Phillips signed to long term deal?

Hal McCoy is reporting on his new blog that the Reds and Brandon Phillips have agreed to a long term contract extension. Terms were not available. We'll see... some of the long term deals that have been signed this offseason have been extremely good deals for the teams, but those usually have been for pre-arbitration eligible players (Tulowitzki, Granderson, etc).

Unfortunately, I'm leaving town for an interview first thing Saturday, and therefore might not have a chance to post an analysis until mid-next week on whatever the deal turns out to be. But I will do my best to break down the deal when I have a bit of time. In the meantime, here's a link to the post where I tried to analyze his arbitration case.

Baker is quantifiably good at managing?!

I'm still working my way through the 2008 Hardball Times Annual. I've seen a fair bit of attention around the internets on Tom Tango's With or Without You articles, which are very good and really cement the case on Derek Jeter's (lack of) fielding prowess. And I've seen criticism of Bill James' surprisingly substance-less article on clutch hitting, which I completely agree with.

One thing I haven't seen much on, however, is David Gassko's interesting attempt to quantify differences between managers. The effects of managers (and coaches) are often discussed by the public and in the media. See, for example, all the prognostications of the Dodgers' resurgence this year because of the arrival of Joe Torre. But the actual effects of managers are hard to quantify, because their performance is confounded with the performance of their players. As a result, few studies have done a good job of quantifying manager effect, and many of the ones that have done a good job often report fairly minimal effects.

In Gassko's article, he succeeds by keeping his focus narrow: all he tries to do is address the issue of whether some managers get their players to perform better than others. He does not address issues of strategy. He uses a fairly simple projection system to predict player performance each year (it includes an aging curve, park factors, league adjustments, past performance, etc). Next, he compares how players actually did, relative to their projections, to get a "runs above self" statistic for each player season. Finally, he sums up the runs above self statistics for all players playing for each manager in history. The result is a statistic that allows one to detect differences in manager performance.

Technical notes: Gassko does regress to the mean. He also confirmed that the performances within managers of players with last names in the first half of the alphabet were correlated to those in the last part of the alphabet, which indicates that there's some real signal present here and he's not just describing random variation...though as a side note, I'd much rather he just randomly split players within managers into two groups using a truely random process (e.g. rand() in excel). The alphabet-based split is a classic example of non-random sampling decisions that are intended to be random, and is something that's been discussed in several stat classes I've taken. Still, I'm sure that the answer would be the same either way, so it's a minor point.

One of the surprising findings was that Dusty Baker comes out as the 7th best manager of all time, in terms of his "skill" (or, historical tendency) to get players to play above their projections, with a rating of +1.65 wins per 162 games. In fact, while he's been nothing special with pitchers, Gassko reports that he has been the best manager of all time in terms of getting his hitters to perform above their projections. Derrick Lee may be helping him a bit, but not enough to vault him to the best of all time.

I know there's a lot of Dusty hate out there. I personally put myself into the category of "concerned," and I've written about my worries with respect to his record several times. But if there's one thing that I've heard time and time again from insiders about Dusty Baker, it's that players love to play for him, and that he gets the most out of what you give him. Gassko's study provides data that supports that contention.

Update: Commenter David (not to be confused with the study author David Gassko, or Dave from Louisville who also commented!) pointed out that part of Baker's excellence might be due to the fact that he presided over several of Barry Bonds' Ridiculous Years. David Gassko very kindly forwarded me a spreadsheet with all of Baker's players and their "runs above self" statistics so I could break this down.

I found that when removing Barry Bonds from the dataset, Baker's score dropped from +1.7 wins to +1.0 wins per 162 games (+2.7 hitters + -1.7 pitchers; I'm using a 50% regression to mean, which Gassko indicated is appropriate in this case). That would pull Baker off of the top-10 all time list, but still would rank him pretty darn high on the list, and would certainly be among the highest scores of currently-employed and living managers. I'd also point out, however, that it's really unfair to Baker to do this--we should pull the best hitter out of each manager's score to make this a fair comparison. If we did this, Baker would probably still fall in the overall rankings a bit (Barry was ridiculous, after all), but not as much as he does in this comparison.

