SB Nation User Blog: bushe

Short grass infield - statistical relevance

bushe — Thu, 26 Feb 2009 19:16:45 -0000

A while ago I promised to do some number crunching on whether the short grass in the Ranger's infield has an effect on the number of errors and other types of hits given up in the ballpark. Here are my results:

Team & Location	Balls in Play	Grounders	Outs	Balls Through Infield	Infield Hits	Fielding Errors
Rangers in Arlington	2328	922	669	183	49	17
Rangers Elsewhere	2359	953	699	165	63	18
Opponents in Arlington	2526	1004	720	193	54	28
Opponents Elsewhere	2413	1053	754	192	73	25

Team & Location	GB%	Out% for GBs	IFH%	F%	GB to OF%
Rangers in Arlington	39.604811	72.55965	5.31	0.975218659	19.84816
Rangers Elsewhere	40.3984739	73.34732	6.61	0.974895397	17.31375
Opponents in Arlington	39.746635	71.71315	5.38	0.962566845	19.22311
Opponents Elsewhere	43.6386241	71.60494	6.93	0.967907574	18.23362

To sum it up it doesn't appear that there is much effect if any on fielding percentage and it looks like the fast turf actually cuts back infield hits. It does this by noticably increasing the percentage of grounders that get to the outfield. At home the rangers were a full 2.5% more likely to get a grounder through the infield, while the opponents only increased by 1%.

We already knew this but this chart also further reinforces just how bad the infield defense was this past year as the Out% when the Rangers were hitting is much higher than when they weren't.

Some caveats - There are 6-10 or so grounders that aren't accounted for in each group, dunno but if anyone really wants to know I can try to look.

All thanks to retrosheet.org fantastic site.

25 under 25

bushe — Tue, 30 Sep 2008 13:35:20 -0000

There has been a lot of talk about who the rangers top prospects are and I thought it would be interesting to do a value rating of the top young players who are under control of the rangers. This is where I currently see their value to the rangers going forward presented with their clock to FA and this years stats.

batters are presented with AB | H | XBH | BB | SO | BA | OBP | SLG

pitchers are presented with G | IP | H | R | HR | BB | SO | ERA | WHIP

1. Chris Davis (MLB) - 6 years to FA

FRI | AA | 186 | 62 | 27 | 13 | 47 | 333 | 376 | 618
ORH | AAA | 111 | 37 | 18 | 13 | 29 | 333 | 402 | 685
TEX |MLB | 295 | 84 | 42 | 20 | 88 | 285 | 331 | 549

2. Neftali Feliz (AA) - 2 years to rule 5

CLN | A | 17 | 82.0 | 55 | 25 | 2 | 28 | 106 | 2.52 | 1.01
FRI | AA | 10 | 42.1 | 34 | 16 | 1 | 23 | 47 | 2.98 | 1.26

3. Max Ramirez (MLB) - 6 years to FA, 2 options left

RNG | RK | 5 | 4 | 2 | 2 | 0 | 800 | 857 | 1200
FRI | AA | 243 | 86 | 35 | 37 | 56 | 354 | 450 | 646
ORH | AAA | 37 | 9 | 3 | 3 | 13 | 243 | 293 | 432
TEX | MLB | 46 | 10 | 3 | 6 | 15 | 217 | 345 | 370

4 Justin Smoak (A) - 3 years to rule 5

CLN | A | 56 | 17 | 6 | 5 | 10 | 304 | 355 | 518

5. Derek Holland (AA) -2 years to rule 5

CLN | A | 17 | 93.2 | 77 | 30 | 2 | 29 | 91 | 2.40 | 1.13
BAK | A+ | 5 | 31.0 | 20 | 12 | 1 | 5 | 37 | 3.19 | 0.81
FRI | AA | 4 | 26.0 | 14 | 4 | 0 | 6 | 29 | 0.69 | 0.77

