Beyond the Box Score - A Saber-Slanted Baseball Community (via Mowser)

in association with

Beyond the Box Score FanPosts FanShots

I wanted to contribute, but I didn't know how. Rest in peace, kid.

1 day ago Justin Bopp 1 comment

According to his daughter, Gary Carter has died

So sad. We all knew this was coming, but hoped it never would. We'll miss you, Kid. What an amazing player and man.

1 day ago adarowski 0 comments

MLB Complete Org. Charts - MLB Daily Dish - MLB Trade Rumors and Signings

What do you get when you add MLB Contracts, Depth Charts, Prospects, and Salary/Arbitration details (and a touch of executive structure)?

MLB Daily Dish Complete Organizational Charts, that's what.

They're an extremely useful tool that shows everything you need to know whether you're a fantasy geek or just can't get enough rosterbation. The link goes to the Org Chart section over at MLBDD, but I've added the links to each individual team over on the left right here at BTB. Hope you enjoy!

2 days ago Justin Bopp 0 comments

A Graphic Look at the Window to Win: Tampa Bay Rays

by David Fung on Feb 16, 2012 11:09 AM EST in Visuals Above Replacement

Just in time for prospect season, we take a look at the idea of "windows" and a team's prime time to win. Inspired by what seems to be a once every three years rebuild for the Oakland Athletics, is there going to be a time where all their premier prospects hit and they'll have the best chance to win? Here we present the pleasures of trying to maximize production during one's service time.

Eleventh in the series, we look at the Tampa Bay Rays. Ranked 7th overall by John Sickels, they have 1 A-rated prospects and 12 B-rated prospects. Keith Law sees them much higher in his organizational rankings released last week putting them at #2 overall. Here's what he had to say:

If you favor ceiling over probability, you could make a strong argument for having the Rays ahead of the Padres, based on the fact that this system could quite easily produce six to eight players who end up as grade-60 players or better in the majors. After that first tier, however, there's a lot less probability here than there was a year or two ago, and several executives from other clubs pointed out that the Rays have a gap in their prospect pipeline coming up that will be filled only if some of their 2011 draft picks move faster than anticipated.

Aside from LHP Matt Moore ranked at #3, SS Ha-Ju Lee is #12 in Keith Law's top 25.

This Rays graphic is slightly different than the others since they clearly are within a window to win. The question for them is how long this stays open for them?

Continue reading this post »

4 comments | 1 recs | Tweet

The only reason that many of these stats go from crappy to useful or even pretty good? Sample size. If you have 100 or 200 innings? ERA or RA9 starts becoming useful. Give me a thousand innings, and RA9 is pretty good. BABIP? Well, after several years, a pitcherâ€™s BABIP is a pretty useful metric. A careerâ€™s worth of pitcher wins? Well, thatâ€™s useful too.

And therein lies the reason that people are fooled: because 300+ win level were all reached by great pitchers, then the pitcher Win stat MUST represent greatness, even at the seasonal level. So, even though the significance of a metric is dependent on the sample size, once that significance is reached, the reason for its significance (sample size) is summarily ignored.

THE BOOK--Playing The Percentages In Baseball

2 days ago Justin Bopp 0 comments

How Do You Run Your Saber Fantasy Leagues?

by Justin Bopp on Feb 15, 2012 5:58 PM EST in Opinion & Editorial

If you're like me, Fantasy Baseball is one of those times of the year in which it's most difficult to marry my sabermetric view of things (value!) with a fun and rewarding game.

Problem 1: Roto or H-2-H?

The first issue is whether to choose a rotisserie or head-to-head style game. Roto leagues have a set number of teams and a set number of stats, each of which you can 'win,' scoring a number of points depending where you rank in each stat. Most points wins.

Then there's H-2-H, where there's a set number of teams that play round robin, one against the other each week throughout the season. It's the same idea as roto, but broken down into a weekly game. Instead of attempting to win each stat for the season, the goal is to win the most stats against your opponent, scoring a win. Best record wins.

The choice is obviously yours, but word of warning: if you're going with rate statistics to honor your sabermetric view of things, roto leagues can get awfully boring once you get about halfway through a season. I prefer H2H for exactly that reason.

Continue reading this post »

6 comments | Tweet

Specifically, to what extent to do park factors affect the usefulness of various ERA estimators? It seems reasonable to assume that while much of what happens when a ball is put in play is not controlled by a pitcher.

However, given that some extreme parks are likely to exercise their own environmental force over the outcome of batted balls it stands to reason that ERA estimators that factor in a pitcherâ€™s batted ball profile may do a better job in certain types of parks than others.

Park Factors and ERA Estimators: Part I | FanGraphs Baseball

Bill's debut over at FG. Great work and can't wait to see more.

3 days ago Justin Bopp 0 comments

Put Them in the Hall of Fame: Part 1, 19th Century

by adarowski on Feb 15, 2012 10:11 AM EST in History & Hall of Fame

Bill Dahlen, Bob Caruthers, and Deacon White (L to R) should be in the Hall of Fame.

While working on my Hall of wWAR project, I've focused intensely on identifying players who have been overlooked by the Hall of Fame.

Just to recap, I kicked all 209 elected (MLB) players out of the Hall of Fame, whipped up a weighted version of Baseball-Reference's Wins Above Replacement (wWAR), and re-populated the Hall with the top 209 players in history, by wWAR. The results were fascinating.

In all, 63 players who are not in the Hall of Fame ended up being "inducted" into the Hall of wWAR (while 63 current Hall of Famers were given the heave-ho). Do I think all 63 deserve to be in the Hall of Fame? Probably not. But I certainly believe most of them do.

Let's say I think 50 belong (which, believe it of not, I might). If I start arguing that each and every one of them belongs, I'm going to sound crazy and I'll never get anywhere. So, lately I've been thinking a lot about where to place my focus—especially now that Bert Blyleven and Ron Santo are in.

Which players are the most egregious omissions? Which players do I feel have no flaws in their case that should reasonably keep them out?

Continue reading this post »

2 comments | 3 recs | Tweet