I feel like my Four Factors series, which has covered a few interesting hitters, has gone over well here. I felt that it could be more, however, and I believe I’ve taken the first step into making it more than a simple tool or rule of thumb. The following is more of a reference post than an analytical post, and as the title suggests, there will be some math involved here. What I put forth here also suggests a possible addition of a fifth (or sixth) factor, albeit one (or two) that appears to be much less important than the other four.

For the four factors to have more use besides as an at-a-glance hitter evaluation tool, it would have to mean something in terms of runs. For hitting, that means wOBA. A bridge between the Four Factors and wOBA would mean that we could find how meaningful it is that Ryan Howard has seen his strikeouts drop if his power returns to previous form, or how much better my boy George Kottaras would be with a respectable BABIP instead of his current .195 mark.

Of course, BB% and K% can give us raw (or, even better, per plate appearance) numbers for walks and strikeouts. Working to figure out the other four events – 1B, 2B, 3B, and HR – would give us a working estimate of wOBA. This can be done with the use of POWH (XB/H), the version of Isolated Power that only looks at slugging percentage on hits, and BABIP (H/BIP), the other two factors. These four relatively isolated hitting skills can almost completely account for a player’s overall line.

The tricky part comes with estimating home runs, because of the four stats we have, only two of them deal with contact, and of those, one deals with balls in play, excluding home runs. But we can solve for home runs as follows. Follow the jump for the math.

POWH*BABIP = (XB/H)*((H-HR)/BIP) where BIP = PA-BB-SO-HR, or balls in play. Now, it’s time to use some “fancy algebra,” which means a lot of steps. Note that instead of using PA, I use 1, as instead of calculating raw PA totals, I prefer per plate appearance totals for the results.

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With both myself and the newly arrived Carson Cistulli now residing in Madison, Wisconsin, the only natural thing to do would be to catch the main baseball fare of the city. That means heading down to the Duck Pond at Warner Field and catching a Northwoods League game with the Madison Mallards.

The Northwoods League is in the same vein as the Cape Cod League and many others in that it is a collegiate wood bat league. Outside of the fact that these players are amateurs, the Northwoods League models itself as a minor professional league, using the same rules and equipment. The league is in its 16th season and has graduated at least 48 MLB players and has seen 277 players drafted in the last two seasons alone. Notable alumni of the Mallards include Ian Kinsler and Ryan Spilborghs; others from around the league include Ben Zobrist, Andre Ethier, Max Scherzer, Curtis Granderson, and most recent graduate, newly debuted Cubs’ starter Thomas Diamond.

Mallards starter Matt Morgan (Purdue) was torched for a few singles in the first inning by the opposing Eau Claire Express, allowing three runs in the first inning. Felix Cardenas (University of Texas-Permian Basin), starting for Eau Claire, got touched up for three runs in the first inning as well, thanks to three well-struck doubles from Mallards hitters. After another two Express runs scored in the second, thanks partially to SS Ty Forney’s (Yavapai) second single of the game, Morgan settled in, striking out 9 (unofficial) batters in only five innings of work, walking two. But the Express, led by Forney and a two hit performance from Nathan Orf (University of Illinois-Chicago) did manage six runs off of Morgan.

Six would be just enough to hold off Madison, who despite a 3-5, 2 2B performance from Josh Parr (Illinois) and a 3-5, 2B performance from Carson Cistulli special Reed Gragnani (Virginia), couldn’t take home a win. With the score 6-5 in the bottom of the 9th, the Mallards put two on base, but #3 hitter Kyle Gaedele (Valparaiso) grounded into a double play (in a possible bunt situation!), and the Mallards’ rally died along with their chances of winning the game.

Carson has his own notes from the game, as follow:

• Firstly, it’s impossible not to note the quality of the facility (Madison’s Warner Park) and the excellent crowd in attendance. I’ve mentioned in both these and other pages how underwhelming the experience frequently is at Portland’s PGE Park, a stadium that was drawing fewer than 4000 fans per game this season despite a capacity of around 19,000. By contrast, the announced attendance at Warner was something like 6,700 — this despite the fact that Jack and I, eyeballing the stadium, figured it couldn’t have a capacity of much more than 5,000.

