Back in March, we released the Ducksnorts community projections (hitters, pitchers), lovingly dubbed IVIE in honor of former Padres first-round pick Mike Ivie. Like most projections, they were fun and probably less useful than some folks might prefer to believe.
In the interest of accountability (and fun), I thought we’d look back at our guesses and see how we did. Hitters are ordered by actual OPS minus projected OPS, pitchers by projected ERA minus actual ERA. This places the most pleasant surprises at the top for both groups.
Reader Pat joked at the time that “our projections are not park adjusted.” Although he was being funny, he also may have been right. We badly overestimated the Padres offense and underestimated their pitching.
Hitters
| IVIE | Actual | Diff Player | PA BA OBP SLG OPS | PA BA OBP SLG OPS | OPS -----------------+------------------------+------------------------+----- Aaron Cunningham | 139 .251 .322 .385 707 | 147 .288 .331 .417 748 | +41 Yorvit Torrealba | 213 .251 .310 .385 695 | 363 .271 .343 .378 721 | +26 Matt Stairs | 111 .231 .346 .420 766 | 111 .232 .306 .475 781 | +15 Nick Hundley | 382 .252 .316 .413 729 | 307 .249 .308 .418 726 | -3 David Eckstein | 430 .259 .328 .341 669 | 492 .267 .321 .326 647 | -22 Adrian Gonzalez | 614 .289 .401 .545 946 | 692 .298 .393 .511 904 | -42 Will Venable | 487 .271 .342 .437 779 | 445 .245 .324 .408 732 | -47 Jerry Hairston | 282 .264 .330 .377 707 | 476 .244 .299 .353 652 | -55 Chase Headley | 601 .277 .355 .444 799 | 674 .264 .327 .375 702 | -97 Tony Gwynn | 373 .264 .335 .353 688 | 339 .204 .304 .287 591 | -97 Oscar Salazar | 178 .269 .327 .429 756 | 148 .237 .318 .336 654 | -102 Everth Cabrera | 591 .271 .353 .376 729 | 241 .208 .279 .278 557 | -172 Scott Hairston | 442 .274 .339 .476 815 | 336 .210 .295 .346 641 | -174 Chad Huffman | 95 .260 .299 .373 672 | 21 .167 .286 .167 453 | -219 Kyle Blanks | 517 .273 .357 .500 857 | 120 .157 .283 .324 607 | -250 Mike Baxter | 42 .240 .323 .369 692 | 9 .125 .111 .125 336 | -356 Dusty Ryan | 57 .249 .300 .348 648 | 0 .000 .000 .000 000 | -648 Matt Antonelli | 170 .250 .316 .370 686 | 0 .000 .000 .000 000 | -686
Notes:
- There weren’t any real pleasant surprises.
- Cabrera, Scott Hairston, and Blanks were colossal disappointments; Headley and Gwynn mild ones.
- Our projections for Stairs and Hundley couldn’t have been much more accurate; hooray for us.
Pitchers
| IVIE | Actual | Diff Player | IP ERA | IP ERA | ERA ----------------+------------+-------------+------ Chris Young | 149.2 3.91 | 20.0 0.90 | +3.01 Ernesto Frieri | 25.2 4.56 | 31.2 1.71 | +2.85 Tim Stauffer | 88.1 4.44 | 82.2 1.85 | +2.59 Joe Thatcher | 53.1 3.47 | 35.0 1.29 | +2.18 Ryan Webb | 40.2 4.24 | 59.0 2.90 | +1.34 Mat Latos | 134.1 3.78 | 184.2 2.92 | +0.86 Heath Bell | 70.0 2.77 | 70.0 1.93 | +0.84 Mike Adams | 65.0 2.54 | 66.2 1.76 | +0.78 Clayton Richard | 165.1 4.31 | 201.2 3.75 | +0.56 Jon Garland | 206.1 4.00 | 200.0 3.47 | +0.53 Edward Mujica | 76.1 3.93 | 69.2 3.62 | +0.31 Wade LeBlanc | 88.2 4.51 | 146.0 4.25 | +0.26 Adam Russell | 44.4 4.16 | 15.2 4.02 | +0.14 Luke Gregerson | 73.1 3.29 | 78.1 3.22 | +0.07 Kevin Correia | 191.1 4.15 | 145.0 5.40 | -1.25 Luis Perdomo | 49.1 4.50 | 1.0 9.00 | -4.50 Cesar Ramos | 36.2 4.67 | 8.1 11.88 | -7.21 Cesar Carrillo | 47.0 4.43 | 0.0 inf | inf Aaron Poreda | 40.1 3.92 | 0.0 inf | inf Radhames Liz | 24.1 4.83 | 0.0 inf | inf
Notes:
- Stauffer was the big surprise; several others outpaced our expectations by plenty.
