Baseball Auction: Discussion

[oykib]

I was looking over the end of the first round thread where we started discussing how we would play out the season. But I figured that I'd start a new thread, rather than bumping the old one, in hopes that everyone would look at it. I hope I'm not stepping on your toes, Bishop. But I think that we should get started on this discussion.

Also, it gives the real baseball nuts among us an interesting thread to post in while we are waiting for the end of round three.

I came up with two ideas while I was supposed to be working today.

[BishopMVP]

Here's what I said in the first thread: "4. I will post 5 groups of 6 teams, based on when you PM"ed me. The forum as a whole will vote (publicly) on which is the best in each group, and the 5 finalists will advance to another poll. I don't think there are many here who will vote for or against a certain team because the user, so each owner will have the chance to submit a post about their team to sway the voters. The voters will choose based on whatever criteria they choose, so if you choose 1-year wonders or solid 12+ year big leaguers, explain that in your post. Also, you are allowed to vote for yourself, but it will be public, so if you have 1 vote for your team and it is you, we will point and laugh."

Other than changing it to 4 groups of approximately 5 each, I'm going to stick with this format. This isn't intended to prevent anyone else from doing what they want. I encourage and would love to see seasons run from strat-o-matic or whatever else. There is no real one way to do this, as every way has advantages and flaws, so I'm personally going to stick with what I laid out prior to the contest. The real fun of this draft to me is in the bidding and the experience rather than figuring out which team is 'the best', especially because it is impossible to determine. The game of baseball is all about arguing over who was better and so I encourage everyone who wants to to use their method. The only thing I want to prevent is people here at the forums who aren't interested in participating from feeling overwhelmed by the number of threads, so I ask you to be conscious of that when posting new threads (i.e. just don't post like 15 on the front page).

[oykib]

The first thought I had was this. We would pick a particular year in a player's career. That would be the base for the player. We would count that as half of his ability. But to not too greatly reward fluke seasons, and reward great players, we would take the six consective seasons surrounding or including it. You could choose either two prior and two after or three prior and two after.

So, for example, you could take Robin Roberts' 1953 season. He was twenty-six and had been in the league for 5 years. his numbers look like this:

 Year Ag Tm  Lg  W   L   G   GS  GF  CG SHO SV   IP     H    R   ER   HR  BB   SO  HBP  WP  BFP   ERA *lgERA *ERA+
+--------------+---+---+---+---+---+---+---+--+------+----+----+----+---+----+----+---+---+-----+-----+-----+----+
 1948 21 PHI NL   7   9  20  20   0   9   0  0  146.7  148   63   52  10   61   84   4   1   604  3.19  3.95  124
 1949 22 PHI NL  15  15  43  31   9  11   3  4  226.7  229  101   93  15   75   95   5   1   933  3.69  3.96  107
 1950 23 PHI NL  20  11  40  39   1  21   5  1  304.3  282  112  102  29   77  146   2   2  1228  3.02  4.06  135
 1951 24 PHI NL  21  15  44  39   4  22   6  2  315.0  284  115  106  20   64  127   3   4  1274  3.03  3.84  127
 1952 25 PHI NL  28   7  39  37   2  30   3  2  330.0  292  104   95  22   45  148   5   3  1310  2.59  3.66  141
 1953 26 PHI NL  23  16  44  41   2  33   5  2  346.7  324  119  106  30   61  198   2   3  1412  2.75  4.20  152
 1954 27 PHI NL  23  15  45  38   6  29   4  4  336.7  289  116  111  35   56  185   5   2  1331  2.97  4.03  136
 1955 28 PHI NL  23  14  41  38   3  26   1  3  305.0  292  137  111  41   53  160   2   3  1256  3.28  3.96  121
 1956 29 PHI NL  19  18  43  37   6  22   1  3  297.3  328  155  147  46   40  157   2   2  1228  4.45  3.73   84
 1957 30 PHI NL  10  22  39  32   5  14   2  2  249.7  246  122  113  40   43  128   1   0  1033  4.07  3.80   93

So, we count the raw numbers 1950, 1951, 1952, 1953, 1953, 1953, 1953, 1953, 1954, and 1955, and then divide them by 10. We can then get rate stats and have a good idea about the players durability. In Roberts' case, he averages over 40 starts and 300 innings per season.

