When is the time to start selling?

[monty57]

"At best"

 

Pos, Player, OBP / SLG / OPS (Year)

 

1B Fielder .412 / .602 / 1.014 (2009)

2B Weeks .340 / .517 / .857 (2009 - partial season)

SS Escobar Unknown - The average of Bill James, CHONE, Zips & Marcel had him projected for .725 OPS (not "at best" scenario, but a projected scenario)

3B McGehee .360 / .499 / .859 (2009)

LF Braun .386 / .551 / .937 (2009)

CF Gomez .296 / .360 / .656 (2008)

RF Hart .346 / .565 / .911 (2010)

 

SP Gallardo 2.58 ERA (2010)

SP Wolf 3.20 ERA (2002) 3.23 (2009)

SP Davis 3.39 ERA (2004) 4.12 (2009)

SP Parra 4.39 ERA (2008)

SP Bush 4.18 (2008)

 

Current

1B Fielder .392 / .479 / .871 (-.143)

2B Weeks .369 / .452 / .821 (-.036)

SS Escobar .299 / .327 / .626 (-.099)

3B McGehee .342 / .464 / .806 (-.053)

LF Braun .342 / .461 / .803 (-.134)

CF Gomez .274 / .365 / .639 (-.017)

RF Hart .346 / .565 / .911 (---)

 

SP Gallardo 2.58 ERA (---)

SP Wolf 4.49 ERA (+1.29)

SP Davis 7.56 ERA (+4.17)

SP Parra 4.45 ERA (+0.06)

SP Bush 4.23 ERA (+0.05)

 

I know ERA isn't the best measure, but it's quick & easy for this.

 

If all of our players were playing at their historic best, our hitters would, on average, add .069 to their OPS, and the starting pitchers would subtract 1.11 from their ERA. That would definitely make us better than "a .500 team at best."

[pebadger]

This team has been bad for a full year of baseball. Even in their recent good seasons this has not been team that has shown sustained excellence. They made the playoffs largely due to CC and yet another Mets collapse. In 2007 they raced out to a big lead and then proceeded to give it all away. 2006 was a disaster, Everybody was just happy to make it back to .500 in 2005.

 

This is a franchise that, even in these new quasi-glory days by Milwaukee standards, has been clawing and scratching just to edge themselves into the picture of respectability when viewed from a broader perspective. This doesn't mean that the Brewers aren't a bad baseball team right now. They are. But it does help to temper some of the disappointment that I feel anyway. The legacy of a quarter century of being a rudderless saiboat in a competition that is largely dominated by nuclear-powered aircraft carriers can't be erased overnight.

[The Truth]

Teixeira and Fielder have remarkably similar batting stats, but Teixeira is a Gold Glover defensively. Fielder and Teixeira do not have equal trade value.

[adambr2]

The Pittsburgh Pirates would probably contend for the division if all their players performed near their at-best projections. You could probably say that about the majority of MLB teams -- the problem is that you're not going to get your entire 25 man roster to perform to their best possible scenario, it's just not realistic.

[Ennder]

In the last three games the Brewers have given opponents 11 unearned runs while scoring a total of three and costing our #1 pitcher for who knows how long. That is not competitive baseball. That is about as ugly of baseball that I can imagine. If we think this team has 80-82 win talent, but ends up with 68-70 wins, we may need to conclude the projection for this team's talent was off considerably.

I'd trust the projections before I'd trust actual records. The projections are based on 3+ years of data, the records are based on 1 year. Results are a terrible way to measure things like talent in baseball unless you are using much larger than 1 year sample. I would expect an 81 win talent team to win somewhere between 65 and 97 games with most season being between 71 and 91. I think the gap between results and talent is that large.

 

I still think we should be looking towards 2011/2012 though. At this point even playing at a 91 win level the rest of the way probably doesn't make the playoffs.

[trwi7]

I just have a hard time believing this team is performing below their talent level.

 

We're 37-47, our pythagorean is 39-45. Our offense is fine, but our pitching was going to be average at best and when you factor in our awful defense they were going to look worse than they are. Is it any shock that our pitching has a .328 BABIP with our awful defense behind them? You could say that's luck, but it's not. It was known that this wasn't going to be a good defensive team.

