Article: A Few Rays Of Hope In PECOTA's Depressing 2016 Twins Projections

[Mike Bates]

If you’re a pessimist like me, you look at the PECOTA projections released by Baseball Prospectus yesterdayand you see a confirmation of everything you’ve suspected this offseason. You see a team who has done nothing to build on its surprising run in 2015 and, in turn, has slipped to the bottom of a competitive AL Central division.

 

You think about a thoroughly mediocre starting rotation led by Ervin Santana, Phil Hughes, and Kyle Gibson and you resign yourself to falling behind early. You think about the bullpen, populated with retreads and low upside plays like Casey Fien and Fernando Abad and you shudder about holding onto leads. You see an offense with potential, but one that will struggle to reach base.My low expectations for the Twins are probably a defense mechanism, preventing me from being disappointed in a bad year, and heightening my enjoyment of a surprise run. But it’s not fun to be doom and gloom all the time. There are reasons for hope in these projections. Let’s look at them in some detail:

 

The trade for John Ryan Murphy works out.

 

Baseball Prospectus sees Murphy as being worth a win in 2016 while playing 60 percent of the time behind the plate. That’s not great, of course. That said, it’s light years better than Kurt Suzuki’s projection and also better than PECOTA thinks Aaron Hicks will do for the Yankees.

 

Eddie Rosario’s playing time

 

This is counter-intuitive, given that PECOTA thinks Rosario will hit just .250/.280/.401 and will be more than a win below replacement while playing 85 percent of the time. First, it’s important to note that this projection is entirely reasonable for a guy who struggled in the minors and who had a .289 OBP last year with a 15/118 BB/K ratio and whose slugging was inflated by 15 triples (which will be difficult to repeat). Now, Rosario could certainly outperform that quite easily with even a slight improvement in his strike zone judgment, but I don’t doubt the numbers BP came up with. However, if Rosario is only hitting .250 with a .280 OBP, there simply is no way that he keeps his job. The only reason he played as much as he did in 2015 is that he was hitting .290 at the end of July. If he doesn’t start off hot, he’ll get shuffled to Rochester like Danny Santana and Kennys Vargas did, in favor of Max Kepler. No matter what happens, Rosario’s position won’t be as bad as BP thinks it will.

 

They're sleeping on Eduardo Escobar

 

To put it simply, Baseball Prospectus hasn’t caught up to Escobar: He has provided league average offense and good defense at a premium position when he’s been allowed to play there over the last two years. Instead, PECOTA pegs him as a replacement level shortstop. Now, Escobar’s on-base percentage is never going to be good, but it can be just OK enough that, when paired with his defense and his mid-range pop, he is a two- or three-win player.

 

Trevor Plouffe is not a replacement-level third baseman

 

I have no idea what PECOTA is doing here, pegging Plouffe to be worth less than a win. By their own metrics, he’s been worth in excess of two wins in each of the last two years. Assuming he’s going to more than halve his production just when he turns 30 makes no sense to me.

 

Where the hell is Jose Berrios?

 

For some reason, Baseball Prospectus has projected that Ricky Nolasco is going to be part of the starting rotation and doesn’t think that Jose Berrios is going to throw any innings for the Twins in 2016. Barring injury, there’s simply no chance of that happening. Berrios will be up in June at the latest and will get in at least 100 innings for a club desperate for some upside on the mound. Depending on how he adjusts, Berrios could be worth between one and two wins for the club after he debuts, especially as he pushes a less deserving arm to the bullpen or back to Rochester.

 

Now, it’s not all good news. PECOTA, for instance, projects Byron Buxton to be worth four and a half wins and to play 85 percent of the time in center field. I’m finding it increasingly hard to believe that the Twins will commit to Buxton out of spring training, and there’s a good chance that any kind of a slow start will exile him to Rochester until late June. If that happens, the Twins will lose a ton of value on defense, and probably on offense as well, especially if they try to make do with Danny Santana, Oswaldo Arcia, and/or Carlos Quentin in his place. Enough, probably, to give back almost everything they're going to gain from the rays of hope I outlined above.

 

Sorry to end on such a bummer. But I did warn you; it's my nature.

