2013 Fluke or Future - Shin-Soo Choo

General managers looking for outfielders had two really great choices this off season. One was Ellsbury and the Yankees have snatched him up. The other is Shin-Soo Choo. News about Choo's free agency have been rather quiet and you would figure that after the season he just had, GMs would be jumping all over themselves to land the Korean-born star. The fact is that you cannot even find his name on the first page of mlbtraderumors.com. So what gives? Are GMs doing the same thing as me and wondering if Choo's 2013 was more fluke or a sign of future performance?

Choo might have been the steadier of the two outfield options. On-base percentage does not usually slump and Choo's has consistently been higher than Ellsbury. Choo has twice finished a season with a .400 or higher OBP. However, his walk rate did jump even higher in 2013. His walk rate has ranged during his career from 10.6% to 12.8%. But he had the phenomenal rate of 15.7% in 2013.

Can you call that a fluke? I don't think so. His plate discipline, always terrific, was even better (naturally) in 2013. He swung at only 20.8% of pitches outside of the strike zone. And he carried this consistently through the season. If you look at his splits, he never walked less than 17 times in any month of 2013. That is pretty remarkable. Add to the 112 walks (107 unintentional) the 26 times he was hit with a pitch and Choo was on base a remarkable 300 times on the nose in 2013.

That is amazing to me. But I think the part that is bothering teams is that Choo sort of got lost in 2011 and 2012. After being traded to Cleveland by the Mariners for Ben Broussard--one of the worst trades ever--Choo had terrific seasons in 2008, 2009 and 2010. 

But then, as memory serves, he was stopped for drinking and driving before the 2011 season and it seemed like he never recovered from that. And after a two down years, the Indians included him as part of a humongous three-team trade that included the Diamondbacks and Reds. Choo ended up being a one year rental for the Reds and he rewarded them with a fantastic season.

So what do you make of 2011 and 2012? If you look at 2008 through 2010, you get WAR values of 3.0, 4.8 and 5.9. Terrific, right? But then 2011 and 2012 and 1.3 and 2.4. Weird. But he was back to 5.2 fWAR (4.8 rWAR) in 2013. So what do you believe then?

I believe he simply got lost for a two year period. He now has four solid years of production. He is going to bat between .280 and .300. His on-base percentage is going to be between .380 and .400 and he will add 18 to 20 homers and 35 to 40 doubles. That is kind of hard to beat.

Unless you look at fielding data. Ugh. His fielding stats are ugly. And you would smartly say that Choo played out of position for all of 2013. The Reds played him in center field. He is not a center fielder and it showed. Fangraphs.com gave him a minus 13.3 runs below average. Baseball-reference.com was even harsher and gave him -16.6. So fine, move him back to right field.

The problem was that he played 154 games in right field for the Indians in 2012 and scored -23.6 according to Fangraphs. B-R was much, much kinder to Choo in RF in 2012. My take is that if you put him back in right, he is going to be fine. He will be just below league average, which is doable with his offensive contributions. 

Oliver projections for the next five years show Choo peaking at 4.8 in 2014 and then going down a couple of notches every year for the next five, but still maintaining his on-base skills. I think that is a little conservative. I would be doubtful that Choo can maintain the .390+ wOBA he put up in 2013, but he is going to be a productive offensive player for the next five years. He has bad splits against lefties, but that does not happen nearly as often, so it is acceptable.

I do not think Choo's 2013 was a fluke season. He is a really good offensive player who is going to help whichever team he ends up with. I just wonder which team that is going to be.

2013 fluke or future - Colby Rasmus

Would you believe me if I told you that Colby Rasmus' slugging percentage was only seven points lower than McCutchen in 2013? Would you believe me if I told you that he had a more valuable season than Adam Jones? How about if I told you that he had a better defensive season than Span, Ellsbury, Blanco and McCutchen? I would not blame you if you would not have believed any of those. Neither did I until I saw them. Was this 2013 season by Colby Rasmus a fluke or what his future will look like?

What do the experts think? I like to look at projections, especially this time of year. The first thing I did was look at last year's ZiPS projection for Rasmus. While ZiPS was dead on for his total doubles and homers, that projection was for a full 588 plate appearances. Due to a couple of bouts with injury, Rasmus only played 118 games and compiled only 458 plate appearances. So Rasmus easily beat his power projections and his batting average and on-base percentage projections too.

But it is hard to blame ZiPS for what it came up with. After a breakout season in 2010, Rasmus ran afoul of Tony LaRussa in one of the most famous doghouse incidents in recent times and then got lost for a couple of years. All Rasmus could muster was a .688 OPS in 2011 and a .689 OPS in 2012. Therefore, ZiPS projection of a .749 OPS for Rasmus in 2013 seemed overly bullish. But Rasmus blew that away and finished with an OPS of .840, 91 points higher.

So the projections would be more optimistic for 2014, right? Wrong. ZiPS has not gotten to the Blue Jays yet (from what I could find). But Steamer and Oliver have put theirs out and they predict Rasmus to fall back to .771 and .770 respectively. Oliver goes further and gives a five year projection. That system never expects him to be as good as he was in 2013.

There must be obvious reasons for the lack of faith in what Rasmus did in 2013. For one thing, Rasmus had a BABIP of .356. That had to be lucky right? His last two seasons before that featured him not being able to achieve a BABIP over .270. But Rasmus once had a season with that high a BABIP--2010.

