25
2013
Comparing Mets 2005-2010 Draft and IFA Signings To Other MLB Teams?
An article by Vinny B.
Many Mets fans have extremely passionate opinions about how well the Mets drafted and signed International free agents during the Omar Minaya era. It is a hotly debated topic, but after every heated debate, there are never any clear answers to how the Mets drafted during this period. Because of the lack of clarity, I felt this would be a great subject to research extensively.
With help from Satish Ram, I compiled the draft results of all 30 teams (as well as IFA signings) during the 2005-2010 seasons, and I compared them to the Mets. The results provide a clearer picture of how the Mets stocked their farm during 2005-2010, and the results debunk some the most common arguments about Minaya’s tenure. The link to our data is at the end of this post. below.
This research shows that the Mets compared to all other 30 teams are above average. The Mets finished 10th overall with 37 total points, and the MLB average is about 30 points. When compared to other teams, the Mets actually produced a strong amount of players – in fact, only seven teams produced more.
The Mets also have some starters with All-star potential like Ike Davis, Jon Niese and Matt Harvey. In addition to those three, they have quality starters like Ruben Tejada and Daniel Murphy that still provide value in other ways. The Mets do not have a proven superstar player, which is what prevents them from ranking higher, but their combination of depth, quality starters, and potential all-stars separate the Mets from the average team.
Some have argued the fact that Atlanta has had much more success drafting in comparison to the Mets and use this as a knock against the 2005-2010 era. While it’s true the Mets fall way short of Atlanta, my research shows why it is misleading to use Atlanta as a measuring stick.
Virtually every team in the major leagues falls way short of Atlanta.
Atlanta crushed the competition with a staggering 58.5 points. If we were to use Atlanta as the standard for all teams, every team would look like they drafted poorly as well. The best way to judge how the Mets drafted is to compare how they did to every team, and when done so, they look significantly stronger.
Another common misconception is that the Mets haven’t drafted any elite players and that defines their drafts as mediocre. Like I mentioned earlier, it’s true the Mets haven’t drafted an elite player, but the results show that this doesn’t make the Mets’ drafts mediocre. It just prevents the Mets from ranking even higher.
Many of the elite players were already picked before the Mets even had a chance to pick in their drafts. The Mets could not have drafted a player like Evan Longroria, Ryan Braun or Troy Tulowitzki because they did not have the opportunity to do so.
Sure, there are a few elite players who fell into the later rounds, but since my research shows there are only 35 or so all-stars drafted, and only some fell to the later rounds, criticizing the Mets for not drafting those players is like criticizing the Mets for not finding a needle in a haystack.
This is why I also made a separate ranking which includes draft positioning. It penalizes the teams who continually pick high, and it gives points to teams who pick later to level the playing field.
When I take draft positioning into account, the Mets jump up to 5th overall with 39 points (the MLB average is 28.6). It’s true the Mets hurt themselves by giving up 1st round picks in some years, but even if they didn’t give up any picks, they would still be operating at a disadvantage against teams like the Nationals and Rays who had the luxury of many top draft picks. What the adjusted ranking does prove is that the Mets did a solid job with what they had available to them.
The reasons why the Mets have been struggling are due to factors like disastrous free agent signings, devastating injuries, financial problems, and an overall failure to surround the team with quality players through trades and free agents.
The players drafted from 2005-2010 are not the problem, but currently they are part of the solution. The results back this up. Many of these players have bright futures, and will be fundamental to getting this franchise back on the right path.
New Updated link to Spreadsheet Data
Note from Joe D. – Special acknowledged to Mr. North Jersey of Real Dirty Mets for all of his assistance today. Thank you for helping to format the data into a more legible and presentable format. Mostly, thank you for reaching out to us and volunteering to help resolve some issues for us. 
About the Author: Brian Devine
253 Comments + Add Comment
NL East Standings
| Team | W | L | Pct. | GB |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Braves | 23 | 18 | .561 | - |
| Nationals | 23 | 19 | .548 | 0.5 |
| Phillies | 20 | 22 | .476 | 3.5 |
| Mets | 16 | 23 | .410 | 6.0 |
| Marlins | 11 | 31 | .262 | 12.5 |
Last updated: 05/18/2013
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How are you weighing each category? How much does a guy who starts on a bad team get?
Also, do you penalize teams for lacking, say quality position players, or having most of the their hitters being 1B/DH types?
How much focus is on the individual players vs the production of the entire system?
You also need to show the formulas and values you assigned to each otucome and how you came to those values.
I explained all of that in the guideline.
why are you including undrafted players in a study about the draft?
Are you trying to hide something or did you just make an honest mistake?
Why not give us those numbers separately One total for IFAs and one for the draft?
Is he trying to hide something? Are you serious?
What’s their to hide?
Only a dope would think IFA’s do not count toward a GM’s player acquisition and development.
The better questions is this.
Is oleosmirf saddened that the Mets didn’t rank like shit?
Go root for the Pirates, you’re not a Mets fan, just an Alderson fan.
You were rooting for the Mets too look bad and it’s obvious.
What does the title of the article say?
Does it say minor league system as a whole or does it say the draft?
I want to see how the Mets draft matches up with the other 29 teams in the league, so I can judge Minaya properly…
“The results provide a clearer picture of how the Mets drafted, and the results debunk some the most common arguments about the Mets’ drafts during Minaya’s tenure.”
Again, many of us are just saying that by including IFA it doesn’t provide a clearer picture of how the Mets drafted.
I understand your point about IFA’s, but I felt it would be necessary to include them so we could get a clear picture of all the players that were developed during this time frame. That was the goal.
In my opinion, there’s no difference between a high school player drafted in the US and a young player signed as a IFA. They were both still developed by the system.
Maybe I should have said “players developed”, but I think that’s just semantics and I didn’t expect this to be a big issue. And since all 30 teams IFA’s were weighed equally, the results are valid.
If the Mets drafted them and then traded or released them should they get credit for developing them?
the problem is your article talks about the draft. The biggest criticisms of Omar is not that he had a terrible farm system, but that he was a poor drafter.
Your conclusion is that Omar’s drafting issues were not accurate which your study does not answer.
Not really, you just assigned random point values to particular outcomes. You gave a guy points for starting, but nothing to determine if he was just on a bad team or if he was actually worth starting.
I did account for that. There was three levels of starters. “fringe” starters like Kirk and Lannan for example, counted only as 1.5 points, while other starters who had seasons with average to above average numbers were counted as 3 to 4 points.
why are they worth 2x-3x a fringe starter? How did you come to those weights? What defines “fringe”?
How does being a former top 100 prospect who hits .300 compare to a player who wasn’t top 100 who does the same?
Also, how to account for Thole being a back up but still starting? Shouldn’t the fact that we had no one better than him on the farm the last 5 years be held against Minaya?
Matt Harvey has 10 starts. How is considered “high end” already?
You took vague, subjective terms and in several cases very small sample sizes and tried to retroactively attach value to them.
“high end starters” are young players with all star potential. I did this because it would be unfair to not take into account that players like Harvey or Rizzo for example have the potential to be future stars.
Wouldn’t it be easier to just rank them at current production levels instead of potential future results? Of course that means that these rankings could change, year to year, or even month to month but that being said… shouldn’t they?
I don’t think that would be right though. Wouldn’t you much rather have a young player that has posted above league average numbers, and is a player that scouts have raved about, instead of an older player that has above league average numbers?
But then Vinny you are letting subjective into your rankings that are supposed to show results. Until Harvey produces, he can’t be a high end starter.
Why are you including IFAs in a discussion about the DRAFT?
Your inclusion of international free agents makes any analysis of the draft completely useless…
I agree. How do we assess the draft when we are including international signings? Does the fact that the Mets recently spent a ton on IFA make up for the group of unsigned draft picks last year?
IF you are going to compare drafts, compare drafts.
The players drafted from 2005-2010 are not part of the problem, but they are part of the solution. The results back this up.
No the results of your study do not back this up because you evaluated players that were NEVER DRAFTED. Ruben Tejada was never drafted so why are pretending that he was?
Your results simply show that homegrown players acquired from 2005-2010 have made the 10th most contributions to their MLB team.
I agree with others above, it would make more sense to make it two separate metrics. IFA’s have nothing to do with the draft and it would be nice to see where teams strengths are.
Huge undertakings like this can be nit-picked to death. But I very much appreciate the effort and believe your basic point stands.
Personally, I dislike defensive metrics because they attempt to quantify the qualitative — pinning a specific number on a quality — and I think you inevitably invite some of those same problems here.
But still: great job, and thank you.
Nice work.
HI Vinny,
Welcome aboard.
Very fair assessment of the Minya years when put into proper perspective of what is reasonable to expect from a minor league system. Too many have criticized the former GM of concentrating on winning for today over looking for tomorrow which I think has always been an unfair rap – especially for trading away top draft picks for how many good players do we see coming from the later rounds.
You are right – many looked at Atlanta and the Braves far exceed other teams with successful draft picks and thus what might be more necessary that a advanced statician would be an advanced computer hacker to break into the Brave’s secret hard drive.
And I’m so glad that you pointed out that no producing elite players obscures the importance of producing a quantity of good players instead. But your closing argument is what I liked best:
“The reasons why the Mets have been struggling are due to factors like disastrous free agent signings, devastating injuries, financial problems, and an overall failure to surround the team with quality players through trades and free agents. The players drafted from 2005-2010 are not part of the problem, but they are part of the solution. The results back this up. Many of these players have bright futures, and will be fundamental to getting this franchise back on the right path.”
That is exactly what so many of us have been saying – yes, some of the free agent signings made by Omar proved disasterous but that is ancient history in the sense that we have a nice young core already established and nothing has been done to supplement them which has held the team back from progressing further at this stage.
