Offensive Curse Deepens
by Matthew on May 18, 2010 4:00 PM PDT
in Seattle Mariners Stats
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PrintOur offense is snake bit and it appears that they've let the antivenin stores expire.
About two weeks ago I took a look at the team's park adjusted wOBAs against their regressed wOBAs as a way of picking out some of the luck that our hitters have experienced. What I did then:
wOBAr takes a hitter's batted ball types and uses his own past success rates on each type to generate an expected wOBA line. There's some more stuff in this thread which I link to with a note saying that I've since exempted home runs from the regression. I took at the Mariners' park-adjusted wOBA's and their corresponding wOBAr's and using the difference (Diff) between the two, calculated the amount of runs that difference would entail.
I felt it time for an update, so here is the results from the same procedure:
| Player | Diff | Runs |
|---|---|---|
| Josh Bard | 56.8 | 0.3 |
| Milton Bradley | 5.9 | 0.4 |
| Eric Byrnes | 26 | 0.9 |
| Chone Figgins | 30.7 | 4.5 |
| Ken Griffey Jr. | 33.6 | 2.8 |
| Franklin Gutierrez | -24.1 | -3.3 |
| Rob Johnson | 60.1 | 3.7 |
| Casey Kotchman | 72.6 | 8.6 |
| Ryan Langerhans | -49.8 | -1.3 |
| Jose Lopez | 26.9 | 3.8 |
| Adam Moore | 18.4 | 0.9 |
| Michael Saunders | 27.1 | 0.7 |
| Ichiro Suzuki | -4.4 | -0.7 |
| Mike Sweeney | 55 | 2.4 |
| Matt Tuiasosopo | 37.7 | 1.1 |
| Jack Wilson | -46.1 | -3.3 |
| Josh Wilson | 44.8 | 1.8 |
Negative in the runs column means that the players has been "lucky" and that regressing his wOBA to his wOBAr would subtract away that many runs from the team. Last time through there was a team total of six runs that they were unlucky. We were 24 games through the season at the point so the run scoring was about 0.25 runs per game below what we would expect given each player's recent batted ball rates.
This time the difference has jumped to 23.3 runs after just 14 additional games. Based on this measure of luck, the Mariner offense has been unlucky to the tune of almost 1.25 runs per game over the last fortnight. That's insane. In aggregate, the team is around 0.6 runs per game unlucky now. Not impressive enough for you? If that keeps up for an entire season, that's 100 runs lost. 100!
We say it every day, this offense isn't this bad. They're getting unlucky. They're getting really freaking unlucky.
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It's crazy how bad the offense has been. Whether including bad luck or not its just been really ugly.
If you removed the outfielders from the equation, the entire infield and DH combination is hitting at a ridiculously bad clip.
Also bad.
Regressing their wOBAs bumps the team up to a 630 RS pace. We’d probably have three or four more wins, which would be huge right now, but boy the offense has still been bad.
We're on pace to allow 648
I love fast baseball.
by Jeff Sullivan on May 18, 2010 4:13 PM PDT up reply actions
Would it be completely statistically invalid...
…for me to look at the 630 figure compared to the 648 figure and project that to a slightly under .500 record for the year (in a very rough sense)?
Not invalid
They’re unsustainable figures, but you probably know that.
by Jeff Sullivan on May 18, 2010 4:53 PM PDT up reply actions
Right, but they're unsustainable on both sides, no?
For example, we expect Vargas & Fister to allow more runs than their performance-to-date suggests; just as we expect our offense to score more than their performance-to-date suggests.
All of this is just another way for me to approach the “we’re not as bad as our 2010 record suggests” argument – both because I’m stressed at work and can’t take the time to delve into the deep stats, and because some of the folks I talk to (like my GF) would hit me if I tried to talk about those deep stats!
But runs are easy to talk about – and the ’metrics 101 blog posts related runs to wins…
Fister and Vargas are actually both pitching pretty well
we’d expect them to give up more, but their shiny ERAs aren’t too off – they’ve both thrown some good baseball
by seattlebruin on May 18, 2010 5:20 PM PDT up reply actions
ewww...ERA?
I didn’t think we were allowed to use that word around here. FIP and xFIP are much preferred, no? I’ve only been around LL & USSM for 6 months, but I’ve picked up a thing or two!
Yes, but seattlebruin is saying their regression (from ERA to FIP/xFIP/tRA) won't be too harsh.
by Matthew on May 18, 2010 5:35 PM PDT up reply actions 1 recs
Wait, pardon me for being a novice at this...
…but wouldn’t it be from FIP to xFIP? I mean, I get (in a rough sense) how FIP & xFIP are adjusted to make the numbers scale similarly to ERA – but if ERA is a bad predictor then why would you compare ERA to FIP/xFIP to determine over/underperformance? Wouldn’t FIP vs. xFIP be a more apples-to-apples comparison?
You juxtapose their ERA and FIP.
If their ERA is say a full three runs under what their FIP should be then you could can tell most of their performance is fielding dependent or luck based and that won’t sustain. However since the gap is not big between their ERA and FIP then they’re performing along the lines they “should” be performing at albeit a little above their heads.
You got slurved!
You are either over thinking this or under thinking this.
ERA (or RA better yet) records the actual runs allowed and it’s the actual runs that determine wins and losses. You should never use ERA (or RA) to evaluate pitchers. seattlebruin didn’t.
