From: thornley@milli.cs.umn.edu (David H. Thornley)
Newsgroups: rec.sport.baseball
Subject: Re: AL Rookie of Year Award?
Date: 29 Sep 92 19:49:33 GMT
Article-I.D.: news2.1992Sep29.194933.23471
Organization: University of Minnesota, Minneapolis, CSci dept.

In article <19trj7INNh0v@uwm.edu> paul@csd4.csd.uwm.edu (Paul R Krueger) writes:
>In article <1992Sep25.004100.24855@odin.corp.sgi.com> dickh@tribe.esd.sgi.com (Dick Harkness) writes:
>>[A team that wins 20+ games on baserunning is remarkable.  Can you identify
>> the games?]
>   
>   No I can't list them off right here, there are too many games in the season
>   to remember each particular one. But I have watched, listened or been to 
>   almost every game this year and I can honestly say (as could any other    \
>   Brewer fan) that the running game has won at least 20 games for the Brewers
>   this year. If it hasn't been because of stolen bases it's been because of
>   what Garner likes to call "forced errors." It may sound stupid, but if      
>   you've watched the team all year, you'd be amazed at how throwing errors and
>   silly mental mistakes other teams make because of the pressure of the 
>   Brewers running game.
>
First, what do you mean by winning 20+ games on baserunning?  You can't mean
that they won 20 more games than they would have if they didn't run bases (or
if they ran like I do), since all teams do that.  Do you mean something like
20 more games than if they ran like the Red Sox?

Second, can you mention a few games?  If you are confident that the running
game has won 20 games, you must have seen a few.

Actually, I find the concept of a team winning 20 games on baserunning
virtually impossible, the rough equivalent of having a paraplegic playing
left field.  The difference between the two is that we could all *see*
a paraplegic in the outfield, but we have to interpret to see games won.
I also suspect that you aren't netting out games *lost* by baserunning;
the Brewers lead the league in Caught Stealing, and only the Angels are
anywhere close.  About 5% of Brewer runners are removed that way, and
that has to cost runs.

Brewer baserunning is unlikely to interfere with the opponent's offense, so
its only large effect on winning will be to cause more runs to score (it
may also bring in runs in more useful numbers, but Milwaukee has in fact
won less than you would expect based on runs scored and allowed).  Now, we
would expect to have to remove about 200 runs from an offense to change the
results of 20 games in general, and so we are looking for traces of 200
runs in the stats.

Now, the Brewers have a mediocre .330 OBP and an unimpressive .375 SLG,
and a fairly impressive 715 runs, exactly equal to Oakland with its
.346 OBP and .386 SLG, so it seems reasonable that the Brewers are getting
some runs from baserunning.  The RC estimate is 658 runs, or, with the stolen
base version, 662, and the Brewers are 53 runs over that.  The 662 figure
seems fairly comparable with teams with somewhat comparable SLG and OBP, so
it seems that *something* is getting Milwaukee an extra 50 runs.  It could
just as easily be clutch hitting.

Normally, I would count 50 extra runs as about 5 wins, but the Brewers (as
mentioned) are not converting runs into wins efficiently, so the actual
effect is probably slightly less than this.  If you want to claim that
baserunning gets the Brewers about 4-5 extra wins a year, I'll go along
with it (something does, and has done so in the past), but not 20.

David Thornley
"Never rely on players traded by a smarter GM, since they will either lose
on the field or disrupt the clubhouse."- Niccolo Machiavelli

>>|>     That's where the word valuable comes in. Listach has been an infinite
>>|>     number times more valuable to the Brewers, than Lofton to the Indians.
>>|>     Simply put, without Listach the Brewers are comparable to the Indians,
>>|>     with him, they're in a pennant race.
>>
>>So next year, all the teams that are close to .500 should go out and try to get Listach because he will make a .500 team into a pennant contender.  Sounds to me like he should be making $5 million a year...
>     
>     No, that would be silly. He is a perfect fit for the Brewers and the style
>     of play that Garner wants. With Spiers out and Chef traded, Milwaukee was
>     woefully weak on the infield. Listach has been a Godsend. The next in line
>     for the SS job would be Gantner, and if Gumby was playing instead of
>     Listach the Brewers would probably be around a .500 team, if that. 
>
>     Listach probably wouldn't be worth so much to most of the other teams,
>     but for Milwaukee he was really a gift.
>     This is not to take anything away from Lofton who has a great year also,
>     but in terms of being valuable, I think Listach gets the nod.
>
>     --salty
>
>>|> >Dick Harkness
>
>