Updated Wins Above Replacement Standings

TEAM	Position Player Wins	Pitcher Wins	Total Wins	Games Played	Expected Wins	Expected Losses	Expected Games Back	Actual Wins	Difference
TAMPA BAY	12.2	3.2	15.4	45	28.72	16.28	0	23	-5.72
TORONTO	8.2	6.9	15.1	46	28.72	17.28	0.5	27	-1.72
BOSTON	6	6	12	45	25.32	19.68	3.4	25	-0.32
NEW YORK	8.7	1.9	10.6	43	23.33	19.67	4.39	25	1.67
BALTIMORE	3.8	1.8	5.6	43	18.33	24.67	9.39	18	-0.33
TEAM	Position Player Wins	Pitcher Wins	Total Wins	Games Played	Expected Wins	Expected Losses	Expected Games Back	Actual Wins	Difference
DETROIT	6.8	5.7	12.5	41	24.64	16.36	0	25	0.36
KANSAS CITY	3.6	8.6	12.2	43	24.93	18.07	0.71	21	-3.93
MINNESOTA	6.8	3.2	10	44	23.02	20.98	3.12	21	-2.02
CLEVELAND	6.5	2.7	9.2	42	21.63	20.37	3.51	17	-4.63
CHICAGO	-0.5	6	5.5	44	18.52	25.48	7.62	19	0.48
TEAM	Position Player Wins	Pitcher Wins	Total Wins	Games Played	Expected Wins	Expected Losses	Expected Games Back	Actual Wins	Difference
TEXAS	8.7	4.1	12.8	42	25.23	16.77	0	25	0.23
LOS ANGELES	5.8	5.4	11.2	42	23.63	18.37	1.6	22	1.63
SEATTLE	2.1	4.5	6.6	44	19.62	24.38	6.61	20	-0.38
OAKLAND	0.6	4.1	4.7	40	16.54	23.46	7.69	15	1.54
TEAM	Position Player Wins	Pitcher Wins	Total Wins	Games Played	Expected Wins	Expected Losses	Expected Games Back	Actual Wins	Difference
NEW YORK	5.1	5.4	10.5	41	22.64	18.36	0	23	0.36
ATLANTA	3.5	6.7	10.2	42	22.63	19.37	0.51	22	-0.63
PHILADELPHIA	7.8	-0.1	7.7	42	20.13	21.87	3.01	23	2.87
WASHINGTON	5.9	1	6.9	44	19.92	24.08	4.22	12	-7.92
FLORIDA	1.3	3.2	4.5	42	16.93	25.07	6.21	19	2.07
TEAM	Position Player Wins	Pitcher Wins	Total Wins	Games Played	Expected Wins	Expected Losses	Expected Games Back	Actual Wins	Difference
MILWAUKEE	8.7	3.3	12	45	25.32	19.68	0	26	0.68
ST. LOUIS	5.7	4.5	10.2	45	23.52	21.48	1.8	26	2.48
CINCINNATI	5.2	3.7	8.9	42	21.33	20.67	2.49	22	0.67
PITTSBURGH	5.2	2.6	7.8	41	19.94	21.06	3.38	19	-0.94
CHICAGO	4	3.7	7.7	43	20.43	22.57	3.89	21	0.57
HOUSTON	4.3	2.4	6.7	41	18.84	22.16	4.48	18	-0.84
TEAM	Position Player Wins	Pitcher Wins	Total Wins	Games Played	Expected Wins	Expected Losses	Expected Games Back	Actual Wins	Difference
LOS ANGELES	7.9	6.1	14	44	27.02	16.98	0	30	2.98
COLORADO	3.1	5.5	8.6	42	21.03	20.97	4.99	17	-4.03
ARIZONA	2.4	4.9	7.3	43	20.03	22.97	6.49	19	-1.03
SAN DIEGO	3.9	2.9	6.8	43	19.53	23.47	6.99	21	1.47
SAN FRANCISCO	0.6	5.5	6.1	42	18.53	23.47	7.49	20	1.47

A Look At Home Runs In Minute Maid Park

With the UW Club Baseball team, I had the fortune to play at a myriad of parks this last year. Many of them were, to say the least, not good. Aside from the poor infields and bumpy outfields that can be expected playing at public parks, one of the things that a player must adjust to is the distance of the fence. At one park I played at, the fence was concave - the shortest point in right field came about 30 feet to the left of the RF foul pole. In high school, a non-conference rival's field had the right field foul pole 240 feet from home plate.

