SB Nation User Blog: Peter Bendix

CC Sabathia's Performance Has Been Historically Good

Peter Bendix — Mon, 29 Sep 2008 16:11:03 -0000

CC Sabathia began the 2008 season terribly. After four starts, the large lefty sported a 13.50 ERA through 18 innings, prompting me (and many others) to wonder what’s wrong.

As it turned out, either nothing was wrong, or whatever it was could be easily fixed. Because since those four starts Sabathia has thrown 230 innings – more than most pitchers throw in a full season. And over those 230 innings, Sabathia has been nothing short of incredible. In fact, here is how CC Sabathia’s last 230 innings compares to some of the other best pitching performances since 1996:

Name	Year	IP	ERA	BB	K	HR	BABIP
CC Sabathia	2008	235	1.88	45	237	14	0.285
J. Peavy	2007	223	2.53	68	240	13	0.273
P. Martinez	2000	217	1.74	32	284	17	0.236
P. Martinez	1997	241	1.90	67	305	16	0.258
K. Brown	1996	233	1.89	33	159	8	0.259
G. Maddux	1997	232	2.20	20	177	9	0.280
R. Clemens	1997	264	2.05	68	292	9	0.294

Remember, overall offensive levels are lower this year than in previous years. Also, we obviously can’t give Sabathia a complete mulligan for his awful four starts at the beginning of the season. But that being said, CC’s performance this year has been historically good.

Ever wonder what song your favorite player comes up to bat to?

Peter Bendix — Fri, 26 Sep 2008 17:49:00 -0000

Ever wonder what song your favorite player comes up to bat to?

Wonder no more.

What If The Twins Still Had Johan Santana?

Peter Bendix — Fri, 26 Sep 2008 02:46:29 -0000

We can assume that the Twins would’ve opened the season with a rotation of Johan Santana, Scott Baker, Kevin Slowey, Boof Bonser and Livan Hernandez. Let’s run with this idea.

This season for the Twins, Glen Perkins replaced Scott Baker in the rotation on May 10, because Baker had gotten injured. Perkins has remained in the rotation since.

Then, when Baker returned to the rotation, he replaced Boof Bonser, relegating Bonser to the bullpen.

Then Francisco Liriano replaced Livan Hernandez at the beginning of August.

Let’s assume that the Twins were wedded to Hernandez through the end of July, no matter what. After all, they could have called up Liriano earlier – Liriano began dominating in triple-A on June 10.

So if the Twins had Johan Santana the entire year…

When Scott Baker gets hurt, Nick Blackburn would replace him on May 10, not Glen Perkins, since we can assume that Blackburn was ahead of Perkins on the Twins organizational depth chart. Therefore, Blackburn would have made 25 starts, not 32. Meaning Blackburn would have pitched 146 innings (25 starts x 5.84 innings per start, which is what he’s averaged this year), rather than 187.

Then, we can assume that Baker would once again replace Bonser in the rotation when he returned on June 10.

Would Perkins have ever cracked the rotation? His only hope would have been if the Twins decided to give up on Livan Hernandez and replace him with Perkins. The fact that they left Liriano in triple-A for nearly two months while Liriano pitched well and Hernandez pitched terribly suggests that they would not have been inclined to insert Perkins over Hernandez, either. Therefore, we can assume that Perkins would’ve never made it into the rotation, and would’ve spent the year in the bullpen.

Nick Blackburn would’ve been inserted into the rotation when Scott Baker got hurt, and then would’ve stayed in the rotation when Baker came back – essentially, Blackburn would’ve played the role of Glen Perkins. In this scenario, Perkins would never have cracked the rotation.

So the 32 starts that Johan would have made were actually split between Blackburn and Perkins – Blackburn made seven (the additional starts before Baker got hurt), and Perkins made 25.

How might Johan Santana have fared in the AL? Well, the AL is better than the NL this year, and Shea Stadium is a pitcher’s park.

