Any statisticians around? Warning: Math!

[Guest]

Forget anything else...forget how many runs, how many hits, how man wins....just forget it all for 10 minutes.

Is the catcher one of the more important positions or is it like Chevy suggests:
CHEVY>> Historically catchers have just been a bunch of fat guys that squat there and throw the ball to the pitcher.
That's what a catcher is


If you believe that, then you are not worth debating with anymore.

The catcher is one of the most important positions, and if you don't agree, perhaps you can agree that it is at least more important than LF.
But do your WAR comparisons between LF and CATCHERS.

Sure Chevy says they subtract x points for LF, and add 99 points for catchers, and that the math they used is scientific.

Come on...don't make me laugh so hard.

Chevy also told me he is a salesman in his real job...so calculate that in the equation.
Sorry, I am not buying.

Rpos is a component of RAR that I had no part in creating.

It is designed to adjust the positions in terms of RAR, which plays a role in the formation of WAR.

99 'points' are not added for Catchers. Johnny Bench' career Rpos is 99, meaning over the course of his career he received 99 bonus runs because he was a catcher.

This number was not chosen by me. It was not 'chosen' by anyone. It was determined by statistics. Statistics I played no role in developing.

99 points, runs, whatever .....
it was a variable given because he was a catcher. There was a formula "created" that derived that number 99, which no one can suggest is "scientific".

How can you make a statement when you have not even seen the formula that determines Rpos!

It is ridiculous for you (or anyone) to make a judgement on something you have never seen and never used.

 

[hofautos]

[quote="Chris Levy":3w2odbnv]

Forget anything else...forget how many runs, how many hits, how man wins....just forget it all for 10 minutes.

Is the catcher one of the more important positions or is it like Chevy suggests:
CHEVY>> Historically catchers have just been a bunch of fat guys that squat there and throw the ball to the pitcher.
That's what a catcher is


If you believe that, then you are not worth debating with anymore.

The catcher is one of the most important positions, and if you don't agree, perhaps you can agree that it is at least more important than LF.
But do your WAR comparisons between LF and CATCHERS.

Sure Chevy says they subtract x points for LF, and add 99 points for catchers, and that the math they used is scientific.

Come on...don't make me laugh so hard.

Chevy also told me he is a salesman in his real job...so calculate that in the equation.
Sorry, I am not buying.

Rpos is a component of RAR that I had no part in creating.

It is designed to adjust the positions in terms of RAR, which plays a role in the formation of WAR.

99 'points' are not added for Catchers. Johnny Bench' career Rpos is 99, meaning over the course of his career he received 99 bonus runs because he was a catcher.

This number was not chosen by me. It was not 'chosen' by anyone. It was determined by statistics. Statistics I played no role in developing.

99 points, runs, whatever .....
there was some variable awarded because he was a catcher. There was a formula "created" that derived that award, which no one can suggest is "scientific".

How can you make a statement when you have not even seen the formula that determines Rpos!

It is ridiculous for you (or anyone) to make a judgement on something you have never seen and never used.[/quote:3w2odbnv]

How? Because it doesn't take a rocket scientist to realize it is impossible to assign a variable to a position player to determine a mathematical truth.
And it should be apparent to anyone, even if they had no sense of logic, because of the results it produces.

 

[hofautos]

^^^ My guess is that the author, in picking his arbitrary formula for catcher, was not clever enough to come up with a formula that would not put all catchers up too high, so he worked with what he could. He should acknowledge his error and create a WARv2. I am sure he already has someone working on it, and if not, he's an idiot.

 

[hofautos]

^^^ Baseball References "HOF Monitor" suggests using a different catcher variable dependant on how many games they caught.
That is not "bad", But what would be better is if they considered a derivative of defense and games, and because a catcher handles the ball more than ANY other player, his defense "weight" should be way up there, which could be a combination of both defense and innings caught. Sure offense numbers count, but this weight should be a pretty decent weight as well.

example....a great catcher with a .275 BA could easily be considered greater than a great left fielder with a 300 BA if both had 30HRs and great defensive skills.

I am not suggesting any specific variable here, so please don't start...I am just suggesting one reasonable possibility.

Or another possibility is to use totally different statistics for catchers as other position players just like they do for pitchers.

