2024 FanGraphs WAR Update
Today, we’ve made some changes to Wins Above Replacement that completes the move from UZR to the full suite of Statcast equivalent metrics in FanGraphs WAR. This process began in 2022, when we replaced UZR’s range component with Statcast’s Fielding Runs Prevented, which is Outs Above Average (OAA) converted to runs above average. UZR will continue to be calculated on FanGraphs through the end of the 2025 season. Today’s changes are retroactive to the 2016 season.
Here is the complete list of what is included in this update:
- The catcher blocking component of Statcast’s Fielding Run Value has been added
- UZR’s ARM runs above average has been replaced with the arm component of Statcast’s Fielding Run Value
- DRS’ stolen base prevented runs above average has been replaced with the catcher throwing component of Statcast’s Fielding Run Value
- Ultimate Base Running and Weighted Grounded into Double Play Runs have been replaced with Statcast’s baserunning metric (labeled XBR)
- UZR’s Double-Play Runs has been removed
You can read more about the Statcast metrics here:
- Outfield Throwing Arms Metric
- Catcher Blocking Metric
- Caught Stealing Above Average
- Baserunning Runs Above Average
We’ve added XBR (Statcast’s baserunning metric) to the Advanced section of our leaderboards. We have also added a new Statcast fielding section to our leaderboards, which include all of the additional metrics that have been added to WAR.
There are a handful of notable changes in WAR from the update, but almost all players’ WAR totals are within 1 WAR of their previous totals from 2016-2023. We’ve updated Legacy WAR (L-WAR) on the leaderboards if you’d like to see all the changes.
Here are the players whose WAR increased more than 1 WAR:
| Name | Previous WAR | New WAR | Change |
|---|---|---|---|
| Yadier Molina | 11.1 | 14.1 | 3.0 |
| J.D. Martinez | 19.6 | 22.5 | 2.9 |
| Tucker Barnhart | 3.6 | 5.5 | 2.0 |
| Jacob Stallings | 3.3 | 5.1 | 1.8 |
| Trea Turner | 35.6 | 37.2 | 1.7 |
| Robinson Chirinos | 2.6 | 4.2 | 1.6 |
| Yasiel Puig | 7.0 | 8.6 | 1.6 |
| Roberto Pérez | 6.4 | 8.0 | 1.6 |
| Carlos Correa | 29.0 | 30.5 | 1.5 |
| Vladimir Guerrero Jr. | 10.1 | 11.6 | 1.5 |
| Jose Altuve | 40.3 | 41.8 | 1.4 |
| J.T. Realmuto | 31.2 | 32.5 | 1.3 |
| Gio Urshela | 6.3 | 7.7 | 1.3 |
| Yasmani Grandal | 24.6 | 25.9 | 1.3 |
| Christian Vázquez | 11.2 | 12.5 | 1.3 |
| Hunter Dozier | -0.4 | 0.9 | 1.3 |
| Austin Hedges | 5.7 | 7.0 | 1.3 |
| Michael Pérez | -1.8 | -0.6 | 1.2 |
| Martín Maldonado | 7.3 | 8.5 | 1.2 |
| Amed Rosario | 7.6 | 8.8 | 1.2 |
| Brandon Drury | 6.4 | 7.6 | 1.2 |
| Ty France | 6.5 | 7.7 | 1.2 |
| Buster Posey | 20.5 | 21.7 | 1.2 |
| Eric Hosmer | 3.7 | 4.9 | 1.1 |
| Albert Pujols | -0.7 | 0.4 | 1.1 |
| Alejandro Kirk | 6.3 | 7.4 | 1.1 |
| Austin Romine | -0.7 | 0.4 | 1.1 |
| AJ Pollock | 8.3 | 9.3 | 1.1 |
| Stephen Piscotty | 5.0 | 6.1 | 1.1 |
| Matt Duffy | 3.4 | 4.4 | 1.0 |
And here are the players whose WAR decreased more than 1 WAR:
| Name | Previous WAR | New WAR | Dif |
|---|---|---|---|
| Mookie Betts | 51.7 | 48.8 | -3.0 |
| Joey Gallo | 15.1 | 12.7 | -2.4 |
| Andrew Benintendi | 13.1 | 11.0 | -2.1 |
| Paul Goldschmidt | 36.5 | 34.6 | -2.0 |
| Gary Sánchez | 16.0 | 14.3 | -1.7 |