6. Eric Hurley (MLB) - 6 years to FA

FRI | AA | 1 | 7.1 | 4 | 0 | 0 | 1 | 2 | 0.00 | 0.68
ORH | AAA | 13 | 74.2 | 86 | 51 | 15 | 29 | 72 | 5.30 | 1.54
TEX | MLB | 5 | 24.7 | 26 | 15 | 5 | 9 | 13 | 5.47 | 1.42

7. Taylor Teagarden (MLB) - 6 years to FA, 2 options left

FRI | AA | 59 | 10 | 4 | 8 | 23 | 169 | 279 | 305
ORH | AAA | 187 | 42 | 15 | 28 | 59 | 225 | 332 | 396
TEX | MLB | 47 | 15 | 11 | 5 | 19 | 319 | 396 | 809

8. Elvis Andrus (AA) - 1 year to rule 5

FRI | AA | 482 | 142 | 25 | 38 | 91 | 295 | 350 | 367

9. Kasey Kiker (A+) - 2 years to rule 5

BAK | A+ | 23 | 121.2 | 138 | 72 | 14 | 37 | 111 | 4.73 | 1.44

10. Jerrod Saltalamacchia (MLB) - 5 years to FA, 2 options left

ORH | AAA | 55 | 16 | 6 | 7 | 15 | 291 | 391 | 491
TEX | MLB | 198 | 50 | 16 | 31 | 74 | 253 | 352 | 364

11. Michael Main (A) - 3 years to rule 5

RNG | RK | 3 | 13.1 | 9 | 8 | 1 | 5 | 15 | 3.38 | 1.05
CLN | A | 10 | 45.1 | 38 | 16 | 4 | 13 | 50 | 2.58 | 1.13

12. Omar Poveda (A+) - rule 5 elligible

BAK | A+ | 17 | 90.2 | 82 | 56 | 10 | 40 | 97 | 4.47 | 1.35

13. Matt Harrison (MLB) - 6 years to FA

FRI | AA | 9 | 46.0 | 49 | 23 | 3 | 14 | 35 | 3.33 | 1.37
ORH | AAA | 6 | 38.0 | 40 | 15 | 3 | 14 | 20 | 3.55 | 1.42
TEX | MLB | 15 | 83.7 | 100 | 57 | 12 | 31 | 42 | 5.49 | 1.57

14. Brandon McCarthy (MLB) - 3 years to FA

RNG | RK | 2 | 5.0 | 7 | 2 | 0 | 1 | 5 | 3.60 | 1.60
ORH | AAA | 5 | 26.2 | 21 | 10 | 2 | 8 | 23 | 3.38 | 1.09
TEX | MLB | 5 | 22.0 | 20 | 11 | 3 | 8 | 10 | 4.09 | 1.27

15. Blake Beavan (A) - 3 years to rule 5

CLN | A | 23 | 121.2 | 105 | 42 | 12 | 20 | 73 | 2.37 | 1.03

16. Julio Borbon (AA) - 6 years to FA, 2 options left

BAK | A+ | 291 | 89 | 22 | 15 | 30 | 306 | 346 | 395
FRI | AA | 255 | 86 | 19 | 14 | 32 | 337 | 280 | 459

17. Tommy Hunter (MLB) - 6 years to FA, 3? options left

BAK | A+ | 9 | 58.1 | 63 | 26 | 6 | 8 | 50 | 3.55 | 1.22
FRI | AA | 8 | 52.1 | 52 | 24 | 5 | 17 | 28 | 3.78 | 1.32
ORH | AAA | 8 | 53.0 | 55 | 18 | 6 | 9 | 28 | 2.89 | 1.21
TEX | MLB | 3 | 11.0 | 23 | 20 | 4 | 3 | 9 | 16.36 | 2.36