 

Team ERA is 4.76, team xFIP is 4.41. The ERA is 14th in the National League, the xFIP is 11th. So still well below average.

 

This isn't luck, it's a poorly constructed team.

[Ennder]

The 11th best pitching in the NL combined with one of the top 3 or 4 hitting teams should result in around a .500 team...

[DougJones43]

The 11th best pitching in the NL combined with one of the top 3 or 4 hitting teams should result in around a .500 team...

And then you have to factor in the team's terrible defense as well.

[Ennder]

BPro projected the Brewers to win 75 games with 755 RS, 782 RA. We are on pace for 71 wins and 768 RS and 841 RA. The difference pretty much comes down to the pitching under-performing and more specifically you can point at Wolf, Davis, Hoffman and Hawkins having their various problems.

 

I'll catch a lot of flack for this but 84 games is way too small of a sample to judge a team on. 162 games is probably too small but obviously is the most you can work with during a season, 84 is just way too small. I think this team is somewhere around .500 so like I said we should be looking towards 2011 and 2012 but trying to say people are wrong for thinking something about a team because of 84 games just isn't realistic.

[sheethead]

Results are a terrible way to measure things...

 

Maybe its just me, but I wasn't able to read past this part.

 

One pub projects 81 wins, one projects 72 wins, one projects...

 

All make more sense than what actually happens? Forget it, I didn't mean to ask that question.

[monty57]

Ennder, you have a great way of concisely saying what I take far too many words to say. Even with most of our position players hitting below expectations and with our terrible defense, if the pitchers you mentioned were pitching the way they did last season, we wouldn't be having this conversation.

 

We have talent on the team. We (mainly Wolf, Davis, Hoffman, Hawkins) played really bad to start the season. We aren't that far away from being a decent team. It could probably be argued that if we hadn't signed Hoffman and Davis this offseason and had let Suppan go before the season started, we would be a .500+ team right now and in the middle of the playoff chase.

[Baldkin]

If you can't understand that 84 games is a small sample size when talking about things (especially starting pitching) and that over half a season a teams record can be extremely volatile based on a few players performing way above or way below expectations, I'm not sure what to say.

 

Take the 2004 Brewers for example. After 81 games they were 43-38, on pace to win 86 games. The next 81 games they went 23-58. I don't think either of those 81 game records is where the "true talent" of that team was. They would've been hard pressed to win 86, and hard pressed to only win 46. I'd say they were about a 65 to 70 win team overall, and that's where they finished.

 

This season, thus far, the 'Crew has been extremely unlucky, and have had a majority of their poor performers come from the same spot -- the pitching staff.

[sheethead]

If it makes you feel better to think this team is unlucky, rather than just bad (which is where I will dig my heals in and believe), than more power to you. Rather than take a half year of stats and say certain players are under performing, or better yet take a year of each players best stats and say this is what "could happen", I look at the state of the team and here is what I see...

 

Twelve unearned runs allowed in three games.

 

The errors were bad, but let's look at the walks and how many scored. Uh, nah I don't even want to bother. We'll just go with a lot.

 

Pathetic defense, a pitching staff that walks a ton of hitters, and 3-4 hitters not giving a rats behind add up to a bad team. Not unlucky in my mind, its just bad.

 

Walking hitters is not unlucky, its BAD pitching. 330 to be exact, second to last (MLB) in front of only SF. The difference? SF pitching OPS against is .688 (2nd in MLB), Milwaukee's is .782 (27th). If there is one thing in baseball that I can say is not predicated on luck for pitchers, its giving up home runs and walking batters. The awful defense is icing on the cake, and this same awful defense has been awful for years. Yost had it middle of the road, but Macha has this group back to some of the worst I've seen.

 

Is awful defense unlucky?

Is awful pitching unlucky?

 

The only unlucky part of this team I will secede is Prince's atrocious numbers with anybody on base. Other than that, this team isn't unlucky. They are b.a.d.

[rluzinski]

Teixeira and Fielder have remarkably similar batting stats, but Teixeira is a Gold Glover defensively. Fielder and Teixeira do not have equal trade value.

