Manny's defense, revisited Options

[Tangotiger]

Manny is also a poor clutch hitter:

http://www.fangraphs.com/statss.aspx?playe...amp;position=OF

From 2002-2006, he's +24.6 wins, when not considering the men on base and leverage.

If you include the men on base, he's +26.4 wins, which is pretty good. He brings it on, with men on base. However, when you factor in the closeness of the game, he becomes +19.9 wins.

What this means is that:
a - he's still a monster (that +19.9 wins, even considering his chokiness, likely keeps him as one of the top 5 hitters in MLB in that time period)
b - he's not quite the monster his context-free stats make him out to be

You can also check out his career here:
http://www.baseball-reference.com/pi/bsplit.cgi?n1=ramirma02

[xjack]

Manny is also a poor clutch hitter

Well, he's a very disciplined hitter, and I think that's the key to understanding the clutch hitting numbers.

He walked 25% of the time last year in close and late situations, to the tune of a .459 OBP. With runners in scoring position and two out, he walked 30% of the time and his OBP was .545.

[Pumpsie]

Well, he's a very disciplined hitter, and I think that's the key to understanding the clutch hitting numbers.

He walked 25% of the time last year in close and late situations, to the tune of a .459 OBP. With runners in scoring position and two out, he walked 30% of the time and his OBP was .545.

Bingo, xjack.

Bobby Abreu has that same tendency and so did Ted Williams, I believe. They're just not going to chase pitches out of the strike zone. To say that that translates to "Manny is not a clutch hitter" is just an out and out lie. Pitchers pitch to Manny as if he's a nuclear device on a hair-trigger. They'd much rather pitch to Trot Nixon or whoever else the Sox have had batting fifth, and who can blame them? If Manny chased, his production would slip further.

David Ortiz does not face this problem, of course. If Papi had to bat fourth with a Trot Nixon hitting behind him, his production would slide even more because he's not as disciplined as Manny is and can get frustrated if they're not throwing him anything at all to hit. That's why Tito has Papi third and Manny fourth.

This seems to be another case of viewing baseball through the lens of statistics without actually watching the games themselves.

This post has been edited by Pumpsie: Mar 20 2007, 03:18 PM

[Tangotiger]

Bingo, xjack.

Bobby Abreu has that same tendency and so did Ted Williams, I believe. They're just not going to chase pitches out of the strike zone. To say that that translates to "Manny is not a clutch hitter" is just an out and out lie. Pitchers pitch to Manny as if he's a nuclear device on a hair-trigger. They'd much rather pitch to Trot Nixon or whoever else the Sox have had batting fifth, and who can blame them? If Manny chased, his production would slip further.

David Ortiz does not face this problem, of course. If Papi had to bat fourth with a Trot Nixon hitting behind him, his production would slide even more because he's not as disciplined as Manny is and can get frustrated if they're not throwing him anything at all to hit. That's why Tito has Papi third and Manny fourth.

This seems to be another case of viewing baseball through the lens of statistics without actually watching the games themselves.

It is not an out-and-out lie. And I wasn't referring to only the handful of PA in 2006. Just look at his career record. In late&close (1100 PA), his SLG is .497, while his career SLG is .600.

If you check out other heavies (Bonds, Thome, Junior, ARod), they lose 30-50 points from their overall SLG. Manny loses over 100. As for "pitching around", here's an excerpt from The Book, by Andy:

http://www.hardballtimes.com/main/printart...around-batters/

Bobby Abreu is FANTASTIC with men on base, and not so good in late&close. Overall, he's still a net positive clutch hitter, enough that, while he's an overall worse hitter than Manny, he's better than Manny when you consider men on base and closeness of game.

[wade boggs chick...]

I posted a link to what Joe Arthur had found in the "What's Manny Really Worth" thread; the link appears to be broken. But assuming I was lucid at that point, here's how I summarized it:
I'll see if I can't find the original thread again.

