"
Yesterday, I had the very delightful treat of sitting 4 rows back on the third-base line, just passed the Rockies Dugout. The seats were excellent, the company the best, and the Astros come-back victory was frustrating, but incredible. While I could hem and haw about how I don't like the current line-up, in the end, line-ups aren't that important (see: Billy Martin). Instead, I'm going to focus on the bottom of the 8th.
Brian Fuentes came into the ball game, which was a good omen for me, because the last time I was at Minute Maid and he came into the ball game, Mark Loretta hit a walk-off HR. His first batter, Hunter Pence. If ever Pence was going to get a big hit, it was against the erratic lefty, and after a 1-2 count, he hit a flier into Center for a single. In comes JR Towles, he of the .429/.636/.857 split stat against lefties, with the Astros looking at a .783 Run-Expectancy (the number of runs expected to score, given the historic data of runner's scoring in that exact game state, in this case, a runner on 1st, with no outs) and a Win-Expectancy of 41.1% (meaning that historically, a home team trailing by two-runs in the bottom of the 8th inning that get their lead runner on with no outs have gone on to win 41.1% of the time). So in steps a man who slugs over .800 against lefties, hits of .400 against lefties, and gets on base an astounding 64% of the time...AGAINST LEFTIES. Seriously, just read through line again...that makes Barry Bonds drool. So what does Coop do...he throws the book at Fuentes and calls for the Sac-Bunt.
ANECDOTE: So I see Towles square to bunt, and an a few obscenities fly. My virulent anger is further stoked by the fact that the numbers I just quoted you loomed on the jumbotron in Right as JR squared to bunt. My question is: Does Coop need his Rx changed on the glasses, because as I saw it we had a man who crushes lefties, facing a a lefty who is known for his struggles; what more could the man ask for? Everyone around me was perplexed and I will now attempt to explain:
a)Why I was livid
and
b)Exactly how lucky we got
So Towles drops down a bunt, is thrown out at first and Pence is safe at second. The Astros now had a Run-Expectancy (RE) of .699 and Win-Expectancy (WE) of 36.6%. We let a person who has just one of the most distinct split-stats possible against Left-Handed Pitching drop down and sacrifice bunt to decrease our odds of tying the game and decrease our odds of winning the game, while facing a LEFT-HANDED PITCHER!!! On what planet does that make sense? Say Towles simply got a hit, or just a walk that moves Pence to second with no outs, our RE would have been 1.38, meaning we would have doubled the RE.
There we were, Pence on Second, 1 out, and in comes Mark Loretta to Pinch-Hit, he draws a 4-0 BB, which because it was the sloppiest pitching of the day, incensed me even more, given that we WASTED an out when Fuentes was struggles-city. So with Loretta on First and Pence still on second, the WE goes to 41.2%. Please think about that for a second. We wasted an out to get back to the exact same WE. We also wasted an out to get the RE to .888. So one out later we've added to the probability that we'll tie the game, marginally.
In comes Michael Bourn, who as a left-handed hitter has .179/.273/.503 against left-handed pitching...Mario Mendoza, eat your heart out. I guess it's hard to fault Coop for not pinch-hitting for Bourn given that I can't think of who we could have put up there and Bourn's obvious defensive value...but still, I'm hung up on the fact that he made Towles create an out when Towles CRUSHES lefties. So Bourn, grounds into a 1-3, but moves Loretta and Pence over. Runners on 2nd and 3rd, 2 outs. The RE is .611. Yes, we are now at the lowest point of the inning as far as RE goes, and our WE is 34%. Are you beginning to comprehend the insane cost of that Sac-Bunt and of that precious out that was WASTED?
What happened next could be called clutch, but I've already done a far bit of talking about clutch and luck, so I'm calling it Luck. Kaz Matsui worked the count full and then banged out a single to left field. Hunter Pence and Mark Loretta score. Our WE sky-rockets from 34% to 84% on that single. Remember too that we had an expected Run value of .611 runs, and managed to drive in two, and the later 3 on Tejada's double. We got insanely lucky. Just look at the graph of our WE throughout the game. Whether you believe in clutch or luck, you have to admit, what happened was highly improbable (which, of course, the numbers attest too). 2-out rallies happen, but they're luck more than skill. Players who crush left-handed pitching generally crush left-handed pitching, no matter what.
Of course everyone who had heard me curse Cecil Cooper for calling for that bunt gave me some form of a smug-I-told-you-so type look, but at least you and I know that we just lucked out. More than that we all have a better appreciation for the supreme value of an out.
Sources:
http://www.fangraphs.com/plays.aspx?date=2008-04-20&team=Astros&dh=0
http://www.baseball-analysis.com/article.php?articleid=4842
**UPDATE**
Wholly unrelated to the post, but absolutely incredible nonetheless:
The Best Chicago Cubs rant, EVER
Thursday, April 17, 2008
Miguel Tejada, You just got Punkd!
Having a hot Latina Pop-star for a Wife: Totally Sweet
Winning the 2004 Home-Run Derby: Who isn't Jealous?
Winning the 2002 AL MVP: Not to Shabby
Getting totally humiliated on national TV: PRICELESS.
So not only does Miguel Tejada get traded for a day before he appears in the Mitchell Report, he now gets busted for lying to get a contract. While he certainly tread some morally gray waters, I can't say I don't blame the man for doing what he had to do to get into the MLB. In fact, I don't even care that he lied, Billy Beane and co. should've done some better homework, I mean if some jerk-off at E60 can do it, you'd assume they could've too.
