As a transplanted Rays fan who now lives and works in Durham, NC, I try to go out to the Bulls games every once in a while and see our prospects. Of course, as of late there are not too many legitimate prospects left in AAA. I caught the game last night with Dice-K and Matsui, and it was packed, if not sold out. The enthusiasm for the Bulls runs very high in Durham, and some of the Durhamites are becoming Rays fans as a result. It is probably a bit unprecedented but I can't wonder if the Rays should consider playing a series or two in Durham every year while Durham has an away game. Granted, this might hurt already-stumbling ticket sales, but then again, the game will sell out and the ticket prices can be much higher than normal. Plus, if the game is against a team like the Orioles or the Blue Jays, the game attendance won't be that much less than normal. It could have the effect of converting some Bulls fans into Rays fans, grabbing some share in a traditionally Brave-centric market as well as gaining some attention for the Rays. And the Bulls' park is a beautiful, awesome place. Thoughts?

We are all aware that the Rays have been victims of "perfect games" twice in the past few years, and it seems that these events are taking place with an increasing frequency. MLB has gone as far as to call 2010 "the year of the pitcher," and guys like Ulbaldo Jiminez, Roy Halladay, and others are lights out this time around.

FanGraphs has a good article about The year of the pitcher that basically acknowledges that there has been some decline in offense in recent years, most notably in 2010, but offers very lukewarm conclusions as the author notes that the results are a "black box" and thus causation is merely speculative. Regardless, I find it fascinating that these events have occured with greater frequency in recent years:

• 2010 Halladay
• 2010 Braden (ugh!)
• 2009 Buerhle (ugh!!!!)
• 2004 Johnson
• 1999 Cone
• 1998 Wells
• 1994 Rogers

Prior to Rogers' gem, there were 13 previous "perfect games" in baseball history. This makes for a total of 20 perfect games in over 130 years of history, at a frequency of about a perfect game per six or so years, ASSUMING everything here is homogenous - years = years, there are no other factors than pure chance that determine a perfect game, etc.

A tremendous pitcher may post a BAA around .230. If he is a control artist who walks only 1 batter per 9 IP, he has a 1/27 = .037... Walking average against, for an on-base against average of maybe around .240 including hit batsmen and the like (errors, etc). This means that the probability that he records an out should be about .770, which is good for N = 1 trial or even N = 3 trials. However, a perfect game is 27 outs, and thus the chance of a perfect game for this pitcher should be about (0.770)^(27), which comes out as 0.000861. This means that an EXCELLENT pitcher has about a 0.08% chance of throwing a perfect game on any given start.

Continuing with liberal estimates, we may say that perhaps 10 of these types of pitchers exist in baseball every year, and they complete 350 starts total. Multiply 350 by 135 (number of years) by P, we get around 40.7 perfect games in history, which is about double of what has thus transpired. You get the picture.

What does this have to do with the Rays? Well, the Rays were victims of perfect games in consecutive years. Let's say that past performance != future results, meaning that we should expect about 41 perfect games rather than the 20 that have occured to this point.

Now, we test the hypothesis: Is this a mere fluke of variation, or is there something to it?

In two years, an MLB team should expect a mean of: 40.7 games / (30 teams * 77.5 years) = about 0.2 perfect games. Assuming normalness, you have a variance of about 0.2 * (1 - 40/(30*135))  or still pretty close to 0.2 perfect games. Given that 2 = 0.2 * 100, we are so many deviations off that P(t) is about 0.

Does this mean that the Rays suck? Does this mean that the perfect games were a harbringer of things to come?

No, not really at all. Let's examine further.

Although the probability that THE RAYS IN PARTICULAR would be perfect-gamed twice in two years is extremely small, the probability that TWO TEAMS in consecutive years would be perfect-gamed is much better. This is known as the "Birthday paradox" in intro probability theory. This, of course, assumes that there is no covariance between 2009 Rays and 2010 Rays, which we know not to be the case.

Another way of putting it: the chance that a fastball hits a bird mid-pitch on any given day is small; however, the chance that it occurs at all may be much larger. Think about "teams who are victims of perfect games" as outcomes in a hat. The chance that a particular team is chosen is 1/30, but there is 100% chance that some team is chosen given that there is a perfect game. Let's say for the sake of argument that over a 40 year time window we expect about 10 perfect games. We have 30 teams in the hat and 10 perfect games to hand out. Does this mean that every perfect game will be given to a different team?

P(All different) = 1/1 * 29/30 * 28/30 * 27/30 * 26/30 * 25/30 .... = 29....21/30^9 which is about .184, meaning that there is a greater than 80% chance that at least one lucky team will receive 2 or more of these gems. GO Rays!

The point is that the very infrequency of the perfect game makes the distribution of its victims somewhat staggered, rather than flat across the board, since as the saying goes "it has to happen to somebody." Statistics and probability theory are very useful in certain applications in baseball, but still struggle to tell "The whole story" when we deal with events that are subject to such variation, infrequency, and flat-out luck. Which is the truth? That the Rays are HORRIBLE because there is no way that 2 perfect games can be explained due to randomess? Or that the Rays are simply the victim of a likely occurence that would be handed out to somebody twice more often than not?

PtB is due for some improvement at the plate, unless he truly has fallen off that much. I think he is more than capable of posting a 250/350/450 line at DH this year for the Rays, but I'm not satisfied. I watched the game tonight and enjoyed it thoroughly (the Trop was crazy after we won) but I felt that Pat was a bit overmatched.

His horrible 09 was truly an anomoly in his career - the chance of it being purely "random," according to my analysis, is less than 1%, and even less than 0.5%. There are a couple of proposed explanations, some likely, many not, including: (i) he doesn't try hard, (ii) he is struggling with the NL/AL switch, (iii) randomness, (iv) steroid use, and (v) general other injuries. I find 1, 3, and 5 a little hard to believe given his past history and lack of injuries, and I think 2 and 4 are legitimate. If it's (iv), then we're screwed, oh well. But if it's really just (ii), why not send him back over?

The Nats have money to blow, a good DH in Dunn (at a pricey rate), and a need for pitching. Why not offer Burrell up to the Nats, along with starter Andy Sonnanstine and a lower level prospect, for Dunn and cash. I would guess that $2M would do the trick, although knowing Friedman he make look for $3-4 M.

