What happened to Yuniesky Betancourt?

[The Truth]

Where are people getting Escobar's offense being better? Betancourt is at -7.6 and Escobar is at -16.2 before positional adjustments. Escobar comes in at about 2 wins better defensively.

Baseballreference.com WAR stats

[MkeSouthSide]

In fairness, the original post asked for this:

Someone convince me that this guy is just a fraud...

 

So people discussing his horrible defense weren't giving uninvited criticism.

[cwolf2012]

"Baseballreference.com WAR stats"

 

I have no idea what BR is doing to get that. Alcides has better baserunning stats, sure, but not enough to counteract the improvement in SLG for Betancourt. They must not use wOBA.

 

Betancourt is clearly the superior hitter, but only because he can hit for more power. They get on base at about the same clip. Escobar, however, is leaps and bounds better at defense, and I would take him in any season (last year, this year, and for the rest of his career) over Betancourt. Remember, this discussion isn't about Greinke, just Escobar and Betancourt.

[mkm13]

But when EVERY statistical measure says he is the worst defensive SS, along with the scouts and the fans, how much more do we need?

 

I haven't seen a single statistic, not one, that indicates he's anything other than a complete butcher. I grant that defensive stats are somewhat sketchy, but when EVERY method used tells us the same thing, we have to accept that there's something there, don't we?

I realize all the defensive stats point to him being very bad. I question how accurate all those stats are. I am not saying they are accurate or not...I guess I am just a person that would prefer to actually analyze the data before running with it and making extreme statements. If you don't know what the context is behind a statistic..it means little. As I said, it is a big red flag to me when the correlation from year to year is only 0.5.

 

 

[rluzinski]

As I said, it is a big red flag to me when the correlation from year to year is only 0.5.

 

Sample Size and Reliability

 

One thing to keep in mind is that as with all metrics based on sample data where you are trying to estimate a true mean or value, the more data you have generally the more reliable your estimate. In other words, the more opportunities that UZR is based on, the more reliable the number, everything else being equal. On defense, 2B, SS, and CF have almost twice the number of opportunities per game than do the other positions on the field, but that does not necessarily mean that a UZR based on 100 games at SS is as reliable as 200 games at 3B. There are other factors that affect the reliability of a sample number.

 

How many UZR opportunities do you need for UZR to be reliable? There isn’t any magic number. If I asked you how many AB you need before a player’s BA becomes reliable, you would likely answer, “I don’t know. The more the merrier I guess.” That is true with UZR and with all metrics. Of course, for some metrics, you need more or less data than for other metrics for an equivalent reliability. It depends on the sampling error and the spread in underlying talent, and other things that are inherent in that metric. Most of you are familiar with OPS, on base percentage plus slugging average. That is a very reliable metric even after one season of performance, or around 600 PA. In fact, the year-to-year correlation of OPS for full-time players, somewhat of a proxy for reliability, is almost .7. UZR, in contrast, depending on the position, has a year-to-year correlation of around .5. So a year of OPS data is roughly equivalent to a year and half to two years of UZR.

 

Another way to look at it is after one year, a player’s true talent UZR or what you might expect from him in the future is as close to that one-year number as it is to zero (technically, the average of a similar type player, which might not be zero). The best estimate is somewhere in between – in fact more or less the mid-point. Given that, I don’t think it is fair to say that one year of UZR data is “unreliable.” Of course, the words “reliable” or “unreliable” have no quantitative meaning. You can make of them whatever you want. Personally, no matter what size sample of data I look at, I always do a mental regression. For a one-year UZR, I mentally regress UZR halfway toward the mean, which means basically to “cut it in half” since the mean is defined more or less as zero. If you want to refine that “rule of thumb” a little, you can regress a player’s UZR (per 150 games) toward +2 for a fast player, -2 for a slow player, and zero for anyone in between. That is more true in the OF than in the IF, and more true at SS and 2B than at 3B or 1B, as you might expect. In addition, when I say “fast” or “slow,” I mean relative to the average player at that position. So, for example, if a player is fast, but only as fast as the average CF’er, and he is a CF’er, then you still want to regress his UZR to zero.

 

http://www.fangraphs.com/...he-fangraphs-uzr-primer/

[1992casey]

While the gurus will tell us that the newer defensive stats have shortcomings,

their flaws don't qualify them as duds. They're usable if they're handled with care and their specific

flaws are taken into account.

 

I think that most stats that do a reasonable job at what they're supposed to measure are probably pretty good at spotting the extremes. In Betancourt's case, we have several stats that put him smack dab at the bottom over a large sample.

[mkm13]

I have read that entire thing already..that does not tell me enough to be confident in the statistic to call him easily the worst.