The thing that totally chaps my ass about the whole ordeal is this: How often when the Mitchell Report came up did you see Roger Clemens and Andy Petite wearing Astros' uniforms on ESPN? I can recall Roger being in the Astros' uniform on the front page of ESPN.com with some sort of tawdry steroid headline right above it. I mean for guys who spent three years with an organization when their careers have spanned a decade and decade plus respectively, was that necessary? Did the E60 guy have to sit down with Miggy in his Astros uniform and bait him into making an ass of himself? Why didn't they try to do this when he was Baltimore, when get got his contract or after he got implicated by Palmeiro? Everyone knows the huge East Coast sport's bias that fuels ESPN, but really was pulling this stunt with Miguel Tejada or the afformentioned unnecessary linkage of steriod-Roger with the Astros? As much as I love sports and baseball especially, network television kind of ruins it (however, FSN or RSN type networks' coverage of sporting events is actually a HELL of a lot better than ESPN, FOX, TNT, etc) To quote the brilliant Gary Huckabee:
ESPN’s brass has lost all faith in sports as drama. This I don’t get, but it appears to be the case. The addition of music-video editing patterns, bad pseudo-metal soundtracks, and visual augmentation of highlights, and the cringe-worthy hip banter between anchors slightly too old to really be using urban lingo has made SportsCenter a test of endurance, not a destination on the dial...like MTV before it, ESPN seems to be convinced that the hype around the core of the offering is of more utility than the core offering itself. I mean, who the hell came up with “Who’s Now?”, and why weren’t they summarily beaten with a big-ass sack of oranges? And why didn’t one of the “talent” speak up and say “You must be joking, right? I’m not doing that crap.” If, before, anyone had even grudging respect for Stuart Scott and all the unindicted co-conspirators who served on the panels, I hope you’ve had the good sense to write them off as the empty and fungible vessels they are. Admit it—it’d be pretty cool to have the anchors off-camera, doing a voice over of what comes up on the teleprompter, and have a turnip, motionless, on the anchor desk. Would the viewer experience be worse? What percentage of the audience would comment that Scott Van Pelt “looks a little jaundiced this evening”?
Simply summed, while Miguel Tejada's age certainly might factor into his baseball-ability, it doesn't seem to this year so far and it's hard to blame the man for lying to get out of extreme poverty when MLB's millions came knockin' at his door. What we should all be disgusted with is ESPN's inability to do anything besides come up with this kind of "To Catch a Predator" rip off.
Wednesday, April 16, 2008
Examining the Wizard, 2.0
This past offseason, Astros fans heard quite often that our starting pitching would be a worrisome aspect of our club. Thirteen games in, the rotation has a total of two wins to show for it's otherwise competent work. For instance, every Astro starter has at least one quality start, except for one. Roy Oswalt has started his ninth major league season with an 0-3 record a 9.00 ERA. He has made no admissions about an injury being the cause (although he was hit with a batted ball in his first start against the Padres), and his fastball has been consistently around 93-94 MPH. Oswalt wondered openly whether or not he was tipping his pitches in last Friday’s loss to Florida. Whatever the case may be, Astros fans, Fantasy owners and the team itself are searching for reasons why one of the most consistent pitchers in the game has struggled to open the season.
For the past few years, writers and broadcasters have come to the conclusion that Roy Oswalt just doesn’t throw that hard anymore. Opinions differed as to whether this was due to declining skills or because he simply changed his philosophy, but this theory is becoming more entrenched in the baseball community. However, looking at his pitches from 2007, seem to indicate that he's still throwing hard. A glance at his average numbers should give 'Stros fans and fantasy owners a like a ray of hope, given that his pitches' speeds (hopefully he gets his location down or discerns whether or not he was tipping his pitches) have been in line with his 2007 averages, and 2007 was certainly a very effective year for Roy.
So why's he struggling then if velocity can't be blamed?
When looking at his career numbers, it is apparent that Roy has declining rate statistics associated with strikeouts. His walk rate jumped quite a bit in 2007, as evidenced by his sharp decline in K/BB. Besides that however, his statistics are remarkably consistent. Even his much talked about K/9 rate diminished only slightly after a fairly dramatic dip after the 2004 season. Has Oswalt has made an effort to reduce his pitch count by attempting to pitch to contact more, thereby using less pitches to get hitters out? Looking back at his split-season statistics, this hasn’t not been the case. Though, in 2007 this may have been due in large part to the high amount of walks he surrendered, stymying his ability to get contact.
Looking at his small sample of pitches from 2008, we can see that the problem has been his curve ball has significantly flattened. In 2007, his legendary curve ball broke, on average, 6.69" away from a right-handed batter, while dropping 6.35". In '08, his curve is breaking a scant 3.45" away from a right-handed batter and only dropping 3.73". Roy has said in a few interviews that he hasn't found the right grip for the pitch this year, and it certainly seems the case. As a result of not being able to use his curve ball effectively, Roy Oswalt is now throwing 5% more fastballs (from 65.53%, to 70.9%). If hitters are getting a steady diet of fastballs, Roy's bound for trouble.
What leads us to believe that his stuff will return and his 2008 struggles end, is his that his PERA from 2005-2007 have been improving (3.98, 3.73, 3.60 respectively) as his PECOTA projections indicate he should be regressing, if ever so slightly. Simply summed, the man is learning how to adjust to the fact that he's not as dominant as he used to be. Roy struggled at times last year to get a grip on his curve, but found his stride. While this is assuredly the worst period of his career, in reality, it's only been 16IP, and we should see him return to form.
