American League

National League

Jay Bruce: Barry Bonds, or Wily Mo Pena?

Can Drew Stubbs hit major league pitching?

Who is the real Homer Bailey?

Is Aroldis Chapman the next Randy Johnson?

What's going on in left field?

More on Base Runs later.  Let's start with a graph looking at how the run environments of the minor leagues (and major leagues) vary:

The first thing to take from that graph is how much the run environments of these leagues vary.  The NL and AL are fairly intermediate, while the minor leagues vary by about a half-run per game in either direction.  The Florida State League (high Single-A) is a notorious pitchers' league, but I was surprised to see the International League (Triple-A) virtually tied with the Gulf Coast league (low Rookie) for second-lowest runs environment.  Maybe I need to give the Reds' Triple-A Louisville players a bit more credit for their production (and be more cautious about their Triple-A pitchers!).  At the other end of the spectrum are the high-scoring leagues: the California (high Single-A), the Arizona Summer League (Rookie), and the Pioneer League (Rookie) all averaged more than five runs per game from 2007-2009.

Here is a sampling of offensive statistics from each of these leagues so that we can see where the differences come from (again, using 2007-2009 data).  The table is sortable if you click in the header.

These are substantial differences.  For example, both the Florida State League and the California League are high Single-A leagues, and thus (probably) have roughly equivalent talent levels.  What these data are saying, therefore, is that you could take an average hitter from the Florida State league (hitting .256/.324/.374) and move him to the California League, where he'd "improve" to .271/.339/.418.  The reason?  Nothing to do with the player himself.  Rather, it's probably some combination of environmental factors (humidity, altitude) and ballparks.  Nevertheless, it means that you have to be very careful about how you interpret a player's statistics coming from these lines.

It's also the case that hitter leagues don't "achieve" those run environments in the same way. The Pacific Coast League gets its five-plus runs per game thanks to the highest minor league home run rate, second-highest OBP, but relatively low error rates (again, you can click in the header to sort the table and see this more easily). The Arizona Summer League, in contrast, has pretty high AVG and OBP, very high error rates (better only than the foreign rookie leagues), but relatively weak power totals (including one of the lowest HR/PA rates in the minors at 1.1 percent). The Dominican Summer League is one of the more interesting: the worst AVG, SLG, and HR percentage in baseball, but also the highest walk rate, error rate, and stolen base attempt rates you will find: Small ball is alive and well in the Dominican Republic!

Speaking of error rates, another interesting finding from this table can be seen if you click on the Error (E%) header above.  This is showing the percentage of plate appearances that involve an error, and you can see that there is a virtually perfect relationship between error rate and quality of play. This has been observed before (see also this related piece by Harry), but I was surprised how strong the relationship is. Better-quality leagues have fewer errors.  You see similar, though not as strong, relationships between league quality and stolen bases attempted per opportunity (SBA/Opp; more attempts at younger levels, almost without regard to run environment), home run rate (HR%; better leagues have more home runs, probably a reflection of hitter quality), and (perhaps) unintentional walk rate (niBB%; more walks at lower levels, probably due to young pitchers with lousy command).

The final thing I'd like you to take away from this is that "my" Base Runs model is doing a nice job of estimating the runs produced within each league.  What is Base Runs?  It's the best available run estimator today.  If you're not familiar with it, Patriot wrote probably the best introduction, while Tango's series really demonstrates its power over other run estimators.  Briefly, though, Base Runs is a simple approach to modeling run scoring in baseball, and written in English looks like:

    [Baserunners] * [Baserunner Scoring Rate] + [Home Runs] = Runs

The major innovation of Base Runs over earlier estimators like Runs Created was the special treatment given to the home run.  This helps it handle a much wider range of offensive environments than any other run estimator

What I did is start with a base runs equation (from this work by Tango) that was tweaked (equation shown in resources below) to accurately predict linear weights values for MLB 2007-2008 (kindly provided by Colin Wyers via e-mail).  With that equation in hand, I then ran it on 2007-2009 totals for both of the major leagues as well as all of their affiliates.  I am using the exact same equation in each league, and yet the square root of the mean square error is just 0.06 runs per game (that figure is after you adjust for the average shortfall of about 0.05 runs per game: I'm including as many events as I can find (passed balls, wild pitches, errors, etc), but there are ways to score runs that I don't have in my minor league data set, and perhaps as a result I'm missing about eight runs per 162 games from each league).

One of the nice things about having a good-performing Base Runs equation like this is that one can use it to produce league-specific linear weights.  With the aid of Patriot's spreadsheet that automates this process, here are the linear weights (in absolute runs) in a Google Spreadsheet.  How well they work depends on how well the Base Runs equation is working: we're getting good matches in overall runs estimates, but the truth is that I don't really know if what is happening at the individual event levels are correct (except that they are probably very close for the major leagues).  However, in the absence of pbp data (maybe someday I'll try to get there with Gameday), this is probably the next best approach to linear weight generation.  At least for players who don't have particularly unique skill sets, using these linear weights should give you a good estimate of their absolute runs production.