Obviously, the projections are not buying it. But perhaps you can consider that Rasmus had his best ever line drive percentage in 2013. He had never gone over 20% in that category before and his line drive percentage was 22% in 2013. You hit that many ropes and your BABIP will get a boost. You could say it was a fluke. But what if it wasn't?

Rasmus also had his lowest ground ball rate since (yeah, there is a theme here) 2010. And a higher percentage of those fly balls went over the fence than ever before in his career (17.3%). So more of his fly balls left the yard and his line drive percentage spiked. That will help your BABIP.

There is another thing the projections might be seeing and that is the strikeout and walk rates. Rasmus did compile his highest strikeout rate in 2013 and his lowest walk rate. His swing and miss rate was also the highest of his career. His strikeout rate in 2013 was just a bit higher than (oh my) 2010 and then went down in 2011 and 2012. The interesting thing here is that his percentage of swings at pitches out of the strike zone dipped under 30% for the first time in his career. So he is a bit more selective but is swinging and missing a lot.

Wasn't it the strikeouts that first put him in LaRussa's doghouse?

I can see where the projections might be skeptical of Rasmus. The BABIP, strikeouts and walks would put a analytic damper on things. But the projections also knock down his defense. And, again, it is a bit understandable. His defense was worth 11.5 runs above average in 2009 but then fell into the negative in 2010 and 2011. He bounced back with 2.1 runs in the positive in 2012 and then seemed to explode to 12.9 runs in 2013.

So it is easy to see what the "machine" is looking at. Oliver gives him a projection of 3.8 runs above average and Steamer, six. So Steamer is a bit more optimistic.

I get where the math comes from. The algorithms look at the cold hard data and that is the purpose. But what if there were circumstances involved the algorithms cannot see? Maybe the LaRussa thing really messed him up for a couple of years. Maybe he was immature and did not handle things well. The mental part of the game is something that cannot be measured.

Maybe he is in a better place in his life and in a more supportive atmosphere, the same one that made stars of Bautista and Encarnacion. Colby Rasmus is only 27 years old. I am being bullish here and thinking that 2013 might not have been a fluke. Maybe it is a case of a former #1 draft pick finding himself. Perhaps the future only gets brighter from here. I will feel a little more confident in that pronouncement if he can repeat or better his 2013 season in the year or two to come.

I will leave you with this last bit of mind wandering. Think of the defense up the middle of two guys LaRussa chased out of St. Louis. Think of how crazy good Brendan Ryan is at short and Rasmus is in center. Imagine how scary good the Cardinals could have been in 2013 with those two instead of Kozma and Jay!

Can Hamilton and Pujols bounce back?

When Robinson Cano signed his mega-deal with the Seattle Mariners, the two names that came up most often in stories and comparisons were Albert Pujols and Josh Hamilton. The two recent free agent sweepstakes winners were used as the counterweight of what can go wrong with signing long-term deals to players past their primes. Instead of "Remember the Maine" being used as a battle cry, we heard, "Remember Pujols and Hamilton." Forget the money for a moment. The two Angel players are going to get paid insane amounts of money. There is nothing to be done about that fact. But can they come back in 2014 and contribute?

Let's start with Josh Hamilton. Unlike Pujols, Hamilton appeared to be healthy in 2013. He played in 151 games, which, when it comes to Hamilton's past injury history, you would have taken gladly. But he did not produce and became all but forgotten in the grand scheme of things. His wOBA of .319 (OPS+ of 108) was the lowest of his career. His 21 homers were half of his 2012 season. His lack of luster in play led him to become, along with Pujols, the symbol of all that had gone wrong for the Angels.

So what went wrong? For one, he did not enjoy success hitting at home. After successful years hitting at Rangers Ballpark and putting up a career .964 OPS there, Hamilton could only muster a triple slash line at Angel Stadium of .236/.289/.401. That paltry .690 OPS at home compares pretty snugly to the career .717 OPS for his career in that ballpark. Sometimes you have to wonder if agents and players think about ballparks when considering offers. It is clear that Angel Stadium is not conducive to Hamilton's success.

Hamilton hit much better on the road. And while his .787 road OPS is much better, it is still below his standards. So what else went wrong then?

One key statistic is his pitch value against the fastball. In his two great years in Texas, his fastball pitch values were over 30 runs per season. In his lesser years there, his values against the fastball were still fearsome at 19.0 and 18.4 runs above average in 2011 and 2012. That plummeted to only 5.7 runs above average in 2013.

While he used to kill fastballs, Hamilton held his own against other pitch types. But in 2013, the slider killed him. While never previously finishing below -2.4 runs against that pitch and often scoring above average in most other years, Hamilton had a pitch value against the slider of -12.7 runs. Wow!

Word gets around on such things and pitchers exploited Hamilton with the slider. He saw the pitch 19.5% in 2013, the highest of his career.

The real thing most people talk about when it comes to Hamilton is his free-swinging ways. Much has been made about his O-swing rate or the rate Hamilton swings at pitches out of the strike zone. Fangraphs.com rates Hamilton's increase in doing so way more than PitchF/X does, which makes you wonder which one is more accurate.

If you believe Fangraphs, then his O-swing rate the last three years has gone through the roof. But if you believe PitchF/X, then he had a one-year blip in 2012 and his rate in 2013 was near his career norms.

