OSU BB: Christmas for Adults

Tomorrow [Wednesday, as of when I wrote this] will be opening day at Bill Davis Stadium for the Ohio State Buckeyes. After winning their season opener, the Buckeyes dropped three straight but have since run off a dozen straight wins to enter the portion of the schedule that is played anywhere remotely close to Ohio at 13-3. While the competition was not very tough (Boyd Nation ranks their strength of schedule at 154, lowest in the Big Ten), it’s tough to do a whole lot better then 13-3, and the Buckeyes are 65th in the RPI and 43rd in Nation’s ISR. According to Baseball America, the Big Ten may get an at-large bid this year, and OSU would be in contention for that spot. So the Buckeyes certainly have a lot to play for besides the quest for the B10 regular season crown.

Tomorrow the opponent will be Toledo, with whom the Bucks have opened the home campaign each of the last two seasons. Then it will be a weekend series to open B10 play with Iowa, which is terribly timed for the OSU faithful, as many, the author included, will find it hard to focus on baseball on Saturday. That’s a good thing though. A bad thing is that there are thunderstorms predicted for tomorrow and an 80% chance of rain.

But Opening Day, no matter what level of the game you are at, is special. And so like a kid on Christmas Eve, I will be excited as I drift off to sleep tonight, thinking about putting on a ballcap and getting out the trusty old scorebook, skipping class and heading off to the ballpark. For all of the rationalistic and probabilistic and scientific trappings of this blog, that feeling is what makes baseball the beautiful thing that it is. Let there be baseball.

Playing Against Pythagoras

As the Indians set to embark upon the 2007 season, their opponents go beyond the White Sox or the Tigers or the Mariners. They include, prominently, an ancient Greek philosopher/cult leader who believed that “number is the ruler of forms and ideas and the cause of gods and demons.”

Apparently, the numbers weren’t quite as potent as Pythagoras thought. For over the last two years, the Indians have fallen miserably short of the winning percentage from runs and runs allowed that we call by his name. In 2005, the Indians “should” have won about 96 games; that would have given them the wildcard by a one game margin. Instead they won 93. This type of discrepancy happens all the time, and is no particularly noteworthy--however, the consequence of the shortfall does gall. But in 2006, the Indians “should” have won around 90 games; instead, they won 78.

So are the Indians, on paper, a team that had a 90 win-type performance or a 78 win-type performance last year? It’s semantics, but it is important to forming an opinion of how much better the team must play this season to contend. If they were truly unlucky, then we can assume that they are already right in the race. If however, the 78 wins truly represent their performance, then there’s a long way to go in order to contend, and in a division with three other contenders, the odds can’t be good.

I tend to believe that the Indians are closer to 90 then 78, but all of the mysteries of Pythagoras will not matter once the season begins; the team will win or lose real games, and the standings will reflect it. So let’s set that aside, hope that fortune or the gods smile upon the Tribe this year, and take a look at who will be taking the field.

At catcher, Victor Martinez is one of the top offensive players at the position. On defense, he’s one of the top offensive catchers. That led to some increased time at first base last year, along with the presence of a credible backup in Kelly Shoppach. Those two should keep it held down well this year; in case of injury, a faceless catcher will be plugged in as the backup, and will post a putrid offensive line.

There is more intrigue at first base, where Casey Blake figures to emerge with a great deal of playing time, as will Ryan Garko. Garko’s presence on the roster is not a certainty, but it the signs seem to point to him coming north with the team. Garko’s RBI-laden late-season performance has earned him a the vaunted “clutch” designation from many Tribe fans; he is a solid bat but not someone with a high ceiling as he is already 26. He may play relatively well, but will probably be viewed by many fans as a disappointment.

At second base, Josh Barfield comes over from the Padres to provide a long-term solution. Barfield played well enough in his rookie campaign, hitting 288/327/435, nine runs better then an average second baseman. This looks to be a trade that will work out for both teams, as Kevin Kouzmanoff can hit, and will in San Diego.

At third, Andy Marte has lost almost all of his super-prospect luster, but bettering Aaron Boone’s +2 RAR and statuesque defense should be well within his range, and Jhonny Peralta is a good bet to recover from his bad 2006. Not to the 2005 level, which was over his head, but to a level where he is an above-average contributor.

The infielders will apparently be backed up by Mike Rouse. I had assumed that Hector Luna would be the utility spot, but he came to camp overweight, butchered everything that came near him in the field, and generally ticked off the Indians’ brass this spring. Rouse is a 27-year old out of Cal St.-Fresno who played in eight games for Oakland a year ago. His OPS at AAA the last two years has been around 735, so he’s not likely to contribute much at the plat. Luis Rivas is the other potential option, but he is not on the forty-man roster, and is not valuable enough to make a move.