Thoughts?

Hey, so I took a few minutes earlier today to do a little personal research about the effects of variance on WAR and value in general. I chose WAR because I am lazy and it is a neatly packaged counting stat. The basic idea is that value is based on more than just the "average" production. You pay a preminum for reliability and receive a discount (sort of) for injury-prone guys, surgery guys, inconsistent players, etc. I took a look at some of the 2009 Rays pitchers and position players to see exactly how variance can affect the actual value of a player.

For this, I chose players from the 2009 squad who contributed, and used their last four years as tracking data. I only examined WAR totals for each year, calculated the variance/SD; the results may be interesting, but they're not that revealing without another piece of the puzzle. You can get the spreadsheet here but here are some of the more interesting results:

• Zobrist had a mean of 2.0 WAR and a standard deviation of 4.5 WAR, which is an expression of his newly-found value - I will explain later.
• James Shields had a mean of 3.7 WAR with a standard deviation of 1.2 WAR, demonstrating what a great deal Friedman has for this guy
  
• The most consistent players out of the group were JP Howell, Akiiiiiiiiiiinori Iwamura, and Chad Bradford. Each of these guys had a SD of only 0.7 WAR.

How do we interpret this data? Well, the mean is not a prediction, but a description of the data. In theory, the probability of getting exactly the mean at the point is infinitesmally small or 0. However, we describe probability as "area under the curve" and so we can make predictions about ranges. I'll give you a simple example of the difference between the two. I ask "how many pounds will Prince Fielder gain this offseason?" One answer may simply be the average number of pounds gained per previous offseason, and this is a fine thing to do on the surface. But what if he gained 50 pounds one year, lost 50 pounds the next year, and gained 5 pounds last offseason? Now we have a lot of "Spreadedness" that isn't described by the mean alone, which would be only a little bit positive.

Instead, we might say: There is a 90% probability that he will gain between -10 and 15 pounds, etc. This means that we don't know "what" he's going to gain, but past results indicate that there is a 90% chance he will gain SOMEWHERE in that interval. We don't know where, but it's in there.

I chose a 75% interval, which means about 1.1503 * SD. This means that you can project the player to produce somewhere in the range of AVG - 1.1503SD, AVG + 1.1503SD. I called this product the "Upside number," meaning the amount of potential up (or down) side within that 80% interval. I'm an optimist.

Ben Zobrist had an upside number of 5.2 WAR, which is astounding. Let me give you the implications of that: Based on past performance, it would appear that he will produce with an 80% probability between -3.2 and 7.2 WAR. The uselessness of that statement should be obvious to you; it is like saying "he will be better than Julio Lugo and worse than Albert Pujols." (actually, he was more valuable last year!) We'll investigate into how to translate that into a useful number in a bit.

Carl Crawford had a mean of 4.0 WAR and an SD of 1.3 WAR, which makes him a fairly reliable producer in LF. His upside number is 1.3 * 1.1503 which is about 1.5. This means that with 80% confidence we can say that he will produce between 2.5 and 5.4 WAR next year. This is an extremely valuable feature of Crawford, which is consistency. Whether he rakes triples and steals bases or struggles at the plate, his defensive prowess has kept him a true asset.

The Boss is projected between 0 and 5.3 WAR, while Gabe Gross is projected between 0.6 and 2.6 WAR. Think about it a little bit.

Grant Balfour seems to be a bit risky, projected between -0.2 and 2.0 WAR, while JPH (sitting comfortably between 0.4 and 1.9 WAR) offers a tiny bit less upside but much more safety in return.

The problem with these ranges is that there is no directionality, meaning that they are constructed as if time is not a major factor in the progression (or regression, and definitely the diminishing) of a players skills. In other words, how much of that SD should we really attribute to time? The idea is that:

VARIANCE = VARIANCE DUE TO CHANGE IN TIME + VARIANCE DUE TO OTHER SHIT

This is not exact, but it's a nice approximation of a more difficult concept. What we do here is find the r value of the four years and (1, 2, 3, 4) representing the actual years. That correlation value is then multiplied by SD, since:

r^2 = ratio of variance explained by data

So, since SD^2 = Var, we only need to multiply r by the upside number to find a more meaningful, and quick, point prediction. Since correlation can be negatve, it gives us "direction" in some sense. For example, Ben Zobrist has a great correlation value (he is trending strongly upward over the last four years) and so his 4trend adjustment is 4.5 WAR. Adding that to his average of 2.0 WAR gives us 6.5 WAR, which is probably just a bit optimistic.

However, we do find some predictions more believable than others. For example, I have Shields at 4.7 WAR (probably a bit high) and Garza at 3.6 WAR (about right), while Kazmir is highly discounted by the system (at only 1.4 WAR because of a very bad correlation coefficient). For batters, I have Aki at 1.5 WAR and Longo at a whopping 7.8 WAR. And there enlies the problem: for guys like Longo with very limited data points, the results will be unrealistic. He is trending "perfectly" upwards right now, since there are only two points. Bartlett looks about a win too high at 3.7 WAR, while Aybar seems about right at 0.7.

After some fiddling around, I decided to make the middle interval 68% instead of 80%, which could narrow things down a bit (and remove some of the optimism!). Check out the sheet for these best (but still lazy) predictions.

"I'm sure if they gave him two weeks in a cage, he'd be hitting amongst the best in the game right now," Borris said. "But Major League Baseball will never give him that chance."

"If they would have let Barry play baseball until his on-base percentage dropped below .400, he probably would've been playing until he was 56," Borris said.

http://articles.sfgate.com/2009-12-10/sports/17182403_1_jeff-borris-bonds-career-federal-grand-jury

I had a dream last night. In the dream, a man was vindicated. The baseball world was shocked. The Prisoner's Dillema had solved itself.

In this dream, Barry Bonds is a Tampa Bay Ray.

After hearing McGwire, Rafael, A-Rod, and others admit to steroid use, he finally decided to come clean at a press conference in Tampa Bay - right between Andrew Friedman and Stu Sternberg.