First let’s take Santana’s raw ERA of 2.64 and park-adjust it. Interestingly, it appears that the Metrodome played as a pitcher’s park this year, a little more even than Shea Stadium. It was actually more difficult to homer in the Metrodome than in Shea, and both parks severely depressed singles. Given Shea’s tendency to be more of a pitcher’s park over the long-term, let’s call this a wash (even though I believe Shea is probably still more difficult to hit in than the Metrodome).

Therefore, the only adjustment necessary is a league adjustment. There is a 1% difference in the average AL ERA (4.29) and average NL ERA (4.33), but we can assume that there is approximately a 6-7% difference in league quality overall. This was discussed in Baseball Between the Numbers a few years ago, and the difference in league quality hasn’t curtailed much (if at all) since then. Let’s say that Johan’s ERA would rise 6% by virtue of being in the AL. That would take his 2.68 ERA and bring it up to 2.84. That seems reasonable enough.

Essentially what this all means is that the Twins would have 32 starts from Johan, totaling 225 innings with a 2.84 ERA, meaning Johan would’ve given up 71 runs in those 225 innings.

Remember, his starts would have come at the expense of Blackburn and Perkins. In his seven additional starts, Blackburn would’ve pitched 41 innings (he averaged 5.84 innings per start), and allowed 19 runs. Perkins would’ve pitched 146 innings, allowing 73 runs. This is the production that Johan would have replaced – 187 innings, and 92 runs. But Johan has pitched 225 innings, so he also would have replaced an additional 38 innings from the bullpen. The Twins’ bullpen has a 3.93 ERA, so in those 38 innings the Twins’ bullpen would have allowed 17 runs. So in the 225 innings that Johan would have pitched, he would have allowed 71 runs. Instead, those innings were split between Blackburn, Perkins, and the bullpen, and they combined to allow 109 runs.

                  IP   ER        IP    ER
Johan    225    71    Blackburn    41    19
                                   Perkins       146   73
                                   Bullpen      38    17
                                   Total            225   109

Therefore, we can say that Johan Santana would’ve saved the Twins 38 runs – and, in reality, he probably would’ve saved them more, because his presence would’ve knocked the worst pitcher out of the bullpen (replacing that pitcher with Nick Blackburn first and Glen Perkins later). Therefore, we can conservatively estimate that Johan Santana’s presence would’ve been worth at least four wins to this current Twins team, assuming similar performance by everyone else (and similar behavior from the management in terms of who replaces whom, and when). Considering the Twins are 0.5 games behind the White Sox, those four wins would mean a heck of a lot.

Furthermore, if the Twins had never made that deal, they wouldn’t have had Carlos Gomez and his abysmal offensive production (granted, Gomez is excellent defensively in center field). It’s unlikely that the Twins would’ve managed to find an even worse offensive player to replace Gomez (who hit .258/.297/.354 in 559 at bats), and it’s quite possible that they would’ve received a lot more production. Heck, Gomez’s VORP this year was -2.4, meaning that he was worse than a replacement player. Even if you take Gomez’s excellent defense into consideration, his production was barely better than a replacement player, so all the Twins would have to do in order to improve upon his production was find a slightly-better-than-replacement-player to play in center field.

Of course, hindsight is 20/20. PECOTA projected the Twins to win 73 games, and while that seemed slightly low, I thought the Twins would be in a battle with the White Sox all year…for third place all season. While I was skeptical of the return, I agreed with the Twins’ decision to deal Johan before the season, because I thought that that was when he would have the most value, and I thought the Twins didn’t have a chance of competing. Therefore, I do not fault Bill Smith’s decision to deal Johan.

But it’s still interesting to consider where the Twins would be if they still had him.

Steve Phillips is the new Joe Morgan

Peter Bendix — Thu, 25 Sep 2008 17:47:15 -0000

Steve Phillips is the new Joe Morgan

Guy (Chicago): OK, this is a pretty specific request for a prediction, but if you had to pick one player who will have the best postseason this year (a sort of Playoff MVP), who would it be?