Apparently Joe Arthur lurks here but is not a member (SHORT ASIDE: SHOULDN'T HE BE GIVEN A MEMBERSHIP HERE!) and he sent me a link that works: (you can change the page by adjusting the start & stop numbers)

I think it's already been linked, but in case it hasn't, here's a short piece that he did on CF and Coco.

Thanks Joe.

[Worst Trade Evah]

It is not an out-and-out lie. And I wasn't referring to only the handful of PA in 2006. Just look at his career record. In late&close (1100 PA), his SLG is .497, while his career SLG is .600.

If you check out other heavies (Bonds, Thome, Junior, ARod), they lose 30-50 points from their overall SLG. Manny loses over 100. As for "pitching around", here's an excerpt from The Book, by Andy:

Well, late and close is kind of a data slice. With another data slice, say, 2 outs RISP (where Manny has just about the same number of appearances as late and close), Manny has a 1.073 OPS. Even late&close, his OBP is .416, putting his late&close OPS over 900. It's kind of hard to complain about that, especially in light of his numbers with 2 outs RISP, in Tie Games, etc.

I guess he's losing around a little ground in some "clutchiness" stat, but on the other hand, he destroyed the Yankees last year, and I'm not really worried about Manny up in key situations with the bat in his hand. You don't actually think Manny has any kind of a "clutch" problem, do you? As a retrospective assessment of Manny's results, yes, he's been down a little in some situations. Going forward, I don't think it means anything at all.

I like Abreu, but would you really rather have him at the plate in a big spot than Manny? I wouldn't.

This post has been edited by Worst Trade Evah: Mar 20 2007, 05:08 PM

[elias]

I like Abreu, but would you really rather have him at the plate in a big spot than Manny? I wouldn't.

This says it all to me. Honestly, it is a no brainer for any manager in the league.

[dkappelman]

I like Abreu, but would you really rather have him at the plate in a big spot than Manny? I wouldn't.

It's really a difference in what you consider "Clutch". Manny compared to most players did quite well in clutch situations. But compared to himself in non clutch situations, he did noticeably worse. It's probably fair to say he didn't "elevate his game". Some players, like Abreu and of course Oritz, did.

[Pumpsie]

Some players, like Abreu and of course Oritz, did.

Don't tell this to Philly fans. They were all over Abreu for not coming up big in the clutch for the Phillies. This was a "known fact" in Philadelphia. Of course, they ARE Philly fans.

[mangotree101]

It is not an out-and-out lie. And I wasn't referring to only the handful of PA in 2006. Just look at his career record. In late&close (1100 PA), his SLG is .497, while his career SLG is .600.

If you check out other heavies (Bonds, Thome, Junior, ARod), they lose 30-50 points from their overall SLG. Manny loses over 100. As for "pitching around", here's an excerpt from The Book, by Andy:

http://www.hardballtimes.com/main/printart...around-batters/

Bobby Abreu is FANTASTIC with men on base, and not so good in late&close. Overall, he's still a net positive clutch hitter, enough that, while he's an overall worse hitter than Manny, he's better than Manny when you consider men on base and closeness of game.

I don't know. I like and trust stats as much as the next guy, but if the numbers tell me A-Rod is more clutch than Manny, I stop believing the numbers...

I know it doesn't mean much, if anything (SSS and all that), but in 2006 Manny's L&C SLG was .685, and his OBP was .545, as compared to his overall SLG/OBP of .619 and .439. He's turned things around!

[PedroKsBambino]

Manny has had some terrific clutch hits, and I certainly don't worry about him being up in the clutch. That said, I think he's getting some halo effect here, too.

David Ortiz is an amazing clutch hitter. Perhaps the best in modern baseball. But Manny Ramirez, to my eyes, isn't anywhere near that. I am not stunned that he's below other top sluggers in the clutch, even. The Sox get a lot of wins because the middle of their order produces in the clutch, and Manny does well enough...but I think perhaps people are overstating how effective he's been there and perhaps some of that is his lineup neighbor.

Just my take; it's obviously a subjective one.