Of course they don't. Teixeira's contract probably pays him more than he projects to be worth while Fielder will probably make somewhere close to what he's worth over the next 1+ years. If those assumptions are correctI, Fielder is worth more in a trade.

 

As for the team being unlucky, I would presume they have been at least a little. Most preseason projections had them around 77-80 wins (IIRC) and they are currently on pace for 71. I'll take the easy way out and simply say that their collective talent is better than 71 wins. Of course, if you take all the teams that are on pace for 71 wins or less, they will most certainly win more than that next year.

 

The farther away anything is from average, the more likely luck played a part.

 

 

 

 

[JonnyLungs]

Luck fluctuates, but so does talent. Teams can't invest three years of patience from the fans by trotting the same collection of talent out there to get an accurate sample size. That's where scouting comes in. Projections are nice but it takes a keen eye to see when a player is about to decline. I know you can project declines based on age and injury history, etc. but all that gives us is what an average guy will do based on the mitigating factors.

 

I'm not saying fundamental changes need to be made to the team at this point, and we can point to performances like Davis' and Hoffman as reasons for under performing, but where is the next under performance going to come from? Will we be back in the same spot next year when player X or player Y suddenly don't perform to expectations and should we simply throw our hands up and say we were unlucky again?

 

Don't get me wrong, I understand small samples and luck but there is going to come a time where luck simply can't be used as an all encompassing crutch to explain performances that don't mean expectations. Maybe they shouldn't put a team projected to win 81 games out there and hope for good luck.

[mletto157]

If there is one thing in baseball that I can say is not predicated on luck for pitchers, its giving up home runs and walking batters.

 

Homeruns are most definitely luck dependent (to a point I guess). The HR/FB ratio of a pitcher can change so much in a one years worth of stats. Most pitchers will average our around 10-11% over their careers... so if one year they are at like 3% do you think they just pitched extremely well that year in "limiting opponents homeruns" or do you think it was lucky? How about vise versa... if said pitcher has a ratio of 20+% on the year... was he just extremely bad at keeping the ball in the ballpark that year, or was he just extrmely unlucky?

 

The answer is most likely that he was just lucky or unlucky. Many studies have been done to look at pitchers in those extremes one year and then see what happened the next year. Almost to a man, all of them revertec back to the mean (about 10-11%). Is this because the ones that really limited their opponents homeruns somehow forgot how to do that the next year? Or the pitchers that gave up a bunch of homeruns the first year somehow figured out how to limit them the next year? No, it's not. It's because that is an extremely luck-driven statistic.

[The Truth]

Teixeira and Fielder have remarkably similar batting stats, but Teixeira is a Gold Glover defensively. Fielder and Teixeira do not have equal trade value.

Of course they don't. Teixeira's contract probably pays him more than he projects to be worth while Fielder will probably make somewhere close to what he's worth over the next 1+ years. If those assumptions are correctI, Fielder is worth more in a trade.

I was saying that in reference to those who look at Teixeira trades in the past and thinking that is what a Fielder trade will bring in. I'm saying that Teixeira is a better overall player and Fielder's trade value isn't what Teixeira's was in the past. Not comparing their trade values in 2010

 

 

[pebadger]

Every team changes every season. Sometimes subtly, sometimes dramatically. The sample size of 162 is really about the best sample size you're going to get. And, in terms of making the playoffs, it's the only sample size that matters.

 

I won't argue against luck, because luck is a vastly underrated factor in just about every facet of life. That said, I am reminded of the scene in Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid when Butch, Sundance and Etta step off the train at their very primitve, very dirty destination in Bolivia. Butch says that all of Bolivia can't be that bad, and Sundance counters that it could be that they are right then standing in the garden spot of the entire country. It just seems that every time luck is brought up on this site that it is to say that things aren't really that bad, when in fact maybe they are. Maybe the Brewers are actually fortunate to have the wins they do.

 

In the end it doesn't matter in that Brewers are where they are and there needs to be some clear-headed assessment of how they want to handle their internal player personnel issues going forward. It would help if this franchise had a consistent, long-standing approach/philosophy when it comes to talent assessment, development, and retention but they don't. At least not in the way some of the better organizations do. The Brewers were sort of fortunate in that they had a good group of young players all come up and perform well in a given window, but that sort of hit-and-miss approach is way too luck-based to work over any extended period of time. For the Brewers it has been one hit per quarter century.

