(Update: I republished all the Cardinal affiliates with their numbers in google docs for those of you too lazy to sort. 
Click here to see)
Dan Fox rocks. I don’t know if you’ve been following his research at BP on his new fielding metric Simple Fielding Runs or not, but it’s worth the read if you don’t mind hearing about some methods. Of course, the good part is when he gets to the numbers…until you find out just how bad Chris Duncan really is. On the flip side, you hear again just how good Pujols is.
Fox also just provided a download of SFR that included minor league infield data. Huge props to him.
So how did some of our infield prospects rate?
- David Freese has had somewhat of a bum rap for his defense, but not so according to SFR. He’s the 8th best 3B in the minors and worth about 12.3 runs.
- There have been a lot of questions about Allen Craig’s defense, and according to SFR he’s more close to neutral then detrimental, coming up +2.7 runs. That jives with what Derrick Goold told us a few weeks ago. “He’s not great at third, he’s not a game-changer at third, but he also – according to an opposing manager – doesn’t hurt his team.”
- We have a couple of good fielding shortstops in Jose Martinez and Tyler Greene. Martinez came in at +8.3 and Greene at +8. (edit: Martinez also was a +6.8 at Palm Beach) That’s encouraging. Last year there was talk that Greene should move to third, and this season we’ve been hearing that Martinez would be better at 2B. Both have more value at their current posisition. Speaking of SS’s, Brendan Ryan was +3.6 for Memphis.
- The best infielder in the system? Donovan Solano. He was a +12.6 at 3B for Quad Cities, and +4.3 at SS for PB. Unfortunately he has just a .589 career minor league OPS. Then again, our starting big league SS had a career .630 OPS in the minors and still has made it to the big leagues because of his defense.
- So who was the worst fielder in the system last season? Thankfully, it wasn’t a prospect but a minor league journeyman-New Padre Edgar Gonzalez was -13 runs. Yikes. No wonder he hasn’t seen a big league at bat yet. I think he owes Blake Hawksworth and Mike Parisi an apology.
- Pete Kozma wasn’t great but wasn’t bad. +1.9. His high school team played on turf, word is he was adjusting to a different surface. I’m optimistic he’ll improve.
- Jarrett Hoffpauir was also about neutral. +1.2 in AA, -1.2 in AAA.
- Brian Barden was a +11 for Tucson at 3B, making him one of the better fielders in the minors.
- Mark Hamilton was bad, a cumulative -4.5 between A and AA.
Filed under: Allen Craig, Brendan Ryan, Brian Barden, David Freese, Jarrett Hoffpauir, Jose Martinez, Pete Kozma, Tyler Greene, fielding
erik
azruavatar
fewgoodcards
roarke49
theredbaaron
I’m pretty happy Martinez showed an above average glove at shortstop last year. I trumpeted his glove work since the first time I saw him and firmly believed he could stay at shortstop. honestly I was always a little bit confused whenever people said he wouldn’t stick at shortstop, at twenty one he already looks a lot like renteria.
no surprise on hamiliton. he just looks clumsy in the field, why he’s considered a prospect is beyond me.
freese had a bad rap in college, but baseball america named him the best defensive third baseman in the california league this year.
as for craig, i am glad the numbers back up my beliefs. people give him a lot of grief about his errors, but his stats in palm beach weren’t any higher than other tp third base prospects around the minors. i knew a guy that played shortstop his whole college career couldn’t have been as bad of a defensive player as people were saying.
now the question becomes who plays third for springfield next year? i don’t think either is ready for AAA yet, and obviously neither is going back to high-A. i would think they would split time there, but my guess is that freese gets the majority of the time with craig filling in at first, DH, and even the outfield.
It’s important to remember that each of those numbers is relative to the league. So a +4 in AA does not (necessarily) equal +4 in AAA. You would expect some kind of improvement defensively moving up the minors but the degree of which is debatable. I suspect Dan will look at translations once the outfield version of SFR is complete.
any numbers on Arnoldi Cruz ???
hey, i just wanted to comment about the last post. I just wanted to reassure you that no matter what your views are, we can all agree that your baseball knowledge is what we are here for….i don’t even see most of the ads.
arnoldi cruz-for qc-2.2. you can dowload the excel doc by clicking on the link, there’s more then what i talked about, i just covered the highlights.