Whichever is correct, there is no denying that Hamilton has no plate discipline. When a 30% O-swing rate or lower is the ideal, then Hamilton's PitchF/X career average of 39% is not good and never has been. But Hamilton produced despite that fact until 2013.

So is he done then as a productive player? I have a hard time making that pronouncement. If you look at his career, he has always had swings in his years. 2009 was otherworldly and then 2010 was not. In fairness, there was some injury problems there.

There is a little hope in that his second half of 2013 was much better than his first half. And he finished real strong in September, though it is troubling that his homer total fell off in the second half. Hamilton's batting average and on-base percentage improved dramatically in the second half, but his first half contained more power.

While there is hope that Hamilton bounces back in 2014, I don't expect it. Half of his games are in a ballpark where he has never seemed comfortable at the plate. Unless he can adjust to the slider pitchers are feeding him and get his groove back against fastballs, then Hamilton becomes an .800 OPS guy, which simply is not enough to help the Angels where they need to go.

So far the projections match my feelings that Albert Pujols will bounce back some in 2014. You have to assume that 2013's results were totally from injuries suffered to Albert's wheels. He tried to play and could barely walk, never mind run and still hit 17 homers in 99 games.

And yes, 2013 finished a three year arc of decline for Pujols that has seen his OPS fall from consistently over one to .906 his last year in St. Louis to .859 in 2012 and then .767 in 2013. I still believe much of 2012 and 2013's problems were health related but time will tell.

All I know is that for Albert Pujols' first ten years, he was right up there with the greats of all time. At the age of 33, he only needs eight more homers for 500. In only 13 years, he has compiled over 2,300 hits and over a thousand extra base hits. Does a guy like that just fall into sheep dip? Maybe. Maybe not.

Like Hamilton, Pujols has fallen off against the fastball. He killed them in the past and fell off in his last year at St. Louis to half his previous value against fastballs and then that was cut in half again in 2013. Pujols never had negative values against any pitch type in his first ten years but was in the negative on three different pitch types in 2013.

Steamer and Oliver both project Pujols to bounce back somewhat in 2014. Though that bounce back will not get him back to where he was in his first ten years, it is still a projection that is optimistic that he will have some impact for the Angels.

Personally, I don't think Pujols is done as a player and I expect one or two more big seasons from him. I do believe his health has not been optimal since 2011. If he can come back feeling good in 2014, then people may be surprised by what he does. Heck, Harmon Killebrew had an MVP season at the age of 33 after a down season plagued by injury. That slugger followed his MVP season with another great one at the age of 34.

For the Angels, you know that (if he stays healthy) Mike Trout is going to Mike Trout. But if Josh Hamilton and Albert Pujols can recapture some of their past glory and give the phenom some support, 2014 might be a far better scene for the Angels than 2013 was.

Deion Sanders and 14 / 6

I read a great piece by Stacey Gotsulias on It's About the Money, Stupid as she remembered the terrible 1990 New York Yankees team. There was one mention in the story that piqued my attention: Deion Sanders. Somehow I had forgotten that he began his baseball career as a member of the Yankees. I probably have erased the fact from my memory because Sanders did nothing really memorable for the Yankees and it was not until he went to the Braves that he had some interesting seasons.  As I do whenever I am curious, I quickly glanced at Deion Sanders' player page on Baseball-reference.com. One set of numbers really caught my eye: 14/6.

The year was 1992 and it proved to be Sanders' best year in baseball. Don't get me wrong, to be a two-sport athlete with both the MLB and NFL on your resume is pretty astounding and worthy of admiration. But for most of his time in the Majors, Sanders really was not all that great a player. He had three good seasons out of nine (most were partial seasons, which again was amazing as he split time with his NFL duties). But he was very good in 1992.

Sanders played 97 games for the Braves in 1992 and still compiled 3.2 rWAR. He was a plus center fielder that season with an .841 OPS and 130 OPS+. He also had one of the most memorable World Series in a losing cause against the Blue Jays that season. He came to the plate 17 times in that World Series and got on base ten of them. Call it David Ortiz without the homers.

Okay, but here is the part that caught my eye. That season (1992), he hit fourteen triples. He also hit eight homers. But he only hit six doubles. Fourteen triples and only six doubles. That seemed very odd to me. The guy was blazing fast and it makes sense he would rarely stop at second and head right for third. But these numbers seemed freakish.

If you look at the most recent prolific triples hitters like Jimmy Rollins and Curtis Granderson, the years they hit a lot of triples, they also hit a lot of doubles and homers. So I did some quick work on B-R's Play Index and it turns out that nobody had ever done what Sanders did (with at least ten or more triples) before 1992 or since.

Nobody in baseball has ever had a higher triples to doubles ratio when hitting more than ten triples. The closest anyone ever came to Sanders' 2.33 ratio was Edd Roush who, in 1916, hit 15 triples and seven doubles (a 2.14 ratio). Nobody else ever had a higher than 2 to 1 triple to double ratio. Chief Wilson in 1912 came close with 36 triples and 19 doubles.

I hugely enjoyed both Deion Sanders' and Bo Jackson's careers. What they did was remarkable and I wonder if we will ever see the likes of that again. But what I like best about baseball is that there are always these odd little stats to discover like 1992 when Sanders hit 14 triples and only six doubles.

