Haiku Wednesday

Cookies

They are Santa's treat
Bet reindeers wished he'd eat less
Coffee might help more!

Rox Talk

WAR - What is it good for? - Part 4

Last week we talked batting, this week we will close out with pitching. Again I must mention that WAR is only suppose to show the previous year...no one claims that it is predictive. Below is a graph plotting the Rox FIP vs WAR since 2002 (min of 20 innings pitched). These graphs might be a bit more correlated than the batting ones because the fielding isn't part of the Pitching WAR calculation. I did find it interesting that starters (empty squares, red line) and relievers (black squares, blue line) broke into two distinct groups.

Lower FIPs lead to bigger WARs. Again I fitted the points and used the expression to estimate possible outcomes for next year. The spreadsheet below shows Bill James FIP projections for the 2010 season. Using my handy dandy expression I get the following WARs (see sheet below, click on pitchers). The Bill James FIP can be found at Fangraphs and the website is currently taking fan guesses to what the player's WAR will be. As mentioned last week the fans WAR total for our 2010 team is 108 wins. My roster below is missing another arm. I would expect Rox to carry 13 pitchers(?)

Based on this WAG I have the Rox winning about 82 games. Just my gut says that we probably have about 6 more wins in there...accounting for the any missing players and Tulo and Jimenez being a bit below averaged based on historical numbers. As the season gets closer I will revisit this but 88 wins doesn't sound too bad.

Bento Box!

The Japanese love to compartmentalize. Well ordered and a place for everything, the Bento Box is essential Japan (to me at least). Interesting to me that an outlet hasn't sprung up to provide these. I mean kids have them in "Lunchables"...why can't adults enjoy a nice box lunch...me want tasty bento!

T-Minus: The Race to the Moon

A graphic novel retelling of the space race. A nice 124 page condensed version. Even with my extreme space knowledge there were a few tidbits that even I never really considered. Interesting to see what was included and not included.

Some things of interest:

1) Caldwell C. Johnson, I never have heard his name but the authors used him as kind of the engineer to represent them all.

2) In the 50s the Russian used a roomful of women to do calculations...they called this their "computer"

3) Interesting to note that in 1960 the Russian's learned the dangers of using a pure oxygen in their capsule (although this was learned during a training exercise on the ground) and lost a cosmonaut...too bad they kept the info to themselves otherwise we could have saved three lives in 1967.

4) Amazing to think Gargarin parachuted out of his capsule to land...

5) Every pound to the moon takes 3 pounds of fuel to get it there!

6) I've mentioned the Apollo Guidance Computer before but to put its memory in a new perspective it had enough space for 4 seconds of a MP3 song!

Haiku Wednesday

Ice

Water's evil twin
Driver's nightmare,skier's too
Leave it to Hockey

Song Memory - Desire

U2's Desire came out as a single back in November 1988. As the first single off of the Rattle and Hum album it was my first "I can't wait for the release" album. Every time the song plays I think of two things...my last high school cross country race and driving in the blue Nissan truck with my Dad.

Back in the day, during the Thanksgiving holiday weekend, the Kinney (now Foot Locker) Individual National Cross Country Championship qualifying race occurred in four venues throughout the country. The South regional meet was held in Charlotte every year. If you finished in the Top 8 you were then invited (all expense trip) to race in San Diego for the national meet. It was a good goal to shoot for. During my Junior year I had finished 11th so I was somewhat confident that I could make the top 8 in my senior year. The race course did not suit me very well. It was a relatively flat course that narrowed into a small trail. To get a good position one had to get out fast which was the complete opposite of how I had run all year. I ran okay but it wasn't my day and I finished 16th or so. It was a rather disappointing afternoon but on the way home we stopped for lunch and I picked up the single. So when I hear the song I think of Charlotte, NC, my last race, and the blue Nissan!

Rox Talk

WAR - What is it good for? - Part 3

OK so we are all smarter when it comes to WAR but what does it all mean? Well it is not a predictive tool, so it simply shows the value of the player for the previous year and shows whether a player was truly worth what the team forked over for him. Back in May on the Purple Row website a pretty good explanation is shown using WAR and Rox payrolls to show whether the team was worth its wins.

The Rox management team should be commended. They earned alot more wins then what they are paying. Essentially this is because they haven't delved into the free agent market and they have a lot of WAR coming from players in their pre-arbitration days. Tulo and Jimenez are outright steals right now! It will be interesting to see during the next union bargaining whether players try to change how they can bargain when they first make the big leagues. Small market clubs are simply jettisoning players once they become arbitration eligible. Look at Atkins, he is 28 and should be coming into his attractive payroll period and yet the Rox just threw him aside for younger cheaper talent. It is a strong possibility that Atkins is done and probably will never see $7 million a year again. Now of course he could have signed a long term deal too so a player does have that option...stability over free agent big bucks...you better not swan dive during that pre free agency year!

Back to WAR...I wonder if there is any predictive value to it? WARNING: WAR is only suppose to show the previous year...no one claims that it is predictive. Below is a graph plotting the Rox wOBA vs WAR since 2002 (min of 60 plate appearances). As I mentioned this really shouldn't tell me anything because position played and defense ability does factor into WAR in the transition from wOBA but what the heck...with excel and a new tool I just found I can do whatever I want! (it is my web page).

Higher wOBAs lead to bigger WARs. My new tool helped me create a nice line through the data. After some simple ;-) math I got this expression...whoopee!

f(x)= 2.38733*exp(15*x- 5.16638)-0.44

So back to estimating. The spreadsheet below shows Bill James wOBA projections for the 2010 season. Using my handy dandy expression I get the following WARs (see sheet below). The Bill James wOBA can be found at Fangraphs and the website is currently taking fan guesses to what the player's WAR will be. Currently the fans WAR total for our 2010 team is 38.9 for our players and if you add the pitching data in (next week post) the Rox would end up with 108 wins (fans might be thinking a bit too highly)! My 2010 team below also is missing another two or three bats (a catcher , infielder, and pitch hitter). Also I don't think Hawpe is going to get 642 bats!

Of the numbers using my estimating tool I would think Tulo and CarGo might have better seasons then what their wOBA says. Rox do have some talent, the big question is 2010 going to be like 2009 or 2008? Will expectations once again bite?

Winter Running

I hear the snow crunch

Running on a white blanket

Day three-four-zero

Sarah Flannery - In Code

Another ancient book on my books to read list...funny this list never seems to shorten! Since discovering the library I have found that finding these older books and reading them is a lot easier on the wallet...doh!

I have no idea where this book came about. My usual suspects don't ring a bell and I can only think that it might have been in the New Yorker? Interesting book especially insight into a mathematical mind. Cryptography is a fascinating topic and the work this teenager did was pretty fantastic. Math get a bit rough and thus the book kind of bored me but the concepts were interesting. Interestingly I googled her to see what she has been up to since winning and frankly not much. She worked for EA then went on to her own company...

Haiku Wednesday

Lights

Meaning of Christmas?
Tangled up, the missing bulbs
Ah the frustration