Crazy Crabbers | Giants Baseball Blog

Allocation of Talent

2012-02-28T15:18:00.001-08:00

I am in the middle of catching up on the backlog of things on my reading list after being on vacation for a week and found something that I found to quite interesting and thought it would be worth a share (If this has already made the rounds sorry for the duplication on a week old post).

The article in question is from Marginal Revolution and revolves around an email sent by economist and baseball fan J.C. Bradbury talking about the allocation and ways that talent is evaluated in the different major leagues.

What does Jeremy Lin tell us about talent evaluation mechanisms? This article argues that the standard benchmarks for evaluating basketball and football players at the draft level are flawed. The argument is that Jeremy Lin couldn’t get the opportunity to succeed because his skill wasn’t being picked up by the standard sorting procedure. This got me thinking. Baseball sorts players in a different way than basketball. In professional basketball (and football), college sports serve as minor leagues, where teams face a high variance in competition (the difference between the best and worst teams in a top conference is normally quite large), with very little room for promotion. There is some transferring as players succeed and fail at lower and higher levels, but for the most part you sink or swim at your initial college. This is compounded by the fact that the initial allocation of players to college teams is governed by a non-pecuniary rewards structure with a stringent wage ceiling, which likely hinders the allocation of talent. At the end of your college career, NBA teams make virtually all-or-nothing calls on a few players to fill vacancies at the major-league level. In baseball it’s different. Players play their way up the ladder, and even players who are undrafted can play their way onto teams at low levels of the minor league. At such low levels, the high variance in talent is high like it is in college sports; however, promotions from short-season leagues through Triple-A, allow incremental testing of talent along the way without much risk.

I've always found the different ways that the major leagues have developed their talent to be quite fascinating. I am not so sure I necessarily agree with the conclusion that the way that football and basketball bring talent into their leagues is sub-optimal because there are few occasions like the Lin situation where a player falls through the cracks only to become a star even though there is a great incentive on the parts of general managers and scouts to try and find these players.

Anyway I find that this is an interesting thing to ponder.

UPDATE: As I continue to read through my RSS reader I notice that David Pinto weighed in on the topic as well. Here is his take.

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Checking out the Competition: NL West Short Stops

2012-02-28T07:00:00.000-08:00

Now that the start of the season is within view I thought it would be nice to take a little bit of time and take a look at how the teams in the NL West compare to each other.

Yesterday I took a look at the third basemen and today it is time to move on to the short stops, the projections for each player are from the ZIPS projections from Baseball Think Factory and projected starters from MLB Depth Charts.

So first the not so surprising news, Troy Tulowitzki is awesome and I am incredible jealous and secondly I wish that the Giants had a guy who could be a league average hitter at short stop like Stephan Drew.

Now the somewhat surprising news, by comparison Brandon Crawford doesn't look as bad when you look at the rest of the NL West short stops. On a strict OPS perspective Crawford is within spitting distance of being the third best hitting short stop in the NL West by OPS! This is looking really hard for a silver lining because really at this point as a Giants fan that is all we have when it comes to short stop this season. That Marco Scutaro trade kills me every time I look at this.

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Checking out the Competition: NL West Third Baseman

2012-02-27T14:59:00.000-08:00

Now that the start of the season is within view I thought it would be nice to take a little bit of time and take a look at how the teams in the NL West compare to each other.

Last week I took a look at the second basemen and today it is time to move on to the third basemen the projections for each using the ZIPS projections from Baseball Think Factory and projected starters from MLB Depth Charts.

It's no surprise that Pablo Sandoval is the best third baseman in the NL West and I think that you could probably make an argument that he is the best in the National League (although ZIPS projects Ryan Zimmerman to be slightly better).

What is somewhat surprising is that only Chase Headly of the Padres breaks the 100 barrier in OPS+ at 108, I guess the park effects between Petco and Chase Field amount to about 10 points seeing as both have about equal projected stats.

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Checking out the Competition: NL West Second Basemen

2012-02-21T09:59:00.000-08:00

Now that the start of the season is within view I thought it would be nice to take a little bit of time and take a look at how the teams in the NL West compare to each other.

Yesterday I took a look at the first basemen and today it is time to move on to the second basemen the projections for each using the ZIPS projections from Baseball Think Factory and projected starters from MLB Depth Charts.

The NL West's crop of second basemen is pretty weak, not a single player on any of the five teams is projected to have an OPS+ over 100. The Giants offensive savior and big free agent acquisition (if you believe the hype coming out of the Giants management) Freddy Sanchez is projected to hit a pedestrian .273/ .313/ .373 which equals an OPS+ of 86. To top it all off who knows how much he will actually be able to play this year.

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Checking out the Competition: NL West First Basemen

2012-02-20T09:47:00.000-08:00

Now that the start of the season is within view I thought it would be nice to take a little bit of time and take a look at how the teams in the NL West compare to each other.

Yesterday I took a look at the catchers and today it is time to move on to the first basemen the projections for each using the ZIPS projections from Baseball Think Factory and projected starters from MLB Depth Charts.

The NL West is a pretty barren place for thumping first basemen, with only Paul Goldschmidt projected to be an above average hitter and the only one to project to have an OPS above .800. The sad part for Giants fans is that if it was Brandon Belt in this grouping he would be projected to be the best hitter in the division by OPS+, I guess there is always the chance that he has a big spring and forces the Giants to put him in the lineup everyday.

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Checking out the Competition: NL West Catchers

2012-02-19T09:38:00.000-08:00

Now that the start of the season is within view I thought it would be nice to take a little bit of time and take a look at how the teams in the NL West compare to each other.

