Soriano 248/295/439 ? RFK ain't a friendly ballpark, bue I think he'll be better than this.

You sure better hope so, because no amount of HRs and SBs is going to cause GMs to overlook a SLG-heavy .734 OPS out of a $10 million defensive liability come the deadline when the Nationals are out of the race.

So much for Brendan Harris, the next Albert Pujols.

I'd like to see Sammy Sosa's projection as a Gnat... Holy ugliness...

In 326 ABs away from Arlington, Soriano hit .224/.265/.374. In 2004, he hit .244/.291/.444. Considering he will be playing approximately 120 games in Washington, New York, and Florida (which is worse than merely non-Texas), that projection seems even a little optimistic, especially in homers & slugging.

Well, Harris is bad (though that projection doesn't include him tearing up the AFL, which could justify pushing it up a little), but Guzman is just gawdawful. Any chance the Nats give Zimmerman a look at SS with Harris at 3B (or vice versa)?

I'm not high on Soriano, but lets not forget his road stats for the Yankees.

.306/.350/.567 in 2003

.319/.352/.582 in 2002.

Adjust his total stat line by the appropriate park factors and leave it be. Don't try to read any more into his actual home/road splits.

Dan, can you run Sosa's numbers at RFK? I'm curous to see how bad he projects to be. TIA.

.306/.350/.567 in 2003

.319/.352/.582 in 2002.

Of course, he could've just been a better player then. When I've seen him the last few years, it certainly looks like pitchers are letting him chase crap more often than they used to now that it's clear they won't get punished.

Zimmerman is god

Zimmerman is a BEAST!!

ZIPS+PT projects them at 85-77, but that's with Johnson and Vidro staying healthier then they have been (480 AB each). It is, however, with Church relegated to a bench role, albeit as probably the #1 OF fill-in (260 AB). The pitching is pretty good, really; 715 RA (669 ER). How they'll get 760 runs out of this lineup, I don't know, but that's what projects.

More proof that my system is somewhat flawed, I'd wager.

How they'll get 760 runs out of this lineup, I don't know, but that's what projects.

6 guys with OBP over .340 gets you a lot of runs...

6 guys with OBP over .340 gets you a lot of runs...

Yeah, those offensive projections look pretty good given the park. The "league average" OPS there last year was just 743 (don't know what ZIPS used). Don't know how the playing time will be divvied up, but it's a line up with 4-5 above-average hitters, a couple average guys, and Guzman.

So much for Brendan Harris, the next Albert Pujols.

But he's not that far off from the current Soriano. :-)

Who are the 4-5 above average hitters? Short, Church, Vidro, Guillen, Zimmerman? I'll give you Johnson. But the others are all much bigger question marks than the top 4-5 hitters on other teams.

Of course, he could've just been a better player then. When I've seen him the last few years, it certainly looks like pitchers are letting him chase crap more often than they used to now that it's clear they won't get punished.

Then how would you explain the wide splits for almost all the Texas hitters? ARod had wide splits too when he played for Texas. I think using home/road splits to prove a point is just looking for an excuse to make an argument you want to make. I'm not saying this specifically to you Dan, but to everyone here that does it. I don't think it's made any difference though, although I say it every chance I get.

More proof that my system is somewhat flawed, I'd wager.

I think your problems basically fall into a few areas:

1. It doesn't seem like you adjust projections at all for the unbalanced schedule - not sure if this makes a big difference, but in a division with NYM, ATL, and Philadelphia (I don't really think much of them, but all the projections have them high) I would think it'd matter quite a bit
2. You seem to to make rather drastic changes in ZIPs for a few guys. I think that if you don't like someone's ZIPS ERA of 4.1 and think it will be 4.6, you out to not move it more than half the difference
3. I haven't thorougly looked into all your projections, but I think you think replacement level pitchers are too good - especially on teams that have shown they have trouble finding replacement level pitching

Remember, guys, Short signed to play in Japan last week. Vidro is still coming back from surgery. Johnson is injury prone. The offense is really one-half of Johnson (i.e. the half season he'll actually be on the field), Guillen, Zimmerman, and Church. And I'm not really sold on Church.