SportsNation Steve Phillips: The guy to look out for in the playoffs this year is Dustin Pedroia. His consistency this year has been second to none, after a slow start, and he has that ability to elevate his game in big moments without trying to hard. It's a special trait for such a little guy. If the Mets make the playoffs, it will take all the pressure off of them, and they are going to be a tough team to beat, and I suspect that David Wright could have a huge postseason.

Brad Lidge Is Having A Heck Of A Season

Peter Bendix — Wed, 24 Sep 2008 03:18:39 -0000

After compiling a 3.36 ERA last year, Brad Lidge was traded to the Philadelphia Phillies, where he has thrived, posting a 1.87 ERA this year. Is Lidge’s success a fluke, or is it the beginning of a trend?

It appears that much of Lidge’s success this year comes from a very low home run rate. In fact, many of his statistics are almost exactly the same as last year:

Year    IP   Ks    BBs    BABIP
2007    67      88    30    0.288
2008    67.3 89    34    0.287

But, of course, Lidge had a 3.36 ERA last year and has a 1.87 ERA this year. So what accounts for the difference? Homer rate:

Year    HR/FB
2007    14.7%
2008    4.4%

Lidge is giving up 10% fewer homers on his fly balls than he did last year. That’s a huge drop, and is especially surprising given the fact that Lidge now plays half of his games in the homer-friendly confines of Citizens Bank Park. Other than his homer rate, it would appear that Lidge is the exact same pitcher that he was last year.

But actually, that may not be the case. If we look deeper, we can see that Lidge has actually been very different this year, most notably in his pitch selection and velocity.

Here is Lidge’s fastball:

Year    Velocity    %Thrown
2005    96.0    53.9%
2006    95.7    56.3%
2007    95.4    58.0%
2008    94.3    43.5%

And Lidge’s slider:

Year    Velocity    %Thrown
2005    87.1    43.7%
2006    87.3    42.8%
2007    86.8    36.4%
2008    85.1    56.0%

Notice that Lidge’s velocity is down for both his fastball and slider this year. And note his pitch selection: he is throwing far more sliders this year, at the expense of his fastball.

Interestingly, Lidge is getting less horizontal movement on his slider this year than last year. This year, his slider is moving 1.32 inches horizontally, whereas last year it moved 2.94 inches.

Finally, while Lidge has the exact same strikeout rate as he did last year, he has experienced a large uptick in called strikes this year, but has induced fewer swinging strikes. Additionally, batters are swinging at his pitches far less often than before:

Year    Called strike %    Swinging strike %    Swing %
2005            24%                          31%                     76%
2006            23%                          28%                     77%
2007            23%                          29%                     77%
2008            30%                          26%   70%

Perhaps Lidge’s decision to throw more sliders has led to batters laying off more of his pitches than usual, as batters would much rather swing at Lidge’s fastball than his slider. Taking this one step further, perhaps Lidge is better able to locate his slider this year, because it is breaking less, horizontally, than it has in the past. In other words, perhaps batters are laying off of Lidge’s slider, and he’s dropping it in for a called strike.

It seems rather odd that Lidge has managed to post the exact same strikeout and walk numbers as last year, despite a noticeable decline in his velocity, a vastly different pitch selection, and different amounts of called and swinging strikes than the previous year. Often times, when a pitcher shows trends like this, I’m inclined to believe it could be the sign of him getting worse. However, in Lidge’s case this may not be so. Although his fastball and slider velocities are down, he is still throwing both very hard. And the fact that he has still maintained a high strikeout rate suggests that he is as dominant as ever, even with somewhat "diminished" stuff.

It will be interesting to see if Lidge’s improved command (as evidenced by his higher amount of called strikes) is a one-year fluke (after all, his control isn’t any better than previous years) or the beginning of a trend (perhaps he sacrificed velocity for command). No matter what happens, however, Lidge will not be able to sustain his 4.4% HR/FB rate going forward.

Jeff Francoeur's Awful Season

Peter Bendix — Mon, 22 Sep 2008 02:42:30 -0000

Jeff Francoeur had some good seasons in his first three years in the majors, hitting 62 homers over two-and-a-half seasons. However, this power was accompanied by nearly unparalleled hacky-ness, as Francoeur managed only 62 unintentional walks during this span, good for one walk in every 26.7 plate appearances. For comparison’s sake, noted free-swinger Vladimir Guerrero averaged one unintentional walk in every 18 plate appearances during the same time period.