• Along the same lines as that first note, it’s also impossible to ignore the contributions of Warner Park PA announcer, who the internet says is named Aaron Sims. Sims talks constantly during the game and generally behaves unlike any other announce this author has ever come across. Example: Any fan who retrieves a foul ball can exchange said ball for a free hot dog. It’s for this reason that, any time a ball leaves the field of play, Sims says — in the most matter of fact way — he just says, “Wiener.” At one point, when a ball was hit over the backstop, but was just barely caught by the net that protects the fans back there, Sims said, “Rejected wiener.”

• In terms of performance, Mallards reliever and Santa Clara sophomore J.R. Graham displayed the best stuff of any pitcher. Throwing the 8th and 9th innings for the Mallards, Graham routinely hit 95 and 96 mph with his fastball — this while every other pitcher struggled to cross the 90 mph threshold. Graham complemented his fastpiece with an 85 mph slider that appears to be a decent, if not devastating, offering. Though he struck out two in this two innings of work, his strikeout totals for the summer (18 K in 26.0 IP) don’t appear to be in line with what I saw tonight. Nor were his numbers at Santa Clara off-the-charts awesome this year: 27.1 IP, 21 K, 10 BB). This is on a Santa Clara team that featured no fewer than four pitchers with K/9 above 9.00.

• Among batters, Madison’s Kyle Gaedele, who just finished his sophomore year at Valparaiso, looks the part of a prospect. He offers an interesting power-speed skillset, entering the game second on the Mallards in homers (6), first in triples (5), and first in stolen bases (23 in 25 attempts) in 247 at-bats. Interestingly, his numbers in college this season were almost identical: 236 AB, 8 3B, 7 HR, 17/17 SB. His plate discipline numbers (23 BB and 40 K in Madison, 23 BB and 42 K at Valpo) are also shockingly similar. Interesting note: Gaedele is the great-nephew of Eddie Gaedel, the 3’7″ player who became the shortest player to bat in a major league game, taking a plate appearance for the St. Louis Browns while wearing the jersey number 1/8.

• Finally, catcher Rafael Lopez had probably the hardest hit ball of the night — an opposite-field line-drive double almost all the way to the left-center wall. Though he doesn’t have a body you’d call “projectable” — he stands at 5’9″ — his numbers on the season are hard to ignore: 92 AB, .337/.436/.533, 14 BB, 11 K. This for a team with a collective line of .282/.369/.398. Lopez had a less impressive college season, slashing .278/.389/.397 for a talented Florida State team that slashed .300/.411/.496 as a team en route to an 18-12 record in the ACC.

And of course, it’s not a Wisconsin event without some fried cheese curds:

In the first inning of today’s game against the Toronto Blue Jays, Alex Rodriguez blasted his 600th career home run to dead center field off of Toronto starter Shaun Marcum. You can watch the video here.

Rodriguez becomes the seventh player to reach this milestone, and he does so at only 35 years old, suggesting that he may be able to chase 700 and the marks put up by Babe Ruth, Hank Aaron, and Barry Bonds. If Rodriguez can do anything near what either of these three monoliths put up after their age-34 seasons (Rodriguez turned 35 on July 27th, meaning he spent a majority of the 2010 season as a 34-year-old), even 800 home runs could be a possibility. Ruth had the weakest twilight years of the trio, with 198. Aaron blasted 245 in the eight seasons he played after turning 35, but that doesn’t quite touch Bonds’s 317. Of course, Bonds’s performance is covered by the shadow of the steroids era, but it still far outweighs the performance of any of his peers at that age.

Can Alex Rodriguez keep up his performance? Even though New Yankee Stadium favors left handed hitters more than right handed hitters, StatCorner’s park factors suggest it should still help Rodriguez in his quest for 800 or 762 or 755 or any other number he’s going after. The real question is if he can fend off the effects of aging long enough.