For a man that is entrusted with anchoring perhaps the least proven (read: worst) pitching staff in baseball, this is welcome news. Oswalt probably will not achieve the levels of success that he had from 2001-2006, but rumbles concerning his eminent demise seem to be far from the truth, statistically speaking.
Tuesday, April 15, 2008
Dude, you're blowing it
"Dude, you're blowing it," was the favorite line of a dude-bra friend of mine who graduated last year, but Jose Valverde can congratulate himself on eliciting the phrase from me, with 96% of a loss tonight. 8 innings of shut out baseball by Chacon, only to have Coop pull him from the game with a scant 109 pitches...WHY? Whatever Cooper's idiocy, Valverde's absolutely dismal performance can be blamed on no one but himself. Last week I suggested that luck is a large part of the game, while I hold firm to that claim, tonight, Valverde made his own luck with abysmal pitching. Here's to hoping he figures himself out, SOON.
Sphere: Related ContentMonday, April 14, 2008
Examining the Wizard
Lance Zierlein readers: We have a more recent analysis of Roy Oswalt's struggles:
EXAMINING THE WIZARD: THE MAY REPORT -- It's much more relevant and thorough.
This past offseason, Astros fans heard quite often that our starting pitching would be a worrisome aspect of our club. Thirteen games in, the rotation has a total of two wins to show for it's otherwise competent work. For instance, every Astro starter has at least one quality start, except for one. Roy Oswalt has started his ninth major league season with an 0-3 record a 9.00 ERA. He has made no admissions about an injury being the cause (although he was hit with a batted ball in his first start against the Padres), and his fastball has been consistently around 93-94 MPH. Oswalt wondered openly whether or not he was tipping his pitches in last Friday’s loss to Florida. Whatever the case may be, Astros fans, Fantasy owners and the team itself are searching for reasons why one of the most consistent pitchers in the game has struggled to open the season.
For the past few years, writers and broadcasters have come to the conclusion that Roy Oswalt just doesn’t throw that hard anymore. Opinions differed as to whether this was due to declining skills or because he simply changed his philosophy, but this theory is becoming more entrenched in the baseball community. However, looking at his pitches from 2007, seem to indicate that he's still throwing hard. A glance at his average numbers should give 'Stros fans and fantasy owners a like a ray of hope, given that his pitches' speeds (hopefully he gets his location down or discerns whether or not he was tipping his pitches) have been in line with his 2007 averages, and 2007 was certainly a very effective year for Roy.
So why's he struggling then if velocity can't be blamed?
When looking at his career numbers, it is apparent that Roy has declining rate statistics associated with strikeouts. His walk rate jumped quite a bit in 2007, as evidenced by his sharp decline in K/BB. Besides that however, his statistics are remarkably consistent. Even his much talked about K/9 rate diminished only slightly after a fairly dramatic dip after the 2004 season. Has Oswalt has made an effort to reduce his pitch count by attempting to pitch to contact more, thereby using less pitches to get hitters out? Looking back at his split-season statistics, this hasn’t not been the case. Though, in 2007 this may have been due in large part to the high amount of walks he surrendered, stymying his ability to get contact.
Looking at his small sample of pitches from 2008, we can see that the problem has been his curve ball has significantly flattened. In 2007, his legendary curve ball broke, on average, 6.69" away from a right-handed batter, while dropping 6.35". In '08, his curve is breaking a scant 3.45" away from a right-handed batter and only dropping 3.73". Roy has said in a few interviews that he hasn't found the right grip for the pitch this year, and it certainly seems the case. As a result of not being able to use his curve ball effectively, Roy Oswalt is now throwing 5% more fastballs (from 65.53%, to 70.9%). If hitters are getting a steady diet of fastballs, Roy's bound for trouble.
What leads us to believe that his stuff will return and his 2008 struggles end, is his that his PERA from 2005-2007 have been improving (3.98, 3.73, 3.60 respectively) as his PECOTA projections indicate he should be regressing, if ever so slightly. Simply summed, the man is learning how to adjust to the fact that he's not as dominant as he used to be. Roy struggled at times last year to get a grip on his curve, but found his stride. While this is assuredly the worst period of his career, in reality, it's only been 16IP, and we should see him return to form.
For a man that is entrusted with anchoring perhaps the least proven (read: worst) pitching staff in baseball, this is welcome news. Oswalt probably will not achieve the levels of success that he had from 2001-2006, but rumbles concerning his eminent demise seem to be far from the truth, statistically speaking.
Sunday, April 13, 2008
Projecting Pence
This off-season saw a movement towards locking up super-two’s in order to keep them through the first years of free agency and to avoid inflated arbitration awards. Troy Tulowitzki’s contract has set the bench mark for signing these stars in the making. With a club payroll hovering around $90 million, and the commitment to carry Carlos Lee through the next four years, the hometown-nine has to find a way to cut costs, while rebuilding around a core nucleus of younger players.
ROY-caliber Hunter Pence, set Astros records in SLG and Extra-Bases in his limited rookie campaign. Despite his struggles early this season adjusting to batting behind Michael Bourn and generally becoming more patient at the plate, Pence is the leading candidate to become the face of the organization. After hitting his third homerun of the season today, J.R. Towles has already shown flashes of being the kind of prospect turned cornerstone that this team needs to be viable in the future. Given his even more limited sample size, the future of Towles is more of a wait and see proposition, however. That being said: just how much is Hunter Pence supposed to be worth? More than that, should the Astros sign him to a multi year contract after less than a year’s time in the bigs?
