Best Outfield Arms of 2006
It was the last day of 2006 and I was getting ready for a little
New Year’s Eve get-together. While I was blowing up some balloons, I
saw a new message in my inbox, and after a click I realized that I had
just received a late Christmas gift—the 2006 play-by-play data had
just been released by Retrosheet. Oh, joy! I know, it’s pretty nerdy to get worked
up over a big bunch of numbers, but I usually can’t wait for the new release to come
out, and this year the crew at Retrosheet.org outdid themselves by
bringing home the data two or three months ahead of schedule. Nice
work, boys.
So, the first order of business was to determine the best outfield
arms of 2006. Last year I developed a method for evaluating outfield
arms, which you can read about here
and here.
The first article has all the gory details of the methodology, here is the short, painless
version: using play-by-play data, I consider five different
situations when an outfielder’s throwing ability comes into play:
- Single with runner on first base (second base unoccupied).
- Double with runner on first base.
- Single with runner on second base.
- Fly out with runner on third base, fewer than two outs.
- Fly out with runner on second base, fewer than two outs (third
base unoccupied).
For those
plays, I add up how often the runner is thrown out or how often the
runner is “held,” i.e. prevented from taking the extra base. A
comparison with league average allows me to rate the outfielder’s arm.
By the way, I used this same method to rank the arms of outfielders
from the full Retrosheet era, which roughly covers the years from Roberto Clemente
through Juan Pierre. Actually, the rankings pretty much go from Clemente to
Pierre, as well. Anyway, if you enjoy this kind of thing, the article
appears in
The Hardball Times Annual 2007, so be sure to check it out. Now,
let’s get to the matter at hand.
Right Fielders
I always start with right field, I suppose because that’s where we
expect to find the strongest outfield arms, and I want to get right to
the best stuff. In my view, the best right field arm in 2006 belongs
to Alexis Rios, the Blue Jays right fielder. Here’s a table showing
Rios’ performance:
Alexis Rios - RF
Situation | Opps | H K | Hexp Kexp
S-1B | 44 | 31 2 | 25.4 0.6
S-2B | 30 | 20 1 | 12.7 1.6
D-1B | 16 | 10 1 | 9.3 0.8
OF-3B | 11 | 5 0 | 2.6 0.4
OF-2B | 22 | 14 1 | 12.5 0.5
Overall | 123 | 80 5 | 62.5 3.8
Notation:
Opps - number of opportunities
H - Hold: runner did not take extra base.
K - Kill: runner (or batter) thrown out on bases.
Hexp - Expected Holds based on league average play.
Kexp - Expected Kills based on league average play.
Each of the first five rows shows
how Rios did in the five situations considered. You can see that in
every category, runners tended to hold more than they did on average.
Overall, Rios “saved” around 18 extra bases by holding runners. For good
measure, he also had one more “kill” than expected given his opportunities. Rios
ranked pretty high last year (5th among right fielders), but really
aired it out this year.
The worst performance in right field—in any field, actually—was
turned in by Shawn Green:
Shawn Green - RF
Situatation | Opps | H K | Hexp Kexp
S-1B | 57 | 22 0 | 32.6 0.7
S-2B | 35 | 11 0 | 14.0 2.0
D-1B | 21 | 11 0 | 13.1 0.9
OF-3B | 12 | 1 1 | 2.8 0.5
OF-2B | 15 | 8 0 | 8.5 0.3
Overall | 140 | 53 1 | 71.0 4.3
Ouch! That is bad. Green can’t throw anybody out (only one kill, when
four were expected) and the runners know it. They ran hog-wild on the
Diamondbacks/Mets right fielder, taking the extra base fully 18 times more
than they would have against an average right fielder. Green also ranked
dead last among right field arms last year—they need to get
this guy closer to the runners he’s trying to throw out. Maybe he can
swap positions with Carlos Delgado.
I have converted these hold and kill numbers into runs saved above
average, and ranked all right fielders according to the number of runs
saved per 200 opportunities (generally, around one full season’s worth).
