Neil Weinberg: Hey all. Queue is open and we’ll begin at 3pm. Remember priority to stat/data/FG info questions, but anything is fair game. I’m @NeilWeinberg44 if you’re looking for me on Twitter. See you in a few.

Neil Weinberg: Alright. Let’s get started. A little light on questions so far, so today’s the day to get stuff answered.

Comment From 804NatsFan
What is that picture I see? Sandlot football for dads… w/ uniforms! (Sans helmets?)

Comment From zurzles
WHAT IS HAPPENING TO MY CHAT WHEN DID THIS HAPPEN AM I SAFE

Neil Weinberg: People have strong opinions!

Neil Weinberg: As always, if you know of a better service than CIL, we are all ears.

Neil Weinberg: Hi all, we’ll get started at 3pm but the queue is open. Remember that this chat prioritizes stat/data/FG/how does that work type questions, but everything is fair game.

If you’re looking for me, @NeilWeinberg44 on Twitter during non-chat hours.

Neil Weinberg: Alright, let’s discuss baseball! Keep the questions flowing.

Comment From Raymond
How exactly is WAR calculated?

Neil Weinberg: For position players: http://www.fangraphs.com/li…

Complete position player example: http://www.fangraphs.com/li…

Neil Weinberg: The pitcher one is a little more complicated and is out of date on the site. I’ll be updating that, hopefully very soon.

Comment From Matt (St. Louis)
When evaluating projected stats, is there a hierarchy you think works best to sort through players? Meaning, is it helpful to look at wRC+ first and then combine that with the best wOBA second, and so on.

Neil Weinberg: Hey all, queue is open and we’ll get going at 3pm! Priority to stat/data/FG questions, but anything is fair game. I’m @NeilWeinberg44 on Twitter if you’re looking for me. See you shortly.

Neil Weinberg: Alright, let’s consider important* topics (*-no guarantee of actual importance)

Comment From Pale Hose
Does Steamer project PAs? I know the projected PAs on the player pages on manually set by FG staff. Say Steamer projects a player for 200 PAs and FG manually adjusts to 400 PAs. Are the rates stats kept the same and counting stats double?

Neil Weinberg: Steamer projects PA, but FG also does custom playing time numbers. That said, Steamer is driving the rate stats 100%, so a .340 wOBA projection is a .340 wOBA projection whether we project 1 PA or 500 PA

Comment From Vslyke
How often do bugs like Nori Aoki’s -10 BsR pop up?

Neil Weinberg: I don’t know the official answer, but I seem to notice one or two mistakes a year…usually they are easy to correct, but sometimes not. I’m not sure exactly why we haven’t updated the database on that one, but he’s supposed to be a slightly above average runner this year

Neil Weinberg: Hey all. We’ll get started at 3pm. Remember, focus of this chat is stat/sabermetric/FG questions, but anything is fair game. Queue is open.

Also, if you need to reach me during the week for similar questions, I’m @NeilWeinberg44 on Twitter.

Comment From Pale Hose
Have you seen the fielding bible awards? Do you think that lineup plus an average pitching staff would be the best team in baseball 2015?

Neil Weinberg: /refreshes memory of winners

Neil Weinberg: Not a lock, but I think they would be close.

Neil Weinberg: That’s a good group.

Comment From Pale Hose
Hey Neil. How awkward do you think it is for Ned Colleti to go into work?

Neil Weinberg: Hey all, we’ll get started at 3pm. Remember this chat has a stat/sabermetrics/FG data focus, but anything is fair game. And I’m @NeilWeinberg44 on Twitter if you’re looking for some info during other parts of the week. Queue is open!

Neil Weinberg: Alright, shall we baseball chat?

Comment From mtsw
Which outfield prevents more runs: 2 Lorenzo Cains or 5 Fangraphs writers?

Neil Weinberg: I would think 2 Cains, but I guess I don’t know for sure the talent distribution of the staff. I would put my confidence at 95%.

Comment From John
Could you all ever add standings to team stat pages? It would make it a lot easier to test the effect of different variables on W/L records.

Neil Weinberg: You can use Team Pitcher W/L record to take care of that.

Neil Weinberg: Afternoon, all. We’ll get started at 3pm. Fill up the queue with your stats, data, FanGraphs type questions and then anything else related to baseball that might be on your mind.

I’m @NeilWeinberg44 on Twitter if you want to get in touch that way, too.

Neil Weinberg: Alright, let’s get started.

Neil Weinberg: Remember that we have live blogs during each world series game if you need more of this kind of thing. I will likely be hosting Saturday/Game 4.

Comment From mtsw
If AL teams were given the option to forego having a DH (their pitcher must bat) in exchange for being able to play an extra fielder (giving them 10 men in the field at once) would it be worth the tradeoff to do so?

Neil Weinberg: Let’s do some quick research

Neil Weinberg: AL DH: .327 wOBA
AL P: .101 wOBA

Neil Weinberg: Hey, we’ll get started at 3pm, but go ahead about post your questions now! Remember this chat is designed to help you understand the site, our data, and sabermetrics, but pretty much anything else baseball related is welcome. There’s also a game in an hour, so you’re welcome to hang out for the first few innings of that as well.

