Is defense really that important in baseball?

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Originally Posted by dickay

so did their defense improve that much, or are the stats flawed?

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I can't speak for the other teams besides the Mariners, but they traded for guys like Franklin Gutierrez and Jack Wilson AND creating a statistics department led by Tony Blengino and hiring Tom Tango as a consultant AND having the GM and manager talk about these stats and credit them to our success. There's a reason JackZ is quickly becoming one of the best GMs in the game and it's because he understands that advanced metrics have a place, along with scouting, in the front office.

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Here's a quote from special assistant to the GM (and SABR member) Tony Blengino:

The statistics add another level. It shouldn't be scouting against numbers. Successful organizations have to find a way to blend the two. It's our responsibility to blend the two. ... Our own [statistics] are easily adjustable measures as they build in nature of our pitching staff and our defensive positioning. There's a margin for error with positioning with many of the public metrics. If you over-shift quite a bit, the shortstop may have skewed out of zone ratings. ... To properly evaluate teams have to know the context of how those numbers are generated. So, we use our own metrics to account for that.

There's plenty of other interesting stuff in the article, so definitely read the whole thing, but the gist is that the Mariners are among quite a few teams that are actively trying to quantify things that until recently have been based on eyes and scouting reports. Perhaps the most popular of the publicly available defensive metrics is Ultimate Zone Rating, and the Mariners have gone from 20th in UZR last season at -20.9 runs to second-best in UZR this year at +52.1 runs.

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http://fullcountpitch.com/2009/08/24...get-defensive/

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Originally Posted by 200tang

I can't speak for the other teams besides the Mariners, but they traded for guys like Franklin Gutierrez and Jack Wilson AND creating a statistics department led by Tony Blengino and hiring Tom Tango as a consultant AND having the GM and manager talk about these stats and credit them to our success. There's a reason JackZ is quickly becoming one of the best GMs in the game and it's because he understands that advanced metrics have a place, along with scouting, in the front office.



http://fullcountpitch.com/2009/08/24...get-defensive/

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^ ^ ^

Word up to the bolded part.

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Originally Posted by dickay

they are/were also a very young developing team. same players doesn't equal same performance year in and year out. a guy has a good year pitching and you want to attribute nearly all that to better defense behind him? I'll pass.

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You're gonna have to be more specific than that. What "guy" are you referring to? The pitching staff did improve from 2008 to 2009. They allowed 1 HR/9 , 3.2 BB/9 and struck out 7.1 per 9. That's a slight improvement over the 1.3/3.6/7.5 rates of 2007 (although a decrease in strikeouts means greater responsibility for the defense). That does not explain a 300 run improvement in runs allowed though. I don't know how you DON'T attribute a significant part of that to the defense.

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Originally Posted by dickay

so did their defense improve that much, or are the stats flawed? not just when they did good, but when they did poorly? Is it proof of a small sample size? Is it improved pitching that helped the defense? Or is it truly that their defense improved that much and that alone improved their pitching and win totals?

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All defensive efficiency is is percent of balls in play that were turned into outs. How does improved pitching make 6% more balls in play turn into outs? A 6% difference is very large. There's no way to explain that without part of that explanation being an improved defense.

And, of course, common sense backs up the fact that they improved their defense. Jason Bartlett is a much better defender than Brendan Harris at short. B.J. Upton was a terrible infielder and spent significant time their in 2007 but in 2008 played solely in the outfield where he is a plus defender. Akinori Iwamura moved from 3B to 2B and Evan Longoria took over at 3B. Longoria is a great defensive third basemen, and Iwamura was a clear upgrade over BJ Upton and Ty Wigginton at 2B. Delmon Young was gone in 2008 and was a poor defender. Without even bothering to look at any stats, it's mind-numbingly obvious that they improved their defense at multiple positions.

Also, stop saying "that alone" caused the increase. I've never even said that. In fact:

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Originally Posted by HoustonGM

I think that it was due to a combination of the better bullpen and the much better defense.

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A 300 run improvement cannot be explained solely by defense or by pitching improvement (barring very extreme cases, of course). It's obviously a combination of the two, but, once again, I don't know how you deny the importance of defense in the turnarounds of these teams I've mentioned when the stats from the simple (Defensive Efficiency) to the advanced (UZR) back up the defensive improvement AND the "eye test" and scouting side ALSO support clear defensive improvements. Couple that with a great decrease in runs allowed....how the hell do you deny the importance of defense? I really do not understand it. I understand that you do not trust the accuracy of advanced defensive metrics, but I think you're letting your distrust of that get in the way of what really is common sense. Better defense = more balls turned into outs = less runs allowed.