Still, there is no denying the fact that, despite his lack of plate discipline, Jeff Francoeur was not a bad hitter. In fact, he managed to post OBPs of .336, .293, and .338, despite his low walk totals. Obviously, these are not good OBPs, but they are not downright awful (okay, except for that ugly .293 figure). The point is, Francoeur was obviously skilled at hitting the ball – and hitting it far. If he could only add a little more plate discipline…

And then there’s this year. Francoeur has been an absolute disaster, posting a line of .235/.293/.352 with 11 homers, good for an OPS+ of 72. If not for the horrendously awful Tony Pena Jr., Francoeur would have the lowest VORP in all of baseball. What’s gone wrong?

The answer is not obvious. In fact, Francoeur has appeared to actually improve his plate discipline this year: his strikeout rate has gone down, and his walk rate has gone up (albeit very slightly). Take a look:

Year       K%      BB%
2005    22.6%    4.1%
2006    20.3%    3.4%
2007    20.1%    6.1%
2008    17.8%    6.3%

Interestingly, Francoeur has also been swinging at fewer pitches and making more contact this year:

Year    Swing%    Contact%
2005    60.87%    71.79%
2006    61.56%    76.76%
2007    57.38%    73.92%
2008    55.53%    76.83%

But the thing is, Francoeur is not swinging at fewer pitches out of the strike zone. Rather, he’s cutting down on the pitches in the strike zone that he swings at.

Year        O%                Z%
2005    34.91%    83.06%
2006    36.67%    85.83%
2007    36.70%    80.42%
2008    35.95%    75.49%
(O% is percentage of pitches outside the strike zone that were swung at, and Z% is percentage of pitches inside the strike zone that were swung at.)

Furthermore, Francoeur is swinging at a lower percentage of first pitches this year than in the past:

Year    First%
2005    47%
2006    52%
2007    46%
2008    43%

This is significant because from 2005-2007, Francoeur hit .355 when he put the first pitch in play, with a .648 SLG. In fact, 24 of his 62 homers (38.7%) came on the first pitch of an at bat, even though Francoeur only put the first pitch in play in 18.7% of his plate appearances. However, this year Francoeur is only hitting .263 on the first pitch, with a .400 SLG (but he has 3 of his 11 homers – 27.3% - despite putting the first pitch in play in only 15.4% of his at bats).

Another large part of Francoeur’s problems this year can be attributed to his BABIP. Despite a 20.4% line-drive percentage, Francoeur is only hitting .266 on balls in play.

Year    LD%    BABIP    xBABIP    Difference
2005    19.1%    0.337    0.311    0.026
2006    18.3%    0.284    0.303    -0.019
2007    19.4%    0.337    0.314    0.023
2008    20.4%    0.266    0.324    -0.058

As you can see, Francoeur’s LD% (and therefore his xBABIP) has remained very stable throughout his career, with his BABIP fluctuating up and down. This year, Francoeur has underperformed his expected BABIP by 58 points. If you normalize his batting line by adding in his “expected” hits (adding non-HR extra base hits at the same rate as he’s actually accumulated them), his 2008 line becomes:

.263/.319/.415

Which is right in line with what we could’ve reasonably expected before the season. In fact, PECOTA’s 25% quartile prediction for Francoeur was .260/.304/.418.

Francoeur is probably trying to improve his plate discipline, but this year it has not worked. While he has swung at fewer pitches, he’s generally still swinging at too many of the wrong pitches (pitches out of the strike zone), and perhaps laying off of too many strikes. However, even given his poor season, much of Francoeur’s lack of success can be attributed to poor outcomes on balls in play – outcomes which we can reasonably assume have to do with bad luck. However, even if we adjust for this luck, Francoeur’s power is still notably down.

