We’d be remiss if we didn’t mention Bill Simmons‘ most recent column in which he “finally joins the revolution” and highlights stats such as UZR, WAR, FIP and BABIP!

The more I played around with fangraphs.com, the more I realized, “Hey, there’s really something here.” The numbers for Boston players jibed with what I had been watching all last season. For instance, Jacoby Ellsbury had lousy instincts in center, his jumps were routinely late, he took bad angles on balls, he drove me crazy week after week … and yet, he is fast and committed only two errors all season. How bad could he have been? Well, UZR wasn’t fooled.

In the last post, I mentioned some pitchers that had taken good advantage of their opportunities to face other pitchers in the batter’s box. I don’t have any information on how repeatable a skill, if you even want to call it that, dominating other pitchers is. It doesn’t strike me as an independent skill like getting ground balls. Rather, I imagine there’s a giant correlation between how good a pitcher is against all hitters and how good he is against pitchers.

So how about the other side of the coin? Who are the pitchers who performed poorly against other pitchers, relative to our expectations? Daniel Cabrera and Scott Olsen are two big outliers each only striking out three pitchers in 26 attempts, over five fewer Ks than average. Of course, both Olsen and Cabrera were mediocre in getting strikeouts in general, so it would be unwise to call them unlucky by the full five strikeouts.

In order to figure out roughly how many strikeouts lucky or unlucky a pitcher was, I devised a quick formula based on the following variables and stats:

KH = Percentage of non-pitcher hitters struck out
PF = Batters faced that were pitchers
KP = Number of pitchers struck out
17.5% = League average percentage of non-pitcher hitters struck out
32% = League average percentage of pitcher hitters struck out

The formula is:
( ( ( KH / 17.5% ) * 32% ) * PF ) – KP

Here’s an example sticking with Scott Olsen above. He struck out 14.8% of non-pitcher batters, which was 85% as good as the league rate. Therefore, I expect him to strike out pitchers at a rate that is 85% as good as the league rate, giving us a 27% expected K rate on pitchers. He faced 26 pitchers so we expect seven strikeouts (26 * 27%), but he actually only got three so in this case we would have expected Scott Olsen to record four more Ks than he did.

Is this perfect? Of course not. If I were constructing this for serious study, I would need to see if this “skill” is actually independent or not, regress the strikeout rates and do some other tweaks. I’m not proposing a modification to tERA or WAR though. I wanted an easy way to rank pitchers “luck” on this matter. Again, this is not perfect.

Using this as a guideline, the same four pitchers I mentioned before appear at the top of the “luckiest” rank with the addition of Roy Oswalt who killed opposing pitchers but was below average against all other hitters.

Looking at the other side, the most unlucky pitcher under this rank was Tim Lincecum. The Cy Young Award winner had a strikeout rate nearly double that of the league average but was only about average against other pitchers, suggesting that he missed 12 expected strikeouts. Other pitchers breaking the five strikeout barrier were Jason Hammel (9.5), John Johnson (9.5), Ricky Nolasco (8.2, boy is there anything this guy was lucky at last year?), Chris Carpenter (7.9), Carlos Zambrano (6.0) and Chad Gaudin (5.3).

Hard numbers? No, but fast ones and good enough to paint the broad strokes of a picture.

[Author’s Note, 5:46 p.m. EST : I meant to include Minnesota originally, but forgot… Now added.]

It is often said of fourth outfielders and utility infielders that “they could start for so many other teams!” I wrote something along those lines myself in yesterday’s post about the Rays. Are there players of whom this is true?

Take Angels utility infielder Maicer Izturis. Izturis has seen time at third, second, and short, and has done well in limited action, including a near three-win season in 2009. Averaging CHONE, ZiPS, and Fan projections, his 2010 offensive projection is for a .335 wOBA, about +4 runs above average for the season. Izturis is a good defender and his stats reflect the positional adjustments fairly well; let’s call him an average defensive shortstop, and a +5 defender at second and third, so a +7.5 per season infielder. Izturis’s playing time has been limited because of his utility role, so let’s conservatively assume he could handle starting 75 percent of the time. We should also take into account that he is projected to face more difficult AL pitching. In all it comes out to: 4 offensive runs + 7.5 fielding + 25 AL replacement level x 75 percent playing time = ~2.7 WAR.