Carlos was smiling. Maddon was reading Vanity Fair or something. BJ was obviously up to no good. Everything was right, all at once, for the 2010 Tampa Bay Rays.

Friedman said, "This is Bonds' shot at redemption. Barry is truly regretful for all of his actions in the past and wants to make amends and show the world what he can do without PED's."

Bonds even apologized. "My bad," Bonds lamented.

The Rays picked up Bonds on an incentives-laden deal with a $1 M base salary and another million per each 100 PA's. Burrell had been traded on a salary dump to the Cubs or Mets or Giants or Astros or maybe the Yakult Swallows, and BJ, Bonds, DJ, Crawford, and Lance Cormier gathered in for a photo op.

What, you have a problem with Lance being in the photo op? Why?

Afterwards, Bonds went on to post a .255/.405/.505 line for the Rays. He even played 3 games in the outfield, costing the Rays approximately 30 runs.

REDEMPTION.

The prospect of picking up Halladay for only one "rental" season sounds unappealing, and most of his suitors are obviously going to attempt to sign him to some sort of meaningful extension. This would seem to not apply to the Rays, which according to DRB are looking at winning in 2010 with Doc in the rotation. We couldn't offer him a reasonable extension compared to what he could be making, as the saying goes, but what if we made an unprecedented offer of partial team ownership along with a fair (but team-friendly) salary? Doc lives in the TB area and he has made it clear that he prefers training in FL, so he probably likes to play in Florida. Team ownership would incentivize performance and make a big splash, not to mention that if Doc is successful over a 4 year period, for example, he would receive a sizeable return on investment - right now, attendance can pretty much only improve, and with Doc we'd be looking at a cost-controlled rotation of Halladay/Shields/Niemann/Price/Davis or Hellickson, with depth in the minors to spare. If Doc would agree to a 3-year + option extension for say, $35 million, plus some ownership, why not?

The Rays are running into the problem this offseason of an excess of (arguably) major-league caliber players. All the talk of Iwamura's option, our great infield depth (Brignac and Rodriguez), Desmond Jennings, and other such nonsense has the Rays in a unique position to perhaps deal some of its players/prospects. At the same time, we could still use a true 3+ WAR RF option, and I think I've found the perfect match: one of the league's most underrated players (and one of my favorite), Indians RF Shin-Soo Choo. This year he has been worth 4.3 WAR providing an excellent bat and league-average fielding. The Indians are undeniably rebuilding, and one of our pitching prospects (Wade Davis, Jeremy Hellickson, Jeff Niemann even, dare I say David Price?), Aki, and one of our position players/prospects may be enough to get the deal done. If we can deal CC for something big (a couple big time prospects, for example), we could seriously cut our payroll next year and provide a true Playoff-caliber team. I envision:

1B Pena
2B Zobrist/Aybar/Brignac
3B Longoria
SS Bartlett/Brignac
LF Deej
CF Beej
RF Choo Choo
C Hopefully somebody awesome and cheap we trade CC for
DH Pat Burrell I guess.

Imagine the haul we'll get for CC - we'll miss the defense, no doubt, but Deej figures to be a pretty good defensive LF and a great offensive LF, in the same vein of Carl. If we can net a ML ready catcher and a good SP prospect for Carl, I think we pull the trigger. We'll be looking at a great team next year and even without one of Davis, Hellickson, Price, and Niemann, I think our rotation and depth are pretty solid:

SP Shields
SP Garza
SP Price
SP Niemann
SP Hellickson

for example.

What are your thoughts?

 One of the perplexing things about the first half of the 2009 season for the Rays has been the run differential, which is seemingly indicative of a great performance but not necessarily reflected in the W-L record for the Rays.

A potential source of the discrepancy between expected W-L and actual W-L is found in bad luck, which the Rays have been party to this year. This includes performance in close "1-run" games, high leverage situations ("runners in scoring position") and other such areas of chance.

Another source, however, may be found in the Rays run variance. The Rays have experienced the following:

Runs scored per game (standard deviation): 5.35 (3.56)
Runs allowed per game (standard deviation): 4.49 (2.84)

Runs scored per win (standard deviation): 7.40 (3.31)
Runs allowed per win (standard deviation): 2.84 (2.00)

Runs scored per loss (standard deviation): 2.95 (2.04)
Runs allowed per loss (standard deviation): 6.12 (2.82)

We have exhibited a pretty high level of variance in runs scored. In fact, the RS standard deviation represents more than 1/2 of the mean, which means that we'll observe rather useless results like: about 68% of the time, we score between 1.79 and 8.91 runs. Wow! So we're scoring between about 2 and 9 runs per game most of the time. Even if we try to squeeze the interval, it's very tough - the standard deviation (and therefore variance) in runs scored is ridiculously high, especially in our wins. So, that would help to explain some of the seeming discrepancy in our run differential.

Ideally, we'd like to score as many runs as possible, but additionally, we'd like to be consistent - that is, we want to capture a reasonable 68% or 95% interval for our RS. For example, between a team that scores 4.5 RPG with a .5 SD and a team that scores 5.5 RPG with a 3.0 SD, which would you pick? Tricky question: The 68% interval (1 SD) for the first team captured 4.0 - 5.0 RPG, while the 68% interval for the second captures 2.5 - 8.5 RPG. Which is more valuable? More than likely the first, as teams are pretty close to "as likely to win" with 5 runs as they are with 8, but much disadvantaged when they score 2.5 or 3 runs as opposed to 4.

via i29.tinypic.com

In the next part, I will examine how the Rays stack up to the other teams in the major leagues in terms of run variance and try to reconcile our run differential with the results. After taking a preliminary look at the numbers, it appears that the Rays are by and far in the lead in terms of runs scored variance.