For Roberts, who was incredibly consistent, the lesser years don't have much impact. However, for fluke players, those years would bring them much closer to the norm.

As an option for the truly great or truly consistent, we could allow the identifiable window to be increased to eight years or ten or twelve or any multiple of two above six. This would allow for you to account for an untimely injury that prevented a good follow up to the player's peak season, but did not keep him from following up later. Some players are incredibly durable throughoput their careers but for one particularly bad injury (e.g. Tommy John).

There are some problems with this system, though.

1) what do we do with players with no stats or unreliable stats. For instance, Negro League, Early-era, and foreign players. Even MLB has this problem. The SB numbers of some of the early players are immense. But they didn't keep CS numbers. Some of these numbers have been retro'd. And the CS rates were incredible. But on some players stat lines there is a blank. Was that player a speed demon or was his manager just crazy?

2) all eras and stats are not the same. We all know Honus Wagner's greatness and can see through his, without proper context, unimpressive stat lines. But are we going to do expansive park and league contexts for everyone?

I pretty much rejected this as a viable way to disply the talents of players. But I did really like one aspect. The bit about choosing a target age and having a six season stretch.

It will put more thought in when we get to the evaluations of players during the seasons. For example, do you use Willie Stargell when he was younger and more effective, but lose out on the "Pops" leadership for your team. Do you want a crafty veteran catcher that can only catch 110-125 games but can position the defense for you and knows how to call a game, or do you want him as a young stud who'll give you greater offensive production and do it for an extra fifteen games?

[oykib]

The first thought I had was this. We would pick a particular year in a player's career. That would be the base for the player. We would count that as half of his ability. But to not too greatly reward fluke seasons, and reward great players, we would take the six consective seasons surrounding or including it. You could choose either two prior and two after or three prior and two after.

So, for example, you could take Robin Roberts' 1953 season. He was twenty-six and had been in the league for 5 years. his numbers look like this:

 Year Ag Tm  Lg  W   L   G   GS  GF  CG SHO SV   IP     H    R   ER   HR  BB   SO  HBP  WP  BFP   ERA *lgERA *ERA+
+--------------+---+---+---+---+---+---+---+--+------+----+----+----+---+----+----+---+---+-----+-----+-----+----+
 1948 21 PHI NL   7   9  20  20   0   9   0  0  146.7  148   63   52  10   61   84   4   1   604  3.19  3.95  124
 1949 22 PHI NL  15  15  43  31   9  11   3  4  226.7  229  101   93  15   75   95   5   1   933  3.69  3.96  107
 1950 23 PHI NL  20  11  40  39   1  21   5  1  304.3  282  112  102  29   77  146   2   2  1228  3.02  4.06  135
 1951 24 PHI NL  21  15  44  39   4  22   6  2  315.0  284  115  106  20   64  127   3   4  1274  3.03  3.84  127
 1952 25 PHI NL  28   7  39  37   2  30   3  2  330.0  292  104   95  22   45  148   5   3  1310  2.59  3.66  141
 1953 26 PHI NL  23  16  44  41   2  33   5  2  346.7  324  119  106  30   61  198   2   3  1412  2.75  4.20  152
 1954 27 PHI NL  23  15  45  38   6  29   4  4  336.7  289  116  111  35   56  185   5   2  1331  2.97  4.03  136
 1955 28 PHI NL  23  14  41  38   3  26   1  3  305.0  292  137  111  41   53  160   2   3  1256  3.28  3.96  121
 1956 29 PHI NL  19  18  43  37   6  22   1  3  297.3  328  155  147  46   40  157   2   2  1228  4.45  3.73   84
 1957 30 PHI NL  10  22  39  32   5  14   2  2  249.7  246  122  113  40   43  128   1   0  1033  4.07  3.80   93

So, we count the raw numbers 1950, 1951, 1952, 1953, 1953, 1953, 1953, 1953, 1954, and 1955, and then divide them by 10. We can then get rate stats and have a good idea about the players durability. In Roberts' case, he averages over 40 starts and 300 innings per season.