Here’s the list of all right fielders who had at least 100
opportunities in 2006:
Inn/9 Opps Kill+ Hold+ Runs Runs/200
Rios_Alexis 106 123 133 129 7.1 11.6
Hawpe_Brad 134 187 202 110 9.6 10.2
Ordonez_Magglio 141 150 164 106 5.4 7.2
Cuddyer_Mike 136 149 143 115 4.9 6.5
Suzuki_Ichiro 118 154 125 107 3.9 5.1
Francoeur_Jeff 158 223 127 110 4.6 4.1
Blake_Casey 90 111 155 88 0.9 1.6
Markakis_Nick 102 143 86 100 0.9 1.3
Nixon_Trot 99 102 117 93 0.2 0.4
Kearns_Austin 137 196 73 110 0.1 0.1
Guerrero_Vladimir 121 146 61 110 0.0 0.1
Abreu_Bobby 144 192 124 96 -0.4 -0.4
Bradley_Milton 89 112 75 102 -1.0 -1.7
Giles_Brian 155 161 108 94 -2.4 -3.0
Dye_Jermaine 138 172 34 99 -2.7 -3.2
Jones_Jacque 133 158 54 103 -2.8 -3.5
Encarnacion_Juan 109 134 68 95 -2.6 -3.8
Drew_J.D. 124 147 60 101 -2.9 -4.0
Nady_Xavier 95 119 137 79 -2.8 -4.7
Jenkins_Geoff 122 138 46 96 -3.7 -5.4
Green_Shawn 125 140 23 73 -9.1 -13.0
Notation:
Inn/9 - Defensive games
Opps - Opportunities
Kill+ - Normalized kill rate, e.g. 110 means 10% more kills than average
Hold+ - Normalized hold rate
Runs - Runs saved above average
Runs/200 - Runs saved per 200 opps
You can see that Brad Hawpe was excellent as well—in fact, since he played
more, he actually saved his team more runs than Rios. Seeing J.D. Drew so
low surprised me, since he is considered to have a strong arm. It may be that his shoulder problems in 2006 were
hampering his throwing.
Center Fielders
You know what? Willy Taveras has a great throwing arm. Last year I
was surprised to see him rank quite highly (sixth out of about 30
center fielders with 75 opps). Here’s what I wrote about him then:
Taveras eliminated more than twice as many base runners
as expected. He did not hold runners well, but I think it’s fairly
common for rookies to have poor hold rates, since opposing teams are
going to test their arms. Especially, when they are six feet tall and
weigh 160 lbs. Six of Taveras’ kills came in the critical situations
2-4, where the key play occurs at the plate. This results in Taveras
having a large number of runs saved.
In 2006, word had definitely got around about Taveras’ arm: his hold
rate of 108 was well above average. But, he still managed to gun down
more than twice as many runners as the average center fielder. Very
impressive work, by the now-Rockies center fielder. Here’s the
complete list of center fielders with 100 opportunities in 2006:
Inn/9 Opps Kill+ Hold+ Runs Runs/200
Taveras_Willy 124 119 211 108 3.5 5.9
Sullivan_Cory 94 122 106 102 1.6 2.6
Figgins_Chone 92 101 101 97 1.1 2.2
Beltran_Carlos 132 173 142 101 1.9 2.2
Byrnes_Eric 117 136 128 107 1.0 1.5
Rowand_Aaron 100 127 82 115 0.8 1.2
Edmonds_Jim 88 118 92 104 0.4 0.6
Sizemore_Grady 153 227 113 101 -0.3 -0.3
Kotsay_Mark 116 144 144 95 -0.7 -1.0
Wells_Vernon 143 176 60 109 -1.0 -1.1
Matthews_Gary 136 201 106 101 -1.2 -1.2
Jones_Andruw 146 190 68 99 -1.7 -1.8
Baldelli_Rocco 83 130 114 94 -1.2 -1.8
Hunter_Torii 137 164 84 94 -1.6 -1.9
Pierre_Juan 158 173 107 89 -1.8 -2.1
Griffey_Ken 97 129 27 105 -1.5 -2.4
Clark_Brady 101 128 28 100 -1.7 -2.7
Patterson_Corey 120 161 94 89 -2.3 -2.9
Lofton_Kenny 107 145 72 86 -2.7 -3.7
Anderson_Brian_N. 107 151 24 107 -3.0 -3.9
Granderson_Curtis 146 163 47 93 -3.4 -4.2
Crisp_Coco 100 133 53 92 -2.9 -4.4
Finley_Steve 108 148 72 90 -3.4 -4.6
Cameron_Mike 138 151 90 88 -3.5 -4.6
Gathright_Joey 113 175 77 80 -5.8 -6.6
Damon_Johnny 121 146 49 87 -5.0 -6.9
One thing to note right away: aside from Taveras, nobody really stood
out in center field in 2006. In fact, there isn’t really much difference
between number three, Chone Figgins, and number 15, Juan Pierre. The bottom two,
though, Joey Gathright and Johnny Damon are genuinely atrocious throwers, at least
they were in 2006. Damon ranked very poorly last year—well,
nobody is surprised by this. I think most of us when seeing Damon
throw conjure up an image something like this.
Left Fielders
The Rodney Dangerfields of the outfield throwers, left fielders never
get no respect. Nevertheless, many left fielders save (or cost) their
team significant amounts of runs each season. The cream of the crop
in 2006 was the Dodgers’ Andre Ethier, who doubled his expected kill
total and was also excellent at holding runners.