I'm side-thinking this...
…I was considering their performance-to-date versus their historical record (admittedly, more from an “eyeball” level than a detailed stats level). I was not looking at it from a “luck” level, which I guess is where the ERA issue enters in.
I mean, you can have luck not be a factor and still under-perform!
RRS: Rough example
Just to try to explain (and possibly be corrected by you) by way of example, let’s take RRS… Let’s say for argument’s sake that the fielding around him has been decent and good & bad “luck” factors have evened out. But his bad pitching is definitely dragging even his FIP down, right? If you looked at his expected FIP (xFIP) from the beginning of the season, you’d say he’s horribly under-performing when compared to his projections for the year, no?
In this case ERA and FIP should be similar – but the most direct comparison is still FIP versus xFIP, right?
If RRS “regresses” then we’d expect his FIP to come more in-line with his xFIP, right? It doesn’t just apply to things like “luck factors” – or am I mis-using the concept?
SB said "their shiny ERAs aren't too far off"
He was showing that their ERAs are actually right around their talent level. You are overthinking something that was pretty straight forward.
...and now I'm here
Overthinking and completely misinterpreting
I realize now the comment was an implicit comparison of FIP and ERA (if not in name then in concept). I took it as a claim that their ERA was not far off of what you’d expect for them on the year – and given their 2009 numbers I would expect them to have given up more runs than they have so far.
Anyways, thanks!
The one that always sticks in my head is Rob Johnson lining out with the bases loaded
Also there was Rajai Davis, but I suppose that one evened out.
Bottom of the fourth, May 2nd
Single, steal, run-scoring single, double. Men on 2nd and 3rd, none out. Lineout, HBP, K, lineout. No more runs score.
And now I’ve just realized we may be thinking of the same game.
Bad luck for a Seattle team!
That’s okay, just stack it over there with…hmm. That section’s full of Mariners ‘77-’94…Seattle Pilots…Husky basketball, no room there…not here, that’s SBXL…this whole wing is jammed with Sonics juju…I think we’re gonna need a bigger boat.
by lemonverbena on May 18, 2010 4:19 PM PDT via mobile reply actions 4 recs
There's a silver lining
I’ve lost almost 5 pounds from Grifflent. Projecting out over a full season I will be dead by October.
You can't be a catcher if you can't catch. Rob Johnson will henceforth be listed as a traffic cone on the roster.
by Drew_D on May 18, 2010 4:24 PM PDT reply actions 1 recs
*in the chart for each batter
Might take more time than its worth though.
by Edgar for Pres on May 18, 2010 4:40 PM PDT up reply actions
Matthew, how would one calculate this number for our opponants?
Would there be a reference somewhere?
...and now I'm here
All the needed info is available on StatCorner
I have another post following tonight covering the league in general however.
Ah, okay. I'll wait for that.
But I’m wondering if there is a place I could look up opposing team batted ball types, ie, the number of line drives against the Mariners. Does that reference exist?
...and now I'm here
Oh huh, I can just look at our pitcher's data.
Way to go, me.
...and now I'm here
Why was my comment deleted?
I clearly meant no harm by it. Could someone explain?
It was off topic.
Please keep front page posts on topic. If you have off topic things to say, put it in the off topic post.
...and now I'm here
by CapSea on May 18, 2010 4:55 PM PDT up reply actions 2 recs
Jesus Christ, Kotchman must have fucked a gypsy's daughter or something.
8.3 runs….
Hard work never killed nobody, but I won't take my chances.
by JAH on May 18, 2010 4:58 PM PDT reply actions 1 recs
The toppings are also cursed.
You can't be a catcher if you can't catch. Rob Johnson will henceforth be listed as a traffic cone on the roster.
Only if they're offensive toppings?
(sorry, I couldn’t resist)
Using woBAr to look for breakout candidates looks like fun.
Griffey’s wOBAr in 2009 was .360 =(. It would be nice if the entire Mariner lineup was not considered a breakout candidate.
...and now I'm here
It is difficult for me to consider his deal as bad luck.
Bad luck for us he’s on the team I guess.
Well he's been abysmal this year.
But a .360 wOBAr last year is nothing to sneeze at. I’m guessing it’s not properly weighted since he was on a clear decline phase making three year averages less valuable, but hey, it would make some sense that someone didn’t think he was dead.
...and now I'm here
He was a league average hitter last year with a .220 BABIP
Which was pretty out of the blue. Griffey didn’t decline, he fell off a cliff
That does it: I wanna see a "Cliff-Diving Junior" bobblehead!
…who knew he would make Sexson’s decline look less-distasteful?
by NWade on May 18, 2010 5:40 PM PDT up reply actions 1 recs
You really don't need to put the "..." before your comment every time.
...and now I'm here
Kinda nit-picky for a guy with "..." in his signature
:-) But yes, I see it’ll get annoying fast.
so Griffey is not bad, just unlucky?
Thank the Christ.
Damn, my eyeball tastes good.
by Gekko Mojo on May 18, 2010 7:57 PM PDT via mobile reply actions
by that criteria, then, I'll say Kotchman and Lopez are bad.
Damn, my eyeball tastes good.
by Gekko Mojo on May 19, 2010 6:30 AM PDT via mobile up reply actions
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