SB Nation User Blog: Mike Rogers

MLBTR: Angels in Serious Discussions with Rodney

Mike Rogers — Tue, 22 Dec 2009 20:13:51 -0000

MLBTR: Angels in Serious Discussions with Rodney

Seems like the Angels are scrambling and, well, let's just say I'm glad I'm not an LAnaheim fan.

Scouting breakdown of Austin Jackson's swing

Mike Rogers — Sun, 13 Dec 2009 06:26:33 -0000

Scouting breakdown of Austin Jackson's swing

I was in the forums at Project Prospect (a site that I sometimes write at) and asked Steve Carter, who breaks down the swing of various prospects for the site about Austin Jackson. This was his report.

Cliffnotes version: He's not impressed. I've always looked at Austin Jackson through a statistical light and not liked him. Steve does it through scouting and sees big holes in his swing. Hey, at least he's only the starting CFer in 2010 (most likely). No biggie.

I don't think Bobby Crosby would be a worth-while addition to the Tigers roster.

Mike Rogers — Sun, 06 Dec 2009 23:02:25 -0000

I don't think Bobby Crosby would be a worth-while addition to the Tigers roster.

The idea that they would give away a player of value (Curtis Granderson, Edwin Jackson) if you'll...

Mike Rogers — Wed, 02 Dec 2009 20:01:28 -0000

The idea that they would give away a player of value (Curtis Granderson, Edwin Jackson) if you'll take one of their many bad contracts (Dontrelle Willis, Nate Robertson, Magglio Ordonez)? Hasn't even been discussed, people inside and outside the organization say, and at this point doesn't interest them.

Danny Knobler, the first national writer (and former Tigers Beat Writer) dispelling the false rumors of a Tigers firesale. I hope Ken Rosenthal was paying attention.

Joe Mauer tipping signs to Jason Kubel. I have zero problems with this. Love it.

Mike Rogers — Thu, 01 Oct 2009 18:49:31 -0000

Joe Mauer tipping signs to Jason Kubel. I have zero problems with this. Love it.

Tigers Rearrange Furniture and Acquire Aubrey Huff

Mike Rogers — Tue, 18 Aug 2009 21:46:20 -0000

More photos » by Duane Burleson - AP

Baltimore Orioles' Aubrey Huff walks to the dugout after discovering he was just compared to a recliner in a terrible analogy. He is not happy. (AP Photo/Duane Burleson)

Browse more photos »

Dave Dombrowski cleaned out his basement and decided to rid himself of the recliner he had been meaning to get rid of for a few weeks because he didn't have a couch. His neighbor Andy McPhail was walking out of his house with a recliner to leave by the curb as well. After some heated discussion on which shade of orange looks better, Dombrowski agreed to take the recliner off of MacPhail's hands. "This'll go great in my basement! I could really use a nice, new recliner down there!"

In reality where Major League Baseball General Managers don't live on the same street and amidst all of the hoopla on what draft picks will or won't sign, Dombrowski pulled the trigger on a deal to acquire left-handed "slugger" Aubrey Huff from the Baltimore Orioles in exchange for relief prospect Brett Jacobson. This would be a great deal if, you know, there weren't already numerous in-house options to pick from.

Aubrey Huff's value gets explored after the jump (and I promise, no more made up story lines in my mind)...

Huff's projected for a .334 wOBA the rest of they way. The Tigers have 45 games left, and at 85% playing time and 4 plate appearances in, we're looking at about 150 PA's. That works out to around 0.65 runs above average, but let's be generous and give him a full run (1) over the average hitter the rest of the way -- hey, maybe he goes on a mild tear.

However, devil_fingers has done some work over at Driveline Mechanics on platoon-skills. That would put Huff's platoon-wOBA at .343 the rest of the way. It still comes out to essentially 1 run offensively.

But that's not the problem. The problem is finding 85% worth of playing time for someone who's struggled so much all year and striking out a near career-high clip. Add in that he's a DH/1B that would be masquerading as a defensive helper elsewhere, and there's not much other value he'd give. He's played 48 games since 2007 at the hot corner, so he could spell Inge there (and in the last few years, he's looked just a bit below average at 3rd). Let's be generous again and call him league average at 3rd base.

He'll get starts in left field, as well, since Carlos Guillen's shoulder isn't good enough to throw or bat right-handed. Eyeballing the last few years Huff's been in the outfield, he's been probably around 5 runs below average. I'm in a good mood, so let's call him -3 in the outfield over 150 games.

1st base ... I'm not sure there's room for him. Between Carlos Guillen and Miguel Cabrera, so I'm electing to not put him at 1st for any time.

And then there's DH. Marcus Thames is DH'ing against right-handed pitching. That leaves Carlos Guillen or Aubrey Huff to DH against left-handed pitching but I'll give more of the PA's in this category to Guillen to give Huff as big of a value boost as I can.

Let's give him 20% of his starts at 3rd base, 40% of his starts in LF, and 40% of his starts as a DH. If the Tigers face 70% right-handed pitching (their season average thus far), that leaves 32 games for Huff to play in if he's a strict platoon player. Using those percentage breakdowns, that's 6 games at 3rd, 13 games in LF and 13 games at DH. That positional adjustment would be -1.91 -- we'll call it -2.