Just want to know how you guys feel about the prospect of Kazmir in the pen as a closer or high-leverage type guy if he continues to struggle with injury/inefficiency/mechanics/crowd size/breaking pitches/location/umpires who call poor strike zones/too many Hot Cheese Fries the night before? Do you think it is possible that the Rays would consider a move to the pen for Kaz if he continues to simply struggle, or do you think they will move hiim to the DL? Do you think Kaz would even make sense in the pen, considering he is not generally good or on point in the 1st ever? Do you think Kaz smokes blunts or vaporizes or hits a Zong/Rowr or sticks to j's? WHAT IS GOING TO HAPPEN TO KAZMIR??? How would you feel about the Kaz-pen for the playoffs: Kazmir CL, Balfour SU, Howell SU, Nelson MR, Shouse LOOGY , Davis MR, and Sonnanstine (LR)? And the Kaz-less playoff rotation? Shields, Garza, Price, Niemann?'

btw before you all blast me: This is not my idea. I saw it on an MLBTR post and I was instantly intrigued. I know the whole "bullpen pitches way fewer innings so saves way total fewer runs compared to replacement" argument and that's obviously true - I'm suggesting that if Kaz continues to have control, efficiency, and other struggles as a starter. would a move to the pen help?

Just throwing it out there.

Arguably, the main reason that the Rays were able to contend in 2008 was the presence of acquired and drafted pre-arbitration talent. ALCS MVP? Matt Garza (2.9 wins). OBP leader? Bossman Junior (4.6 wins). Future ace? David Price (not that many wins in 2008 but he did save Game 7 of the ALCS, throw me a bone here). Innings eater? Andy Sonnanstine (3.6 wins). All of these players combined earned less than Carl Pavano in 2008, yet contributed almost 12 wins above replacement to the team. The problem is that many of these players will soon be due for arbitration, and barring any poor performances (another issue in itself), they will be due for some pretty big raises. BJ has already indicated his preference to go "year-to-year" in arbitration, seeking top dollar for his talents. Sonnanstine and Garza are both up for arbitration after this season and will certainly both look for significant raises. Friedman has indicated in his tenure his preference to sign these young stars to below-market, long-term deals that are generally seen as "Club Friendly" (see: Evan Longoria, Jamie Shields, Willy Aybar, Scott Kazmir) in order to control costs. The problem is that a player of Upton's caliber could command anywhere from $3 to $8+ million in his FIRST year of arbitration, and if BJ posts a 20/20 (or even 30/30) season with a 900+ OPS, he will look for Ryan Howard money.

I just don't see how the Rays will be able to afford Bossman, Garza, Sonnanstine, Price, and several others through the arbitration process. Philly saw a massive increase in payroll this offseason with few additions to the team thanks to the arbitration process, limiting their flexibility in free agency to the point that they couldn't cough up the change to sign an established set-up type like Will Ohman. I don't think Sternberg and company can afford such cost uncertainty, especially in this economic climate.

The Marlins faced similar issues after their WS wins and chose to deal with the issue by dealing away their arb-eligible stars for younger, cheaper talent. The question is the return - will front offices continue to pay big in prospects for arb-eligible guys who command higher, near market-value contracts? I don't think so, and the Rays may face a problem in this area.

To make it simple: trade value is a function of many things, but the four most important factors are cost, production, length of control, and need. Theoretically, at the moment of signing, a free agent carries "0" trade value if he signs with the highest-offering team because he is playing for what he is worth on the market. Conversely, young players signed to team-friendly contracts (Evan and James) are highly valuable because they produce, they are under control for a long time and below market value, and they are on the upswing of their careers.

I would like to see what you guys think will happen to the pre-arb and arb-eligible players: BJ, Garza, Sonnanstine, Price, Bartlett, etc. I, for one, do not think that the Rays will be willing to go year-to-year with high-production guys like BJ and (hopefully) Price. It's therefore my prediction that Sonnanstine will be traded after the end of this year (when he is up for arbitration) and replaced with Davis or Niemann in the rotation. Similarly, I think that BJ will eventually find himself in a new uniform in return for some good hitting prospects and depth in our system.

(By the way, I am still working on the discrete differential simulation project I was talking about earlier. I'm finishing the programming part of it, which I will probably end up posting here in about a couple of days, but I still need a little help with the data side. In particular, I need to be able to produce a "PA log" of the player, meaning all of his PA's from his very first appearance numbered and tied to a specific outcome - 1B, 2B, 3B, HR, BB, SOS, SOL, GO, FO, etc. I asked a little earlier about this and got some help but I'm still looking for a good source of downloadable player data that would include this type of information, specifically the SOS/SOL and GO/FO outcomes. A lot of the data sources only include "out" and "strikeout" as out types rather than breaking them down in this way, so that would be helpful if anyone can give me a link or a tip. Or, if you know of a good way to export game logs/download game logs, specifically in the PA-outcome format, please let me know.)

First, my help request: WHERE can i find data logs or game logs for players for the past few seasons? The simulation needs to know specific AB results, as in not just 24 HR and 110 RBI, but as in AB 145 was a strikeout looking. Let me know where I Can find this stuff.

Hey, so I am working on developing a simulation in C++ that will model a player (position or pitcher) season by AB in the following way:

Initial outcome space: (AB=0)

Determined by 1/4 weight to past 5 AB, 1/4 weight to first 10 AB last season, 1/2 weight to career line

Use outcome space to form initial outcome (random function with weights for all outcomes)

First step (AB=1)

d(outcome)/d(AB) = 1/4 * prob(past 5 outcomes, including AB=1 and four from the previous season) + 1/4 * prob(outcomes within +/- 10 AB of the same numbered AB last season) + 1/4 * prob(average of last two seasons) + 1/4 prob(career line)

Outcome space (AB=1)

add all the d/dAB's to the outcome probabilities. This should be approximately 0 for most outcomes, except for the outcome that just happened in AB=1. Note that d/dAB doesn't ever decrease for any outcome, but rather, simply increases for some outcomes more than others. This is what creates the secondary effects that make the simulation fun.

Second step (AB=2)

Determined by outcome space, probabilistically

d(outcome)/d(AB) changes in the same way, including AB=1 and AB=2

Iterate for as many AB's as you would like.

Do the same for pitchers, but obviously reverse the outcome space.

Obviously, the weights and choices of games are totally arbitrary at this point, but I'm going to develop it this way first in order to get some results and publish the program here in a day or two. If there are any experienced C++ guys or data miners, PLEASE let me know!!!!

