Figgins Back To Third
Dave · January 7, 2011 at 9:50 am · Filed Under Mariners
We all saw this coming, but Jack Z tells Kirby Arnold that Chone Figgins will be moving back to third base for 2011. The second base experiment was an unmitigated disaster, and with Dustin Ackley on the way, there was no point having Figgins take another run at it. With Figgins back at third, Brendan Ryan is clear to begin the season as the starting second baseman. If Ackley forces a promotion at some point in the summer, then they have the flexibility to have Ryan take over at shortstop if need be.
It’s only news in the sense that it the rumor is now confirmed, but it’s nice to see that the M’s are making the logical move here.
Yeah I don’t see any way that Ichiro is moved out of the #1 spot in the order unless he asked to be moved(which I doubt he ever would)so that is just not happening.
And hopefully Figgins feels more comfortable in the #2 slot and hits like he did in the second half last year.
I’ll be happy to watch young players learn on the job. I don’t expect a division championship. Figgins was a bad signing. He did not look good defensively at 2b and while I do expect him to improve at 3b… even then he is, at best, average. A corner infielder with ZERO power is a burden unless surrounded by players who can make up the difference. Not looking good. Trading Figgins for salary relief would be a blessing… but who would be crazy enough to take him? This team is awful and will remain so for another year or more.
Snuffy-
I’m not sure “awful” is the right word… Last year was “awful” definitely… But there have to be other variances between “awful” and winning the Division.
Let’s compare 2010 & 2011
Ichiro = Ichiro (far above awful)
Figgins = Figgins (3B less awful, OBP above awful)
Kotchman < Smoak (less awful)
Griffey < Cust (hey, an actual DH, less awful)
Guty = Guty (far from awful, BA should improve)
Bradley = Saunders (less awful, with upside)
Lopez < Ryan (thank you baby Jesus)
R.Johnson < Olivo (WAY less awful, being average)
Wilson = Wilson (not any more or less awful)
Now, if we can add Ackley and platoon Ryan/Wilson at SS… Even less awful.
This could be a better than league average club, actually. With a little luck, in a less than “deep” division. Not likely to compete for a title, but I think a healthy run towards 2nd in the West would be a great improvement. Two years ago was a fantastically fun season to watch, and we didn't win anything that year either.
I'm okay with hoping for that again. And looking forward to 2012.
Ichiro would lead the league in grounding into fielders choices. He hits way too many infield hits which would be FC’s to 2nd anytime someone is on base.
sodomojo360: his career stats with man on first v. bases empty are nearly identical if I remember right.
Wow-
Y’know, after looking at that a bit… We’ve actually significantly improved our team, just in little steps, instead of one or two big splashes…
Projected lineup:
Ichiro
Figgins
Smoak
Cust
Guty
Saunders
Olivo
Wilson
Ryan
That could easily be a 3.5-4 runs a game lineup, as opposed to last year’s 2 runs a game lineup.
The thing that blatantly sticks out is it NO LONGER has the huge hole in the middle of the lineup that sank last season as we pulled away from the dock. I think the fact that Figgins, Bradley, and Guty WON’T be expected to be the best bats in the lineup will actually free them up to be above average at the plate.
Smoak
Cust
Guty
Saunders/Bradley
Olivo
Is one hell of an upgrade over:
Guty
Lopez
Griffey
Kotchman
R.Johnson (not his spot, but still…)
I much prefer this year’s lineup. With tempered expectations of course.
If winning the world series is the standard, then every season in the history of the Mariners — including 1995 and 2001 — has been a “lost season.” Fortunately, at least some of us can enjoy something beyond that.
Yep. People are always getting this wrong. Yes, Ichiro gets more IFH than anyone else. But that doesn’t mean he’d be an outs machine if he had someone getting on ahead of him. Just look at his career BA:
bases empty: .330
with men on: .333
with RISP: .337
(Rember: a FC counts as an out and therefore does not add a hit to the totals used for BA) And that’s with almost a thousand or more PA in each category, so it’s not SSS; clearly, he can adjust his approach as the situation dictates.
(Just for fun, have a look at Figgins’ career stats in the same split. Then look at Jeter, Crawford, and somebody like Jonny Gomes)
Just saying that it was one slice of time, somewhat arbitrarily chosen, during the steroid era, to produce one study.
But in order for this issue/conversation to be particularly important, Tango’s study doesn’t need to just be a little off, it needs to be off by multiple orders of magnitude. You’re suggestion that the reduction in offense between now and then (If you mean something else by ‘steroid era’ I’m afraid you’ll have to spell it out) is somehow going to make the impact of batting order on runs and wins greater by orders of magnitude, you surely must have concrete, specific reasons for this view. I can’t figure out what these would be, but I’d be curious to see them spelled out.
Nice to see the flimsy veneer of “what’s best for the team” flaking off and the irrational hate peeking through:
So we need to just sit back and enjoy our $18M per year leadoff singles hitter as he helps us to another sub .500 year. Go M’s!
It wouldn’t surprise me if most of the screaming to move Ichiro out of the leadoff spot is just one or two bashers hoping for anything to throw him off his game.
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Sorry, totally wrong. I love Ichiro, think he’s a Hall of Fame guy, no question. Saw him in his first year at spring training and was amazed even then. One of the best ballplayers to ever play, in my opinion.
To me, it’s all about “what options do the M’s have?” The have two at leadoff (both very good), and hardly anything for the #3 slot. Ichiro has been an excellent leadoff hitter, but for several years we’ve had no one to move’em over,get’em in. He seems like an obvious option there. Pretty simple.
And I’m saying that Tango’s study is accepted as gospel when I’m not certain that its sample is correct for any given year from then on, or that one study is so rock-solid that it’s the reason to discard standard thinking about batting order that’s been around for years, that still seems to be in use even today.
