I'm interested in seeing whether DeWitt's September - 282/410/462/872 with 4 homers and 14 unintentional walks - was real.
ZiPS certainly doesn't think so.

Where's Billingsley?

Tough to see Maddux ranked behind some dude I've never heard of before.

Chad Billingsley?

okay, Chad's under the spotlight but not grouped with the rest of the starting pitchers.

Dan,

Don't forget that Meloan was traded to the Indians in the Blake deal.

Excuse me if this is a stupid question, but are the projections means, medians, or what?

Excuse me if this is a stupid question, but are the projections means, medians, or what?


Essentially, a weighted mean.

Is there a reason John Ford Griffin hasn't caught on as a 4th OF anywhere?

Assuming Ramirez and Furcal leave, I have trouble seeing this team winning any more than 81 games. Assuming Loney/Ethier/Kemp are the 1B/LF/RF, those are basically three average bats for corners. Martin is the only guy who is an elite hitter for his position. Meanwhile, CF (Pierre or Jones) is a blackhole, while 2B, SS, and 3B lack an internal option that can provide even average production for the positions.

Below average offense plus slightly above average pitching equals a .500 team at best, in my opinion.

Dan, was the BJ Lamura line a typo? I only ask because it seems very optimistic and is identical to Brad Penny's.

I better check on LaMura - i have his translations as 6.16, 6.23, and 6.49 the last three years.

OK, fixed.

10. The Dodgers were on a .500 clip before Manny were traded to the team, and for a good chunk when Furcal was injured.

The 2009 Dodgers can win 82 games as currently constructed. However, I am not sure that will be enough to win the NL west.

Bah, now my comment in #3 doesn't make any sense.

Tripon, don't forget that in addition to likely losing Ramirez and Furcal, the Dodgers are likely to lose Lowe and Penny (although they won't miss his 2008 performance, they could use his 2009 projection). And they'll be losing Garciaparra and Kent, which isn't devastating but the internal replacements will likely underperform what they gave the Dodgers in 2008.

Now the Dodgers might make some additions through trades or free agent signings (although with Colletti's track record, it's questionable whether any personnel additions will be beneficial). But "as the roster is currently constructed" I don't see how they project to be anything more than a .500 team.

I'm surprised that it's so common to see poor to fair fielders showing up as Very Good and Excellent overall.

I love this, BTW:

SS
VERY GOOD
Nomar Garciaparra

I've thought for the past several years that teams have overreacted to his injury risk and defensive struggles. Someone should plunk at SS for all the games that he is able to play. They'll get a pretty good player out of it. LA could do a lot worse.

Is there a reason John Ford Griffin hasn't caught on as a 4th OF anywhere?

Yes, he hits like a 4th outfielder and fields like a DH. That combination is a 4 letter word, containing a series of the letter A.

I've thought for the past several years that teams have overreacted to his injury risk and defensive struggles. Someone should plunk at SS for all the games that he is able to play. They'll get a pretty good player out of it. LA could do a lot worse.
Last season, Nomar got 29 starts (106 ABs) at short, and he hit... 236/270/396/666. His Range Factor was below average, too.

Darren, I may be understanding you, but as I understand it there isn't an overall ranking in the ZiPs projections. There is one ranking for their offense and one for their defense.

I do think it would be fantastic to see a single overall projection with offense and defense included measured in total runs, but I don't know if the defensive ratings here are specific enough to do so.

I'm interested in seeing whether DeWitt's September - 282/410/462/872 with 4 homers and 14 unintentional walks - was real.
ZiPS certainly doesn't think so.

Yeah, I was surprised that his projection was worse than his age 22 season. I know that the formulas shouldn't be ignored if we don't like the projection, and he was less than stellar coming through the system - but he also produced acceptably overall last season in 421 plate appearances, and will be a year older. I would take the over on the projection, personally.

Bill James has DeWitt at 261/344/383/728.
That sounds more realistic.

If a bit low on the power end.

Bill James is super-optimistic - when I looked at the projections they came up with a few years ago, he had the majority of starters being better than average at every single position.

Dan, is #19 correct? When a player is listed in the category "VERY GOOD," does that refer only to his offense? If so, I think you should rethink the presentation of these stats. The way it is set up here it makes it look like listing of players who are "VERY GOOD" overall. Part of the problem is that the player names, not just their offensive stats, fall under these categories (visually) and another part of the problem is that defensive rating (again visually) falls within these categories. I'd recommend that you change the listings so that the offense ratings are a column just like the defensive ratings.

Last season, Nomar got 29 starts (106 ABs) at short, and he hit... 236/270/396/666. His Range Factor was below average, too.

Those 106 ABs are a pretty tiny sample. I doubt such splits mean anything.