But after undergoing this analysis, we can see that Jeff Francoeur’s future is not nearly as dim as it first seemed; while he has failed to improve this year, he also hasn’t gotten as bad as his overall line suggests, as he’s been quite unlucky on balls in play. Regression to the mean should bring his batting average closer to his career line in the future, and if Francoeur can continue to make adjustments with regards to his plate discipline, he could still become a very good major league hitter.

(Editor's Note: all numbers are as of Friday. And this weekend Corey Patterson has a surge of suckitude to vault into second-to-worst in VORP, making Jeff Francoeur the third least productive player in baseball this year.)

Remember Them?

Peter Bendix — Thu, 18 Sep 2008 16:53:50 -0000

There are two pitchers in the minors who look like they’re going to have bright futures. Both are right-handed; one is 24, the other is 22. They both have track records of dominating the minors, and both have good enough stuff to suggest success in the majors (although, to be fair, the 22-year-old has better stuff than the 24-year old). Here is a breakdown of their recent histories in the minors:

22-year-old:

Age	Level	K/9	BB/9	HR/9
20	AA	10.71	2.48	0.39
21	AAA	8.79	2.51	0
22	AAA	9.62	2.79	0.6

And the 24-year-old:

Age	Level	K/9	BB/9	HR/9
22	A+	10.29	3.14	0.29
22	AA	10.54	3.14	0.37
22	AAA	8.83	2.86	0.52
23	AAA	9.39	2.22	0.5

Note: each player’s most recent season is this year.

Those are some fantastic numbers. It seems that both pitchers are poised to step into a major league rotation next year, and experience some degree of success – perhaps even a lot of success.

So who are our mystery prospects? You’ve probably guessed by now: we’re talking about Phil Hughes and Ian Kennedy.

Some people may have forgotten about this pair, or perhaps given up on one or both of them. Yes, they have somewhat checkered histories at the major league level, but they have occurred in extremely small sample sizes. Both men have the stuff and track record that suggests success, likely as soon as next year.

Of Twins and RISP

Peter Bendix — Tue, 16 Sep 2008 02:34:18 -0000

The Minnesota Twins are clutch. They have managed to hit .314 with runners in scoring position this season, despite hitting .280 overall. Their .314 average with RISP is the highest of any team going back to the year 2000 (I couldn’t find pre-2000 data). And, unsurprisingly, the difference between their overall batting average and their average with RISP is also the largest of any team since 2000. Is this random variation, or are the Twins on to something?

The Twins’ season is within the realm of statistical fluctuation. Since 2000, teams have hit .266 overall, and .267 with runners in scoring position.

In our dataset, we see a normal distribution of batting average with RISP, around the mean of .267. Overall, 68.5% of teams had an average one standard deviation from the mean – between .251 and .283. There were 96.2% of teams that fell within two standard deviations of the mean – between .234 and .299. And every single team in the dataset fell within three standard deviations of the mean – between .218 and .315.

Interestingly, the difference between overall BA and BA with RISP was also normally distributed. However, the Twins’ difference of 34 points fell exactly three standard deviations from the mean. But even this is within the realm of random statistical fluctuation: there are 270 samples in our dataset (30 teams, nine years). So, if the data were normally distributed, we would expect exactly one team to be outside of three standard deviations from the mean. The Minnesota Twins are that team. And, luckily for them, they are hitting better with RISP, rather than worse.

From a macro perspective, we may write this Twins season off as random variation – chance which is benefitting the Twins, but which is not of their own doing (and therefore is not repeatable). They’re just happening to get a very disproportionate amount of hits when runners are in scoring position.

But this is baseball, not stats 101: we want an explanation. And the Minnesota Twins have been good at hitting with RISP for the last several years:

(Note: this chart was made about a week ago; the Twins are now hitting .280 overall and .314 with RISP this year, and still have a 34-point difference)

At first glance, it appears that perhaps the Twins are onto something: they’ve been better with RISP every year since 2004 (a negative difference signifies that the Twins were better with RISP than overall). But perhaps not: my hypothesis is that any team has a 50-50 chance of performing better (or worse) with RISP in any given year. Thus, while the Twins have performed better with RISP for the past five years, they performed worse for each of the four years before that. Meaning, that in the last nine seasons, they have performed better five teams – which is consistent with my hypothesis.