How bad will the offense be?

What about the rotation?

What about the bullpen?

So just how good are the Reds going to be this year?

Some additional details on methodology

1. Will Dusty Baker let the kids play?

2. Can the young guys hack it in the rotation?

3. Who will start in center field?

4. Can the Reds avoid the injury bug again?

5. What's going to happen in the outfield corners?

Milwaukee Brewers—first half in brief

Hitting

• The strength of the Brewers' offense can be seen clearly in this figure, with eight of 14 hitters in the upper-right quadrant, and only one player in the lower-left.
• The spectacular first half of Prince Fielder has been well-publicized, but I had no idea that Corey Hart and Ryan Braun were hitting as well as they are—albeit with fewer at-bats. They have certainly earned more playing time in the second half.
• J.J. Hardy had an amazing first two months, though a cooler June makes his excellence seem a bit less dramatic in this figure. Is he Brian Roberts, or is he Jeff Kent? He's missed a lot of development time the last few years, but is only 24 years old...
• Geoff Jenkins has, thus far, exchanged power for on-base percentage in the first half.
• Damien Miller also has been very impressive, thanks in large part to his high batting average.
• Kevin Mench comes out looking pretty bad in this figure—his power has been average—but he has been well below the OBP Mendoza line. He's expected to contribute his worth via power, but a .291 OBP? Yikes.
• Craig Counsell is still an excellent defensive player, but he hasn't contributed much with the bat for a few years now.

• Counsell is one of those rare hitters who can deliver good walk rates while keeping his strikeout rates down. Unfortunately, that represents the bulk of his offensive contribution.
• Fielder, Weeks and Hall all show above-average walk and strikeout rates. This is common for power hitters, and usually represents a net positive contribution to offense.
• Jenkins and Braun show up in the bottom-right quadrant. Jenkins has long fallen into this category, but Braun might yet move up into the upper-right as his career progresses. Or not.
• Estrada and Mench both have been extremely aggressive hitters, swinging early enough—and making sufficient contact—to avoid running out the count. In both cases, this approach has resulted in a sub-par on-base percentage, though perhaps it contributes to their power(?).

• Braun stands out as the biggest surprise here. No one could have expected him to hit as well as he has in his first 180 plate appearances, but the 23-year-old is a legitimate prospect who may anchor the hot corner in Milwaukee for years to come.
• Miller, Hardy and Fielder have also outperformed expectations by roughly 100 OPS points. With Fielder, the sky's the limit, of course, but how could one reasonably predict the season he's having? Hardy's power surge over the first few months was certainly one of the season's early surprises, though Miller's AVG-heavy contributions have been valuable as well.
• Hall, Weeks, Mench and Graffanino are among the biggest disappointments. Hall, in particular, has been disappointing, given his excellent season last year. And everyone had hoped that Weeks would continue to show great progress. The modest power's been there, but the OBP has not. Weeks' wrist has been bothering him this season— maybe he can rebound when it has healed.
• Hart, on the other hand, seems to be performing right in line with BPro's projections. It's good to see him breaking through.

• Hart, Braun, Miller and Gwynn all show up as being a bit "lucky" in this analysis. The latter three, in particular, also have BABIPs in the .345-.390 range, while Hart's .326 BABIP seems high given his 18% LD percentage. Assuming no change in their skills, we might expect some decline in their production in the second half. Nevertheless, PrOPS estimates that Braun normally still would be hitting at a .900+ clip anyway.
• Fielder, amazingly, actually may have underperformed a touch, given his batted ball stats. His BABIP is just .278.
• Counsell, Graffanino and Gabe Gross all may have underperformed as well. Gross, who has the fewest plate appearances of any Brewer, appears to have had the most dramatic run of bad luck, as evidenced by his .217 BABIP.
• Unfortunately for the Brewers, the disappointing seasons of Weeks, Hall and Mench seem largely in accordance with their batted ball statistics. Doesn't mean that they can't improve, just that one can't attribute their struggles to ill fortune at the plate.

Pitching

• The spectacular half-season of the Brewers' bullpen is very apparent in this figure, particularly among Francisco Cordero, Derrick Turnbow, Matt Wise and Carlos Villanueva. Brian Shouse, the sole lefty in the pen, in limited innings, also has been quite good at preventing offensive production. Villanueva deserves special recognition, as he has already thrown 55 innings across 35 bullpen appearances.
• The rotation has been less consistent. Ben Sheets has had a fine season (and has been healthy!), and David Bush has been dead-on average, but Jeff Suppan, Chris Capuano and Claudio Vargas have struggled.
• Yovani Gallardo has been excellent since his promotion. If he can perform at even league-average levels in the second half, it would be a huge boost to this team's pitching staff.

