I enjoy looking at the projections for the upcoming season when they're released. Sometimes I enjoy it more than others. If the Cubs are going to be good I'm excited. When they aren't, not so much. This is one of those years.
Despite that, Berselius and I have posted projections for the Cubs going back to 2007 so we'll do it again for 2013. Because we have to.
The Bill James projections are usually the first to come out. They're published in his annual and that usually comes out in early November (Nov. 1 this year).
Position players
| Hitter | AB | 2B | 3B | HR | BB | SO | Avg | OBP | Slg | wOBA |
| Anthony Rizzo | 604 | 40 | 1 | 33 | 55 | 126 | 0.283 | 0.346 | 0.517 | 0.368 |
| Bryan LaHair | 314 | 20 | 0 | 14 | 32 | 89 | 0.268 | 0.335 | 0.465 | 0.347 |
| Starlin Castro | 629 | 35 | 10 | 12 | 38 | 86 | 0.304 | 0.346 | 0.448 | 0.345 |
| Brett Jackson | 302 | 16 | 4 | 11 | 39 | 111 | 0.242 | 0.328 | 0.430 | 0.333 |
| Alfonso Soriano | 530 | 32 | 1 | 27 | 40 | 142 | 0.245 | 0.304 | 0.462 | 0.326 |
| Ian Stewart | 143 | 7 | 1 | 6 | 16 | 37 | 0.238 | 0.327 | 0.427 | 0.324 |
| Luis Valbuena | 261 | 16 | 1 | 7 | 29 | 54 | 0.253 | 0.330 | 0.402 | 0.323 |
| David DeJesus | 489 | 26 | 4 | 9 | 52 | 86 | 0.264 | 0.345 | 0.389 | 0.322 |
| Welington Castillo | 333 | 18 | 0 | 13 | 30 | 85 | 0.252 | 0.316 | 0.423 | 0.322 |
| Steve Clevenger | 226 | 16 | 1 | 3 | 19 | 31 | 0.265 | 0.322 | 0.385 | 0.314 |
| Josh Vitters | 487 | 31 | 1 | 15 | 28 | 89 | 0.251 | 0.293 | 0.411 | 0.305 |
| Darwin Barney | 555 | 28 | 3 | 5 | 31 | 59 | 0.268 | 0.311 | 0.357 | 0.296 |
| Tony Campana | 152 | 5 | 1 | 0 | 10 | 32 | 0.276 | 0.321 | 0.322 | 0.292 |
People have a tendency to say the Bill James projections are overly optimistic, but that's not necessarily true. Everything is relative so a .340 wOBA in a league projected to have a .450 wOBA is pretty damn bad. Obviously nobody would project a league to have a .450 wOBA. The point is that without knowing the average we can't know how optimistic a projection system is for various players.
It's no surprise to anyone that Rizzo is projected to hit better than any Cub. What is a little surprising is how much better he's projected to hit than everyone else. What's most surprising here is that the Cubs 4th best hitter is Brett Jacikson. Despite the strikeouts last year, Jackson was actually passable as an MLB hitter. He wasn't good, but he wasn't terrible either. Luis Valbuena is projected to be a significantly better hitter than Josh Vitters, but that also is not surprising. Stewart is too, but I'm much more pessimistic about him based on what he's done the last couple years.
Pitchers
| Pitcher | IP | H | HR | BB | SO | HBP | ERA | FIP |
| Shawn Campe | 75 | 80 | 6 | 21 | 50 | 4 | 3.96 | 3.91 |
| Jeff Samardzija | 193 | 177 | 21 | 63 | 169 | 6 | 3.78 | 3.94 |
| Matt Garza | 198 | 186 | 22 | 62 | 171 | 7 | 3.68 | 3.96 |
| Carlos Marmol | 62 | 43 | 4 | 46 | 80 | 6 | 3.63 | 3.97 |
| Alberto Cabrera | 43 | 48 | 4 | 21 | 40 | 2 | 5.02 | 4.15 |
| Travis Wood | 196 | 191 | 22 | 66 | 159 | 9 | 3.90 | 4.18 |
| Rafael Dolis | 32 | 33 | 2 | 17 | 23 | 1 | 4.50 | 4.26 |
| Manny Corpas | 59 | 61 | 6 | 19 | 40 | 4 | 4.12 | 4.34 |
| Chris Rusin | 76 | 81 | 8 | 25 | 50 | 4 | 4.38 | 4.40 |
| Justin Germano | 119 | 125 | 16 | 24 | 80 | 8 | 4.01 | 4.41 |
| Michael Bowden | 60 | 55 | 7 | 27 | 50 | 1 | 3.90 | 4.45 |
| Chris Volstad | 155 | 171 | 18 | 53 | 99 | 4 | 4.59 | 4.54 |
| Brooks Raley | 56 | 65 | 7 | 20 | 37 | 2 | 4.98 | 4.68 |
| Jason Berken | 45 | 54 | 6 | 15 | 31 | 2 | 5.20 | 4.69 |
| James Russell | 67 | 74 | 11 | 19 | 49 | 2 | 4.84 | 4.81 |
I included anyone who was on the Cubs last season. Volstad is gone and so are some of the others.
