Projections

I’m Still Wilin

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I can’t say his name without thinking of the Lowell George song made famous by Little Feat, “Willin'”, but I’m partial to the cover by Commander Cody and His Lost Planet Airmen. Here it is, a soundtrack for player analysis.

We published our first pass at 2015 roto prices at pattonandco.com (you’ll need a free registration to see it all and comment) last week, and one of the biggest sore thumbs seems to be my robust price for Wilin Rosario. That price, $21, is the same I had for him in the Fantasy Baseball Guide, and is based on the fact that the Rockies catcher earned $20, $22 and $13 the last three years. Last year he struggled with a wrist injury and a viral infection, which explains some of the power dropoff, but commenters are struggling to see how he’s going to get at bats unless he’s traded. And if he’s traded he’ll lose the Coors Field advantage, which leaves him where?

How is Rosario as a catcher? Nobody thinks he’s a good catcher. In John Dewan’s +/1 rankings he was the fourth worst catcher in baseball last year, though over the last three years he escaped the bottom group. So he’s not the worst. But he’s bad enough that the Rocks say he will platoon with Justin Morneau at first base this year, taking the at bats there versus lefties. Losing catcher eligibility is a long-term concern, but nothing to worry about for 2015. This year he’s a catcher.

Rosario can’t hit righties. Against righties he has a career OPS of .707. That’s not so great compared to his spectacular OPS against lefties of 1.009, but it isn’t helpless. While 27 catchers with 500 or more PA over the past three years have a better overall OPS than .707, only six have a better combined OPS than Rosario’s .795. It would be better if Rosario was better against righties, obviously, but he’s been so productive against lefties that on past performance he ranks as a solid Top 10 catcher. He also has the third-best Slugging Average the last three years among catchers overall.  He’s a productive hitter, even if he only plays against lefties.

Rosario can’t hit on the road.  There are 29 catchers with 500 PA the last three years who have a better OPS overall than Rosario’s .690 road OPS. This is a point of some concern, since part of the worry about Rosario is that he’ll be traded to a team that won’t play its home games a mile high. But until that happens, Rosario is playing half his games at Coors. His overall numbers make him the seventh-best backstop in the game the last three years. You have to worry about a move, but it hasn’t happened yet.

Will Rosario be traded? If the Rockies had a catcher they could go to every day, I would worry about this, but so far Rosario’s competition is Nick Hundley and Mike McKenry. Hundley is a good defensive backstop with a pretty weak bat. McKenry hit last year like he never did before, in a limited number of at bats. At his age, he is an unlikely candidate to repeat. Rosario is a good platoon partner with Morneau and can serve as an alternate to Hundley behind the plate, at least part of the time. That adds up to another 400 AB season this year, I think, with home games in Coors. Which makes $20 or so dollars of earnings a no brainer.

Okay, it’s time for Little Feat’s live version of Willin’ in 1977 on German TV, which is really great.

What’s Rosario’s value? A healthy Rosario has shown $20 and $22 earnings, which dropped last year to $13 when he was sick and hurt. People talk about how he’s declined each of his ML years, but they’re not looking at the offensive context. Rosario earned more in 2013 than in 2012, despite hitting fewer homers. And in 2014 he walked more, if not a lot, improving his approach to the strike zone. It is because of all of this that I expect him to get 400 AB and hit 20 homers. That’s what he does. If he hits .274, that works out to about $17 in earnings, so maybe my $21 bid limit is a little too high.

Every Rosario Has Its Thorn. Wilin Rosario is a flawed hitter. Not so good versus righties, of whom there are way more than lefties, and not so good away from Coors Field, where he may not be a permanent fixture. So it’s easy to see why all the naysayers are dumping him. He’s not perfect, and he’s likely to have some rough times (read: slumps) at times.

Every Thorn Has Its Rosario. But this is a catcher with prodigious home run power, even when he’s not a Mile High. He’s hit 36 homers in 709 AB at Coors. He’s hit 29 homers in 659 AB away from Coors. In a counting game, give me the homers, and the discount of the naysayers.