The book on Omar will not be completed for a while. He has lots in the pipeline for which he might get credit for (and deserved). Guys like Flores and some of the other IFAs he signed could turn out highly successful which will make his tenure look better.
As for the draft, again, the book isnt done. Realistically, if a GM hits a HR with a player every few years, that is success. Ike and Harvey might be the two poised to really set Omar’s tenure on a different level. A few AS appearances could be in their near future. Also, a guy like Edgin could also aid in this effort if he becomes a permanent, successful fixture in the BP.
The draft is a numbers game…always has been. Omar had 300 picks roughly over 6 years. Simply random chance means that a few players will pan out. Did Omar exceed the norm or fall short of it? Again, I believe it is too soon to tell. There are still many players (Den Dekker, Kirk, Duda, Vaughn, etc..) who could still make an impact. Give it a few more years before deciding.
no t agee,
Vinny B knows more about the draft than YOU do. The extremely hard work he did to put this together tells the story. You don’t need anymore.
He doesn’t seem to know the difference between the draft and international free agency.
Back with the t agee whoever that was. Well, whoever he or she was, baseball knowledge surely eclipsed yours.
As for the post, you seem to prove yourself incapable of reading. I did not disagree with the poster simply that the book isnt complete yet. But you feel the need to attack.
By the way, when someone uses CAPITAL letters such as you do while continually attacking, they shown themselves to be childish and immature. Cyberbullying does not make you an adult.
Well done Vinny B. and I’m glad to see someone without bias has joined MMO. I can see already the flogging you are going to take on this.
One is saying where are your formulas when the link is right there, another saying IFA’s dont count, and the Sand People already calling you useless. Don’t let them get you down.
I appreciate what looks to be hours upon hours of research and in the end it was only to show that Minaya was better than average which is all that most of his defenders have been saying all along.
Also thanks for ranking all 30 teams so that we get an across the board look at Minaya compared to everyone else.
I like that you rated MVP caliber players higher, All Stars a notch below, average starters below that, and fringe players ranked lowest.
It was fair and honest and unfortunately that wont fly with the usual suspects as you can already see. Great job, Vinny!
“Well done Vinny B. and I’m glad to see someone without bias has joined MMO.”
Except I’ve had discussions like this with him, and he already has a predetermined outcome
“One is saying where are your formulas when the link is right there,”
No formulas in the link, I checked both.
“another saying IFA’s dont count”
In a discussion about draftees
“It was fair and honest and unfortunately that wont fly with the usual suspects as you can already see”
People who know how these things actually work?
I should clarify: Vinny B didn’t show formulas, he just assigned random numbers. It assumes Lucas Duda starting in the outfield has the same value as Jason Heyward starting in the outfield.
I think he used site based to determine to give Heyward 4 points and maybe Duda 1.5?
Ya, Heyward’s AS appearance.
But again, random numbers based on a subjective outcome. Why do we give credit to starting guys like Thole and Duda when it is debatable that they are starting caliber players?
Looking it’s Duda 1.5 and Heyward 5.
Still determining these points seems a little subjective? What do you use to determine if a guy is a high end or low end starter? Or guys like Harvey being a high end starter worth 4 points or Kirk being a low end starter at 1.5 or Mejia and V-Spin as backups?
I’d say use their actual production and compare it to league averages and such. Or other comparable players.
True but then you get into PA and all kinds of other junk. To me this is just too difficult of an undertaking.
It certainly is time consuming.
that is why the society for baseball research probably has really powerful computers. And poorly paid interns to do all the grunt work!
The rankings are not subjective.
Duda gets 1.5 points because he’s a projected starter that has never had a single season WAR of 2 or higher. Heyward is 5 points because he is an all star.
Harvey is 4 points because he’s a projected starter that was a former BA top 100 prospect, and his ERA is below league average.
Mejia and Valdespin are not projected to be starters, so they are ranked as backups, which count as 1.5 points.
So in your opinion Niese and Harvey are worth more than Latos?
The rankings do not reflect my opinions.
Yes, they do, whether you admit it or not. The very thing you wrongly accuse proponents of sabermetrics is all over your work here.
LOL, well OK then. I would then say your rankings have some flaws. What stat did you use to determine that Latos wasn’t a high end starter and Niese was?
Latos was a non top 100 prospect and Niese was. Latos was one of the players that kind of fell through the cracks, and players like him are the reason why each team has a three point margin for error.
So, even if you think Latos should be ranked higher, the results will still be the same.
If we are trying to use a single number metric to judge a player, might as well use WAR.
Latos 8.6 WAR in 105 starts, Niese 3.1 in 94 starts
It’s a lot more than just Latos. It’s full of these type issues because it’s not really based that much on actual results.
Latos is just one player out of god knows how many players No matter what method I used, there would always be some players that the rankings wouldn’t work 100% for. However, for the majority of the players, my method works well. These are only minor problems that don’t change the rankings and the overall point.
Again, I think pending what formula you use could completely alter this list. If it works for you so be it. To me it’s way too subjective and not based on actual results enough for my taste. When you start by saying to be in group 3 they have to have been a top 100 prospect and will be disqualified if they have played too much? Why?
I did that because players like Mike Pelfrey would be ranked in that group.
Shouldn’t they be?
No, because that ranking was specifically designed for young players that are at the beginning of their careers, like Niese or Ike, or for players just entering the league like Harvey.
But then how would that actually show how good Omar’s drafts were? Are we judging the entire thing or just the more recent drafts? Pelfrey would and should count just as much as anyone else. He was drafted by the Mets under Omar’s tenure right?
Of course Pelfrey counts. He just doesn’t qualify for that specific group.
Like I said, I will just agree to disagree on the formulas used and how they alter the results. For example, I can’t say that Wheeler is worth only 1.5 less than Madison Bumgarner. Not until Wheeler proves something. Those are two close to each other. Same thing with Latos and Niese as we mentioned earlier. It’s hard to base results on potential.
Cherry-picking a few rankings you disagree with does not make the results and overall point of the article invalid. Especially, when I say in the post to give each team a 3 point margin for error.
You could go ahead and rate Latos, Morrow, and Garza higher than Niese. And you could not count Martinez, Mejia, Quintana, Carrerra for the Mets(which would be totally unfair if you don’t exclude similar players for other teams), and I still could write the same exact article because the Mets would still be above average.
None of what your saying would change the main point of the article.
“Cherry-picking a few rankings you disagree with does not make the results and overall point of the article invalid.”
Except that’s what you do when you dismiss advanced metrics. You dismiss FIP because according to you “it makes Tom Glavine not look as good as he is” (which is wrong a few different ways but whatever).
“Especially, when I say in the post to give each team a 3 point margin for error.”
What exactly does that mean in this context? You’re not working on a percentage like political polls or anything.
“You could go ahead and rate Latos, Morrow, and Garza higher than Niese. And you could not count Martinez, Mejia, Quintana, Carrerra for the Mets(which would be totally unfair if you don’t exclude similar players for other teams), and I still could write the same exact article because the Mets would still be above average.
None of what your saying would change the main point of the article.”
If you can change that many variables and not find a different result, something is very wrong with your process.
What’s cherry-picking a few stats among friends? We seem to ALL do it.
I think I could obviously set out to prove that his drafts were a disaster and do so by changing the formula around.
Vinny – Nice research. I have a few questions but they all stem from 1 first.
If a player is listed on your spreadsheet, does that mean you are rewarding the team with positive points for them?
So for example, Fernando Martinez, Mejia, Quintana, Carrerra – are they all earning the Mets points in your final tally? Because based on the drafted players you list, that is how it appears?
Maybe you should read his work first including that three page document that outlines his ranking system in it’s entirety!!!
Do you agree MVPs, All Stars, Regulars, and bench players should be ranked accordingly?
Guess what, so does Vinny B!
I see the 2nd tab on the spreadsheet now – which brings me to my point
I am sorry but ADDING points even if it’s small because of FMart, Quintana, and Carrera only ruins the research you compiled and adds a significant flaw to your point.
First of all, Quintana didn’t even make his MLB debut with the Mets. The guy was released 1 year after the Mets signed him but he adds 1.5 to the Mets? I mean come on Vinny you’re better than that. What does signing but then releasing Quintana prove in the Mets benefit?
That’s a research flaw, I’m sorry.
I could look through this player list and pick it apart. That’s the point. This is all based on opinion. For example, you list Mat Latos as “average” but Jon Niese as “high end”?
Latos was an 11th rounder to Niese’s 7th rounder
Latos turned 25 this December
41-33 3.41ERA 105GS 598K 630IP 199BB 1.15WHIP – that is average to you
but Niese who turned 26 in October
35-32 4.06ERA 95GS 561IP 470K 172BB 1.36 WHIP – that is high end?
Again for the 100th time, I appreciate your research but your ranking system relies solely on your opinion. Mat Latos has been a better starting pitcher than Jon Niese. So a ranking system that treats him less than Niese to me proves a pro mets bias or miscalculation. I don’t blame you, you see Niese more – but that’s why this is all opinion based
Latos is obviously a high end starter. He also has a top 10 CY young season, I realize the points system only gives credit for top 5 but he’s a damn site more accomplished at this point than Niese. I still like Niese going forward but give Latos his due.
Right. At the end of the day we are all Mets fans and we like our guys more than Cincinnati’s guys… but when you look at some of these rankings it says more about how you view talent rather than how you evaluate a draft
High End:
Niese
Detwiler
Average:
Medlan
Latos
Morrow
Garza
I’m sorry Vinny but… No.
Allen Craig is “average” and Ike Davis is “high end”?
You know if you wanted to try this more objectively, one piece of advice could have been to send the list out to numerous people all with different views and use those rankings.
Maybe attempt a double blind. Find a way to take the names out of the players involved and rank them purely by production.
The rankings weren’t subjective. All players were ranked by a certain set of rules. Of course, the rules don’t work perfectly for every single major league player(that’s why I said to give each team 3 points margin for error), but every team has the same exact advantages and disadvantages.