The Twins are also known for an organizational philosophy emphasizing "small-ball" and abhorring strikeouts – perhaps this has something to do with their increased performance with RISP over the past five seasons. I ran the numbers in my database, and found that the correlation between strikeout rate the difference between BA overall and BA with RISP is .20. That’s rather low.

The numbers do show that the Twins tend to strike out less often than other teams: overall, players have struck out in 19% of their at bats, while players on the Minnesota Twins have struck out in 17.59% of their at bats. However, this strikeout percentage is not the lowest in baseball since 2004, when the Twins began their RISP prowess – the Angels and Orioles have lowest K percentages in that time. Here is how they have fared with RISP during that stretch:

As you can see, neither team has performed nearly as well as the Twins with RISP during this time.

Furthermore, this season the Twins have struck at the second-lowest rate in the majors. The only team who has a lower strikeout rate is the Seattle Mariners. And the Mariners are hitting 12 points worse with RISP than they are overall.

The Twins have been extremely good with runners in scoring position this year, but their performance is within the realm of random statistical fluctuation. Furthermore, the possible explanation that their emphasis on putting the ball in play has allowed them to hit so well with RISP seems to hold no water.

While it is possible that the Twins are able to identify players who hit well with RISP and/or play a specific type of baseball that causes players to hit well with RISP, the evidence in this study suggests that the Twins have simply been beneficiaries of random variation. And next year they, like every team, will once again have a 50% chance of having a higher batting average with RISP than overall.

Post-script:

Here are the other teams who have had the highest difference between their overall batting average and their batting average with RISP in the past nine years, and how they have fared in the following season:

2003 Royals: .274 overall, .304 RISP (+30)

2004 Royals: .259 overall, .267 overall (+8)

2006 White Sox: .280 overall, .307 RISP (+29)

2007 White Sox: .246 overall, .243 RISP (-3)

2005 Angels: .270 overall, .296 RISP (+26)

2006 Angels: .274 overall, .274 RISP (0)

2007 Tigers: .287 overall, .311 RISP (+24)

2008 Tigers: .273 overall, .267 RISP (-6)

2007 Tigers: .287 overall, .311 RISP (+24)

2008 Tigers: .273 overall, .267 RISP (-6)

2003 Athletics: .254 overall, .277 RISP (+23)

2004 Athletics: .270 overall, .260 RISP (-10)

2004 White Sox: .268 overall, .291 RISP (+23)

2005 White Sox: .262 overall, .259 RISP (-3)

2002 Astros: .262 overall, .285 RISP (+23)

2003 Astros: .263 overall, .262 RISP (-1)

As you can see, only one of these other eight managed to beat their overall BA next season.

The Success of the Angels: Luck or Skill?

Peter Bendix — Mon, 15 Sep 2008 04:00:45 -0000

The Los Angeles Angels of Anaheim are having a fantastic season. They have already sewn up a spot in October and have the best record in baseball. However, much of their success has been predicated on timely hitting and pitching, neither of which is likely to continue.

This season

First of all, let’s look at the Angels’ pythagorean "expected" win totals. Based on runs scored and runs allowed, the Angels’ 91-57 record (editor’s note: all statistics do not include Sunday’s games) "should" be 81-67. But beyond that, their third-order expected record "should" be 77-71. By this measure, they’re outperforming their true skill level by a whopping 14 games.

Part of the reason for this overperformance is that the Angels have been dramatically better in the clutch, all season – both pitchers and hitters.

Somehow, nearly every single one of their pitchers this season has outpitched his FIP. In fact, of all Angels pitchers who have pitched at least 20 innings this season, only four of twelve have underperformed their FIP. And of those four, two are Dustin Moseley and Darren O’Day, who have pitched 40 and 41 innings, respectively. Both men have been unlucky, but they have accounted for a mere 6% of the Angels overall innings pitched. Furthermore, the other two men who have underperformed their FIP have done so by only the slimmest or margins: Ervin Santana has a 3.36 ERA and a 3.33 FIP, and Jered Weaver sports a 4.25 ERA and 4.10 FIP.

