2015 Baseball Forecaster: & Encyclopedia of Fanalytics

RON SHANDLER’S 2015

BASEBALL

FORECASTER

AND ENCYCLOPEDIA OF FANALYTICS

Copyright © 2014, USA TODAY Sports Media Group LLC.

No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, or otherwise, without the prior written permission of the publisher, Triumph Books LLC, 814 North Franklin Street, Chicago, Illinois 60610.

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ISBN: 978-1-63319-021-4

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Statistics provided by Baseball Info Solutions

Cover design by Brent Hershey

Front cover photograph by Jayne Kamin-Oncea/USA TODAY Sports Images

Author photograph by Kevin Hurley

Ron Shandler’s

BASEBALL

FORECASTER

Editors

Ray Murphy

Brent Hershey

Associate Editor

Brandon Kruse

• • • • • •

Technical Wizard

Rob Rosenfeld

Design

Brent Hershey

Data and Charts

Matt Cederholm

Player Commentaries

Ryan Bloomfield

Rob Carroll

Matt Cederholm

Brent Hershey

Ray Murphy

Stephen Nickrand

Greg Pyron

Kristopher Olson

Josh Paley

Brian Rudd

Jock Thompson

Rod Truesdell

Research and Articles

Jason Collette

Patrick Davitt

David Martin

Vlad Sedler

Todd Zola

Prospects

Rob Gordon

Jeremy Deloney

Tom Mulhall

Injury Chart

Rick Wilton

Acknowledgments

Producing the Baseball Forecaster has been a team effort for a number of years now; the list of credits to the left is where the heavy lifting gets done. On behalf of Ron, Brent, and Ray, our most sincere thanks to each of those key contributors.

We are just as grateful to the rest of the BaseballHQ.com staff, who do the yeoman’s work in populating the website with 12 months of incredible online content: Dave Adler, Andy Andres, Matt Beagle, Dan Becker, Alex Beckey, Rob Berger, Brian Brickley, Ed DeCaria, Doug Dennis, Matt Dodge, Greg Fishwick, Neil FitzGerald, Colby Garrapy, Matt Gelfand, Phil Hertz, Joe Hoffer, Ed Hubbard, Tom Kephart, Chris Lee, Chris Mallonee, Troy Martell, Craig Neuman, Harold Nichols, Frank Noto, Nick Richards, Mike Shears, Peter Sheridan, Skip Snow, Matthew St-Germain, Jeffrey Tomich and Michael Weddell.

Thank you to our behind-the-scenes troopers: our technical dynamic duo of Mike Krebs and Rob Rosenfeld; and to Lynda Knezovich, the patient and kind voice at the other end of your phone or email inquiries.

Thank you to all our industry colleagues, a truly impressive group. They are competitors, but they are also colleagues working to grow this industry, which is never a more evident than at our annual First Pitch Arizona gathering each November.

Thank you to Dave Morgan, Chris Pirrone, Dan Fogarty and the entire team at USA Today Sports Media Group.

Thank you for all the support from the folks at Triumph Books and Action Printing.

And of course, thank you, readers, for your interest in what we all have to say. Your kind words, support and (respectful) criticism move us forward on the fanalytic continium more than you know. We are grateful for your readership.

From Ray Murphy Ron and Brent each possess a rare combination of talent and dedication that make it a distinct pleasure to collaborate with them. In fact, the full BaseballHQ.com roster is a collection of talent and depth that would be the envy of any MLB GM. Particular thanks go to our sometimes-overlooked tech team: Rob Rosenfeld’s wizardry has completely transformed our production process for this book, and Mike Krebs saved this edition from falling into the hands of nefarious online entities. Most importantly, thanks to my wife (and best friend) Jennifer, and our daughters Bridget and Grace, for patiently indulging my obsession with this game.