Izturis can play third, second, and short, making it easier to find places he could start, so I don’t want to make this any simpler for Izturis or myself. I’m excluding horrible and/or rebuilding teams like Washington, Pittsburgh, Kansas City, San Diego, or Houston, for whom many players above replacement level could start. I’m also going to stick with fairly clear-cut cases. I won’t pretend to be exhaustive, I’m sure readers will find additional cases to be made (and cases with which to disagree!). One last important note: this does not take into account contracts, age, or player development. It’s just to see who Izturis projects to be clearly better than in 2010.

In the NL West, Izturis could clearly start at shortstop over Zombie Edgar Renteria, and I’d take him over Freddy Sanchez at second, too. In LA, I’d play Izturis over the Blake Dewitt/Ronnie Belliard/Jamey Carroll morass at second and Casey Blake at third. I like Arizona’s Kelly Johnson, but Izturis is better. Colorado 2B Clint Barmes has a great glove, but Izturis is no slouch in the field, either, and can actually hit.

Moving on to the NL Central, the “best fans in baseball” might love Skip Schumaker’s grittiness, but I think they’d prefer a good player. St. Louis could also start Izturis over the David Freese/Felipe Lopez/whatever group at third. Izturis is better than Cubs’ second baseman Mike Fontenot, Milwaukee third baseman Casey McGehee, and Reds shortstop Paul Janish.

In the NL East, I’m sure Marlins fans (let’s pretend they exist) would love to see Jorge Cantu’s glove banished from third forever in favor of Izturis. Ditto for Mets fans (whom I’m sure exist) and Luis Castillo at second.

Moving our way back across the continent, the AL East has only one obvious case (outside of Toronto) — Maicer could easily take his half-brother Cesar Izturis‘ job at shortstop in Baltimore.

In the AL Central, Izturis could start at any of three positions in Detroit: Adam Everett‘s and Brandon Inge’s excellent gloves aren’t enough to beat out a 2.7 WAR player, and Scott Sizemore isn’t likely on Izturis’ level yet. In Cleveland, Izturis would beat out Luis Valbuena at second and Jhonny Peralta at third. I like Mark Teahen, so it pains me to write that Izturis is far superior to the White Sox third baseman. Izturis is obviously far superior to Nick Punto and Brendan Harris at third base for Minnesota, and honestly, I think he’s probably better than Orlando Hudson at second, too, but I was going to leave out the close ones.

Back home in the AL West, I’m sure Oakland would love to have Izturis starting at shortstop rather than Cliff Pennington or Adam Rosales. Even a defensively oriented team like Seattle should realize that Jack Wilson’s bat makes him an inferior performer at shortstop to Izturis, and that Izturis would be better than Jose Lopez at second or third (wherever former teammate Chone Figgins isn’t playing).

That’s a long list of teams, but Izturis is a good player. If he was on the market, he wouldn’t be out of work for long. Oh, one more: Izturis could start at third over Brandon Wood for the Angels.

I have a lot of respect for Brian Cashman, and I think he’s tremendously under-appreciated as a GM. Under his watch, the Yankees went from an erratic money pit into a dominant machine, and he’s put processes in place to ensure that the team is permanently good. Everything I said about the Red Sox is also true about the Yankees now. They do everything well.

And, yes, they’re disgustingly rich. They outspent the #2 team in 2009 opening day payroll by $52 million. They outspent the Red Sox by $80 million, or, essentially, they spent as much on their 2009 team as the Boston and Milwaukee combined, and the Brewers have a league-average payroll. It’s just a monstrous advantage, and they take full advantage of it.

This isn’t to say that the Yankees haven’t earned their championships. The Mets have access to the same media market and spend money like drunken sailors, but they don’t win, because they’re not using their resources well. The Yankees are using their resources very well, and there is no reason to disrespect their accomplishments simply because they have access to more capital than every other MLB team.

But there’s a reason I said that the Red Sox were the model franchise for a big market team. The Yankees aren’t, because they don’t fit into that category. They’re a you-can’t-build-a-market-like-this team, and there’s no point for anyone trying to recreate what they’re doing, because it’s impossible. You can’t recreate 100 years of history. You can’t fix your organization’s past and make sure it includes Babe Ruth, Mickey Mantle, and Yogi Berra. The Yankees have a tie to the roots of the game itself that no other club ever will.