 

I'm not all that happy with Doug Melvin, but he's much better than what has come before. Ownership needs to decide if Doug is the guy to put into place a larger organizational philosophy that can serve as a blueprint after he is gone, or if he is just a guy who will try to assemble teams on an ad-hoc basis over some collection of identified shorter-term windows of opportunity.

[sheethead]

if said pitcher has a ratio of 20+% on the year... was he just extremely bad at keeping the ball in the ballpark that year, or was he just extrmely unlucky?

 

Generally, and this would hold true for a vast majority, if a pitcher is at 20+% for a year they are either hurt or at the end of the line. Grooving meatballs has more to do with bad pitching than it does with luck.

[mletto157]

Although the ability to induce more ground balls is definitely a skill... so I guess to a point, skill is definitely incolved in giving up homeruns. If you're an extreme flyball pitcher, for example, you probably give up more homeruns than the majority of groundball pitchers.

[monty57]

or better yet take a year of each players best stats and say this is what "could happen",

 

Someone said "at best this is a .500 team." I simply was trying to point out that at best it's better than a .500 team. At best, Fielder and Braun are aroun 1.000 OPS guys and Wolf and Davis are solid pitchers. I certainly don't expect everyone to perform to their best level every year, but I also don't expect most of the Brewers to continue to perform much worse than their "mean level" as they have been to start this season. The Brewers have a lot of talent on the team, as is shown both in the players' "good" seasons and in their "average" seasons. They just have a lot of players who are playing below their "average" levels. You can say they are b.a.d., but please excuse me if I think that is a w.r.o.n.g. assessment.

 

I look at the state of the team and here is what I see...

 

Twelve unearned runs allowed in three games.

 

So at least you're taking a large sample and reasonable expectations into consideration. Yes, it sucks that we had three horrible and extremely untimely errors in three straight games. Do you reasonably expect four unearned runs per game to be a continuing trend? You really "dig in your heels" that this is a bad team because they made three errors in three games?

 

With most of the players on the team performing worse than they historically have, some of them having the worst seasons of their careers, we are on pace to win somewhere in the low-70's. It should be reasonable to believe that if some of the players play a little better (closer to expectation), they will perform better in the 2nd half than they did in the 1st.

 

Maybe they shouldn't put a team projected to win 81 games out there and hope for good luck.

 

Well put. While many believe that Melvin's a failure, I believe that it takes a long time to build a team from absolute wasteland to periennial playoff contender. I think the moves made this season and this offseason are very important. We're finally ridding ourselves of some bad contracts after this season, so we will have money to spend, and we have a core of our team (Hart, Fielder, Weeks) who will be FAs after next year. Not to sound too dramatic, but the moves Melvin makes this season and offseason will go a long ways in determining how good we'll be for years to come.

[Baldkin]

Is awful defense unlucky?

Is awful pitching unlucky?

No and Yes, it can be. Braddock, for example, has a babip against of .482 and an ERA of 4.91. Has he been awful?

 

The Brewers have walked more guys than league average, but they're 4th best in K/9 and the BB's have come down a lot since a horrid May (5.09 bb/9 as a staff) -- 3.50 in June and 3.12 so far in July. BTW, their babip in May against was .356, which has skyrocketed their babip against to .328 on the season.

[trwi7]

And the bad BABIP is because of a bad defense.

[thumperden]

Now is as good a time as any. Baseball Prospectus Playoff Odds Report lists the Brewers' chances of making the playoffs at 1.14%. A week ago it was about 2.25% after a decent winning trend.

 

The White Sox have worked their way back into contention of late and their chances have grown 5% in the last 7 days to 22%, which is still only 6th best in the AL.

 

IMO, the Brewers will have to duplicate what the White Sox have done for twice as long to be even considered a contender.

 

It is time to sell, and there are plenty of veterans to chose from.

[Funketown]

I would say the pitching staff is unlucky to have a terrible defense...

 

And yes, they probably have performed somewhat below their true talent level. Whether that's luck, being on the wrong side of variation, or whatever, they are better than a 71 win team.