[Vermonter At Lar...]

If you read the illustration, I don't use the .30 out value at all. The only thing I did was model a baseball game, and described how many runs a team will score with 41.6 batters faced, and what happens if a play that would have been an out was then allowed to become a hit (i.e., now 43.2 batters faced). And then figured how many runs scored.

And that's it. The answer was an extra .8 runs. No .30 or .50 talk whatsoever in order to get the .8 figure at all.

Now, to *explain* how one could derive the .8 figure without creating the illustration I did, then I tell you about the .3 and .5. But, that part is completely irrelevant to the illustration.

All I can tell you is for you to create your own model using whatever run modeler you want, and let you come up with the answer. If it's not .8, then we can talk.

Tango,
I love you in a manly way, but that example is a little confusing on many different levels.

First of all, one hit more per team per game is a huge, huge margin, way beyond realistic expectations. In 2006, for example, the best hitting team in the A.L. averaged 8.10 NHRHs per game, while the worst averaged 7.71 NHRHs per game, for a difference of .39. Most teams operate within .20 NHRHs per game of each other. So using the extreme 8.1 and 7.7 NHRH split between your two teams and a league average BB/G value of 3.5, the lwts value of the batting portion of your two teams is actually 5.21 and 5.01, or a difference of only .20 runs. Subtracting for the 27 and 26 outs respectively, we come to values of 2.51 RPG for Ozzie's team, and 2.41 runs for the low team. Applying the same adjustment for 26 to 27 outs that you used, we get a run total for the low team of 2.12, for an overall difference of .39 runs, which is exactly half of the .78 run value you came up with. And this is the extreme example. In reality, the actual difference is probably quite a bit lower than .39 runs between average teams.

If those run values seem low, remember that we are not including HRs or other multipliers which add up to run totals.

Another logic test would be to look at how much an average PA is worth. The 2006 American League averaged .122 batting runs created per PA. If I multiply that times 41.6 PAs, I get 5.075 BRC, and by 43.2 I get 5.270 BRC for a difference of .195 runs. If I substitute actual runs (1.30 per PA) instead of BRC, I get 5.408 in 41.6 PAs and 5.616 in 43.2 PAs, for a difference of .208 runs per game. This is clearly about 25% of what you are estimating in your example, which is way too much for any possible excursion from the league average.

Having said all of that, I am not sure what your example actually has to do with defensive metrics. That it doesn't fit the .50 + .30 values doesn't mean those values aren't correct - just that the example doesn't prove that they are.

Since we are talking SS's, let's look at some other numbers.

First of all, we actually know how much run value a ball hit into a SS zone and not played is: about .47 runs. This is because there is almost no scenario in which a misfielded ball that a shortstop might be expected to field (or 2B for that matter) can be expected to be anything but a single (.47 runs). Actually, it's probably a few hundredths of a run lower than that, since there are probably a higher number of singles in a SS zone that don't advance runners at average expected rates, so they have less run-producing value.

Another interesting thing about SSs is that their fielding errors probably have lower run value than corner infielder and outfielders. Again, a misplayed ball is probably not going to exceed .47 runs, and throwing errors, which must surely comprise half or more of total SS errors, tend to be single base errors, so I would estimate that an average SS error is probably less than .40 runs. It occurs to me that breaking down errors like this could ultimately lead to a nice study reevaluating the defensive spectrum, since although middle of the defense players handle far more chances than the corner players do, the damage done through misplays is probably quite a bit less. There might be some interesting findings in such a study ...

Anyway I think we can use the .47 or even a .45 value of a playable hit as a good starting point for a SS. Next we have to decide what to do with outs. I would suggest using the .11 value in cumulative studies where we want to examine exactly how many runs a fielder yielded, or the .30 value if we are looking to produce something like a league average. I'll play with the cumulative model since that's my druther, and suggest a starting value of .56 runs for a SS fielding play.

Anyway, that's a start point. I'm running out of time and energy at this point, but we can surely build on this discussion from here.