[rluzinski]

I have read that entire thing already..that does not tell me enough to be confident in the statistic to call him easily the worst.

 

 

Of course. No stat can tell you anything with certainty. Two years of wOBA is about equal to four years of UZR in terms of uncertainty.

[Ennder]

The worst player in baseball is fully capable of putting up 100 good AB. Yuni isn't far off from the worst player in baseball so it isn't surprising he has done it. He has been more or less the player everyone expected. In the bottom 20 in the league for WAR and one of the worst full time SS in the league and that is after a hot streak.

[kramnoj]

No, he doesnt, he is a horrible hitter, currently he has an 80 wRC+, which is WORST in all MLB for qualifying SS

http://www.fangraphs.com/...nth=0&season1=2011&ind=0

 

I think this is the kind of thing that can happen with hysteria. There is so much talk about how Yuni is the worst SS in baseball that it's just expected that he is going to be the WORST and it has to be CAPITALIZED to show how important this is. Of course, as pointed out, Betancourt isn't the worst in this category, at least not currently.

 

Career UZR/150 as SS:

Betancourt: -9.4

Hairston: 2.3

 

I think it's somewhat important to note that Hairston has only played in 145 games in his career at SS, and his total innings there equal about 114 games. He's a 35 year old whose career high games started at SS was last year with 53 games. I do think that he should be getting time at SS, but I don't think he should be expected to be decent defensively over a large number of games. As a point of comparison, Hairston has a -8/150 UZR at 3B in 767 innings played.

[Ennder]

I think this is the kind of thing that can happen with hysteria. There is so much talk about how Yuni is the worst SS in baseball that it's just expected that he is going to be the WORST and it has to be CAPITALIZED to show how important this is. Of course, as pointed out, Betancourt isn't the worst in this category, at least not currently.

 

I don't feel like actually looking this up but I'm betting he is close to the worst, nobody said he was absolutely the worst SS in baseball and nobody could ever be worse, he is just one of the worst SS in baseball and has been for many years now.

[kramnoj]

nobody said he was absolutely the worst SS in baseball

 

You don't think anybody ever said that? How confident are you in that?

 

I don't feel like actually looking this up but I'm betting he is close to the worst,

 

15 points separate him from Alcides. As a comparison, Elvis is 15 points ahead of Yuni at 95.

[geddymd73]

Anyone who's a regular starter in MLB is not the worst in baseball. The only reason that he shows up as the worst is because the default only shows the "qualified SS" by games. There are several SS that have worse UZR/150. They just simply haven't had the opportunity to accumulate the playing time.

Guys like Sean Rodriguez, Matt Tolbert, Eduardo Nunez, Trevor Plouffe, and Chase D'Arnaud.all have worse UZR/150. Plus there are about 20+ unqualified SS this year with worse WAR as well.

[TheCrew]

Yuni, in his career, is a much better hitter in the 2nd half - I still say he has lost some weight and looks to be in better shape compared to the start of the season. He's been playing some great ball and definitely changed his approach at the plate, his defense still leaves a lot to be desired but who cares when he's been swinging the bat this well.

 

Tired of hearing the UZR argument against Yuni as well - people should be using these advanced stats as compliments to their argument, not the basis. After all, UZR says McGehee is a plus defender this year with good range - and advanced stats once told us that Nyjer Morgan was worth more than Ryan Braun.

[PKBadger]

http://images.cheezburger.com/completestore/2011/8/8/dfe5bf71-9600-47e0-8171-f3178f7b1062.jpg

[kramnoj]

I did a forum search using "betancourt worst". A lot of hits don't match up, but there are certainly quite a few posts that describe Betancourt as one of the worst SS, one of the worst players people have ever seen, worst player in baseball, etc.

 

As an example, here is one post that says "Betancourt very well may be the worst full time player in major league baseball." http://forum.brewerfan.net/search.php?keywords=685058/How-many-of-you-are-willing-to-give-Betancourt-a-shot#reply-685058

[JohnBriggs12]

kramnoj, Betancourt is the poster child for the "we're smarter than you are crowd because we use fancy sabermetric stats that weren't around 20 years ago" and only we can interpret them for you out of date traditionalists that actually watch guys play and decide for yourself.

 

I went into this season with an open mind on Betancourt. That was in contrast to many who had already convinced themselves that he was the worst starter in baseball, damn the evidence to the contrary even if it unfolded right before their eyes. Then again, I think being one of the toughest to strike out is actually evidence of skill. That's real out of date thinking. Betancout is hitting now because he's being more selective at the plate. He's got an amazing talent for putting balls in play even it they are good pitcher's pitches. Most guys swing and miss those or at best foul them off. But if he can lay off those real good pitcher's pitches, and wait for one that he can handle, he usually hits it hard.