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Originally Posted by 200tang

If you didn't run a defense out there and the only way to get an out was to strike him out, his K/9 would be 27. So, yes, defense DOES have an affect on K's. That's obviously the extreme, but to say it doesn't is incorrect.

[Edit : I should clarify that the effect is probably small on most teams, but the less outs the defense makes the more chances of a strikeout.]

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You're looking at it backwards. If the pitcher strikes out everybody, none of the fielders can ever make a play, and everyone's RF would be 0.

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Originally Posted by dps

You're looking at it backwards. If the pitcher strikes out everybody, none of the fielders can ever make a play, and everyone's RF would be 0.

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They affect each other.

There is probably a lot about all this on Tom Tango's website: http://www.insidethebook.com/ee/
Might take some searching though. It is the blog for The Book, which Tango and MGL wrote.

Also, I believe that UZR/150 is independent of pitching as I believe that the 150 is the expected number of chances in 150 games for the position(s) played.

Also, while obtusely related to the subject at hand, this post and the discussion are well worth reading: http://www.insidethebook.com/ee/inde...v_true_talent/

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Originally Posted by 200tang

They affect each other.

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No, not really. The pitchers, per nine innings pitched, always has the opportunity to strike out 27 batters, regardless of what the fielders do. The only exception is when the catcher fails to catch a 3rd strike, and the batter then reaches 1st safely, which happens so rarely that it can be ignored. Otherwise, the fielders can't do anything to increase that number, nor can they decrease it, because they will only make plays on balls put in play by batters which the pitcher has already had the opportunity to strike out, but failed. The pitcher, OTOH, can deny the fielders any opportunity to make a play on a particular batter by striking him out.

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Originally Posted by dickay

so did their defense improve that much, or are the stats flawed? not just when they did good, but when they did poorly? Is it proof of a small sample size? Is it improved pitching that helped the defense? Or is it truly that their defense improved that much and that alone improved their pitching and win totals?

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Re: the bolded question, in a word: no. It is not proof of a small sample size because it is a team-wide season long measurement. Anything less than 1500 PA is a small sample size for a player. In 2009, the average team had 6236 BF against their pitching staff, and allowed an average of 1895 (BB + HBP + K + HR). That leaves (give or take) 4341 balls which were put in play per team. That is easily an acceptable sample size from which to draw conclusions re: improvement, increased suckitude etc. with regards to team defense, which is what DE or DER measures.

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Originally Posted by dps

No, not really. The pitchers, per nine innings pitched, always has the opportunity to strike out 27 batters, regardless of what the fielders do. The only exception is when the catcher fails to catch a 3rd strike, and the batter then reaches 1st safely, which happens so rarely that it can be ignored. Otherwise, the fielders can't do anything to increase that number, nor can they decrease it, because they will only make plays on balls put in play by batters which the pitcher has already had the opportunity to strike out, but failed. The pitcher, OTOH, can deny the fielders any opportunity to make a play on a particular batter by striking him out.

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And the fielders can deny the pitcher any outs besides strikeouts by not making any plays on balls in the field. They affect each other. I really don't see what you're trying to get at :|

It looks like it's not just internet goofball fans like us arguing about defensive metrics, their applications, and the weight they should be given.

http://mlb.mlb.com/news/article.jsp?...tnerId=rss_bos

Good MLB.com article about the Mariners and Red Sox embracing defensive metrics, while some other clubs like the Phillies do well while snubbing them completely.

Good article, and some basics on the metrics as well. A good primer for Dickay.

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Originally Posted by Alloutwar

while some other clubs like the Phillies do well while snubbing them completely.

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It's funny that even though they snub them they had 3 gold glovers at 3B/SS/2B last year and Ryan Howard by most accounts is average. I have never looked at their OF, but I'd guess it's below average in the corners.

However, it does seem like the new Phillies management doesn't care about defense..or age for that matter. It will be interesting to look at that team in 4-5 years.

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Originally Posted by 200tang

It's funny that even though they snub them they had 3 gold glovers at 3B/SS/2B last year and Ryan Howard by most accounts is average. I have never looked at their OF, but I'd guess it's below average in the corners.

However, it does seem like the new Phillies management doesn't care about defense..or age for that matter. It will be interesting to look at that team in 4-5 years.