It’s not just the size of the Big Apple that gives the Yankees the advantage they enjoy. It’s their place in the history of the game, and how well they’ve leveraged that into developing a fan base that perpetuates itself constantly. The combination of the market, the nostalgia, and the winning have created a perfect storm, and the result is a franchise that towers over the rest. The Red Sox do everything right, and they still aren’t the Yankees. They can’t be. No one can.

We talk about dominant eras in sports history. The Brian Cashman-era Yankees are going to take their spot someday, because with the way the organization is structured, they’re going to be scary good for the foreseeable future. This is what happens when you spend $200 million really, really well.

The New York Yankees club is clearly the No. 1 organization in baseball and it has remained a powerhouse for as long as it has because of its ability to sustain itself through in-house player development. The club has done this both by slotting home-grown talent into key roles and by trading prospects for proven veterans.

General manager Brian Cashman does not get the credit that he deserves, partially because he has been overshadowed by the Steinbrenners, and in part due to the fact that he has a large budget to work with. Make no mistake about it, though, he rarely makes a bad move.

Damon Oppenheimer enters his sixth season overseeing the amateur draft. The club has done a respectable job in recent years despite having one of the last selections in the first round. The club picked up some interesting talent in ’09, including outfielder Slade Heathcott, catcher J.R. Murphy, and pitcher Bryan Mitchell. The club’s ’08 effort was a little ugly when the club failed to sign top pick Gerrit Cole and second rounder Scott Bittle. It found some later-round diamonds-in-the-rough to help compensate (Brett Marshall, D.J. Mitchell).

The team also spends a lot of money on the international market. Recent signings include Gary Sanchez, Gian Carlos Arias, Ramon Flores, Jackson Valera, Yeicok Calderon, and Anderson Felix.

The organizaiton has perhaps the best catching depth in baseball, with the likes of Jesus Montero, Austin Romine, Gary Sanchez, and J.R. Murphy. A lot has been made about a possible move from behind the plate for Montero, but he has the bat (and massive power) to play anywhere, while Romine could develop into a Grade-A catching prospect to help fill the gap left behind.

The starting pitching depth in the system is down a bit but the club has spent a lot of money in the free agent market so that’s not a great concern, either. The club does have some talented arms that can help out in the bullpen, including David Robertson, Mark Melancon, and good ol’ Joba Chamberlain. Phil Hughes is a rare youngster that has been able to crack the veteran-laden starting rotation after cutting his teeth in the bullpen in ’09. And don’t forget that he’s still just 23 years old.

The starting lineup does not feature many young players, but left-fielder Brett Gardner is expected to play regularly for the club. He should much-needed speed on the base paths. New center-fielder Curtis Granderson was acquired this past off-season for young players Austin Jackson, Phil Coke, and Ian Kennedy. All three players have potential but they had greater value to the organization as trading chips. And Granderson could absolutely explode playing in Yankee stadium and with the lineup protection around him.

The main core of the Yankees big league club is getting older, but the team’s ability to compete is not going to disappear any time soon. It has the resources and know-how to ensure that the organization remains a powerhouse for years to come.

It turns out even the Yankees have a budget. After years of steady increases in payroll, the Yankees have topped out around $200 million for each of the past five seasons, the most recent of which saw them reclaim a championship. At an estimated $212 million though, the Yankees 2010 payroll looks to be their highest in history trumping 2008 by a couple million.

The Yankees clearly had a successful season last year with 103 wins and a playoff championship. Our varied projection systems do not expect much of a drop off this year. You the readers ended up with 98 wins for the Yankees, four more than any other team in baseball. CHONE pegs New York at 99 wins, six more than any other team. CAIRO agrees with 99 wins and once again, six more than any other team.

What’s there to say about the Yankees current talent? Given the nature of the team, it’s not like there are any big surprises lurking on the roster that people haven’t heard of. It’s hard to find fault with players the like the Jorge Posada, Mark Teixeira, Robinson Cano, Derek Jeter and Alex Rodriguez around the infield, but one issue that might come up for New York is their depth behind the starters. Aside from Cano, none of the starting five are young pups.

Teixeira is probably a good bet to stay healthy, but he’s also the one with the best backup, either Nick Johnson or Nick Swisher. Ramiro Pena, currently the backup 2B, SS and 3B overproduced last season thanks to his .340 BABIP. He isn’t bad as a backup but would be highly exposed if pressed into a starting role due to injury. Francisco Cervelli looks like a fine enough insurance policy on Posada that catching shouldn’t be much of a concern.