Meanwhile, eight of the Angels’ main 12 pitchers have performed better than their FIP, and many of them have a large difference between their ERA and FIP. Take a look:

Thus, it should come as no surprise that their team FIP is 4.18, while their actual ERA is 3.88. Over 1328 innings, that is a difference of 45 runs, or four and a half wins.

Some of this could be because of their defense. However, the Angels defense is only slightly above-average: according to Justin’s stats (hat tip to Sky), the Angels have the 12^th best defense in baseball. The Angels also have the 8^th best defensive efficiency, at .705.

So their defense is above-average. But it’s not amazing; and it’s certainly not worth four and a half wins. No, the main reason why the Angels’ actual ERA is lower than their FIP is that Angels pitchers have pitched particularly well with runners on base.

With no one on base, Angels pitchers have allowed the 12^th lowest OPS in baseball. But with men on base, Angels pitchers have allowed the 5^th lowest OPS. This explains how they are tied for second-highest strand percentage in the AL (74%). The only team with a higher strand percentage is Toronto (at 75%), who has both a lower ERA and lower FIP than the Angels, meaning they should strand more runners because they have better pitchers. (Incidentally, the Angels are tied with Tampa Bay, who also has a lower ERA and FIP than the Los Angeles).

Okay, so, Angels pitchers have pitched better with men on base than no one on base, leading to a higher-than-expected strand percentage and fewer runs allowed. They have beaten their FIP (partly because of their pitching with men on base). What about their hitters?

With no one on base, Angels hitters are batting .249/.307/.381, good for a .688 OPS – 26^th "best" in baseball. But once they get someone on base, the rest of the lineup magically transforms into excellent hitters: with men on base, the Angels are batting .288/.353/.444. Their .797 OPS with men on base is good for 9^th best in baseball. That’s quite an improvement.

So Angels pitchers have excelled at leaving runners on base. And Angels hitters have excelled at driving in runners. But how much of that has to do with luck?

We can see if Angels hitters and/or pitchers have had a history of performing better with men on base. The following chart details where Angels pitchers rank, in terms of OPS allowed, with no one on base and with men on base, since the year 2000:

As you can see, even though Angels hitters have been better with men on base for the last two years, since 2000 they have been better with men on base only five times in nine years. That’s exactly what we’d expect, if our hypothesis was that any team has a 50/50 chance of being better with men on base in any given year.

What about the hitters? This is a little more murky. The Angels – and Mike Scoscia, specifically – are known for a unique brand of baseball that emphasizes the "little" things, like taking the extra base, "productive" outs, and manufacturing runs. This is generally eschewed in sabermetric circles, but maybe Scoscia is on to something:

The Angels have hit better with men on base in six of the last nine years. Of course, this could very easily be attributed to luck as well: if you flip a coin nine times, there’s a decent chance that you’ll get six heads (furthermore, if you flip 30 coins nine times, you can be almost assured that you’ll get six heads at least once). So maybe the Angels’ philosophy has something to do with their improvement with men on base, but chances are this is simply a statistical fluke.

The future

The future does not look rosy for the Angels. They are playing well over their heads this season due to the good fortune of having a lot of timely hitting and timely pitching. Furthermore, their pitchers have almost all outpitched their FIP. The Angels true record should be much closer to 77-71, rather than 91-57. Furthermore, Francisco Rodriguez and Mark Teixeira are going to be free agents after the season; while the Halos will be potential suitors for each, there is no guarantee that they can sign either, let alone both.

Losing Teixeira would be a big blow. Mark Teixeira has posted a 3.2 WARP in his time with the Angels. Before being dealt, Casey Kotchman posted a 3.6 WARP. Therefore, Angels first basemen have combined to post a 6.8 WARP this season. If the Angels fail to re-sign Teixeira, that 6.8 WARP could be replaced by Kendry Morales, who PECOTA pegged to hit .274/.320/.425 in the majors this year – which would be good for a 2.3 WARP in 425 at bats. While Morales has a nice line in the minors this year - .352/.387/.559 – that has been produced in a very favorable offensive environment, and is supported by an unsustainably high BABIP (.371). Using our handy MLEs we see the Major League Equivalent of Morales’s line this year is: .276/.316/.429.