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Victorino and Werth are both above average at their positions for their careers - though Victorino didn't have a great year last year. Ibanez is probably below-average though he posted a UZR 8 runs above average last year.

Anyway, I took the article as saying that they ignore the new defensive metrics - not that they ignore defense. If they trust their scouts to be more accurate than the data at evaluating expected performance, then there isn't much reason to worry about the statistics. And since we have no idea what their scouts are saying, it is difficult to evaluate that position.

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Originally Posted by kenny1234

Victorino and Werth are both above average at their positions for their careers - though Victorino didn't have a great year last year. Ibanez is probably below-average though he posted a UZR 8 runs above average last year.

Anyway, I took the article as saying that they ignore the new defensive metrics - not that they ignore defense. If they trust their scouts to be more accurate than the data at evaluating expected performance, then there isn't much reason to worry about the statistics. And since we have no idea what their scouts are saying, it is difficult to evaluate that position.

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Response to the bold sentence: I think trusting their scouts more is a perfectly fair position, but I still think it's foolish to completely ignore the statistics.

At any rate, I was going to post the same thing as the underlined sentence.

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Originally Posted by 200tang

However, it does seem like the new Phillies management doesn't care about defense..or age for that matter. It will be interesting to look at that team in 4-5 years.

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One other thing, I don't think the comment about age makes sense. They are a team with a large group of very good players at their peak age - and when you are in that position you add established talent to try and win now. They probably don't care about what they look like 4-5 years from now - and they shouldn't. If they can make a run of making the playoffs for the next 3-4 years before these guys start to fade - that would be a successful strategy.

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Originally Posted by kenny1234

One other thing, I don't think the comment about age makes sense. They are a team with a large group of very good players at their peak age - and when you are in that position you add established talent to try and win now. They probably don't care about what they look like 4-5 years from now - and they shouldn't. If they can make a run of making the playoffs for the next 3-4 years before these guys start to fade - that would be a successful strategy.

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I think the "age" comment was regarding the multiyear contracts handed out to guys like Raul Ibanez and Placido Polanco.

I haven't read this article in full yet, but it seems like a good primer for anybody interested in learning about UZR.

http://www.blessyouboys.com/2010/1/9...te-zone-rating

ask bill bucker ;)

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Originally Posted by HoustonGM

I think the "age" comment was regarding the multiyear contracts handed out to guys like Raul Ibanez and Placido Polanco.

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This. We're talking about the CURRENT FO. The CURRENT FO has given contracts to Ibanez/Polanco. Unless you wanna talk about the past FO, but that's like bashing JackZ because of the Bedard trade. Stupid.

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Originally Posted by dickay

Someone posted this in the Lowell thread;



1) Can someone please explain to me what UZR is, and how its determined.

2) Is one season really enough of a sample size to determine if a team or player is bad or good defensively? Bad luck, plays ruled errors that were hits, players who play with injuries....there seems to be alot of variables that come into any equation.

3) I hear of Bay being a poor defender. Since when did LF defense matter in Boston? Yes, if I had two guys near even in offensive performance i'll take the better "defender" but how much offense is needed to offset the poor defense?

4) Again regarding Bay or any defender who remains in their prime, are these statistics for defense solid enough to truly say as they do for Bay, he was a good defender early in his career and is now subpar? I again go back to sample sizes and variables.

Appreciate all unbiased input.

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The current trend amongst the younger crowd of GMs is that there is no difference between a run prevented or a run scored. Its all Zero sum.

Theo has been making his moves in Boston along those lines...

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Originally Posted by Mightyzug

The current trend amongst the younger crowd of GMs is that there is no difference between a run prevented or a run scored. Its all Zero sum.

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That isn't a "trend." There IS no difference between a run prevented and a run scored.

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Originally Posted by HoustonGM

That isn't a "trend." There IS no difference between a run prevented and a run scored.

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No, but it is a trend to BELIEVE that a run prevented is the same as a run scored.

I suppose.. lol

I guess a more accurate phrasing would be "The current trend is placing an emphasis on defense." :)

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Originally Posted by HoustonGM

I suppose.. lol

I guess a more accurate phrasing would be "The current trend is placing an emphasis on defense." :)

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Yes, but I'm not an LSAT question writer, so I don't deal in "more accurates."

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Originally Posted by haveacigar

Yes, but I'm not an LSAT question writer, so I don't deal in "more accurates."

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Do you still hate fish?

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Originally Posted by 200tang

Do you still hate fish?

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I hate you now.