Certainly, ballparks in the major leagues don't have dimensions that ridiculous. Still, some parks play very differently from others. One of these is Minute Maid Park. Famous for the Crawford Boxes down the left field line and the hill in center field, Minute Maid Park's dimensions make it a difficult place for opposing outfielders (and home outfielders, for that matter). Not only do the dimensions change how outfielders play, they also has drastic effects on the number of home runs hit .

The two points of interest mentioned above are what I decided to take a closer look at. Thanks to one of my favorite websites, www.hittrackeronline.com , people can see the trajectory and distance of every home run hit in the major leagues. Here is a plot of all 43 home runs hit at Minute Maid Park entering last night's game.




The blue dots in the picture are the landing points of the home runs.

First, let's examine the home runs hit to left field. At first glance, it looks like these are all cheapies. This plot, however, shows landing points, and because of the wall behind the Crawford Boxes roughly 350 feet away from the plate, none of these HRs will look like they went farther despite hitting high enough off the wall that they would've traveled much farther. There have been 18 HRs hit to into the Crawford Boxes so far this year. Here they are in chart form.


There are only 3 HRs here over 400 feet. Not a whole lot of bombs hit here. However, the most interesting thing to note here is the number of parks that a ball hit with that trajectory would be a home run in. 11 of the 18 HRs would be out in every park. This isn't surprising, as the portion of the field we're examining is relatively close to the left field line, and a 370 foot homer down the line is out in any stadium. What stands out in this list are the 4 home runs at the top. Between these 4 home runs, they would produce a total of 10 HRs out of 120 possible. That's 8.3%. Let's take a look at these 4 home runs in a relatively neutral stadium - Atlanta's Turner Field.



Not only are those not HRs. Those aren't even close. Over 20 games, Minute Maid Park has added 4 HRs that wouldn't be a HR in the average ML stadium (or nearly any stadium, for that matter). Considering these balls are so far from the fence, it's probably safe to assume that an average ML left fielder could turn these balls into outs. That means that LF in Minute Maid Park adds 16 HR over a full season. According to linear weights, that's roughly 31 runs over 81 games.

Of course, not all of Minute Maid Park is built so short. Center field in Houston is the deepest in the majors at 436 feet, and that's even before taking the hill into account. Much unlike left field, center field tends to swallow up HRs and turn them into either doubles, triples, or outs. Here is a plot of Minute Maid park with 4 homers that are out in 27 out of 30 parks, but would stay in at the Juice Box.


In this picture, no home runs were hit between the two black lines coming out from home plate. The red dots show the HRs trajectory, the blue dots show the landing spot, and the green dots show their "Std. Distance", or their projected landing spot had they not hit elevated ground. Here are the 4 home runs in tabular form.


All of these home runs were farther than 414 feet in Std. Distance. These are the kind of hits that get deemed moonshots by the announcers. These are just examples. Across the league, there have been 198 home runs hit between the black lines in the above picture, and none of them have occurred at Minute Maid Park. That's 16% of the total number of home runs hit in the major leagues (1232 total), and yet, we see 0 of them in Minute Maid. If we take out the 4 home runs that were added by the Crawford Boxes, Minute Maid would've allowed 39 home runs as of yesterday's games. However, if we would expect 16% of the home runs to come from between the black lines, then that would mean that there are 6 would-be home runs missing. It seems, then, that at least so far this year, these two parts of Minute Maid combined have actually suppressed 2 homers over 20 games.

Over the small sample size, it is likely that the home runs added by the Crawford Boxes and those suppressed by the deep center field will even out. Minute Maid is also getting slightly more home runs than average in right field and left-center, to put it's 2.15 HR/G rate slightly above the league average of 2.08, consistent with its park factors over the years. Minute Maid Park is one of those quirky parks that, as a road team, certainly make you change the way you play both as an outfielder, a hitter, and a pitcher.

NL Standings by Wins Above Replacement

Here are the NL standings based on Wins Above Replacement. As with the American League, replacement level is set to a .296 winning percentage, or 48 wins over 162 games.