• Cordero, Bush and Sheets are the only players in the bottom-right part of the figure, though Wise, Chris Spurling and Gallardo are close enough. Cordero has been phenomenal.
• Suppan's walk rates are right in line with his career numbers, but his strikeouts are down a touch so far this season—and when they weren't high to begin with, that can mean trouble.
• The walk rates of Capuano, Vargas and Turnbow have continued to be high this season. Capuano's might be the most disappointing, as he seemed to have made strides in that area last year.

• Bush shows up as the biggest disappointment here, and that may seem odd given how good he looked in the previous two figures. More on him below.
• Capuano also shows up as a disappointment. As mentioned above, his walk rate seems to have increased again this season, and that may be the difference.
• On the surprise side, almost the entire Brewers bullpen shows up. They have been outstanding thus far, but I always get a bit concerned when players deviate that dramatically from projections. PECOTA isn't perfect by any means, but one might expect some regression toward the line by the season's end... particularly if the peripherals also indicate some luck is involved (see below).

• Bush shows up as being very unlucky so far this season. His peripherals compare very well to Sheets', and yet he has nothing but a high-fours ERA to show for it. It's reasonable to expect a strong second half from him.
• Speaking of Sheets, I wonder if we should be mildly concerned about him. His strikeout rates are down significantly from previous seasons, and his walk rates, while still excellent, are also up.
• The news for the surprising Milwaukee bullpen is mixed:
• The outstanding K-rates and HR-rates for Cordero and Turnbow actually peg them as being a bit unlucky in this figure. I'm not sure how well FIP works when K-rates start to exceed 10 K/9, but at the least it indicates that their surprising seasons thus far have been legit.
• On the other hand, Villanueva, Wise, Shouse and Spurling all probably overachieved a bit given their peripherals. That said, FIP is still estimating a mid-threes ERA for all but Spurling, which is perfectly acceptable for quality relievers. I don't see reason to predict a bullpen collapse here, though a small regression would not be surprising.
• Vargas' ERA ranks him second among Brewers starters (not including Gallardo), yet his FIP is terrifying, thanks to very high home run allowed rates and high walk rates. He is probably not to be counted on in the second half, unless he can significantly improve those numbers.

Fielding

• How important is Counsell to the Brewers' defense? With him, as a team, the Brewers are 10 plays above average. Without him, even as a part-time player, they drop to eight plays below average. If only he could still hit...
• Hardy and Fielder fall into the intriguing category of players who are good out of the zone, but struggle a bit on balls hit closer to them. Hardy's an athletic fielder, and given how much time he has missed the past few seasons, one can hope that he might improve. Fielder also shows surprising athleticism for a big man, getting to enough balls out of the zone to be rated just about average overall.
• Braun hasn't been a complete disaster at 3B, as many had feared, but he hasn't been particularly good either. If he'd played all season, he probably would rank among the five or six worst players in baseball at his position. But he also probably wouldn't be last: Akinori Iwamura is currently running away with that title, 19 plays below average despite missing substantial time due to injury.
• Weeks currently ranks fifth from the bottom in baseball at 2B, though his RZR is actually up from prior seasons (.721 in '05, .765 in '06, and .781 in '07), so he's improved. Still, with a team in a pennant race, Weeks could lose time to Counsell if he can't get his offense back to where it was last year.

• Gross seems to be the team's best all-around defender in the outfield, leading Brew Crew outfielders in plays above average despite limited playing time.
• Hall has made the transition from SS (where he often excelled) to CF quite well this season. He has struggled at times with balls hit relatively close to him, but that is to be expected for someone learning a position. Nevertheless, his excellent athleticism has allowed him to make a good number of plays out of the zone. If he can come back from his ankle injury at full strength, I'd expect him to continue to get better defensively.
• Mench also has shown good range for a left fielder, though he has been less impressive in right.
• Most other players seem to have more or less average range, with no players showing exceptionally good or (most importantly) bad defensive skills.

• Estrada and Miller are similar defensively. Both have had WP + PB / G rates below league average, which indicates a good job of keeping the ball in front of them. On a team with as many strikeout pitchers as the Brewers, that's saying something.
• They also are well below average in terms of throwing runners out. Both have contributed offensively above replacement level this season, which helps offset this. But caught-stealing rates below 20% are difficult to stomach.

Looking forward to October

 PA   %K   %BB   %LD   HR/F  BABIP   AVG   OBP   SLG   ISO   OPS   PrOPS   wOBA    RC   WPA
131  18%   10%   23%    26%   .274  .267  .344  .534  .267  .878    .974   .372    22  0.33

Outlook