Bill James does not like James Russell. He sees him as slightly better than he did a year ago, but still terrible. That seems odd to me, but he's been consistent. Something in his system doesn't like Russell.
Probably his terrible and short career as a starter. Are there any starter innings mixed in to his projection?
If the Cubs can’t pick up someone decent on the FA market (Youk?), I’m fine with giving Ian Stewart another shot. Then again, I’m the last person to give up on anyone that was decent at any point in their career (cf. Randy Wells).
There should be a macro that converts Shawn Camp to Shawn CaMVP.
@ Berselius:
I’m usually with you in that way, but not here. Stewart has been so bad the last 250ish plate appearances that it’s very difficult for me seeing him as anything that would even approach being above replacement level at this point. I think he’s better than Vitters, but that’s about the best thing I can come up with.
I’m actually more surprised that Bryan LaHair is 2nd.
@ Aisle424:
He was the best hitter entering last season so that doesn’t surprise me too much. Add in his 109 wRC+ from last year and he probably is the team’s 2nd best hitter. Probably not as far behind Rizzo as the Bill James projection would indicate.
The Cubs offense sucks.
http://espn.go.com/nfl/story/_/id/8592214/sean-payton-deal-new-orleans-saints-voided-nfl-sources-say
NFL flexing its muscles again. WTF.
@ mb21:
I’d rather go out and get a real 3b, but if the “choice” is between Stewart, Valbuena, and Vitters I’d hold my nose and go with Stewart. At least he has an injury excuse.
http://www2.macleans.ca/2012/11/04/tarnished-silver-assessing-the-new-king-of-stats/
Now that the NFL isn’t covering everything with pink, I no longer have any idea that breast….cancer? exists.
@ Berselius:
True, but that injury excuse is also not a more serious problem than it once was. I don’t think it matters much. i think even Stewart rebounded he’d barely be better than Valbuena, but there is that possibility. I just think it’s a very slim possibility.
We can all agree that even at their worst, Valbuena and Stewart are better than Vitters. (dying laughing)
Berselius wrote:
They can’t.
Aisle424 wrote:
I’m not.
mb21 wrote:
@ Suburban kid:
(dying laughing) (dying laughing)
SK —> full snark mode
So the Bears are pretty good.
@ Rice Cube:
’85 Bears Remade!
/all media
@ Rice Cube:
They’ve been playing well today. I’m wondering if the Titans are just that crappy. I don’t know enough to be sure. Next week will be a much greater challenge.
I still don’t know how they didn’t catch up to Urlacher. I think I could have run in faster.
WaLi wrote:
The ’85 Bears had a better quarterback
/all media
Rodgers —> discount double check
Cutler —> good at football
Bill James predicts the Cubs offense will suck? Anyone can do that. Can he predict how the election will turn out?
Hamilton wants 7 years, $175M.
Sounds a bit high to me, but he’s probably basing it on Fielder’s ridiculous contract. I think teams are going to shy away b/c of addiction and his injury history.
@ josh:
Can there be a clause in the contract that says if he misses games or has a loss of performance due to drugs then contract can become null and void?
@ WaLi:
I think there are character clauses within contracts that could account for this. They could also put him on the restricted list and therefore not pay him if he engages in conduct detrimental to the team.
This must be the Terry Bradshaw fail GBTS was talking about on facebook:
http://updates.deadspin.com/post/35011352676/terry-bradshaw-says-reggie-bush-was-chasing-a-bucket-of?utm_campaign=socialflow_deadspin_facebook&utm_source=deadspin_facebook&utm_medium=socialflow
Oy.
@ Rice Cube:
(Dying laughing) what an idiot
WaLi wrote:
Why is the “D” capitalized? Did you type that out?
I guess I can’t stop posting this until they lose:
Test…
(dying laughing) vs. (dying laughing)
@ Rice Cube:
Guess you pretty much have to type it out for the capitalized version then
I slept through most of the second half of the Bears game (the baby was being all warm and snuggly), but I definitely enjoyed waking up and seeing the team take a knee with 51 points on the board.