We’ll be employing MORP a proprietary statistic from Baseball Prospectus. MORP looks at the recent market fluctuations, and combined with their “deadly accurate” PECOTA projections, determine a dollar value for players. Using Troy Tulowitzki as the foundation, and outfielder Chris Young, who just recently received a five-year deal from the D-Backs, as a comparison of what a less position scarce player might receive, we’ll look at what MORP can tell us about the idea of giving similar treatment to Pence. Keeping in mind a player is eligible for free agency after six big league seasons, and for arbitration after three.
Laying out the specific years and dollar amounts of Tulowitzki’s contract, the numbers look like this:
6 year/$31M (2008-13), plus $15M 2014 club option
The per season dollar amounts are as follows:
2008:$0.75M, 2009:$0.75M, 2010:$3.5M, 2011:$5.5M,
2012:$8.5M, 2013:$10M, 2014:$15M club option ($2M buyout)
Source: Cot's Baseball Contracts
As noted in the aforementioned article, this is the largest deal ever for a player with less than 2 years of service. Shortstop is a position of greater scarcity than most any other position, save pitcher and catcher, so this assuredly weighed into the calculus of Rockies GM Dan O’Dowd and their entire front office.
Utilizing MORP, Tulowitzki’s projected value is:
MORP: $64,875,000 (through length of contract)
So the final tally, with the assumption that the team will pick up his $15 million dollar club option in 2014, stands at a bargain to the tune of $18.875 million dollars. Tulowitzki will be 30 when his current contract expires, and will most likely have begun to experience the regression that is associated with playing a position as demanding as short stop. Regardless, this contract should stand as an excellent decision on the part of the Colorado Rockies. The amount saved on this particular contract may be able to fund an excursion into the free agent market for a pitcher or go to adding a few more dollars to a long term deal to re-sign left fielder Matt Holliday.
Now, let’s take a look at a somewhat more comparable player, Diamondbacks centerfielder, Chris Young:
5 years/$28M (2009-13), plus 2014 club option
$1M signing bonus
2009:$1.75M, 2010:$3.25M, 2011:$5M, 2012:$7M, 2013:$8.5M,
2014:$11M club option ($1.5M buyout)
Source: Cot's Baseball Contracts
The main difference between Tulowitzki and Young’s contracts seems to be the rate at which their salaries reach their peak. Young will be paid higher dollar values earlier, but Tulowitzki will have more eight figure seasons than will Young. Maybe this says something about the Diamondbacks confidence in their young centerfielder’s ability to stay healthy and continue to progress throughout his contract. He will be 31 at the end of his buyout year, but given PECOTA’s projections of him, Young has many years of high value in front of him, as evidenced in his MORP:
MORP:$62,900,000 (Through length of contract)
Once more, we see a franchise saving themselves quite a bit of money . $23.9 million dollars, to be precise. However, no two or three situations are exactly alike, and our own situation with Hunter Pence needs to be examined in it’s own light, in addition to the actions of other teams. Pence does not play a position that is particularly scarce from year to year as far as sheer volume of productive players is concerned. He does not have the athleticism of Chris Young (insofar as ability to consistently steal bases), nor does he project to be as much of an OPS threat as Young is. Bearing everything we can in mind, a 5 year, $25 million dollar contract extension for Pence seems reasonable. (If it doesn’t, comment on why we’re dopes. We’re thick skinned). Following that line of thought, Hunter’s future projects favorably to either of the aforementioned players.
For Pence:
MORP: $55,700,000 through theoretical extension
This is a lot of prognostication on our part, but given a $8-11 million club option for the last year on his contract, signing Pence to an extension starting next season would save the Astros roughly $21.2 million dollars over the life of the contract. (Using $9.5 million as a median value for the 2014 season option). After years of Carlos Lee’s (amongst others) big contract eating at Drayton’s expense ledger, a value such as this would be hard to pass over. This franchise has been routinely lambasted for making seemingly foolish fiscal choices. While signing Hunter Pence to an extension is not exactly a no brainer, it is a good bet to give the team a degree of flexibility in altering its payroll when necessary.
Thursday, April 10, 2008
10 Game Recap: Searching for Silver Linings
As promised, here is our 10 game wrap. For this, our inaugural edition, we decided to look at some raw statistics to see what they tell us about our dismal 3-7 start.
| Hitting | ||||||||||
| PA | R | HR | RBI | BB | SO | AVG | OBP | OPS | ISO | K:BB |
| 339 | 36 | 11 | 34 | 22 | 56 | .232 | .286 | .707 | .190 | 3.65 |
Not a lot of surprises here, we just aren’t hitting and more importantly, we’re not getting on base. A positive note, though, is that when we are hitting, we’re hitting for a pretty decent power (note: Isolated Slugging of .190). Even this positive sign is due in large part to a four home run performance on Monday, capped off by this welcoming present from Mr. Tejada.