 

[Guest]

^^^ Baseball References "HOF Monitor" suggests using a different catcher variable dependant on how many games they caught.
That is not "bad", But what would be better is if they considered a derivative of defense and games, and because a catcher handles the ball more than ANY other player, his defense "weight" should be way up there, which could be a combination of both defense and innings caught. Sure offense numbers count, but this weight should be a pretty decent weight as well.

example....a great catcher with a .275 BA could easily be considered greater than a great left fielder with a 300 BA if both had 30HRs and great defensive skills.

I am not suggesting any specific variable here, so please don't start...I am just suggesting one reasonable possibility.

Or another possibility is to use totally different statistics for catchers as other position players just like they do for pitchers.

Sigh. That Catcher WOULD receive a higher WAR than that Leftfielder because of Rpos. See, you clearly don't understand how it works.

1974
C Johnny Bench: .280 BA, 33 HR, 9 Rpos, 7.6 WAR
LF Willie Stargell: .301 BA, 25 HR, -7 Rpos, 5.9 WAR

 

[hofautos]

^^^ Baseball References "HOF Monitor" suggests using a different catcher variable dependant on how many games they caught.
That is not "bad", But what would be better is if they considered a derivative of defense and games, and because a catcher handles the ball more than ANY other player, his defense "weight" should be way up there, which could be a combination of both defense and innings caught. Sure offense numbers count, but this weight should be a pretty decent weight as well.

example....a great catcher with a .275 BA could easily be considered greater than a great left fielder with a 300 BA if both had 30HRs and great defensive skills.

I am not suggesting any specific variable here, so please don't start...I am just suggesting one reasonable possibility.

Or another possibility is to use totally different statistics for catchers as other position players just like they do for pitchers.

Sigh. That Catcher WOULD receive a higher WAR than that Leftfielder because of Rpos. See, you clearly don't understand how it works.

1974
C Johnny Bench: .280 BA, 33 HR, 9 Rpos, 7.6 WAR
LF Willie Stargell: .301 BA, 25 HR, -7 Rpos, 5.9 WAR

No, that shows that I do understand how it works. It does use some arbitrary formula to attempt to compensate for position...which is what i said.
THey just don't compensate properly.
but see if you can dig a little deeper and find .275 vs .300 and equal HR and equal defense.

I also said that is one example...try different positions...try 1B.

What do you suggest is the importnace of each position...put them in order of what you consider least important to most important, and we can play ball.

 

[hofautos]

it would be nice to have the author or any member of the WAR team here so we can get some straight answers.

Also interesting is that Fangraphs and Baseball reference publish different WAR values. That makes me think that there is some "tweaking" going on, or has already gone on. Of course the team that doesn't publish disclaimers about margins of errors or inaccuracies may tweak things without version control.

Anyone else here know WAR? Wheres that tribe guy :?:

 

[fonda1119]

it would be nice to have the author or any member of the WAR team here so we can get some straight answers.

Also interesting is that Fangraphs and Baseball reference publish different WAR values. That makes me think that there is some "tweaking" going on, or has already gone on. Of course the team that doesn't publish disclaimers about margins of errors or inaccuracies may tweak things without version control.

Anyone else here know WAR? Wheres that tribe guy :?:

Please go here to read all about WAR before you talk about it anymore.

 

[elmalo]

Is this thread really 21 pages? I agree catching is an important position, in fact I would put it right after ss, but that doesnt mean that bc Johnny Bench was the greatest atcher ever that he is one of the top 50 players ever. Especially since we are talking about over 100 years of baseball!

 

[hofautos]

Is this thread really 21 pages? I agree catching is an important position, in fact I would put it right after ss, but that doesnt mean that bc Johnny Bench was the greatest atcher ever that he is one of the top 50 players ever. Especially since we are talking about over 100 years of baseball!

Well WAR says he is the greatest catcher ever, and I agree.
Sorry, I don't see any logic where 10 pitchers can make top 50 before one catcher, given the fact that a pitcher only pitchers 1 in 4/5 games.

Unless the WAR authors suggest that pitcher WAR values cannot be compared against position values on the same scale as Chevy has done.

And even if that is the case (Chevy seems to place pitchers in the same list as position players in defining greatest), I want someone that knows WAR well enough that can explain to me the magic formula they use when assigning different values to different positions.

And if they seperate out pitchers from positions, why not just compare like positions, and don't use a delta for different positions.

 

[hofautos]

it would be nice to have the author or any member of the WAR team here so we can get some straight answers.

Also interesting is that Fangraphs and Baseball reference publish different WAR values. That makes me think that there is some "tweaking" going on, or has already gone on. Of course the team that doesn't publish disclaimers about margins of errors or inaccuracies may tweak things without version control.