From Brent Hershey This year’s cover photo symbolizes several layers of my gratitude. First, it represents two colleagues at the top their game: my partner Ray, whose insight contains all the depth of a Clayton Kershaw curveball; and Ron, the one before and so similar to the current ace, who set the standard of excellence at a nearly unreachable height for the franchise. Thanks to you both. Second, the photo emanates that end-of-event feeling, when, as you survey the results of the hard work of your team—in this case, every name in the box to the left—you let yourself believe that We nailed it. Gracias, all. And third—and most importantly—that Kershaw scream of elation is probably what you heard from my family as we put the wraps on this edition. To my wife Lorie, and daughters Dillon and Eden: Thank you for supporting me in doing what I love.

From Ron Shandler It has been an honor to have my name attached to this work now for nearly three decades. THANK YOU to the amazing group of analysts who build this great structure, so ably helmed by Ray and Brent.

All three of us are outscored by the supportive women in our lives, 3-1. That’s fair. My annual update: Darielle now lives the theatre dream in Manhattan, doing light design, stage management and riding the subway at ungodly hours. I just made my final tuition payment for Justina (yay!), who finished recording her second EP and is headed out to LA after graduation (boo!). For Sue and I, it’s now winters in south Florida. If you’re at Tradition Stadium in March, look for us.

As always, I’m incredibly grateful for your support all these years. Good luck in 2015!

TABLE OF CONTENTS

Benchmarks

Encyclopedia of Fanalytics

Fundamentals

Batters

Pitchers

Prospects

Gaming

Statistical Research Abstracts

Gaming Research Abstracts

Major Leagues

Batters

Pitchers

Injuries

Prospects

Top Impact Prospects for 2015

Top Japanese Prospects

Major League Equivalents

Leaderboards

Draft Guides

Blatant Advertisements for Other Products

Benchmarks

by Ron Shandler

Imagine that you are sitting in the first car of a rollercoaster at an amusement park. You’re taking that slow climb up the lift-hill to the precipice. You wait in eager anticipation for that point when you catch the first glimpse of open air below you.

And then…. whoooosh!

Down you plummet, picking up speed, faster and faster, while your brain tries to gauge how much longer your stomach will stay in your throat. If we were to graph the journey, it might look something like this:

Coincidentally, this is also a graph of league-wide batting averages over the past 12 years. It is presented as a 3-year rolling average to smooth out a few extraneous bumps in the track. But make no mistake—the annual trajectory is just as precipitous (actually, even moreso).

There is one key difference between this trend and the rollercoaster analogy. on a rollercoaster, you can see where the drop ends and the track levels off. For those of us on this batting average ride, there is no telling when BAs will bottom out. Will it be 2015? How about 2016?

Last year’s major league batting average was only .251. That was the lowest level since 1972, when batters hit .244 league-wide. Will the current trend continue to that point? Or maybe it will plummet all the way to .237, which is where offense settled in 1968. That’s baseball’s all-time low.

You’re shaking your head. (Yes, I can see you.) You’re thinking, No, it won’t go down that far. That’s a logical reaction, but how do you know?

The current trajectory is pretty steep. The down slope covers an 8-year period. At the current trajectory, it would take only three more years to reach .244, and about another three to reach .237.

Let’s take a deeper look:

Typically, we look at data one year at a time. But really, each data point can be considered a small sample, and thus prone to some normal year-to-year volatility. To the undiscerning eye, this might even obscure a notable trend. But all we need to do is group the years into pairs and suddenly the trends are nothing short of striking.

Needless to say, this all filters down to the distribution of talent on an individual player basis.

And while nobody wants to point a finger at any one variable, perhaps for fear of being accused of confusing correlation with causation, please explain to me how this happens:

Where did these bionic arms come from? That’s a huge increase in super-human performance over such a short period of time.