TEAM	Position Player Wins	Pitcher Wins	Total Wins	Games Played	Expected Wins	Expected Losses	Expected Games Back	Actual Wins	Difference
NEW YORK	5.4	4.5	9.9	36	20.56	15.44	0	21	0.44
ATLANTA	3.2	5.3	8.5	36	19.16	16.84	1.4	18	-1.16
PHILADELPHIA	6.3	-0.1	6.2	35	16.56	18.44	3.5	19	2.44
WASHINGTON	5	0.1	5.1	35	15.46	19.54	4.6	11	-4.46
FLORIDA	1.1	3.9	5	35	15.36	19.64	4.7	18	2.64
TEAM	Position Player Wins	Pitcher Wins	Total Wins	Games Played	Expected Wins	Expected Losses	Expected Games Back	Actual Wins	Difference
MILWAUKEE	6.7	3.5	10.2	36	20.86	15.14	0	22	1.14
CINCINNATI	4.4	3.7	8.1	36	18.76	17.24	2.1	21	2.24
ST. LOUIS	4.6	3.4	8	36	18.66	17.34	2.2	21	2.34
CHICAGO	4	3	7	35	17.36	17.64	3	20	2.64
PITTSBURGH	4.7	2.1	6.8	36	17.46	18.54	3.4	15	-2.46
HOUSTON	3.5	2.2	5.7	35	16.06	18.94	4.3	16	-0.06
TEAM	Position Player Wins	Pitcher Wins	Total Wins	Games Played	Expected Wins	Expected Losses	Expected Games Back	Actual Wins	Difference
LOS ANGELES	6.6	5.2	11.8	38	23.05	14.95	0	25	1.95
COLORADO	3.1	4.6	7.7	35	18.06	16.94	3.49	14	-4.06
ARIZONA	1.3	4.5	5.8	37	16.75	20.25	5.8	14	-2.75
SAN FRANCISCO	0.7	4.7	5.4	36	16.06	19.94	5.99	18	1.94
SAN DIEGO	3.5	1.4	4.9	37	15.85	21.15	6.7	15	-0.85

Notes:
AL -
Best Team: Toronto (+13.8)
Worst Team: Oakland (+2.8)
"Luckiest" Team (Actual Wins - Expected Wins): Boston (+1.25)
"Unluckiest" Team: Cleveland (-5.35)

NL-
Best Team: Los Angeles (+11.8)
Worst Team: San Diego (+4.9)
"Luckiest" Teams: Florida and Chicago (+2.64)
"Unluckiest" Team: Washington (-4.46)

I plan on updating every Sunday to coincide with FanGraph's UZR updates. Any comments are appreciated.

AL Standings by Wins Above Replacement

Here are the current AL Standings entering play Sunday based on Wins Above Replacement by FanGraphs. I believe these would be analogous to 2nd Order Wins from BaseballProspectus, because they are context neutral and not adjusted for schedule. The "difference" column shows luck. NL Standings coming later tonight.

TEAM	Position Player Wins	Pitcher Wins	Total Wins	Games Played	Expected Wins	Expected Losses	Expected Games Back	Actual Wins	Difference
TORONTO	8.1	5.7	13.8	39	25.34	13.66	0	25	-0.34
TAMPA BAY	8.7	2.4	11.1	38	22.35	15.65	2.49	18	-4.35
BOSTON	5.2	4.6	9.8	37	20.75	16.25	3.59	22	1.25
NEW YORK	6.6	1.6	8.2	36	18.86	17.14	4.98	19	0.14
BALTIMORE	3.8	1.7	5.5	37	16.45	20.55	7.89	16	-0.45
TEAM	Position Player Wins	Pitcher Wins	Total Wins	Games Played	Expected Wins	Expected Losses	Expected Games Back	Actual Wins	Difference
KANSAS CITY	3.6	7.6	11.2	37	22.15	14.85	0	19	-3.15
DETROIT	4.5	4.9	9.4	35	19.76	15.24	1.39	19	-0.76
CLEVELAND	5.6	2.5	8.1	38	19.35	18.65	3.3	14	-5.35
MINNESOTA	4.9	2.9	7.8	37	18.75	18.25	3.4	18	-0.75
CHICAGO	-0.7	5.3	4.6	35	14.96	20.04	6.19	15	0.04
TEAM	Position Player Wins	Pitcher Wins	Total Wins	Games Played	Expected Wins	Expected Losses	Expected Games Back	Actual Wins	Difference
TEXAS	7.9	3.5	11.4	36	22.06	13.94	0	22	0.06
LOS ANGELES	3.9	4.1	8	35	18.36	16.64	3.2	18	0.36
SEATTLE	1.8	3.9	5.7	37	16.65	20.35	5.91	17	-0.35
OAKLAND	-0.6	3.4	2.8	33	12.57	20.43	7.99	13	-0.43

LaTroy Hawkins Blows It Again... Again

LaTroy Hawkins, pictured above in his short stint with the Colorado Rockies, has been much maligned over his career. Hawkins has pitched, since 1995, with the Minnesota Twins, Chicago Cubs, San Francisco Giants, Baltimore Orioles, Colorado Rockies, New York Yankees, and currently the Houston Astros, as well as for the USA in the 2009 WBC. Hawkins has been moderately productive over his 13 years, producing 11.2 wins above replacement.

