Wednesday Infographic: Things you already painfully know

Published by on October 26, 2011 | 25 Responses

This team might have had trouble hitting.

Again, kind of like Otis’ Failure Cake post, this is based on offense only — relative to the league split for that position. sOPS+ was used because it’s readily available on Baseball-Reference. We’re also talking about cumulative production from each spot.

Quick takeaways:

* So, shortstop sure was terrible, huh? As good as third base (Sandoval) was for the Giants, short was it’s equivalent in bubble size, but in the wrong direction. That smarts.

* Right field — largely on the back of Carlos Beltran’s .925 OPS while playing the position — eked out a positive total performance. If the Giants don’t make the trade for Beltran, third base would be the only above average position, offensively by positional split, on the team.

* Center field was really bad. That’s because Aaron Rowand somehow managed 203 at-bats of .646 OPS gamerness at the spot. Andres Torres crashing and burning (.635 OPS, 337 ABs) didn’t help matters, either.

* It will always amaze me that the Giants replaced a horrible shortstop (Tejada: .577 OPS, 142 ABs) with a horribler shortstop (Cabrera: .491 OPS, 119 ABs). They did it during a playoff drive, too. That takes talent.

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Nivra
Nivra

I'd love to see a version of this charge with fielding runs added in to the adjustment. Torres and Crawford were both well below average offensively, but well above average defensively. That adjustment would also bump Panda up significantly.

sbtokyo
sbtokyo

Love the chart. Sabean needs to pin it on the wall.

marc
marc

How about this then? "Posey suffered a very serious injury that may affect his ability to catch and possibly some other positions in the future. He also does not know how to adequately protect his body while catching." "Arm injuries often come about from poor mechanics." "Health is a skill" - Ron Shandler I don't know if I'd agree with truism, but I certainly would say there's a correlation.

Liem
Liem

Well, let's address this one quote at a time. "Health is a skill" - Unless you can identify the skill set that prevents a catcher from being run-over in an awkward position while receiving a throw from RF, I'd say Buster's injury was the result of bad luck/timing, a lack of skill. Posey has never had a history of injuries before this collision. Some people win at slot machines--that doesn't mean they possess a skill. "Arm injuries often come about from poor mechanics"-- I agree, but Posey didn't suffer an arm injury, so this is irrelevant to our discussion. "Posey suffered a very serious injury that may...." key word in this quote is "may". No one knows how he'll recover. He may walk with a limp for the rest of his life, or he could come back as strong as ever like Frank Gore did after two ACL injuries. "He also does not know how to adequately protect his body while catching." I'm not sure what context this is coming from. Are they talking about the collision or just catching in general? I'd agree that Posey has a terrible habit of turning his head on pitches in the dirt, but that's not related to his ankle/leg injury at all. As for the collision play, Posey was caught in an awkward position as he went down to his knees to receive the throw from RF and tag runner/block home plate in one motion. Unless Posey had decided not try to catch the ball or make the tag, it's hard to imagine how he could have been in any better of a position. Bottom line: Brian Sabean would be right to bet that Buster Posey will recover, and to not feel compelled to sign another catcher.

Ryan
Ryan

This diagram could get some serious greening with a move for Rollins, a trade for Quentin and a flyer on Sizemore. Rollins puts SS in the green easily. Quentin and Sizemore would be high risk moves to put those positions at slightly above average. Belt would probably bring 1st base to league average. It's possible every position could be above league average. Huff could be an above average left handed bat off the bench and DH for inter-league and World Series ;-)

Shankbone
Shankbone

This chart definitely shows the needs pretty clearly, but cutting out defense entirely only tells part of the story. A harder metric to measure but defense is important, especially with the pitching and the park.

Chris Quick
Chris Quick

You could do one based on WAR pretty easily. Though, I'm skeptical of single season defensive metric data.

Robert Haymond
Robert Haymond

Just another Reader to say thanks for the visual chart, Chris.

Paapfly
Paapfly

I also majorly dig this chart. Nice work, Chris. Yep, I'm still around. Sorta.

rog61
rog61

I love, love, LOVE this chart. I love all your bubble charts, but this one really has captured my fancy for how starkly it portrays our problems last year. If you made 162 of them I'd animate it into a quicktime movie, then we could watch the disaster unfold Timelapse style!

Fanadapanda
Fanadapanda

Thanks. Puts the problem in pretty stark visuals. Thank god for Pablo. It got me wondering what the chart in 2010 would have looked like. Reverse the Panda and the color of the 3b circle, and then I'd guess it was small positive at catcher (Posey's 2/3 season outweighing Molina's negative), decent positive at first base (Huff was better than Howard last year on many offensive stats, e.g.), meh at second (Sanchez before injury t-1 and Fontenot?), negative at short (Uribe/Renteria), small positive in left for the first five innings (Burrell after the trade, DeRosa and Lewis early), small positive in center with the career year from Torres, dragged down by Rowand (and definitely positive if you include defense and people like Kemp having off years), and below average in right (Bowker, Schierholtz, Guillen, Ross...Velez?). But in the playoffs and W.S...

Chris Quick
Chris Quick

Here's the 2010 sOPS+ scores C: 117 1B: 103 2B: 104 3B: 95 SS: 112 LF: 121 CF: 100 RF: 81 That looks light years better than the 2011 team.

Fanadapanda
Fanadapanda

Surprised by the shortstop values...did the ghost of Johnnie LeMaster's one good two-month span slip past me? I guess Uribe's power made up for his abysmal on base. More importantly, what can we realistically expect for 2012? Posey +, Huff -, Sanchez (if healthy) +, Crawford/Burriss/? -, Sandoval +, Belt +, Torres/Christian/Brown -, Schierholtz -, Pill ?, Beltran/Keppinger/ DeRosa/Ross/Burrell/other free agents ? (given the track record).

