Saturday, March 9, 2024

Anatomy of an Importance Score: Position Player Deep Dive

 Ultimately, my goal with calculating WAR totals is to come up with an average WAR per year because that's the baseline for my "Importance Score" metric that I use to judge the Hall of Fame candidates. So, for example, someone who produced 50 WAR in 10 seasons would have a baseline Importance Score of 5.0 before bonuses (which are given out for WS Rings, Cy Young Awards and MVP Awards.) 

To make the most accurate comparisons possible, I would ideally compare apples to apples aka shortstops to shortstops and designated hitters to designated hitters etc. To this end, I have sorted the HOF by position where "position" is defined by where they played the most ML innings rather than what WIS says on the site (because sometimes there's a difference.) As of this writing, there are no shortstops in the Stickball HOF and just one DH. This means that figuring out what the "average HOF DH" in Stickball world is fairly straightforward and also my next project...which makes that player, Yeico Johnson, the perfect case study for my "Anatomy" series of posts. Here's how that goes: 

Step 1: Calculate Estimated Offensive WAR 

  • When I plug the stats from the HOF spreadsheet into this calculator, I find that he produced 1929 Runs Created in his career as a DH
  • According to research that I did awhile back a "replacement level" DH should produce 70 RC/year and his 2433 games played = 15.02 full seasons...so 15.02 seasons * 70 RC/season means that a replacement level DH that got his amount of playing time would produce 1051.30 Runs Created
  • That means that he is 1929-1051.30 = 877.7 Runs Created above "replacement" 
  • At 10 runs/win, that gives him an "Estimated WAR" of 87.77 on offense 
Step 2: Calculate Estimated Defensive WAR

Once I have an Offensive WAR total, I shift my focus to defense. For this, I lean heavily on the FanGraphs Positional Adjustment.  Their career innings at each position and those adjustments from FanGraphs account for one part of the defensive WAR calculations and Errors, Plus Plays and Minus Plays account for the second part of the defensive WAR calculations. In the wOBA calculations that my more complicated spreadsheet uses a single is worth 0.31 Runs Created, so to make my life easy I do (Plus Plays-Errors-Minus Plays)*0.31 to get a "Raw Fielding Runs" total at each position. Then I combine the Raw Fielding Runs with the Positional Adjustments to get Total Fielding Runs which are then converted to Fielding WAR using the "10 runs per win" rule once again. My calculations for Johnson are below: 


In total, his Estimated Defensive WAR is -12.28 Wins Above Replacement. 

Step 3: Combine WAR totals....87.77 Offensive WAR & -12.28 Defensive WAR = 75.49 total for Estimated WAR

Step 4: Create An "Importance Score" Baseline... Johnson saw ML action in parts of 18 ML seasons, so 75.49 WAR/18 seasons = an average of 4.19 WAR/season. 

Step 5: Calculate "Importance Score" Bonus Points...the Importance Score is essentially borrowed from an MLB.com piece on ranking the best free agent signings of all-time, so I also basically borrowed their scoring system. That system awards 2 points for a WS Ring, 2 points for a Cy Young and 2 points for an MVP Award. They also award 1 additional bonus point for each year that a player recorded 4+ WAR, but I don't give those out until I've had a chance to calculate Park Adjusted WAR for each year of a player's career. Johnson didn't win any rings but he does have 3 MVP awards to his name, so that's 6 bonus points. 

Step 6: "Final" Importance Score with Estimated WAR... Johnson's Importance Score using Estimated WAR is 4.19 (baseline) + 6 (bonus points) = 10.19 total. The general guideline that I have given the HOF Committee is that any player in double digits is likely worthy of election, so Johnson clears that bar. 