760 runs isn't happening here.

16 -- Spivey, I agree with you. Soriano seems to have fared from a road park disadvantage as well, playing a large share of his road games in Oakland and Seattle. And although it should balance out, the pitching staffs he's facing in Oakland and Anaheim aren't slouches.

I don't think he'll put up the same road numbers he did as a Yankee, but looking at last year's stats probably isn't fair. His three year splits are probably a more reasonable approximation: .260/ .303/ .465. Not great, but not as bad as the one year split looks either.

I don't think he'll have as hard a time at RFK as some assume. He has decent power to the opposite field, but most of his homers are pulled. You can pull the ball at RFK, it's just that the power alleys are so deep, if you go the other way, it's going to be an out -- you can ask Jose Guillen all about that.

Spivey, I think you're right on with most of this. I think that 3.) is the biggest problem, though the ZIPS projections for hitters and my adjustments for pitchers certainly make it look like offense is going way up next year. Anyhow, it's a paradoxical version of the problem, in that for almost every team I've been able to fill out the 1440 innings I'm using (the ML average last year) for each staff with pitchers for whom there are ZIPS projections, so I haven't had to use generic repacement-level innings. I've been just using ZIPS-projected ERAs for everyone but a few starters, and dividing the innings realistically, assigning, if anything, too few innings to the starters (nobody over 190 except noted workhorses like Livan). The problem really is that too many hitters and pitchers project to actually be good, something that Anaheim Rally Monkey has dubbed "Lake Woebegone Effect." (where every kid is above-average...) Every year in reality, most teams have several players completely tank, but who can say which ones? ZIPS tries to mitigate that by regressing players more when they're past thirty, but some players regress more and earlier than others, and vice versa. Since these are for the most part projections of what would happen if everything went right for everyone, I'm increasingly thinking that that's the explanation. All the teams would finish with between 83 and 93 wins if everything went right for everyone. But, that can't happen, because lots of things go wrong. So, while these projections do show us that we shouldn't be shocked if the Nationals finish 84-78, or the Orioles 80-82, it won't happen unless almost everything goes right for them, a difficult proposition, which also means that things go wrong for some other team, and it underperforms expectations, as some teams also do every year. It's a maximum potential thing, I suppose, which is why the only fans that should really be concerned are those of the Angels, the only team who projects surprisingly low given a lack of any significant regression. The White Sox's demise is caused by a combined ERA of their starting rotation of 4.25, something which may well not actually happen; if their pitching duplicates 2005, they'll be right in line for the same 87 wins that the Indians are.

Yeah, I think you'd get much better results if you didn't change the rate stats for any of the players from ZIPS and if you didn't change the playing time up for any of the players. Just take the guys expecting to start and assign them at their full ZIPS rates/PA/IP and fill up the missing PA and IP with the rate of the backups (and you are probably better using the component rates of BB, 1B, 2B, 3B, HR, SB, CS, AB and then projecting runs from that instead of trying to do it from R or RBI).

So that means most starting pitchers only get the 150 to 175 IP that ZIPS projects.

If you do that, at the team level, then by in large the someone tanking is taken care of as the amount of error it introduces over a team is small. I.e., there is more confidence in EV(team) than in the individual EV(players). Of course if you have a player that is as important as a Bonds, Santana, Halladay, etc. who is injured or doesn't play then you are in trouble. But by and large the unexpected poor performances are balenced by the unexpected good performances when you look across a team.

That's essentially what I do for the position players. I use the number of AB ZIPS says for the starters, and divide the rest of the ABs logically among the backups (obviously, a certain number have to go to backup OFs, backup IFs, backup C, etc.). I calculate the runs scored by using the OBP*SLG*AB formula for RC, which brings most players in no more than a run off from what the full component formula does, though come to think of it, that would bring teams in 12-15 runs high--more credence for the conversion factor at which I arrived yeterday, since that's about as many as it cuts off for most teams.