Hey all,

First of all I was really thrilled by some of the responses to my last post about differential basbeall analysis. I am doing some of the math behind the project right now (I unfortunately had no takers in helping me on the stats/data mining side), and I am already seeing some very interesting results about the real, negative value of "ground ball" hitters as well as guys without patience. One of the interesting consequences of differentials is the existence of many secondary effects, and GB hitters as well as those who don't see too many pitches have a very real and negative type of secondary effect that I will be measuring. Hint: in this system, Bartlett is a very, very poor hitter for your team, not individually.

Second of all, I wanted to ask everyone's opinion about Stephen Strasburg, the rookie phenom who is apparently the next coming of everyone from Barry Sanders to Carey Price and everything in between. His agent, venerable Scott Boras, is reportedly seeking a $50 MM deal for Strasburg's rookie contract.

Strasburg is clearly the best available player in the draft. He throws in the high 90's, sometimes topping 100, doesn't walk many people, and seems to have at least three major-league quality pitches already. One scout (probably a cronie of Mr. Boras) has hyped that Strasburg is already a better pitcher than AJ Burnett, a claim I find pretty ridiculous given Strasburg's zero pro ball experience.

The Nationals, thanks to winning fewer than 60 games last season, have the distinct advantage of picking first this year, and Strasburg should be a no-brainer. Except the kid (Boras) wants a $50 MM deal with a $10 MM signing bonus included. This is more money than we committed to Pat Burrell, a proven (if defensively inept) major league hitter who is expected to provide an impact bat to the offense. Washington really has its hands tied here: the financial committment to Strasburg, however large it may be, will probably tie its hands over the next few seasons. Who's to say Strasburg doesn't crash and burn at the major league level, or at least not produce up to expectations for a season or two. For $50 MM, you can get three years of Derek Lowe consistency or two years of the best right-handed hitter in baseball. For $50 MM, you should be getting a sure thing. And, financially-strapped, small-market teams (which are more likely to receive high draft picks due to smaller budgets) are now being put in a position where they may not be able to select the best overall available player because the player is willing to sit out.

Don't get me wrong here - I'm a big believer in the free market, and I think that the draft may not really even be the best or most fair way to get rookie players to teams. I'm totally against a salary cap in baseball (or any organized sport) and I like to see market-setting behavior from teams such as the Yankees and Dodgers, who basically determine player prices after acquiring top-line talent. The problem is, without any way of controlling rookie salary demands, struggling organizations such as Washington will not be able to select the best overall player, and if they choose to do so, they risk not being able to sign him to an earthly deal. This is a problem going on in many sports, including the NFL.

The NHL caps rookie contracts. I don't think this is the right approach. But, players who declare for the draft should be signable at a modest rate, no matter what kind of potential or current skills the players may possess. If the player is truly spectacular, he will make money through the arbitration process in as soon as two years. He could be commanding Ryan Howard money if he is successful, and then the Nationals will be even more strapped for cash. At least if he is signed, however, he is tradeable, and they can move him before arbitration kicks in.

What should baseball do? Here's my suggestion: Create an "opt-in" system. What  mean by this is that baseball should force rookies to declare whether or not they will go to and agree by an arbitration hearing should they not sign a contract with a willing team. If the player opts in, he and/or the team can request arbitration, and the two parties must agree to abide and sign by the arbitor's decision. If a player opts in, he is eligible for arbitration as a "Super Two."

If the player chooses not to opt-in, he can still declare for the draft but his status will be noted as such and he will not be eligible for arbitration until after his third year, no matter how he performs the first three.

I don't know if the players' union will go for this (most likely not) but it could easily be tied into other changes in the arbitration and compensation system that make equal or better concessions for veteran players and other such nonsense. The point is that by forcing an arbitration hearing, the team knows that cost control won't be so much of an issue (it will be hard for any agent, including Boras himself, to convince an arbitor that his rookie should receive a $50 MM deal before ever playing a single day in the majors).

That's just my two cents. Let me know what your suggestions are!

So I'm probably not running across anything too groundbreaking right here, but I think I'll give it a whirl none the less: baseball is a game that lends itself to statistical analysis, and rightfully so - the large game/PA sample size leads to statistically relevant, significant, and noticable differences between players at every position. The problem with traditional baseball statistics, however, is consistency: a team may get "hot" at the right or wrong times, hit like crazy and pitch lights out, and all of the sudden seemingly collapse at the end of the season or during a long losing streak. Losing, hitting, and hitless streaks are quite statistically improbable. For example, consider a .300 hitter going on a 10 AB hitless streak - the probability of that event is 0.700^10, which is about 2.8%. This happens quite frequently in baseball, seemingly more often than the numbers would seem to suggest.

That is because of a simple principle: prior performance is the best indicator of future success. This seems to be true in both the short and long runs, and how you can you deny the logic? A pitcher who has performed well recently will probably continue to perform well, and a pitcher who has given up home runs, walks, and hits like nobody's business will probably continue to do so. At the same time, some hitters are rather "streaky" (or are considered that way, at least) and tend to hit better in one portion of the season, hit at a high clip for short periods of time, or reach hitless streaks that make Andruw Jones and Jason Varitek cry. In economics, we say "averages are better than extremes," and so if starters A and B pitch to the tune of a 3.75 ERA, the one who is more consistent should be considered the better starter. That is, if starter A gives up 1-2 runs per start but never blows up, whereas starter B may pitch lights out but also gets nerve-rattled about 10 starts a year, you have two players with contrasting values. In economic terms, in terms of cost control, and in most cases in baseball, starter A is more valuable than starter B because he is more consistent and has less variation in earned runs per inning pitched.

So, going along with this general principle, what if we considered inter-seasonal statistical progressions and regressions using differential equations? In other words, what if we try to describe or predict the team runs scored / runs allowed in a particular outing strictly based on prior performance over the past three, four, or five outings as well as their general running seasonal averages? Would the result be useful and insightful, or a wasted exercise in mathematics? If we know that the Rays will be a "Summer" team and the Sox will be a "September" team in advance, because the pitchers and hitters seem to trend that way?

I think it would be really interesting to see this worked out and played out mathematically. It would be a tough differential system to figure, especially since there are so many players and it is difficult to verify with any kind of certainty which data should be ignored and which data should be examined. In the end, however, we should use prior game performance (again, in the small but statistically significant range) to see how streaks, consistency, and prior performance affect the standings and the statistics.