For Roberts, who was incredibly consistent, the lesser years don't have much impact. However, for fluke players, those years would bring them much closer to the norm.

As an option for the truly great or truly consistent, we could allow the identifiable window to be increased to eight years or ten or twelve or any multiple of two above six. This would allow for you to account for an untimely injury that prevented a good follow up to the player's peak season, but did not keep him from following up later. Some players are incredibly durable throughoput their careers but for one particularly bad injury (e.g. Tommy John).

There are some problems with this system, though.

1) what do we do with players with no stats or unreliable stats. For instance, Negro League, Early-era, and foreign players. Even MLB has this problem. The SB numbers of some of the early players are immense. But they didn't keep CS numbers. Some of these numbers have been retro'd. And the CS rates were incredible. But on some players stat lines there is a blank. Was that player a speed demon or was his manager just crazy?

2) all eras and stats are not the same. We all know Honus Wagner's greatness and can see through his, without proper context, unimpressive stat lines. But are we going to do expansive park and league contexts for everyone?

I pretty much rejected this as a viable way to display the talents of players. But I did really like one aspect. The bit about choosing a target age and having a six season stretch.

It will put more thought in when we get to the evaluations of players during the seasons. For example, do you use Willie Stargell when he was younger and more effective, but lose out on the "Pops" leadership for your team. Do you want a crafty veteran catcher that can only catch 110-125 games but can position the defense for you and knows how to call a game, or do you want him as a young stud who'll give you greater offensive production and do it for an extra fifteen games?

[oykib]

Bishop, actually what I meant is how do we evaluate ability? We're going to be all over the map in a flat poll. What seasons do we show? Do I get to have Tim Raines for the whole season? He always seemed to miss a month of action.

[BishopMVP]

Originally Posted by oykib

Bishop, actually what I meant is how do we evaluate ability? We're going to be all over the map in a flat poll. What seasons do we show? Do I get to have Tim Raines for the whole season? He always seemed to miss a month of action.

It's up to the voters, and up to you to argue persuasively in your post for the poll. That subjectivity is one of the reasons I'm doing the polls. As much as I like statistics, and the whole sabermetric movement, it is impossible to really quantify how good a player is when we are comparing different eras and different leagues. As much as I don't think that the members of FOFC will necessarily be correct with everything, in something as subjective as this it is the easiest method. If you lose out on a vote by somethnig like 25-23, is that really going to make you believe that the other team is better? Of course not, just as someone using statistics and running seasons won't determine my view either. That's why I want to see as many of these as people are willing to give. Because they will all be fun and interesting. I was just saying that after the auction is finished, I'm going to create the polls. Just because I'm running the auction doesn't mean that this is 'my thing.' It's really nice that you guys are trying not to step on my toes, but please don't hold back at all because you're worried about me. Once the auction is finished and the teams are set, I'm just one of the 18 or so owners.

[oykib]

I thought that the six-season bit was perfect because most players effective period is going to be about that long. We're usually looking at about a six-year stretch from somewhere between 25-33.

My thought was because stats aren't easily reliable (and in some cases not at all reliable), we should rate each player on his abilities. In baseball video games made here in Japan they tend to use this scale: S_A+_A_B+_B_C_D_F

This would be ideal because we could easily define the level of ability.