A-Rod’s power from ages 31-34 is trending down and right now it’s hard to imagine him rattling off another 200 home runs in his career to reach 800. It’s possible that 762 will be tough for him to reach, and we always have to account for the possibility of injury. However, Aaron had an even less impressive, albeit more consistent, stretch in that same time of his career, and he went on to be a tremendous slugger through age 40. Ruth’s career was simpler, as he steadily declined from utterly ridiculous to merely really good from age 32 to age 40, but Ruth’s power numbers were driven by a more balanced attack between doubles and home runs, whereas Aaron didn’t hit many doubles in his later career.

Alex Rodriguez has already cemented himself as one of the elite hitters in the game’s history at a relatively young age. Now the question becomes how much does he have left. He certainly has the chance to be the first player to reach 800 home runs stateside – one can never forget the great Sadaharu Oh and his 868 career Japanese home runs – but there’s also no guarantee, given the realities of injury and aging, that he can reach the records of Bonds and Aaron or even become the fourth player to reach 700 home runs. Over the next few years, we will find out if Rodriguez can join this pantheon of greats, but even if he doesn’t, this is an accomplishment to be celebrated.

In one of the most disappointing stories of the MLB season to date, Cleveland Indians’ catching phenom was put on the 15-day DL with a hyperextended knee and a high-grade LCL sprain. Santana will almost certainly miss a significant amount of time, if not the rest of the season, as high-grade LCL sprains can take up to 12 weeks to heal, and the Indians have no reason to rush Santana back to action given their spot in the cellar of the AL Central.

Even though it has been shortened or even prematurely ended, Carlos Santana’s 2010 season deserves celebration. Santana has been everything we though Matt Wieters would be, producing at a high level both at the plate and behind it. His .383 wOBA leads all AL catchers with at least 150 plate appearances. Putting up that kind of production at catcher is quite remarkable; in under 200 plate appearances prior to his injury, Santana managed 2.0 WAR. He has thrown out 12 of 34 (35%) of baserunners, too. Santana has brought the total package this season.

Of course, crazy things can happen in short samples. What Santana has shown so far, however, has been mastery of the game of strike zone and solid power. Santana’s 19.3% walk rate is easily tops in the majors amongst players with at least 150 PAs, 1.7 points above second place Jason Giambi. His 19.3% strikeout rate is below the league average. That means Santana makes a good amount of contact, and when he does make contact, he makes things happen. His .207 ISO (13 2B, 6 HR) is 141% of league average. The only thing preventing Santana’s wOBA from topping the .400 mark is a .277 BABIP. If that goes up and the peripheral stats remain – certainly not a lock, given the small sample, but a possibility given Santana’s pedigree – we could be looking at one of the best players in Major League Baseball.

This season was only a taste of how good Carlos Santana can be. Hopefully he recovers quickly and can get back to doing what he’s done in 2010, not only for the Cleveland Indians and their fans, but for Major League Baseball as well.

The Braves called up RHP Chris Resop back in June, mainly in order to avoid losing him to an out clause in his contract. Resop appeared in only one Major League game, on June 15th, before missing time due to an oblique injury. Apparently, the Braves feel as if they need his 40-man roster spot, as they have requested outright waivers, according to Dave O’Brien of the Atlanta Journal Constitution.

It’s easy to get confused about what kind of waivers mean what (I know I was), so we’ll let Biz of Baseball explain outright waivers here.

A club that wishes to remove a player from its 40-man roster but keep him in its minor-league system must first place him on outright or special waivers. Outright waivers are not revocable, so a player claimed on outright waivers may not be pulled back by his original club. When a player in the middle of a guaranteed contract is claimed on waivers, the claiming club pays $20,000 and a pro-rated portion of the league minimum salary, with the original club remaining responsible for paying the rest of the money due under the contract. A club may not request outright waivers on a player with a complete no-trade clause or on a player ten-and-five rights.

So it appears that Chris Resop will be up for grabs. It’s not terribly surprising that a 28 year old with 27 innings of MLB experience and -0.2 WAR in that time is put on waivers, but Resop isn’t your typical player. He has moved from outfielder to reliever and now to starter in his time in the minor leagues, and he looked phenomenal in AAA this season. Resop struck out 87 batters in just under 80 innings for AAA Gwinnett while inducing grounders on just under 50% of his balls in play. His 2.78 FIP was deflated by a low HR rate, but it’s hard to argue with the strikeout numbers, even with a walk rate just over 3.