I am a math and economics major, if you can't tell, and I am willing to do all of the math behind this project. I'm sure it has been done before in some incarnation and it will be an exercise for math students in the future, but if you are a data miner and interested in working on an alternative analysis and getting your name out there, let me know and I will hook it up. Also, please give me any thoughts on this approach.

Well, a lot of the posts and comments in the next couple of days are going to focus on the likes of Jeff Niemann and Jason Hammel, two Rays organization RHP who are out of options. Niemann has not had much time in the majors whereas Hammel has served time as both a starter and as a reliever, mediocre at best in both cases. We do have a jogjam at SP, but that doesn't mean we have to trade away either of those two guys for chump change. Hammel is a serviceble #5 type who will give you GB outs and an acceptable number of strikesouts at about 4.8-5.0 FIP. Niemann, on the other hand, is a projectible righty who has seen success, albeit not wild success, in all levels of the minor leagues. You have to be a little bit excited about Niemann, watching him throw from such a great arm slot and at that height. I believe he has #3 - #4 starter potential in the major leagues, and I think his upside is deecentl. Either way, we shouldn't have to DFA these guys, and really, everybody in baseball knows this. So, why trade away a valuable part of your farm system for a Jason Hammel type when you know he's going on waivers anyway?

This is a real problem for the Rays and one that they will need to find a creative way to solve. One way is to keep Hammel and Niemann on the 25-man roster, which is certainly a possibility given that David Price still has tons of options and only a few starts above the AAA level. In a good case scenario, Hammel works as a servicible reliever and Niemann gets to start from the #5 spot. Perhaps Joe will switch it around and spot-start Hammel for Niemann if necessary. I think this good-case scenario sees Hammel working around a 4.2 FIP clip in 23 innings and Niemann working around a 4.0 FIP clip over, say, 77 innings. If David Price is ready, by that time we will either have an injury on our own staff (cough Garza cough) and we very well may need the services of Price anyway. If Price strugles in AAA, we could see Davis or Talbot get a shot as well. But, even if we are lucky and healthy, somebody else in baseball will finally break down from roids or Cialis and the result will be a need for a good SP who is proven, young, strikes people out - Oh wait, maybe that will be Jeff Niemann! With his slider and his frame, you have to like his chances as a good starter in the majors. Hammel could also be trade bait - I don't think he mentally understands the game well enough to ever succeed in any role.. He is a thrower, not a pitcher.

But, let's say (and God forbid this happens) that Niemann absolutely dominates and the rest of the rotation is solid. Now, we have a great trade chip (and believe me, Niemann has the stuff to get lucky and go on a 5 game, 2 ER or less streak because he can bring it) and you know some idiot GM is going to overvalue Niemann and trade for him. Then we can pick up an offensive piece that we need, such as a true long-term solution at RF, C (I'm not a Navi fan), 1B after Pena, SS, or maybe some low-level prospects. EIther way, we'll get some value for a guy who really didn't have enough innings to prove himself.

Finally, the worst-case scenario:: Hammel and/or NIemann blow. This is possible and with Hammel it may be probable. Hammel is a bit too hittable for the major leagues and Niemann can get ahead of himself on the mound sometimes, so they dould hvae poor years. So what? We trade them for nothing, use them as mop-up guys, or DFA them - chances are that if Hammel was DFA'ed at that point, nobody would pick him uo, Niemann, on the other hand, would be history.

Now, what about Price? Yes, I've met the guy in person, and I'll just say that if you know what 420 means then he's chill as fuck. But anyway, he told me that he didn't expect to make it out of camp this year no matter what, that Andrew Friedman explained to him that "even though you are clearly the be option at the 5 to win games now, you are not the best option there to win the most total games for us in the next six years." In other words, it hurts the team and Price when they lose trade value just because guys happen to be out of options. Price also does need work on his changeup; I've seen it in person, it is an elite-lvel high-school quality pitch. It will be crushed by the Pujols and the Ramirezes of the world.

Finally, here's my rant about trade value. People always pose stupid ass questions on ESPN like "Would you trade Albert Pujols for ARod?" or "Would you rather have Evan Longoria or Chipper Jones?" that in terms of actual baseball business have no meanings. Let me give everybody here who doesn't know (or maybe isn't clear) an idea of what trade value is:

Trade Value = Projected value wins (in dollars) over time of control - Cost over entire time of control.

For  example, A-Rod has very limited trade value. Many (including myself) would say that A-Rod has a negative trade value, and that is because the market for players and the value of wins is declining as the economy tanks. So, if you thought that a win was worth, say, $8 million dollars, you may pay A-Rod $300 million over 10 yearsif you expect to break even at 37.5 wins, or a 3.75 win-per-year clip, which is reasonable but certainly not earth-shattering. On the other hand, given all of the negative publicity on the A-Rod divorce, contract, steroids, Jeter, etc., his trade value is actually most likely NEGATIVE right now. Think of it as an investment. Maybe you bought Microsoft when it was worth $100 a share, then it dips to $75 a share. Either way, it's YOUR liability and thus nobody really wants A-Rod at that rate and for that period of time.

On the other hand, players who are still in pre-arbitration years are pretty valuable considering you can basically dictate their salaries to them like Mousillini to the Italians for the first three (or ocasionally, two) years of their MLB existance. So, these players have EXTREMELY HIGH VALUE

BJ Upton is soon going to be arbitration eligible and he is already indicating a preference for "year-to-year" negotiations. How will the Rays ownership afford the enormous price tag placed on him by the same committee that gave a poor defensive first baseman who struck out 200 times multiple seasons $8 million in his first year of arb? Point is, if BJ has the 300/400/550 season with 30+ SB that we all know he is perfectly capable of doing, we're looking at a guy who may want $10 M in first year arb! Let's not even talk about 2nd and 3rd arb, because that's just nasty.