Injury prone, brittle and phooey

There are several discussion points or "memes" thrown around all the time that get my dander up. One of them is, "He plays to win." Gosh, athletes are competitors, so wouldn't like 97% of them play to win? Another large one lately is when a player is labeled, "injury prone" or "brittle." This last one is highly amplified by the recent free agent signings of Jacoby Ellsbury by the Yankees and Josh Johnson by the Padres. Ellsbury's signing, of course, was a big deal because of the Yankees/Red Sox angle and that the deal was so large and for seven years. Ellsbury was quickly stated by many to be injury prone. I have heard of measuring skill sets. But measuring a guy's ability to stay healthy? Come on.

Josh Johnson has missed a significant number of starts in four of his eight full big league seasons. Thus he is injury prone. Scott Kazmir miss years and had lost his fastball before he disappeared. So he is injury prone. What are we measuring here? Are we saying that some guys were born with more of a dark cloud over the heads? Are we saying that some guys are babies who go on the disabled list for every other thing? Do some players have a disposition to get hurt? Coco Crisp comes to mind there the way he throws his body all over the outfield when he plays out there. But even so, how much are injuries just random, freak events?

2013 was a banner year for injuries according to a great story by Jeff Zimmerman of Fangraphs.com. According to Zimmerman's data, there were 29,504 days lost by players to the disabled list. That is astounding. I found a different way of looking at it.

If there are eight position players on each team and there are thirty teams, that leaves 240 possible times where a player can play in 150 games (I didn't count the DH). Obviously, there are platoon situations that prevent that happening and some players prove to be poor during the season and are replaced. So that prevents many from playing in 150 or more games. What would you say that figure to be? Maybe half? Less than half?

According to some research I did last night, only 62 position players (ie, non-pitchers) played 150 games or more. That is some 25.8% of the total possible. Obviously, injuries play a factor. I also counted how many of those 62 were players aged 30 and higher. Only 21 of those guys played 150 games or more.

According to my data, the last three years have shown a sharp decrease in both areas. Here is my data:

	Players	over 30
Year	> 149 games	> 149 gms
2013	62	21
2012	64	26
2011	62	16
2010	74	29
2009	73	23
2008	67	24
2007	74	29
2006	74	24
2005	71	28
2004	69	28
2003	73	24
2002	75	21
2001	74	24
2000	75	30
1999	72	35
1998	90	38
1997	75	29
1996	74	31

And here it is in graph form:

The amount of players over 30 has decreased from the peak days of 1998 and 1999. Is this a PED thing? Perhaps. And from 1996 to 2003, the amount of total players over 150 games was always over 70. The last three years, that has shrunk to 62, 64 and 62 respectively. 

Looking over this data and combining it with Zimmerman's stuff just reinforces the idea that a lot of players are getting hurt. This stuff just happens. Occasionally, you get a player where it seems to happen a lot. There is Tulowitzki and even Brett Gardner. In the past, George Brett and Mickey Mantle were considered injury prone.

I consider most of these players to have been unfortunate. They have missed more than their share of games due to injury. Does that mean they are injury prone? Or does that just mean they have been unlucky?

And does such bad luck predict what will happen in the future? Unless it is a chronic injury such as Nick Johnson's wrist or Mantle's knee, I don't think that is fair or accurate. The odds of the Tulowitzki, Gardner, Johnson and, yeah, Ellsbury staying healthy in 2014 and each year beyond seem just the same as not. 

Players get hurt all the time. They hit the bags wrong when they slide or step on them. The dive and bounce off walls. They fall into seats. They get hit by pitches. These all seem random. I'm not a good numbers guy. I cannot give you foolproof data. But from my perspective, this injury prone stuff is all phooey. And every time somebody says that a guy is injury prone and it has nothing to do with a chronic problem, my teeth will continue to grit. 

Cost per win rising with free agents

Twenty-three free agent signings have been noted thus far, not including minor league deals. And so far, the cost per win above replacement has risen. It was not long ago that the cost per win was around $3.9 million. At the start of last year (if memory serves me correctly), that figure had risen to about $4.6. Fangraphs.com, for example, has risen its valuation from that figure to its current $5 million per win. To date, free agents are getting paid an average of $5.29 per win.

And that makes sense since free agents are usually signed in a bidding war for services going to the victor. Well...it makes sense for the top free agents. But relief pitchers--of which Rob Neyer famously called, "fungible"--and utility infielders are getting far above the current $5 million value.

I still think a team's strongest minor league infielder would do just as well as a utility infielder and make far less money.

To get my values, I averaged each player's fWAR over the last three seasons. Perhaps GMs go five years, I don't know. And then I divided the average yearly value of each contract by the three-year fWAR average to get a cost per win.

Joe Smith recently received a three year deal worth an average of $5.25 annually. His three year fWAR average is .67. Divide the $5.25 by .67 and you get $7.84 million per win, which is high. 

Nick Punto, on the other hand, got a one year deal worth $3 million and has averaged 1.37 fWAR per season the last three years which means his contract is paying $2.19 million per win. His agent should get fired.

Willie Bloomquist, as all of Twitter is attesting, just got a screaming deal from the Mariners that is worth $8.79 million per win. He either has a great agent or met a dumb GM. You decide.