Unfortunately, none of the systems we use here at FanGraphs have projections for Resop except for Marcel, which projects the league average due to a nearly complete lack of MLB information. As such, it’s hard to put a concrete value on Resop, due to his lack of time as a starter and his advanced age for the league. But it’s also hard to imagine a situation where all 30 teams can’t find a 25-man roster spot for a player with a solid fastball and those kinds of numbers in AAA. If Resop clears waivers, some GMs are going to have some explaining to do.

In case you’re unaware, one of the biggest pitching prospects in Major League Baseball made his debut last night. It wasn’t met with the hype and festivity of Strasmas, but Helloween certainly did not disappoint.

Helloween, of course, refers to the Rays’ Jeremy Hellickson. Hellickson’s debut came against a depleted Twins’ lineup – without both Joe Mauer and Justin Morneau – but it’s hard not to be impressed by his performance. The Twins mustered only two runs off Hellickson on three hits, a home run, and two walks. Hellickson struck out six Twins, including three against Jim Thome, one of the best power hitters in the history of the game.

Hellickson flashed three solid pitches last night (Brooks Baseball has the Pitch F/X values on the game). His fastball drew five swinging strikes and sat in the low-90s. His changeup was nearly 10 miles per hour slower, and was a nasty pitch for Hellickson, drawing six whiffs on only 26 pitches. With 15 overall strikes out of those 26 changeups it could mean that the best pitch in Hellickson’s arsenal is his changeup. He also showed a curveball, throwing a whopping 14 of 17 for strikes, even though “only” three of them were whiffs, for a still solid 17% whiff rate.

Helloween, for now, will be short lived. The Rays have already optioned Hellickson back to the minor leagues and will be bringing up first baseman Dan Johnson to shore up the bench and fill in for an injured Carlos Pena. That certainly doesn’t mean that we won’t be seeing more Hellickson as the season goes; right now, though, the Rays are set in the rotation and have no reason to stash a top prospect like this in the bullpen and possibly damage his development.

As our own R.J. Anderson reminds us, it’s only one start. But it’s one start backed up by a fantastic minor league career and an absolutely ridiculous arsenal of pitches. He’s not up for good, but he will be soon, and he could be one of the best, so get excited, fans of the Rays and fans of pitchers everywhere.

Given the minimal returns for players like Dan Haren, Roy Oswalt, and Lance Berkman at the deadline, it’s hard to consider this year’s trade market as anything other than a buyer’s market. As such, one would expect that a team like the Pittsburgh Pirates, looking to sell at the deadline, would have to settle for a disappointing return, particularly given the performance of their trade pieces this season. I wrote back in June about their relatively bleak trading prospects:

The obvious answer is to sell; what’s less obvious is who to sell. Octavio Dotel is an interesting flamethrowing reliever, but he’s performed right around replacement level this season. Akinori Iwamura likely doesn’t have a future with this Pirates team, but given his terrible performance this year, the return for him would be minimal, and similarly for Ryan Church and Brendan Donnelly. Right now, this Pirates team really doesn’t have anybody to sell.

Dotel has picked up his performance since the writing, but Church has been horrendous and both Iwamura and Donnelly have been designated for assignment. The Pirates also managed to move Bobby Crosby, D.J. Carrasco and Javier Lopez, who compiled a grand total of -0.2 WAR in 2010 and aren’t projected to get much better. These three, along with Dotel and Church, were owed about $4.5 million for the rest of the season. Given the fact that the Astros and Indians had to throw money into trades with the Yankees, it seems hard to believe that the Pirates could acquire value for this ragtag group without at least throwing in a significant sum of cash.