Conclusion. My bid price in the Guide was based on what I thought Rosario would earn. And the fact is that even at that price, I thought you should want him. The comments, however, suggest I’ve wildly (and willingly) overbid Rosario. Cool! At $21 Rosario was par. At $17 he was safe. The bottom line for me is that 26 year olds with a history of success are good bets not to be terrible. And every dollar I don’t have to pay for them because the common wisdom hates them, is a savings for me. I’m dropping my bid price to $17, because that seems the more likely winning bid price, and better matches his predicted (by me) earnings in 5×5 roto. But his value as a catcher is greater than that, in Tucumcari and Tonapah.

LINK: Making the Most of the LABR Mixed Draft!

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The LABR Mixed Draft was held this week, and Josh A. Barnes makes an excellent point over at FakeTeams about how to make use of it. In a nutshell, ignore the guys who went higher than expected, since those picks may be the ravings of a single lunatic, but look closely at the guys who dropped below expectations. These are the guys the experts are collectively cool on.

While fine tuning my projections, I’m going to take a closer look at some of these guys, like Adam Wainwright, Josh Harrison, Felix Hernandez, Justin Upton and Mark Trumbo, today over at PattonandCo.com. Read Barnes’ story, for sure, and stop by at Pattonandco.com to get another take.

Ask Rotoman: John F. Kennedy or Kennedy Fried Chicken?

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Rotoman:

Here is my predicament:

I believe in Ian Kennedy! It’s terrible I know. A 4 ERA on the season and a 5.67 ERA over the the last 7 days (this letter was written June 30, since which Mr. Kennedy has had two exemplary starts, allowing two runs in 13 innings, gaining two Wins and striking out 14) doesn’t get many excited. But I can’t get over the fact that he has a 9.67 K/9 on the season and an 11.37 over the past 7 days! If he throws a 6-7 inning 0-2 ER game it’s a gem because he strikes out 7-9 during it.

I guess my question is: Do you see him getting back to 2011 numbers, as we saw at the beginning of the year? Or do you see him regress and be a 2013 Lincecum? (4+ERA, 8.5+ K/9).

“Ianized”

Dear Ianized:

Player performance fluctuates. Some of that is due to a player’s health or physical groove, and some of it is random. Our goal in a player projection is to remove the short-term effects of health and team and ballpark and then isolate the player’s skills from the vagaries visited upon him by luck.

This would be a problem if a player’s career was one of constant skills, but the fact is that a playing career consists of many mini-careers. When young a player is physically strong, but probably not as smart as he can be. He is better equipped to overpower than finesse. When he approaches 27 his physical skills are still strong, and with experience has come wisdom and smarts, which is why so many career years happen about this time. As he advances into his 30s a player’s physical skills deteriorate, but survival skills allow him to add abilities that enable him to hold on.

Predicting a player’s season performance means deciding where he is in his career arc, and also in the mini arcs that really define his career.

20041222-jfk-1073The question here is whether Ian Kennedy, as he approaches 30 years old (this coming December), is still a young enough phenom that can recapture the glories of his year 27 season, when he went 21-4 with a 2.88 ERA? John F. Kennedy. Or is he a savvy enough veteran to improve his game by being smarter rather than better physically, holding on by grit and grimace. Kennedy Fried Chicken.

I think the fact that Kennedy hasn’t achieved the way he did in 2011 this year, despite throwing fewer fly balls than ever before and allowing fewer homers per fly ball than ever before and striking out more than ever before, is a tipoff that 2011 was an outlier. That was the perfect storm of the physical, the mental and the lucky, and it is unlikely that he will repeat that for any extended period ever again. He just isn’t good enough.

That said, right now Kennedy is throwing harder than ever before and striking more guys out. He seems to have changed his repertoire to get more ground outs and allow fewer fly balls, and throwing fewer homers at least in part because of that. He is mixing savvy and physical skills, and whatever good performances he’s putting up can be attributable to being a better smarter pitcher, still with young man skills.

For now, he’s a man with a career 3.97 ERA, a career 3.95 FIP, and a 3.71 ERA on the season, striking out 9.67 per nine innings pitched for a team that is scoring runs at a historic low rate.  He could very well help a fantasy team in the second half of the year, because of the strikeouts and some good but not great qualitatives, but savior status is too much to expect.

He’s more Kennedy Fried than JFK, but I like him.

Politically,
Rotoman

LINK: 10 Lessons about Projections

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From ZiPS inventor Dan Symborski, over at The Hardball Times, his 10 Lessons about making baseball projections. All very interesting and at the same time they feel quite familiar to me, echoing many of my experiences.

