You might be able to see if the IF is being positioned differently to make up for Jeter. If Ventura is giving up more 2B down the line than he would be expected to, or if Soriano gets to more ground balls up the middle (and/or less ground balls into the hole) than he would be expected to. I suspect Ventura would be the easier and more likely candidate.

Why not look at extra base hits to left? If there are more of them since Jeter's return, it may be an indication that Ventura isn't playing as close to the line as he was with one of the backups there and so more balls are scooting down the line.

Good work as always Mike! A couple of things...

1) It's not like we need to validate what we already know - that Jeter is a terrible defensive SS. Whatever you find in 2003 simply adds to the mix. Given that Jeter has had atrocious defensive stats (UZR, ZR, etc.) for as long as I can remember, one, he is extremely likely to have bad stats this year, given his likely woeful defensive ability, his advancing age (for a SS), and his injuries, and even if he had average or better defensive stats this year, like any recent sample of stats, that would merely tell us that he was probably not quite as bad as we thought.

2) It is almost impossible that repositioning other infielders can "make up for" another IF'er's bad defensive ability! If other infielders are "repositoned" then their defense must suffer, otherwise they would position themselves that way ALL the time. PERHAPS repositioning other IF'ers can make up, say, 2 runs for a -15 run infielder, or something like that. But to think that it can make up any more than that just doesn't make sense.

Based on the UZR/162 and DP/162 that MGL provided at the above location, here's Jeter from 1999 to 2002

1999: -15, -6 = -21

2000: -8, -5 = -13

2001: -21, -2 = -23

2002: -32, -2 = -34

Overall: -19, -4 = -23

In terms of "translating" a SS's fielding value into a "neutral" position, you'd probably do something like

UZR(neutralPos) = UZR(SS)/2 + 10

(I'm working on doing the translation for all positions, so look for this in a few weeks.)

Jeter, over the last 4 years a bad SS, would probably be an average fielder at a neutral position. (Of course, it depends on his exact skill set).

However, as Jeter ages, he'll become a liability at SS that cannot be supported. I would not be surprised if he has reached this point right now. A shift to 3b or LF should be close at hand.

I have a feeling that I just posted a comment unintentionally. I'm on an unfamiliar computer away from home.

The evidence from 2003 suggests that even though there are more balls in the SS vicinity that get through when Jeter is playing there, the Yankee infield as a whole allowed about the same percentage of balls to go through with and without Jeter. Furthermore, the evidence suggests - as it has in prior years - that there are fewer balls hit in the vicinity of the SS when Jeter is playing there than there are when his backups are there. That suggests that the Yankees are doing "something" when Jeter is playing to reduce his opportunities - whether that be the positioning of the fielders, the pitching patterns of the pitchers, or both. I don't think that infield positioning can have a significant effect "on the team", for the reasons that MGL suggests - but it can affect the type and quality of opportunities that an individual fielder gets.

I'm only going to be able to respond sporadically to comments for the next week or so, since I am on a trip. Please feel free to make them, though, and I'll try to hit the high points when I get back.

-- MWE

Given that Jeter has had atrocious defensive stats (UZR, ZR, etc.) for as long as I can remember

MGL, you're memory needs some help. Check out how Jeter did in your first version of UZR (look at your inaugural sLWTS article). He was actually a plus in the beginning!

Your updated version of UZR cut his numbers down big time...

The Three True Outcomes aren't totally devoid of defensive variability. Walks, strikeouts, and homers are not (usually, in the case of homers) produced on the first pitch. Therefore, there is a chance that during the pitch sequence, there's a foul ball that a better defensive player might get to. Instead of an out, the batter might strike out on the next pitch, or might hit a home run, or might walk. These are negligible, but the Three True Outcomes aren't tautologies, and it would be a mistake to label it as such.

You suggest the pitching patterns of the pitchers may be one of the reasons fewer balls are hit to SS when Jeter's playing there. Although I think it would be surprising that a pitcher would pitch to the other half of the plate, to encourage batters to hit more balls to Soriano and Giambi, I think this could be evident in the higher HR rate seen when Jeter is at SS. Is the flyball/groundball ratio different when Jeter's at SS?

Joe -- your explanation seems right on the money to me. Matsui generally had a good defensive reputation in Japan, and despite what appeared to be early struggles, it wouldn't surprise me at all that he'd cover more ground in CF than Bernie. Rivera is also a decent OF despite a couple of misplays that made the highlight shows.

Also, FWIW, Diamond-Mind had Nick Johnson and Jason Giambi rated the same defensively (average) in 2002, so there's probably not as much slippage there as most people would think initially.

It seems folks may need to go back and re-read Mike's series of articles on this subject. The link to the summary is below the article and here's one quote from it:

In the case of the Yankees from 1998-2000, the ball-in-play distribution and the probable alignment of the fielders in the face of that distribution combine to limit the number of opportunities that Derek Jeter has to make plays

For whatever reason, Jeter gets fewer opportunities than other SS, even after controlling for the BIP distribution (if I remember right). What Mike is saying is that this has been true so far this year as well. However, this year, we have the added oddity that when Jeter's not in there, the other Yankees' SS see more opportunities than Jeter -- though that could just be random chance.

