Comments on: Sexson and old player skills

By: galaxieboi

galaxieboi — Tue, 22 Apr 2008 16:40:19 +0000

What would isolated OBP be isolated from?

Batting average? Take out the hits and you’re left with everything else- BB, HBP, ect.. I’m not sure why you would, but that’s what you’d be doing.

By: 6-4-3

6-4-3 — Tue, 22 Apr 2008 16:27:29 +0000

I expected to see Ken Phelps in that Mariner top ten list.

By: nathaniel dawson

nathaniel dawson — Tue, 22 Apr 2008 08:55:07 +0000

1986 it is…..but I don’t know if that’s the first place he brings it up.

“Another young player with an old player’s skills–superb strike-zone judgement, power, but slow and already lodged at the left end of the defensive spectrum…I didn’t realize he was quite so slow before reading Jeff Welch’s study. He can hit, though…”

The study he refers to was of a tabulation of base-running errors by the Mariners in 1985. It seems Davis was thrown out twice at second on singles to left field.

By: Breadbaker

Breadbaker — Mon, 21 Apr 2008 23:47:15 +0000

What’s fascinating is who’s not on the list. The “old player’s skills” term comes from a post that was in, I think, the 1986 Bill James Baseball Abstract, and the player involved was Alvin Davis.

By: Bender

Bender — Mon, 21 Apr 2008 22:44:57 +0000

I work at Norms. People come for the 40’s, not the cheap Bud…

By: galaxieboi

galaxieboi — Mon, 21 Apr 2008 21:48:40 +0000

How does Youklis fit in that comparison?

Youk isn’t a homerun hitter and he certainly doesn’t strike out much (at least for our purposes). He walks a lot.

By: true_slicky

true_slicky — Mon, 21 Apr 2008 21:38:59 +0000

Old young player skills = Juan Pierre? Urrgh…

By: kevinzelko

kevinzelko — Mon, 21 Apr 2008 21:36:22 +0000

How does Youklis fit in that comparison?

By: joser

joser — Mon, 21 Apr 2008 21:08:49 +0000

This reminds me of a barstool conversation I had with a friend: what if you had a player like Vlad or Ichiro, who could get the bat on the ball almost anywhere, but this guy couldn’t get around on the ball. In other words, he could foul off pitches forever (or watch them go by for balls) but couldn’t ever get a hit. (Never mind such a player would get nowhere near a professional game, it’s just a gedanken experiment). Now he might walk, which is some value (and occasionally he’d get an out on a caught foul ball). But what he’d really do is run up the pitch count. If this guy sees 15+ pitches in an at-bat, he essentially takes the starter out of the game one inning earlier per plate appearance. So if you’re the opposing manager, what do you do with this guy? You treat him like Barry Bonds — you IBB him. He’d be all OBP, no ISO (or AVG). We didn’t really think of Rickey in this context, but… yeah.

By: 6-4-3

6-4-3 — Mon, 21 Apr 2008 20:53:28 +0000

I’ve often thought it’s too bad many hitters develop good plate discipline too late in their careers for it to be a real benefit. Yeah, they get on base a lot, but then they can’t go from first to third on that base hit because they’ve got no speed. Yes, it’s better than not getting on base, but it seems like they aren’t able to take advantage of this skill to the maximum extent.

Conversely, think about how devastating somone like Vince Coleman could have been if he could get on base more. OK, essentially he would have been Rickey Henderson rather than Vince Coleman!