Except No. 8, which talks about the regression of inseason stats, which is not as pronounced as from season to season. This means that a player who gets off to a hot start for half a season, is more likely to continue that hot start in the second half than he is to have it continue the next year.

That doesn’t surprise me for any particular individual, but in aggregate it does.

This 10 Lessons story is part of 10 Lessons week at THT. Mitchel Lichtman’s piece about defensive statistics is full of great stuff, too.

 

 

ASK ROTOMAN: Excited to Add Tim Hudson

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Dear Rotoman:

I have a chance to add Tim Hudson.  I need to drop a pitcher in order to do this.  Pitchers to drop: Francisco Liriano, Jeff Samardzjia or Zach Wheeler.

Do you think Hudson in better than any of the three listed.  Scoring roto categories are  W, L, ERA, WHIP, Ks and saves.  What do you think.  

“Tim Is On My Side”

Dear TimIOMS:

I like to start with benchmarks. Some expert leagues (CBS, LABR, TW) recently had auctions. How did these guys rate?

Liriano: $15, $10, $14 (my bid price is $8)
Samarzdjia: $11, $9, $13 ($7)
Wheeler: $10, $10, $10 ($6)

OLYMPUS DIGITAL CAMERAHow about Hudson?

Hudson: $4, $8, $5 ($8)

The experts leagues don’t like this idea at all, and while I have Hudson a little higher, I’m sure I would prefer Liriano, at least, to Hudson, but your question is whether I’d prefer Hudson to any of them. And clearly in my preseason rankings, I valued Hudson by a little over Wheeler, who may have a bright future ahead of him but entered this season a bit underdeveloped as a ML starting pitcher.

Tim Hudson is an experienced veteran with a long track record of success, but he’s coming back from ankle surgery and he’s 38 years old. Guys recovering in their late 30s are far from sure things, and have to be considered somewhat delicate.

So, you have youth and vigor facing off against age and savvy, and you’re looking for the edge. By my reckoning it’s close. I would give a very slight advantage to Hudson in real baseball, and given the probability that the Giants are going to be the better team all season long, that bumps up to a healthy advantage in a league that puts a value on losses as well as wins.

Not only might the Mets not score so much for Wheeler to win, but that bullpen could lay some hurtful losses on him as well. Still, you’ll be giving up quite a few strikeouts, so make sure you can afford those.

And remember, too, that you’re giving up the sexy young rapids to add a lazy ol’ river. If things go wrong you and me both are going to look a little dum.

Edgily,
Rotoman

 

ASK ROTOMAN: Wacha Flocka Cashner?

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Hi Rotoman –

Can you explain how prices sometimes do not coordinate with projections? For example below are your projections for Cashner and Wacha:

Cashner: 10 W, 3.53 ERA, 149 K, 1.24 WHIP
Wacha: 9 W, 3.45 ERA, 173 K, 1.16 WHIP

Yet you have Cashner at $16 and Wacha at $8.

Could the difference be perceived risk?

“Wacha Flaka Cashner”

Dear WFC:
In the Fantasy Guide, the projections are a starting point. They’re based on past performance rates regressed toward the mean, with some manual adjustments, scaled to a rough estimate of playing time (which is also regressed). The Projections are my attempt to describe a player using numbers. I hope that they give a sense how hittable a guy is, what sort of control he has, does he hit for average, can he run, that sort of thing.

The Big Prices in the Guide are my attempt to fix a guy’s value against the market. The prices are meant to be advice on who to buy and who to not buy. Essentially, I try to set the price on guys I expect to do well a buck or two higher than their “market” price. And guys I have concerns about, I set a buck or two lower.

It is important to note that the Prices add up to the budget for a 12-team AL or NL league with $260 budget per team. The reason to budget this way is because it helps you track the spending during the auction. If guys are going for more than the bid prices, you know that there are going to be bargains later. If guys are going for less? A bubble is born.

Now, let’s fast forward to March 15. That’s the day I posted the updated projections and prices here, for purchasers of the Guide. The adjusted projections were:

Cashner: 184 IP, 3.54 ERA, 10 W, 149 K, 1.14 WHIP
Wacha: 172 IP, 3.77 ERA, 11 W, 163 K, 1.24 WHIP

Now here’s the interesting part. The price for Cashner in 5×5 is $16. The price for Wacha is $15. But if you translate the above to dollar values, Cashner’s line is worth about $17, while Wacha’s is worth $8.