Our hitting woes are a surprise to say the least. This team has been heralded all off-season long as one of the best line-ups in the NL. Lance’s career .412 OBP always gives reason to be optimistic, but Carlos Lee (.341) and Miguel Tejada (.343) do not have the track record of getting on base. Balancing the good with the bad, we wanted to find a reasonable prognostication about our team’s ability to score runs. In this pursuit, we decided to use a metric called RC/27. It’s an approximation of the number of runs, per 27 outs (the length of a ball game) a player or team is creates. In 10 games our hitters (the hitting stats above exclude pitchers, for the purpose of solely analyzing what the men who are paid to hit the ball are doing for us) have manged 36 runs, which is an average of 3.6 runs/game (tough math, I know). I am using PECOTA’s projections to come up with our projected RC/27 score. Though there are many formulas for RC/27, most just trying to be more and more precise, I used the quick and dirty formula of:
RC= 25xOBPxSLG / (1-AVG)
The projected values for our lineup (including bench players, but Kaz Matsui is excluded because he has not played yet):
OBP: .344 SLG: .437 AVG: .274
This yielded a RC/27 of 5.17. So clearly, we have been vastly under performing at the plate, but we clearly are bound for a regression to the mean -- i.e. something’s got to give. Regardless of notions associated with clutch hitting, luck is a big part of hitting. Hit ‘em where they ain’t may be an old baseball axiom, but it’s very much true. Line drives are often caught, while bloop singles go for RBI’s just as frequently it seems. This offense has a track record of success. Regardless of regression due to age, or questionable lineups, it should (based on our projections) start to hit better, and score more runs as a result.
| Starting Pitching | ||||||||||
| IP | W | L | K | BB | K/9 | K:BB | BABIP | ERA | E(W) | E(L) |
| 58 | 0 | 4 | 36 | 18 | 5.59 | 2 | .303 | 4.03 | 1.9 | 3.7 |
For all the talk about how bad the starting rotation was going to be this year, through 10 games, it has been the one bright spot on the club. Even with Roy Oswalt’s hip being a purple bruise and Chris Sampson struggling through the flu yesterday, we’ve put up solid numbers. Brandon Backe went toe to toe with Chris Young and Carlos Zambrano, and kept us in the game both times. Wandy Rodriguez bounced back form a rocky outing in San Diego, and has pitched over nine innings of scoreless ball in a row.
The vacancy in the win column is a testament to our bullpen’s ineptitude. The E(W,L) values are slightly skewed, namely because of both Roy and Chris’s rotten starts. E(W,L) cannot be read as though you were looking at a W-L column, quickly said, it is the expected win share a pitcher earned for getting through X number of innings having allowed X number of runs, determined by the number of wins and losses pitchers through out history have earned with the same IP and RA. The good thing to note is that our BABIP is close to the mean, meaning that should our rate stats stay as strong as they are, then this just might be the way things will go.
| Relief Pitching | |||||||||||
| IP | W | L | SV | K | BB | ERA | BABIP | K/9 | K/BB | H/9 | BB/9 |
| 27 | 3 | 3 | 1 | 19 | 12 | 5.67 | .379 | 6.33 | 2.03 | 12.33 | 4 |
Like we said last night, this team has been built around hitting and strong bullpen, and just like hitting, the bull pen has STRUGGLED. Just like hitting though, it appears that bullpen is also do for a regression to the mean given their absurdly high BABIP of .379 reflected in a astronomical H/9 of 12.33. While the other rates stats haven't been phenomenal, expect them to improve slightly, but not much. Just expect the bullpen’s BABIP’s regression to the mean to make all the difference in the world. Sphere: Related Content
Wednesday, April 9, 2008
Let it out
Sometimes, you just gotta vent. Sabermetrics are fine and dandy. Stephen and I usually write objective, statistically based articles that we hope make people think and perhaps look a little more into the subject.
This is not one of those articles.
After "watching" the game on MLB.com, he and I both came to the same conclusion: this team looks the same as it always has. Sporadic hitting. A bullpen that can't hold a lead or positive momentum. In the end: losses to the Cardinals. Change the players, the general manager, the manager. Same 'ol, same 'ol.
Yes. They battled back. But the Cardinals do not have the talent we do. Brad Thompson, Braden Looper, Todd Wellemeyer. Come on now. We're not sending Smoltz, Glavine and Maddux out there either, but we knew that coming in. Ed Wade built this team around offense and our bullpen. Six hits on offense. Three earned runs in five innings of relief work, including four walks and two homeruns. Worst of all, we let their most legitimate, proven bat beat us. Albert Pujols is to the Juice Box what Leif Erikson was to the Eastern seaboard of Canada. He comes uninvited and does what he pleases with whomever he pleases.
As long as THE homerun, THE Lidge crouch afterwards, and Andy Pettitte's look of horror and exasperated "On my God" live on in Houston sports infamy, seemingly so too will the inability of the Astros to ever truly assert their will on those teams that we consider our rivals. The Cardinals came in as a team that was out manned on paper, yet they walk away with another series win.
In the next few days, we will post an article detailing the Astros first ten games of the season. Three up, seven down. Not quite the start we were looking for, but Michael Bourn and Miguel Tejada have impressed. Bourn changes the complexion of the game with only a slight lead off of first base. Tejada snagged victory from near defeat, both with his glove and bat on Monday. Starting pitching has been on the whole a bright spot, and I'll delve into the specifics more in the aforementioned Re-cap article. There is a lot of work to be done. Thankfully, the cliche holds: it's a marathon, not a sprint.
Tuesday, April 8, 2008
What's Luck got do to with it?