S = All Time Great
A+ = Greatest of his era (very high black ink numbers, maybe five-seven league leads in this category)
A = Top of the league (Very high Gray ink numbers, fairly likely any given year to be a league leader)
B+ = well above average (maybe one league lead or a good number of top ten finishes)
B = above major league average (a recognized good player, but not really considered the best)
C = Average major league level
D = Below average major league level (Replacement level)
F = Terrible ability (most pitchers hitting ability, for instance)

I thought that without some way to come to a general consensus about each player's abilities we would quagmire in a season discussion thread.

We could limit the number of S and A+ ratings to seperate the truly great from the great. We might have an average of one S ranking and two A+ rankings per position per category. So a total of eight Ss in each offensive category and one S defender at each position. Although, we might wind up with no S-fielding RF or LF and no S-power hitting SS or 2B.

We could go through a thread to hand out the S rating in each category with each owner presenting the player they feel is deserving and then having it voted on.

We could do the same thing with the A+s.

For rankings up to A, the owner sets the line for the team. Each team sets the line for one position at a time. For example:

Sam Greene - RF
Hit for Power - B+
Hit for Average - C
Run - B
Catch - C
Throw - A
Plate Discipline - B (I think Plate Discipline should be added to the list of tools)

Anyone can challenge your rankings. And if so, the players in one of the other divisions vote on it. If the challenge goes through, then the player who challenged your line can lower the line a total of two levels (one stat from A --> B, or two As --> B+). At that point your player is open to challlenge again. That should keep everyone honest. We won't have the problem of a bunch of players having As and B+s across the board.

Anyway, submitted for your approval.

[BishopMVP]

With idea #2, assuming you can accurately reflect every player (and that task alone is nearly impossible), what do you do once you've created these ranking for each player?

[oykib]

Originally Posted by BishopMVP

With idea #2, assuming you can accurately reflect every player (and that task alone is nearly impossible), what do you do once you've created these ranking for each player?

Then we have the poll. But then we are talking about team roles and manager tendencies rather than arguing whether Dave Winfield could hit Satchel Paige.

This wouldn't be to short-circuit discussion. This would be to create more of it. Each owner would basically be responsible for his team. I'm assuming that we all, for the most part, drafted guys that we are familiar with. So then we can enlighten/argue with the other owners about our favorites.

Each owner is not going to be familiar with all the players on every team. Also, if the polling is open to the general FOFC population, we can make the data very quick to hand.

The limits I mentioned are so that we have something of a bell curve distribution to the rankings of abilities. Also it will make owners realistically list weaknesses. Most players tend to be good at only one or two skills.

[Honolulu Blue]

oykib:

What you had mentioned in your first notion is basically what Diamond Mind has done in its Greatest Players disk. Everything is adjusted for park and era, then take the best consecutive years and normalize that into a full season.

It is still my intention to run a Diamond Mind league based on these teams and write a dynasty report. I took some time to create a few players, and move everyone onto the appropriate rosters. I haven't done anything with the Negro & Japanese League players yet, or the really old-timers (DM starts counting seasons from 1894). This, I hope, will provide a more objective look at which is the best team. Not perfect, of course, but what is?

More details to come soon.

[oykib]

Originally Posted by Honolulu Blue

oykib:

What you had mentioned in your first notion is basically what Diamond Mind has done in its Greatest Players disk. Everything is adjusted for park and era, then take the best consecutive years and normalize that into a full season.

It is still my intention to run a Diamond Mind league based on these teams and write a dynasty report. I took some time to create a few players, and move everyone onto the appropriate rosters. I haven't done anything with the Negro & Japanese League players yet, or the really old-timers (DM starts counting seasons from 1894). This, I hope, will provide a more objective look at which is the best team. Not perfect, of course, but what is?

More details to come soon.

I was aware of DMB. But I thought it would be fun to debate the ratings ourselves. It'd also be a good way to learn about the eras and players that we're not as familir with. Basically, I saw it as a way to get more mileage out of it. Because, frankly, I can see us losing a lttle steam now that the easily identifiable greats are all off the board.

[QuikSand]

Beware Mark Fydrich.

[Suicane75]

Didnt MLB count Extra base hits as Stolen Bases until early in the century?