Monday, January 07, 2008

Reds Outfield Arms - Concerns about Griffey

John Walsh has released his annual report on outfielder arms. With the exception of the Fans' scouting report data, all of the fielding ratings that I've discussed on this blog of late look solely at the ability of outfielders to catch fly balls. That's typically the most important component of outfielding, but preventing baserunners from advancing via either "kills" or "holds" can also be an important factor in a fielder's performance, which is what makes Walsh's arm ratings so valuable.

Only three Reds actually made his cut-off and appeared in his article (I'm surprised Hamilton didn't, but...):
Dunn -4 runs
Freel +2 runs
Griffey -6.5 runs

Remember, part of these "arm" ratings is how fast an outfielder can get to a ball; someone can have a canon, but if they can't get to a ball fast enough, runners will take the extra base anyway. That's probably part of why Dunn and Griffey do so poorly.

How does this affect total value estimates of these players? Let's see:
PlayerOffense (RAR)
Fielding (RAA)
Throwing (RAA)
PosAdj (RAA)
Total
Dunn
51.3
-11.6
-4.0
-3.3
32.4
Freel
-0.2
1.0
2.0
1.5
4.3
Griffey
36.4
-7.1
-6.5
-3.2
19.6
Freel didn't play enough--or hit well enough--for his nice throwing rating to give him much of a bump. And Dunn's offense still carried his value, though his total fielding "performance," including position adjustment and throwing, cut his value by ~35%.

Griffey, on the other hand, got hit really hard, and is now rated as essentially equivalent in 2007 value to Alex Gonzalez according to my numbers (see other Reds in this post). This is consistent with a value estimate by MGL earlier this offseason. He projected Griffey, after factoring in offense, fielding, throwing, baserunning (advancement, not just steals), and aging, to be at or below replacement level. I'm not willing to go that far--both my fielding and Walsh's throwing numbers are a bit more generous to Griffey than MGL's. But I am very concerned about how much value Griffey really is adding to the team out in right field at this point.
Posted by at 1:58 AM
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7 comments:

  1. I really don't see the Reds picking up Griffey's $16.5 million option for 2009, so this should be his last season with the Reds. He's just not worth that kind of money anymore.

    Before the Hamilton trade I had become comfortable with letting Dunn walk, but now I'm not so sure the offense could sustain his loss (unless Votto manages a .900 OPS at first and Bruce can do the same in the outfield). Ideally, if they do keep Dunn they will be able fill the rest of the outfield with plus defenders. I wouldn't mind an outfield of Dunn, Stubbs, and Bruce, even if Stubbs can't manage much of a bat in the Majors. Maybe having a rangy CF next to Dunn will help to cover up some of his flaws. And maybe having Dunn's bat in the lineup can help cover for Stubb's flaws as well. Stubb's could be the plover bird to Dunn's crocodile, so to speak.
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  2. As I think I've seen you mention in the past, the risk with Dunn is that players of his sort--value from power and walks--don't tend to age very well. But I agree that losing two thirds of the outfield at this point is not a reasonable thing to do. And Griffey quite simply should not be continued.

    By my numbers, Dunner's a 3-3.5 WAR player when he's right, so projecting forward and subtracting a half-win for aging, I'd think that a 5-year contract paying him for 2.5-3 WAR per season is pretty reasonable. Based on Tango's scale this offseason, and adding 10% inflation, that would put his contract value in the $41-56 million range over five years.

    Given that they're already paying him $13 million, I can't see him signing for less than 5/$65. So they're probably going to have to overpay to keep him. But overpaying for his production might still result in a better team than not paying for his production at all...
    -j
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  3. Yeah, I don't expect Dunn to age well, but I also don't expect a decline to start for a couple of years either. The two things that concern me is the big body and the long swing. I think it would behoove him to move to 1B, but who knows what kind of defense he would put up there.

    Two things about the rest of what you said. First, they probably would have to overspend, given the contracts that outfielders are getting these days I can't imagine Dunn taking less than $15M a year. However, it's only overspending from the team's perspective if (a) they are giving him that money when a viable replacement is available at a cheaper price; or (b) they are giving him more money than any other team would reasonably spend; (c) the money they give him prevents them from giving money to a more valuable/important player. It depends on the actual money, but I'm not sure that (a) will exist and (b) is a debatable point that really depends on how he performs in 2008, I think.