Therefore, it’s fair to say that PECOTA’s projection for Morales was exactly right. So if the Angels fail to re-sign Teixeira and choose to plug in Morales, they will lose approximately three wins in the process, as we can assume that Morales will produce a WARP of approximately three next season (and this is giving Morales the benefit of the doubt). Plus, this doesn’t account for any difference in defense between Teixeira/Kotchman (who were excellent) and Morales.

Losing Francisco Rodriguez would further hurt the Angels’ cause, but his importance is vastly overstated. He generally only pitches 60-70 innings a year, and he’s not trending in the right direction. However, the Angels are certainly a better team with him than without him.

Without Mark Teixeira, the Angels are a .500 team (that 77-71 third order record becomes 74-74 if you downgrade from Teixeira to Morales). They could be even worse if they lose K-Rod, too. Furthermore, Torii Hunter, Vladimir Guerrero, Scot Shields, Jon Garland, Gary Matthews Jr., and Darren Oliver are getting older. And while I do have high hopes for Brandon Wood, the Angels do not have much other young talent knocking on the door.

Even if you’re willing to give the Angels the benefit of the doubt and assume that their style of play really does lend itself to better performance with men on base, I still think they have gotten lucky this season. Their performance with men on base has been so much better (even compared to previous "lucky" seasons) that it’s bound to be at least somewhat due to luck. Furthermore, both the Angels’ hitters AND the Angels’ pitchers have been lucky with men on base, allowing them to score more runs and prevent fewer runs than they should. Nearly all of their success has to do with their timely pitching and hitting; if they cannot maintain this, they will not maintain their success.

Right now, the Los Angeles Angels of Anaheim have clinched a playoff spot and are battling for the best record in the league. But their true talent level is well below their record. And next year they may be worse than most people expect.

Fun With Standings

Peter Bendix — Wed, 10 Sep 2008 16:37:37 -0000

Over at Baseball Prospectus you can find "third order" adjusted standings. Basically, these standings are based upon AEQA - adjusted equivalent average. In other words, how many runs a team "should" have scored and "should" have given up, based upon their (and their opponent's) batting line, adjusted for strength of schedule.

The idea is that these standings paint a picture of a team's "True Ability", and that any deviation from these standings is probably due to things outside of a team's control (like batting with runners in scoring position, or having your pitchers leave more men on base than average).

These standings change nothing about the past. But they do have an influence on the future, as they are more reflective of a team's True Ability than actual standings.

With that said, here are third-order standings:

Boston	91	53
Tampa Bay	86	57
Toronto	82	62
New York	81	64
Baltimore	67	76

Chicago	80	64
Cleveland	75	68
Minnesota	73	71
Detroit	73	72
Kansas City	64	81

Los Angeles	75	69
Oakland	70	74
Texas	70	75
Seattle	60	83

New York	79	65
Philadelphia	76	69
Atlanta	71	74
Florida	70	75
Washington	57	88

Chicago	85	59
Milwaukee	79	66
St Louis	74	70
Houston	70	75
Cincinnati	61	84
Pittsburgh	54	90

Los Angeles	78	67
Arizona	72	72
Colorado	71	74
San Francisco	63	81
San Diego	62	83

A few notes:

* The Red Sox are really, really good.

* The Blue Jays are the third best team in the AL...and in the AL East.

* The Angels are not that good (more on them later in the week), and the difference between them and Texas and Oakland is not that large.

*Pittsburgh and Washington are awful. At least the Pirates have a somewhat bright future.

*Despite injuries to Jake Westbrook, Fausto Carmona, Victor Martinez, and Travis Hafner, the Indians are still a good team this year. Look out for them next season.

*The eight playoff teams, as of today, according to "regular" standings are the same eight teams that would make the playoffs, accoding to third-order standings.