(Step 7: Calculate Park Adjusted WAR for all seasons of a player's career)

(Step 8: Adjust baseline Importance Score using new WAR totals)

(Step 9: Award 1 bonus point for each season of 4+ WAR)

Wednesday, March 6, 2024

Meet Your Hall of Famers: Renato Hernandez

 

Bio:   Renato was born in Maiquetia, VE (Pop. 88,000, in North Central Venezuela, on the Caribbean Sea).  Renato broke on to the baseball scene when he pitched for Venezuela in the World Baseball Classic.  In that tournament he struck out 18 batters in just 8 innings of work.  He then signed with Austin in Season 42.

International Signing: Signed for $7 million in Season 42 (8th most that year) by Austin (rwgeorge7)

Scout Lucas Fick- “Renato displayed great velocity with tremendous control in the WBC.  He reminds you of Mariano Rivera being so effective with just 2 fastballs.  His pinpoint control made him deadly to right handers.”

 Career Earnings: $101,839,000

Career: Renato Hernandez was an international free agent signed by Austin (rwgeorge7) in Season 42. He broke into the Majors in season 44 and played 17 seasons.  He also played six seasons for Tampa/Memphis before heading to FA.  In FA he signed with Seattle and played 10 for the Super Troopers. He then finished his career playing one season in Huntington.  In his first pro season he had elbow surgery that almost cost him his career.  He rehabbed and when on to be a 14-time All-Star, won 5 Fireman of the Year Awards (48, 52, 54, 55, 56), and won 3 World Series Ring (52, 53, 55).  Renato was so consistent for his career; it is tough to pick out his best year.  But I feel his best year was Season 53 in Seattle. In that year he threw 91 INN with a WHIP of .91.  He won 10 Games and had 32 SV, with 93 K’s and OAV .191 and 2.37 ERA.  Over his career he had 645 SV, and 53 Wins.  He also accumulated 1081 K’s over 1142 INN with a .207 OAV, 1.06 WHIP, and 2.35 ERA. He holds the Season and Career Record in Saves for Seattle with 53 in season 52 and 435 overall.

Speech Highlight- After being compared to Mariano Rivera..he copied some of his speech “But my abilities were not good enough for me to be a soccer player, so the Lord was pushing me to baseball.  I love baseball but I didn’t think baseball would be something I would use as a career.”


Monday, March 4, 2024

Meet Your Hall of Famers: Aurelio Wong and George Paul (The Cousins)

 



Bio: Aurelio Wong and George Paul were known as "The Cousins" of the Fargo locker room.  Although they were born in different countries, their personalities mired with each other as if they were cousins.  Aurelio was born in Barahona, DO (Pop. 138,000, in Southwest Dominican Republic).  George Paul was born in Atlanta, GA (Pop. 498,000).  Paul attended Crim High School in East downtown Atlanta.

Wong was an IFA: Signed for $19 million in Season 42 (The most that year) by Fargo (thebigdogs)

Paul was drafted: 3rd overall in Season 39 by Fargo (thebigdogs), Signed for $3,440,000

Scout Abdullah Woodward: “Both Wong and Paul were great hitters.  Just different.  Wong had a lot of power and would swing and miss his fair share.  Paul was a great contact hitter with above average power.  Both could run…Paul had great speed and Wong had above average speed.  Neither was a great defender.”

Manager (thebigdogs): “Both Wong and Paul were an interictal part off the Fargo offense in the World Series runs in the late 40’s and early 50’s Seasons.  They added power and speed to make our offense elite.”

Career Earnings: Wong $176,137,000  Paul $96,062,000

Teams:

Wong: 15 ML Seasons Fargo 9, St Louis 1, El Paso 4, Las Vegas 1

Paul:  17 ML Seasons Fargo 11, New York 6

Awards:

Wong: 4-time All-Star, 2 Silver Slugger Awards (48, 57), and 4 World Series Ring (47, 48, 49, 51)

Paul: 4-time All Star, 1 MVP (50), 6 Silver Slugger Awards (43, 45, 46, 47, 48, 50) and 4 World Series Ring (47, 48, 49, 51)

Best Season:

Wong (Season 50): 175 H, 122 R, 23 2B, 7 3B, 55 HR, 166 RBI, 34 SB, .275 AVG, .924 OPS

Paul (Season 50 MVP): 209 H, 118 R, 43 2B, 4 3B, 43 HR, 145 RBI, 42 SB, .302 AVG, .911 OPS

Career Stat:

Wong: 2476 H, 1633 R, 347 2B, 75 3B, 670 HR, 1945 RBI, 469 SB, .274 AVG, .887 OPS

Paul: 2833 H, 1637 R, 539 2B, 76 3B, 508 HR, 1818 RBI, 791 SB, .291 AVG, .866 OPS

Speech Highlight: “The baseball journey goes beyond stats, accomplishments, and money….it is about the relationships and brotherhood you have with other players and coaches.  This journey has been filled with those relationships and am ever grateful.”


Wednesday, February 21, 2024

Anatomy of an "Importance Score": A WAR Story (but not the conflict kind)

 For the past few seasons, I have used the Importance Score to not just guide my own Hall of Fame voting, but also to make recommendations to the HOF Committee about who we recommend as locks/suggestions etc. I have also used it (when possible) for my Awards Voting blog...including this season, when thuggis asked for a more in-depth explaination of the Wins Above Replacement portion of that (and other) metrics that I have used. This is my attempt to adequately explain the process without writing a novel, but I make no guarantees about part two of that statement (sorry in advance!) 

Since I joined Stickball World, I have used a couple of different methods to calculate WAR for hitters: the first one I call the "Estimated WAR" because that's pretty much what it is...a back-of-the-napkin snapshot that gives a fairly accurate but not precisely calculated total. To get that I use the SB method on this calculator  to get an Estimated Career Runs Created total. I then take that number and subtract the Expected Runs Created for that player (which I get from the number of seasons that they played & their primary position...corner guys are expected to produce more than up-the-middle guys.) That tells me how many more Runs Created than average that person produced...from there I simply use the "10 runs per win" rule to divide by 10 and get a guesstimate for their Wins Above Replacement. While being fairly accurate, that does not account for a few key factors such as defense and home park, plus it only works for hitters. 

The second method that I use is what I call "Park Adjusted WAR" which accounts for all of the following aspects: hitting, fielding, pitching, position(s) played and home park. This method takes longer to calculate but I feel it is worth the time as it is significantly more accurate and can be used for any player any time rather than just hitters. While it is by far the best method that I have found, it is still not perfect as it is somewhat based on MLB data rather than Stickball data. 

By that I mean that the spreadsheet I found calculates a batter's value off of wOBA and a pitcher's value off of FIP, but the numbers that it uses to calculate those values come from extensive MLB research rather than anything that WIS or myself has produced. In an ideal world, I would easily be able to calculate those values for Stickball each season...and I do think that the data that I need is somewhere on the site, but it's an extra step and quite a bit of time that I'd have to take so I don't currently bother. That being said, if someone has made it this far in my ramblings and has an idea on how that can easily be done I'd love a suggestion! 

Once I have an initial WAR value based off of wOBA or FIP, I adjust that for the player's home park using the Park Factors that WIS has made public. After that, I factor in the player's defense at each position they played during the season and then add up the park-adjusted offensive WAR, total fielding WAR and pitching WAR that he produced to get a final total for the season. At that point, I enter his season total in the spreadsheet that I have created to track career totals. 

I know that's quite a lot all at once, and also fairly theoretical/vague so my plan is to make this the first in a series of posts with the next two being an example of calculating a position player's WAR and then calculating a pitcher's WAR. Feel free to Trade Chat, Sitemail or post in World Chat with any questions you have!