What is going to put the brakes on this free fall? You can’t just say, It’ll stop on its own. Baseball always runs in cycles. You can’t say that because there has always been some type of external event or intervention to interrupt past cycles. An adjustment to the pitching mound put the brakes on 1968’s plummet. PEDs drove the offensive explosion of the 1990s. MLB’s fear-instilling drug testing P.R. campaign likely helped reverse that cycle during the past decade.

But with pitching dominance continuing to pick up speed, what is going to stop this runaway car? Maybe MLB will give us livelier baseballs next year. Maybe MLB will enact the time-saving measures they tried out in the Arizona Fall League (ha!), thus disrupting pitchers’ timing. Or maybe the rate of Tommy John surgeries will continue to rise, thus wiping out all of baseball’s young pitching talent.

It’s fun to speculate.

Actually, there is one real variable that MLB might consider addressing. The following data was published by Jon Roegele of The Hardball Times:

Roegele wrote: The strike zone has been changing since the possibility arose of grading umpires with newly installed pitchtracking technology…. In the PITCHf/x era (beginning in 2007), the bottom of the strike zone has been expanding at a higher rate than the edges have been contracting, leading to a larger strike zone. This imbalance has paved the way for higher strikeout totals and lower walk totals. The changes have altered more pitch counts in favor of the pitcher, leading in total to a larger number of less successful plate appearances from batters and fewer runs scored.

Unless MLB decides to address this issue, odds are the current levels will persist.

Right now, there are probably some of you thinking, So what? What’s the harm of us just sitting back and being a spectator to all this exhilarating chaos? I would respond with one word:

Plastics.

No, no, wrong word.

Benchmarks.

There was a time when 30/100/.300 meant something. Those were the benchmarks for stardom; a point of reference around which we could evaluate performance. Thirty home runs, 100 RBIs and a .300 batting average. When PEDs were peaking 15 years ago, at least two dozen players were reaching those numbers every year.

And now? Without looking, how many players reached that triumvirate of offensive accomplishment in 2014?

No looking. I mean it.

Last year, the only players to accomplish 30/100/.300 were a 27-year-old rookie who had never before faced major league pitching and a 35-year-old veteran who had never seen even 26 HRs in 10 previous years, let alone 30.

Jose Abreu and Victor Martinez.

Benchmarks.

There was also a time when a sub-2.00 ERA was virtually unachievable. Thirty-one pitchers (min. 30 IP) accomplished that feat in 2014.

A strikeout-to-walk ratio of 2.0 used to be our delimiter of success; it was one of the foundation filters of the LIMA Plan. Today, pitchers with that ratio are in the bottom 25%. Starting pitchers (min. 120 IP) with that ratio are in the bottom 15%!

There was a time when you could just mentally filter your pitcher list by ERA. Anyone under 4.00 had to have some redeeming quality and was worth at least considering. Today, you legitimately have to start your search at 3.50. In analyzing the hundreds of pitcher boxes in this book, if I saw someone falling off to a 3.75 ERA, I’d think, heck, that’s not so bad. But those 3.75 guys are barely league average these days.

So, what’s good any more?

I don’t know; certainly, the old benchmarks are of no help. I suppose we could arbitrarily set new benchmarks based on current conditions—30/100/.300 becomes 25/90/.290—but how long would they remain relevant?

Over the years, we’ve presented several of our metrics in this book normalized to the league average level. PX (linear weighted power index) and Spd (statistically scouted speed) have always been presented as an index with 100 representing league average. Batters with a 120 PX, for instance, were producing power 20% above league average; batters with a 65 PX were 35% below league average.

This was intended to provide a better measure of good for those skills that had a tendency to shift over time. And 100 could bounce off the walls for all we cared, but it didn’t matter because everyone was benched to that league average.

Now, nearly everything is shifting. The use of indices to normalize metrics to a league average is more important that ever.

Given all of this, it has become time for the Mayberry Method to acquiesce to the changing times and transition all of its components to normalized metrics.