 

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[old nurse]

Curiosity here. I wonder why with no reliability and no validity do people with a purported understanding of statistics  bother with these projections

[Seth Stohs]

 

Curiosity here. I wonder why with no reliability and no validity do people with a purported understanding of statistics  bother with these projections

 

They're fun... and give us something to talk about...

 

 

[dgwills]

Wow. They have the Royals at 76 wins and last in the AL Central. Makes me feel better about the Twins projection. 

[nicksaviking]

Good point on Rosario, I can't see him starting all year if he has a .680 OPS, particularly if that's being weighed down by his OBP, which is a skill the Twins are dearly lacking.

 

Same with Plouffe though. If he's playing that poorly, we should probably expect Sano at 3B.

 

And if Murphy is head and shoulders better than Suzuki, I think the split will be more than 60/40. On one hand, this team likes it's veterans, on the other, they are going to want to showoff what they got for Aaron Hicks.

[Dantes929]

" You see a team who has done nothing to build on its surprising run in 2015 and, in turn, has slipped to the bottom of a competitive AL Central division."  

If you consider adding Murphy and Park as doing nothing I am ok with that but developing players is my favorite way to build and free agency is my least favorite.

 

  Sano, Santana, Buxton, Duffey and Jepsen for a full season should make this a better team with Berrios added along the way.      I get the pessimism but I have been reading for 15 years about how every other team has added fantastic players every off season while the Twins have sat still and how the Twins will finish at the bottom every year save for 2010 and yet the Twins have finished first 6 times and 2nd 3 times in that period.      If the only thing these projections get right is that the Twins finish above KC I will be OK with that.  

Oddly, Mauer and Perkins weren't mentioned and are two of my biggest question marks.    Good years from those two would go a long way.

[MikeBates]

To say that projections have "no reliability and no validity," old nurse, is simply not correct. The whole point of designing projection systems is so that they can provide relatively reliable and accurate data that represents a snapshot of a club's overall quality. That said, individual teams and players do out- and under-perform these projections, and the likelihood of them doing that are built into the models for each system. But, taken as a whole, the projections tend to jive with the performance of clubs on the field. 

 

In fact, more interesting than simply pointing and yelling that any given system is wrong is actually taking the time to figure out what happened that led to a "miss." Like last year, when the Twins got crazy lucky with chaining together hits early in the season and jumped out to a hot start. It's that unpredictability, especially when we can project so much that's going to happen, that makes baseball fun and worth watching in the first place.

[Han Joelo]

ZERO innings for Berrios?  Holy cripes.  If my video game console did that I'd throw it out the window.  

 

Of all people, I would imagine the Baseball Prospectus people have a graph charting page hits, and I'm sure it's got a nice spike in it right now.  My uneducated guess would be that 80% of all fan bases are outraged about their projection right now.

 

"Some supposedly smart guy I've never heard of thinks my teams sucks!  He's an idiot!"

 

I wonder, though--why is it "luck" when a team doesn't make their projections, but a "miss" when the computers are wrong?  As if a "hit" is a preordained conclusion?

[Winston Smith]

From:

Aaron Gleeman        ✔   @AaronGleeman 

Twins moved to Target Field in 2010. Since then they've won 442 games and Baseball Prospectus' PECOTA has projected them to win 441 games.

[gunnarthor]

 

To say that projections have "no reliability and no validity," old nurse, is simply not correct. The whole point of designing projection systems is so that they can provide relatively reliable and accurate data that represents a snapshot of a club's overall quality. That said, individual teams and players do out- and under-perform these projections, and the likelihood of them doing that are built into the models for each system. But, taken as a whole, the projections tend to jive with the performance of clubs on the field. 

 

 

This gets said a lot but is simply not true.  PECOTA's projected standings are usually off by 6 games per team every year.  And their projected order of finish isn't much more reliable, even within their own division.  Last year, in the AL, their projected final standings were off completely - they missed on the correct order of finish of all 15 AL teams.  Not one right and they only got two teams within one placement of their final standings.  They were off on the final record of each team by an average of 9 games and only 4 teams were they even within 5 games for.  

[gunnarthor]

 

From:

Aaron Gleeman        ✔   @AaronGleeman 

Twins moved to Target Field in 2010. Since then they've won 442 games and Baseball Prospectus' PECOTA has projected them to win 441 games.