The outfield will depend a lot on how Gardner does with a full time role for the first time at the big league level. His bat strikes me as mostly average, but he’s a good fielder that can play in center and that will help overcome the positional hit in left field and should make him a roughly average player overall. Granderson is a nice upgrade over Melky Cabrera and with Randy Winn as a roving backup, the outfield defense should be very good this season.

In the rotation, the Yankees brought in Javier Vazquez for another go-around hoping that it works out better than the first time. even if it doesn’t, Vazquez should provide his steady 200 innings. For the “oh” decade (2000-2009), Vazquez was second only to Livan Hernandez (by 38 IP) for total innings pitched. Joba Chamberlain is out (for now) and Phil Hughes starts the year as the fifth starter.

Mariano Rivera, Joba Chamberlain, Sergio Mitre, Damaso Marte, Alfredo Aceves and David Robertson were all above average last season in relief and should provide the bulk of the relief innings. Whether a Boone Logan or others fills out the back end is entirely negligible. It will be a solidly above average unit provided they do a better job avoiding the Jonathan Albaladejo’s and Jose Veras‘ of 2009 this time.

Great hitting, improved fielding, improved starting pitching and a decent bullpen. $200 million helps a lot, but the Yankees have assembled a great team with that money.

I’d pull out the old “always the bridesmaid” cliche, except the Red Sox have won two World Series titles in the the last six years, so it doesn’t really fit anymore.

The Red Sox have essentially become a model organization for a big market club. They don’t waste much of their financial advantage, but instead have used to increase their international presence, spend significant dollars in the draft, load the front office with smart people, and leave enough left to put consistently good teams on the field every year.

They don’t have any real weaknesses as an organization. The front office understands how to build a winning team, and their player development system is one of the best in the game. They lock up their homegrown talent early, allowing them to use the rest of their budget to fill out the roster with good veterans who don’t require long term commitments. The players love the manager, and he works well with a stat-savvy front office.

Really, I don’t have a bad thing to say about the organization. They do a great job. Every team in baseball should try to be more like the Red Sox. That makes for a rather uninteresting commentary, but I feel like I’d be nitpicking to the nth degree to try and find a problem worth discussing here.

So, congratulations Boston, you’ve got a great franchise. It will pay off for years to come. Rather than expecting the team to find a way to lose, you can expect to win, and win a lot.

Boston is an organization that has a lot of money but it is also a very smart organization; it’s run by people that could probably turn a team with a $40-million budget into a World Champion.

Much like the Tampa Bay Rays, whom we looked at yesterday, the organization is led by a young, aggressive general manager: Theo Epstein. Although a lot of the organization’s front office talent has been picked through over the past few years – including Jed Hoyer and Jason McLeod – the club still has some very smart men overseeing the club’s future stars. Mike Hazen continues on in his role as director of player development, while the scouting department will have a new leader in 2010 with the loss of McLeod to the San Diego Padres organization.

The club on the field consists mostly of veteran players. Younger, home-grown talent includes outfielder Jacoby Ellsbury and second baseman Dustin Pedroia. Jon Lester has developed into a legitimate No. 2 starter in the rotation, and Clay Buchholz also has promise and has been coveted by a number of teams in trade talks. Closer Jonathan Papelbon, another home-grown talent, is no longer a “young player” but his eventual replacement – Daniel Bard – is.

The organization has done a nice job of developing both top tiered amateur talent (Casey Kelly, Derrick Gibson) and lower round selections (Josh Reddick). With money to burn, the club has used its monetary advantage to sign some high-risk, over-slot player such as Ryan Westmoreland, Lars Anderson, Ryan Kalish, and Anthony Rizzo. Over the past three seasons, the club has handed out more over-slot deals (outside of the first three rounds) than any other team in baseball: 16. Along with the amateur draft, the club is a major player in the international market with the signing of players such as Junichi Tazawa, Stolmy Pimentel, and Jose Iglesias.

The club is not afraid to use its young players as bargaining chips in trades for proven talent, such as catcher Victor Martinez. The organization sent young pitchers Justin Masterson, Nick Hagadone, and Bryan Price to Cleveland. One player that Boston would like to have back is shortstop Hanley Ramirez, who was part of the loot sent to Florida for pitcher Josh Beckett in 2005.