 

Defensively, based on all the negativity, I expected to see a stiff out there with stone hands and a scatter arm. On the contrary, I've seen an athletic guy with real smooth quick hands and a generally accurate fairly strong arm. Oh, he'll make an error occasionally as all SS do (Barmes was throwing one ball after another in the dirt over the weekend), but on balls that should be outs, they generally are with Betancourt. Once in a great while a ball gets hit to his right in the hole where you know the premier guys get there, but that's happened maybe a half dozen times all year. This staff just doesn't allow that many balls on the ground.

 

He's far from the worst starting SS. If I had to rank him, he'd fall around 22nd of the 30 starting major league SS, near the top of the bottom third. Since the All Star game though, he's been in the top 5 or 6.

[Ayt]

What happens in this thread when Yuni forgets how to hit and continues his steady play of bottom shelf defense?

I was also going to say that I am amazed that people are puffing out their chests over the play of Yuniesky Betancourt, but we can't be the first fanbase to have seen that.

[Yeti73]

His defense still is extremely questionable, but I would say his offense is making up for it at this point. His ABs are no longer as despicable as they once were. I wonder if Sveum got him to adjust his swing or something? Before the All-Star break he was just flailing away...now it indeed seems like he is "waiting back" as Rock says.

This was my question at the outset. Is there any reason to hope that the adjustments could be permanent? Obviously there is room to debate.

 

 

[DuWayne Steurer]

His defense still is extremely questionable, but I would say his offense is making up for it at this point. His ABs are no longer as despicable as they once were. I wonder if Sveum got him to adjust his swing or something? Before the All-Star break he was just flailing away...now it indeed seems like he is "waiting back" as Rock says.

This was my question at the outset. Is there any reason to hope that the adjustments could be permanent? Obviously there is room to debate.

 

To directly answer the original question........I'd have to say no. I think it's just a bad hitter having a hot streak. And it's hard to JUST answer that question. The reasoning here is that (according to many) his defense is SO bad for a shortstop, that even if he does turn it around, and become, let's just say, for example, a regular .750 OPS guy (which IMO is being very generous), he's still going to likely have negative value.

 

I'll say this. I don't cringe when he comes up with guys on base in a critical spot right now. I'd often times rather see him up with a man on 3rd and less than 2 outs than Hart, Lucroy, or Weeks. For the rest of the year, he's our best option. I'm past the point of hoping he does so abysmally bad that Doug would have to replace him. At this point, it's not gonna happen, obviously. But I'll go back to the original question........at this point, I wouldn't even CARE if he made some minor adjustment to turn his offense around. He still draws walks at an abysmal rate, and he just doesn't have enough power to offset that. I would guess even if he hit lights out for a 4 month stretch, he'd struggle to put up an .800 OPS for a full season, and with his defense, that kind of offense just doesn't excite.

 

I'll root for him for the rest of this year and the playoffs, but I'll be happy when he's bought out and off the roster before next season.

[JohnBriggs12]

Let's keep in mind, that Betancourt has a hefty $2 million dollar buyout. That's a third of what they would have to pay him to play next year. True, his worth is about half of the $6 million, but it may be hard to find a clear upgrade without significantly increasing payroll. The more he keeps hitting, the more difficult in theory it is to find an available upgrade.

[DuWayne Steurer]

Let's keep in mind, that Betancourt has a hefty $2 million dollar buyout. That's a third of what they would have to pay him to play next year. True, his worth is about half of the $6 million, but it may be hard to find a clear upgrade without significantly increasing payroll. The more he keeps hitting, the more difficult in theory it is to find an available upgrade.

With Fielder coming off the books (almost a certainty) I don't think money's going to be that big of an issue. I'm assuming that Melvin's happy with his CF platoon, and if they make a change at 3B, I'm assuming that Taylor Greene gets first shot, rather than a high price FA.

[endaround]

His worth is about 450K at best. He's hit like this before.

[igor67]

Warning revisionist history, from the beginning one of the remarkable things about Betancourt's badness was that it didn't really matter how you evaluated him UZR, other defensive systems, prior fan observations, and scouting all had his as substandard. This was pointed out months ago, to claim this under the antiquated scouts vs. stats debate is not remotely accurate.

[Flood Pants]

This tendency toward second-half hot streaks explains how Betancourt always has a job the next season, despite putting up terrible numbers. Every year he proves that everybody has been wrong about him all along and that he can turn it around.

 

I hope the Brewers don't touch that option. There's no reason to believe his next season will be any different from the rest of his career.