Yeah, that was Gleeman's way of obscuring PECOTA's unreliability.  If you look at it year by year it's a bit different - 

2010 - projected 82 wins - off by 12
2011 - projected 83 wins - off by 20
2012 - projected 71 wins - off by 5
2013 - projected 66 wins - perfect
2014 - projected 71 wins - off by 1
2015 - projected 82 wins - off by 12

So they were pretty good at saying the Twins would suck in 2013 and 2014 (big gamble there), were in the ball park in 2012 and no where close in 2010, 2011 and 2015.  But Gleeman's tweet tries to imply that PECOTA was nearly spot on for the six years.

[USAFChief]

 

To say that projections have "no reliability and no validity," old nurse, is simply not correct. The whole point of designing projection systems is so that they can provide relatively reliable and accurate data that represents a snapshot of a club's overall quality. That said, individual teams and players do out- and under-perform these projections, and the likelihood of them doing that are built into the models for each system. But, taken as a whole, the projections tend to jive with the performance of clubs on the field. 

 

In fact, more interesting than simply pointing and yelling that any given system is wrong is actually taking the time to figure out what happened that led to a "miss." Like last year, when the Twins got crazy lucky with chaining together hits early in the season and jumped out to a hot start. It's that unpredictability, especially when we can project so much that's going to happen, that makes baseball fun and worth watching in the first place.

Has anyone actually taken the time to figure out if the Twins got crazy lucky with chaining together hits early in the season?

 

Or is "sequencing" just the latest buzzword used to explain away results that don't jive with theory?

 

 

 

 

[alarp33]

 

Has anyone actually taken the time to figure out if the Twins got crazy lucky with chaining together hits early in the season?

 

Or is "sequencing" just the latest buzzword used to explain away results that don't jive with theory?

 

It's a very real thing. 

 

https://thepowerrank.com/cluster-luck/

 

The Twins benefited on Offense and Defense quite a bit.  This can explain how the Twins were 15th in the AL in OBP, and 12th in Slugging, yet scored the 8th most runs.  

Edited February 17, 2016 by alarp33

[USAFChief]

 

It's a very real thing. 

 

https://thepowerrank.com/cluster-luck/

 

The Twins benefited on Offense and Defense quite a bit.  This can explain how the Twins were 15th in the AL in OBP, and 12th in Slugging, yet scored the 8th most runs.  

The basis of that premise is in the first sentence of your cited article:

 

"In baseball, teams have little control over the clustering of hits."

 

That sounds to me like an unsupported theory, rather than proven fact.  I'd go so far as to say those who assert such a thing should provide some level of proof, rather than asking us to take on faith that results which do not line up with their theory are due to things that are not controllable.

 

Not to mention, if this actually is a "thing"--if a month-long run of "cluster luck" is enough to throw off the projection system for multiple teams, every year--the projection system is, by definition, useless.

[Bob Sacamento]

 

It's a very real thing. 

 

https://thepowerrank.com/cluster-luck/

 

The Twins benefited on Offense and Defense quite a bit.  This can explain how the Twins were 15th in the AL in OBP, and 12th in Slugging, yet scored the 8th most runs.  

Nice page and yes the Twins stringed together alot of hits together, I was just listening to a Baseball Prospectus podcast and this was brought up.  The Twins had a lot times where they had say 9 hits in a game but say 6 of them came in one inning which would account for more runs then what would normally be pegged to happen if they had spaced out those 9 hits throughout the game.  The BP joke was "what Molly can't teach that in Spring Training"

 

Biggest thing I got out of the cluster luck page was that the Tigers and Indians were very unlucky in 2015 and have added to their clubs...  

 

Oh that and the Cubs were unlucky all around and still put up a great season.

[Bob Sacamento]

 

The basis of that premise is in the first sentence of your cited article:

 

"In baseball, teams have little control over the clustering of hits."

 

.

Something a team has little control over is pretty much luck, thus the Twins were one of the luckiest teams in 2015 (The third behind the Missouri teams of Kansas City and St Louis).  Teams need luck to win, you just can't count on it.  Hence the Royals won the WS and the Cards got outperformed by the Cubs.

