May Fortune Favor the Foolish
By Scott Barzilla
It’s hard to call Ed Wade foolish considering that the club nearly pulled off a miracle in 2008 and had a better draft than the club had had in years. However, a series of winter moves seem to be either head scratchers and/or duds. Toby Hall was brought in to solidify the catching situation. Oops. The club let Ty Wigginton go because he was too expensive only to see him sign for three million a season. Then, they quickly scooped up washed up third baseman Aaron Boone only to lose him to open heart surgery this spring. Despite all of these events, everything seems to be working out. The club has a significant upgrade at catcher with Ivan Rodriguez and presumably a defensive upgrade at third base with Jeff Keppinger and Geoff Blum.
Fielding is kind of a new wave in statistical analysis. Bill James and his ilk have pretty much pegged offense at this point in time, but we have a number of different approaches to fielding analysis. Part of that is dependent on how you approach fielding. Some look at pure volume of plays made while others look at percentage of plays made. My personal favorite is the Fielding Bible approach. John Dewan takes plays that other players at the position routinely make, sometimes make, and rarely make and then creates a +/- approach to the analysis. However, this isn’t to say that this is necessarily the best approach.
One of the things we have learned across the board in fielding analysis is that players can have career seasons and slumps just like they can with the bat. Anyone that bases any analysis based on only one season deserves what they get with the glove or the bat. The Yankees seem to use this approach and they’ve been burned more than occasionally. You don’t have to be a seamhead to know that you better steer pretty clear of A.J. Burnett. Of course, the Yankees and Braves didn’t know that. Most reasonable people could see Carl Pavano and Jaret Wright’s meltdown coming a mile away. The same is true with hitters and fielders. The Cubs are buying big into Milton Bradley after one great season in Texas. If you drafted Josh Hamilton in your fantasy draft then I wish you the best of luck.
When we move back to fielding we look at one of the facets of baseball people rarely focus on. Who could blame them? A scant ten years ago you had about as good a chance of picking out a truly good fielder as winning at the roulette wheel. Sure, everyone can pick out the butchers and the best, but the in between is harder to peg. Now, those odds are a little better. Still, very few teams make moves based on the sabermetric fielding numbers I described above. The Astros may have lucked out based on everything that has happened. Since Morgan Ensberg melted down, the Astros have seen a collection of butchers man the position regularly. Mike Lamb and Ty Wigginton aren’t going to win any gold gloves. Before we look at 2009, we should look at how the old Astros did the last three seasons at the position.
Ty Wigginton
Geoff Blum
Aaron Boone
Which of these don’t belong? Well, it would be the guy who is staying. Through their bumbling, the Astros managed to shed themselves of the two worst defensive options they had at third base. They replace them with Blum and Jeff Keppinger. Keppinger has a zero (average) rating at the position in over 250 innings over the last three seasons. So, a weakness has become a strength. Kaz Matsui has a good defensive pedigree even if he didn’t perform well last season and Miguel Tejada played inspired (for him) defense last season. Combine that with Lance Berkman (who is second to only Albert Pujols in defensive prowess) and you have one of the better defensive infields in baseball. Imagine what would have been if the Astros had any luck.
On the other hand, the Astros probably considered the offensive numbers and they are beginning to change the high strikeout tendencies of their offense. Below we will look at last season’s lineup with their walks per 100 PA and strikeouts per 100 PA. Then, we will look at the current lineup assuming that Keppinger gets the majority the plate appearances at third base. Hopefully, this projects to the Astros having fewer slumps than they have had in the past.
2008
CF Michael Bourn
2B Kaz Matsui
1B Lance Berkman
LF Carlos Lee
SS Miguel Tejada
RF Hunter Pence
3B Ty Wigginton
C Brad Ausmus
When you only have two guys in the regular lineup that even draw ten walks in 100 plate appearances then things are bad. If you have three regulars that have three times as many strikeouts as walks it’s really bad. No wonder this team scores runs in bunches. We can only hope that things will be better with a little more contact in 2009.
2009
2B Kaz Matsui
3B Jeff Keppinger
1B Lance Berkman
LF Carlos Lee
RF Hunter Pence
SS Miguel Tejada
C Ivan Rodriguez
CF Michael Bourn
Pudge isn’t exactly an efficient hitter, so the talk of having him hit in the two hole is downright scary. Having Keppinger in the second spot is actually an appetizing thought. He isn’t a traditionally high OBP guy, but he will make contact. He is a great guy to do hit and runs with because he will put the ball in play. The key for this season is for Hunter Pence to continue improving as he did at the end of last season. Keppinger and Rodriguez are mixed blessings, but overall the lineup is better since Rodriguez and Bourn are able to hit near the bottom.
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