Offense = 1 run
Defense, pro-rated and combined = -0.25
Positional adjustment = -2

Total value: -1.25 runs above (below) average.

But, the other factor is who he'll be replacing. Ryan Raburn looks to be a run or so below-average in a corner spot, and is projected to have a wOBA of .330 the rest of the way. Or, how about Jeff Larish? Larish's platooned wOBA the rest of the way is projected at .336.

Given that Huff's getting (I think) around $2 million in salary over the remainder of the season, the Tigers are paying more money for production they could've gotten from in-house replacement options. And, to boot, they give up a prospect who John Sickels graded a B- (round to a B and that's $5.5 million in value). Huff is a Type-A free agent, but would almost assuredly accept arbitration if offered, so the Tigers aren't likely to recoup the draft picks for him.

All in all, I quickly valued the deal on my own giving huge bonuses to Huff (like making him the everyday 3rd baseman with league average defense, him declining arbitration, etc etc), and still really didn't get a substantial value for Huff. It seems Dave Dombrowski's just shuffled the pieces around and dealt away a relief prospect for no real upgrade.

1984 Cy Young. I forgot to put it on the graph, but the x-axis is WAR. And that is courtesy of some...

Mike Rogers — Wed, 12 Aug 2009 03:36:52 -0000

1984 Cy Young. I forgot to put it on the graph, but the x-axis is WAR. And that is courtesy of some cool guy named Rally.

By the by, this is when Rick Sutcliffe went 16-1 with Chicago and won. He was -0.2 with Cleveland to start the year.

Order of finish:

Rick Sutcliffe, 24 first place votes, 120 points
Dwight Gooden, 0 first place votes, 45 points
Bruce Sutter, 0 first place votes, 33 points
Joaquin Andujar, 0 first place votes, 12 points
Rich Gossage, 0 first place votes, 3 pionts
Mario Soto, 0 first place votes, 2 points

Valuing the Jake Peavy Trade, Again

Mike Rogers — Mon, 03 Aug 2009 19:34:27 -0000

Please welcome Mike Rogers to the BtB family. Mike's been around in the comments sections a lot recently, and writes for two other blogs, Fire Jim Leyland and Friar Forecast. I'm a big fan of Mike's ability to talk baseball from a smart angle without making the smart angle the subject of his writing. He'll be tackling current events, with the occasional unique research piece tossed in for good measure. Say hi, readers...

The San Diego Padres managed to get Jake Peavy to OK a deal sending him to the Chicago White Sox minutes before the trade deadline expired at 4 p.m. EST last Friday. Peavy nixed virtually the same deal back in May. Sky valued him at about 3.8 Wins Above Replacement with some generous assumptions going in Peavy's favor two months ago.

Then Peavy tore the posterior tibialis tendon in his right ankle, and is on the shelf until the end of August at the earliest. But that doesn't stop the unpredictable Kenny Williams from doing, well, the unpredictable. What's the verdict, monetarily, on this deal? Win or loss for the White Sox?

Well, Jake Peavy will get about six starts the rest of the way after he returns, providing around 0.75 WAR. Due to winning of the Cy Young in 2007, Peavy's 2009 salary ballooned from an $8 million option to $11 million. He'll be on the White Sox for the last, roughly, 35% of the season, so I'm comfortable saying they'll be paying him ~$3.85 for the remainder of 2009.

Using Sky's Trade Value Calculator, that 0.75 WAR would be worth $3.6 million on the open market. The White Sox are "overpaying" by about $300K, or essentially paying him market value.

But after 2009 he gets more expensive.

For 2009, pre-season FIP predictions put him on pace for about a 4.5 WAR season. Declining by half a win per year for the remainder of the deal means Peavy's WAR would be:

So, the White Sox would, by these projections, be losing about $1.2 million in the value of just Jake Peavy. That doesn't include the value of the pitchers going the Padres way.

But, how valuable were those four pitching prospects?

Well, Clayton Richard is a massive left-hander with a sinking fastball that works in the 88-92 MPH and decent change-up. John Sickels' website rated Richard as a C+. Thanks to Victor Wang's research and Erik's application of that, a C+ prospect over the age of 23 is worth about $1.5 million. Richard's got a 4.32 FIP in 142.1 innings pitched in his Major League career, so I can see him being, in retrospect, better than that C+ rating -- ground ball pitchers tend to be underrated at times, but I'll stick with that $1.5 million.

The big gun in the deal is Aaron Poreda. Sickels rated Poreda as a B+ pitcher. A pitcher rated as a B by John Sickels and being 22-years-old or younger is worth about $6.5 million. I feel comfortable moving a B+ pitcher to around $7 million.

Dexter Carter is a big, power arm with upside. He's dominated Low-A ball thus far and Sickels rated him as a C prospect. At 22-years-old that puts him at $2.1 million in value.

Adam Russell was unranked by Sickels.