What happened?

Two things. As we hurtled toward the baseball season I learned that the market for Wacha is red hot. People consistently have him valued higher than Shelby Miller, which I think is a little wacky. It turns out that he tends to be going in the $16-$18 range in startup auctions. If I kept him at my pessimistic $8 price, it would look like a massive overpay when he went for twice that on draft day. But it isn’t really. The low end of the market for Wacha is $16, and I don’t want him at that.

Cashner, on the other hand, is a guy I want at $16. I mean, I’d rather have him at $14, and that’s been his average price this preseason, ranging from $13 to $15, but if I have to go $16 I’m okay with that.

The other thing I did was tinker with the projections to better reflect my perceptions about these two.

Wacha was a fastball/changeup guy last year. That’s it. An excellent fastball, a tough change, and early success, but it’s really hard to sustain a high level of success over multiple times through the lineup with just two pitches. No matter how good they are. My pessimism derives from the limited arsenal and the good chance that as major league scouts and hitters get repeated looks at him, there is going to be some payback.

The reason why most everyone thinks I’m wrong is because Wacha has added a curveball, which he threw a fair amount in his first start this year, and a cutter, which he didn’t throw much. It’s early, the pitches are new, and so there’s a lot we know. If he adds them effectively, he will become every bit the ace he looked like late last year. My bet is there is going to be some adjusting and he’s going to have some rough starts. So I think he’ll allow more hits and runs. We’ll see.

Cashner, on the other hand, is older, more experienced, has a more traditional fastball/slider/change repertoire already in place. I like him being at least as good as he was last year, when he earned $17.

The final word is that this process is one that consists of information, generated by the players that play, the press that follows them and tells the world what happened, and the numbers that describe what they did. This information is distilled by analysts as it comes in and added to both the projection, something of a description of average talent levels, and the market, which filters it all through the lens of risk and reward, which leads to bid values.

The whole process stops, for a few seconds at least, the moment the auctioneer says Sold! And then it starts all over again.

 

Introducing: Bolick’s Guide to Fantasy Baseball Prospects

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bolickbaseball2014 coverJD Bolick has been writing rookie and draft analysis for the Baseball and Footaball Guides since shortly after the beginning.

He came to me this year and wanted to do a Rookie Guide for Fantasy Baseball Prospects that we might sell as an eBook and other formats.

We didn’t get this together until too late in March, and then it turned out that Apple and Amazon add their own delays, so we’re just appearing today.

You can find the eBook for Kindle here. You can Look Inside the book there and get a taste of it. There are also sample profiles at www.booknoise.com/Bolick

There will be an Apple version soon, I hope. They seem to take longer to approve. And I’m going to post a pdf version here, in case you don’t want to go through the big stores.

If you didn’t buy because of the price or any other reason, please let us know at askrotoman (at) gmail.com. If there is anything you would like to see added, send that to that email address, too.

I think we have a great first draft, hitting the stands too late. But you should be able to tell most of what you need to know by the preview Inside the Book at Amazon. We want to get your $3 next time.

Thanks.
Peter

ASK ROTOMAN: Lake At The Top?

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Dear Rotoman,

in the current TXT files, you have Junior Lake hitting .318.  Typo or irrational exuberance?  If typo, what do you really predict (I’m curious, he’s pretty high variance).

“Junior Birdman”

Screenshot 2014-03-17 22.56.11Dear Jr.

Not really a typo, but one of those instances where a player with limited major league playing time has a high BABIP and a high strikeout rate, and manages to go through the projection tweaking without me noticing his outsized batting average.

If I had noticed I would have dropped Junior Lake’s BA projection this year to .275, which is more in line with his past production and contact rate. Maybe it’s a bit high, actually, but he’s always had a good BABIP coming up through minors. It’s hard to take that completely away from him without good reason.

The other numbers I have for him in the Patton $ Software and Data, are right on, but the .318 is the absolute high end of the possibilities for him this year. That’s if he strikes out less, gets on base a lot on batted balls, hits a homer every 40 at bats or so. That’s possible.

Equally possible is that major league pitchers are going to see that he’s not patient, and they’re going to extend the zone on him. He’s going to strike out more, and pop out more, and his average is going to drop to .235. That’s possible, too.