Thinking about Cve's quote of the night from last night (see below), I decided to check the Astros X W-L, which as MLB computes is: Expected won-loss record based on runs scored and runs allowed, using this formula: RS^1.82/((RS^1.82)+(RA^1.82)). Currently the Astros have an X W-L of 4-4. Which means we should have an extra win, or should we?
The formula MLB uses was created by legendary Sabermetrics guru, Bill James. It gives us an approximation of how a team should have performed. There are, of course, limitations to X W-L and one has to look no further than the 2007 Diamondbacks to see that (90-72 W-L to 79-83 X W-L). The Diamondbacks played a lot of very close ball games last year, which is why Jose Valverde was able to lead the National League in saves. In comparing the Diamondbacks W-L to X W-L we can see they were either very lucky or very clutch -- where you fall depends on whether you believe clutchness exists or does not (click the link if you really want to make up your mind).
So with that in mind, and with Cve's thought that the Astros seem to have the tools to be a slightly above average team (which is all it takes to win the NL Central) in mind, what does that ellusive win that the Astros should have represent? I assert that it in fact represents bad luck. For the Astros to be successful this season, a lot of things will have to go our way. Backe and Wandy have to pitch career years, Roy has to be Roy (which he hasn't been so far), and our hitters have to hit well and all of that has to occur simultaneously. That simultaneous provision is the luck factor that I feel accounts for that 1 win we are deficit. Thus far, it has been hit or miss as far as it all coming together, but if that win we are deficit is truly just a result of bad luck, then I think we're ok. Why? Because luck evens out over time (see the law of large numbers, or averages). We've seen all of those factors I discussed so far this season, we just haven't seen the together so far. If they exist, then they should; and when they do, X W-L says, so far, that we should be a .500 team.
Who knows, with a little luck in our favor, we're a few wins above .500 and maybe, just maybe, we're in a play-off hunt. Of course, I am looking waaaaaaayyyyy to far into the futher as we have only played 8 games, but it's food for thought none the less. So I guess Cve's fundamental question of whether have "faith and hope" in the Astros is too loyal or not can't be answered yet, but lady luck has a lot do with it. So, do we feel lucky? Do we? (Sorry, that was a poorly done Clint Eastwood reference).
Monday, April 7, 2008
Home Opener Live Blog
Well, not quite the turn out we hoped for, and not quite the victory we hoped for, but all in all it was a great night. Hope to see some more of you next time, and if there is a specific day of the week that works better for people, leave a comment and name that day or drop us an email at domedogs@gmail.com; help us, help you.
Regardless, thanks to Cve, and Chris for taking the time to chat about the game, I think that all in all it was a pretty good experience and well worth it.
Quote of the Night:
Cve: so, during the game when we are not playing very well, i get very frustrated and pessimistic, but while we're not playing, i look at our lineup and the way our pitching staff has been playing, and think we can take the division, is that me being TOO loyal to the stros, or is it reasonable???
The philosophic quandary of all Astros fans, and probably just NL Central fans in general.
Also: Worth buying a subscription read stuff like this:
"the phenomenon of Cub-death, defined as the extremely painful slow wasting disease that eats nerve axons from the inside out once a player, particularly a highly-paid player, puts on a Cub uniform. A physician who treated Rich Hill after last year's playoffs recently told the New England Journal of Medicine that the late stages of the disorder are "like something out of a science fiction novel--nothing in the world compares to it. The vital organs liquefy before your eyes. You can't do an autopsy because you can't dissect gumbo." In a testament to the ragged poverty of the NL Central, the Cubbies made the playoffs last year, then rolled over in the playoffs like France in 1940. This is a team that has a lot of talent, a legit ace starter, lots of middle-of-the-order power, and a psychological albatross that makes the Isiah Thomas Knicks look like an "Up With People!" revival tour."
--Matt Taibbi
Sunday, April 6, 2008
A Modest Proposal
Is it early in the season? Yes. Is it too early for a couple bloggers to start throwing out ideas about radical changes to the Astros? Never.
Love the player, hate the contract, or some combination of the two- regardless, Carlos Lee is here to stay. Here is the good:
Career Averages:
BA: .288 OBP: .341 Slugging: .499 HR: 30 RBI: 107 Runs: 96
That being said, Lee doesn't exactly inspire confidence with a glove in his hand. So far this season, he hasn't been credited with an error, but that doesn't begin to describe the extent of his relative ineptitude in the outfield. To give the Astros a better chance of playing winning baseball, the braintrust here at Dome Dogs makes outlandish proposal #1 for the year: put Carlos at first, and move Lance Berkman to LF.
An error only takes into account plays that reasonably should have been made by a particular defender. It was a statistic that was developed during the infancy of the sport, when gloves were hastily thrown together straps of leather that did little more than protect the player's hand. Players in today's game should be expected to be a bit more proficient in what they are able to do. Errors are handed out by the official score keeper, whose attention is primarily focused on the batter/pitcher match-up. It is a subjective call, which takes away from its legitimacy. Various statistics have been developed to put defensive performance into context, and while none of them are perfect, they are infinitely better than having only the error at the disposal of fans and statisticians alike.
Revised Zone Rating (RZR), is a defensive statistic that we're going to use to explain ourselves. Revised Zone Rating is the proportion of balls hit into a fielder's zone that he successfully converted into an out. Hardball Times The field of play is divided as such. Basically, a player is evaluated by looking at only those zones that an average fielder at that player's position fields at least 50% of balls successfully for outs. Doing this allows statisticians to split the playing field up between fielders and give each an amount of responsibility for those zones that they are supposed to cover. For our purposes, we'll take a look at what Left Fielders and First Baseman did in 2006 (the last year I could entire fielding statistics).