[old nurse]

 

To say that projections have "no reliability and no validity," old nurse, is simply not correct. The whole point of designing projection systems is so that they can provide relatively reliable and accurate data that represents a snapshot of a club's overall quality. That said, individual teams and players do out- and under-perform these projections, and the likelihood of them doing that are built into the models for each system. But, taken as a whole, the projections tend to jive with the performance of clubs on the field. 

 

In fact, more interesting than simply pointing and yelling that any given system is wrong is actually taking the time to figure out what happened that led to a "miss." Like last year, when the Twins got crazy lucky with chaining together hits early in the season and jumped out to a hot start. It's that unpredictability, especially when we can project so much that's going to happen, that makes baseball fun and worth watching in the first place.

 If at the end of the year, as you say, you have to figure out why  they were off they have no reliability.  From a statistical projection they are useless.

[gunnarthor]

 

It's a very real thing. 

 

https://thepowerrank.com/cluster-luck/

 

The Twins benefited on Offense and Defense quite a bit.  This can explain how the Twins were 15th in the AL in OBP, and 12th in Slugging, yet scored the 8th most runs.  

How much is "quite a bit"?  Is that a runs created model?  Are the off and def equal in value?  (The formula link doesn't work).  If I'm reading this correctly (and there's a really good chance I'm not), the Twins should have given up 31.6 runs more on defense than they did.  Are we using the 10 runs = 1 win thing here?  

 

Interestingly, the common refrain is that the Twins were lucky in May by clustering their hits but that's not quite true.  In May the Twins were 4th in runs scored buy also 5th in OBP, 3rd in slg and 4th in wOBA.  They earned those runs.  Their "lucky" month was actually August.  6th in runs but 14th in wOBA.  

 

[old nurse]

 

 

They're fun... and give us something to talk about...

Would not argue against that they have entertainment value and give people something to talk about.  That pretty much sums up what projections do.

[alarp33]

 

How much is "quite a bit"?  Is that a runs created model?  Are the off and def equal in value?  (The formula link doesn't work).  If I'm reading this correctly (and there's a really good chance I'm not), the Twins should have given up 31.6 runs more on defense than they did.  Are we using the 10 runs = 1 win thing here?  

 

Interestingly, the common refrain is that the Twins were lucky in May by clustering their hits but that's not quite true.  In May the Twins were 4th in runs scored buy also 5th in OBP, 3rd in slg and 4th in wOBA.  They earned those runs.  Their "lucky" month was actually August.  6th in runs but 14th in wOBA.  

 

"The Power Rank calculates cluster luck by using the Base Runs formula to compare actual runs scored and runs allowed to expected runs scored and runs allowed."

 

If I understand it correctly, the Base Runs formula says the Twins should have scored 33 less runs, and given up 31 more runs than they did in 2015.  

[gunnarthor]

 

"The Power Rank calculates cluster luck by using the Base Runs formula to compare actual runs scored and runs allowed to expected runs scored and runs allowed."

 

If I understand it correctly, the Base Runs formula says the Twins should have scored 33 less runs, and given up 31 more runs than they did in 2015.  

Right, but does the base run formula use 10 runs = 1 Win or is it closer to 19 as the deviation point?  

[alarp33]

 

Right, but does the base run formula use 10 runs = 1 Win or is it closer to 19 as the deviation point?  

This is the formula used I believe, I think the .285 number can changed, as its based off of runs scored per game across the league.... Not positive on that

 

W% = RS^x/(RS^x + RA^x)

Where 

x = ((RS + RA)/G)^.285

 

Base runs had the Twins at 73 wins last year, so those 64 runs of cluster luck worked out to an additional 10 wins

Edited February 17, 2016 by alarp33

[mazeville]

 

Yeah, that was Gleeman's way of obscuring PECOTA's unreliability.  If you look at it year by year it's a bit different - 

2010 - projected 82 wins - off by 12
2011 - projected 83 wins - off by 20
2012 - projected 71 wins - off by 5
2013 - projected 66 wins - perfect
2014 - projected 71 wins - off by 1
2015 - projected 82 wins - off by 12

So they were pretty good at saying the Twins would suck in 2013 and 2014 (big gamble there), were in the ball park in 2012 and no where close in 2010, 2011 and 2015.  But Gleeman's tweet tries to imply that PECOTA was nearly spot on for the six years.