Thirteen of the twenty-three free agents have been paid more than $5 million per win. The other ten are under. Interestingly, two of the recent PED signers both received less than the $5 million per win. Take that, Mr. Zeigler.

So far, according to my list, backup outfielders are underpaid, relievers are overpaid and the cost of utility infielders is all over the place. Starting pitchers are overpaid too. Phil Hughes and Tim Hudson both were given over $5 million per win contracts.

Just for my own curiosity, I will follow this and write updates once in a while. While WAR is not the be all and end all for how GMs must value free agents, it is interesting to see how each free agent makes out.

Here is my list:

	Total		Ave year	3 yr	Cost per	over/under
	in millions	Length	in millions	WAR Ave	Win	5
Brian McCann	85	5	17	2.77	6.14	1.14
Jhonny Peralta	52	4	13	3.67	3.55	-1.45
Marlon Byrd	18	2	9	1.63	5.52	0.52
Ricky Nolasco	49	4	12.25	2.87	4.27	-0.73
Tim Hudson	35	2	17.5	2.37	7.38	2.38
Josh Johnson	8	1	8	1.87	4.28	-0.72
Carlos Ruiz	26	3	8.67	3.17	2.73	-2.27
Dan Haren	10	1	10.00	4.03	2.48	-2.52
Scott Kazmir	22	2	11.00	0.40	27.50	22.50
Phil Hughes	24	3	8.00	1.43	5.59	0.59
Javier Lopez	13	3	4.33	0.60	7.22	2.22
Chris Young	7.25	1	7.25	2.50	2.90	-2.10
Jason Vargas	32	4	8.00	1.50	5.33	0.33
David Murphy	12	2	6.00	1.70	3.53	-1.47
Joe Smith	15.75	3	5.25	0.67	7.84	2.84
LaTroy Hawkins	2.5	1	2.50	0.43	5.81	0.81
Dioner Navarro	8	2	4.00	0.57	7.02	2.02
Giovany Soto	3.05	1	3.05	1.17	2.61	-2.39
Skip Schumaker	5	2	2.50	0.07	35.71	30.71
Nick Punto	3	1	3.00	1.37	2.19	-2.81
Willie Bloomquist	5.8	2	2.90	0.33	8.79	3.79
Brendan Ryan	4	2	2.00	1.20	1.67	-3.33
Brayan Pena	2.275	2	1.14	0.03	37.92	32.92
	442.625	53	8.35	1.58	5.29	0.29

Hall of Fame ballot is stuffed like a turkey

There were sixteen times during their films together that Oliver Hardy said to Stan Laurel, "Well, here's another nice mess you've gotten me into." That seems doubly fitting when considering this year's Hall of Fame ballot. Due to either total ineptitude or moral high horse-ism of the BBWAA, deserving candidates from the past several years are now lumped together with several newcomers and I count at least sixteen names on the ballot that should be no-doubt Hall of Fame members. And it is fairly easy to predict that only a few will be elected at most this year.

There are several obstacles this year's vote will face. First, half will vote for those either verified as PED users or rumored as such. Combine that with the artificial limit of only ten names on each ballot and half will be voting for people that the other half have stiffened their jaw against. This leaves only five other slots on the ballot they can vote for. So five other so-called "clean" players will not get in either. Add this to the blind part of the BBWAA vote that does not even cover or watch baseball and you have a mess.

Oh, and there is one other nasty bit of business. Many of those that are Hall of Fame deserving players are on the ballot for the first time and there is a large chunk of writers that do not like putting non-gods through on the first round. Oy.

And it will only get worse in the coming years as even more superstars of the sport are introduced to the ballot.

Here is my list of the sixteen definite Hall of Fame players on the ballot by rank:

1. Barry Bonds - I don't care if you hate him or not. And I do not care if there is an asterisk by his home run totals. If he had been through playing after 2000 season, he was already a Hall of Fame player. He won three MVP Awards before all the questions came into being. What is a Hall of Fame without one of the best players of all time?
2. Roger Clemens - Say what you will. The man was acquitted. As far as we know, he never failed a test. JAWS has him as the third best starting pitcher of all time. He blows away every Hall of Fame standard known to mankind. Again, what is a Hall of Fame without the third best pitcher of all time?
3. Greg Maddux - He might be one of the few who gets in. According to JAWS, he is the tenth best pitcher of all time. And there has been no hint of any controversy about him. He won four straight Cy Young Awards and from 1992 to 1998, his peak was breathtaking.
4. Mike Mussina - Most people have no idea how insanely good Mike Mussina was during his career. His best years in Baltimore were largely ignored due to his team and in his Yankee years, people remember his awful year and his masterful and iconic last season, his first as a 20-game winner. Mussina according to JAWS is the 28th best pitcher in baseball history.
5. Curt Schilling - Gosh, I hate this guy. But he was a Hall of Fame pitcher. In fact, JAWS has him higher than Mussina. And you can never forget his 11-2, 2.23 in the post season either. Schilling put up the numbers to be here this high on my list.
6. Mike Piazza - According to JAWS, Mike Piazza is the fifth best catcher in baseball history. Fifth. How can you not vote a guy like that in the Hall? He is the best offensive catcher ever. And he was not quite as bad defensively as people think. And when you think of his offensive numbers, consider that he never, EVER, played in a good park for hitters as his home park.
7. Jeff Bagwell - The sixth best first baseman ever? Yeah, I'll take me some of that. There is absolutely no doubt in my mind that he is a Hall of Fame player.
8. Frank Thomas - The champion of the "clean" player. Yeah, whatever. Just give me numbers and Frank Thomas did just that. Forget that he was a DH for a long time. If you judge him just as a first baseman, he is the ninth best of all time. Slam dunk.
9. Tom Glavine - Did he benefit of an era with a lousy strike zone? Sure. But he was smart enough to use it and won 305 games. He was good in the post season and won two Cy Young Awards. The 30th best pitcher ever works for me. A definite Hall of Fame guy.
10. Larry Walker - The tenth best right fielder ever. If you finish in the top 15 as a position player after 150 years of baseball, then what can you argue about? Playing in Colorado? Give me a break.
11. Rafael Palmeiro - The poster boy for the PED moralists. His numbers are insane. "He was never the best," the saying goes. But there is something to be said for metronome production year after year after year. The eleventh best first baseman ever.
12. Alan Trammell - His low voting percentage year after year on the ballot is a crime. The eighth best shortstop ever deserves to be in the Hall of Fame.
13. Tim Raines - What is it that keeps him out? The coke thing? He was Ricky Henderson light and the second best lead-off batter in his time. Without the gaudy batting average, he was every bit the offensive player as Tony Gwynn.
14. Edgar Martinez - Let's face it, the DH is a position and he was the best at that position. His offensive numbers are unbelievable. And he was the one guy who could hit Mariano Rivera. But even if you rate his numbers as a third baseman, he comes in as the eleventh best at that position in value all time.
15. Craig Biggio - Suffers a bit from moving around so much on the field. But he was a terrific lead off batter with over 1,800 runs scored in his career. The numbers are there. He was a HOF player.
16. Mark McGwire - He gets marginalized by the others on this list, but he is my last entry as a player on the ballot who should be in the Hall of Fame.

Those who fall just short for me: Fred McGriff, Sammy Sosa, Jeff Kent, Jack Morris

Definite No votes for me: Don Mattingly, Lee Smith and the rest.

Definite Yes votes for me on the expansion vote (they change the name every year): Joe Torre, Bobby Cox, Tony LaRussa, Marvin Miller, George Steinbrenner and Ted Simmons. On the fence, Tommy John.

As you can see, there are just too many candidates and there is no way you can get them all in with the voting the way it is. What a shame the mess this has all turned out to be. To quote one variation of Oliver Hardy's famous line, "Well, here's another nice kettle of fish you've pickled me in."

Just how bad was CC Sabathia in 2013?

I wrote about just how bad CC Sabathia was in 2013 for It's About the Money. Check it out here.

Drugs have always been in baseball

Twitter was quite alive last night first with the news of Brian McCann signing with the Yankees and shortly after with the news that, apparently, Jhonny Peralta is set to sign a big deal with the Cardinals. The latter provided much more irony and angst since Peralta got caught up in the Biogenesis scandal and lost fifty games of his season in 2013. Despite paying his penalty, the common comment was that PEDs work if you look at how rich Peralta just made himself. I do not get all the hysteria over this. After all drugs have been in baseball forever.

The thought for this article came to me while at MLB.com watching an Adam LaRoche clip. It occurred to me that drugs were all over the sport. We have Phil Coke and Brett Pill and even the star of the World Series is called, "Big Poppy." So why are we hating on Jhonny Peralta? Heck, even one of his former teammates, Anibal(ic) Sanchez was named after a steroid. But the point is, these guys just follow a long list of drugs in the game.

For example, there have always been "bennies" in the game. It is stimulating to know that Bennie Tate played in the 1920s and 30s, Bennie Warren played in the 30s and 40s and Bennie Daniels played in the 50s and 60s. So bennies have always been around.


And who could forget Bob Greenwood back in the 1950s? Greenwood had a successful cup of coffee in 1954 and then got bombed out in one game in 1955 and never saw the Major Leagues again. He did pitch several more years in the minors. The 6'5" right-hander seemed to have a pitcher's build. His nickname was, "Greenie." If you want to know why, just look to the right at his picture. Look at those eyes!

Again, this goes way back. Heck, back in the 1880s and 90s, there was Ducky Hemp. The outfielder played two partial years and looked totally lost. Again, all you have to do is look at his picture on the left to know there was a problem.

Then, as soon as the century ended and we get into the early "nineteen-aughts," we find an infielder/outfielder named Frank LaPorte. Obviously, he had a traumatic upbringing being born with the nickname, "Breyfogle." I mean, what the heck is that? So it is understandable that his nickname is forever known as, "Pot." And if you click on his name that is linked and look at his baseball-reference.com page at his picture, you will certainly see that he was a stoner.

And speaking of stoners, a guy named Lil Stoner played in the 1920s and 30s and Tobi Stoner just played recently in the last decade. So you see, you'll never rid the game of this stuff.

And it hasn't just been weed and amphetamines that have been a problem. From 1905 to 1920, a guy named Fred Luderus played in the Majors. You don't think it a bit suspicious that his nickname was, "Ludy?" And during Ludy's playing days, Frank Ludes played in the minors.