Left Field (responsible for Zones F through H on line drives and C through I on fly balls and popups) :
Balls in Zone: 3,825 Plays Made: 3,264 Zone Rating: 0.853
Lee's 2007 Rating: .827
First Base (responsible for covering zones V through X, the three zones closest to the right field line):
Balls in Zone: 2,779 Plays Made: 2,083 Zone Rating: 0.750
Berkman's 2007 Rating: .718
RF:
Balls in Zone: 3,941 Plays Made: 3,428 Zone Rating: 0.87
Berkman’s 2007 Rating: .884
We can see that neither player were at league average for their positions in 2007. However, Lance (though in limited playing time) was an above average RF, which is a more difficult defensive position . Further, he successfully converted 11 balls in play into outs that were outside of his zone (OOZ) in 289 innings in RF. Carlos only managed 36 in 1369 innings.
It's tough to hypothesize how Carlos would do at first. He probably has less of an area to cover, as far as zones are concerned, but would have to learn to pick throws out of the dirt, hold runners on, etc. Either way, we say it's worth a shot: we've already seen two Lee misplays on line drives lead to runs (once yesterday against Chicago, and once against San Diego). We are not trying to say that Lance would have the range of Carl Crawford, but he would be able to cleanly play those balls that are hit into his zones at a higher rate than Lee.
Friday, April 4, 2008
Callin' a good game (Brad and J.R. not involved)
Anyone who watches sports should be familiar with the popularity of networks to hire former athletes, and peddle them to the viewing public as experts. The play by play person will usually acquiesce to whatever drivel their partner feels the need to spew. It is in this spirit that we as Astros fans should feel grateful to have Jim Deshaies (along with Bill Brown) broadcasting games.
What prompted me to write this post, was a conversation JD and Brown were having in the booth prior to the start of the game. The topic was the length of the new grass that adorns the playing field at Wrigley. Commenting that it was shorter and should not play to the pitcher's advantage as much anymore, although JD noted that he was no agronomist. Not that the term is incredibly difficult to discern, but I was impressed that a color commentator threw that jewel in. For comparison's sake, here is a piece of solid analysis from Ron Darling circa 2005.(Note: Darling is contemporary athlete of JD's and a YALE UNIVERSITY ALUMNUS):
"Castilla at the plate with the bases loaded. He'd really like to get a hit. The Nationals are down 2 - 1. If they score a couple of runs, they'll be winning. Strike 3. The pitcher threw the ball, Castilla missed it."
Tre-men-dous stuff. It's almost as if being a Yalie is negated once you step into the booth. Glad to see that Deshaies is a violator of the federal statute against thinking while announcing.
Addendum:
Jeff Brantley gives us a few more reasons to worry about head trauma in professional sports, and the effects on ex athletes. Specifically the second post down "XXX" (sorry they don't let you link to specific posts, but the video is just incredible).
New Domain and The Friendly Confines
We ponied up the cash (it wasn't much) and bought out a domain. So no longer do you have to type in root4thegoodguys.blogspot.com, save your fingers the work, and go with: www.dome-dogs.com. Look for more flashy updates in the coming weeks.
We're at Wrigley today (also please note that I'm posting this at 6AM, I've got insomnia with a capital I, and one can only watch Sports Center and Law and Order for long) facing off against Rich Hill. Chris Sampson, whom we championed last year and performed to our hype until elbow trouble felled his season, takes the mound for the first time this season and looks to regain his early season form of 2007. Here's the line-up I'm hoping for:
1. Bourn - Cf 3BB
2. Miggy - ss 0BB 0K
3. Berkman - 1b 2BB
4. Lee - DH (wishful thinking) 0BB
5. Pence - Rf 0BB 3K's
6. Wiggy - 3b 1BB
7. J.R. - C 2BB
8. Mediocre 2b de jour AVG of 1BB (2BB for Loretta, 0 for Blum)
9. Sampson - p
I love Hunter, but I just don't think such a free swinger needs to be in the 2-hole until he calms down enough to adjust his approach to the situation. Which is a very nice way of me saying I'm tired of seeing Michael Bourn draw a walk off of some of the best pitchers in the game and then Hunter go down swinging, or a defensive hack put a ball in play. It might be irrational, but it's way to early for me to be up. I don't know, let me know what you think about the line-up, maybe offer your solution? I just think that if you're reading the blog, you could take the time comment and let us feel loved (or hated).
**UPDATE** 11AM
I put in the number of walks our boys have drawn, I think that speaks volumes for our offensive ineptitude. I'm still sticking by Miggy in the 2 hole and Pence down in the 5 hole and I don't know why. I'll justify it buy saying that Miggy is projected at a .350 OBP and Pence a .344 (PECOTA). However, Miggy got on base .368 last year in the AL East, so I'm going to get behind him to beat that projection by a lot.
Thursday, April 3, 2008
On Park Factors and Luck
**UPDATE 10:31AM** The links are fixed. Sorry, apparently blogger has changed since last year, annoyingly. Sorry for the inconvenience .