That, however, is exactly what Neal Huntington managed to do, turning this group of players into Chris Snyder, John Bowker, Joe Martinez, Pedro Ciriaco, James McDonald, Andrew Lambo, and, perhaps most shockingly, $2.5 million dollars. Snyder is likely the only player who will make an immediate impact at the Major League level, but he’s a good player, with a bat above the league average at the catcher position. McDonald may also have a quick impact, either in the bullpen or in the starting rotation. The rest have varying statuses, from utilityman ceiling to legitimate but troubled prospect to junkballing righty. Still, this is a group that at worst contains an above-average MLB catcher and at best could produce two or three more starting players for the Pirates. Given the fact that the Pirates traded essentially useless players with limited team control to acquire this group, that’s a big time win, and the kind of moves that teams in the Pirates position need to make.

Now, none of these deals are going to catapult the Pirates into contention next year or anything like that. None of it will matter if players like Jose Tabata, Neil Walker, and Brad Lincoln, among others, can’t turn into contributors for the Major League ball club. But if the Pirates’ core of young players can reach their ceilings, they will need supporting players to bring them to the playoffs. This deadline, the Pirates picked up a group of talented players under team control for a long time. The aforementioned group could form the supporting cast that brings a playoff berth to Pittsburgh in 2014 or 2015. Neal Huntington’s Pirates are certainly headed in the right direction, and although it’s hard to be excited about a team that’s 32 games below .500, there is hope in Pittsburgh.

Rick Ankiel and Kyle Farnsworth represented exactly why so many in the sabermetric community constantly deride Dayton Moore and the front office in Kansas City. “Trusting the process” meant bringing in players like Ankiel and Farnsworth and paying them way too much money, given Kansas City’s lack of big-time Major League talent outside of Zack Greinke and Joakim Soria. Contracts like those given to this pair of players are why the Royals franchise has been stagnant for my entire lifetime, and why another sub-.500, fourth or fifth place season is inevitable in Kansas City.

It’s not that Ankiel and Farnsworth are terrible players – Ankiel has good power and can play solid defense in a corner spot. Farnsworth throws hard enough to get strikeouts, and his control is better than perceived, making him a good, but not great relief pitcher. Both players are decent pieces on playoff teams, but aren’t going to do anything for a rebuilding franchise. Throw in the fact that these two players make a combined 7.25M this season (including option buyouts) and there was no reason that the Royals shouldn’t try and move the pair at the deadline, even if it was just for salary relief.

The Royals brought in more than salary relief in their deal with Atlanta, as Gregor Blanco, Tim Collins, and Jesse Chavez will join the Royals organization. This isn’t exactly a big time haul, but there is a discernible amount of talent present here. Blanco, 26, isn’t exactly much of a prospect any more. He has a decent eye at the plate and good speed, but no power to speak of and average contact skills. ZiPS projects a .305 wOBA with a 11% walk rate, which will make for an okay role player if he can handle center field, but not much more.

Bryan Smith covered Tim Collins earlier, as he was part of the package Atlanta brought in for Yunel Escobar.

In terms of pedigree, it’s outrageous to think that 5-foot-7, 155-pound Tim Collins could rank ahead of Reyes, a big-bodied former second-round pick. This is the type of thinking that Collins has long been susceptible to, and the thinking he’s consistently outpaced. In 130 games at the minor league level over four years, Collins has a 2.40 ERA, 13.6 K/9 ratio and 5.9 H/9 ratio. He lives in the strike zone, and brings deception and sneaky velocity everytime he touches the mound… It’s hard to think that Collins has a long career ahead of him, but naysaying this guy has essentially become pointless.

Jesse Chavez is a replacement level, super fly-ball reliever who misses enough bats to draw strikeouts but just can’t keep the ball in the park. His presence in this deal is negligible.

Overall, this isn’t exactly a huge win for Kansas City, and the players that the Braves are bringing in will certainly help them in their stretch run. However, this deal is a step in the right direction by the KC front office, as they managed to dump some salary and bring back some potential value in the process. It won’t matter if they continue to make the same mistakes in the free agent market that they have in the past. Still, it’s hard to argue with the process employed by Dayton Moore and the rest of his front office here.