 

That's an average variation of about 8.3 wins, which means that the Twins could end up anywhere from 71 to 87 wins. If the standings are similar this year to last year, that means the Twins would either be last in the AL Central or a wild card team. 

 

The stat in Gleeman's tweet is virtually worthless. It's almost a complete statistical anomaly that it ended up as close as it did.

 

That said, it IS interesting. And it's it's nearly impossible to predict a baseball season because of so many variables like luck and injuries and all that. And if I recall correctly, PECOTA last year predicted a big decline for Joe Mauer, and that's exactly what happened. 

 

I actually view a 78-win projection as pretty solid. The Twins won 82 games with a suspect roster last year, and so they're only projecting a four-win decline. Whether anybody likes it or not, this team has a lot to prove.

[gunnarthor]

 

I actually view a 78-win projection as pretty solid. The Twins won 82 games with a suspect roster last year, and so they're only projecting a four-win decline. Whether anybody likes it or not, this team has a lot to prove.

Yeah, I don't think that part is all the controversial.  The Twins overachieved some last year (how much depends on how much you want to credit to luck or whatever) and they have a young group of players who may take a step back or might just take off.  There's a lot of possibilities.  Should be a fun season.  

 

Whether you want to put any weight on a system like PECOTA is up to you.  I think they've shown they are pretty unreliable to the point that they should be mocked.  But others may differ.  

[amjgt]

I disagree with the premise that a 79 win projection is depressing. 

[Devereaux]

 

Whether you want to put any weight on a system like PECOTA is up to you.  I think they've shown they are pretty unreliable to the point that they should be mocked.  But others may differ.  

But PECOTA is a PROJECTION.

Just mocking.

[Broker]

Projections are fun to read in the off season. I don't pay much attention to them though. I pay attention to the W-L column which is 0-0 right now. 

[Otto von Ballpark]

 

This gets said a lot but is simply not true.  PECOTA's projected standings are usually off by 6 games per team every year.

I just read a better mind than me say that 6 wins off actually may not be bad, given all the variables involved:

 

"Even if you had perfect information about playing time and performance level of every player the standard error on team level projections can't be lower than 5-6 wins."

 

http://www.baseballthinkfactory.org/newsstand/discussion/pecota_hates_the_royals_part_ii/#5157584

[Lee-The-Twins-Fan]

 

It's a very real thing. 

 

https://thepowerrank.com/cluster-luck/

 

The Twins benefited on Offense and Defense quite a bit.  This can explain how the Twins were 15th in the AL in OBP, and 12th in Slugging, yet scored the 8th most runs.  

Ok, but I question how much 'cluster luck' is actually 'luck'. Is a manager's lineup worth nothing? Are coaches' encouragements, tips and helps valueless? Is a player's hard work meaningless?

 

The lineup card could have some impact on offensive 'cluster luck'. Knowing where to put defenders on a field could have some impact on defensive 'cluster luck'. 

 

If my premise holds true, then Molitor had a really good year. And the Twins could over achieve again next year.

[alarp33]

 

Ok, but I question how much 'cluster luck' is actually 'luck'. Is a manager's lineup worth nothing? Are coaches' encouragements, tips and helps valueless? Is a player's hard work meaningless?

 

The lineup card could have some impact on offensive 'cluster luck'. Knowing where to put defenders on a field could have some impact on defensive 'cluster luck'. 

 

If my premise holds true, then Molitor had a really good year. And the Twins could over achieve again next year.

 

That's not really how stats like this work.  

 

Here's an example I read elsewhere that explains cluster in the simplest way ever.  

 

If the Twins get 9 hits in a game, all singles.  If those 9 hits all come in the 4th inning, they would likely score 7 runs.  If those 9 hits come in separate innings, they would likely get shut out.  Cluster luck accounts for this.  

 

Players in general, or managers, don't possess some kind of special skill to make sure all their hits come in the same inning.  

 

Highly inflated cluster numbers, or RISP numbers, generally even out to the mean over time.  The Twins may very well get "lucky" again... but they may also have a much better team offense, yet be on the bad side of "cluster luck" and score less runs than last year.