And just so you don't think Phil Coke is alone, the 1950s and 60s saw a Jimmie Coker roaming Major League fields. And if that wasn't bad enough, a harder version exists too. And he is a catcher in the Hall of Fame! Chicago loved Ray Schalk even though his nickname was, "Cracker." You have another Hall of Fame player named Chief Bender.

And there were a lot of different drugs involved. There was Scat Metha and then there was Herb Hash, who had an appropriate first name. In the early days of the Pacific Coast League, there was a guy named Louis Smacker.

And there is another drug that people think is quite modern. But it goes way back. In fact, Molly Moore played in 1875 and soon after, there was Molly Craft.

How many players named Adam have there been? You cannot fool me. That was a slang term for Meth. And what about all the Reds? What about Angels? Is that not a nickname for PCP?

Charlie Grimm played for twenty years early in the 20th Century and then managed. His nickname was Jolly Cholly. We know what "cholly" is a nickname for, so it was no wonder, Charlie was jolly.

And what about one of my all time favorites, Dooley Womack? There have been five minor league players with the name, Downer. There historically has been seven minor league players named Dube and two named Dubee. So it is not just a Major League problem.

I think I have proven my point. PEDs may be the latest problem. But the game has always been full of drugs. Geez, there was a guy who played from 1913 until 1918 named, Hugh High. So this has always been there. Get over it already.

Disclaimer: Obviously, this is all a joke and there is no intention to indict any of these players for actual drug use.

Red Sox should resist extending David Ortiz

This site is well into its eleventh year and for the last six of those, there has been an annual pondering of what the Red Sox should do with David Ortiz. If you don't believe me, just do a search on his name here and you will find them all. The call here has been something like, No, No, Yes, Yes, Heck yes. All of the "Yes" years have included a caution for going beyond two years. Now, we come to year seven of such pondering since Ortiz has hinted publicly that he wants an extension. The answer this year should be, No.

The Red Sox have handled Ortiz in a brilliant fashion. They took a chance that he would bounce back after the stumbling seasons of 2008 and 2009 and limited his contracts to a year or two at most since that time. The lack of long-term deals has worked perfectly and Ortiz for the third time helped the Red Sox win a World Series. His World Series heroics were the stuff of legend and will be discussed for years.

All the while, the Red Sox have protected themselves from the eventual breakdown that is sure to some day waylay the hulking slugger. His current two-year deal had a lower base with bonuses based on how often he was on the field. Ortiz made the max in 2013 to the benefit of himself and the Red Sox. He will again go into 2014 with the $11 million base and can make as much as $15 million depending on how often he plays.

Depending on which stat site you look at, Ortiz has averaged a valuation of $14.775 million over his last four seasons. So Ortiz has earned what he is worth and the Red Sox have not overpaid. Fortunately, no one has come up with a standardized valuation that includes the post season. But still, the deal has worked out for all parties involved.

Ortiz is entering this last year of his contract for his Age 38 season. And, after what he did with his Age 36 and 37 seasons, there is a reasonable expectation that he can repeat something close to those amazing numbers at the plate this year. But the Red Sox have hedged their bets and well they should.

Sooner or later, Ortiz will give in to Father Time. All ballplayers do. Look at Jeter's sad story in 2013 as a reminder of how quickly it can happen. If that wall hits in 2014 for Ortiz, no harm, no foul as the Red Sox have had a wonderful run with their post-season-smashing team icon. If he again performs near 2013 standards in 2014, then they can string it along a year at a time in 2015.

If Ortiz falters, they can end the relationship with a huge celebration for a guy that helped bring the team three titles.

The Red Sox have handled David Ortiz perfectly through the years. They have allowed Ortiz to make a good living while protecting themselves for what will ultimately happen. There is no reason to end that string of smartness now. Despite the giddiness of another title, the Red Sox should resist the euphoria of what just happened, resist an extension and play the final year of Ortiz's contract out and reevaluate at the end of the season.

Nasty boys - The best relief pitcher stuff of 2013

Last year I had this idea that if you added together the value given the pitches a pitcher throws you could rate the pitchers nearly as accurately as other measurements such as WAR, ERA+ and FIP. The results do not match up perfectly, but they are close in most cases. After all, if you throw consistently nasty stuff over the course of a season, the results you obtain with those pitches will lead to success. I have seen others rate the best fastball, the best splitter, the best curve, etc. But I like to add them all together to come up with a total "stuff" ranking.

Fortunately, this is fairly easy to do. Otherwise, I would not be doing it as I am no genius. All I did was go to Fangraphs.com's leaderboard and then go to the PitchF/X tab. And then I go to the Pitch Value tab. I prefer to use the PitchF/X calculations instead of Fangraphs' own proprietary pitch valuations as the latter seems (to me) more accurate for the type of pitch thrown. For example, Fangraphs.com says that Kenley Jansen throws a fastball and that is what they rate. But it is pretty obvious watching him pitch that he throws a cutter, which is what PitchF/X says he throws.

Anyway, once I have the pitch values in front of me, I downloaded the CSV file (Isn't it fabulous these stat sites are so generous with their data?). The CSV opens like a Microsoft Excel file and I can then delete the columns I don't want and do a Sum function to the first pitcher listed on the sum value of all his pitches to come up with a total pitch value. I copy that down for all the pitchers and then do a Sort to be able to see the top and the bottom. I did this for both starters and relievers. In my last post, I gave you my results for the starting pitchers. Today the relievers are rated..