Mayberry Method 4.0

Some background: The foundation of the Mayberry Method (MM) is the assertion that we really can’t project player performance with the level of precision that advanced metrics and modeling systems would like us to believe.

MM is named after the fictional TV village where life was simpler. MM evaluates skill by embracing the imprecision of the forecasting process and projecting performance in broad strokes rather than with hard statistics.

Here is an excerpt from my original article back in 2009:

Tonight, the friendly weather forecaster on my local television station has told me that it is going to be partly cloudy tomorrow with a high of 78 degrees.

I suspect that the meteorologist’s advanced modeling system spit out that fancy number—78. I often think, why not 77? Or 79? The truth is, if I were to walk outside right now, I’d feel no difference if it was 77, or 78, or 79.

In fact, it probably requires a good five degrees for me to feel any noticeable difference, and even then, it would be slight. 79 versus 74? 46 versus 41? 97 versus 92? More important, a five degree difference wouldn’t likely make me change my behavior. If I’m not wearing a light jacket at 79, I’m not likely going to do so at 74.

The 10-day forecast seems to be an exercise in excessive precision: 80, 82, 81, 82, 80, 77, 77, 77, 74, 76. What does this tell me? The first half of the week is going to be warm. The second half of the week is going to be marginally cooler.

In fact, they could just say that the temp will be in the low 80s and I would be perfectly okay with that. High 70s, low 80s, high 80s, low 90s … that’s all I need. They wouldn’t even have to bother with mid-70s or mid-80s because that won’t change what I am going to wear anyway.

What do we gain from the extra precision? We delude ourselves into believing we are gaining accuracy when in fact we are gaining an increased probability of being wrong. We’re just not good enough to predict the temperature to the exact degree on a daily basis. We need to come to terms with that. And most important … there’s no great need to be so perfect.

From here, it’s an easy leap to replace temperatures with home runs, or stolen bases, or even strikeouts.

Remember that our unit of measure when comparing 25 home runs to 22 is errant gusts of wind.

MM reduces every player to a 7-character code. The format of the code is 5555 AAA, where the first four characters describe elements of a player’s skill on a scale of 0 to 5. The three alpha characters are our reliability grades (Health, Experience and Consistency) on the standard A-to-F scale. The skills numerics are forward-looking; the alpha characters grade reliability based on past history.

MM has gone through several iterations over the years, adjusting some of the factors. We are now at version 4.0.

Batting

The first character in the MM code measures a batter’s power skills. It is assigned using the following table:

Given that PX is already a normalized metric, it fits in perfectly with our goals for MM 4.0.

The second character measures a batter’s speed skills. RSpd takes our Statistically Scouted Speed metric (Spd) and adds the elements of opportunity and success rate, to construct the formula of RSpd = Spd × (SBO + SB%).

Here, too, speed is already normalized to league average. You’ll note, however, that average—100—ranks pretty high on the scale. That’s because the pool of baseball’s most prolific speedsters is small and the distribution of stolen bases does not form a normal bell curve.

The third character measures expected batting average.

This is where we start running into trouble. Given the decline in batting averages—and xBA as well—assigning scores based on raw data does not work anymore. Check out the distribution of players in 2014 under the existing table:

More than 77% of batters earned a MM score of 0, 1 or 2. Only 22.5% earned scores of 3, 4 or 5. We need to find a better balance.

If we index xBA levels to league average, we can create a much more useful table:

Now, 49.3% of batters earn a MM score of 0, 1 or 2 and 50.7% earn a score of 3, 4 or 5.

The fourth character measures playing time. This can remain unchanged.

Pitching

The first character in the pitching MM code measures xERA, which captures a pitcher’s overall ability and is a proxy for ERA, and even WHIP. Once again, pitching dominance completely skews the distribution in the current chart.

More than two thirds of pitchers earned a MM score of 3, 4 or 5. Only 32.1% earned scores of 0, 1 or 2. We need to find a better balance, but this time the task is more difficult.

