AL Central Defensive Rankings by UZR After Two Months

by royalsreview on Jun 1, 2009 11:59 PM EDT in News Comment 26 comments

Last month, Royals Review took a perhaps too early look at the AL Central's defensive rankings via UZR. Back then, Detroit, Minnesota & Kansas City all had similar profiles somewhere in the good-to-average range in the American League, while Chicago and especially Cleveland looked horrible.

So with twice as much information now on record, has anything changed?

Before we get to the answer, it is again worthwhile to lay out there a kind of general statement of agnosticism regarding defensive statistics, one that should be especially considered given that we're still early in the season. I offer this rankings as a starting point for discussion, not the final word on the subject. I've listed the UZR/150 rankings instead of the raw numbers to further convey a sense of fuzziness, as opposed to a specious precision.

Here we go, division leaders are in bold:

	KC	CWS	CLE	DET	MIN
1B	7th	4th	10th	5th	13
2B	11th	12th	14th	1st	13th
SS	12th	2nd	3rd	11th	9th
3B	9th	12th	8th	3rd	1st
RF	13th	12th	6th	11th	7th
CF	2nd	6th	11th	5th	7th
LF	10th	12th	11th	5th	13th
OF*	10th	11th	9th	6th	8th
Overall	13th	10th	11th	2nd	9th
Overall on 4/30	6th	10th	13th	5th	4th

* overall outfield ranking

As you can see, in May the Royals slid from the middle of the league to the bottom of the league. That overall ranking of 13th you see is actually a t-13th, which is the same as tied for last. I'll leave it up to you if you want to consider them above or below the Boston Red Sox. Chances are, the Royals were the worst defensive team in the AL in May, at least according to UZR.
The biggest positional declines for the Royals were at shortstop (5th to 12th), third (2nd to 9th) and left field (3rd to 10th). Very minor improvements in the rankings at 2B and RF (Jermaine Dye versus Jose Guillen!!!) hardly overcome these drastic declines.
The defensive strides the Tigers attempted this off-season continue to appear in the statistical record.
Cleveland meanwhile, though better off than they were a month ago, appear to remain a weak defensive club, though now their overall profile is ahead of our Royals.
Overall, the AL Central looks like a very weak division defensively, with three bad teams dragging the division down.

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Doolittles article seems pretty accurate

Platoon Jacobs and Guillen(Devil really 1st on this), play Maier in RF and trade for Jack Wilson. The offense is so poor the only way to improve this team is on the defensive side. This would allow Aviles and Bloomy to platoon behind the middle infielders strengthening the bench. These moves would only make sense if they were done within the next week or so while KC was still in the race. If GMDM waits and KC falls back then he might as well sell of Teahen or DDJ and Buck or Olivo for as much as he can get.

I don't know how to put this but I'm kind of a big deal.

by kcscoliny on Jun 2, 2009 12:38 AM EDT reply actions 0 recs

Wilson is very $$$$

not sure if that’ll fly with an already all-time high payroll.

by Fernando Vina School of Linguistics on Jun 2, 2009 3:37 AM EDT up reply actions 0 recs

Hopefully Aviles can

comeback and play similar to the way he did last season.

I don't know how to put this but I'm kind of a big deal.

by kcscoliny on Jun 2, 2009 10:39 AM EDT up reply actions 0 recs

10th in Left field?

Wasn’t DDJ’s move to left supposed to give us + defense in left?

If you were thinking, you wouldn't have thought that.

by Warden11 on Jun 2, 2009 1:04 AM EDT reply actions 0 recs

sure as shit hasnt and wasnt ever going to give us +offense....

so, one would assume so

Fire Hillman

by billybeingbilly on Jun 2, 2009 1:33 AM EDT up reply actions 0 recs

I don't know what is going on there either...

I’m not ready to say DDJ has been a disappointment there… but something went haywire in May, thats for sure

by royalsreview on Jun 2, 2009 2:57 AM EDT up reply actions 0 recs

DDJ

didn’t he sit quite a bit when he was in his slump to make way for Bloomy? It sure seemed for a week or so like the Spork was out there alot

Marriage is a great institution, for those that like being in institutions.

by fats on Jun 2, 2009 9:58 AM EDT up reply actions 0 recs

I'm as big a fan of DDJ as just about anyone else here

I mean, I didn’t stalk him at a Burger King or anything, but I’ve always liked him

I think he’ll get better this season, but I don’t think there’s anything wrong about admitting that his performance so far both at the plate (-6.6) and in the field (-0.1). I

I'm not a sabermetrician, but I do play one at Driveline Mechanics.

by devil_fingers on Jun 2, 2009 11:47 AM EDT up reply actions 0 recs

Same here.

What is causing his UZR to be so poor? A few misplayed balls (I remember a couple at the track that he could have caught) that is showing poor range or what?