The players you listed who count as average starters are ranked that way because they never made BA’s top 100 list, And in Morrow’s case, I think he passed the innings cut off to be a high end starter. Remember, the high end starters is only for young players that have all star potential.
“The rankings weren’t subjective.”
Sure they are. The fact that you included things like MVP voting and All Star selections, both of which are subjective, as part of your criteria brings in subjectivity.
Okay, but the point I was making was that each players individual ranking wasn’t my own personal opinion about that specific player.
Well you didn’t seem to have a problem that he counted d’Arnaud for the Phillies despite him never playing a game for them did you?
My 2nd question is, did a team receive negative points if a better player was taken AFTER their guy you list
So for example just to use the Mets
Do you give the Mets positive points for Pelfrey but then negative points because in the same round McCutch, Bruce, Ellsbury, Garza, Buchholz were picked after him?
Or does Pelfrey just net the Mets points and case closed?
In 2006, do the Mets receive negative points because they took Mulvey with their 1st pick and left guys like Cahill, Masterson and Jon Jay on the board to be picked late 2nd round?
I get what you want to do here and again I appreciate the research you and Satish did but judging a draft is not black and white. It just isn’t.
If I wanted to make it black and white, I’d ask “was player X the best guy they could have gotten?”
In truth if you look at: Murphy, Gee, Niese, Parnell, Duda – I’d say the Mets did a pretty good job with their later picks and I’d also argue that the chances Mr. Minaya had anything to do with the actual selection of those kids is slim at best. I can concede the point on early round picks like Harvey, he probably has input on. But an 8th round pick, an MLB GM is unlikely involved at all. That is the Dir of Amateur Scouting’s actual job duty.
sorry but you are going way too far.
You have to draw the line somewhere…
“Do you give the Mets positive points for Pelfrey but then negative points because in the same round McCutch, Bruce, Ellsbury, Garza, Buchholz were picked after him?
Or does Pelfrey just net the Mets points and case closed?
In 2006, do the Mets receive negative points because they took Mulvey with their 1st pick and left guys like Cahill, Masterson and Jon Jay on the board to be picked late 2nd round? ”
See, when it comes to acquiring the talent, I’m less concerned with the specific names than I am the process itself. If you have a good process, you can bomb on a couple of tries, but rebound in the long run.
You can always go back and say we picked Player W when Players X,Y, & Z all had better careers/ advanced faster or whatever.
But, if you can show me that the reasons you picked Player W were at least consistent with your other well thought out actions, then I won’t get too riled up about it.
I look at it this way. After trading for three top 100 prospects the farm system is rated 12 after several seasons in the the twenties. Omar’s farm system was a mess.
Thank God Omar left Sandy a Cy Young and a 6-time All Star. They’d be ranked 30 now if not for Beltran and Dickey.
Pretty close, I would agree with that. You can’t take a bottom dwelling minor league system and cut that in half in 2 years without trades.
Except this article deals with a ranking system as a result of the draft – not FA signings – both of which Beltran and Dickey were.
I think he was saying that the prospects obtained in those trades is what the Mets system is now built on. No doubt about that.
Ah….I get it now.
Are we thanking Joe McDonald for leaving Cashen with Mazzilli, Allen, Brooks etc to get Darling, Hernandez, Carter and HoJo? Are we thanking Steve Phillips for the players Omar used to get LoDuca and Delgado or even Johan? I don’t think so.
Actually no it was not. You are wrong and misinformed or just making that up out of the clear blue sky in order to defend your Messiah. Omar’s farm system is the foundation of this team now and in the future and also what got you Wheeler & d’Arnaud.
So you wrong. I think you intentionally meant to be wrong anyway.
” Omar’s farm system is the foundation of this team now and in the future and also what got you Wheeler & d’Arnaud.”
Beltran and Dickey were free agent signings, so you should revise your statement.
You’re right, I will revise my statement. The 2nd part.
It was players obtained by Omar Minaya that got you Wheeler & d’Arnaud. But Omar’s farm system still is the foundation of this team now and in the future.
Omar’s farms system is the foundation for a mediocre big club. If Wheeler, d’Arnaud, Syndergaard, Mateo, Fulmer, Montero among others aren’t the real deal then Omar’s farm system is going to continue to be the foundation for mediocrity because Ike, Harvey, Niese, Tejada, Murphy and Duda don’t add up to a championship nucleous. Even if Ike and Harvey reach their ceilings.
That’s awful to say. You’re a terrible fan and have no faith in any of our players.
Yes how terrible of me to call a mediocre team, mediocre.
Everybody knows Omar was a FANTASTIC international scout. There might not have been another GM in MLB history better than he was at finding IFAs.
However, if you are going to do a study about the draft you cannot take into consideration players that were not taken in the draft. That’s common sense.
You are misleading your readers…
serious question, but who were the big IFAs he found that you are talking about? earlly on Jose was while he was here (and I know that it has been debated to death who gets credit there!) but beyond that, there is F Mart, Tejada, mejia/Familia that have hit the majors. Anyone else of any note?
How did Omar’s farm system get the Mets Wheeler and TDA?
Wheeler was traded for Beltran….was Beltran a minor league farm hand. No he was a FA signing.
What about the trade for TDA? Are you saying that Nickeas and Thole, both Omar products were the focal pieces of that trade because they are the ones who came up through the farm system.
No, sorry. At this point I will have to quote you….”You are wrong”.
I corrected that statement above, t agee
to be real nit picky, Nickeas was not even an Omar signing. they traded for him.
I changed the title to reflect that this was a piece on the Draft AND IFA signings. I should have made that clear in the title and apologize to Vinny for not doing so and assuming that readers would simply figure it out after reading. I’m responsible for over 50% of the titles on MMO. Vinny’s research included both players accrued in the MLB Draft and those signed from the International arena.
Vinny, sorry and thanks for your exhaustive research in your first of what I hope will be many more great posts for MMO. Welcome to our team.
Thank you for your correction and honesty.
Please also correct the second to last two sentences of the post.
No further complaints here…
“The results provide a clearer picture of how the Mets drafted, and the results debunk some the most common arguments about the Mets’ drafts during Minaya’s tenure.”
How about this one?
yea I have a hard time believing this wasn’t intentionally slanted toward Minaya, but it’s whatever.
I am curious to see how he actually did in his drafts.
If Minaya did create the 10th best farm system overall between 2005-2010, I am curious to see what role IFA’s played in our system.
It would certainly change how I perceive Omar…
Well considering that most agencies that rate farm systems had the Mets consistently at the bottom of the pack, I would say it was much closer to the bottom than the middle or top.
To be fair, Joe, the write up makes it a moving target. Here’s the first sentence:
“Many Mets fans have extremely passionate opinions about how well the Mets drafted during the Omar Minaya era.”
Thanks for the clarification, Joe.
I feel awful for muffing the title on a writer’s debut post. I was up early at 3 AM when I did that and should have been more attentive and I wasn’t.
watching donal and trs desperately trying to argue semantics is like watching 2 lawyers trying to get a mistrial on a case before it starts they know they will lose.
Watching Bay try to make a fair and coherent point is like… well I have no idea considering it’s never happen.
Shouldn’t you be cursing Vinny out and threatening him about how you don’t need numbers to know who are the better players?
I was just thinking the same thing…..
“MY EYES DAMMIT MY EYES!!!!!!”
He even used WAR as a metric!
No, that would only happen if the conclusion had not been favorable to Omar. or of course, you or Jessep had written it.
Interesting effort. Must have taken a lot of time.
I do have a key question (and I appologize, but i can’t get to the links from here).
Are players given points regardless of where they succeed (meaning if the Mets traded a MiL who became a star elsewhere, are the Mets still getting the points earned by that guy?). i would assume so, otherwise the exercise has a major flaw!
Of topic, but here’s something for the guys keeping up with the minor leaguers:
http://www.baseballprospectus.com/article.php?articleid=19694
http://www.baseballprospectus.com/article.php?articleid=19198
Man those are some quick risers. Wheeler from 30 to 5 and Noah from 93 to 28.
Yeap. Jose Fernandez from 80 to 6 was the biggest jump i saw….
“Yeap. Jose Fernandez from 80 to 6 was the biggest jump i saw….”
Go Marlins?
Nope, go marlins scout director and the guy in charge of the draft….
It’s good to know you like BaseballProspectus.
I don’t like it, i saw it and i figure to post it here since i know many people here who are gung ho on minor leaguers will like it… Never cared for minor leaguers because as a long time fan, i’ve seen my share of “Can’t miss prospects” become PO’ss… sPecially for us so..
I see so you don’t agree with their rankings.
74 spots, nice. Noah’s was only 65. What a slob.
Yeah, considering who’s nearest to the bigs is an atonishing accomplishment wouldn’t you say? imagine we could’ve had him, wheeler, AND noah in the top 100 would’ve been even better no?
Sure. Imagine if Omar had drafted McCutchen instead of Pelfrey? Then we wouldn’t need a CF. Right?
I thought you hate reading about prospects and such?
I believe you have referred to it as “loser talk”.
AM i reading? or posting a link that shows the “Top Prospects” in the minors? You cannot be this stupid donal…
Wow, just hanging the curveball right there.
Why bother swinging. He won’t understand the irony.
Oh, forgot to add, this analysis is pretty much a variation on sabermetrics, in terms of trying to quantify various results into a comparable # used to rank teams.
and from reading the comments, it seems that there are now a few more saber fans on MMO!
Still, there is a key point being overlooked, considering this is an Omar defense piece. Quoting from above: “The reasons why the Mets have been struggling are due to factors like disastrous free agent signings, devastating injuries, financial problems, and an overall failure to surround the team with quality players through trades and free agents”
Well, the items there are the vast majority of what the GM really does. drafting is really handled by the draft/scouting directors, with minimal input from the GM (outside of the 1st round picks and overslot guys), though he does hand down a philosophy.