Looking over the various teams, I've given the large majority of starting pitchers about 180 innings, but that may be a few too many. I let Zito have his 222, for example, I let Livan Hernandez have his 248, I let Buehrle have his 236. Of course, giving the White Sox's rotation fewer innings would lower their already-low projection even more. And, I'm reluctant to project more runs given up, because the runs-allowed totals already seem fairly high, and they correspond to the adjusted runs-scored totals as they are. The one thing I could do that might make a small difference would be to assign generic numbers of IP to relievers. Most full-season big-league relievers are projected by ZIPS to pitch 70-80 innings, which is in a lot of cases 10-15 too high. I did lessen some of them, but by no means all, which means 20-50 too few replacement-level innings for most teams. That can result in 8-10 fewer runs allowed, but that's only one win. I could try to get an "average garbage innings per team" figure, and reserve that many of each team's innings-pitched for replacement pitchers.

It looks like for most teams, the additional garbage innings that would be added by setting all the relievers with over 60 innings pitched down to 60 would, even at a 5.20 ERA, would add only 10-15 runs alowed. That lowers the pythagorean projections by about one win. Interestingly, the team more hurt is the Angels, but that's because they have a couple of relievers who consistently pitch 80 innings.

I know this is a simple question but how are you getting runs allowed? Are you simply multiplying ERA by IP for each pitcher and then adding them up?

I can't fathom why the Nationals are so mistreated Vidro in favor of Soriano.


"Zimmerman is a BEAST!!"

I am just hoping that he qualifies for SS.

"I suppose, which is why the only fans that should really be concerned are those of the Angels, the only team who projects surprisingly low given a lack of any significant regression."

After losing 2/5's of their pitching, including their only lefthander who has led the team in ERA 6 of the last 7 years and their All Star/Golden Glove catcher, it seems Angel fans should be happy with a projection over .500
OTOH, they probably aren't done this off-season and if their youngsters actually play, their upside could be big.

I don't see Zimmerman qualifying at SS - they abandoned they Zimmerman to SS experiment in the minors after a week or so, traded Castilla to free up 3B for Zimmerman in 2006, and have repeatedly stated that Guzman is the starting SS come hell or high water. Besides, if Zimmerman goes to SS, who plays third? Jackson? Carroll? Fick? Anderson? Harris is probably the best option, but given the way the organization handled him last year he's not going to get any kind of shot in 2006. There's no real good reason to expect Zimmerman to get any playing time at SS in 2006.

The weighted 3 year park factors given on this site for Texas and Washington (obviously not 3 years) are as follows:

Team R H 2B hrbbso
Texas 1.16 1.08 1.1 1.2 0.98 0.98
Washington0.88 0.88 0.92 0.76 0.98 1.06

the last two years Soriano has hit :
2004: .280-28-91 (324/484)
2005: .268-36-104 (309/512)

in a "neutral" park that was equivalent to:

2004: .270-26-85 (315/460)
2005: .259-33-97 (301/485)

in Washington that's equivalent to:

2004: .255-23-80 (301/430)
2005: .245-29-92 (287/452)

The difference between Texas and Washington is similar to the difference between Colorado and a more normal park.

Vinny Castilla went from : .271/.332/.535 in Colo to: .253/.319/.403
in Wash.
Guillen went from .294/.352/.497 in Anaheim (a pitcher's park) to .283/.338/.479 in Wash

I really think there is a very good chance that Sori loses 10-20 points in average and OBP and 40-60 in slugging. The new owners (whoever they may turn out to be) better pray Bowden doesn't sign him to an extension...

16 -- Spivey, I agree with you. Soriano seems to have fared from a road park disadvantage as well, playing a large share of his road games in Oakland and Seattle. And although it should balance out, the pitching staffs he's facing in Oakland and Anaheim aren't slouches.

The "road park disadvantage" doesn't really go away in the NL East. Seattle (99 hitters PF for 2005 according to baseball reference), Oakland (103) and Anaheim (96) aren't good parks for hitters; Atlanta (104), Philadelphia (108), Florida (94) and New York (99) aren't a whole lot better. If you prefer Dan's 3-year weighted park factors (I'll use the R PF here for a quick overall view): Anaheim (0.94), Oakland (1.00), Seattle (0.90) vs Atlanta (1.04), Florida (0.84), NY (0.98) and Philadelphia (1.10).

