I have received 14 submissions in the W-L contest and one thing stands out: the higher the predicted wins, the lower Dice's estimated ERA.
The four readers with the lowest ERA predictions also submitted the four highest win totals. At the other end, the three highest ERAs are from the three readers who (so far) have predicted the fewest Sox wins.
6 comments:
And you didn't plan that.
Oh, and Redsock, did you know Manny is the worst LF in the league?
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/03/18/sports/baseball/18score.html?ref=baseball
It's the NYT, but not Murray -- the analysis is something Chass couldn't handle. But I'm not sure I believe it.
As soon as I posted that, I got some more emails and that theory is now shot to hell.
Yeah, I saw that. There is a bit of a discussion at SoSH about the methods for this. At least one metric includes balls off the Wall as being in the fielder's zone, so Manny will be penalized for not recording an out on a ball that hits 2/3 of the way up the Wall.
Manny is not Willie Mays or Tris Speaker, but I have a hard time believing he's as bad as they say -- how many runs he allows over an average LF. Maybe he is, but the ways of measuring fielding still need work. I'd say he's average at Fenway, less than average on the road.
The SoSH discussion is here.
Looks like more MUMS to me...
None of the defense studies I've seen takes account of outfield positioning (which is subjective, anyway). We know Manny plays shallow at Fenway, meaning any hard-hit balls rocket by him, and who knows how many bloops he turns into outs. I compare him to Bonds--who is a fire-hydrant out there--EXCEPT--he has an excellent read off the bat and resultant first-step jump. This enables him to get to a surprising (to me) number of balls. I've often wondered whether this is a teachable skill--there are a couple of other Sox of'ers who could benefit (howdy, Coco, Wily Mo). Nothing against DeMarlo Hale, but I wonder what Red Sox outfield coaching concentrates on.
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