So, if he has that monster season, look for the Rays to trade him after the season. I know, I love BJ and he is a great asset to this team, but he's pricey! He would command an enormous return in ML-ready talent and good lower level prospects to refill the Rays depleted system for 2012 and beyond, which is lacking that kind of hitting talent that a good system desperately needs. If we continue winning, our free agent spending and trade moves will become even more relveant as our draft position gets worse and worse. Let's say we get Taylor Teagarden, plus tons of good lower level prospects and/or Ian Kinsler, from the Texas Rangers for BJ. Here, we have a guy who will probably not have as great of numbers as from last year, but is a clear and present danger at the plate compared to our current catcher, We upgrade at a premium position this way but we do lose a + center fielder. Luckily, there are many great defensive fielders out there who can't hit and will play for the league minimum. Oh yeah! Navarro, right? What about him? We trade him away for help at short. My proposal: Navarro and Jake McGee for Troy Tut.

Thoughts?

Hey, so I was hoping there would be some people here watching the WBC, which I have found to be very entertaining so far. I know Korea is down pretty badly right now, 8-2, but their hitters seem to all have great fundamental approaches and some of them really do have the size and bat speed to make it in the majors. They have some SERIOUS pop too. Even though he gave up 8 ERs in 1l.1 IP, I was still impressed with the Korean lefty starter, who seemed to have pretty good stuff but suffered through some of the worst game calling I have ever seen by a catcher. I think Korea has the type of hitting (and on-base ) skills necessary to move on deep into the tourney. Of course, you have to like Japan here, because their team is stacked with great players such as Ichiro, Aki, Dice-K, Yu Darvish, and all the rest of them. It will be interesting to see how the rest of the game goes...

With the economic signing of Brad Penny for 2009, the Sox have probably finished revamping their rotation for 2009 and thus the rotations for the AL East contenders (New York, Boston, Tampa) have been finalized. Let's take a look at each of the projected rotations (with handedness and 2008 FIP):

New York

1. CC Sabathia (L) 2.91
2. AJ Burnett (R) 3.45
3. Chieng-Ming Wang (R) 3.91
4. Andy Pettitte/Phil Hughes (L/R) 3.66/4.34
5. Joba Chamberlain/Phil Hughes (R/R) 2.65/4.34

Boston

1. Josh Beckett (R) 3.60
2. Jon Lester (L) 3.64
3. Dice-K (R) 4.03
4. Tim Wakefield/Clay Bucholz (R/R) 4.84/4.82
5. Brad Penny/Clay Bucholz (R/R)  5.27/4.82

Tampa Bay

1. James Shields (R) 3.82
2. Scott Kazmir (L) 4.37
3. Matt Garza (R) 4.14
4. Andy Sonnanstine (R) 3.91
5. David Price (L) 3.42

Now, my gut feeling is that Andy will take the 10 MM offer on the table from the Yanks as he won't want to pitch in hitter-friendly Texas and very few teams will even offer him close to such a deal. It's a shame, but Boston will likely hold Bucholz back regardless of how he does in Spring Training and put Masterson in the bullpen to set-up Mr. Papelbon. It's also possible that David Price doesn't start the year in the majors but barring an injury or control setback, it's very likely that he sees 150+ IP in the major leagues this season, so I'm going to slot him as our number 5.

One immediate thing to take from all of this is that Boston has only one lefty in the rotation and only one solid lefty in the pen, which is all the more encouragement for us to pick up a decent right-handed bat. I think this puts Boston at a distinct disadvantage when compared to the Rays/Yanks.

Another observation is that the Yanks clearly have the strongest starting three, of course barring injury. CC is not just a power lefty, he usually has control, and he is always an innings-eating horse.  AJ is a strikeout guy whose 2008 campaign was much better than his ERA indicates. Wang is a sinkerballer who can always work deep into games and would project as the majority of ML teams #1.

Boston's starting three are also quite capable, as Beckett's FIP was significantly better than his ERA last year and is known to be a gamer/7+ innings guy. Lester is probably due for a little bit of a setback but he is still projected very well next year and can also work deep into games. Dice-K is the biggest question mark as his high walk totals will probably catch up to him eventually and he risks overexposing the Boston pen.

Tampa Bay's starting three did very well last year, but none of them have "elite" FIP's (Shields is best with a solid 3.82). While Shields can work deep into games, he doesn't seem to have the MPH to strike guys out with his fastball, and he can incorporated the changeup just as much as probably could last year as an out pitch. Kazmir is basically a better, lefty version of Dice-K who demonstrated extreme flyball tendencies last year while walking too many and failing to demonstrate an effective "out" pitch other than his fastball, which has always been rock solid. At any rate, I think that Shields and Kaz are proven enough at this point to be considered anchors of our rotation. Garza, on the other hand, is a ground-ball guy with great stuff but paltry strikeout numbers. If he can develop an effective out pitch he can really improve his strikeout numbers (and FIP).

The back ends of the Tampa Bay and New York rotations project to be quite good. Sonny is likely due for an improvement next season given his awesome control and ground-ball tendencies, and we all know what Price can do. On the other hand, New York will probably end up signing Pettitte, who is a strikeout lefty and a proven winner. Joba Chamberlain is the right-handed, fatter David Price with a little more life on his fastball and a little less on his slider. Boston seems to be at a considerable disadvantage in the back-end, given that they are hoping for a rebound season from Brad Penny and relying on the randomness that is Tim Wakefield. Overall, I'd give the Rays a slight edge over the Yankees, and a huge one over the Sox in this regard.

Overall, I think that the Yankees rotation is by far the best in the East, as it will likely feature four strikeout guys and three who can work deep into games to avoid bullpen exposure. The Rays probably have the second-best rotation and definitely the deepest one. The one area of concern for the Rays are those darn K's - sometimes, you need to strike a guy out and only two of the Rays SP's are likely to be high strikeout guys (and they're both lefties!). Boston is the weakest, but not by much, and they are likely to move Bucholz up once he regains his control in the minors.