If Tango’s study uncovered a fundamental behavior or trend, then it should be able to be applied to any similar range, or even a longer period of time, and still hold true. Does it? Can you take his methodology and apply it to say 2000-2010 and have similar results? I haven’t seen this.
I admit that I’m terrible with math, so I don’t trust myself to take what Tango did and run the numbers correctly. So if someone can explain why Tango’s study points to a trend that applies no matter what the date range is, or even better to an exercise that applied the same reasoning to a more recent timeframe, that should be enough for me.
You’re coming from the position of “start from the premise that Tango’s study is right until someone disproves it”. I’m coming from the position “one study alone may make a compelling argument but isn’t necessarily enough”.
If Tango’s study uncovered a fundamental behavior or trend, then it should be able to be applied to any similar range, or even a longer period of time, and still hold true. Does it? Can you take his methodology and apply it to say 2000-2010 and have similar results? I haven’t seen this.
But you still haven’t been able to give me 1) a straightforward actual reason to expect significant variance in batting order importance across different time periods, or 2) pointed to any actual flaw or shortcoming in the study in question.
I don’t get it. First of all, obviously, such a study isn’t “uncovering behavior”, or even a trend. It’s seeking to empirically verify claims about the causal impact of lineup construction on run production. I’m not sure what you think the trend or behavior that’s being explained here is. More importantly, though, you still haven’t identified an actual reason why a moderate change in the offense/defense balance across the league would, logically, mean that optimizing batting order is now dramatically more important.
Here’s the central fact of the matter: the best existing research indicates that batting order optimization has a trivial effect on run totals. As with any evidence-based examination of the workings of the world, it’s within the realm of possibility that future findings will change or substantially modify our knowledge about this issue. But the degree of skepticism you’re advancing here seems out of proportion with “it might be different in different eras for some vague unspecified reasons” as a the central foundation of skepticism.
As to why ‘standard thinking’/conventional wisdom isn’t particularly accurate about this, it hardly seems the mystery you make it out to be. It’s one of the very few things under managerial control. It’s part of the much, much larger trend of overstating the importance of managers on outcomes. I don’t see why “X has been traditionally beleived to be true for practitioners since forever” means much of anything in the absense of concrete evidence. Lots of ineffective treatments have long been held to be true by practicioners in every possible field of human activity, from rain dances to leech treatments to ‘protection’. Sometimes unverified folk believes turn out to have some reality behind them, but often they don’t. That’s why it’s worthwhile to empirically check up on them.
Because (in re-reading portions I can access online, I need to dig up my copy of Tango’s book at home), the argument is based on calculating run values for base/out states, and # of PAs for each batting spot, using data from 1999-2002. It’s an even smaller period that I remember.
If how often each batting spot comes up with men on, and # of PA for each batting spot, hasn’t changed between e.g. 2008-2010 and 1999-2002, or 2000-2010 and 1999-2002, then fine, it’s a representative sample.
Where can I find historical info on # of PA for each spot in the batting order and how often each batting spot came up with men on? I.e. trying to recreate table 50 on page 128?
I don’t know (I hope someone does as I’d be curious to see it). Again, it seems plausible (although far from certain) that these era changes could potentially increase the value of batting lineup optimization moderately. You still haven’t told me why we might expect the difference in era to change the value of lineup optimization to be more important by orders of magnitude, which seems profoundly unlikely to me. That would be the only way this conversation becomes relevant.
And even if optimization mattered more now by orders of magnitude, the Ichiro to #3 crowd is still pretty wrong, because as others have pointed out, the proposed lineup fix would move our best hitter into the #3 slot, which is only the 4th most important slot for hitters in lineup optimization theory. And no, I don’t find “folk wisdom must not be completely wrong!” to be a compelling rejoinder. It’s been wrong about much more important issues before.
…..digging back through my old baseball links, I find this from Ruane at Retrosheet, which uses markov chain analysis and 12 seasons of data. I’m sure I’ve read others; my physical baseball book collection is in an office I won’t return to for another week, so I can’t cite anything for you. But just because Tango’s research is the only one you’re aware of doesn’t mean it’s the only study that exists.
I’m sure there are nits to pick with Ruane’s study, but the onus for evidence is now clearly on the people who continue to believe batting order optimization is significant. I don’t see any such evidence offered in this thread, even as many continue to presume it exists.
Tango does have an active community on his site, and he does respond to people who have questions about his research (at least those who ask politely). I’m sure he, or someone on his site, can point you to other studies with larger (or at least different) samples.
You could also play around with the Baseball Musings Lineup Tool though I don’t recall offhand the research that went into creating it.
I appreciate your time and looking through past links, djw. You have your mind made up, and will only accept a couple narrowly defined ways of changing it, so there’s nothing else for me to say unless I blindly accept that point of view, or refute it only using the exact magic phrase you’re looking for. Moving on…
joser – thanks, I’ll check those out. I should do my homework as described above before just asking tango; I don’t mean to come across as “your research is crap!” here, and certainly don’t want to possibly seem that way on his own site…
You have your mind made up, and will only accept a couple narrowly defined ways of changing it, so there’s nothing else for me to say unless I blindly accept that point of view, or refute it only using the exact magic phrase you’re looking for.
Eh, I’ve changed my mind quite dramatically about any number of empirical questions before, and this could easily be another one, if systematic empirical evidence comes to light to demonstrate the existing state of knowledge is wrong. I’m an empiricist; and my current views are based on what I understand the state of the art to scientific research to be. If I’m wrong and properly designed contrary studies exist, or come to light in the future, I’ll change my position.
If by “narrowly defined” you mean following the scientific method, I cheerfully plead guilty.