Details aren’t official yet, but Lance Berkman will be a Yankee within 24 hours, according to Joel Sherman. Berkman will ostensibly become the DH for New York, supplanting Marcus Thames and Juan Miranda, and will also be able to fill in for Mark Teixeira at first base.

Berkman is in the middle of a down year right now, mostly due to a career low .279 BABIP. His power is down as well, as his .191 ISO is his first ISO below .200 since his first season in the big leagues, 1999. As such, 2010 has been Berkman’s worst full major league season. Still, he’s been productive. His wRC+ of 123 is solid, even at first base, as evidenced by his 1.9 WAR in 385 PAs. The plate discipline is as good as ever, as Berkman is walking a remarkable 16.8% of the time – 195% of the league average.

It’s not likely that Berkman will ever repeat his 162 wRC+ seasons of 2008 and 2006, given that this is Berkman’s age 34 season. However, there is reason to believe that he will improve. Power numbers can fluctuate wildly over the course of even half a season. ZiPS projects that Berkman will put up a line of .268/.386/.486 for the rest of the season – a roughly 140 wRC+. That’s a major improvement over the below average hitters that the Yankees are currently running out as DHes in Juan Miranda and Marcus Thames, and it also beats the projection for Jorge Posada, who has actually seen the most PAs at DH of the entire Yankees squad.

This one’s exceedingly simple for the Yankees. With Nick Johnson injured, DH was a bit of a weakness. Apparently, the cost for Berkman is minimal in terms of prospects, and the Yankees can easily absorb the roughly $6M remaining on his $14.5M contract – Buster Olney even reports that the Astros will pick up a significant portion of the money remaining. Berkman should be able to add roughly a win over Thames and Miranda over the course of the season, and there’s a chance that he sees a rebirth of his power in New Yankee Stadium, particularly batting left handed. Between the switch hitters Berkman, Mark Teixeira, Nick Swisher, and Jorge Posada, the Yankees will also have a lineup that won’t be susceptible to specialist relievers. The Yankees used their cash reserves to effectively buy another hitter for the stretch run, and an impressive Yankees lineup will only get better now.

Word from CBS Sports’s Scott Miller is that Matt Capps will be heading from Washinton to Minnesota. Going to the nation’s capital from Minnesota’s capital will be AAA catching prospect Wilson Ramos.

Matt Capps has had a solid season, including an All-Star appearance, coming off of a questionable non-tender from the Pittsburgh Pirates. He’s not quite as good as his 2.80 ERA or 25 saves would suggest, but all of his peripherals suggest that he is an above average reliever. He misses about as many bats (9.4% swinging strike rate) as the average reliever but has good control, walking fewer than two batters per 9 inning both this year and for his career. Capps has also increased his ground ball rate about 7% so far this season, and as ground ball rate stabilizes relatively quickly, that is a great sign going forward. ZiPS projects a 3.69 FIP going forward, which is good for roughly 0.3-0.4 WAR for the rest of the season.

The Twins already carry Jesse Crain, Jon Rauch, Pat Neshek, Matt Guerrier, and Ron Mahay, who all have FIPs below 4.00. However, only Mahay has an xFIP below 4.00, suggesting that their FIPs are either aided by HR luck or the effects of Target Field, which aren’t known exactly yet. Capps likely becomes the best reliever on the team, and should enter the closer’s role immediately. Capps won’t be a huge upgrade over Rauch, but due to the effects of bullpen chaining, the addition of Capps helps the entire bullpen.

It does seem pretty disappointing, however, that Capps is the return for Ramos after he was rumored to be half of a trade for Cliff Lee. Ramos, 22, is struggling at AAA but had a very solid 21 year old season in AA, hitting .330/.352/.447. That kind of bat could play well at catcher, and his skills will be covered in greater depth in the other side of this trade analysis.

This one’s pretty simple for the Twins. They upgrade the front end of their bullpen, but at the expense of a promising talent at catcher. Just as far as the short term goes, the Twins obviously come out ahead, as Capps is a solid reliever and immediately becomes the best on the team. He’s not a great reliever, though, and the effect probably won’t be as high as his low ERA would suggest. I just wonder if the return for Ramos could have been more.