What does this all mean? According to this our best defensive middle infield based on SFR is Kennedy and Izturis.
I guess my question is what is bad? Obviously guys who are in the negative range are bad. But are guys in the 0-4 range much better than the negative players?
Heck everyone said how bad Miles is but he is at 2.6 and Hoffpauir is 1.2 and that is a 1.4 difference which is a pretty good amount if you are to say that Miles is two times the fielder that Hoffpauir is.
I don’t get what this metric is? I guess I would have to pay to understand more.
Brian Barden is a guy no one talks about–not saying they should. But he has been a decent minor league player (better numbers than Ryan and Hoff) yet no one champions him playing.
Any particular reason why? Could he play second? I don’t even know if I like him–just curious.
ICBIRDFAN - The spreadsheet is broken out by year and position. The 2.6 you are quoting is 2006 data at second base. Last year between 2nd, 3rd and SS Miles was -10.4 with most (-10.2) of the damage coming at SS.
The numbers should act as rough guidelines. The scale I usually stick with is:
less than -15: terrible fielder who should probably switch positions
-15 to -5: bad fielder
-5 to +5: average fielder
+5 to +15: good fielder
greater than +15: standout defensive player
You can see that it’s not easy to make it to the extremes on that scale. That’s how I think of it in my head at least.
AZRUAVATAR-
Thanks for the breakdown!! You gave me exactly what I wanted. I knew there was some sort of range but was not quite sure what the range was for each category of fielder. I was looking at too narrow of a range. As you can see I was trying to compare a 1.2 to a 2.6 where they might was well be equal.
thanks
Is it just me, or is “Glove Love” a dirty name for a baseball post?
it’s just you
Thanks. I was hoping Cruz would be mint with the glove. I would have checked out the spread sheet but I’m at home all week and my P.c. here is hamstringed a bit…
Next year, you gotta go with “Smell the Glove.”
why wait? i should be leaning on your input for more snazzy blog post titles, fritz
I have to give props to a Spinal Tap reference!
So…a week ago it was understood that Jose Martinez would inevitably be moving to 2nd base, but now we see that his defense is so good it “goes to eleven.”
Add together Jose’s A+ and AA numbers with the leather, and he saved 15.1 runs in a 5-month minor league season. That’s truly elite (and having nearly identical defensive numbers from 2 different leagues is strong evidence that JM’s performance is legit), and on a par with much-lauded fellow SS prospect Chin Hu of the Dodgers.
If Jose’s AA performance at the plate at age 21 was a harbinger of what’s to come (.300 avg., 10 HR’s in 250 AB’s), the Cards have another Placido Polanco–or better!
Thanks for linking to the spreadsheet and discussng SFR. A couple of comments:
- park effects are not considered in this system so a player that plays on turf may be more affected than the vast majority that play on grass
- I like the range that AZRUAVATAR provided. These numbers are based on underlying probabilities and not visual inspection of each play and so it is certainly the case that there is variability in play. For a single season those ranges should suffice but as we look at more data we should be able to shrink those ranges somewhat.
- After making a few more tweaks on the outfield numbers I’ll be publishing v1.0 of the outfield methodology and will include minor league numbers. However, the outfield ratings are more dependant on park effects and since I only have data for 2005 through 2007, those numbers will have more variance. Those outfield numbers should include outfielder throwing as well (an essay on this topic will be included in Baseball Prospectus 2008 due out at the end of the month) as how the fielder does on ground balls, fly balls, and line drives.
- Although I haven’t published it the infielder SFR numbers can also be broken down into how the fielder does to his left and right. Still working on that.
- “if you don’t mind hearing about some methods”
Doesn’t everyone want to hear about methodology and algorithms? Hmmmmm….
Martinez left me impressed before I had ever heard of the guy, I had to look him up
Seemed like he stung the ball every time and made some great plays in the field.