Piece Mobility

In math terms, the team is calculating the “delta” between the value of an 850 OPS catcher at league minimum and the value of an 850 OPS 1b/DH at league minimum.

In non-math terms, if you have Yogi Berra or Johnny Bench, you're going to win a lot of championships. :- )

Give me a catcher who bats fourth and wins MVP's, and I will return flags on your investment.

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The current discussion over Jeff Clement's proper position gives D-O-V a chance to get on its soapbox and remind that VORP/$ doesn't capture the effects of putting Johnny Bench on a baseball team (yes, I know that Clement isn't yet Johnny Bench).

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A chessmaster doesn't just look around the board and play the one threat that looks good at the moment. GLORP! WHATEVER you do, don't live move-to-move. "Move quick so you'll have a lot of time to regret your mistakes," we geeks say ... a virtuoso chess player positions himself to maximize the potential threats and opportunities in a snowballing effect.

A poker champion doesn't simply push all in, because he's got two pair to your straight draw. He positions himself to take all your money, not just the $70 in the pot at the moment.

Grandmasters — at any game — are thinking in terms of sequences. Not in terms of what looks best for this one turn.

Erik Bedard and Johann Santana aren't "captured" by how much performance they leave you with, after you subtract their salary performance out. Also to be considered is their effect on your other 24 roster slots — across a roster-sequence of many years.

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=== Start With Bench, You'll Figure Out the Rest Eventually ===

You play 25-man-roster chess in a completely different way if you have ARod at SS or Yogi Berra at catcher.

1B/LF/RF are now 10-year parking slots for whichever bad boy you can nab in a particular year. This provides agility and in practical terms, your teams are going to be better after taking into consideration the limits on your opportunities.

Because LF was open for the Reds, and they didn't have Raul Ibanez or Richie Sexson frozen there, they could stay on their toes until they found the mecha-Godzilla George Foster. Because you haven't had to lock yourself into a 120-OPS+ guy at 1B and LF, you can try for more.

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Your flexibility to fit in a glove man like Omar is different if your #4 hitter is the catcher, and your #5-6 hitters are at 1B/LF; your entire 10-year roster is vastly more fluid and agile. You can respond to shifting terrain much more effectively.

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This was the case for the Johnny Bench Reds — they moved all sorts of players in and around him. They started off "excellent," in the Menke / Tolan years, and got constantly better from there, until they spiralled off into a baseball universe that was never seen before or since. (Show me another offense that was 1st in triples, homers, walks, SB's …1st in EVERYTHING.)

Johnny Bench positioned the 1969-1977 Reds to shuffle their roster until they were simply ridiculous. Of course, the Reds had a Carlos Triunfel or two ready to add along the way, in LF and RF …

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=== Hard To Make A Mistake That Way, Dept. ===

Another important Game Theory insight from chess: a position might be theoretically winning, but unwinnable in practical terms.

It's important to understand that (all) GM's will make mistakes. But not nearly as many, if they have Yogi Berra behind the plate!

Maybe a computer can take Kasparov's pawn gambit and hack through the variations to defend itself and win the endgame, but a human can't. In chess, you try to reach positions that you, as a human, won't botch in the practical world.

In baseball, there is the stoploss aspect to consider. When you are shuffling Olivos and Riveras through the position, you are always eligible for 50-OPS+ disasters. This affects not only your offensive totals, but also your team psyche. A team with a problem at catcher is a team with a problem in the pennant race.

Why not create positions in which it is hard to fail?

A team with a great catcher has a hard time constructing a lousy offense.

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=== Not That Kind of Swag, Dept. ===

Conversely, when your catcher is a superstar who owns the team — Berra, Pudge, Piazza, Bench — the entire team persona is that of swagger.

We are nine miles afield from Math Club analysis here — but you show me a team with a truly great catcher, and 80% of the time I'll show you a team that thought it owned baseball.

Carter with the Mets, the Marlins' miracle year, the Berra Yankees of course, the Big Red Machine, the Dodgers in their Piazza heyday, the Munson Yankees, etc etc.