Today, LaTroy Hawkins entered in a 4-4 game between the Cubs and his Houston Astros. It took 3 batters for the Cubs to score the game winning run off Hawkins. Although this was not a save situation, many fans of Hawkins former teams will attest to his ability to blow saves. In fact, since 2002, Hawkins leads the MLB in blown saves with 39, which is even more amazing (ridiculous?) considering his save total of 37 in that time period.

The blown save requires that the pitcher enter a "save situation" and then give up the lead. It sounds like it would be difficult for a non-closer to rack up as many blown saves as Hawkins did, then. However, nearly any time that a pitcher ends with a lead could technically be considered a "save situation."

• He enters the game with a lead of no more than three runs and pitches for at least one inning.
  
• He enters the game, regardless of the count, with the potential tying run either on base, on deck.
• He pitches for at least three innings.
  

So anytime the reliever gives up the tying run - whether or not that run is inherited from other relievers - the reliever is charged with a blown save.

Interestingly enough, LaTroy Hawkins has not been below replacement level for any full season during this period in which he's leading the league in blown saves, according to either FanGraph's Value Wins as well as Rally's WAR database. Hawkins is certainly not a great reliever and not necessarily even a good one, but he's certainly not as terrible as his blown saves number would suggest. Then again, I suppose that would be nearly impossible.

Fun With Sabermetrics/Fun With Not Studying For Finals

Just some musings I had tonight - we'll see if they're worth delving into more later.

AT WHAT LEVERAGE INDEX DO YOU PULL A DEFENSIVELY MINDED PLAYER IN THE BOTTOM OF THE 9TH INNING EVERY TIME?

- WHEN DO YOU PLAY A BETTER FIELDER OVER THE BETTER HITTER
 -+50 R/150G FIELDING
    - +.31 R/G => +.0711 R/PA AT 4.34 PA/G (average)
    - AT 1 LI
      -.113 wOBA = -.0713 R/PA
      -.195 wOBA = .0000 R/PA
      -.277 wOBA = +.0713 R/PA
   -SO A .082 DIFFERENCE IN WOBA ROUGHLY EQUALS A +50 R/150 DIFFERENCE IN FIELDING
    -SCALE IS LINEAR
             -+25 R/150 = .039 WOBA POINTS
             -+10 R/150 = .0156 WOBA POINTS
       -ETC.

 -WE ASSUME THAT THE REGULAR FIELDER WILL HAVE A 1.00 pLI, BUT HOW MUCH BETTER DOES THE BENCH HITTER HAVE TO
  BE TO DEMAND A PINCH HIT, BASED ON LI?
  - CONSIDER THAT THE HITTER RECEIVES A ROUGHLY -.025 IMPACT TO HIS wOBA IN A PH ROLE
 - 4.9% OF GAMES GO TO EXTRA INNINGS - SO THEN THE PINCH HITTER OR SOME DEFENSIVE REPLACEMENT MUST TAKE
          THE FIELD
 - THEN RV(B-9) = LI*{[PH(wOBA)-.025) - STARTER(wOBA)]/1.15}
         + xinLI*{.049*[(DREPLACE(DEF)/150/4.34)-STARTER(DEF)/150/4.34)]}
[Note by jhmoore, RV(B-9) is run value in the bottom of the 9th]