If you're interested, here are the top-10 and bottom-10 seasons contributing to Baker's outstanding "skill" with hitters. You'll see that most of his "best" player seasons occurred in San Francisco, but many of his "worst" player seasons also occurred there. Interestingly, some guys show up on both lists. :)

Top 10 Baker hitter seasons in runs above self

year	playerID	nameLast	nameFirst	team	adjRAS
2001	bondsba01	Bonds	Barry	SFN	80.55
2002	bondsba01	Bonds	Barry	SFN	63.69
2001	aurilri01	Aurilia	Rich	SFN	49.42
2000	kentje01	Kent	Jeff	SFN	44.08
2000	burksel01	Burks	Ellis	SFN	40.61
1999	burksel01	Burks	Ellis	SFN	36.92
2002	kentje01	Kent	Jeff	SFN	36.53
2005	leede02	Lee	Derrek	CHN	31.46
1999	maynebr01	Mayne	Brent	SFN	30.00
2002	bellda01	Bell	David	SFN	27.95

Bottom 10 Baker hitter seasons in runs above self:

year	playerID	nameLast	nameFirst	team	adjRAS
1997	kentje01	Kent	Jeff	SFN	-26.89
1996	aurilri01	Aurilia	Rich	SFN	-21.70
2005	patteco01	Patterson	Corey	CHN	-20.51
2004	leede02	Lee	Derrek	CHN	-18.04
1996	benarma01	Benard	Marvin	SFN	-17.35
1995	thompro01	Thompson	Robby	SFN	-14.24
1997	wilkiri01	Wilkins	Rick	SFN	-12.77
2004	martira03	Martinez	Ramon	CHN	-12.76
2000	muellbi02	Mueller	Bill	SFN	-12.01
2004	sosasa01	Sosa	Sammy	CHN	-11.90

Thanks to David Gassko for not only conducting this interesting study, but also generously sharing his data upon request.

Craig Wilson

On Saturday, the Reds signed Craig Wilson to a minor league contract with an invitation to spring training. Wilson, 31, was a second-round selection in the 1995 amateur draft by the Toronto Blue Jays. Wilson has been a controversial player throughout his career due his tendency to strike out. Nevertheless, his overall offensive production has been good over most of his career, as evidenced by his career OPS+ of 113.

Wilson is apparently going to get a look as a right-handed bat at first base, probably just in case Keppinger fails to hit next season. What can we expect from him? Well, here are his recent offensive stats:

Majors
Year	Age	Team	PA	%K	%BB	%LD	BABIP	AVG	OBP	SLG	ISO	OPS	SBRuns	R/G	RAR
2005	28	PIT	238	29%	13%	22%	0.379	0.264	0.387	0.421	0.157	0.808	0.525	5.9	12.9
2006	29	PIT/NYY	395	31%	7%	17%	0.329	0.251	0.314	0.446	0.195	0.760	0.175	4.6	8.4
2007	30	ATL	69	36%	12%	15%	0.281	0.172	0.304	0.259	0.087	0.563	0	2.9	-1.5
3yrs	---	---	702	31%	9%	18%	0.341	0.248	0.338	0.420	0.173	0.758	0.7	4.8	19.9

Wilson has posted successively poorer numbers every season since at least 2004, and arguably (just looking at rate stats) since 2003. Over the past three years, his strikeout numbers have steadily been rising, his line drives have been steadily falling, and predictably his batting average has steadily fallen. His walk rate also took a big hit in '06, which sapped a major part of his offensive value. At least his power still seems to be present, assuming that 2007 is just a case of small sample sizes.

Baseball Prospectus-types would probably point to him as a classic case of a guy with "old player skills" declining quickly. But who knows? If he can recapture something similar to his 2005 season this year (or, his 2006 season, but with walks), he could provide some nice offensive value for the Reds against left-handed pitching.

Fielding

Wilson has played first base and the corner outfield slots over the past several seasons. His 2003-2007 UZR numbers put him at +4 runs/season at first base, -9 runs/season in right field, and -41 runs/season in left field. I'm guessing the latter is a sample size aberration, so I'll say ~+0.5 wins/season at first, and -1.0 wins/season in the corner outfield. In other words, he really should only be playing first base.

Projected Value

Overall, if we take his 3-year average offensive rates and extrapolate to a full season, he's about a +1.5 WAR hitter, a +0.5 wins fielder (at first base), and he gets a -1.0 win value penalty for being a first baseman. That puts him at ~1.0 WAR. If we subtract another 0.5 wins for where he is on the aging curve, that gives a fairly reasonable projection for him next year of ~0.5 wins above replacement. And that's in a full season of work.

I'd put pretty big error bars around that, however. If he can hit like he did '05, he could be a +1-1.5 WAR player. And, of course, he could be well below replacement. Certainly a fine guy to take a rider on, given that he costs nothing for the time being. We'll see what the Reds' scouts think of him in spring training.

Photo by the AP

THT Season Preview 2008

I'm excited to announce that the The Hardball Times Season Preview has been published!

