Archive for Mike Jacobs

Yesterday, we took a look at what goes into infield defense by examining the cases of Mike Jacobs and Hanley Ramirez. Keeping with the themes of defense and, well, the Florida Marlins, I decided to check some data out at the suggestion of colleague Brian Cartwright. Brian astutely pointed out that both Ramirez and second baseman Dan Uggla have posted similar fielding numbers in the sense that both looked slightly different in 2006 and 2008 than they did the year in between.

Interestingly enough, Miguel Cabrera’s defense at third base has followed the same trend, -4 in 2006, -8 in 2007, and -4 in 2008. Of course, Cabrera did not play for the Marlins last season, and was replaced by Jorge Cantu, who proceeded to post a -6 UZR. Let’s visualize the overall UZR numbers for their infield in this span, stacked up next to each other:

Name      2006   2007   2008
Jacobs    -3.2   -4.1  -11.1
Uggla     +7.0   -9.6   +2.9 
Ramirez   -5.5  -19.1   -0.3
Cabrera*  -4.3   -8.1   -6.2

*-Cantu for 2008

In 2006, Jacobs and Cabrera were quite comparable. The next season, Jacobs declined slightly while Cabrera fell off much more, yet their infield peers, perhaps in trying to make up the difference, lost 14-16 runs from the year prior. Last season, the third base situation improved a bit and Ramirez bounced back fantastically. Conversely, Jacobs experienced a vast decrease in his defensive mark and Uggla gained 11-12 runs.

Their respective ranges produce similar results. While we might expect worse range from Jacobs and Cabrera/Cantu to lead to worse UZR marks for Uggla and Ramirez, there seems to be more at work here. Cabrera’s range decline of a couple of runs cannot be the sole contributing factor to Ramirez’s overall defensive mark falling completely off the chart. Likewise, how would Uggla get that much better if Jacobs also fell by the wayside?

As the Chase Utley/Ryan Howard example showed, where Utley posted a ridiculous + – score largely due to Howard’s lack of range, worse range at a position right next door can lead to more opportunities. Unfortunately, many forget that more opportunities can also lead to more failure, but Ramirez and Uggla did not cost their team drastically more error runs than they had in 2006, meaning their extra opportunities were not as detrimental as you might think.

As both MGL and I have shown here, more range actually leads to less errors, and vice versa, with less range leading to more errors, but even when the ranges of Ramirez and Uggla took significant hits in 2007, they did not experience huge shifts in errors compared to the league average fielder at their position.

It makes perfectly good intuitive sense that when the infielder playing next to you shows poor range, that your numbers would also suffer, but that does not seem to be the definitive case here. Perhaps something else is at work, like the pitchers being hit very hard, or both players experiencing the injury bug, but I do not have the end all solution here. Maybe a wisdom of the crowd approach would serve well to answer this question. So, what say you? Why would the defensive numbers of Ramirez and Uggla drop so drastically in 2007 when Jacobs and Cabrera did not take too significant of a hit? And why then would Ramirez and Uggla improve even though Jacobs severely worsened?

Royals skipper Trey Hillman recently spoke about the defense of his new first baseman, Mike Jacobs, subtly hinting that the numbers deeming him poor are not entirely accurate. Jacobs, according to Hillman, is very good at handling the 3-1 plays in which the first baseman lobs the ball to the pitcher covering the base, which apparently makes him much more of a solid fielder than meets the eye. Whenever I read quotes like this, or stories about players discussing the shortcomings of defensive metrics, I get a bit annoyed because it seems that those doing the talking have a complete lack of understanding of how the metrics work. Hillman may be an innocent bystander in all of this, but his words, for whatever reason, tipped me over the top.

Mike Jacobs, over the last three seasons, has the following UZR numbers: -3.2, -4.1, -11.1. His Dewan + – numbers further confirm the fielding ineptitude. But when managers or players hear numbers like this, they automatically assume it refers to errors made, which is utterly incorrect. Let’s look further at Jacobs, shall we? Thankfully, UZR breaks down where the runs saved/allowed come from, and a more granular analysis at Jacobs shows that he is quite adept in certain areas and equally awful in others.