Don't let math blind you to the fact that pro sports are vicarious wars, fought between men, men who have more/less self-belief depending on circumstances. There are certain kinds of players who are the Straw Who Stirs The Drink, and a catcher who wins an MVP is definitely that kind of player.

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A catcher who is an MVP candidate with the bat, that's probably the only kind of player I value more than a Bob Gibson or Felix Hernandez.

A chessplayer attacks when his piece mobility — his options — exceed those of his opponent's. A GM with a great catcher is a GM with the responsibility to win multiple World Series titles.

I don't know if Jeff Clement is a great catcher, but I certainly am alert to the possibility, if I'm Jack Zduriencik. Take care of your 120 RBI at the catcher slot, and there's no telling how many opportunities you'll be able to pick-and-choose from among each winter's outfielders.

Cheers,

jemanji

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image:  http://www.equilibrix.com/fieldofdreams/images/0606johnny_bench.jpg

Comments

1
Sandy - Raleigh's picture

Bravo!
Oddly enough, this is one of the very reasons I was cringing at the thought of Teix for 8 years. It wasn't the contract itself, really -- it was the ORDER of moving the pieces. (In hindsight, the concept of plugging 1B to prevent the mistake of moving Clement there could have more value than I want to admit -- but we still don't have a GUARANTEE that Clement is going to hit the way we hope he will).
Give me a catcher, SS and 2B who can hit, and lineup construction becomes trivial. Be strong where others are weak, and you can make hay being average where others are strong.

2

Yes, and whatever chemical properties were enabling as much, Bret Boone's .950 OPS from 2B in 2001 made that lineup hard to mess up even w/o the HOF catcher. Bench + Morgan and you're totally foolproof.
In your Lopez piece, you didn't mention his winter performance, FWIW:
Age 24 Jose Lopez pre ASB .298/.318/.412/.730 -- 26 doubles, 5 HR
Age 24 Jose Lopez post ASB .294/.327/.487/.814 -- 15 doubles, 12 HR
Age 24 Jose Lopez VWL .368/.448/.611/1.059 -- 8 doubles, 5 HR, 13 BB, 9 K
The key change in the second half was doubles became HR. In Venezuela, he adds a level of patience not before seen while retaining the power boost.
And don't forget Lopez is younger than Clement.

3
Saluboy's picture

In general, I'd like 2009 to be mostly used as a sieve. There are just SO MANY questions to answer. Can Clement catch capably? Will he hit? Who is the real Johjima? Will the stopgap 1B platoon hold water? Will Lopez continue his hot hitting to ensconce himself as a trademarked Major Leaguer? Will his defense hold up? Will it improve? Will Betancourt smooth the rough edges of his wildly inconsistent defense from last year? Will he regress to his Ozzie Smith-like on-field grace? Will Beltre's healed thumb ligament allow all those 2008 looooooong outs to turn into doubles or HRs? Will Ichiro defy convention yet again and remain Ichiro? For how long? When will Wladimir start to hit in the majors? Will he fit in well in Safeco's notoriously cavernous left field? Will Gutierrez develop into a decent bat or is he stuck as an all-glove CF-er?
And that's just the starting nine! No mention of the bench, manager, GM, starting pitching, or the relief corps.
2009 must answer so many questions, my head feels like it's falling off. Is it spring training yet?

4

++ Oddly enough, this is one of the very reasons I was cringing at the thought of Teix for 8 years. It wasn’t the contract itself, really — it was the ORDER of moving the pieces. ++
There is no doubt whatsoever that the 1B vs SS/CF/C is one factor against making Tex your franchise player.
Your draft an Alex Rodriguez in fantasy ball, it's a beautiful sight to see him sitting there at SS/CF and you haven't even touched your 1B/DH/RF/LF openings.
The permutations just open up so much more, when your fixtures (or at least some of them) are playing glove slots...
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As you know, no one factor is an absolute, however... offer me Lou Gehrig for the next fifteen years and see if I'm willing to work around the roster inflexibility :- )

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