In the outfield, Grady Sizemore is the centerfielder and leadoff hitter, and one of the finest players in the American League. He will see many different combinations to his left and right, however. Casey Blake, Jason Michaels, David Dellucci, and Trot Nixon will all see time in the corners. Michaels and Dellucci figure to platoon in left, with Michaels going versus lefties and Dellucci versus righties. Last year, the two in those platoon splits combined for 475 PA of 296/358/494, so this at least has the potential to be a productive arrangement. Nixon will be trying to rebound from an injury-plagued year, but if worst comes to worst, Blake can assume right with Garko playing full-time at first. The Indians may not have a great outfield, but it is a flexible and deep one.

Michaels can handle backup duties in center, so there will be no need for a fifth outfielder, leaving Ben Francisco and Shin-Soo Choo on call in Buffalo.

The Indians should have a fairly good starting rotation once again in 2006. CC Sabathia is the unquestioned ace. Although he has never been able to establish himself as an elite pitcher, he has been very good on a consistent basis and was again with a +47 RAR campaign. He is followed by Jake Westbrook, who is a good bet for 200 innings of above average performance. Third starter Cliff Lee regressed last year, and will now miss the opening of the season. Jeremy Sowers was excellent in his major league debut, with a 3.57 ERA in 88 innings. However, his low strikeout rate (3.6) is a concern and casts doubt on his long-term potential. Paul Byrd suffered through an awful season; it remains to be seen whether he is done or if he can bounce back.

With Lee temporarily felled, Fausto Carmona will be the fifth starter. Carmona pitched decently in a few callup starts last year, then looked very good out of the bullpen until he was handed the closer’s role. The meltdown that followed was of historic proportions. Carmona is still young and well-armed, but questions will remain around him until he succeeds at the big league level. If any more problems befall the rotation, top prospect Adam Miller is hovering on the horizon and could be summoned up; he worked eleven scoreless innings in Florida.

The disaster area that was the Indians bullpen last year has been patched over, but is not significantly better on paper. The good news is that I believe that good bullpens are largely formed through fortune and not necessarily through high-priced acquisitions. I don’t believe that the bullpen will emerge as a strength, but I also doubt that it will be ghastly as in 2006.

Joe Borowski is nominally the closer, but for a town where Bob Wickman’s baserunner-laden saves produced consternation, it’s the same old tune; his 4.69 eRA in Florida last year is not particularly encouraging. Setting him up will be the ageless Roberto Hernandez, whose 3.13 ERA last year belies his 4.61 RRA and 4.57 eRA and Rafael Betancourt, whose consistently solid performance remains unappreciated. Aaron Fultz gives the Indians a lefty specialist they lacked last year; his numbers weren’t good last year, but he did allow a .344 $H and he faced many more righties (211 of 317) then he will this year. He held lefties to a 668 OPS in 06 and 666 in 05, so he figures to have prettier numbers from the alternate role.

Behind them, Fernando Cabrera and Jason Davis have never lived up to their potential, although I am a big believer in Cabrera’s stuff and eventual success, and could easily envision him closing come summer time. Davis has never had the strikeout numbers to match his stuff, but he is out of options and will make the team. Matt Miller will be the last member of the bullpen, health-permitting; he has pitched very well when able, but skepticism about his stuff as a sidearmer and health have prevented that from happening too often. If Miller cannot go, lefty Juan Lara or righty Tom Mastny could get the call. Beyond them, depth is provided by lefties Rafael Perez and Tony Sipp and righties Brian Sikorski, Edward Mujica, and Brian Slocum (a tweener between starting and relieving at this point).

Eric Wedge is in his fifth season as manager, but could quickly be on the hotseat. Buck Showalter was brought in as a consultant to the front office, and it easy to see a poor start putting him the driver’s seat. Wedge seems to be on good terms with GM Mark Shapiro, but the call may be out of his hand if things don’t go according to plan. Will they? I have a guess, which I will share when I make my MLB predictions on Sunday, but all we can ask from Pythagoras’ numbers is to stay out of the way.

Historical Offense by Position

One empirical topic I have always been interested in is how offensive production varies by fielding position. I have written a number of pieces for this blog on that topic. This is another one, but it will examine all of the years from 1901-2005.

I got the data from the National Pastime Almanac, which is basically a repackaging of the Lahman database. For those who aren’t database whizzes, it provides a decent amount of filtering options, that makes it easy for instance to get hitting by all players at a certain primary position. And that is exactly what I did. The positional assignment for each player-season was based on the position that they played most often.

One quirk that this program apparently has is classifying players with no field time as catchers. For example, Eddie Collins in 1929 appeared in 9 games with 9 PA, and never played the field--the almanac lists him as a catcher. This is obviously an incorrect classification, and I did not realize that this problem was there until I had compiled all the data. Hopefully, though, the small numbers of players affected (with small numbers of plate appearances) will not be enough to affect the results.