| Michael Conforto | 18.5 | 16.8 | -1.7 |
| Jarrod Dyson | 6.0 | 4.3 | -1.7 |
| Matt Chapman | 27.5 | 25.9 | -1.6 |
| José Ramírez | 45.0 | 43.5 | -1.5 |
| Delino DeShields | 3.9 | 2.4 | -1.5 |
| Max Muncy | 19.5 | 18.1 | -1.4 |
| Kyle Schwarber | 12.8 | 11.4 | -1.4 |
| Avisaíl García | 10.1 | 8.7 | -1.4 |
| Brett Gardner | 14.4 | 13.1 | -1.4 |
| Tyler Flowers | 11.9 | 10.5 | -1.3 |
| Adolis García | 11.1 | 9.8 | -1.3 |
| Mike Zunino | 13.0 | 11.7 | -1.3 |
| Yoán Moncada | 14.9 | 13.6 | -1.3 |
| Aaron Hicks | 10.9 | 9.6 | -1.3 |
| Pedro Severino | 0.4 | -0.8 | -1.3 |
| Omar Narváez | 9.0 | 7.7 | -1.3 |
| Freddie Freeman | 43.5 | 42.2 | -1.2 |
| Adam Eaton | 10.8 | 9.6 | -1.2 |
| Rougned Odor | 8.6 | 7.4 | -1.2 |
| Brandon Lowe | 14.1 | 12.9 | -1.2 |
| Mike Yastrzemski | 11.0 | 9.9 | -1.2 |
| Aaron Judge | 41.6 | 40.5 | -1.2 |
| Francisco Lindor | 43.7 | 42.6 | -1.1 |
| Leonys Martin | 4.7 | 3.6 | -1.1 |
| Eddie Rosario | 10.9 | 9.8 | -1.1 |
| Justin Turner | 27.9 | 26.8 | -1.1 |
| Matt Olson | 24.9 | 23.8 | -1.1 |
| Alex Verdugo | 9.2 | 8.1 | -1.1 |
| Kyle Seager | 17.7 | 16.6 | -1.1 |
If you have any questions, or notice any errors, please let us know in the comments.
David Appelman is the creator of FanGraphs.
Amazing!
One of the reasons I love FanGraphs is that you guys keenly understand that WAR is a process, not “the answer.”
Give me all the Tom Tango stats, hahaha
If only they would finally stop basing their Pitching WAR off of FIP…
I’ll take their raw RA9-WAR over rWAR for career totals eight days a week
Then fWAR for pitchers needs to switch to being based on RA9 instead of FIP, since we’ve long known that pitchers do in fact have significant control over their BABIP.
As it is, fWAR for pitchers is even worse than bWAR for pitchers due to being based on a heavily flawed theory that was debunked around 20 years ago.
I disagree. Between Jim Palmer’s 91.6 RA9-WAR and 67.6 rWAR, I’ll take the one that at least tries to take into account the effect of pitching in front of Brooks Robinson, Mark Belanger, Paul Blair, and Bobby Grich.
Now I’m sorting the pitching value columns by various measures and I wanted to pour one out for Glendon Rusch, who has the second most negative BIP wins of all time behind Jim Kaat, in one-third of Kaat’s innings. Rusch had -11.8 BIP wins out of 19.8 career fWAR, leaving him with 7.6 RA9-WAR. Weirdly, rWAR thinks he pitched in front of approximately scratch defenses and gives him 5.4 career rWAR.
Bruce Ruffin is even more extreme, with -8.4 BIP wins out of 13.7 fWAR, and Zach Duke had -8.3 BIP wins out of 15.4 fWAR, but they both made some of that back with LOB wins (2.4 for Ruffin, 5.5 for Duke). Ruffin has 9.8 rWAR and Duke has 10.7, both getting some credit for bad defenses but I guess not that much credit.
(There are some 19th century pitchers with truly freaky numbers, like John Coleman and Bill Stearns, but I’m chalking that up to “19th century baseball was weird.”)
Anyway I’m not saying rWAR is always better than RA9-WAR or fWAR, but they’re all worth looking at.
I respect that!
I just don’t like the rWAR methodology in accounting for defense…or their defensive stats.
The granularity of the Statcast numbers Tom uses in the Snell/Strider article he cites below are my ideal application of the rWAR concept.