-SPECIFIC EXAMPLE
 -JASON KENDALL vs. MIKE RIVERA (OR ANGEL SALOME)
    -JASON KENDALL: wOBA (2008): .293
    -MIKE RIVERA: wOBA (2008): .309
  -DIFFERENCE: .016
             -THE BREWERS ORGANIZATION SEEMS TO ASSUME ROUGHLY 15 RUN DIFFERENCE AT CATCHER (10 BY TZONE)
       -15 R/150 = .246 wOBA POINTS
       -IF THE ORGANIZATIONS ASSUMPTION IS TRUE (DEBATABLE), KENDALL SHOULD BE EVERYDAY CATCHER
             -BUT WHEN SHOULD KENDALL BE PINCH HIT FOR
       -KAPLER wOBA FOR BREWERS 2008 - .362
       -KAPLER(wOBA) - .025 = .337
             -RV(B-9) = LI*{[KAPLER(wOBA)-.025-KENDALL(wOBA)]/1.15}
               + xinLI*{.049*(RIVERA(DEF)/150/4.34)-KENDALL(DEF)/150/4.34}
               = LI*[.337-.293]/1.15 + 2.50*.049(-.0926)
               = LI*[.0383] - .0113
             -RV(B-9) = LI*[.0383] - .0113, UNDER THE ASSUMPTION THAT EXTRA INNING LI WORKS OUT TO ~2.50
             -BREAKEVEN POINT
                 - 0 = LI*[.0383] - .0113
                 - LI*[.0383] = .0113
                 - LI = .0113/.0383
                 - LI = .295
             -SO ACCORDING TO THIS, THE ONLY SITUATION IN THE BOTTOM OF THE NINTH WHERE KENDALL SHOULD BAT
              WITH A KAPLER-QUALITY PHAVAILABLE IS WHEN LI < .295,
              OR 2 OUTS, BASES EMPTY 2 OUTS, NOBODY ON
       -BUT IN THIS SITUATION, THE CHANCE OF EXTRA INNINGS IS MUCH MUCH LOWER THAN 4.9% (RE ~= .1),
              SO THE CORRECT MOVE IS STILL TO PINCH HIT
              

Free Ryan Langerhans

If I was in AAA with your talent I'd be barking too.

Every season, we see a few players start the season in the minor leagues who are clearly better than some bench players currently seeing time in the show. Fangraphs already did a piece on Matt Murton, who is tearing up AAA with the Rockies' affiliate in that league. I'd like to look at a guy that encompasses what I love in a 4th outfielder. Much like the Brewers' Chris Duffy, I like a 4th outfielder who has the ability to play plus defense at all 3 OF positions, has speed, and decent on base skills. Ryan Langerhans is an even better example of this kind of player.

Langerhans first came up with Atlanta in 2002, but didn't receive any sort of regular playing time until 2005. In his first two real seasons in the big leagues, Langerhans put up 3.5 wins in 641 PAs, based upon roughly league average hitting (-2.0 bRAA) and amazing defense, posting a +21.3 UZR between all 3 OF positions, with most of his playing time seen in LF. Unfortunately for both Langerhans and Braves fans, he completely tanked in 2007, playing for three different teams (Atlanta, and then Oakland and Washington following midseason trades) and putting up a combined line of .167/.272/.305, for an abysmal .262 wOBA, worth -13.8 bRAA. Combine that with some poor fielding in CF (-6.5 UZR in 40 games), and Langerhans put up one of the worst seasons in recent memory, worth -1.3 wins. As such, he has been relegated to bench and minor league duty since then.

Langerhans started 2008 in the minors, showing great on-base skill in Columbus (AAA), walking 40 times in 256 PAs, for a 11.7% BB% and posting a .310/.418/.446 line, good for a .390 wOBA. In addition, Langerhans showed the ability to steal bases, with 12 SBs against only 3 CSs, as well as play good defense in CF, with a +2 TotalZone rating in the short span. This performance would lead to a call-up, and in 73 games (139 PA), Langerhans showed the ability to play in the Majors once again, putting up a 4.5 UZR and 2.8 bRAA to be worth 0.8 wins in his short time. The signing of Adam Dunn last winter made Langerhans expendable, however, and Langerhans has spent 2009 in the minors, this time with Syracuse, the new AAA affiliate of the Nats. He's continued to show good on-base skills, with a .415 OBP in 40 PAs.

As Dave Cameron mentions regarding Murton, there's no way there are 750 players better than Ryan Langerhans in the major leagues. CHONE projects Langerhans to be an excellent fielder either in LF or CF (+14 or +9). The various projection systems see Langerhans as a slightly below average hitter, with wOBAs varying from .324 (ZiPS) to .330 (CHONE). With that kind of performance sustained over 600 PAs, that's approximately a 3 win player. Somebody needs to go out and get this guy and put him on a roster, whether it's as a starter or a 4th outfielder, and whoever does it will be glad they did.

Minor League Data from www.minorleaguesplits.com

Major League Data and Projections from www.fangraphs.com