Liem
Liem

Thank you for pointing out Andrus. I'm not sure why I included his name, I must have heard his name on the TV at that moment and typed it. Looking back on that list, I think I meant to type Furcal, who is another "Shudder"-type of player.

Liem
Liem

"A medical truism." I'm already scared by your choice of words. As much as of a "truism" your position maybe, I think you'll have a hard time supporting the position that one injury "always makes future injuries more likely" with evidence. If supporting your truism was easy, the NFL players' union wouldn't have had such a difficult time getting the NFL to admit that concussions had an aggregate affect, even though some injuries, like concussions, certainly make the the same or related injuries more likely. That's because there are many other injuries that do not work in this way. For instance many Tommy John Surgery patients have reported coming back stronger than they were before the original injury. Whether the anecdotal evidence is correct or not, there seems to be no significant increase in repeat Tommy John Surgeries among those who have undergone the surgery when compared to the population of those who have not had the surgery. In the case of broken bones, according this NYT article (arguing that broken bones do not heal faster ironically) Dr. Terry D. Amaral, director of pediatric orthopedic surgery at Montefiore Medical Center in the Bronx, states that "the fracture site is no more or less likely to break again." (http://www.nytimes.com/2010/10/19/health/19really.html) You are correct that Betancourt is a bum. But he's 29, and at the low price he'll fetch, I'd be willing to bet he'll still be better than Tejada/Cabrera, especially if platooned with Crawford. Betancourt sports a 113 tOPS, so he's at least not as much of a bum when facing lefties. Crawford is still terrible against righties, but the glove will make him tolerable.

rog61
rog61

No that's a sports medical truism with lots and lots of stats to back it up. As for the SS, I like the idea of Jamey Carroll, although he'll probably be in some demand this offseason so I don't know what kind of contract he'll take. Scutaro's option is going to be picked up, and if you saw Chris' SS chart last week the Brewers were one of the few teams that could match the Giants lack of production from the position, so I don't see how Betancourt would be a huge upgrade. Nick Punto and Ronny Cedeno actually probably would be slight upgrades which is horrible to conceive. Elvis Andrus is a first year arb eligible player, so obviously he won't be on the FA market. In general, there'll be more teams looking than finding. Maybe Crawford really is the best we can do. Shudder.

Liem
Liem

By competent, I only mean league average at a given position, so by definition there has to be someone that fits that profile. By remotely, I mean someone closer to league average than Miguel Tejada--again another easy threshold. Even a Jamey Carroll-type of player would have turned the Giants' season around. According to Cot's Ronny Cedeno, Elvis Andrus, and Nick Punto will all be free agents this season; Scutaro and Betancourt have team options with cheap buy-outs. Any of those players would be a huge upgrade from Tejada. As for "injury always makes future injuries more likely", I pretty sure that you just made that up.

rog61
rog61

There are a couple of caution points there: 1) first injury always makes future injuries more likely so expectations of Poseys comeback have to be tempered; 2) remotely competent SS are in pretty short supply. Frankly it seems like a longshot for us to end up with such a character.

Liem
Liem

For 2012, Posey should have a disproportionately positive affect on sOPS+ since Catcher is typically a weak offensive position. The same goes for SS, so if the Giants can bring in a remotely competent SS, I think we'll can expect dramatic overall improvement for the offense. I think the two areas of concern would CF and 1B, which are typically strong offensive positions, but at which the Giants have no reliable/proven solutions.Giants fans need to cross their fingers and hope the Huff/Belt/Pill combination figures things out and that Torres can recapture some of that 2010 magic.

Chris Quick
Chris Quick

Uribe was really good on offense (well, for the position) when playing short (393 PA, .245/.303/.451, 116 sOPS+) but the Giants also got good work from Renteria (263 PA, .280/.337/.381, 108 sOPS+) which kind of surprised me.

Pat
Pat

Yes, the Giants have trouble building an offense. Is this a surprise to anyone paying attention before last year? The problem is that when they add free agents, they go position by position on the field, rather than position by position in the lineup. I'm not optimistic about next year either. Brandon Belt is not the second coming of Will Clark, or even JT Snow, but his presence ( and Huff's), may block the Giants from signing the biggest bats available because they play first base.

Liem
Liem

How does filling a roster "by position on the field" necessarily degrade the lineup? This is the second time I've heard this argument and it makes little sense to me. If you want to build a good line-up the most sensible approach would be to acquire the best players available at your positions of need. Filling a roster "by position in the line up" sounds like a great way to end up with 2 hitters at the same position. The Giants' problem in 2011 was that they signed/traded for bad players at each respective position (Cabrera? Really? The only good thing the media could say was that he had a streak on playing for playoff teams. Wow.). Though, I would at least give the Giants credit for trying to address these issues in the draft recently. They've taken a CF and a SS/2B in the first round in consecutive years. With Belt and Pill competing at 1B, Posey returning from injury, and Peguero advancing to AA, I think the Giants offense should be back around league average soon, so they should not sign any "big-bat" free agents to long term deals.

Ryan
Ryan

Does Beltran for 3/36 count as a "big-bat and long term deal"?

Paapfly
Paapfly

No. Seems sort of reasonable, too. But it could always turn into a pretty crummy contract if he ends up being hurt the entire time, which I have to believe is a risk with his age/history.

Chris Quick
Chris Quick

I think you're too quick to give up on Belt. And I think it's presumptive to think that the Giants would ever sign Pujols or Fielder if they didn't have Huff or Belt on the team; also, not to mention, whether or not it's a good idea to sign free agents to such large contracts.