Inn/9 Opps Kill+ Hold+ Runs Runs/200
Ethier_Andre 100 123 206 108 5.6 9.1
DeJesus_David 61 110 90 118 4.5 8.1
Ramirez_Manny 115 135 94 109 4.2 6.2
Monroe_Craig 103 114 187 101 2.8 4.9
Cabrera_Melky 111 144 132 101 2.9 4.0
Soriano_Alfonso 153 202 135 96 1.9 1.9
Ibanez_Raul 155 213 118 105 1.9 1.8
Willingham_Josh 119 134 64 105 1.1 1.6
Murton_Matt 116 135 42 101 -0.6 -0.9
Brown_Emil 80 131 118 96 -1.2 -1.9
Swisher_Nick 73 102 114 100 -1.0 -2.0
Crawford_Carl 139 200 68 99 -2.0 -2.0
Michaels_Jason 112 150 93 98 -1.6 -2.1
Gonzalez_Luis 146 158 36 101 -2.6 -3.3
Lee_Carlos 140 171 68 97 -2.9 -3.4
Bay_Jason 153 224 88 95 -4.3 -3.8
Holliday_Matt 148 176 106 90 -3.4 -3.9
Wilkerson_Brad 74 104 84 97 -2.1 -4.0
Dunn_Adam 147 177 56 97 -4.6 -5.2
Burrell_Pat 110 138 130 91 -3.6 -5.2
Podsednik_Scott 121 130 47 91 -4.9 -7.6
David DeJesus had a curious performance: a low Kill+ with a very high
Hold+. Typically, you see this kind of pattern on established players
who are living more on reputation than present value. DeJesus, of
course, doesn’t fit that description, so it’ll be interesting to see how
he rates going forward. DeJesus also was great in center field in
2006. He did not meet the 100 opp minimum, but his Runs/200 figure was
off the charts at 15.0.
A Picture is Worth 1000 Words
It’s not really, otherwise I could submit a couple of plots each week and my THT
editors would be satisfied. Oh, were life that easy. Anyway, as I
wrote in a previous article, I like to make graphs with colored dots
and stuff so here you see a plot of outfield arms for 2006.
I have have a suspicion that some readers are put off by these scatterplots. I once came
across a discussion of one of my articles, an article that happened
not to have any plots, on a baseball forum.
One poster commented that it was so nice to be
able to read a Hardball Times article without any of “those
meaningless scatterplots.” Well, I’d like to convince you that this
plot is not meaningless. Here goes…
Each point on the plot represents an outfielder for the 2006 season.
The position along the x-axis (that’s horizontal) gives Hold+, while
the y-axis (vertical) shows Kill+. Left, right and center fielders are
color-coded as noted on the plot. The dotted grey lines show the
average for each quantity: players above the horizontal grey
line were better than average at killing baserunners and
those to the right of the vertical line were better than expected
at preventing runners from taking the extra base.
Players appearing in the
northeast quadrant are better than average in both measures and have
the best outfield arms. And conversely, players in the southwest
quadrant have the weakest arms. Geez, look at Shawn Green there, he
looks like Easter Island on a map of the South Pacific Ocean.
Better Than Their Stats
Although we are capturing quite a bit of an outfielder’s throwing
duties with our five situations, we don’t get all of it. For example,
an outfielder guns down a runner trying to stretch a single into a
double. It’s an important play and not uncommon, but unfortunately,
it’s hard to use that kind of play in this analysis. That’s because, although we know how many kills of this type an
outfielder had, we don’t know how many opportunities he was given. In
fact, it’s not even easy to define a “single stretched into a
double” and in any case, such plays (when the runner is safe) just
appear as a double in the play-by-play data.
So, while we can’t somehow work these plays into the system, we can
highlight the outfielders who had a large number of assists that were
not captured by our metric. Head and shoulders above everybody else
in this regard stands Alfonso Soriano. The first-time left fielder led
the majors with 22 outfield assists last season, but only 10 of them
came in one of our five situations. Twelve “unaccounted for” assists
is an unusually high number. In Soriano’s case most of the
missing assists occurred when the batter tried to stretch a hit, but
Soriano also doubled off the runner after catching a fly ball five times.
A perfect ranking system would probably rank Soriano as the top left
field thrower in 2006.
Here is a list of outfielders with at least five “lost assists”:
Soriano (LF) 12 Beltran (CF) 6 Griffey (CF) 5 Cabrera, Me (LF) 5
Along with Soriano, each of the guys probably deserve a boost in their rankings shown
above.
Coming Soon
Next time I’ll have a look at the most valuable outfield throws of 2006 from the perspective of Win Probability Added. I’ll also have a rankings by team and perhaps a couple of other things on outfield arms.