I fail to see what Matsui, Rivera, and Giambi have to do with it ... especially since this has been going on for years according to Mike's article.

Walt -- the effect of Matsui, Rivera, Bernie, Johnson, Giambi wasn't meant as an excuse for Jeter. It was just a reason for why the team defense may appear to be equal this year with Jeter in or out, when really it isn't. I think the theory holds water.

How much time has Jeter missed in the past for that to really have much weight? I think he missed 2 weeks in 1998 and other than that he's been pretty durable, so you've got sample size issues with the findings from previous years (when comparing Jeter to teammates who also played SS).

As far as moving him goes, until the Yankees come up with a SS that can hit as well as Juan Rivera or Raul Mondesi, I don't see it as being an issue. A lot of his defensive value comes just from being able to play the position, allowing another bat in the lineup.

It's one thing to say he's one of the worst defensive SS's in the league (a statement I agree with), it's another thing entirely to say he should be moved any time soon.

As a Yankee hater, I'm disappointed. The Yankees may finally understand that Jeter isn't a good fielder, and move him.

:P

Mike E,

Jeter has participated in very few double plays since he returned, both relative to league and to his replacements. Do the explanations for this differ from the decline in range, or are they the same?

I think the Yankee fiedling pattern anomaly has a lot to do with the thirdbaseman's position and glove.

It seems to me that traditionally speaking, the Yankees have liked having a strong glove man at the hot corner. vis a vis, Ventura, Brosius, and even further back you see they had Nettles and Boyer.

I think if you looked at what Brosius and Ventura have done in the last 6-7 years you might find that they have made significantly more plays than the average AL 3B in that time.
I know it's a flawed tool but I looked up Wins Shares and found that their fielding WS/1000 innings were respectively:

Brosius: 4.40
Ventura: 4.31

and just for comparison, straight out of a mixed bag:
Nettles: 4.40
Boyer: 4.97
Brooks Robinson: 4.24
Wade Boggs: 3.82
Mike Pagliarulo: 3.75
George Brett: 3.73
(it's oall on page 612)

So my guess is that the thirdbasemen have made their own assessment about Jeter's glove and they just go for it, agressivly cutting off balls that other Shortstops might field. So the thirdbasemen Jeter has played with probably field a little shallower and this pushes Jeter further back & towards the middle, and that makes it harder to cover plays that the Thirdbasemen miss at the edge of their ability.

I haven't checked for Secondbasemen and the big hole up the middle, but I'd imagine something similar. Perhaps Soriano is not as bad as we think he is?
Knobluach is listed as 4.30 WS/1000.
Jeter himself: 4.11 which is not good at all for a SS.

The URL linked above will point you to the main directory of games for June 29 (change the "month" and "day" parameters to get games for a different day). If you click on the link for a specific game, the directory for that game will include a file named "playbyplay.html". If you click on that file name, you'll get the play-by-play data. I have used those PBP files to create event files in Retrosheet format.

I wanted to reiterate what seems to me to be the most important thing to come out of this analysis - that even though Jeter's replacements made more plays than did Jeter, and handled a higher percentage of balls in the SS vicinity than did Jeter, the Yankee defense as a whole was no better without Jeter than it has been with Jeter. There are other factors that might be affecting this - for example, the loss of Bernie Williams, whose defense has been deteriorating over the past few years, has probably helped the OF defense - but I think that it's pretty clear that the Yankees do make defensive adjustments when Jeter is playing that reduce the percentage of balls on which he has a chance to make plays, and that don't appear to have a net impact on the team's ability to convert balls into outs.

Nelson Briles tells a (possibly apocryphal) story about Bill Mazeroski, dating to the time when both played for the Pirates. Briles was pitching with a runner on 2B and noted that Mazeroski was cheating up the middle. Given Briles's normal pitching tendencies to the hitter, he would have expected the hitter to hit a grounder to the right side. Briles motioned to Mazeroski to move back toward the hole, and Maz moved a couple of steps back in that direction. After the first pitch, Briles looked around again and saw that Mazeroski had moved back toward the middle of the diamond. This time, when Briles pitched, the hitter hit a ground ball to the spot where Briles had expected Mazeroski to be positioned, which went through the infield into right - and Roberto Clemente threw the runner from 2B out at the plate trying to score. After the game, Briles asked Mazeroski why he had moved, and Maz indicated that he didn't want a ground ball to get through the middle, since the Bucs' CF had a weak arm and was unlikely to make a play at the plate. He had no such concerns about Clemente. Thus, even though it might have been "likely" for the hitter to hit the ball toward the 1B/2B hole, in Mazeroski's judgment, based on the abilities of his teammates, he took a position that reduced the likelihood that he would make a play but increased the likelihood that whatever play was made would be to the team's benefit.

I have my doubts as to whether the specific story is true, but I think the underlying principle is valid; optimal defensive positioning does depend on the capabilities of one's teammates as well as one's own skill set.

-- MWE