But bad FA signings, bad trades and roster composition, those are the meat and potatos of the GMs job. Injuries are a bit of a byproduct (sign old or damaged guys, more likely to get injuries) as is financial issues (see the FA signings as a contributing factor.
As to the draft/IFA part, there is a decent amount of talent, and right now seem to be a few guys with real upside. But after all these years, no established impact players has to really hold back the ratings. now, if Ike wins MVP and Harvey Cy Young in the next 2 years, then that will change.
Yup, some of the formulas used by Vinny here could be tweaked to take a lot of the issues and bias out and by the time you do that and come up with an actual formula that includes points based on actual production before you know it some are sabergoons.
http://cdn.memegenerator.net/instances/400x/31933220.jpg
I don’t know but I clicked on that and now I think I might get fired…. categorized as adult.
Really!?!
It was just a picture of Will Ferrell in Anchorman with the statement “That Escalated Quickly”.
Oh well. These blockers have a mind of their own. It was a pretty offensive movie.
You and me are going to have problems.
LOL, it had it’s moments but overall… nah.
Ya, its the not the pic itself, but the domain may be registered as something that triggers the net nannies.
In regards to the topic there is not much I can add that I haven’t said already. I just wanted to take this opportunity to welcome you to MMO.
I do have one question. Now that you have reached Olympus which God are you?
I make this recommendation:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bias_(mythology)
LOL, only kidding Vinny. I just got through teaching Greece so it was there, had to do it.
My key criticism on Minaya’s farm system was that he diverted money from the draft to international free agents, who on average, take longer (2 years more usually) to develop than a player acquired via the Rule IV draft.
In 2006-2009 the Mets farm system was not very good because those IFAs were either still in the Dominican or in rookie ball whereas a player taken in the rule 4 draft would be in AA.
I also did not like how he rushed prospects to compensate for these shortcomings, but that’s a story for another day…
I think as I said in another post, it’s just so hard to critique each gm’s drafts because the goals change. For Omar, it was clear the Wilpons were not interested in investing in the draft and after 2006 the Mets went into win now mode drafting guys for need like Smith and Kunz and also giving up top picks to sign older players. Is that Omar’s fault? Not sure.
That is generally try to criticize Minaya’s era more than Minaya himself directly.
There are 3 things I try to remind people of
1) For all the criticism he gets, he did leave the farm in better shape than he found it. A low bar, but still, he improved it.
2) We don’t know how much meddling and internal politics messed with his work.
3) It was his first real GM job. He was a caretaker in Montreal. Maybe he shouldn’t have been cutting his teeth as a GM in NY. perhaps at his next job, he’ll take the hard lessons learned here and help make another franchise a top contender.
err That is generally why I try to criticize
drafting/signing is only half the battle. What you do with them once they are in the system is IMO hugely underrated, and a big part of the Brave’s success.
Agreed.
‘ What you do with them once they are in the system is IMO hugely underrated, and a big part of the Brave’s success.’
This is a very good point.
I don’t hold the IFA thing against him since you have a larger talent pool to select from and you get more bang for your buck. Also, you can do something like that on a year to year basis if you think one draft pool is weak, but that same year’s IFA class looks good.
Hi Vinny,
If you noticed, I steered away from ratings and stats but rather on what we’ve seen produced since statistical methodology is often subjective as opposed to just the rationality you expressed in general and how one should observe more specific results rather than how many superstars others produced, how many early draft picks we traded away, etc. in lieu of the good quantity of dependable players we developed instead and that they have to be supplemented in order for the team to be successful.
“since statistical methodology is often subjective”
How many times must you repeat this lie?
HI Donal,
Your question:
“since statistical methodology is often subjective” How many times must you repeat this lie?
Your answer:
“How are you weighing each category? How much does a guy who starts on a bad team get?
“Also, do you penalize teams for lacking, say quality position players, or having most of the their hitters being 1B/DH types?
“How much focus is on the individual players vs the production of the entire system?”
If not subjective, why even the need to ask those questions?
I don’t think you know what subjective means, which is one of the many reasons I say you shouldn’t be jumping into conversations about statistics. The criteria I listed actually takes human bias out of it and makes it just about the actual productivity of the players in question.
That’s why I said perhaps using actual results on the field as the guideline would help take subjective out. Of course you could still slant it by giving more points to things that would make your group look better. Kinda like what Metsie says about WAR weighing OBP too much.
Hi Donal,
Subjective: a subject’s personal perspective, feelings, beliefs, desires or discovery, as opposed to those made from an independent, objective, point of view
Donal: “The criteria I listed actually takes human bias out of it and makes it just about the actual productivity of the players in question”
– and that is why I steered away from Vinny’s stastical ratings – for exactly the points you raised – and focused more on the points he made regarding Atlanta, superstars, draft pick rounds, etc.
Ya, you focused more on buzzwords and bias than documented facts. Kind of my point.
“Subjective: a subject’s personal perspective, feelings, beliefs, desires or discovery, as opposed to those made from an independent, objective, point of view”
So analysis not using statistics is less biased?
Words are not biased on thier own but how they appear in a sentence and how the author constructed it is where the bias is made…
Stats are merely the same as words that have no bias in most cases (Except where thier construct has a bias) and it is the construct of the equations the stats are used and put through where the Bias is inserted.
The Bias is in the Author not the language!
Doesn’t matter if it’s math or English, the bias shows in how they are used.
So to answer your question NO using stats is no less biased than using any other language.
The Bias starts at the author and the language is just the words used to illustrate any bias he may have.
Hi Connor,
One must understand that statistical analysis is not an absolute science. Rather, it is the interpretation of collected data and thus in itself has to be considered subjective.
The reaction to Vinny’s appraisal proves that very point. Look at all the questions of discrepancy regarding the methodology used to come to such conclusions from those who subscribe to such statistical analysis. (Vinny, not passing judgement, just explaining my perspective).
I thought, however, that Vinny’s reasoning – like the points he made about the quality of the picks rather than the how high the draft selections, that one must not just look at the creme of the crop players produced by a system but also the overall number of quality major leaguers that came up through it as well and also not to compare other teams to Atlanta given that organization is the top echelon of all organizations.
Any debate – especially about baseball – will always be subjective. That is why the question “who was better, Mantle or Mays in their prime?” can never be answered. That is why I felt it necessary to point that out about statistical analysis as well for that part of the “equation” is often lost on those who support it so strongly.
Nice job Vinny. Agree with TRS that time will tel ultimately how well this went form 2005 – 2010 but nonetheless this is helpful. No surprise that the Braves, Giants, Red Sox, Yanks and Cards are in the top 10 of your adj ranking. They do it in different ways but they are 5 of the best run organizations in baseball.
What is interesting as well is how low the A’s are which really shows how successful Beane has been at making good trades to keep his system stocked. He cetainly has few peers there.
Also, i thought Omar did some very astute trades (Delgado, LoDuca, Maine, O. Perez, Sanchez) in the first half of his tenure but lost that magic on the back end.
Lotta stress at that back end with little resources left to work with.
Any issues that anyone had with viewing the data and such should be directed to me, and I’m very sorry to you Vinny, for having to deal with an error on my part tainting the effectiveness of your piece.
So again, I’m sorry to Vinny and everyone who was unable to access the guidelines and spreadsheet.
And Joe might have bit the bullet on the title, but I let that slide, so that is also my fault.
Sorry.
I could access them just fine.
Just out of curiosity sake I took the 18 players Vinnie listed for the Mets and totaled their WAR and it was 34.7. The next team down in his list was the Tigers 23 players (2 have no MLB playing time yet) and they have a collective WAR of 39.3.
Tigers Mets
Cameron Maybin 8.4 Mike Pelfrey 5.4
Matt Joyce 7.5 Jon Niese 3.1
Casper Wells 4.1 Josh Thole 1.1
Burke Badenhop 2.2 Bobby Parnell 0.7
Clete Thomas 1.1 Daniel Murphy 6.7
Will Rhymes 0.2 Joe Smith 5
Brennan Boesch 1.5 Dillon Gee 2
Casey Fien 0.6 Lucas Duda -0.9
Scott Sizemore 0.5 Ike Davis 5
Andrew Miller -2.8 Kirk Nieuwenhuis 0
Duane Below 0.1 Matt Harvey 1.6
Rick Porcello 3.5 Josh Edgin -0.1
Charlie Furbrush -0.1 Ruben Tejada 3.3
Danny Worth -0.4 Jenry Mejia -0.1
Alex Avila 7.5 Jordanny Valdespin -0.3
Andy Dirks 2.7 Fernando Martinez -0.7
Ryan Perry 0.1 Jose Quintana 2.2
Drew Smyly 1.5 Ezequiel Carrera 0.7
Rob Brantly 0.6 34.7
Brayan Villarreal 0.8
Avisail Garcia -0.3
Nick Castellanos 0
Bruce Rondon 0
39.3
For sure shows the high end issue with Omar’s draft.
The reason why I avoided using WAR like that is because players who played in more games will have a higher WAR than other players simply because they have played in more games.
So, for example, Casper Wells has a 4.1 WAR while Harvey has a 1.6.
I think when you look at my rankings, it’s more accurate. Harvey is 4 points and Wells is 0.5. Everyone could nit pick over a few points in my rankings, but for the majority of players it works well, like in the case of Harvey and Wells.
Well you could divide their WAR by service time and get it down to an average. But again, until Harvey produces how do you give him credit? I think he’s a stud and will be a high end pitcher but for right now, it’s just predictions. That would be giving more credit to teams for current prospects and taking away points for guys like Pelfrey as you mentioned who certainly had a lot of fan fare when he came up as well.
Harvey’s real value right now is very high. If the Mets were to trade him, they would get great value back. His ranking accurately reflects his real value.