- Correia was the only disappointment; I said at the time, “Correia’s projection seems a shade optimistic to me, especially the innings” (I also thought we were too high on Latos, so what do I know?).
- We nailed Gregerson’s line.
Thanks to all who participated, and to Stairs, Hundley, and Gregerson for making us look smart (ignore the others; clearly those are anomalous cases). This was kind of fun; maybe we’ll do it again next year.
I’m sure I was being quite serious!
I love the IVIEs! I think I’m lousy at these sorts of exercises, but I still find it very interesting, especially in hindsight, to see how things worked out.
Geoff, any chance you’ll compare how IVIE did in its projections with the other systems like zips, Marcel, James, et al.? Would be curious to know if we were significantly worse than them or if any of them were really accurate. Thanks for running the numbers!
Maybe if you make park-adjusted projections next year, you can reduce those “anomalous cases”. One thing I noticed about all of the other projections is, with young players with only one full year in the majors, or two partial years, the default projection seems to be “same as last year”. From the innings pitched projection, it looks like that’s what happened with Richard, Latos, and LeBlanc. I don’t know how to identify which look-see starters one year might make the rotation the next year, but after the revolving door of the 2009 starting staff, it might have been reasonable to assume one or two of those three would start the season in the rotation and get more innings. Other than starters in that situation, the performances of most players are so maddeningly inconsistent from year to year that it’s a crapshoot. You might as well have fun with it, which you did.
I don’t know if anyone else has noticed, but since we are discussing the overall statistical performance of the 2010 Padres, my Woe,Doctor! cohort, Bryant, pointed out to me this morning that there is a valid argument for claiming that Chase Headley was the best defensive third baseman in MLB in 2010. Check out the UZR/150 (which, oddly enough was why Ryan Zimmerman was considered to be exponentially better than Kouzmanoff last year – kind of surprising):
http://www.fangraphs.com/leaders.aspx?pos=3b&stats=fld&lg=all&qual=y&type=1&season=2010&month=0
I’m fascinated by how Headley rates in the advanced defensive metrics because every time I saw him play, which was not very often, to the naked eye he stunk! He’d boot balls, make poor throws and make poor decisions (trying to tag a runner going by him to 3rd when he could have easily thrown to 2nd for the 5-4-3 DP and ending up having to go to 1st for one out only). I hope the metrics are right because he has to be great defensively to offset his mediocre, at best, offense.
The improvements of Richard, Stauffer, and of course Latos mean that the rotation for 2011 can be figured to be at contender level. The same cannot be said of the offense.
Jed has already said he’s going to be addressing the offense, and he already started by picking up Jarrett Hoffpauir. From the scouting reports I’ve read, he’s a hard-nosed contact hitter who can hit and get on base. He’s mostly a 2B with a strong, accurate arm, a major upgrade over Eckstein, whose throws, while accurate and “just in time”, were painful to watch. Hoffpauir can also play 3B and maybe spell Headley, who played every inning of the 161 games he played.
I’m less happy about keeping Ludwick, who finally admitted his calf injury was killing him. He’s going to be 33 next year, and his $6 million is more than Venable, Gwynn, Cunningham, Denorfia, Baxter, and Durango combined. I’d sign him and trade him for a shortstop, even a AAA prospect. There’s got to be an alternative if Everth doesn’t bounce back. I think Venable is ready for a breakout year if he plays regularly, Cunningham is a major-league hitter who just needs ABs, and Baxter is a big kid with a nice looking swing and what looks like a decent glove.
In short, the offensive potential is there, the young guys are the heart of the defense and running game, manufacturing runs in Petco, and it would be better if the young players are given another year to develop offensively and cheaply.
I wish I made a copy of my predictions for the IVIE.
Can’t wait for next year’s IVIE.