It hurts your whole pitching staff to have a major defensive liability at 3B (of course, it doesn't help that he's matched up w/ other defensive liabilities at SS, 2B and 1B either but that's a separate issue...). Baseball Prospectus had some great stuff about defense this year and pretty much raked the Brewers over the coals for being so horrible but also admitted that they don't have a lot of options besides 'The Quartet of Clank' (BP, 2008, P. 278). The other quote I found illuminating (p. 279) 'In a division decided by two games, the tardiness of Braun's promotion (and that of starter Yovani Gallardo) may have been a difference maker, and if that wasn't, Braun's godawful defense certainly was'.
They rated him costing the team 24 runs below replacement defensively which greatly diminishes his value. Even if he's Dunn-esque in LF, he should still 'improve' that number just being less involved in the action and playing an easier position. I don't see how they can't move him out there.
Good points about the pitching & defense winning formula. Speaking of which....the inability for the Brewers to properly manage their pitching situation is a pretty huge liability. They're pretenders.
This might be off topic, but I always wondered if changing position really hurts player's offense. During the offseason I kept hearing people say that Bill Hall will have a better year because he's more comfortable at 3B, but has there ever been a study to prove this?
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I always like it when stats tend to back up old cliches. Defense is an extremely important aspect of baseball, one that is currently being undervalued (See Adam Everett's contract). Having Mike Cameron play defense in CF over Hall, and having Hall's defense at 3B over Braun will help the Brewers out significantly over the season.
Even if Braun's injury is related to being in the OF... well tough. Strengthen your legs more and get used to the position, cause that's where you're going to have to be. The guy is a professional athlete, go train and practice more if it's a problem. On a contending team you cannot have as bad a defender as Braun at 3rd. Brewers will have to improve that infield defense at some point if they ever wanna go deep in the playoffs.
...Boston papers now and then suffer a sharp flurry of arithmetic on this score; indeed, for Williams to have distributed all his hits so they did nobody else any good would constitute a feat of placement unparalleled in the annals of selfishness. -Updike
rib217 wrote:I think alot of the move had to do with Braun's extremely poor defensive skills at 3b rather than fitting Hall into the lineup. if Braun was a better defensive 3b i doubt they would even consider the move.
Of course, but the point is, is it worth risking Braun's health? To me his bat is far too important to risk having him run around out there where he's not used to. It's already apparently not agreeing with his body, as he is having lower leg issues.
Dude, its baseball. Please. If he can't run around, then he isn't healthy period.
Well anyone who says he's not at least more at risk of injury in the outfield (where he's never played before) isn't being honest with themselves.
No doubt Braun moved to the OF helps their defense, I'd just rather make sure I have my star hitter 100%. Cameron in CF already makes the defense better, and the benefit you get by having Hall at 3B is slightly offset by the downgrade you get by having Braun in LF. So all in all, and in my opinion, it ain't worth it.
Hall to 3B, defensive upgrade at 3B. Braun to LF, defensive downgrade at LF (and higher risk of injury to your stud hitter who's never played out there before). An upgrade at 3B with a downgrade at LF doesn't make things that much better. Yes I know more balls will go to 3B than LF, I just don't see the risk of this as worth it, and I guess we'll see what happens. They lose Braun though, and they truly will be pretenders.
By the way, Bill Hall made 19 errors in 2006.........
2 of them at came at 3B in only 10 games You sure you're getting your money's worth of a defensive upgrade vs the risk of injury?
Let's go a bit deeper: Bill Hall 2003: 1 game at 3B......1 error (1 every 1 game) Bill Hall 2004: 7 games started at 3B.......2 errors (1 every 3.5 games) Bill Hall 2005: 49 games started at 3B.......6 errors (1 every 8 games) Bill Hall 2006: 10 games started at 3B.......2 errors (1 every 5 games)
Looks like Bill Hall was worse at 3B in his first couple years than Braun was in his first year. Take out 2005, and Hall made errors at 3B at a clip of 1 per every 3.6 games.....worse than what Braun showed last year. In my opinion he's not THAT much better at 3B than Braun (considering he only had 1 year out of 4 where he actually WAS better at 3B than Braun). Combine that with the fact that Braun is also worse than Hall in LF, and you don't get that much of an overall improvement for what you're doing.
Regarding the above post, I think you're doing your math wrong.
It looks like 2005 is the best statistical sample you have, since it's in the most games, so 1 out of 8 games is closer to Hall's tendency than any of the other years. You are excluding data from 49 games so you can look at data over 18 games.
I also think Braun is much worse than you think. The fielding percentages quoted earlier in the thread are errors per chances, not errors per game. In fact, Braun made 26 errors in 112 games last year, nearly 1 error in every 4 games, which is not that different from Halls worst "years" of 03, 04, and 06, and FAR worse than Halls career totals.
Essentially, this game is not about offense, as much as fantasy owners would like. The team obviously feels that to win more baseball games in real life, they are better off with fewer run-costing errors than the marginal gains (at best) of Braun batting while playing the 3B position. Most importantly, before this minor injury, Braun was doing fine starting in LF during spring training.
rib217 wrote:I think alot of the move had to do with Braun's extremely poor defensive skills at 3b rather than fitting Hall into the lineup. if Braun was a better defensive 3b i doubt they would even consider the move.
Of course, but the point is, is it worth risking Braun's health? To me his bat is far too important to risk having him run around out there where he's not used to. It's already apparently not agreeing with his body, as he is having lower leg issues.
Dude, its baseball. Please. If he can't run around, then he isn't healthy period.
seriously, hes a kid, his health is not jeopardized by this move. He is not made of plastic
chipper wrote:Well anyone who says he's not at least more at risk of injury in the outfield (where he's never played before) isn't being honest with themselves.
No doubt Braun moved to the OF helps their defense, I'd just rather make sure I have my star hitter 100%. Cameron in CF already makes the defense better, and the benefit you get by having Hall at 3B is slightly offset by the downgrade you get by having Braun in LF. So all in all, and in my opinion, it ain't worth it.
Hall to 3B, defensive upgrade at 3B. Braun to LF, defensive downgrade at LF (and higher risk of injury to your stud hitter who's never played out there before). An upgrade at 3B with a downgrade at LF doesn't make things that much better. Yes I know more balls will go to 3B than LF, I just don't see the risk of this as worth it, and I guess we'll see what happens. They lose Braun though, and they truly will be pretenders.
By the way, Bill Hall made 19 errors in 2006.........
2 of them at came at 3B in only 10 games You sure you're getting your money's worth of a defensive upgrade vs the risk of injury?
Let's go a bit deeper: Bill Hall 2003: 1 game at 3B......1 error (1 every 1 game) Bill Hall 2004: 7 games started at 3B.......2 errors (1 every 3.5 games) Bill Hall 2005: 49 games started at 3B.......6 errors (1 every 8 games) Bill Hall 2006: 10 games started at 3B.......2 errors (1 every 5 games)
Looks like Bill Hall was worse at 3B in his first couple years than Braun was in his first year. Take out 2005, and Hall made errors at 3B at a clip of 1 per every 3.6 games.....worse than what Braun showed last year. In my opinion he's not THAT much better at 3B than Braun (considering he only had 1 year out of 4 where he actually WAS better at 3B than Braun). Combine that with the fact that Braun is also worse than Hall in LF, and you don't get that much of an overall improvement for what you're doing.
if you're using errors to gauge defensive prowess, you're already losing the battle.
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by AcidRock23 » Fri Mar 21, 2008 9:56 pm 