Which is the variance you’re talking about, Junior B. and I’m glad you brought it up. My projection for Lake has him earning $13 in 420 AB, hitting 10 homers and stealing eight bases (but getting caught nearly as much). That’s batting .275. But I’m willing to pay $7, a bit more than half, because even though there is a fair chance he’ll do better, there is an equally fair chance he’ll do worse. And I want to get caught holding a smaller bag if that happens.

I’ve seen Lake play and it looks like he has the physical skills to excel, the question is in his head and desire. You don’t want to bet on the come hoping those things develop now, but a modest bet will have decent upside if the others in your league let him go.

Cautiously,
Rotoman

 

Projections for The Fantasy Baseball Guide 2014 owners were updated

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The March 15 release is complete. It has updated projections and prices for 4×4 and 5×5 leagues. Players have league identifiers.

Go to the download page, which is password protected. Fantasy Baseball Guide owners will find the password in the Guide. It is the first word of Rick Wilton’s injury report on Albert Pujols, in the hitter section of the Guide.

You can buy an electronic version of the magazine at thefantasysportsguide.com. Use the promo code rotoman2014 and get a dollar off.

You can also buy the Patton $ Data and Software, with more projections and prices updated through the first week of April. More info at software.askrotoman.com.

ASK ROTOMAN: Does Sizemore Matter?

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Dear Rotoman,

What are your thoughts on Grady Sizemore?

“Thinking Along”

Dear Thinking,

In the Fantasy Baseball Guide 2013 we ran profiles of both Grady and Scott Sizemore. With Grady we noted his three microfracture surgeries, his possible timetable of a midseason return, and said it was best to have no expectations. Scott Sizemore was expected to be healthy after surgery to repair his ACL, which he tore in 2012. $3 I said, for the As third baseman. But Scott Sizemore again tore his ACL in the second game, thus ending his 2013 season. Meanwhile, there was no sign of Grady. Which is why I decided to scratch both of them from the 2014 Guide. Oops.

Now they’re back. Scott Sizemore is competing with the equally back-from-the-dead second baseman Brian Roberts for the Yankees job at second base. And Grady is trying out with the Red Sox, ostensibly to serve as their fourth outfielder.

Here are the knocks on Grady. He hasn’t played a full season since 2008. He was passably productive (.788 OPS) in 503 plate appearances in 2009, and has been ineffectual when not not playing since. That’s a lot of down time. But Grady was a finely conditioned athlete (see illustration), and presumably hasn’t shirked on the upper body while rehabbing his knees.

Screenshot 2014-03-14 09.34.43Still, keeping muscle tone (and this isn’t a recent selfie, this is from 2009) is easier when you’re 31 (turns 32 in August) than it is to keep your bat speed and timing. Especially after years of not facing real pitching. Which isn’t to say he can’t do it.

I was skeptical last year of Victor Martinez coming back effectively after a year off. I could find little evidence of other hitters at his age missing a full year and becoming effective regulars again. Martinez, of course, did just fine. History is a guide, not a destiny.

So, Sizemore has age on his side, but has essentially missed his entire prime to injury. He lands on the post-prime part of his career with a history that offers only caution and hope. It would be nice if he regained some of his career, wouldn’t it?

The nice thing for fantasy players is that he’s a late-round low-cost flyer at this point. Skepticism is damping down his price, while there is a real chance for playing time if Jackie Bradley Jr. doesn’t grab hold of the starting job or someone gets hurt. That could mean real value if Sizemore can actually play.

The problem, of course, is that he’s a low contact high-walk-and-strikeout type of player, which means in a BA league he’s likely to hurt you in that category. He’s had a little power, and maybe will add to that, as guys often do as they move into their 30s. What made him specially valuable back in his glory days were his legs, but since they’ve been the motor of his downfalling, don’t count on big steals numbers. Still, you have to think that if he’s going to make the team as a backup centerfielder that the legs will be healed.

I haven’t put a projection in the software at this point because really? If you made me I’d say 300 AB, .235 BA, .350 OBP, 10 HR and 5 SB. I’d pay a buck for the chance that works out. I’d use a 23rd round pick in AL only. I wouldn’t assume any mixed league value.

I would also wonder why I thought an obvious bad pun was a good idea for a headline?

Seismically,
Rotoman