Anyone else here know WAR? Wheres that tribe guy :?:

Please go here to read all about WAR before you talk about it anymore.

Mr apr 2010 9 poster, please tell me who you are?
Will going there tell me why fangraphs and and baseball reference publlish different WAR values? If so, i don't see it...please enlighten me.

 

[tribefan26]

Anyone else here know WAR? Wheres that tribe guy :?:

I'm here - I just got tired of trying to teach a blind man what the sun looks like.

 

[hofautos]

Anyone else here know WAR? Wheres that tribe guy :?:

I'm here - I just got tired of trying to teach a blind man what the sun looks like.

Good, then you are almost as good as I am....so are you deeply involved with WAR?
Besides Chevy, whom I lost my faith in, no one else seems to know this WAR stuff very well that has visited yet besides you that I know of, and hoping you can enlighten me on magic formulas in assigning to compensate for different positions and if WAR values are supposed to allow you to compare pitchers to position players on the same scale as Chevy has done.

 

[Anthony K.]

Forget anything else...forget how many runs, how many hits, how man wins....just forget it all for 10 minutes.

Is the catcher one of the more important positions or is it like Chevy suggests:
CHEVY>> Historically catchers have just been a bunch of fat guys that squat there and throw the ball to the pitcher.
That's what a catcher is


If you believe that, then you are not worth debating with anymore.

The catcher is one of the most important positions, and if you don't agree, perhaps you can agree that it is at least more important than LF.
But do your WAR comparisons between LF and CATCHERS.

Sure Chevy says they subtract x points for LF, and add 99 points for catchers, and that the math they used is scientific.

Come on...don't make me laugh so hard.

Chevy also told me he is a salesman in his real job...so calculate that in the equation.
Sorry, I am not buying.

Throughout this entire thread you have combined his first and last name into an arbitrary name for him. Why?

A few pages back, you mentioned you "probably have a higher iq then the guy who created WAR". Can you back that up please?

Why are you so hung up that a catcher MUST be one of the 50 greatest players, based on their 5 best seasons?

How can you call Chris Levy shallow, when you yourself are shallow as well?

Why exactly, outside of the fact that a catcher isn't one of them, are you so against pWAR determining that the 52 players he listed are the best players BASED ON THEIR BEST FIVE SEASONS?

Why haven't you come up with your own formula by now and shown everyone who the 50ish best players are based on your formula?

How are you going to prove a player's greatness?

I am out of questions, but most of these have been nagging at me for about 10 pages now. Feel free to respond, if you don't, no harm no foul. Just felt like puting them out there.

 

[hofautos]

Why exactly are you so against pWAR determining that the 52 players he listed are the best players BASED ON THEIR BEST FIVE SEASONS?

AK, the answer is logic, and if you don't know logic, I understand why i nag you...there are other threads.
If you agree with his top 52 players of all time, good he needed company.

He lists 15 pitchers and no catcher. If you don't see that as a problem then more power to you.
Perhaps his biggest problem is comparing pitchers to hitters on the same scale...that is why I want someone that knows WAR.
They probably should not be on the same scale, and he just doesn't know better.

But you can stand up for the guy that can invite me in chat and then throw FU all around and calling me demeaning names because of his lack in logic and debating abilities, and you can agree with his logic all you want.

The top 52 players of all time...