Similar to speed, this skill is distributed in such a way that it’s impossible to create a normal bell curve. The group of pitchers at the top are too far ahead of the pack. Even normalizing to league average can’t flatten the distribution. But we can come close.

While it’s nearly an even split between the top three scores and bottom three scores, you can see that there is still imbalance within the bottom group.

The second character measures strikeout ability. And again, a gross imbalance.

And fixing it as best as we can:

The third character measures saves potential.

The fourth character measures playing time.

Overall Mayberry Scores

I think that the real value of Mayberry is to provide a skills profile on a player-by-player basis. I want to be able to see this …

… and make an objective, unbiased determination about these four players without being swayed by preconceived notions and baggage. In fact, the above provides an interesting case study in four players who have been vying for the #2 spot in early mock drafts, behind Mike Trout. Who would you pick from these Mayberry codes alone?

You can tell that Players B, C and D offer up better power than Player A, but Player A has significantly more speed. Player B trails slightly when it comes to batting average. And Players B and D have both shown inconsistent output on a year-to-year basis. Any idea of the players who make up this quartet? (Answers shortly. Don’t peek.)

While we need to rank players for our draft lists, the truth is, given normal statistical volatility, any of these players could probably hit 30 HRs or bat .300. MM provides a quick-glance assessment so you can opt for the player with the particular skill you find most valuable for your team. For instance, if you believe that building a solid batting average foundation is paramount, you might stay away from Player B. If you want to draft a player who has at least some speed, you’d likely stay away from Player D.

For what it’s worth, the calculation for creating an overall rating for players is somewhat fuzzy, and I rarely use it myself. I’m not sold that MM gains its greatest utility as an overall measure for ranking purposes; I prefer to use it as an individual player profiler. But the calcs exist, so let’s plow ahead.

This is the calculation for the overall MM batting score:

MM Score

(PX score + Spd score + xBA score + PA score) × PA score

An overall MM pitching score is calculated as:

MM Score

((xERA score × 2) + K/9 score + Saves score + IP score) × (IP score + Saves score)

The highest score you can get for either is 100. That makes the result of the formula easy to assess.

BaseballHQ.com analyst Patrick Davitt did some great research about using Reliability Grades to adjust the Mayberry scores. His research showed that higher-reliability players met their Mayberry targets more often than their lower-reliability counterparts, and players with all D or F reliability scores underperform Mayberry projections far more often. Those results can be reflected by multiplying a player’s MM Score by each of three reliability bonuses or penalties:

I’ve taken his work a minor step further and applied slightly different multipliers to each Reliability element.

So, let’s perform the overall calculations for our quartet, using these Reliability adjustments.

Player A: 4455 AAB

= (4+4+5+5) × 5

= 90 × 1.10 × 1.10 × 1.05

= 114.3

Player B: 5245 BBD

= (5+2+4+5) × 5

= 80 × 1.05 × 1.05 × 0.95

= 83.8

Player C: 5255 BAB

=(5+2+5+5) × 5

= 85 × 1.05 × 1.10 × 1.05

= 103.0

Player D: 5155 BAF

=(5+1+5+5) × 5

= 80 × 1.05 × 1.10 × 0.90

=83.2

Last chance to guess who these players are before I reveal the answers. (Cover up the next paragraph if you really want to try.)

Player A is Andrew McCutchen. Player B is Giancarlo Stanton. Player C is Paul Goldschmidt. Player D is Miguel Cabrera. While each player has his strengths and weaknesses, perhaps this methodology helps provide some clarity as to who to draft at #2.

You don’t agree?

Okay, I get it. You might be thinking, All like values are not equivalent skill sets. For instance, there’s no way that Goldschmidt hits as many home runs as Stanton. But given each of their underlying power skills, there is not enough of a difference to separate them. They are both 5s. Maybe Stanton hits 38 and Goldschmidt hits 34, but that could easily be four errant gusts of wind. Are you willing to bet with absolute, gun-to-your-head certainty that one is clearly better than the other?