Season 63 Awards Voting

 After not being able to get a post published in time last season, I wanted to make sure that I got something out this year, which is why I posted the results by WAR into the World Chat a couple of days ago. Now that I have a little extra time, here is the full breakdown for each award...and if I have time I will also go back and add in the Importance Score bonus points to see if those change the outcome at all. Here's what the ballot looked like this season: 

AL MVP

  • Geovany Toregas (LF-Fargo), 6.49 WAR (led league in RBI, Player of the Week = 0.83 bonus pts = 7.32 total) 
  • Adys Sierra (CF-Burlington), 8.55 WAR (Player of the Week = 0.17 bonus = 8.72 total)
  • Emilio Jose (LF-Burlington), 8.39 WAR (led league in H & CS...bonus pts cancel out = 8.39 total)
  • Rafael Jacquez (2B-Fargo), 5.41 WAR (longest hitting streak of season, Player of the Week = 0.5 bonus = 5.91 total) 
  • Danys Uribe (CF-Fargo), 5.14 WAR 
NL MVP
  • Max Franco (1B-Cincinnati), 6.80 WAR (led lg in HR & OPS = 1.33 bonus = 8.13 total) 
  • Ronald Lewis (2B-Las Vegas), 8.33 WAR (Player of the Week = 0.17 bonus = 8.50 total)
  • Emil Vazquez (3B-San Juan), 7.83 WAR (Plyr of the Week x2 = 0.33 bonus = 8.16 total)
  • Max Campos (LF-Las Vegas), 6.33 WAR
  • Joe Lange (3B-Colorado Springs), 7.93 WAR 
AL Cy Young
  • Cesar Chantres (SP-Ottawa), 3.79 WAR
  • Ricardo Estalella (SP-Burlington), 4.25 WAR
  • Gregory Brush (SP-Houston), 3.58 WAR
  • Felix Terdoslavich (SP-Colorado), 2.00 WAR
  • Bruce Higgins (SP-Little Rock), 2.52 WAR (6-way tie for SHO lg lead = .06 bonus = 2.58 total)
NL Cy Young
  • AJ Moreno (SP-Las Vegas), 7.53 WAR (led lg in W, K, OAVG, oppOBP, oppSLG, WHIP & ERA, Pitcher of the Week x3 = 2.84 bonus = 10.37 total)
  • Henry Poole (SP-Cincinnati), 3.32 WAR (6-way tie for SHO lg lead = .06 bonus = 3.38 total)
  • Warren Buckel (SP-Vancouver), 3.58 WAR (Pitcher of the Week = 0.17 bonus = 3.75 total)
  • Julio Pujols (SP-Las Vegas), 4.55 WAR
  • Yordano Fuentes (SP-San Juan), 4.77 WAR
AL Rookie of the Year
  • Jim Erickson (2B-Colorado), 4.79 WAR
  • Marwin Lee (RP-Fargo), 1.68 WAR
  • Sven Huson (1B-Ottawa), 2.97 WAR (led lg in Range Factor = 0.17 bonus = 3.14 total)
  • Bridger Kydd (SP-Fargo), 2.13 WAR
  • Willie Fernandez (SP-Kansas City), 3.80 WAR
NL Rookie of the Year
  • Henderson Moriarty (1B-Trenton), 4.09 WAR
  • Cliff Jones (RF-Trenton), 0.06 WAR
  • Chris Lee (SS-Cincinnati), 1.29 WAR
  • Jeff Nixon (1B-Pittsburgh), 1.36 WAR 
  • Charlie Gran (RF-Seattle), 2.37 WAR

Tuesday, December 19, 2023

S63 HOF Voting

Well, the HOF Committee came to the following consensus,  despite not hearing from our 7th member prior to this post.