While I agree his trade value is really high, I just disagree on this formula completely. Lets just leave it at that. While obviously I appreciate the hard work, just not for me. Guess I should have just said that in the beginning, instead of evidently insulting your manhood. LOL. Good debate though.
No his rankings reflect your judgement, they’re not based on any data. If they actually reflected his real value you would have found multiple examples and tracked their average value over the years. From that you would get a usable, provable formula. That’s not what you did.
There is no such thing as a proven and perfect formula. That’s a myth.
I didn’t agree with Vinny’s criteria after reading it, but the truth is that any criteria that would have produced the same results would have been met with the same criticism.
Because it’s not about the criteria, it’s about the person who did the heavy lifting and people’s preconceived notions about him.
It’s not about the criteria, it’s about the prejudices of two groups that will hate the fruits of the other no matter how fair and objective it is.
I learned that today.
This myth about a better way of doing this, and the perfect stat or metric is pure fallacy.
This is about two groups whose prejudices are exceeded only by their quest to prove the other wrong regardless of fairness or perfection.
If their is such a thing as perfection, maybe we’ll find it in the afterlife, but certainly not on a battlefield between General Ulysses S. Alderson and General Robert E. Minaya.
The hatred runs deep and it’s often mistaken for intellect.
The smart ones know better.
Joe I can’t speak for others but I supported Omar until the last few months. This has nothing to do with Sandy vs Omar to me. It was about a very flawed formula that I think may have been skewed either intentionally or unintentionally in order to produce preconceived notions. The end.
If anybody could come up with a better way to rank them, I’m willing to listen. Like I said many times already, I understand it’s not perfect, but it would be impossible to rank all the hundreds of players drafted(or signed) perfectly.
I felt this was the best way to rank them. Until someone could come up with a better way to rank them, I fully stand by the rankings.
And TRS, how could you suggest the rankings are biased when you have no proof whatsoever that is biased? You could disagree with the rankings, and that’s fine, but that’s not proof that the rankings are biased.
By the way, Harvey’s ranking does include data.
Vinny, I have said my piece and I will close with you did a lot of research on a fine opinion piece.
Provided the guidelines used are used accross the board the only thing you can complain about as far as bias is in those guidelines….and if thats the case then I suggest where Vinny’ds Guidelines gave extra points to anyone wearing a Met Uni….
If you have a problem with Vinny’s Research you are free to do your own any method you want and submit it as a fan post…
Since you didn’t do that you really have no right to question his research.
That’s what I figured and I appreciate all the effort is took to get this information. Just to get the collective WAR’s for the guys on two teams was painstaking.
I was just more curious from a single number perspective (that I don’t necessarily like) to see what the current production has been so far. I think Harvey has the chance to be a great pick by Omar, and he raved about the pick since day one and if I remember correctly people thought Harvey was picked a little too high?
And to all the craziness that transpired here, I know we don’t see eye-to-eye at all, but I hope that you don’t feel me posting this stuff was out of disrespect to your work.
Perhaps you should reconsider who qualifies for your list then. Unless you feel it necessary to weigh projection that heavily against production.
Vinny the people who use WAR dont even understand it’s conception.
You are right Vinny, Oliver Perez had a higher WAR than Matt Harvey last season. What does that tell you?
Let’s trade Harvey for Perez to improve the team because WAR says he’s better?
The rankings had to include projection because otherwise players like A Rizzo, Desmond Jennings, Matt Moore, Wilin Rosario, Will Middlebrooks, Bret Lawrie, A Simmons, Starling Marte, Jarrod Parker, Y Alonso, and Eric Hosmer, would be severely undervalued since they haven’t had a ton of playing time to accumulate a lot of statistics.
It would be foolish not to take into account that those players have high ceilings, and are extremely valuable to their organizations.
I’m disappointed at how a few readers have reacted to a post that was merely the opinion of Satish and Vinny. And I stress the word “few”. I’m saddened that it seems the outcome is what bothers everyone the most. That for some odd reason they wanted the outcome to reflect the Mets in a much worse light than this particular outcome did.
Everyone uses and develops different grading systems and I welcome you to create what you deem to be your own perfect grading system. Baseball Reference and Fangraphs can’t even agree on a perfect grading metric.
This is an opinion piece. You don’t have to like that the Mets ranked as high as they did. You don’t have to like this particular point system. You don’t even have to like the two people responsible for writing the piece and compiling three weeks of work that went into this. But for crying out loud, is a little respect too much to ask for?
Would you like me to delete this post and abolish it from the internet for all eternity? Is that what I should do? Will that make all of you happy and stop this nonsense going on here?
Or shall we have another writer develop a system that shows the Mets were the worst ranked team in baseball from 2005 to 2010 and post it in the next two hours? Will that soothe your nerves and calm the waters?
I can easily do either of those two things. I like to give our readers what they want. Tell me what you want.
Finally and sadly, what a terrible way to greet a fellow die-hard Met fan whose passion for the team led him to ask to write for MMO. I think that’s the worst part in all of this.
For 14 straight days we were on a mission at MMO to pump out 21 different positive pieces on the Mets. Hopeful pieces. Optimistic pieces. Historical pieces with retelling of the glory days. And we still have 12 more to come this week already scheduled for posting.
have you seen the comment counts on those pieces? Absolutely no level of interest at all and it’s very telling.
Can’t speak for anyone else but I read all articles published here and enjoy what each brings to the table.
Maybe it’s b/c I’m a fan for over 40 years but I enjoy the ‘trips down memory lane’ as much as the debates an article such as this one brings.
I wouldn’t change a thing.
Whoaa. Critiquing a post or it’s method is far from having a poor reaction. Debating methods used and calculations used are the only way that the methods could be improved.
I also have an issue with how this is labeled an opinion piece when you make comments at the end saying that results backup the premise.
No one said that Vinny should be burned in efigy or that the post was garbage. Just debating the premise and stats used to determine the premise.
There’s no stat that can honestly show that the Mets drafts during that time were good. We all know that they were not. Were they as bad as they were ranked? Most likely not.
The results were his and the premise was his, and this was not an official accounting, only his results based on his criteria. Of course this is an opinion piece. No different than the countless posts like this that appear on baseball prospectus or Fangraphs daily. Using any metrics you want to back any position you want is not new, not unique, and always an opinion piece. Every writer on any site using stats to state an argument or position is always writing an opinion piece no matter what statistics or criteria is used. I can write a post that reads “5 Stats That Prove Justin Upton is Terrible”, and another one that reads, “5 Stats That Prove Justin Upton is a Star.” Both can be viewed as right, and both can be viewed as wrong, but both are opinion pieces regardless of statistical data to prove either side.
Read above, I should have just said I disagree with the formula used and the premise determined on those formulas and been done I guess. To me challenging this formulas might even challenge Vinny to come up with better formulas taking everyone’s input into account. Not make him want to jump off a bridge.
I have no complaints about the subjectiveness of the rating system. My sole complaint is that the premise of the article was to show that Omar did a good job drafting players from 2005-2010.
The article was intended to show that the negative perceptions of Omar’s drafts were incorrect by incorporating players that were not drafted.
If you are going to analyze Omar’s drafts then you can’t introduce factors that are completely irrelevant in order to skew the results in your favor…
“Complaints” is a subjective word as well. Personally I am not a big fan of the ranking system and certainly I do not believe that it answers the question of
“The players drafted from 2005-2010 are not part of the problem, but they are part of the solution. The results back this up”
Especially considering some of the players the Mets get credit for aren’t even here anymore. How can they be part of the solution, like Fmart, if the team released them?
the point of the article, to me, is he is trying to judge the players Omar selected vs. the players the other 29 teams selected during that time frame.
I don’t see any relevance to the current state of the team. To me, it’s a just a piece trying to show that Omar was better than he is perceived…
I don’t know. I thought it was just to show that but then you read lines like that last one and it makes it look like it is saying they are part of the solution and results back it up.
It was meant to show IFA’s from thr beginning. I’m sorry about the earlier confusion.
“That for some odd reason they wanted the outcome to reflect the Mets in a much worse light than this particular outcome did.”
That is not true at all. There are legitimate criticisms of Vinny’s methodology.
“That for some odd reason they wanted the outcome to reflect the Mets in a much worse light than this particular outcome did.”
Or an accurate light. whichever works.
“This is an opinion piece.”
Kind of stretching the definition of the word “opinion” there. He was trying to prove Minaya’s drafts (or not drafts, can’t really seem to nail that down) were better than most assumed. He wanted to use an analytical method.
” But for crying out loud, is a little respect too much to ask for?”
Where are these cries when other people get attacked for fact based posts? And pointing out flaws in the methodology is not disrespect. Its part of the review process.
You think this is bad? Go on sites like Fangraphs when a new stat is proposed (or an old one is discussed) and see how the hardcore stat guys take it apart.
“Would you like me to delete this post and abolish it from the internet for all eternity?”
Where did that come from? No one has said anything like that.
“Will that make all of you happy and stop this nonsense going on here?
Or shall we have another writer develop a system that shows the Mets were the worst ranked team in baseball from 2005 to 2010 and post it in the next two hours? Will that soothe your nerves and calm the waters?”
No. How about something novel: we don’t try to prove anything. No predetermined outcome. Instead of saying “Were Minaya’s drafts good/bad?” you say something like “How do Minaya’s drafts compare to other teams of that era?” or something.
“Finally and sadly, what a terrible way to greet a fellow die-hard Met fan whose passion for the team led him to ask to write for MMO. I think that’s the worst part in all of this.”
You really want to compare this to the reception and comments other writers get?
No one has attacked him personally. No one called him a child too young to understand, or a moron, or said he has no baseball sense. His methodology was criticized.
Are we not allowed to point out when a writer is factually wrong? If someone were to write about how David Wright is the greatest center fielder the Mets ever had, would we be wrong to point out his error?