Washington as a home park is especially unsuited to Soriano - Soriano's value is in hits and HRs, and RFK deflates both of those (0.88 and 0.76 respectively), while Texas inflates both (1.10 and 1.20 respectively). I think Soriano will marginally outperform the projection above if he stays in Washington (along the lines of ~.260/.300/.450), but he'll be close to the projected numbers.

Looking at the PFs, Seattle/Anaheim/Oakland seems pretty comparable to Florida/Atlanta/NY. Playing games in Philly makes the NL East road a bit more hitter friendly, though.

I ditto question 24. Because if you are doing R = ERA*IP/9 then you are obviously missing the unearned runs. And that would tilt every team to have higher numbers.

But I also wonder where you differ from ZIPS because I saw with another that you claimed to "regress" some of the pitchers ERA up (I think it, for example, Towers with Toronto). So unless by regress you mean calculate an estimated RA from the ERA and "some of the pitchers" meant "all of the pitchers" I think your numbers will be wrong. A rough estimate could be made by figuring out what % of R are unearned and adjusting all of the ERA's that way (or adjusting the teams RA that way at the end).

Why not log5 the projected winning percentages against the teams' projected strength of schedule?

Right, I calculate projected RA by multiplying ERA by IP, dividing by 9, and then multiplying that number by 1.07, which is the average coefficient for converting ER to R over the past few years. It was closer to 1.08 last year, though.

29: If you look at the handedness splits, though, Texas' park doesn't really favor righties (especially compared to lefties).

My point in bringing up the road park disadvantage anyway, was to point out that his road numbers (especially when you stick to just a two-year sample) probably don't reflect a neutral performance for him. You would have to adjust his road numbers up, just as you'd have to adjust his home numbers down.

The "road park disadvantage" doesn't really go away in the NL East.
Wait - people in these parts do account for the imbalanced schedule in building park factors, right?

Although Texas RH splits are not huge (106 for both BA and HR), RFK is much more negative for righties than lefties (86/76 versus 92/99 for RH BA BA and HR versus LH BA and HR). I think ZIPS and JPWF have it right. His road performance reflects both park and pitching staff and he'll face changes in both.

Dan: If this is the last team, where are the White Sox?

Soriano 640 AB .248/.295/.439 27 HR 24 SB

Wilkerson 554 AB .280/.387/.504 24 HR 9 SB
Kinsler 476 AB .248/.310/.431 19 HR 7 SB

Jim Bowden: Great GM or Greatest GM?

Wait - people in these parts do account for the imbalanced schedule in building park factors, right?

Nope, usually not. Usually park factors are calculated as a straight ratio of performance at home games to performance in road games (performance by both teams, of course). In the days when park factors were developed (70s/80s), the schedule was for the most part balanced, so the assumption that the variations on the road would average out in the end was a reasonable assumption - not 100% accurate, but close enough. With the unbalanced schedule now and the introduction of an extreme park or two (Colorado, maybe texas, maybe San Diego), that assumption isn't really all that valid anymore. I've done some preliminary work looking into how park factors change if you take into account the unbalanced schedule and the different run environments in road games, and if you do that the park factors for most teams are the same or within 1 point, but there are a couple of teams that see more significant shifts (IIRC, Colorado's road environment is substantially pitcher-friendly, which if not corrected for overstates the impact of playing at elevation, making Colorado's park look much more hitter-friendly than it probably is. If Colorado's park factor is calculated at 113 but the road environment averages out to ~97, correcting for the road environment brings the "real" park factor for Colorado down to 109-110, for instance)

The computer projects more hard luck for John Patteron.

Dan: If this is the last team, where are the White Sox?

White Sox

Any reason the White Sox and Cardinals did not get linked into ZIPS with all the rest?

Soriano 640 AB .248/.295/.439 27 HR 24 SB

Wilkerson 554 AB .280/.387/.504 24 HR 9 SB
Kinsler 476 AB .248/.310/.431 19 HR 7 SB

Jim Bowden: Great GM or Greatest GM?

Heh