Adam Jones’ comparable players
It’s been interesting this winter to see what comes out of the different projection systems. ZIPS, PECOTA, I check them all out because even when I think they’re way off, the way they look at the problem provides a new starting point to think about the player. If I don’t think Jones is well represented by a system, it’s worth considering why, and examining my reasons for thinking my prediction’s better than a fairly good system.
Take Adam Jones. ZIPS thought he was all potential (“all upside”). PECOTA sees the same things, it seems. The card is so weird when it came out I told Dave “I don’t even know where to start talking about this”.
So, to his comparable player list, which illustrates this: it’s the weirdest bunch of player-years ever.
The top two are Elijah Dukes 2006 and Brandon Phillps’ 2003. Carlos Beltran’s 1999 is between Chet Lemon’s 1977 and Rocco Baldelli’s 2003 (which is ahead of Sammy Sosa’s 1990). Jim Fergosi’s 1964 is #12, and Ruben Mateo’s 2000 is #16. #20 is Carney Lansford.
It’s legitimately crazy. And if I really disagree, I think the picture it comes out with is a little skewed. It feels like if Jones puts his game together, he’ll be really good, and if he doesn’t, he won’t be hitting enough to be a regular. I don’t see the middle road in his future.
I’m a fan, and I have faith, but I also acknowledge that when BA writes him up with the concerns for why he might not develop, those concerns are entirely valid, and if he doesn’t turn into what I hope we get to see, that’ll be why.
But if anyone finds a stranger list of comparable players, I’d love to hear about it.
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Speaking of comparable players, dig who is #1 for Jeff Clement. A cautionary note, most definitely.
From the limited bit that I’ve seen Adam Jones play, I’d say that he projects (in a best case scenario) to a Mike Cameron or even perhaps an Eric Davis type of player.
Of course, I say this with the caveat that I thought Ken Griffey Jr. would project to (at best) a Darryl Strawberry level of player. Back in 1989, that wasn’t an unfavorable comparison, however.
He has to excel. He has to. This is his franchise to save.
King Felix and Prince Jones will be M’s royalty for years to come.
I’m crossing my fingers.
Bobby Abreu has both John Kruk and Rickey Henderson in his top five comparables. I don’t even know how that’s possible.
Well, he sorta does hit like the Krukker.
How’s this for a motley crew of comparables:
Bob Hamelin 1995
Carlos Pena 2006
Carlos Delgado 2000
Boog Powell 1969
David Ortiz 2003
Mike Epstein 1970
Kevin Maas 1992
Willie McCovey 1965
H.Killebrew 1964
Dale Murphy 1983
Those are just a few for Dunn….
I like that you have to get to Bloomquist’s 90% projection before he has a positive VORP.
That’s right, positive VORP.
Even Tui’s 75% is positive.
I wonder what Eric Davis’s minor league pecotas would have been like. Even more, I wonder about Kal Daniels.
Yes but Bloomquist’s 50% VORPi (value over replacement level pitcher) is 11…..
I wonder what Earl would think about WFB and his speed…
Weaver could take a turd and platoon it to usefulness but I’m not sure WFB could’ve been transformed even by Earl…
Earl, take two…
ok, I can’t think of any thing they have in common aside form being male and ball players.
Even if the M’s choose not to look at advanced metrics to evaluate their players, shouldn’t more “traditional” statistics (such as slugging percentage) tell them that not only is Bloomquist a .250 hitter, but it’s one of the emptiest .250’s you could possibly have. He had 9, 9 extra base hits in 250 AB’s last year. How badly do the statistics have to bitchslap the management before they get it?!?
The only player from M’s past that came to mind who got a lot of playing time and was as inept as Willie is Jack Perconte. But even he had a higher lifetime OBP (.340 vs .312) with the same lifetime slugging pct as Willie (.329). And if you compare OPS+ between the two, you find that Jack’s statistics were far closer to the average than Willie’s.
That said, I’m sure others can find former M’s that were just an inept. Perconte was the first guy that came to mind for me (don’t ask me why) and therefore I did a little legwork on his stats.
Well, if you really want royalty, then we should get Earl Weaver to manage, and trade for Prince Fielder.
Maybe find a place for Zach Duke on the pitching staff. Or maybe find a place on the coaching staff for Duke Snider?
Thankfully, we already have Princess Willie.
As everyone knows, numbers aren’t always the answer. It’ll be fun to see how he turns out.
It’s interesting (and completely unsurprising) that most of the player years are minor league performances. They don’t seem to have very many years of minor league performances (certainly not many compared to the major league player seasons that they have.) Jones still winds up with a pretty high similarity index, so maybe it’s not really an issue, but it’ll be interesting over the years to see if adding more and more minor league data helps PECOTA with the younger guys.
That’s hard to even fathom. GREAT find.
(see #5)
…and Abreu used to have a Hendersonish power/average/walks/steals combo.
Holy shit! Was that 2nd Earl Weaver swearing festival for real?
P.S. My son this morning was telling me I swear too much. I called him in to listen to Earl but then told him never mind once he got to the lady with the tomato plant. But it did crack me up.
Earl Weaver is my fucking hero.