You may wonder why I used the pitch values and not the pitch values per hundred. Unfortunately, the latter does not work for me because the numbers get skewed. For example, a pitcher may have pitched four curves all season. If the four were crappy, then his pitch value per hundred on the curve would be like -25 runs or something. That doesn't work for what I am doing.

Without further ado, I give you the nastiest relief pitchers by pitch value for 2013:

1. Koji Uehara: 27.7
2. Kenley Jansen: 21.8
3. Craig Kimbrel, Joe Nathan: 19.4
4. Greg Holland: 18.8
5. Mark Melancon: 18.3
6. Alex Torres: 18.1
7. Tyler Clippard: 17.7
8. Luke Hochevar: 17
9. Luis Avilan: 16.8

The really interesting part of this list is that each pitcher killed with different pitches. Uehara, the most dominant relief pitcher in baseball in 2013, scored well with his fastball and his split finger was off the charts good. Kenley Jansen killed with his cutter. Kimbrel and Nathan used a combination of the fastball and slider to have great seasons. Nathan had a really great comeback season. Melancon relied on a deadly cutter. Torres and Avilan used a two-seam fastball to great effect.

The list also showed a strong season for Luke Hochevar, a pitcher that never lived up to his starter potential, but found a great home in the eighth inning setting up Holland, who was also terrific.

These guys were nasty good and their combined pitch values really showed how difficult a task batters had facing them.

And, of course, if you see the good, you want to hear about the bad, right? The five relief pitchers with the combined lowest pitch value scores were:

• Carter Capps and Michael Gonzalez with -11.9
• Brandon League with -11.6
• Jose Mijares with -9.9
• Chris Perez at -9.7

No other qualifying relief pitcher scored below -6, so that gives you an idea of how ineffective these relievers were.

Nasty boys - the best starting pitching stuff for 2013

Last year I had this idea that if you added together the value given the pitches a pitcher throws you could rate the pitchers nearly as accurately as other measurements such as WAR, ERA+ and FIP. The results do not match up perfectly, but they are close in most cases. After all, if you throw consistently nasty stuff over the course of a season, the results you obtain with those pitches will lead to success. I have seen others rate the best fastball, the best splitter, the best curve, etc. But I like to add them all together to come up with a total "stuff" ranking.

Fortunately, this is fairly easy to do. Otherwise, I would not be doing it as I am no genius. All I did was go to Fangraphs.com's leaderboard and then go to the PitchF/X tab. And then I go to the Pitch Value tab. I prefer to use the PitchF/X calculations instead of Fangraphs' own proprietary pitch valuations as the latter seems (to me) more accurate for the type of pitch thrown. For example, Fangraphs.com says that Kenley Jansen throws a fastball and that is what they rate. But it is pretty obvious watching him pitch that he throws a cutter, which is what PitchF/X says he throws.

Anyway, once I have the pitch values in front of me, I downloaded the CSV file (Isn't it fabulous these stat sites are so generous with their data?). The CSV opens like a Microsoft Excel file and I can then delete the columns I don't want and do a Sum function to the first pitcher listed on the sum value of all his pitches to come up with a total pitch value. I copy that down for all the pitchers and then do a Sort to be able to see the top and the bottom. I did this for both starters and relievers. Today I'll focus on the starters and tomorrow the relievers.

You may wonder why I used the pitch values and not the pitch values per hundred. Unfortunately, the latter does not work for me because the numbers get skewed. For example, a starter may have pitched four curves all season. If the four were crappy, then his pitch value per hundred on the curve would be like -25 runs or something. That doesn't work for what I am doing.

The problem there is that the amount of pitches and innings thrown do not match for each pitcher. Clayton Kershaw threw like 230 innings or something like that while Matt Harvey threw considerably less. So take that into account. I could have divided the total by innings pitched or pitches thrown, but in the end, I did not. My feeling was that Kershaw maintained his stuff despite the greater innings thrown and thus still deserved any total value he might have been given because of the extra innings.

I know, it is flawed, but then again, I never claimed to be a paid analyst either. I'm just a writer finding things interesting as I go.

Without further meanderings, here are the top ten nasty boy starters with their total pitch value and their fWAR rank in parenthesis:

1. Clayton Kershaw: 56.1  (1)
2. Matt Harvey: 44   (5)
3. Jose Fernandez: 40.9   (19)
4. Max Scherzer: 38.8  (2)
5. Adam Wainwright: 38.1  (4)
6. Madison Bumgarner: 37.4   (26)
7. Stephen Strasburg and Yu Darvish: 30.5   (35, 10)
8. Cliff Lee: 30.1   (8)
9. Hisashi Iwakuma: 27.8   (18)
10. Chris Sale: 24.9   (9)

Some notes from the list: Kershaw had the most valuable fastball, a great score on his curve and a very good score on his slider. He had a negative value on his change-up. Harvey was one of the few pitchers that had positive marks on every pitch type he threw. I was mildly surprised by Bumgarner and Iwakuma.

Naturally, you are going to want to know the bottom five:

• Joe Saunders: -36.3 Ugh
• Edinson Volquez: -25.2
• Edwin Jackson:  -19.2
• Jeremy Guthrie:  -17
• Ian Kennedy:  -15.9

No real surprises there.

Stay tuned tomorrow for the relief pitcher version.