I know MO was lamenting the poor analysis of the game, but one thing I thought they nailed was that nice almost touchdown return by Hester. They pointed out that the Bears were double-teaming the sprinters, and that meant the return was on. I thought Devin was going to get the TD, but it was still awesome.
So, the Bears have 7 interception returns for TDs this year. I believe they said the record was 8 for a season?
Four posts, no response. Time to go to bed.
*Checks clock*
Damn you Daylight savings time! Or Not Daylight Savings Time. I don’t know how that works.
@ josh:
May your sleep be protected by the watchful eye of the Aurora Boreanaz…
Does anybody here watch The Walking Dead? Because HOLY SHIT!
No way Vitters gets 487 big league ab’s next year. Jackson probably doesn’t even get that 302 he was so incredibly bad. I wish instead of putting out predictions before the rosters are even close to set, James would take this time to quantitatively evaluate the various projection systems and state which did best projecting the 2012 baseball season. Of course, I also wish soft serve would come out my bathtub faucet.
Back, and to the left.
Back, and to the left.
@ GBTS:
Oh my nose!
@ Carne Harris:
Especially if it is banana flavored
http://isnatesilverawitch.com
@ mb21:
Isn’t that how it works?
@ WaLi:
Kidding.. My phone has a macro that converts (dying laughing) to (dying laughing). I guess it converts L-o-l to (Dying laughing)
http://www.theonion.com/articles/new-york-times-bully-knocks-stack-of-polls-from-na,30218/
WaLi wrote:
Wait….your phone has the same macro as OV? Did you program that in yourself?
@ Suburban kid:
It’s an OV phone, we’ve recently breached the wireless telecommunications market. If you send me $399, I’ll send yours out first thing next week.
@ Carne Harris:
You can ignore plate appearances in any projection system. It’s based on what they’ve done in the past and it doesn’t take into consideration what we know as fans (how those players will be used). Going back to ACB we’ve been running playing time projections in February or March for several years now and will do the same for next season.
There are all kinds of articles out there comparing the results of the various projection systems. They’re all about the same. None of them do well with playing time projections, but that’s the last important part of a projection. We can’t expect those running the projections to look through thousands of players (PECOTA and CAIRO do something like 4000 players)
Also, the roster doesn’t have to be set to project the players. We can adjust the projection if they move ballparks and some systems have only park neutral projections.
@ GBTS:
Will you take an out-of-state two party bad check?
GBTS wrote:
It’s $399 for the .5 GB model, right? I wasn’t present at the meeting when we set prices, but my understanding was that it was like this.
.5 GB: 399
1 GB: 499
1.5 GB 599
2 GB 699
all the way up to 64 GB, which costs $13,099. We’re going to cut that down to $13,049 though, correct?
@ mb21:
What are these “giga”bytes you’re talking about? My model of the phone has 150mb of storage and a 233mhz Pentium II
/actualcomputerthatIbuilt
@ mb21:
The first thing I thought of when I read this was how many games back the Cubs were at the end of the season…
@ Berselius:
That was last year’s model. You should buy a new one. For you we’ll cut the price of any model by $20. Consider it a gift. There are tens of apps that work on the phone too. (dying laughing)
@ mb21:
That’s a sweet looking handset.
@ Suburban kid:
Can they stop bullets? That’s what I’d like to know.
/planning for Detroit trip in future, half-jokingly
I don’t think we should insult our best customers by offering a discount.
I’m really excited about getting in the wireless market. We already have a celebrity endorsement all lined up.
@ Aisle424:
Even action shots!
The celebrity endorsements keep rolling in.
Vote Melky Cabrera for the Scrappiest player award!
http://mlb.mlb.com/mlb/fan_forum/heartandhustle/index.jsp?partnerId=aw-8789351671545870126-1057&partnerId=aw-5782906289932928267-1803
@ Berselius:
If scrappy means doing whatever it takes to win, getting dirty, etc., then he deserves to win.
I can see how this would be much more fun/challenging:
Micah Hoffpauir ——–> still fighting ham
@ Aisle424:
Was he active when they lost to the Giants?
http://hardballtalk.nbcsports.com/2012/11/05/the-giants-win-the-world-series-again/
@ Rice Cube:
No idea.
Aisle424 wrote:
I don’t watch the show, but Andy Greenwald writes weeks recaps and he’s fun to read. Here’s his from last night: http://www.grantland.com/blog/hollywood-prospectus/post/_/id/61259/the-walking-dead-season-3-episode-4-killer-within
People have told me I should watch the show, but I haven’t gotten around to it yet.
@ Suburban kid:
Bet you can still hear better out of that one than my blackberry.