So, these four prospects bring in a total of $10.6 million in surplus value. Given that the White Sox pick up the 2013 option year for Peavy, they lose about $1.2 million on the deal. In giving away $10.6 million in value, plus what they lose on just Peavy's deal alone, they're on the hook for about $11.8 million in total value. Without the Peavy option year, the White Sox still come out on the negative side at $-6.6 million.

Looks like a check in the W column on this deal for the Padres.

Retired Hitters Wins Above Replacement Per Team

Mike Rogers — Thu, 09 Jul 2009 04:59:15 -0000

After posting a fanshot of the WAR for hitters who have had their numbers retired by the Detroit Tigers, Sky noted he'd like something regarding all MLB teams. That's what I've done and have a few graphs handy.

Predictably, the New York Yankees have retired the most hitters among all current Major League franchises with 12. Even as a Tigers fan, it caught me off guard that the Tigers were 2nd with 10 hitters retired. Click all images to enlarge.

via img7.imageshack.us

More after the jump...

There are six franchises that don't have any hitters retired: Arizona, Colorado, Florida, New York Mets, Seattle, and Texas. However, I did include them on all of these graphs.

This is a graph of the cumulative WAR each group of players gave to their teams. I only included the WAR from the time that particular player played for his team. For instance, the Boston Red Sox only get credit for 37.9 WAR for the 11 seasons of service Carlton Fisk gave the club (3.45 WAR per season). Meanwhile, the Chicago White Sox, who've also retired Fisks' number, only got credit for the 29.6 WAR he supplied them over the course of his 13 years (2.26 WAR per season).

via img14.imageshack.us

Of course, having the most hitters retired, the Yankees lead the pack with 785.4 cumulative WAR from their 12 retirees. The team with the worst WAR per Retired Hitters is the Tampa Bay Rays. That's misleading though, as they've only retired Wade Boggs' number after only two seasons in Tampa where he put up 0.4 WAR total. The Anaheim Angels are the team with the lowest WAR per Retired Hitters, coming in at 14.6 average between its two retirees, Jim Fregosi and Rod Carew (they got Carew's "bad" 7 years. Just 16.4 WAR over that time frame from him).

I've also totaled the number of seasons that each retiree gave for his franchise, which gives me the total WAR per Season for the group of retirees. That is below.

via img193.imageshack.us

Finally, a graph without the Yankees leading it as they're supplanted by the Oakland A's. This is misleading, though, as Oakland's only retired one hitter's number: Mr. October. Reggie Jackson spent 9 years in Oakland, accumulating 49.7 WAR (5.52 per season). Atlanta was second in WAR per Season for their retired hitters, at 5.07. Their three hitters are Eddie Mathews, Dale Murphy, and a certain Hank Aaron. Mathews was a great player averaging 5.78 WAR in his 17 seasons with the Braves (98.2 WAR total). Murphy... not so much. He averaged just 2.74 in his 18 seasons where he totaled just 44.4 WAR. Hank Aaron, as you know, was sort of good at this baseball thing averaging 6.72 WAR. His 21 seasons in the Atlanta organization netted 141.1 WAR.

via img190.imageshack.us

The Braves top this list as well -- obviously buoyed by Aaron. They averaged 94.6 WAR per retired hitter. The second highest total goes to San Francisco. The Giants retired Willie Mays (153 WAR, 21 seasons), Mel Ott (109.2 WAR, 22 seasons), Bill Terry (55.3, 14), Orlando Cepeda (28.9, 9), Willie McCovey (60.6, 19) and they've honored John McGraw (1.5, 5) so I included him too. If you don't include him, they averaged 81.4 WAR per retired hitter.

Some of the worst hitters to have their numbers retired (and spent a significant amount of their career there) are:

Joe Carter (Toronto): 5.7 WAR, 7 seasons, 0.81 WAR per season
Frank White (Kansas City): 26.8, 18(!), 1.49
Bill Mazeroski (PIttsburgh): 27.0, 17, 1.59
Willie Horton (Detroit and breaking my dad's heart if he could understand what WAR is): 25.0, 15, 1.67
Harold Baines (White Sox): 36.9, 22, 1.68

-Some notes: San Diego's numbers get dragged down by a dreadful Steve Garvey (1.3 WAR, 5 seasons, 0.26 WAR). Probably a reason that I didn't even realize he played in San Diego in his career.

-Danny Murtagh was not included in the Philadelphia numbers. He didn't play much and was more of a broadcaster. I did the same with some guys who's numbers/jerseys are retired/honored, but spent more of their time managing. Billy Martin fit this description (like the Yankees needed more guys, anyways), as does Hughie Jennings for Detroit.

-Cleveland does not include Bob Lemon. He was a pitcher who had to hit a lot in his career and was, well, a pitcher hitting.

Anyone specific you'd like to know about, I can oblige. This was fun.

All WAR data is courtesy of the great Sean Smith and his wonderful WAR database.

Detroit Tigers All Time WAR per Sean Smith's database..

Mike Rogers — Wed, 08 Jul 2009 21:12:12 -0000

Detroit Tigers All Time WAR per Sean Smith's database..