UPDATE: I got a nice note from Ron Gudykunst, the creator of the National Pastime Almanac. There is now an updated version including 2006 data which has fixed the flaw I mentioned. So it remains a problem with the data here, but not with the program.

I used Estimated Runs Produced as the run estimator, and AB-H+CS for outs (or AB-H if CS was not recorded). Then I took the ten-year moving average of each position’s R/O versus the overall average. The complete table of these offensive positional adjustments is available as a Google Spreadsheet. In addition to each position separately, I included the combinations of 1B/DH and LF/RF. Again, these are ten-year averages, so “1913” represents 1913-1922. The table thus ends at “1996” because this is 1996-2005.

I also made a few graphs to illustrate some of the interesting relationships. On the graphs, “1” is 1901, “4” is 1904, etc. The first includes all of the positions and may be a little hard to read:



Next, we can see how pitcher hitting has gone through the century:



Looking at the three outfield positions together is interesting; today, there is a fairly large gap between the production at the corners and the production out of center, but in mid-century this gap was much smaller, and in the early part of the century, center fielders were more productive hitters then their compatriots:



Finally, second and third base are two that are oft-cited as having flip-flopped on the defensive spectrum. This data gives the point of no return as 1928, but the gap has closed significantly in recent years:



I have not endeavored to interpret a lot of these results because I don’t have any particular insight to share. Hopefully, though, they will be of interest to some readers.

OSU BB: North Floirda, WMU, UConn

The Buckeyes won two games last weekend to even their record at 3-3, beating Georgetown 7-5 on Friday and Lehigh 7-2 on Sunday. The scheduled Saturday game with Duquesne was rained out. On Friday, the Buckeyes got five runs in the sixth-eighth innings to rally from a 5-2 deficit; a highlight was Eric Fyer's homer, OSU's second of the year. On Sunday, Cory Luebke dominated, fanning eleven in seven frmaes, while the offense had a solid singles and walks attack to put runs on the board.

Of note was the debut of true freshman middle infielder Cory Kovanda, who got the start at second base on Sunday with Jason Zoeller sliding over to short. Jonathon Zizzo got a start in left in that game as well, with JB Shuck playing center and Matt Angle getting a rest. Zizzo drew three walks, was plunked, and fouled to first.

This weekend the Bucks have a Friday night game with North Florida, who will make a return visit to Columbus in mid-May. On Saturday afternoon the opponent is Western Michigan, and UConn will be on tap Sunday morning. The scheduled starters are DeLucia, Luebke, and Shuck respectivley. All of the games will be played in Jacksonville on North Florida's campus.

OSU BB: Tough Weekend

After the win over James Madison that I previously discussed, the Bucks were swept by Kansas St. on Saturday 5-4 & 5-2, then fell on Sunday to Seton Hall 6-5.

The bullpen let the lead slip away in each of the games. Up 4-3 going into the eighth in the first game, true freshman Josh Edgin allowed two runs to score. In the second game, a 2-2 tie was broken when Trey Fausnaugh allowed a double and two singles and Eric Best allowed a double for a three run KSU inning. On Sunday, the Buckeyes led 5-1 behind JB Shuck going into the eight, but Shuck was touched up for three runs in that inning before Theron Minium came on to get the final out. In the nith, Minium yielded a double and was relieved by Rory Meister, who got two flyouts but then yielded a single and a double to end the game.

The good news, if there is any, is that key reliever Jake Hale was left home in Columbus with an illness. He will be able to pitch some of the set up innings more effectively (at least in theory) then the freshman Best, Minium, and Edgin.

As I have said before in my season preview, there really is no point in getting worked up about the results of non-conference games, as there is no hope of an at-large NCAA bid anyway. The key is to win a regular season conference title, whether that is a springboard to an NCAA bid or not. In my opinion, success in collegiate sports has become overly defined by national tournaments and rankings rather then conference success. In the old days of OSU football, for instance, the primary goal was the Rose Bowl; going there undefeated with a crack at the national title was secondary. This is unfortunate, and it results in much more negative feelings around the program and hostility to the people that make it up, particularly coaches.

The bright spot of the weekend in my mind was the outstanding play of Tony Kennedy. Kennedy was moved up to second in the lineup on Sunday, and for good reason; he went 6-12 over the weekend. Granted they were all singles, but he also drew 5 walks, and had 2 walks in each of the last two games.

This weekend, the Buckeyes have a game each day in Clearwater. The opponents, Georgetown, Duquense, and Lehigh are a composite 2-7-1, so hopefully OSU can get a sweep and get back to .500. DeLucia, Luebke, and Shuck will get the starts, which will allow Josh Barerra to strengthen the bullpen.