Here are a few things to think about in general:

• If Bucholz regains his control, he effectively rivals Price and Joba in the backend of the Boston Rotation and cuts out the wildcards Penny/Wake
• The Rays will need to continue to play stellar defense, especially if Kaz continues to struggle in generating groundouts
• The Rays have improved their outfield defense by adding Joyce and retaining Gabe Gross
• The Yankees have two guys who are injury risks, and they are #1/#2
• The Rays have tons of depth at SP (Niemann, Talbot, Davis), whereas the Sox have only some (Bowden, Bucholz) and the Yanks have barely any (Ian Kennedy, anyone?)
• The Yankees have SUBSTANTIALLY improved their infield defense by adding an ace defender at first base (from a minus minus one in Giambi)

I have a pretty good feeling on the baseball market and I correctly predicted today to my friend that the Yankees would sign Tex. I knew they would before the offseason started because they had more money coming off the books than anyone could possibly offer, and why not take the top three FA's (literally!!) available. Anyway, I have one more prediction to make, as stupid as it may sound - I think the Rays sign Manny on a two-year record deal in the range of two years, 60 mil. Manny could be our everyday DH and would obviously provide an insane right handed bat. Friedman is known to be "opportunistic" and the only other players in the race for Manny right now are the Dodgers, the Nats/Orioles, and maybe the Yankees, Angels, and Mets. If Friedman and Sternberg can swoop in and make Manny an offer he can't refuse (like being the highest paid player in the world, ever), he may just bite. He would still get a chance to stick it to the Sox, the move would put the Rays lineup at (projected OPS):

1. Iwamura (.330)
2. Crawford (.335)
3. Upton (.358)
4. Pena (.383)
5. Ramirez (.389)
6. Longoria (.366)
7. Joyce (.354)
8. Navarro (.319)
9. Bartlett (.315)

Notice how it goes L-R-L-R-L-R-L-S-R, as Joe has stated he likes it : - P.  Then take a look at the Marcels OPS projections. What a starting lineup!
Now here is my opening day 25-man prediction while we're on the subject:

Starting IF:

1B Carlos Pena 

2B Akinori Iwamura 

3B Evan Longoria 

SS Jason Bartlett 

Starting Catcher:

C Dioner Navarro

Starting Outfield:

LF Carl Crawford

CF BJ Upton

RF Matt Joyce

Starting DH:

OF Manny Ramirez

Starting Pitchers:

1. James Shields
2. Scott Kazmir
3. Matt Garza
4. David Price
5. Andy Sonnanstine

Relief Pitchers:

LR: Jeff Niemann

MR: JP Howell

MR: Chad Bradford 

MR: Derek Rodriguez

MR: Troy Percival (probably a trade here)

SU: Dan Wheeler

CL: Grant Balfour

Bench

IF Willy Aybar

IF Ben Zobrist

OF Gabe Gross

OF Fernando Perez

Backup Catcher

C Shawn Riggans

I am, like everybody else here, really pleased with the result of tonight's game.

However, I was very disappointed with the management of Joe Maddon. Anyone who knew anything about Kaz knew that he just wasn't "on" tonight, his fastball was flat, he had no command, he could not induce a ground ball to save his life, and he couldn't throw any secondary pitch for strikes. His pitch count was already obscenely high to start the 5th inning and we had two very viable long relief options in the pen, one of which is a #1 pick hard throwing premier lefty who none of the sox had really seen before. Yes, I am talking about Price. With the lead we had, why not give Price a shot for 1-2 innings? He would not have done worse than Kaz, and the pressure would not be too high as he was entering a clean, fresh inning with a 2-run lead. Granted, he has no real MLB experience (let alone playoff experience) but very few of our pitchers have playoff experience anyway. Imagine if we put in Price for 2 innings, then Bradford/Miller combo for 1, then Wheeler to set up, and Balfour to close. I think we would have faired pretty well. Where am I wrong here?

Instead of hanging onto our incredible stock in minor league pitching, why not trade a Wade Davis or Jeremy Hellickson for a couple top-line minor league hitting prospect like an Angel Salome, Michael Brantley, or Matt Gamel from the absolutely LOADED Milwuakee affiliate? This would give us what we need now and we would not waste our prospects on overvalued, proven ML starters at the trade deadline next year or in this winter meetings.

...from a comment on the heater blog. makes me wanna shoot myself.

Upton has great talent, and a POTENTIAL All Star, but he's not there yet. He's still a young punk who thinks that just because he's a MLB player he should have things handed to him. Unfortunately he's playing, and talking, as if he were still in Little League. What he has been forgetting to do are the basics tenents of Little League, especially for a centerfielder. You ALWAYS hustle. You NEVER forget how many outs there are and if you do ASK someone, especially the home plate umpire. His swing is lethargic at best. He seems very lazy, as if he doesn't want to be there. If that's the case, get him out of there. I'm sure there are many others who would love to take his place. Something makes me think that when Dukes and Young were traded he began to feel lost. Oh, and by the way, did anyone notice that the "chaw" that he has in his cheek has gotten bigger throughout the season as the "I care" commercials have been played with more frequency?

hey, now that bavasi is fired and ichiro was just moved back to right, where he is supposed to be anyway, why not make the trade for suzuki and make that rf a solid slot. we would have easily the best defensive outfield in baseball, a serious leadoff hitter in ichiro, plus Aki can hit for power now and drive in some runs in the 6 or 7 hole. it would only be a minus becuse ichiro is lefty and that would make our lineup include 5 lefties

Hey, I was wondering... Aybar is not too slow and seems to have a decent arm at 3B when he plays there... why not try him in RF once or twice to see how well he does? It could really pay off offensively big time. he's hitting 293 with some HRs and a lot of 2B so he could be a nice power bat in our lineup. Defensively I know he hasnt really played the position but he's an athlete and I think he would hold his own, at least compared to Hinske and Gomes.

1. Trade Hellickson and Hammel for Holliday. We get a great OF (that can play RF if he needs to) and the Rockies get a high ceiling prospect in Hellickson as well as an MLB ready SP in Hammel, both of which they say they need. We could even throw in another prospect from High A or AA Montgomery if need be. After all, even though the Yanks have the most $$$, trades require prospects and players, and we are rich in those.

2. Sign Bonds. $5 million deal about right before the all start break.

Our lineup then looks like:

Iwamura

Crawford

Upton

Bonds

Holliday

Pena

Longoria

Navarro

Bartlett

Our bench is: Gomes, Hinkse, Floyd (pretty damned impressive), and they will get playing time because Bonds is a part time player anyway.

With this kind of power and speed, combined with our great pitching/defense, we would be unstoppable.