I’m @NeilWeinberg44 on Twitter if you’re looking for me throughout the week.

Neil Weinberg: Alright, let’s chat!

Comment From Mr Skeptic
Pitch framing. All of the work being done by various sites seems to indicate that framing is potentially a massive piece of the catcher’s defensive value puzzle. I do think that the good framers and bad framers are accurately reflected with the work being done but it’s the overall value I have trouble wrapping my head around. How much do you “believe” in the numbers that there are catchers out there capable of providing 2-3 wins of value on framing alone?

Neil Weinberg: I think this is still an open question. I believe that 2-3 wins is possible, but I don’t think we’ve fully resolved exactly the right way to measuring framing. It’s a real skill and one that influences the game, but I’m not sure if we have perfectly estimated the value of stealing a strike or if we’ve properly divided the credit between pitchers and catchers. We’re only a couple of years into real framing research and the data is less than a decade old. Room to grow.

Comment From Yosted
There seems to be a lot of disagreement on how much defense should weight into WAR. Have any regression analyses been performed to see what weighting most highly correlates with team success?

Neil Weinberg: I am blanking on who wrote about this recently, but I’m pretty sure the results suggested we are actually undervaluing defense slightly in WAR.

Neil Weinberg: Hi all. Queue is open and we’ll start at three. Basic reminder that this chat favors stat/FG/sabermetrics questions, but regular baseball stuff is cool too.

@NeilWeinberg44 is my Twitter handle if you want to get in touch another way.

Neil Weinberg: Alright, let’s discuss baseball and baseball stats. We could also pretend a baseball game happening, although that might get complicated.

Comment From Rob
Do you think Adam Eaton will consistently be a 4 to 5 WAR player, assuming he stays healthy?

Neil Weinberg: Was about a 3 WAR player in 538 PA this year, so he’d have to add 10-15 runs of value to do so. I think the 115-120 wRC+ range is about right, so he’d have to really start impressing the base running and defensive metrics. I think he’s good enough to do it in theory, but we’re talking about the stars all lining up. Expected a 2-3 WAR guy, be thrilled if he reaches that 4-5 WAR ceiling

Neil Weinberg: But I am generally fond of his skill set.

Comment From Jesse
Would a trade involving Jose Quintana and Mookie Betts make sense for both teams? The White Sox could potentially have Sale, Rodon,Danks and perhaps sign Shields or a lower tier guy like McCarthy.

Neil Weinberg: Hey everyone. We’ll get started at 3pm, but the queue is open. Remember, I focus on questions about our data/features/sabermetrics/etc, but regular questions are always welcome.

I’m @NeilWeinberg44 on Twitter if you’re looking for me and I publish updates to our Library on Fridays.

Hope you’re recovering nicely from last night!

Neil Weinberg: Afternoon, everyone who isn’t west of the pacific time zone. Morning to those of you who are.

Neil Weinberg: Let’s see about some baseball. I probably won’t run the usual two hours because there will be like 8000 hours of chats this week, but if you ask good questions I will go until my dog starts bugging me to play.

Comment From 1990JaromirJagr
Woof. the hardest part of my day was choosing my player of the year ballot. thank god the choice was easy with my pick of Mike Morse MVP!

Neil Weinberg: I don’t have a vote, which I’m a little relieved about. Picking the down ballot spaces is very hard. Which I guess is why we have the grading part. Lucroy or Cutch? How would you separate them?

Comment From Guest
it seems like this fall is the ideal time to trade Jose Bautista. He had a .404 OPS, 35 HR, 100+ RBIs ect, but he will be 34 shortly and will have a no-trade right as a 10 year player. What is a reasonable to Toronto, assuming they decide to sell high, ignoring the hole his trade would leave.

Neil Weinberg: Hey all. We’ll get started at 3pm. This chat specializes in answering stat/data/FG features questions but any and all baseball questions welcome.

I’m @NeilWeinberg44 on Twitter if you’re looking for me other times. It’s Fall now, so my dog stopped sleeping all day, which means he may attempt to type answers. Can’t really vouch for their quality.

Neil Weinberg: Alright, let’s chat! My dog doesn’t want to chill, so this may run shorter than normal, we’ll see. So get good questions in early! Also, person who always asks about catcher DRS, today is your day. I can answer that question!

Comment From Fronk
What do you think of Felix’s implosion last night? Kluber for Cy Young?

Neil Weinberg: I was a Sale supporter until his bad outing last week, but I think it’s Kluber at this point. I don’t know if he’ll win – that depends on the quality of the specific voting group. But Kluber’s got the best case.

Comment From Vslyke
If I’m trying to calculate a pitcher’s total WAR by adding in his hitting and defense, am I counting the positional adjustment twice?

Neil Weinberg: If you’re adding their WAR as a pitcher and their WAR as a position player, you are not double counting anything.