I thought not.

The Portfolio3 Plan

I have to be honest. As I’ve been using Mayberry more and more over the years, I’ve been using the Portfolio3 Plan (P3) less and less. Seems like a lot of work.

Let’s change that.

First, a review.

The foundation of Portfolio3 was the assertion that, when it comes to profitability, all players are not created equal. Every player has a different role on your team by virtue of his skill set, dollar value/draft round, position and risk profile. When it comes to a strategy for how to approach a specific player, one size does not fit all.

We need some players to return fair value more than others. A $40/first round player going belly-up is going to hurt you far more than a $1/23rd round bust. End-gamers are easily replaceable.

We rely on some players for profit more than others. First-rounders do not provide the most profit potential; that comes from players further down the value rankings.

We can afford to weather more risk with some players than with others. Since high-priced early-rounders need to return at least fair value, we cannot afford to take on excessive risk. Our risk tolerance opens up with later-round/lower cost picks.

Players have different risk profiles based solely on what roster spot they are going to fill. Catchers are more injury prone. A closer’s value is highly dependent on managerial decision. These types of players are high risk even if they have great skills. That needs to affect their draft price or draft round.

For some players, the promise of providing a scarce skill, or productivity at a scarce position, may trump risk. Not always, but sometimes. The determining factor is usually price. A $3, 20th round Michael McKenry is not something you pass up in an NL-only league, even with a Reliability Grade of BFF.

In the end, we need a way to integrate all these different types of players, roles and needs. We need to put some structure to the concept of a diversified draft approach. Thus:

The Portfolio3 Plan provides a three-tiered structure to the draft. Just like most folks prefer to diversify their stock portfolio, P3 advises to diversify your roster with three different types of players. Depending upon the stage of the draft (and budget constraints in auction leagues), P3 uses a different set of rules for each tier that you’ll draft from. The three tiers are:

1. Core Players

2. Mid-Game Players

3. End-Game Players

In the original P3 structure, we used our sabermetrics to help filter the player pool. Now that we need to shift away from the raw gauges, it becomes more useful to integrate Mayberry into the process. Thus:

The Mayberry Portfolio3 Plan (MP3)

Mayberry scores can be used as a proxy for the original Portfolio3 filters, and they make more sense now. Most of the below will not be new, but I’ve made several tweaks to fine-tune the process.

When planning your draft, pretty much all you need to remember is the number 3. That essentially represents just over league average and makes it easy to set your targets.

TIER 1: CORE PLAYERS

General Roster Goals

Auction target: Budget a maximum of $160. Any player purchased for $20 or more should meet the Tier 1 skills criteria

Snake draft target: 5-8 players, with an emphasis on those drafted in the earlier rounds

Reliability grades: No worse than B for each variable (Health, Experience and Consistency)

Playing time: No restrictions, however, pricier early round players should have more guaranteed playing time

Batter skills: Minimum MM scores of 3 in xBA plus either PX or RSpd

Pitcher skills: Minimum MM scores of 3 in xERA and K/9

Tier 1 players provide the foundation to your roster. These are your prime stat contributors and where you will likely invest the largest percentage of your budget or early round picks. There is no room for risk here, so the majority of these core players should be batters.

These are going to be among the most important players on your roster, so their presence provides a report card, of sorts, for your draft. For instance, if you leave the table with only three Tier 1 players, then you know you have likely rostered too much risk or not enough skill. If you manage to draft nine Tier 1 players, that doesn’t necessarily mean you’ve got a better roster, just a better core. There still may be more work to do in the other tiers.

TIER 2: MID-GAME PLAYERS

General Roster Goals

Auction target: Budget between $50 and $100; players should be under $20

Snake draft target: 7-13 players

Reliability grades: No worse than B for Health, no worse than C for