52. Arky Vaughan - SS - Pittsburgh Pirates
51. Home Run Baker - 3B - Philadelphia Athletics
T-49. Ron Santo - 3B - Chicago Cubs
T-49. Charlie Gehringer - 2B - Detroit Tigers
48. Robin Roberts - P - Philadelphia Phillies
47. Steve Carlton - P - Philadelphia Phillies
46. Pedro Martinez - P - Boston Red Sox
45. Mel Ott - OF - New York Giants
T-43. Randy Johnson - P - Seattle Mariners
T-43. Shoeless Joe Jackson - OF - Cleveland Naps
42. Bob Feller - P - Cleveland Indians
41. Eddie Mathews - 3B - Milwaukee Braves
40. Juan Marichal - P - San Francisco Giants
T-38. Ken Griffey - OF - Seattle Mariners
T-38. Tom Seaver - P - New York Mets
37. George Brett - 3B - Kansas City Royals
T-35. Gaylord Perry - P - San Francisco Giants
T-35. Joe DiMaggio - OF - New York Yankees
34. Cal Ripken - SS - Baltimore Orioles
33. Carl Yastrzemski - OF - Boston Red Sox
32. Ernie Banks - 1B - Chicago Cubs
31. Cy Young - P - Boston Americans
30. Wade Boggs - 3B - Boston Red Sox
29. Sandy Koufax - P - Los Angeles Dodgers
28. Ed Walsh - P - Chicago White Sox
27. Rickey Henderson - OF - Oakland Athletics
26. Jackie Robinson - 2B - Brooklyn Dodgers
25. Lefty Grove - P - Philadelphia Athletics
24. Roger Clemens - P - Boston Red Sox
23. Christy Mathewson - P - New York Giants
22. Jimmie Foxx - 1B - Philadelphia Athletics
21. Hank Aaron - OF - Milwaukee Braves
T-19. Bob Gibson - P - St. Louis Cardinals
T-19. Mike Schmidt - 3B - Philadelphia Phillies
18. Pete Alexander - P - Philadelphia Phillies
17. Nap Lajoie - 2B - Cleveland Naps
16. Alex Rodriguez - SS - New York Yankees
15. Albert Pujols - 1B - St. Louis Cardinals
14. Stan Musial - 1B - St. Louis Cardinals
13. Tris Speaker - OF - Cleveland Indians
T-11. Eddie Collins - 2B - Chicago White Sox
T-11. Joe Morgan - 2B - Cincinnati Reds
10. Honus Wagner - SS - Pittsburg Pirates
9. Willie Mays - OF - San Francisco Giants
8. Lou Gehrig - 1B - New York Yankees
7. Walter Johnson - P - Washington Senators
6. Ted Williams - OF - Boston Red Sox
5. Ty Cobb - OF - Detroit Tigers
4. Mickey Mantle - OF - New York Yankees
3. Rogers Hornsby - 2B - St. Louis Cardinals
2. Barry Bonds - OF - San Francisco Giants
1. Babe Ruth - OF - New York Yankees

 

[Anthony K.]

Why exactly are you so against pWAR determining that the 52 players he listed are the best players BASED ON THEIR BEST FIVE SEASONS?

AK, the answer is logic, and if you don't know logic, I understand why i nag you...there are other threads.
If you agree with his top 52 players of all time, good he needed company.

He lists 15 pitchers and no catcher. If you don't see that as a problem then more power to you.
Perhaps his biggest problem is comparing pitchers to hitters on the same scale...that is why I want someone that knows WAR.
They probably should not be on the same scale, and he just doesn't know better.

But you can stand up for the guy that can invite me in chat and then throw FU all around and calling me demeaning names and agree with his logic all you want.

I know logic. I never said you nag me (that's what my wife does ).

I've stood up for far worse people than Mr. Levy in my time, so if a few **** you's and some name calling on the internet rankles you so much, so be it.

I have no problem with you, so I hope you aren't taking it that way, it just seems that 80% of your posts in this thread have been about what YOU feel the top 50 should have in it and how Johnny Bench MUST be on any top 50 list for said list to be taken seriously.

As I said before, I have thoroughly enjoyed reading this thread and learning from it (there has been plenty in it to be learned) and I have also been able to realize that his original pWAR (of 5 years) was used to establish the greatest players in the HOF and eligible for the HOF based on their five BEST seasons.

I still don't know why certain people come into the thread just to star **** with Chris though. A few have popped in to contribute nothing to the conversation and to attempt to discredit or insult anything he has done.

Really showing the true character of some people.

To end my long post, I would be interested in seeing a formula you come up with to determine greatness and the greatest players. I enjoy stats but I am not as good at math as I was when it was just Algebra and Geometry in HS (two college math classes proved this to me), so I enjoy seeing others' formula's and stats and how they are used and applied.

 

[hofautos]

^^^ the FU's and name calling doesn't wrinkle my feathers at all. In fact, it is at that point that I realized I won the debate that he invited me to (actually i knew I won before i started, that was just the point where I feel he conceded). I just was explaining to you why I lost my respect for him. I stood up for him in the beginning, and I still commend him on his efforts, and I do like the pWAR.

Johnny Bench doesn't need to be on a top 52 list to gain my acceptance, but every list i have seen so far (and there are plenty of them out there) has Bench in top 50. I have played top 100 so many times. But my biggest problem is having 15 pitchers before one catcher.