This post has been edited by Vermonter At Large: Mar 20 2007, 07:50 PM

[paulftodd]

Well, late and close is kind of a data slice. With another data slice, say, 2 outs RISP (where Manny has just about the same number of appearances as late and close), Manny has a 1.073 OPS. Even late&close, his OBP is .416, putting his late&close OPS over 900. It's kind of hard to complain about that, especially in light of his numbers with 2 outs RISP, in Tie Games, etc.

I guess he's losing around a little ground in some "clutchiness" stat, but on the other hand, he destroyed the Yankees last year, and I'm not really worried about Manny up in key situations with the bat in his hand. You don't actually think Manny has any kind of a "clutch" problem, do you? As a retrospective assessment of Manny's results, yes, he's been down a little in some situations. Going forward, I don't think it means anything at all.

I like Abreu, but would you really rather have him at the plate in a big spot than Manny? I wouldn't.

I do not believe that Manny is "not" clutch, I think Manny is Manny regardless of the situation but in the clutches sitiations, guys like Manny see the other teams best RP and are pitched around more Papi on the other hand defines clutch. I had put this on another thread, slightly off topic though but relevent to the dicussion in recent posts.

Fan Graphs Clutch = WPA-(OPSWins*pLI)

No question Manny is a great hitter but based on Fan Graphs Clutch data Manny be an even worse clutch hitter than A-Rod. Five year Clutch totals for some selected players

Papi 3.57
JD Drew 2.56
Bernie Williams 2.22
Andrew Jones 2.04
Jermaine Dye 1.92
Tek 0.63
Garry Sheffield 0.31
M. Loretta 0.23
Kevin Millar 0.09
Jeter -0.08
Coco Crisp -0.19
Nomar -0.67
Carlos Beltran -1.22
Mark Bellhorn -1.42
Vernon Wells -1.49
Damon -1.52
Lugo -1.56
Pujols -1.87
Lowell -1.87
Alex Gonzalez -2.06
Jason Giambi -2.33
Edgar Renteria -2.39
Paul Konerko -2.50
A-Rod -2.71
Barry Bonds -3.69
Jim Thome -4.75
Helton -5.76
Manny -6.55

I could not find anyone with a lower 5 yr total than Manny but these were the only players I checked. For 2006 A-Rod was dead last, Papi # 1, and Manny was 136 out of 162 qualified hitters

IMO Manny hits the same regardless of the situation, not "clutch" like Papi , but not a choker, and his poor results here may be related to his lack of protection and not seeing anything to hit in tougher situations and facing the other teams best RP.

There are some surprising names at the bottom of the list so you wonder if this metric is accurate.

Another measure is RBI Pct from BR. If I could separate it out for close and late situations it would of course be a better measure but I can't. But since 2003, Manny is ranked 20th in MLB in RBI Pct for all players with a minimum of 1000 ROB in the period at 17.6%. Papi is ranked 2nd at 19.02 (Mike Sweeney is first), for reference Pujols is 18.71% and A-Rod is ranked 34th at 15.82%). Jim Rice was 17.8% in his peak years from 1975-1980 (his data calculated from BP).

From 2000-2002, Manny was ranked # 2 in RBI pct at 19.71% (Sweeney again was #1). Has Manny regressed, or is it just that Papi is cleaning the bases ahead of him and taking the easier pickings. Probably more of the latter than the former.

[bowiac]

I like Abreu, but would you really rather have him at the plate in a big spot than Manny? I wouldn't.

I don't think Tango would either - while Abreu has been more clutch than Manny in the past, I don't think he was saying that he necessarily expects that to continue. You need to regress those numbers pretty heavily.

[Tangotiger]

Tango,
I love you in a manly way, but that example is a little confusing on many different levels.

I'm trying to stay away from mathematical gymnastics. Let's just stick to reality and to models, rather than doing what you are doing.