Things improved tonight,
That’s as far as I had gotten with this post when Chieto Jr. was down 1-2 to Trevor Hoffman. I was about to write, “but we still couldn’t put up a W,” or something similar to that. I guess having watched all of our hits get nabbed down the lines, or Greg Maddux’s forty-two year-old body being more nimble and agile than $16 million-a-year-lard-ass Carlos Lee amble around left-field and miss balls, got me down. But, that is the beauty of this game, the clock has 27 ticks, but their the out. Though, we were perilously close to that 27th tick, Hoffman cracked. I won’t go play-by-play, but on a night where Geoff Blum got the first home run of our season and Lance Berkman stole 3rd, the hits finally fell for us and we won in improbable fashion after a ridiculous Hunter Pence single and 3-run Lance Berkman BOMB.
Perhaps I got my pessimism at school, because in talking with some friends this morning, I heard a lot of negative comments about how our offense was lacking; so I decided I’d try to rationalize our short comings at the plate. There are two things we have had working against us this series Park Factors and luck.
Park Factor has definitely been our main nemesis. Since 2001, Petco Park has had a negative Park Factor, meaning it’s suppressed offense. In most of those years, it’s been the worst, or within a thousandth of a point of the worst park in all of MLB to score runs. There are many reasons for this and mainly the fact(s) that its at sea-level and right on the coast which means the air loaded with moisture. The air is just dense, which creates friction, and prevents the ball from carrying. Compounding that is that it’s a big yard. So to recap: dense air that slows a ball trapped in a huge field; Petco is the anti-Coors Field. It has been suppressing offense by at least 15% year since 2001 and last year it did so to a the tune of 24.5%. So there you have it, in we came with a team built to score runs through a powerful 2-6 and their power was sapped in that glorious sea-side air. To further our woes, we faced two of the best pitchers in the NL last year.
Now for the luck part. BABIP is a measure of how lucky and unlucky a pitcher/batter is. To be short and sweet, we were way unlucky, posting a .185 BABIP (for those to lazy to click the link, an average BABIP is about .290). So it stood to reason that we were bound to start having some of those liners, long fly balls, and gappers fall/go for hits/homers. The good news is that tonight they did. The better news, it looked like we got robbed still.
So we have a W on the books for 2008 and a chance to finish the first series at .500. Thing we have to all hope for is that our BABIP rises, but our pitchers find continued success out of Petco and it’s pitcher friendly park factor for the rest of the 160 games in front of us (though last year Minute Maid suppressed runs by 10%, so who knows?).
Wednesday, April 2, 2008
Burning Desires/Questions
While our exuberance is still high, is there any topic (batting line-up, positional arrangements, off-season moves you want to rehash, etc.), question, or even a trade speculation you want to discuss? Send us a question at: domedogs@gmail.com And we'll respond/answer it in a post.
In the mean time:
Biggio's 3000th Hit -- There were many to chose from, but this one had a lot of great elements, namely the 14 year-old girl going nuts in the backgroudnd..
Tuesday, April 1, 2008
Live Blog #1
**UPDATE** So in the future, Evan will never be trusted with anything involving basic computer literacy skills. This was an idea we came up with pretty much on the fly, and I handed him the reigns because I was in a night class, our mistake. After working with the software today, I've got in under control. We'll shoot to have to another live blog for their home opener against the Cardinals, Monday, April 7, at 6:05PM.
We're going to try out the Live Blogging. Feel free to come on in and chat during the game, it should be a pretty unique experience.
Let's Keep it Fresh
In order to keep things lively and fresh, we're hoping you'll stop by pretty regularly and let's us know what you thought of the game, other people's comments (our own included), or whether or not you think that Roy O and Peavy have a Broke Back Mountain thing going on? So speak up, lambast us and others, or tell us how your day was.
Stephen's Game One Thoughts:
Well, one game down and 161 to go. I guess that line drive got to Roy and that Peavy must have been in the cage all off-season. We didn't produce offensively, we tried to muscle the ball in cool, sea air...the worst time to play that game. Bourn was sensational in both frames of the innings. One has to imagine that Pence, Berkman, and Lee will come around, and with a speed threat like that who draws walks off the reigning Cy-Young, I'm psyched. Also, Miguel was impressive in the same both of the frames mind-set.
Our defense was pretty stout, which is good, because we all heard about how bad it was during the spring. There's not a lot to complain/worry about...outside of the fact that that the Open Day Games are the most hyper-critically-analyzed games of the season.
As the say..."We'll get 'em next time boys."...Right?
BOLD PREDICTION OF THE DAY: Backe takes advantage of Petco's dimensions and his fly ball tendencies, allowing Pence and Bourn shag flies all night. Astros manage to beat up on Chris Young early...Astros win.
Evan's useless two cents:
AND: Citing the PGA as precedence, MLB allows Carlos Lee to utilize a golf cart to further mobilize himself in the outfield.
Evan's slightly more useful two cents:
Fox Sports Southwest has the Rangers game on tonight instead of the Astros. So, I'll probably stand outside my window covered in tin foil, and hope to get some reception from Houston...or I'll be pouring over Yahoo!'s stattracker to keep up with the game. Today and in future I will try to make some comments on here during the game, and you all should do the same. Be my eyes and/or ears. It'll be fun, and it will keep me from from developing a rash due to prolonged exposure to pseudo-metals.
Also: if anyone has a suggestion for us- something you'd like us to take a look at, an interesting blog, a Richard Justice article from the Chronicle that is ridiculous, or anything baseball related, comment on it. We check the blog with great regularity, so odds are you'll get a response from one of us pretty quickly. Did you just think of a useful trade that could benefit the team? Comment on it. Everybody can join in on the discussion- it'll keep things interesting.