@ Aisle424:
One day, we’ll beat that ham back to its piggy loins.
@ SVB:
You can make calls with a Blackberry!?!?
http://sabermetricresearch.blogspot.ca/2012/10/would-toyota-sell-fewer-cars-if-they.html
@ mb21:
I’m not sure, does such a graph tell you anything about a specific point ont he graph? I don’t necessarily believe it does.
@ mb21:
This comment says it all, to me:
“Could it really just be the sum of a bunch of irrationalities?”
Darn straight it is.
Your unacknowledged assumption (shared my all macroeconomists) that also begs the question is that the demand curve is a line. But all the behavioral research we have shows that it is not a line, at all. Some parts of the demand curve are flat, some are quite steep, and there may be discontinuities, as well. In an economic model, we may approximate a demand curve as a continuous function, but that’s a simplifying assumption that distorts reality when you are focused on something like the $.01 question.
Your latter question is interesting philosophically – it’s the one grain of sand question. If you have a mountain and take off on grain of sand, is it still a mountain? If you keep doing that, is there the one single grain of sand that is the breaking point between a mountain and a hill or non-mountain? How could a single grain of sand by that difference?
This stuff is dealt with in Newton’s discrete mathematics with derivatives and integrals, and is also a common philosophy puzzle. In fact, if I recall, your previous post had something to do with a well-known philosophical paradox relating to categories – seems to be on your mind!
I think you might really enjoy reading up on what people have said about very similar issues. The Stanford philosophy encyclopedia is a good resource. http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/sorites-paradox/
A smooth graph can be deceptive, because it’s a model for behavior, not the behavior itself.
@ josh:
I don’t agree that each penny would reduce the number of sales, but a penny is important. 9.99 sounds better than 10.00 even though it’s really not. I’m not sure 10 sounds any better than 10.01. I think maybe at that point we’re looking at the nickel interval (maybe). Obviously for a car that interval would probably be larger, but I have no clue what it would be and, as mentioned, it wouldn’t be the same with all increases.
@ mb21:
Yeah, agree, there’s a psychological effect, but I think it’s on the round number side. I think we ignore everything after the first two numbers. I’ve seen psychological tests to that effect. It’s not the penny so much as the round numbers in front. Just based on what I’ve read about psychology etc.
I’d be more willing to wager the that the jump from 9.99 to 10.00 costs 100 consumers, than increases from 9.00 -10.00 in penny intervals costs 1 buyer per penny, except on average.
@ josh:
I think that’s true when you get to something over $100, but before that I do think the .49 to .50 makes some difference. Probably not as much as .99 to .00, but it probably makes some.
@ josh:
Would Al bitch less if bleacher seats were reduced by 1 penny for the Cubs’ not-best customers?
@ mb21:
Probably, yeah. I think it’s more spiky than smooth. I just don’t buy the argument that going from 10,000.00 to 10,000.01 necessarily makes any difference. I think there is a weighting you have to apply to the pennies. Using his 50-50 analogy – maybe that particular penny is more like 49.999999999-50.0000000001 (i.e., a difference, but no actualization in terms of buyers, because there aren’t enough buyers for it to show up), but you hit 10,000.49 to 10,000.50, and it jumps to more like 49.999 – 50.001 and you see a slight drop off. Something like that.
I just think that not all pennies are equal in people’s minds.
Dude’s analysis works if people are rational robots, but people are kind of dumb, especially about numbers.
@ josh:
he said after arguing with a friend about what statistics tells for an ENTIRE FUCKING AFTERNOON.
josh wrote:
I agree with this, but the argument against it is that if it wasn’t true, merchandise would be priced higher. That makes sense too. If there’s no drop off in sales between 10.00 and 10.49, why not sell something for 10.49?
So that argument makes plenty of sense to me, but at the same time I don’t believe that every single penny would see a reduction in sales. I really don’t know. It’s an interesting article and a fun idea, but I’m not sure there’s any way to confirm it.
@ josh:
Agreed. I think this is why I disagree, but I love Phil’s work. My only complaint with him is that he doesn’t write more. (dying laughing)
This was an article by him from a couple weeks ago that I really liked: http://sabermetricresearch.blogspot.com/2012/10/can-money-buy-meat.html
@ mb21:
I feel the same way about Breaking Bad. I want to watch it, but I haven’t ever gotten started on it. I think Breaking Bad is probably the better show. Season 2 of Walking Dead was pretty tedious most of the time with brief spikes of action until the last few episodes of the season, which were awesome. but this season has been pretty uniformly awesome.
@ mb21:
Yeah. How much did pop cost when you were a kid?
@ mb21:
I kind of see what he’s saying, but I feel like what he’s saying is only true on average, or with a very large pool of buyers.