“For 14 straight days we were on a mission at MMO to pump out 21 different positive pieces on the Mets. Hopeful pieces. Optimistic pieces. Historical pieces with retelling of the glory days. And we still have 12 more to come this week already scheduled for posting. ”
And it was all “bombs away” with the negativity before that. Facts be damned.
“have you seen the comment counts on those pieces? Absolutely no level of interest at all and it’s very telling.”
So is this rant.
Wait, I missed that. Are we judging quality of articles based on comment counts? If so then this one is going to be incredible!
The comment count thing has been mentioned before. If it is me and you and 3 or 4 of the same people going over the some thing over and over again, is that something to get excited about?
“For 14 straight days we were on a mission at MMO to pump out 21 different positive pieces on the Mets. Hopeful pieces. Optimistic pieces. Historical pieces with retelling of the glory days. And we still have 12 more to come this week already scheduled for posting.
have you seen the comment counts on those pieces? Absolutely no level of interest at all and it’s very telling.”
I have noticed this and felt it was nice to see but I couldn’t bring myself to read half of them. My anger and frustration is so high, that all I can muster is some sarcastic comment and I refrained from posting it, so I down bring down the others that have a way better attitude than me right now.
I get that completely. I’m not trying to breed negativity with the slew of positive articles, so I was keeping quieter.
Salty, I’m so surprised about how often I agree with you this entire winter. And you know what, I think I might have commented once or twice on those posts and they didn’t go unnoticed by me. Actually I’m glad to have read them. But I’m too angry and upset to be jolly right now.
Call me insane or crazy, call me a maniac (lol), but with just two above average outfielders, one being a leadoff type, the other a righthanded power bat, I think we’re in the Wild Card race till the end in 2013.
But instead the white flag will be waving earlier than the last three seasons. Before we lasted to the break. This time I say we’re out of it by late May.
I think I may have totally misjudged you when you first started commenting here, and you really are fair most of the times or at least attempt to be. Sorry if I ever gave you any shit in the past.
….
Hahaha please don’t ever apologize to me. If I was getting shlt it’s because I deserve it. I do try to be very open minded and fair, but I also love being a complete a-hole. So as a result my normal comments usually get looked over because I’m having fun aggravating someone.
We agree a lot more this off-season and I thinks it’s due to the crud that is placed on the field. IF/when this team gets good I am sure we will be on differing sides again.
Pretty much everything that is written here that isn’t a box score is an opinion including the comments. And those of us who don’t think Alderson is one part devil and the other part satan and that the current team is the worst baseball team ever assembled or that we aren’t building a solid foundation for the future are routinely attacked, insulted and belittled for our opinions. Not disagreed with, insulted which I was informed was against blog policy.
I didn’t see any responses to this piece that came close to the usual garbage some of us have to put up with for voicing a simple opinion.
Or what Jessep or Lerner have to deal with in pieces that are labeled opinion pieces.
HI Boomer,
“Not disagreed with, insulted which I was informed was against blog policy.”
- That’s why I use the example of you and I often to show the way it should be done.
Man, I feel bad.
it’s ok to criticize the system used, but I just want to say that I honestly feel the idea thst Vinny was biased in making these towards the Mets is off-base. The reason the guidelines seemed so confusing was because they were revised when we found ourselves in grey areas. The irony in this is that after numerous adjustments, Mets players actually lost points because we originally adressed issues that applied to other players.
Again, the criticism is fine and completely understandable. But if you’re going to accuse him of bias, I supposed I’m biased too. But I would hope you all can take my opinion at face value.
Perseus, to me this reminds me more of like a science project where you take your hypothesis and test it out and then if wrong you bend the results to make yourself right. Does that mean that you are biased? We all are. But to think that Vinny went into this project with no idea or opinion on if Omar’s drafts were as bad as people say they are? Of course he had an opinion on that.
But it was actually the opposite like Perseus pointed out. The adjustments I made actually made the Mets come out lower.
Vinny, that’s not the point. Of course you went in thinking I am going to do this research and prove that Omar’s drafts weren’t as bad as people think. I don’t think for a minute you thought, “hmm I wonder if Omar’s drafts were as bad as people think”. Again, it’s a good idea, I just think the formulas are way off and could be adjusted quite a bit to actually show what I think you are trying to show.
No, it is the point. Your suggesting that I purposely adjusted the rankings to the Mets favor, while that couldn’t ‘be further from the truth.
I brought down the points on the low end starters, which hurt the Mets because they had many of these players. I also brought down the relief pitcher rankings, which also hurt the Mets. I made also made a rule that if a high starter was let go by their original team, they would drop down to 3 or 1.5 points. This made the Mets lose 3.5 points because otherwise, fmart would have been a high starter.
I also included prospects, even though the Mets had no prospects on the list.
After all the time I put into making these rankings as accurate as possible, it’s frustrating to see that people are claiming it’s biased when they have no proof whatsoever that it is biased.
Think as you may. If I wrote an article that said that Sandys drafts were in the top ten the last two years and the formula I used showed that, what would the response be?
Well, no. You shouldn’t hold it against this post just because others would attack you for writing one with different results
Going tit for tat isn’t going to elevate the conversation. Even if Vinny himself made personal attacks on you in the post you proposed, you should still criticize this one on its merits.
My point is still that to me it was much more of a can I prove this hypothesis post than an actual scientific attempt.
Hey TRS,
I do believe that Omar’s drafting and IFA work was better than it tends to be perceived today. Denying that would be futile on my part. But if we classify that as a hypothesis and the results showed that, it doesn’t mean we skewered the results at all. Now, when you criticize the process we used to get those results, I will listen – but I don’t like that people are saying the process was biased. You can argue flaws in the methodology but…yeah, I’m just saying the biased claims struck me the wrong way.
Perseus, to me it’s way too subjective and has a lot of flaws. To each his own. Didn’t really mean to offend the hard work you put in. I just think it gives the impression that you went looking for something and found it.
Hey Perseus, are you also cuddling with Joey D. and Alex at night?
You demigods are all alike. Why don’t you do us all a favor and tell your father Zeus to shoot a lightning bolt up Donal’s ass?
Lmao, maniac, i am not a demigod, only people who write for the site and exhange emails are consider immortals.
It’s times like this I wish we were in the drunk tank. Oh the stories we would tell. lol
Lmao, yes… But even that jesseP managed to destroy…. AMazing!
Completely off topic. Would Duda be a quick fix type guy for the Yankees? He is LH and can stand in LF so he’s got that going for him.
He’d probably make good in that t-ball field.
Hi Vinny,
For what it’s worth, I think you did a fine job raising some very under-appreciated points and even if one disagrees with you (and me) what you’ve been subjected to by many is uncalled for and unwelcome and I hope you just know that it doesn’t represent all of us who subscribe to MMO no matter which side of the fence we are at.
As you saw, I took some heat too. Please don’t let it discourage you from future contributions. Though I haven’t contributed articles the vugalarity of some discouraged me enough to stay away for about a month last summer. But most who participate in Joe D’s website are not like what you’ve experienced today.
What has he been subjected to? Criticism?
Must be worse than what the guys he cuddles up to hurl at people. I never notice him making statements like this supporting say, Connor.
I am still trying to figure out where I insulted him.
Well, think about how much of a dushhhbag you are and then that should answer your question….
There you go 86. Alex just supplied a perfect example of an insulting post that violates the terms of using the site.
Now just go find where you did this, and you shall have your answer.
Alex, why didn’t you ever tell me that you and Joey D. like to cuddle together? Some friend you turned out to be. I can’t believe I had to learn this from Donal and not from you. LOL
Maniac, this is news to me…. I hope joe d sees this and address it. Being offensive like that has no place in a baseball blog…. Utterly disrespectful…
He sees what he wants to see, and we all know who he defends and lies for the most. Oops, sorry, slip of the tongue.
You mean like ridding Sandy while holding my Wright blow up doll? Or being a dushbag as your high vocabulary adequately portrayed it?
“Must be worse than what the guys he cuddles up to hurl at people. I never notice him making statements like this supporting say, Connor.”
Donal, do you mean nothing like this, the last direct reply I made to Connor back on December 2nd? I’m sure after reading this Vinny B. will appreciate more of about what Joe D., myself and others have been trying to say.
Hi Connor,
Always appreciate the detailed research you put into your writings and enjoy reading them. And as before, I am not saying this to embarrass you but for one your age, you are way ahead of the curve in skill and a mature approach than many others much older than you are. So even though I disagree with you about the way you look at David’s contract, know that it is with respect and not in the manner in which Joe D. has often had to address.
As I wrote before,contracts are business deals in which lucrative offers are made with the understanding by the owners that they most likely would create more in profit for them in return. The contract agreement is about the business aspect of baseball and how it will yield a healthy return of an investment and nothing more.
Players, of course, are initially pursued by clubs that could afford them based on how they could help the team in victories and, in the case of some, the extra drawing power and increased television ratings having that marquee name could yield. But never is the FINAL AGREED UPON CONTRACT FIGURE AND LENGTH based based upon WAR. That is for the fantasy leaguers. The final contract offer is based on what the player can – or cannot – command in the open market and how much a club can afford to spend.
And the bottom line is when a team pursues a certain player, the owner isn’t interested in what his WAR stats show, he or she is going to ask to be told in plain English how much is the agent asking for, what they think they can they hardball the figure down to and if the agent would be amiable to a certain type of salary structure and/or bonus incentives, etc. – and if there are others that would cost less that could help the team just as well (which is basic economics and not a new revelation ushered in with money ball). And often, he or she would just say get him at almost any price for there is potentially more money to be made with a marquee player.
The Yankees deciding it was worth it for them to sign Andy Pettite for $12 million was ridiculous in itself but reflects the reality that certain owners look less at the roster budget ramifications in the overall scope of operating expenses than others.