Bruinsfan worked his magic again and came up with his "importance score" for the candidates:

  1. Diego Trinidad, 13.5 Importance Score
  2. Bridger Pressley, 11.2 Importance Score
  3. Leonys Nieves, 10.0 Importance Score
  4. Adam Lieber, 9.7 Importance Score
  5. Luther MacDougal, 7.1 Importance Score
  6. Phil Searle, 7.0 Importance Score
  7. TIE BETWEEN: Max Kent/Julio Bennett/Ruben Nova, 6.0 Importance Score (AWARDS ONLY)
  8. Renato Viriato, 5.8 Importance Score
  9. Dwayne Pillette, 4.8 Importance Score
  10. TIE BETWEEN: Jose Lee & Keith Tatum, 4.0 Importance Score (AWARDS ONLY)
  11. Timothy Lewis, 2.9 Importance Score
  12. Jesse Hammond, 2.1 Importance Score
  13. TIE BETWEEN: Eric Brown, Geovany Diaz, Stephen Garcia, Sal Phelps, 2.0 Importance Score (AWARDS ONLY)
  14. TIE BETWEEN: Brian Blair, Ryan Cloud, Abram Hall, Albert James, Al Montanez, Rafael Pimentel, Gustavo Tavarez, Stewart Dupra, 0.0 Importance Score (AWARDS ONLY)

In the end, after 6 members cast their votes, here were the results:

4 Votes:  Diego Trinidad, 13.5 Importance Score
0 Votes:  Bridger Pressley, 11.2 Importance Score
3 Votes:  Leonys Nieves, 10.0 Importance Score
0 Votes:  Adam Lieber, 9.7 Importance Score
4 Votes:  Luther MacDougal, 7.1 Importance Score

So, with that said, it looks like our two locks are Trinidad and MacDougal, with Nieves being our top sorta-kinda-maybe pick.  

-Stick

Friday, December 1, 2023

Season 62 Awards Snubs

 I didn't get a post up in time to make suggestions for Awards Voting last year, so this time around I will return to my roots and do a voting retrospective: Which guys should have won awards and got snubbed and whose hardware was deserved? 

AL MVP: Banks won w/18 votes

Charles Banks 9.42 

Alex Calvo 8.50 (2nd)

Emilio Jose 5.08 (3rd) 

Stormy De Paula 4.92 (4th)

Leonel Gomez 4.87 (5th)

Banks deserved his hardware so he does not make the shortlist of "snub" candidates. 

NL MVP: Fernandez won with 18 votes

Alex Fernandez 5.43

Francisco Chavez 7.11 (2nd)

Ronald Lewis 7.80 (3rd with 3 votes) 

Steve Lowe 6.30 (t-4th)

Miguel Fernandez 6.78 (t-4th)

Lewis had about 2.4 more wins than the actual winner, so he could definitely be in the running for largest snub.

AL Cy Young: Campos won w/14 votes

Wladimir Campos 5.04

Brad Jensen 3.09 (2nd)

Jerome McClain 4.47 (3rd) 

Magglio Garza 1.69 (t-4th)

Gregory Brush 5.12 (t-4th with 2 votes) 

Campos deserved his hardware so he doesn't make the list of snubs.

NL Cy Young: Moreno won with 25 votes

AJ Moreno 6.19 

Peter Donald 3.67 (2nd)

Jimmie Urbina 1.47 (3rd)

Shane Ashby 3.10 (t-4th)

Angel Camacho 2.78 (t-4th)

Moreno deserved his hardware, so he doesn't make the list of snubs. 

AL Rookie of the Year: Alcantara won with 18 votes

Moises Alcantara 0.95

Brandon Smith 2.63 (2nd)

Dallas Thompson -0.95 (3rd)

Jamie Yoshida 3.04 (4th w/2 votes)

Brian Thielbar 1.09 (5th)

Yoshida had about 2.1 more wins than the actual winner, which is pretty significant but not quite as much as the NL MVP snub. 

NL Rookie of the Year: Morton won with 23 votes

Niko Morton 6.58

Flip Kennedy 3.96 (t-2nd)

Irving DeRojas -1.09 (t-2nd)

Alvin White 1.65 (4th)

Wesley Wooster 4.01 (5th)

Morton deserved his hardware, so it looks like the biggest snub of the season is Ronald Lewis.