Isn’t a weakness of Pecota really that it tends to fall in love with young guys on the cusp (i.e. over estimates their potential)? I wouldn’t say love is oozing from Pecota for Jones but it already projects him to be better offensively than Taveras in ’07. Jones doesn’t show up on the gold standard defensive metrics yet because of sample size so I’m not sure what to think about his defense right now. TangoTiger’s fan poll suggest those who have seen him think he looks about league average.
I’d say there is a lot to be optimistic about with Jones as he essentially already appears to be a roughly league average center fielder.
How do you figure? I don’t think this is true at all.
PA are pretty important when considering productivity. I don’t get how Pecota gives Jones 561, and Lehair 540. On the Reds, it gives Votto 630 (really likes him too) and Jerry Gil about 550,,,all of which are insane. But it gives guys like WFB 227 or Juan Castro 178 PA which seems pretty reasonable.
I don’t get how Pecota gives Jones 561, and Lehair 540.
The last two years now, I think, but this year for sure, Nate Silver has thrown his hands in the air on the major league vs. minor league PA issue. Who knows what kind of crazy decisions major league GMs are going to make about prospects?
That means PECOTA has forecasted Jones at 561 professional PA next year. How those get divided between the minors and the majors is dependent on a lot of factors that have nothing to do with Adam Jones, so I can see the motivation behind not wasting time trying to guess how his playing time will get split.
How do you figure? I don’t think this is true at all.
I agree, I don’t think that’s true now.
I don’t remember all of PECOTA’s history that well, but if there was ever a time where PECOTA didn’t have minor league player-seasons, then I could see how that might have happened. There could have been a selection bias in play where young players got compared only to young players who made the majors, and just making the majors at a young age is generally a sign that you’re talking about a pretty talented player.
But PECOTA certainly has minor league player-seasons in its database now, so I don’t think it would have much of a bias one way or another towards minor leaguers. (Though depending on the number of major vs. minor league player-seasons they have, I could see there being a difference in variance of the forecasts. Even if that did exist, though, it’s probably not large enough to notice without squinting really hard.)
huh. Scott Miller does his ‘Winners, losers and more from a busy offseason’, and amazing the M’s only get one mention (well, except in a backhanded way, as Schuerholz gets credited for Soriano)
Worst personnel moves
5. Seattle keeping manager Mike Hargrove. What’s the point?
Well yes, of course. But how those PA are parsed is not a trivial thing especially considering something as simple as the dramatic differences that may exist in playing environments etc. To me its a potentially big limitation in projection accuracy for younger guys.
But how those PA are parsed is not a trivial thing especially considering something as simple as the dramatic differences that may exist in playing environments etc.
If PECOTA says Fringy McProspecterson is going to hit .235/.290/.330 next year, that’s what it expects him to do at the major league level. If you want to know what he’s going to do at the minors, it’s up to you to translate it to the equivalent minor league line. And PECOTA gives park adjusted stats in their projections, too, so if you need to forecast what a player would do in a different environment you can go ahead and do the park/level adjustment.
I really don’t think that list of comparables is strange at all. I see a lot of lean fast toolsy guys like Jones who, when they were at Jones’ stage in their careers, had a huge spectrum of possible career paths because it wasn’t clear yet whether they were going to be hackers for life or whether they’d develop some plate discipline.
Some developed plate discipline (Beltran, Sosa), some did not (Mateo, Juan Encarnacion), and some appear to be on their way to figuring it out (Sizemore, Hart, E. Encarnacion).
Jones has a reasonable shot at being a superstar and a reasonable shot at being a complete dud, and which of those occurs will depend in large part on how his approach at the plate develops. I worry that the M’s, Hargrove, etc., are not good teachers on that front. Wonder what it would take to get Edgar to hang around the dugout a bit…
On a hunch, I plugged in Lastings Milledge, and whaddya know, it’s the same cast of comparables as Adam Jones produced… Beltran, both Encarnacions, Elijah Dukes, Sizemore, Wells, Chet Lemon, Fregosi… And it’s the same profile of possible futures, too. There’s a ton of upside, but a 20% chance he’ll be a fringe player over the next 5 years, too. I think this type of player is actually pretty easy to describe. It’s the quintessential young, toolsy, player. Try it… pick guys that fit that category, and you’ll see the same names popping up. I just did both of the Uptons – same thing. I can’t think of others fitting this description at the moment, but I’m sure there are more.
Re #14: Todd Cruz?
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he’s not among Adam Jones’ comparables, but Bucky is back, as Geoff Baker takes a look at the phenomena, something he pretty much missed first-hand.
I’d love to know how Baker came to do the profile– was it the Times’ idea, or his own from seeing Bucky vs the Jays?
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This probably belongs in the previous post, but [deleted, belongs in the previous post]
I thought this last year too, notably with Ryan Howard.
PECOTA was pretty dead-on right of his explosion to come.
Howard’s 75th precentile was .311/.409/.647, with 50HRs. His 90th has a 60 HR projection. His weighted mean was a .294./389/.602 line, which, is about what we should expect from him this year.
I really don’t think Howard is gonna hit .300 again if he’s going to continue striking out at the rate he does. He’s probably peaked.
As many homeruns and linedrives as he hits, Howard will probably keep hitting for fairly high averages, despite the strike outs. .290+ isn’t that unreasonable for him.
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