And as we know, franchises without those same type resources can be quite successful with less expensive quality players (rather than top echelon ones) that blend well together as a unit and thus are less costly overall. That still has little to do with WAR as it is baseball people using their instinctive skills in evaluating the intangible talent one can bring which cannot be seen on a chart.
Then there is simply the case of the David Wrights and the R.A. Dickeys – players who have become symbolic icons for their clubs with the fans. Even if their value to the team regarding their performances by most of the fan base is overblown (thus the argument for many that the Mets would be actually better off trading David), owners also know what the effect of that illusion means not so much in wins or losses but in the box office.
No, I don’t mean a back handed compliment and an attempt to invalidate his argument by using his age.
Joey, I may be wrong, but I think Donal just accused of having a gay Menage a Trois with Bayonne and Alex.
LOL
But Donal never insults people right?
DaFuq????
LOL Alex, seriously, isn’t this thread worth the price of admission? Have you ever seen so many Sand People soil their pants at this high level before? Can you hear all the squishing? Somebody wrote a post saying the Mets didn’t suck so bad and look at what happened. Hilarious. Haters gotta hate.
Well what happens now when a poster writes something about the Mets not sucking so bad? A lot worse than what went on here. I don’t see anyone calling Vinny any middle school rhetoric to make themselves look cool.
Somebody wrote a post saying the Mets didn’t suck so bad and look at what happened.”
well, the theme is, the mets players minaya brought in doesn’t suck as expected and the sandy lovers, apologists and sabergooners are in full hating mode….
Really I thought that was you. You know when you said that Davis and Harvey had been surrounded by crap. Well evidently you think all these Omar players are crap.
Well, not all are crap as all you sandy lovers portrait them to be…. the whole sandy inherited a bad farm system…. BS.
Which is it? Did he surround them with crap or did Omar leave him with a full cupboard? Or is it a little bit of both, which for some reason isn’t allowed.
HI Maniac,
By stating something that is not factual one eventually gets caught in his or her own words and thus the insult becomes reflective of the accuser, not the accussed.
Would the Orioles get penalized for going two decades without ever drafting a major league shortstop?
I can see both sides here. sort of. It definitely seemed too quantitative to be a real opinion peice, and for sure, once you start building a case based on a formula, you better be prepared to defend the methodology and assumptions! Heck, plenty of people rail all over WAR because they think it was subjective and just trying to “prove” OBP is the key to the universe, even though that had thousands of hours of heavy duty statistal analysis to fall back on.
but I did not really see any problems with how posters debated with Vinny or Satish. Seemed to make valid points, in a relatively respectful way.
all they really seemed to be doing here was stating an opinion, and doing a lot more legwork to try and come up with something to support it. I even pretty much agree with the overall premise, though I do have some quibbles with how things are weighted.
Vinny –I respect the time and effort you put into this, but I have to say, this is one of the worst systems I have ever seen for ranking drafts and players.
In brief, it’s full of arbitrarily established and convoluted criteria that don’t make sense, and it required a lot of subjective opinion in placing players into certain categories. It appears you set out to devise a methodology that would cover up Omar’s faults in drafting while actually penalizing those GMs who used the draft as a strength. It greatly distorts the value some teams’ farm systems have produced on the major league level. Where do I start?
1) Giving players credit for appearing on a top prospect list – these rankings are based on opinions and mean nothing in the final analysis. What makes it worse — and which appears to favor Omar — is that you made no distinction between a player ranked #100 and #26, giving both the same number of points.
2) Giving points to players based on a projection to start! What? Some players are projected to start primarily because the team has holes and there are no better options, not because of anything noteworthy they’ve achieved! And some of the reasons for a team having no better options is just having gone through 2 years of Madoff-induced financial crisis! Duda comes to mind here.
3) Giving BAD players points — Because of 1 and 2 above, you end up giving Mets players who have a NEGATIVE WAR credit! These players up to now have actually produced below replacement level and you are inserting them as feathers in Omar’s cap! These players are F-Mart, Duda, and Mejia. They may produce in the future, but up to now they’ve essentially done NOTHING of value on the major league level.
4) To continue this point, you’re giving 4 points to Parnell because he’s projected to be a closer or main setup guy when up to now he accumulated just a 0.7 WAR in 5 years in the majors, over 256 innings! FIVE years! You’re giving him the same number of points as Kimbrel (for this points category) who has accumulated 6.2 WAR in just 3 years and 160 innings! SMH
5) Giving players credit for appearing in an all-star game. All-star selections are fan-based and often the manager has stacked his team with his own players.
6) Your adjusted ranking is totally whack! You penalize GMs like Theo and Cashman who were smart enough to procure extra draft picks as part of their strategy, while you put a band aid on one of Omar’s major weakness – his tendency to lose early round picks without getting them back by acquiring players he could offer arb to before they left. Wow.
Before anyone says I’m biased, leaving out points for all-star appearances would appear to benefit the Mets, because none of the Mets players used in Vinny’s method have appeared in an all-star game. I just don’t know why that criteria is in there if you are trying to get an accurate reading on a player’s value (as opposed to his popularity). Not saying all-stars don’t deserve to be on the team – just that it’s not a very accurate or adequate way to determine value.
I know some are going to say I’m just a Sandy lover, but honestly, if you had this methodology reviewed by a group of neutral baseball fans (non-Mets fans), in what would amount to a peer review, I am pretty sure they’d shred it to pieces.
1) The Mets don’t have any players in the top 100 prospects, so how could that in any favor the Mets?
2) Anytime you draft a player that is a starting player, the team should get some credit. The majority of players who are drafted never even make the majors, so it would be unfair to not give the team credit for drafting a major league starter. I don’t think you realize how few draft picks even make the majors, let alone be a starting player. And guys who are poor starters like Duda for example, only get 1.5 points anyway, so they make little impact, as they should.
4) Craig Kimbrel has 8 points, and Parnell only has 2.5. They aren’t rated the same. Parnell had a 2.49 ERA, 1.23 WHIP in almost 70 innings last year – How is giving him 2.5 points unfair?
5) Could you give examples of players that made the all star team that weren’t deserving in this post? Even if there are a few ones, it won’t make a significant impact on anything because the majority of all stars truly are deserving.
6) I really don’t see the issue here. Obviously teams who have more picks will have a better chance at drafting better players. And conversely teams who have no picks will have a less of chance at drafting better players. Why is it wrong to account for that. Also, the Yankees and Red sox’s did not lose any points in the adjusted rankings – In fact, the Yankees gained points.
I guess I’m not getting how you applied your formula then. Can you break down for just the Mets players, how many points you allocated each player and for what?
It’s on the spreadsheet link.
I don’t see a link that gives greater detail. Where?
He gives the point values for the outcomes in the guide and on the second page of the spread sheet, he has the individual players’ point totals.
Nevermind. I see it now.
Also, what did you mean when you said teams “will lose 2 points for every extra pick overall?” Explain that.
So, if a team has more than one 1st round pick, they lose 2 points. If they have 3 1st round picks, they will lose 4 points.
Ya, but should they?
No, they shouldn’t be penalized. And teams that have no picks shouldn’t be rewarded either. Many GMs make it a part of their strategy to optimize the number of early round picks. Omar’s failure to do so was his own failing. And Vinny’s “adjusted” ranking tries to make up for that failing.
Ya, it feels like a system that supposedly is for measuring the effectiveness of a team’s drafting is penalizing a team for putting extra value on the draft.
The Red Sox had 5 first round picks in 2005. Did you deduct points from them that year?
Also, you said “overall” … so is that by round? Or really “overall.” So if a team had 2 picks for the 2nd round, did you also deduct points?
Vinny –
1) OK, I misunderstood how you were applying points. I thought that you were applying points for a player for any category they fell into. The fact that you are not, and just chose the category you wanted to, begs the question why? Why wouldn’t Kimbrel then get points for being a closer and making the all-star team, plus placing in the MVP vote?
2) To call Duda a starter is a stretch at this point. He is only a starter by necessity. Various teams have various resources to spend, so players are only used on some teams as starters because there is no better option. I would say that’s the case with Duda.
4) See #1. Plus, even though Parnell had good numbers last year, his overall major league record is not good. He’s been overall a below-replacement level player.
5) If you list every player you gave points to for being an all-star selection, I’ll go through the list. But the point is, I would never use something as arbitrary as an all-star selection for any rating system.
6) I asked in another comment, but I am trying to understand how you allocated and deducted points for the draft system. So before I address this further, how did you adjust for Boston in the 2005 draft??
Very nice work. While one may debate the exact formulars used, it´s certainly nice to get a fair & complete assessment on a level field for all 30 teams.
A few points:
# 1
It does show that Omar & Co. didn´t do such a bad job procuring young talent as some experts claimed back in 2009 or 2010.
Baseball America generally rated the Mets farm system in the bottom half of systems – with the lone exception of a # 13 ranking in 2007 when Pelfrey – F-Mart – Gomez – Humber -Guerra were all considered top 100 prospects, though Gomez & Humber were inherited from the previous administration.
So, overall, especially considering that the Mets only had two top 10 overall June picks in six drafts during the Minaya era (Pelfrey & Harvey), the Mets got a pretty good return and basically had an underrated for most of that era, in retrospect.
# 2
Of course, one thing working in favor of the Mets´ system from 2005 to 2010 as of today is the heavy reliance on college draftees and almost ignoring the HS ranks for most of that time. Jon Niese being the lone HS pick from the Minaya era that has experience any sort of success in the majors.
If you do this study 3 years from now, odds are that the Mets system will regress instead of improve – even if Matt Harvey, Jon Niese and Ike Davis keep contributing in a big way.
Right now, HS picks from the 2009 or 2010 drafts are barely 21 or 22 years old and often haven´t reached the majors yet.