Jacobs’ double play stats averaged around -0.4 runs/season, placing him right around average. His error runs, which show the runs saved via not making errors relative to the average player at the position, average out to +0.5 runs/season. Essentially, those defending Jacobs because he does not make many errors are correct, but not making errors does not automatically result in a solid fielder. The issue with Mike Jacobs is range, and the fact that he, well, does not have any. Over the last three years, his range has cost the team an average of -6.0 runs.

Put everything together and a player with an average -6.1 runs/season on defense emerges. Certainly not the worst fielder in the history of the sport, but by no means an effective one. Jacobs looks solid in terms of double plays and limiting errors, but his lack of range prevents him from reaching balls that other first basemen can glove. So, just because Jacobs has the reputation of being a poor fielder does not necessarily mean he stinks in every aspect of fielding, and along similar lines, the areas in which he performs well, though important to the mainstream, are not the sole barometers for defensive prowess.

Jacobs’ former teammate, Hanley Ramirez, is another interesting defensive case study, as HanRam has the reputation for being a Jeter-esque fielder despite two league average or slightly worse seasons out of three in the big leagues. That’s right, in 2006 and 2008, Hanley the Manly put up UZR marks of -5.5 and -0.3, respectively, which are much better than the numbers posted by Jacobs given the difficulty of the position. Via positional adjustments, remember that, assuming 162 games for each player, an SS with a -7.5 run defensive mark is equal in overall fielding value to a first baseman with a +12.5 defensive mark, because 1B is very easy to play relative to captaining the infield.

What earned Ramirez the reputation was his -19 run performance in 2007, but getting granular once more shows an interesting tell. Ramirez has been above average in ability to turn double plays in all three of his seasons, and his error runs are not necessarily the ultimate cause of his defensive downfall either, as the -7.3 ErrR in 2007 was not significantly higher than the -5.8 ErrR in 2006. Look at his range runs, though: -1.1, -13.3, +2.5.

In both 2006 and 2008, Ramirez was virtually league average in terms of range, but he lost everything in 2007. The three years may not be a large enough sample from which to draw any conclusions, but my gut instinct tells me that the 2007 season is more fluky than indicative of his true talent level. We have two players here, one of whom is a poor fielder that elicits defense from fans based on an ignorance of what actually goes into evaluating fielding, and another who has garnered a reputation in the mainstream for one really bad year that may very well go down as a fluke among flukes. The bottom line is that more goes into fielding valuations than simply the “ability” to not make errors, and understanding these components is a must in order to ever have intellectual discourse regarding the subject.

The title of this post should be taken quite literally. Cody Ross, a 5’9 outfielder of the Florida Marlins, may not intimidate opposing pitchers with his stature but he sure will with his bat. Over the last 14 days he has been the most productive major league player—hitter or pitcher—with a 1.44 WPA. The player closest to Ross is Jose Guillen, who has a 1.26 WPA in that same span. Ross has posted a .316/.386/.711 slash line in this span, complete with 3 2B, 4 HR, 2 SB, and 11 RBI.

Something really interesting regarding Ross’s numbers is his seasonal slash line: .228/.299/.535. Ross has an OPS of .834 that clearly consists primarily of his power. His ISO counts of this and last year back that up; .318 in 2007, .307 this year. Oddly enough, though, his BABIPs traveled in different directions; .374 last year, .191 this year. Last year’s very high BABIP led to a slash line of .335/.411/.653 in 66 games. With a 1.064 OPS last year Ross showed he could be a productive major leaguer but that OPS looks like a 50/50 balance when stacked up next to this year’s OBP and SLG.

I looked to see if there has been a significant number of instances in which players posted OPS totals above .830 with an OBP under .300 and found the answer to be a resounding no. In fact, since 1901, there have only been three hitters to accomplish this “feat” while playing 50 or more games:

1) Mike Jacobs, 2008: 54 GP, .847 OPS
2) Cody Ross, 2008: 50 GP, .834 OPS
3) Daryle Ward, 2000: 119 GP, .833 OPS

Now, granted Ross and Jacobs are still playing so it is not truly fair to list them alongside Ward; Daryle is the only person to do it for a whole season since 1901. There have likely been others to accomplish what Ross and Jacobs are doing during random 50-game spans but, right now, they are the only two players with these numbers.

For those unaware, Jacobs is also a member of the Marlins. Just two players this year have a sub-.300 OBP and .830+ OPS and both are on the same team. Overall, though, they’ll each need about 60+ games of similar production to reach the level of Ward.