Anyone else’s workforce suddenly that the plural for money was monies? That makes me want to punch myself.
@ josh:
We can’t bust heads like we used to, but we have our ways. One trick is to tell ‘em stories that don’t go anywhere – like the time I caught the ferry over to Shelbyville. I needed a new heel for my shoe, so, I decided to go to Morganville, which is what they called Shelbyville in those days. So I tied an onion to my belt, which was the style at the time. Now, to buy a pop cost a nickel, and in those days, nickels had pictures of bumblebees on ‘em. “Give me five bees for a quarter,” you’d say.
Now where were we? Oh yeah: the important thing was I had an onion on my belt, which was the style at the time. They didn’t have white onions because of the war. The only thing you could get was those big yellow ones…
@ mb21:
I have to disagree on this point. Pretty sure it was DNA/evolution.
@ uncle dave:
Thanks, grandpa.
@ Aisle424:
WD has the better ratings (I think better than Mad Men too), but the critics generally like BB better though they seem to all like WD too. I’ll watch it at some point. Maybe I’ll do that when BB ends next summer.
I’m pleasantly surprised that AMC picked up Hell on Wheels. Not the greatest show on tv, but I like it.
@ WenningtonsGorillaCock:
Absolutely not. I would guess more, because of the insulting nature of the discount.
@ josh:
I don’t remember what it cost at a grocery store because, well, I wasn’t buying groceries (dying laughing) but at machines it was 45 cents. Cigarettes were 1.45.
@ mb21:
For me too, but I don’t know about cigs. Still .75/can in the machine here at the uni.
I still remember when gasoline was under a dollar a gallon. Does that count?
@ Rice Cube:
I remember that. It makes me feel old when I think about the prices of various items.
mb21 wrote:
I remember when a piece of Bazooka bubblegum went from one penny to two pennies.
@ Suburban kid:
I’m just surprised you don’t remember it when they were free. (dying laughing)
@ Rice Cube:
The price dipped below $1.00 briefly in 1999 (where I lived, anyway).
bahleeted for not reading every word
What I find interesting is that the price of gas (in real dollars) hasn’t changed much in the last 100 years:
The 90′s were really a golden age; too bad I was too young to appreciate them.
@ GW:
You’ve been warned.
@ Rice Cube:
Back when I was learning to drive, my parents would give me a twenty and tell me to fill up the tank (I could keep the change). Those were the days.
Cubs interested in Brandon McCarthy. Yes please.
@ Berselius:
I’m RC and I approve this message.
/political talk will hopefully stop after tomorrow
@ Berselius:
@ Rizzo the Rat:
@ Rice Cube:
Gas was $.65 a gallon when I was a sophmore in college. (Which was “only” 18 years ago.)
@ uncle dave:
Yeah, there was one year in about 1999 where gas was stupid cheap in Missouri, which I had to drive through. Somewhere around .75 cents. It was fairly brief though. It was like $1.25 elsewhere. My Honda Civic would fill up half a tank for $5.
@ josh:
It didn’t stay that low for too long, but at the time I figured out that gasoline was cheaper than any other liquid commodity that was available at the ol’ Kum & Go. Which is just silly, when you think of it.
@ uncle dave:
I remember that, yeah. Now gas has milk edged out (barely).
@ josh:
That’s some fuzzy logic
@ AB:
No fuzzier than the OP. “This line proves an equal perceptual weighting to all incremental increases.” That’s not how people work.
Nate Silver is on Colbert tonight.
@ AB:
I’m not sure what he was getting at with the second paragraph, but the first paragraph makes the point that there is more than one path from A to B. The OP assumes one and claims it is reality, but it’s not proven without more work.
Rizzo the Rat wrote:
You aren’t participating in the “Beer” discussion legally, are you, whippersnapper?
/sheesh
@ josh:
haha I still can’t tell if anyone got my pun.
I had to read Zadeh in grad school and he always used that paradox as the theoretical basis for Fuzzy Set Theory.
@ Rice Cube:
I recall when I was living in Iowa in 2008 gas got down to like $1.65 or something obscene like that.
That’s when I really knew we were fucked. (dying laughing)
Hoyer’s making it sound like they’re going to be busy at the GM meetings. Or it could just be the usual GM-Speak
http://hardballtalk.nbcsports.com/2012/11/06/mike-piazza-is-probably-gonna-get-boned-in-the-hall-of-fame-voting-this-year/
I always thought acne on the back just meant they needed more moisturizer.
new shit: http://www.obstructedview.net/commentary-and-analysis/the-managers-record-from-the-bill-james-annual.html