First up on the journey is taking a look at the catchers and the projections for each using the ZIPS projections from Baseball Think Factory and projected starters from MLB Depth Charts.

The depth at the catcher position is pretty deep in the NL West. Buster Posey is the best of the bunch but the other four guys are all not too far from being league average hitters with the Dodgers A.J. Ellis projected to be the worst (even though he has the highest projected OBP!).

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The Blogger Session at Media Day

2012-02-03T14:42:00.001-08:00

So the Giants broke new ground today and let the unwashed Giants bloggers have unprecedented access to Bruce Bochy and Brian Sabean.

I appreciate the chance to ask the questions because I realize that not every team does this.

So some quick notes:

Bruce Bochy uses more technology than Brian Sabean but that still isn't saying much because it is limited to his iPad.

The Giants do utilize some technology and were among the first to utilize Bloomberg's defensive metrics. They are trying to get away from using just eyeballs to measure defense.

On to the question of middle relief, the Giants felt pressure because of the injury to Brian Wilson last season to bring back a lot of the bullpen depth just in case.

Sabean acknowledged that the team probably overpaid for the two but in the end it was something they were willing to do.

Sabean said that the will look at extending Wilson because there really isn't any in house closer options that he sees forcing them to make a change. Talked about that there is a closer mentality even if some people think otherwise.

The Giants knew before the off season that they were not going to keep Jonathan Sanchez from the beginning and are happy with the guys that they got to play their with the increased athleticism.

As for Posey and Sanchez, Bochy is excited to have them both back ad expects to get 145 or so games from Sanchez.

Sabean commented that the way Brandon Belt and Brandon Crawford were brought up wasn't what the team had planned but both guys did a good job working through it and put in good work over the offseason.

He sees that Sandoval, Posey and Belt should make up the core of the offense for the future. There have even been discussions of if Huff can handle a full time role in left field to give Belt a shot at first.

More notes to come.

Media Day Notes

2012-02-03T13:03:00.001-08:00

Tim Lincecum is tired of hearing about leaving San Francicsco. His two year contract doesn't mean he wants to leave just that e was trying to get a deal done before arbitration and this is where the two sides were closest.

Buster Posey is tired of being asked how his leg is holding up. He is well ahead of schedule and is feeling good. He is still a bit nervous about his leg at times but has come along way in trusting that it can hold up.

Aubrey Huff is in a bit of a surely mood. Check out the video that Giants Nirvana took of him.

Brian Wilson interview suite is awkwardly quiet. Oh also he enjoys Starbucks in case you were interested. He loves dub step and teams from Boston. Oh also his elbow feels great and he has been throwing since January 1st.

Pablo Sandoval was happy and looks to be in good shape. Said that it is much easier to workout when you come in to the offseason in good shape.

Sergio Romo loves Kinders. He is a humble guy and gives a great interview. Although he is like all of us and watches him self throwing sliders striking out guys.

Dave Righetti and I had an excellent talk about pitching and the Giants philosophy. Biggest surprise was that the Giants pitching coaches don't really use any of the pitch fx data, in fact Righetti didn't even know about it. I bet he looks in to, he seemed interested.

More to come later.

Crazy Crabbers Top 20 Prospects: Kyle Crick

2012-01-28T08:30:00.000-08:00

Kyle Crick was the Giants 1st round sandwich pick in the 2011 draft and the first of a number of picks taken in the draft on power arms to help build up some more pitching depth in the minors.

Crick is a very raw project who is full of projectability but is still a ways a way from reaching that full potential. He didn't become a full time pitcher until before his senior season so he still has a lot to learn but the upside is that he shouldn't be overworked.

Season

Team

K/9

BB/9

HR/9

BABIP

LOB%

ERA

FIP

2011

Giants (R)

7.0

10.29

0.00

.450

55.6 %

6.43

4.77

Best Tool: Crick is a big kid, with a big arm. His fastball is his best pitch and he sits comfortably in the low to mid 90's and can reach back for as much 97 mph. He has the build of a workhorse and good athleticism.

Needs to work on: Crick is still a very raw pitcher who is still pretty new to the position and therefore has a lot to clean up. His command is a work in progress and his slider, curve ball, and change-up all are inconsistent and will need a lot of work.

Ceiling: Even though he is still a very young pitcher Crick has a power arm in an organization with a reputation for developing these types of pitchers. He has some secondary pitches but they are all inconsistent and will need a bunch of work but Crick has a bright future and could blossom into a front of the rotation type pitcher down the road.

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Giants Sign Ryan Theriot

2012-01-27T09:22:00.001-08:00

Jon Heynan of CBS Sports is reporting that the Giants have signed former Cardinals shortstop Ryan Theriot.

The deal is reportedly for $1.25 million with incentives that could push it to $2 million.

My initial reaction is that this isn't a bad deal, certainly doesn't break the bank. In addition it sets up the possibility of a shortstop platoon as Theriot right handedness compliments Brandon Crawfords left handedness. He offers some value offensively with a career 107 wRC+ against left handed pitching but he is a liability on defense so he should really be used sparingly in the field especially with more ground ball heavy pitchers.

Theriot is a decent utility infielder (which the Giants seem to cornering the market in) but really shouldn't be expected to be a full time starter making him a decent fit for the Giants. This does create some questions about who will make the final 25 man roster where the Giants seem to have stockpiled quite a few middle infielders, I guess it will come down to the classic Spring Training competition that the team loves.

This isn't a flashy signing and as long as Bruce Bochy doesn't develop a veteran crush and start him everyday this should be a solid pickup for the team.

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