    (c) is what interests me though. If the Reds happen to hit the prospect lottery here and 3 of the 4 big guys pan out, then the money situation is much more flexible over the next 4 or 5 seasons. This means they can afford to give a little more money to veterans, if they are valuable to the cause. It's a risky proposition, but then there aren't a whole lot of safe moves in baseball roster management, are there?

    The other thing that came to mind from your comment was that perhaps filling the outfield with good defenders besides Dunn will increase Dunn's value. I don't necessarily mean from a WARP perspective, but from the team perspective. If a team can use each player's strength to cover other player's weaknesses, then could it be a case of the whole being greater than the sum of the parts?

    I don't know if that's really even possible, but I've always felt that if you can manage to cut down the amount of expected area for Dunn to cover, you could help make up for his weakness in range and reads. I don't think this would change his rating on the zone measurements much, but from the Reds perspective it would make the team better overall and make his lack of defensive skill less detrimental.

    This of course is all theoretical and off the top of my head. I wouldn't be surprised if the numbers did not back me up much on this, or if it is even provable.
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  4. Hey,

    Yeah, I agree with pretty much everything you said up there.

    Regarding Dunn's aging, FWIW, PECOTA prior to last year didn't forecast much aging through 2011, at least on a rate basis. So it's not a certainty that he'll decline like other players with "old player skills." Of course, it did assume decreased playing time.

    Assessments about overpaying/underpaying that I'm talking about always assume that there are other players available that would give you the $4.4 million per Win Above Replacement we have targeted as the current average free agent production. And that's not always the case, depending on the supply of available players and current team roster composition. And, of course, you can probably afford to overpay in one area if you're saving in another and the move improves your team--the Marlins may have the highest payroll efficiency in the major leagues, but they're not going to win next year.

    As for how fielders can interact to cover up for Dunn, I think there's a lot to be said for those ideas. I tend to assume minimal interactions simply because they're hard to assess, but I think you can reasonably expect that a phenomenal defender in center field can cover up for some (though certainly not all) of Dunn's shortcomings out there, simply because fielder ranges can overlap. I doubt more than 5 runs per season, but that would go a long way. The retrosheet-based fielding stats like TotalZone and SFR probably have to deal with those sorts of interactions more than a ZR-style stat does (I know Dan Fox built something into his model to address this issue), but that's more due to flaws in the zone-based stats' design than anything else. :)

    I don't think the same is true for offense, though--you can't cover for a hitter's inadequacies, because with the exception of pinch hitters, your terrible hitting starter will still always come up to bat on his own (e.g. Adam Everett). That's why some argue that while individualized, "bottom-up" approaches are fine for hitting, when you look at pitching and fielding you need to use a top-down approach to consider the team first, and then the players. I tend to think you'll converge on the same answer most of the time using either approach, but that doesn't mean the top-downer people are wrong. :)
    -j
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  5. Nice points, all.

    Ages ago, I remember Marty & Joe talking about a simulated game in spring training & how the guys were whining about the unfairness of having all the fastest, best-fielding minor leaguers playing the field. Apparently, they had three super-speedsters playing OF & it seemed like there were 4 or 5 of them, LOL.

    Anyway, having a CF who covers more of Dunn's range (and a RF with above-average range) can't be a bad thing.
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  6. Justin, I like the top-down and bottom-up description. It makes sense to me.

    And I don't think you can hide a bad bat for an entire season, but I think you can make sacrifices at one position if you've got surpluses at other positions. This is true of a weak offensive position like CF, especially. I keep thinking of Stubbs, but you could substitute Dickerson even as well. If the Reds had strong offense in LF and RF, and above-average production from 1B, 2B, and 3B, they could probably sacrifice some offense in CF if he truly is a plus defender.

    That is to say, the Astros could afford to have Everett and Ausmus when the rest of their offense was stronger, but when it's just Berkman, Lee, and occasionally Pence, a no-hit player with a flashy glove is less valuable overall.
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  7. Strictly speaking, I'm sure you're correct. Pythagorean equation for predicting runs is non-linear, so how much you need run production from offense and defense of course depends on what else you have in the lineup.

    But I tend to think those sorts of arguments are a bit overblown. Frankly, I'm shocked that Everett was let go for nothing, and even more shocked that the Twins were the only team to offer him a deal--and at a tremendous discount relative to his historical value. All I can figure is that the Astros and others were convinced that his leg injury last season will have lasting and substantial effects that will keep him from providing the level of defensive performance he did in the past.
    -j
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