If you were thinking, you wouldn't have thought that.

by Warden11 on Jun 2, 2009 12:25 PM EDT up reply actions 0 recs

With the small sample sizes, a couple missed plays will have a greater effect

The reliability of sample sizes for UZR accrues at a much slower rate than for hitting stats (perhaps as much as 1/3 the rate), so it takes longer for a couple misplays to even out over time. For range only (DDJ’s total UZR gets a boost for his arm and his lack of errors and is almost dead even average overall at 0.1), DDJ is -2.3 in LF, which means there have been roughly two or three plays that an average leftfielder would have made that he did not. In two weeks, with a couple nice plays, that number might be even. Overall the last two years in LF (just under 900 innings, or roughly the equivalent of one season out there), DDJ is still +10 UZR (and +7.7 runs just looking at range).

In other words, his defensive performance to date is disappointing (as noted above), but it is not something to get worked up about yet.

by Gopherballs on Jun 2, 2009 2:01 PM EDT up reply actions 0 recs

innings in LEFT, for reference

DDJ- 399
Bloomy- 34
Mitch- 9

by royalsreview on Jun 2, 2009 2:49 PM EDT up reply actions 0 recs

Adam Everett vs. Alexei Ramirez

That really surprises me. Most thought Ramirez would really struggle at shortstop, while Everett has a sterling record at short (he is splitting time with Ramon Santiago so perhaps that is skewing the numbers).

Jose Guillen is only 13th? That can’t be right. Who could possibly be worse?

Relive Royals History at royalsretro.blogspot.com

by RoyalsRetro on Jun 2, 2009 11:08 AM EDT reply actions 0 recs

Other have been worse than Guillen in “absolute” numbers (Markakis [~!]) for example), but they’ve also played 200 more innings. Of RFers with more than 100 innnigs, Guillen’s UZR/150 is by far the worst.

But, as always, with Everett, etc., keep in mind sample size issues.

I'm not a sabermetrician, but I do play one at Driveline Mechanics.

by devil_fingers on Jun 2, 2009 11:51 AM EDT up reply actions 0 recs

Everett has not been the same since breaking his leg and then having shoulder problems

by Gopherballs on Jun 2, 2009 2:04 PM EDT up reply actions 0 recs

Small sample sizes and small margins cloud the results

Relative to the rest of the league, the defense is bad, but relative do the division…9th vs. 10th vs. 11th vs. 13th is pretty inconclusive (excluding the Tigers, of course). Maybe there’s a bigger gap than I understand between the raw scores that put the Twins 9th and the Royals 13th.

by benfunke on Jun 2, 2009 12:03 PM EDT reply actions 0 recs

I like to periodically look at DER on BP

and noticed the Royals dropped from near the middle of the pack earlier this season to 29th now. Royals only converting .670 of BIP into outs. Assuming staff has allowed normal LD rate, that is a truly pathetic performance.

Mr Glass, this is a pro sports team, not a retail store - run it like one!

by loyal2sdad on Jun 2, 2009 1:26 PM EDT reply actions 0 recs

Royals LD rate is the same as the AL average LD rate of 19%

Royals also lead the league in GB rate (47% versus AL average of 42%). Groundballs go for hits more often than flyballs, so that explains part, but not nearly all, of the low DER.

by Gopherballs on Jun 2, 2009 2:07 PM EDT up reply actions 0 recs

do they not compute UZR/150 for catchers?

is there another metric used? This thought might be clouded by the generally crappy level of play lately, but it seems that there are a higher number of wild pitches/pass balls lately.

"Things could always be worse." - Buddy Bell

by buddyball on Jun 2, 2009 2:34 PM EDT reply actions 0 recs

No

Catchers make too few fielding plays for it to be worth anything. Here’s the Royals page on fangraphs. At this early in the season for individual players, it is better to look at UZR than UZR/150 (which is like looking at projected HRs on June 2).

by Gopherballs on Jun 2, 2009 2:42 PM EDT up reply actions 0 recs

No

Because UZR is mostly about range, and fielding grounders isn’t that big of a deal for catchers.

There are other ways of doing catcher defense, but it’s hard in-season. The most fair way to do catcher defense is Tom Tango’s WOWY system since it measures the catcher in combination with pitchers since some pitchers are harder to catch — sure, that’s true for other fielders, but the pitcher as a much greater effect on catcher performance. A guy catching Tim Wakefield, for example, is going to have both higher WP/PB numbers as well as a harder time controlling the running game. That’s an extreme example, but you can think of others.

I ran some basic “against the averages” numbers using an updatedv version of Justin Inaz’s methods with the new B-R. I’ll publish some of it later. Long story short — Buck was indeed having a dreadful year even for him — but it’s not so much the steals rate, but how much throwing errors he had. He was about -4. Olivo does control the running game well (assuming all Royals pitchers are the same in this regard), but, and you aren’t going to believe this, is the worst in the league with regard to blocking pitches… so he was also about -1.5 runs overall.

Like I said, it’s a limited method, and in extremely small samples size so far this season.

I'm not a sabermetrician, but I do play one at Driveline Mechanics.

by devil_fingers on Jun 2, 2009 2:44 PM EDT up reply actions 1 recs