Ok, so instead of removing 1 out and making that a hit, remove 0.1 outs and add 0.1 hits. Work it out. Use a realistic model for how runs are created. I suggest this:

http://www.tangotiger.net/markov.html

But, you choose absolutely anything you want. I'll guarantee you that you'll get .08 more runs scored by turning 0.1 sure outs into 0.1 sure singles.

***

Update: I just ran it with Markov, and I get an extra .083 runs.

This post has been edited by Tangotiger: Mar 20 2007, 11:23 PM

[Tangotiger]

I don't think Tango would either - while Abreu has been more clutch than Manny in the past, I don't think he was saying that he necessarily expects that to continue. You need to regress those numbers pretty heavily.

I never said anything about the future. I only explained the past.

Obviously, you'd regress the numbers heavily as bowiac is saying.

As for the other comment about "a slice" for late & close: that's the point of Leverage Index. You don't have to "slice" it. Every single PA is given a level of crucialness from 0.01 to 10.00 (average of 1.00). And, Manny simply didn't cut it (relatively speaking for him). Even granting that he didn't (relatively) cut it, he's still OUTSTANDING in the clutch relative to almost every MLB player since 2002 (oustide of Bonds, Pujols, Ortiz).

And ARod was one of the worst clutch hitters in 2006. Ortiz, Pujols and Jeter were at the top. Ortiz 2005/2006 may have had the greatest clutch performance of all time. WPA works and delivers.

Finally, please don't quote how Manny did in 80 or 100 PA as evidence of anything. 2 standard deviations = .100 in OBP. A guy can go .350 OBP in 100 PA, and you are 95% sure his real talent level is between .250 and .450. That encompasses just about every player in MLB.

[xjack]

Finally, please don't quote how Manny did in 80 or 100 PA as evidence of anything. 2 standard deviations = .100 in OBP. A guy can go .350 OBP in 100 PA, and you are 95% sure his real talent level is between .250 and .450. That encompasses just about every player in MLB.

Fine.

Over 439 at bats with runners in scoring position from 2004-2006, Manny's OBP was .462. That's 85 points higher than his OBP over 803 at bats with nobody on. There's little question pitchers are more careful with him when the stakes are higher.

[Tangotiger]

I'm more concerned about the late & close.

I already said that he was better with men on base than his overall numbers suggest. What he sucked in (relative to his fantastic overall self) was his performance late & close.

This is what I said:

From 2002-2006, he's +24.6 wins, when not considering the men on base and leverage.

If you include the men on base, he's +26.4 wins, which is pretty good. He brings it on, with men on base. However, when you factor in the closeness of the game, he becomes +19.9 wins.

What this means is that:
a - he's still a monster (that +19.9 wins, even considering his chokiness, likely keeps him as one of the top 5 hitters in MLB in that time period)
b - he's not quite the monster his context-free stats make him out to be

This post has been edited by Tangotiger: Mar 21 2007, 03:43 PM

[elias]

I'm more concerned about the late & close.

The biggest problem is that the stats don't show that in close and late situations Manny's mindframe changes significantly with Ortiz directly behind him. If we had samples of three or 4 guys batting in front of David Ortiz and what would happen to their numbers I bet they would resemble Manny's. To weigh Manny's clutch ability without incorporating this, and to suggest anything about his tendencies by the numbers is very shortsighted, and one sidedly simple.

[Tangotiger]

The biggest problem is that the stats don't show that in close and late situations Manny's mindframe changes significantly with Ortiz directly behind him. If we had samples of three or 4 guys batting in front of David Ortiz and what would happen to their numbers I bet they would resemble Manny's. To weigh Manny's clutch ability without incorporating this, and to suggest anything about his tendencies by the numbers is very shortsighted, and one sidedly simple.

Ortiz is the #3 hitter, and Manny is #4.

Are you suggesting that Manny's SLG drops 100 points, compared to the other big sluggers who drop 30-50 points in late and close situations because he has no one to "protect" him in late & close (but that this doesn't manifest itself in similar men on base situations, but early innings)? That Manny needs protection only in late&close situations. And that this only applies to Manny, and no one else?