This past offseason, I was very pleased be re-invited to contribute the chapter on the Cincinnati Reds for the second edition of this book. In last year's book, my contribution was a 3-page summary of the Reds strengths and weaknesses, player movement, and likely results moving forward into the season. The result of my and the other authors' work was a very useful publication that I referred to time and time again throughout last season.

This year, we've done it one better--or, you could say, 900 better! In addition to a similar-format team essay, each writer was asked to put together comments on roughly 30 players on his/her team (~900 players altogether). My contributions include concise, yet detailed analysis of everyone from Brandon Phillips and Aaron Harang to Joey Votto and Johnny Cueto. As a sample, here are my comments on phenom prospect Jay Bruce:

The 2007 Baseball America and Sporting News Minor League Player of the Year skyrocketed through the minors last year, starting in A-ball and reaching (and dominating) AAA by the end of the season. As arguably the #1 prospect in the country, Bruce has achieved near-godlike status among Reds fans, and his arrival in Cincinnati--whenever it happens--may end up being the biggest event of the year. The Reds tend to handle their prospects conservatively, so it seems unlikely that Bruce will make the team out of spring training. Nevertheless, the trade of Josh Hamilton opens a major hole in center field, and Bruce has a way of advancing faster than the Reds seem to anticipate. No matter what, he seems like a lock to arrive by mid-season. When he does arrive, he may have some initial struggles, as some have voiced concerns about his ability to make consistent contact early on. But he's only 20 years old, he's got a lot of room to improve, and THT's projections indicate that he's already capable of putting up plus offensive numbers. It's going to be fun to watch this kid develop.

The combined efforts of myself and 29 other authors is a 240-page book containing team essays and comments on roughly 900 players written by the people who live and die with their teams every single day. Add to that an improved, sophisticated 3-year projection system by Gassko and Constancio, and you've got a heck of a resource to keep handy throughout the 2008 season.

David Gassko has posted a more detailed overview of the book here, as well as excerpts from one of the team chapters, so that you can get a good handle on what you're purchasing. I really do think that this may be the best season preview book on the market.

You will be able to find the book in your local fine bookstore soon. However, we'd really appreciate it if you would instead purchase it through our publisher, ACTA Sports, as THT receives almost no money from purchases through other venues. Thanks, happy reading, and feel free to discuss the book in the comments here if you wish!

Click here to buy The Hardball Times Season Preview 2008!

2008 Reds Spring Training Preview

I was graciously asked to contribute a short article for a new Spring Training 2008 website, which you can read here.

In the article, I (try to) forecast the Reds' starting lineup, rotation, and bullpen for opening day, and also break down the key battles we'll likely see in spring training. Feel free to comment on my takes either here, or at that website.

Brian, who also writes at Depressedfan.com (obligatory quip: how a Yankee fan can claim to be "depressed" is beyond me...), is organizing the Spring Training 2008 website. He is currently soliciting similar articles from bloggers for other teams. As I write this, at least for the NL Central, there are articles posted for the Cubs and Cardinals. I'm sure that we'll see articles for other teams soon.

Most valuable infielders - 2007 Reds minor leagues

In his most recent column, Dan Fox released a spreadsheet with 2007 minor league fielding stats for infielders (outfielders are still in revision--sorry, no Jay Bruce stats yet) using his Simple Fielding Runs (SFR) approach.

SFR may not be as precise as hit-location statistics like UZR or PMR, but because it can be calculated using play-by-play data, he can get data on players from leagues that are not "video scouted" by BIS or STATS Inc. Therefore, one of its most exciting uses lies in generating quality fielding statistics for minor league players! That's what I wanted to look at tonight.

Below is a table reporting total fielding value for each infielder (excluding pitchers and catchers) in the Reds' system last year. For each player, summed across all positions and teams. SFR is total +/- across all positions that a player played. PosAdj is a pro-rated (by playing time) position adjustment, which varies depending on position played (described here; shortstops get a boost while first basemen get a penalty because an average-fielding shortstop would be a very good defensive first baseman). FRAA is the total fielding value of the player, reported in as Fielding Runs Above Average. There was no adjustment for league, although there probably should be (I doubt the bar for fielding is as high in rookie-ball as it is in AA).