As far as how I would rate the best players, if you really read all the pages as you stated, you would have already seen my suggestions.
Best way would be to rate by position, not on one scale, but if you feel the need to have one scale, don't use just a 5 year. I commended him, and believe that is a good basis, but added longevity career numbers should be figured in. Also whatever "arbitrary" formula WAR used to assign to catchers needs work IMHO, unless someone that knows WAR enough that can logically justify their formula to my satisfaction, I won't accept it.

That would be a good start for best. If you want to talk greatest instead of best, IMHO, that is even more subjective, and could be modified even more based on what the individual perceives as greatest. In any "greatest" list that I would author, all positions would be represented. But I conceded, that I was not going to debate subjective material of that caliber in this thread.

 

[Anthony K.]

^^^ the FU's and name calling doesn't wrinkle my feathers at all. In fact, it is at that point that I realized I won the debate. I just was explaining to you why I lost my respect for him. I stood up for him in the beginning, and I still commend him on his efforts, and I do like the pWAR.

Johnny Bench doesn't need to be on a top 52 list to gain my acceptance, but every list i have seen so far (and there are plenty of them out there) has Bench ini top 50. I have played top 100 so many times. But my biggest problem is having 15 pitchers before one catcher.

As far as how I would rate the best players, if you really read the all the pages as you stated, you would have already seen my suggestions.
Best way would be to rate by position, not on one scale, but if you feel the need to have one scale, don't use just a 5 year. I commended him, and believe that is a good basis, but added longevity career numbers should be figured in.

That would be a good start for best. If you want to talk greatest instead of best, IMHO, that is even more subjective, and could be modified even more based on what the individual perceives as greatest. In any "greatest" list that I would author, all positions would be represented. But I conceded, that I was not going to debate subjective material of that caliber in this thread.

The bolded I completely agree with.

I can understand your view on the top list, because it does seem absurd that 15 players from one position could be better than the best player at any given position.

I have read how you would do it, I guess I should have asked IF you would do it. Then, we could see your top 50 or top 100 list and could open that up for debate :mrgreen:

Glad these things have been cleared up. Here's to 20 more pages in this thread.

 

[hofautos]

Best way would be to rate by position, not on one scale, but if you feel the need to have one scale, don't use just a 5 year. I commended him, and believe that is a good basis, but added longevity career numbers should be figured in.

The bolded I completely agree with.

I can understand your view on the top list, because it does seem absurd that 15 players from one position could be better than the best player at any given position.

especially when you figure pitchers play only 1/4(on avg) the amount of games as a catcher.

I have read how you would do it, I guess I should have asked IF you would do it. Then, we could see your top 50 or top 100 list and could open that up for debate :mrgreen:

I told him i would LOVE to create a formula or two, and asked several times if he would give me his pWAR values...but he won't, and I am too lazy to grab them for the amount of time it would consume.

but a quick and easy method that would be a VAST improvement over his would be to do this:
First seperate pitchers from position players.

Then take pWAR + derivative of career WAR (such that its weight is approx half the weight of pWAR), and then you would have 2 lists
One for hitters and one for pitchers, and those "top lists" would be a dramatic improvement over pWAR.

I could offer much better formulas, but above method would only take 10 minutes once I had the data.
Other formulas (using pWAR 7, and pWAR10, along with career WAR and better compensation for catchers) but that would take more time, and I would be happy to do it, but again, Chevy doesnt want to give me his pWAR values...whatever.

 

[fonda1119]

it would be nice to have the author or any member of the WAR team here so we can get some straight answers.

Also interesting is that Fangraphs and Baseball reference publish different WAR values. That makes me think that there is some "tweaking" going on, or has already gone on. Of course the team that doesn't publish disclaimers about margins of errors or inaccuracies may tweak things without version control.

Anyone else here know WAR? Wheres that tribe guy :?:

Please go here to read all about WAR before you talk about it anymore.

Mr apr 2010 9 poster, please tell me who you are?
Will going there tell me why fangraphs and and baseball reference publlish different WAR values? If so, i don't see it...please enlighten me.

What does it matter who I am, when I joined, and how many posts I have? As long as I'm giving you correct information that should suffice.

For the offensive part of the WAR calculation Fangraphs uses wOBA (weighted on-base average) and BR uses Rbat (number of runs better or worse than average the player was as a hitter).

For pitching, Fangraphs uses FIP (fielding independent pitching) to determine RAR and BR uses simple Runs Allowed and adjusts for the quality of the opponent and the team's Total Zone Rating.

Enlightened?