Right now, the “Top 100 prospect lists” are littered with HS draft picks from the 2009 and 2010 drafts. Names such as James Taillon (PIT), Christian Yelich (FLA), Kaleb Cowart (LAA), Aaron Sanchez (TOR), Noah Syndergaard (TOR), Taijun Walker (SEA) or Nick Castellanos (DET) are all consensus Top 50 overall type prospects for example that were drafted in 2010. Mike Olt (TEX) was a 2010 college pick.
Likewise, Zack Wheeler (SF), Shelby Miller (STL), Tyler Skaggs (LAA), Billy Hamilton (CIN) or Wil Myers (KC) were all HS picks from the June 2009 draft class.
Highly touted IFA from that era include Jurickson Profar (Tex, 2009), Oscar Taveras (STL, 2008), Miguel Sano (MIN-2007) or Gary Sanchez (NYY, 2009) among several others.
Meanwhile, no Mets procured from 2005 to 2010 is currently considered a top 50 overall or even top 100 overall prospect. Now, I do think that Wilmer Flores and Domingo Tapia are somewhat underrated and both could fit at the back end of a Top 100 right now. And there´s certainly some hope for Vincente Lupo, Hansel Robles, Jeurys Familia or Jennry Mejia to have success going forward. But without any sort of frontline prospect left from that period, other organizations will probably catch up in those “standings” over the next several years since more of their premium horses remain in the race. Still, at worst, I see the Mets ending up middle of the pack when all is said and done. Which is certainly better than “worst system in Baseball” as some folks tried to point out a couple of years ago, the chorus being led by Adam Rubin…
To be honest making up a point system to grade farms systems isn’t any better than using WAR which I agreed with Vinny wasn’t the best way to judge players that each system produced either. I think you tried to be fair but I also don’t belive it is totally fair.
I also don’t believe it’s fair to say because they didn’t have a chance to draft early in the 1st round that they didn’t have a chance to draft an elite player. Players like McCutchen, Bruce, Ellsbury, Buchholz, Freeman, Stanton, Jordan Zimmerman to name a few were there for the taking in the first 2 rounds so it’s not exactly like finding a needle in a haystack.
Also giving a team 2 poinst for not having a 1st round pick. I don’t think a team should be rewarded for giving up a pick to sign a Type A free agent. Especially those teams like the Mets who don’t get those picks back IE Billy Wagner.
To me the players drafted and signed during this period 2005-2010 still result in a mediocre farm system as we speak now. There’s still a chance it becomes above average if Harvey is who we think he will be and Ike shows to be more than a feast or famine hitter. Niese is still the best player production wise to come out of Omar’s tenure.
I’ll say the same thing I said when you wrote that piece last year defending Minaya’a farm system. Omar left some useful pieces mostly servicable MLB talent AKA complimentary pieces. He didn’t leave many impact players yet to speak of and you can’t count Ike and Harvey as impact players until they become impact players even though I think without a doubt Harvey will be that.
The point about the Mets developing players since cashen still remains the same. As a franchise they have done a poor job. Also all of the players that we think will be allstar caliber players IE, Niese, Ike and Harvey and even the complimentary players like Parnell, Edgin and Duda were all drafted and signed by scouts that were hired by Steve Phillips so the franchise’s philosophy toward drafting and developing were exactly the same.
Where Omar made the biggest changes were the Intl scouting staff. He only added 4 area scouts when he took over for Duquette. He overhauled the Intl scouting staff. Ismeal Cruz signed just about every one of his top IFA’s. Flores, Mejia, Familia, Tejada, Puello and Lagares were all signed by Cruz. I thought by now we’d have a better turnout in that area. So far Tejada is the only one to make any kind of contribution to the big club. I do love Flores and think he’ll be a big time hitter somewhere if not here though.
Omar can still go from mediocre to very good if Harvey, Ike, Flores, Robles, Lupo and a couple of others become allstar caliber players. Right now I still can’t give more than average grade.
HAHAHAHAHAHA Great Job there Vinny (and hon mention to Satish)…
I am loving the sight of the Sandy rats all scrambling to find ways to discredit the research that seems to poke holes in the lies that have been perpetrated in the name of pumping up Sandy and his work….
Jessup whining about better players being taken AFTER the player we took which if implemented will KILL Sandy in spades when Hawkins is counted vs Cheech….
So much for his opinion on DEVELOPMENT being as important as picking is….
If they make the MLB it really shouldn’t matter who they played for since when you took them they had not played for ANYONE and the selection (and this research) talks to how good they were at picking MLB players, nt how much use they got out of those players. It was never a question when we were talking about how HAVING d’Arnaud was a plus for the Phillies despite him never playing a gae for them but he got them an ACE pitcher….But I digress here…
Only thing I might point out (and I’m sure it is answered in the guidelines which I will read in a minute) is that in the first chart, 4 of the teams ahead of us have all picked higher than us in the draft over that period of time meaning they had a slightly better crop to pick from than we did….
I’m sure there is some compensation made for that in the research but I just wanted to point it out since the Mets were put at a slight disadvantage compared to those teams for the time in question of the research.
I want to acknowledge the incredible assistance by Mr. North Jersey in reformatting the original data so that it could be presented more clearly and professionally.
He offered his help out of the blue like a friend helping another friend in need and I can’t thank him enough for his generosity and the time it took him to accomplish what he did today.
In what has been a stressful day for me, his efforts made it a lot less stressful and I can’t thank him enough for being there for me and for us.
A great big hat tip to Mr. North Jersey.
Vinny’s Ranking Criteria
1. All 30 team’s drafts will be ranked, including IFA’s. Players will count towards the team they signed with and only count if they were signed, not traded for.
2. Players who have only played in a few games, or have had downright awful statistics (like career batting averages sub .200, or career ERA’s well over 5.00), will not be included. Exceptions for these players will only be made if a player is a projected starter for a team.
3. The teams and players will be ranked by a points system that I created. Players will be divided into six different groups based on certain qualifications. The production and some projections of the player determine how many points the player receives inside each group.
4. There will also be a second final ranking, called the adjusted rankings, which will take draft positioning into account.
5. Teams will lose 2 points for picking in the 1-5 spots, and will lose 2 points for every extra pick overall. Teams that select 6-10 lose one point, and teams picking 21-30 gain 1 point. Teams that have no first round picks gain 2 points.
* * * * * Six Ranking Groups * * * * *
1. The 1st group is the MVP group. This group includes players who finished in the top five in the MVP voting as well as players who finished in the top five in the Cy Young voting at least once. If the player only finished in the top 5 once, they will receive 8 points. If the player made it more than once, or won the actual award, they will receive 9 points.
2. The 2nd group is the All Star group. This group is only for players who have made the All-star team for their respective leagues. Players who made the all-star team only once receive 5 points, and players who made the all-star team more than once receive 6 points.
3. The third group is the starters group. This group is for players who are projected to start for their teams in 2013. These players can range from 1.5 – 4 points based off their production and projection. Players who receive 4 points are young players who have high potential, and have also posted numbers better than league average. To qualify for this group, the player will have to be a former BA top 100 prospect, and have OPS higher than .735 or an ERA lower than 3.90 or WHIP below 1.20. Players will be disqualified from this group if they have either pitched for more than 650 IP or had more than 2000 PA’s. Players will also be disqualified if they have been released or traded by their original team for backups, non-top 100 prospects, or for players who are low end starters. Starters who receive 3 points are considered average major league starters. To qualify for this group, the player only has to have a season where he had a single season fWAR of over 2.0. Starters who receive 1.5 points are fringe starters. They are starting for their teams, but they aren’t high quality players. If the starter does not meet the qualifications to be a high or average starter, they fall into this group.
4. The 4th group is the backup group. These players are projected to be bench players in 2013. They will be worth 0.5 points. If a player was a starter in past season, but is projected be a backup in 2013, they will still be ranked as a backup.
5. The 5th group is the prospects group. These are players who are currently in the minor leagues or briefly played in the majors in 2012. To qualify for this group, the player would have to be ranked in MLB.com’s top 100 prospect ranking (BA’s ranking aren’t used because their 2013 top prospects rankings are not published yet). Players ranked from 1-10 are worth 2.5 points. Players ranked 11-25 are worth 1.5 points while starters ranked 26-100 are worth 1 point. Players who made BA’s top 100 in 2011 will be counted as 1 point if they are projected backups for their teams in 2013.
6. The 6th and final group is relief pitchers. These players will be worth 1.5 – 3.5 points. Relief pitchers who are projected closers are worth 3.5 points. Relief pitchers will also receive 3.5 points if they are projected set up men or if they had pitched 55 innings and had an ERA below 3.00 in 2012. Players who have pitched 55 innings and had an ERA below 3.00 in 2010 or 2011 are worth 2 points. Relief pitchers who did not meet these qualifications will be worth 1.5 points.
I’m not going to criticize the ridiculous way this was calculated, but is it really fair to count Quintana since he was cut before his 18th birthday after pitching a total of 5 innings as a 17 year old?
If more people simply took the same approach that the people in this video do when confronted with someone who continually disagrees with them despite what they believe as the individual being wrong MMO would be that much better.
http://youtu.be/s8CpRG-e64E
Hi Joe D.,
“This is about two groups who prejudices are exceeded only by their quest to prove the other wrong regardless of fairness or perfection….., The hatred runs deep and it’s often mistaken for intellect.
“The smart ones know better.”
It’s a shame that this wonderful website you put together has to come down to this. Hatred mistaken for intellect can only summize the comment that offended me this afternoon, accusing me of making a back handed compliment in an attempt to invalidate one’s argument by using his age.”
BTW – for the individual who made that comment, it should be pointed out that that was not the first time I mentioned to Connor that his maturity far exceeded his age and I hoped that it didn’t embarrass him. He wrote back and said that I didn’t embarrass him at all and appreciated the compliment.
Joe, Connor, apologies if I placed you in the middle of this.