18. Warner Madrigal (MLB) - 6 years to FA, 2 options left

FRI | AA | 14 | 15.2 | 11 | 4 | 1 | 8 | 18 | 1.72 | 1.21
ORH | AAA | 17 | 20.1 | 20 | 10 | 2 | 8 | 25 | 3.98 | 1.38
TEX | MLB | 31 | 36.0 | 36 | 22 | 4 | 14 | 22 | 4.75 | 1.39

19. Neil Ramirez (A-) - 3 years to rule 5

SPO | A- | 13 | 44.0 | 25 | 15 | 5 | 29 | 52 | 2.66 | 1.23

20. German Duran (MLB) - 6 years to FA, 2 options left

ORH | AAA | 77 | 20 | 6 | 7 | 12 | 260 | 318 | 390
TEX | MLB | 143 | 33 | 10 | 7 | 32 | 231 | 275 | 350

21. Engel Beltre (A) - 2 years to rule 5

CLN | A | 566 | 160 | 43 | 15 | 105 | 283 | 308 | 403

22. Martin Perez (A-) - 4 years to rule 5

SPO | A- | 15 | 61.2 | 66 | 32 | 3 | 28 | 53 | 3.65 | 1.52

23. Wilfredo Boscan (A-) - 3 years to rule 5

SPO | A- | 15 | 69.1 | 66 | 30 | 4 | 11 | 70 | 3.12 | 1.11

24. Kennil Gomez (A) - 2 years to rule 5

CLN | A | 16 | 88.0 | 75 | 40 | 8 | 20 | 70 | 2.97 | 1.08

25. Mitch Moreland (A) - 2 years to rule 5

CLN | A | 466 | 151 | 59 | 60 | 67 | 324 | 400 | 536

Well all done, let me know what you think.

Rangers farm #4

bushe — Wed, 02 Jan 2008 21:42:39 -0000

Jim Callis posted in his chat http://proxy.espn.go.com/chat/chatESPN?event_id=18658
That these are top 5 for this year:
1 Tampa Bay Devil Rays
2 Boston Red Sox
3 Cincinnati Reds
4 Texas Rangers
5 New York Yankees

exciting. Seems like to me that the red sox are a little too high but I'd say that order independent those are probably the top 5 farms.

Sure does suck to see the red sox and yankees on there.

Mike Young hits too many line drives

bushe — Thu, 13 Dec 2007 19:21:26 -0000

I was looking over hardball times' story about Jose Reyes' ground ball tendencies http://www.hardballtimes.com/main/article/should-jose-reyes-hit-more-groundballs /] or lack there of and hit the link at the bottom to League Leaders for fewest infield flies. A stat with Mike Young as the leader. So I opened his page and looked at his BIP stats.

Year    LD%    GB%    IF/F    HR/F
2004    24.8%    37.4%    N/A    8.6%
2005    25.5%    45.3%    10.1%    12.7%
2006    24.9%    48.1%    3.7%    7.9%
2007    27.2%    48.4%    1.5%    6.8%

So his line drives were up, ground balls were similar and infield flies and homers were down. I'm not sure what really explains this but its almost as if he wasn't trying to hit home runs because he wasn't trying to get under the ball hence his outrageously low IF/F number

2005 Draft -College Catchers

bushe — Tue, 14 Aug 2007 14:23:13 -0000

In 2005 there were 5 college catchers taken in the top 100 picks this is their yearly stats

player-team(pick#)
lvl G/2B/HR/BA/OBP/SLG

Jeff Clement-SEA(3)
AAA 107/30/18/263/358/494

Nick Hundley-SDP(76)
AA 84/19/18/252/339/495

Brett Hayes-FLA(79)
HA 17/3/1/338/413/462
AA 61/15/3/257/302/361
total 78/18/4/275/328/383

Chris Robinson-CHC(90)
AA 79/13/1/254/303/316

Taylor Teagarden-TEX(99)
HA 81/25/20/315/448/606
AA 14/3/2/404/463/596
total 95/28/22/327/450/605

Sure makes Tea look good doesn't it?