Name	SFR	PosAdj	FRAA
Pedro Lopez	7.1	2.6	9.7
Justin Tordi	7.8	1.2	9.0
Jose Castro	3.4	3.8	7.3
Eric Eymann	3.4	3.5	6.9
Brandon Waring	5.5	0.5	6.0
Mark Bellhorn	4.4	0.8	5.2
Kevyn Feiner	4.8	0.2	5.0
Zachary Cozart	3.3	1.7	5.0
Neftali Soto	3.0	1.3	4.3
Jorge Cantu	4.4	-1.0	3.4
Todd Frazier	1.4	1.5	2.9
Angel Cabrera	1.7	0.8	2.5
Justin Turner	1.3	1.1	2.4
Jose Medina	2.1	0.1	2.2
Drew Anderson	1.3	0.7	2.0
Jose Gualdron	1.1	0.8	2.0
Dan Conway	0.1	1.8	1.9
Jeff Keppinger	1.3	0.0	1.4
Anderson Machado	-0.9	2.0	1.1
Ryan Baker	0.9	0.2	1.1
Todd Waller	0.4	0.7	1.1
Jason Louwsma	3.1	-2.1	1.0
Earl Snyder	0.1	0.8	1.0
Chris Valaika	-3.5	4.4	0.8
Jesse Gutierrez	3.1	-2.4	0.7
Paul Janish	-4.4	4.9	0.5
Eli Rimes	0.3	-0.1	0.2
Petr Cech	0.0	0.2	0.2
Kyle Maunus	0.4	-0.3	0.1
Ryan Freel	0.1	0.0	0.1
Michael McKennon	3.9	-3.9	0.0
Luis Bolivar	-1.1	0.9	-0.3
Mike Edwards	-0.3	-0.1	-0.3
Gabriel Suarez	-0.4	0.0	-0.4
Fulton Kendrick	-0.6	0.2	-0.4
Juan Francisco	-1.3	0.7	-0.6
Brett Bartles	-0.7	0.0	-0.7
Jay Garthwaite	-0.3	-0.6	-0.8
Radhames Moreta	-1.6	0.6	-1.0
Paul Witt	-1.3	0.2	-1.1
Jeremiah Piepkorn	1.3	-2.5	-1.2
Jeff Bannon	-1.5	0.1	-1.3
Edwin Encarnacion	-1.4	0.1	-1.4
Logan Parker	6.0	-7.5	-1.5
Billy Rojo	-1.8	0.2	-1.6
David Scott	-1.3	-0.8	-2.1
Raul Tablado	-2.4	0.1	-2.2
Adam Rosales	4.4	-7.1	-2.7
Ramon Ramirez	-2.0	-0.7	-2.7
Joey Votto	2.8	-5.9	-3.1
Aaron Herr	-4.5	0.8	-3.7
Brodie Pullen	-4.5	0.2	-4.3
Carlos Mendez	-1.9	-3.5	-5.3
Michael Griffin	-6.2	0.6	-5.7
Michael DeJesus	-8.9	0.7	-8.1
Caonabo Cosme	-8.1	-0.3	-8.4
Tonys Gutierrez	-4.9	-5.5	-10.4
Enrique Cruz	-16.4	1.8	-14.6

A few assorted comments:

• The Reds' minor league infielders don't really seem to have any substantial defensive standouts, at least according to these numbers. Pedro Lopez, for example, ranked 121st among all minor league infielders. Granted, some of the higher-ranking players in this spreadsheet were playing in the Mexican league, which might have a rather weak level of competition. But there were guys in AAA posting 20+ FRAA. Kind of shocking how far from that any of the Reds were.
  
• Pedro Lopez spent a substantial part of last season in the White Sox organization, and those numbers are included in the above totals. Therefore, Justin Tordi wins the award for most valuable Reds defensive infielder! Tordi, a 41st-round selection in '05, split time between second, third, and shortstop, for Billings, Dayton, and Sarasota last season. Unfortunately, he didn't hit much, posting a combined 0.215/0.282/0.294.
  
• Brandon Waring accompanied his impressive offensive performance in Billings with a very good defensive performance at third base. I hadn't heard much about his fielding before, but these data indicate that he's pretty well-rounded. Also, keep in mind that his totals are essentially just a half-season's work. It'll be interesting to see how he does next year.
  
• Paul Janish and Zachary Cozart have to been seen as having disappointing scores, as both of them are supposed to be defensive standouts. Janish, in particular, comes out really badly.
  
• Nice to see Neftali Soto posting pretty respectable numbers. I haven't been keeping up--anyone hear if he's likely to play a full season in Dayton next year?
  
• Nice to see Votto coming out as a tad above average at first base last year--though not enough to overcome the position penalty.
  
• Chris Valaika and Todd Frazier, currently shortstops, are both expected to eventually move to another position. Frazier did ok last year, but Valaika's numbers indicate that he's already showing signs that a move would be appropriate.
  
• Yikes about Enrique Cruz. 22 errors in 117 games doesn't help, but his range can't be good either.
  

Anybody ever been to Altoona?

I'm interviewing for a job that would involve living in a town that is relatively close to the Pirates' AA franchise in Altoona, PA. Just curious if anyone out there has been to that ballpark. :)