This club may technically be a veteran team, but the organization knows how to acquire, develop and utilize young talent to its fullest.

The Boston Red Sox have, by most projection systems, the second best current talent in the league. Their financial advantage, ability to to value players and commitment to their farm system has left them with this amazing current talent, and, thus, a solid chance at making the playoffs and winning the World Series.

On the position player side there is not a below-average player to be seen. The squad is lead by a pair of up-the-middle superstars, Victor Martinez and Dustin Pedroia: both good bats at premium defensive positions. Kevin Youkilis, who in the past two years added power to his existing walk- and defense-based skill-set, holds down first. The remainder of the infield is made up of two newcomers, Adrian Beltre and Marco Scutaro. The outfield of J.D. Drew, Mike Cameron and Jacoby Ellsbury might not have quite the talent of the infield, but still is a solid group. As a whole the position players should play great defense (the off-season signings seemed particularly focused on defense) while still providing a solidly above-average offense.

The Red Sox’ starting pitching similarly shines. A top three of Jon Lester, Josh Beckett and John Lackey gives the Sox one of, if not the best, top three in baseball. In fact, CHONE projects over 180 innings of sub-four ERA pitching from each. No other rotation can make such a claim. The cut-offs are arbitrary, but it illustrate how strong the top three-fifths of the rotation is. After that, Daisuke Matsuzaka and Clay Buchholz complete the starting rotation. Both are probably average starters with the potential to be quite good — not too bad for the end of the rotation. But even if one of those two stumbles or anyone goes down with injury the Sox have very capable replacements in Tim Wakefield and Michael Bowden.

As Patrick Sullivan mentioned in an interview with Zack Scott, the bullpen had a couple guys whose performance took a step back last year (Jonathan Papelbon, Hideki Okajima and Ramon Ramirez), but I think there is enough talent in the pen for it to be an asset.

Overall this is a very talented team, it is brimming with projected three-plus-win players and has no real discernible holes (except maybe the potential for an Ortiz collapse). Their playoff probability takes a hit because they play in the same division as the Rays and Yankees, but still, if they played the season 1000 times, they should make the playoffs as often, if not a little more often, than they don’t.

This is my last post before baseball’s regular season gets underway. That means, anything that needs to be written before 2010 kicks off, needs to be written now. I’ve chosen to make the most of this closing window by previewing an issue that I guarantee will be written about extensively throughout this season, which just so happens to be the big trade return.

There are a few subsets under this. I’ll focus on two in particular: 1) The free agent to be and 2) the minor league signee who lights it up. Pretty transparently named, but here’s a rundown of each.

The Free Agent to Be

Let’s use Carl Crawford. After the season he will reach free agency. He’s no guarantee to acquire Type-A free agent compensation. Say he does, though; at the deadline, if the Rays are not 150 games ahead of the rest of the American League, undoubtedly some will wonder whether the Rays will trade Crawford or let him walk for nothing. Sky Kalkman put together a great resource for comparative analysis between draft picks and prospects that, in theory, would sprinkle some logic into hot and heavy rosterbation sessions. Only since have we found that to be impossible.

More to the point, though. People overrate returns on players like Crawford all the time. No, he’s not bringing back Buster Posey. Everybody wants shiny prospects but nobody wants to tell their player goodbye until the season’s outcomes are definitive. That will not stop people from wondering out loud as to whether Crawford for Wandy Rodriguez and Hunter Pence is a fair deal come July 30th.

The Minor League Signee

Sticking to the Rays roster for an example, let’s go with Hank Blalock. A month ago, Blalock was without a job and had to choose between minor league offers from the Florida Marlins and Tampa Bay Rays. A few weeks later, he may or may not make the opening day roster. Either way, nothing, I repeat, nothing he’s done since is going to alter his market value dramatically. As much as his agent and the Rays wish a sucker rally would develop, it’s just highly, highly unlikely.

Teams have years and years of data on a guy like Blalock, why would three weeks worth of spring data change his market from two minor league deals to a flood of trade offers that have any modicum of value? Even an injury at this stage in the game does not mean Blalock is suddenly going to become an attractive option.

And yes, I’m well aware this post isn’t preventing or curbing either of these scenarios from popping up all across the internet. But, if it stops just one brain-numbing proposal from being written about, then I think I’ve done my part.