And Range Factor?

Nomar's range factor was even worse than Angel Berroa's was.

Bill James is super-optimistic - when I looked at the projections they came up with a few years ago, he had the majority of starters being better than average at every single position.

If "average" includes backups, isn't it plausible that the majority of starters are better than average?

If "average" includes backups, isn't it plausible that the majority of starters are better than average?

I'm talking about compared to starters, even. Compared to backups, it would've been even nuttier.

Dan, is #19 correct? When a player is listed in the category "VERY GOOD," does that refer only to his offense? If so, I think you should rethink the presentation of these stats. The way it is set up here it makes it look like listing of players who are "VERY GOOD" overall. Part of the problem is that the player names, not just their offensive stats, fall under these categories (visually) and another part of the problem is that defensive rating (again visually) falls within these categories. I'd recommend that you change the listings so that the offense ratings are a column just like the defensive ratings.

Totally disagree. These are offensive projections and everyone knows that this is what they are. The defensive rating is just an addendum.

That seems impossible, Dan. Like Lake Wobegon, where all the children are above average. Perhaps Bill mis-calculated his average, but if so, all you have to do is take the average of his projections and set that as your baseline, no?

Also, there's no way a projection system can be "optimistic" or "pessimistic" assuming it's remotely well-constructed, meaning that the pitching totals and hitting totals balance (i.e., total H for batters equal total H for pitchers, total RC for batters equal total RA for pitchers, etc.) As long as that's the case, you've got a league average (RA/ERA/OBP/SLG), and you determine each player's value based on that average. If the system seems "optimistic" for hitters, then it just means it's projecting a high run environment, and it should then seem "pessimistic" for pitchers, and vice versa.

The other issue is the standard deviation, or how much regression to the mean the system includes--in other words, is Pujols projected to a 155 OPS+ or a 170? But that works both ways--if it's a low-regression, high-stdev system that's projecting Pujols to 170, then for the league totals to add up, it also has to be projecting crap players to put up OPS+ scores in the 50's, say, rather than in the 60's.

These are offensive projections and everyone knows that this is what they are.

Everyone but me apparently. It would take nothing away from these ratings to label them a bit more intuitively.

Bill James is super-optimistic - when I looked at the projections they came up with a few years ago, he had the majority of starters being better than average at every single position.

If "average" includes backups, isn't it plausible that the majority of starters are better than average?

I'm talking about compared to starters, even. Compared to backups, it would've been even nuttier.

I'm confused -- neither the first nor last time. If the "average" at a position includes the performance of starters and backups at that position, wouldn't you expect more than half of the starters to be better than that average?

Sorry, meant less nutty compared to backups, it was late.

The Dodgers have 3 RP that's better than most of the closers in the league. yikes

It's amusing that for the last few years the Dodgers have had an amazing swarm of young talents but never seem to really break out of it. they need just *1* truely great vet to go along with those kids and they be awsome.

Lots of MiLB FAs here. John Lindsey, Luis Maza, John-Ford Griffin, Mike Koplove, B.J. Lamura, Miguel Pinango, Heath Totten. Org depth guys mostly, but still guys that have to be resigned/replaced if they want to have have any org depth in case somebody tweaks a hammy or strains an oblique. Colletti et al. have some work to do.

they need just *1* truely great vet to go along with those kids and they be awsome.

1) You slept through the last two months of the season
2) Monday AM, my irony filter is working at less than 100% efficiency after subjecting myself to sub-McCarverian football commentary

John-Ford Griffin's skillset would pay him about 35x AAA scale in Japan.

1) You slept through the last two months of the season

I didn't, and that's exactly my point, they could either use Manny or someone of similar caliber (say.. Mark Teixeira and then trade Loney) and they're set, espically in that division where only the D-back are going to be semi competitive in the next few season

RollingWave, I beg your apology. Signing Ramirez or Teixeira (and trading Loney) are both fine ideas. Middle infield and overall depth also need to be addressed.

OK, this might not be a biggee, but Jaime Pedroza, you have him 25 bb 24 k, I have him projected 29 bb 117 k - is your 24 k's a typo?

Oops, there's a 1 missing.

I have another req. Dan. Because the stats you project are not normalized, it makes us suffer to try to compare players for off season trades and what not.

Could we have an OPS+/ERA+ or other similar park/league adjusted column?

Like you did last year, could you please put a link to each of the previous teams ZIPS you have posted within each new ZIPS post?

Thanks!
vr, Xei

Player Spotlight - Clayton Kershaw
ERA W L G GS INN H ER HR BB K ERA+
Projection 4.27 8 8 27 26 154 150 73 16 65 124 102

ZiPS nailed Kershaw's record (for the moment, anyway). The rest, not so much.