Most Underrated Fantasy Player 2012

[West]

Thanks for getting back on subject...that guy was brutal. K's are meaningless...what an inane argument.

[OBPlover]

Thanks for getting back on subject...that guy was brutal. K's are meaningless...what an inane argument.

You misread everything. I never said K's are meaningless. For pitchers they are crucial. What I said was that they are menaingless for hitters which was proven in the article I quoted. K's show little correlation to OPS.

The only debate is whether K's are meaningful to predict batting average.

[OBPlover]

1. I'm not sure that looking at BABIP with 2 strikes is what OBPLover is looking to define here. I'd be willing to bet that strikeout% doesn't coorelate that highly with 2-strike BABIP (i haven't pulled the data though). What I would be willing to say is that guys who strikeout more have more success when they do put the ball in play (success can also include HR and more extra base hits, which is being lost if you look solely at BABIP). And this could be for 2 reasons; either because swinging harder is likely to result in the ball traveling faster/harder off the bat, or because hitters who don't hit the ball hard/far and strike out a lot probably aren't seeing much success and therefore aren't in MLB. Another advantage that power hitters get is that pitchers usually fear them more (which is foolish but that's how it is), so they are able to draw more walks.

Suppose on a 2 strike count. A high K% swings and mises since it was a quality pitch. A low K% swings and makes contact. Do you think that low K% hitter will have a comparable batting average as he would in a no-strike or 1-strike count? Of course not. In other words, the same pitch that strikes out Adam Dunn, is not likely to be turned into a base hit by say, Marco Scutaro. BAtting averages on an 0-2 count will be much lower than say, a 2-0 count.

The only thing I concede is that very fast runners can purposefully cut down their swings to make contact on 2 strikes and draw out some extra infield hits. But this won't make a large difference.

3. The reason guys like Willingham get overlooked in fantasy isn't that they aren't useful; it's that they have little upside. In Willingham, you know you are getting a 2-category contirbutor (runs/RBI) who will hurt you in SB and AVG. And the general feeling is that .270/30 HR can be replaced off the wire relatively easily, if you know how to ride the hot hand. What I do find interesting abotu this is that the high-upside power guys (like Bruce/Stanton) tend to be valued a ton higher. I think that's more Bruce/Stanton being overvalued though than it is Mr. Willingham being undervalued (though I agree willingham is undervalued as well; I ended up with him in the 15th round or later in almost all my drafts as a UTIL/bench hitter).

Let me clarify, because I think people are misunderstanding. I am not saying nor have I ever said that Eric Hosmer should have gone for less than Josh Willingham. What I am saying is that the gap between the two players was too high.

There were lots of players in the same boat as Willingham, offering success in just 2 categories and not much else but going for a lot more in the average league. E.g. Nick Swisher

[OBPlover]

Here is another article to explain why striekouts are meaningless for hitters

http://www.baseballprospectus.com/artic ... cleid=2617

The key to understanding this article is knowing that he is including outliers in his data such as ADAM DUNN, Carlos Pena and his ILK, to evaluate the data. So of course if you throw in the extremes like Adam Dunn, it will seem like K's are more heavily correlated to batting average and Slugging than they actually are. The author should have omitted the top 10% of K rates.

I made a similar chart tongiht, albeit using only 2012 data, omitted the top 10% of K% hitters and came up with aan R squared of .019 showing very little correlation. When you have extreme K rates like Adam Dunn's you can assume low batting averages but when you deal with the majority, it's way iffier. In other words, throw out the extremes and you can't rely on K's helping to predict batting average very well.

You can assume that Hosmer's batting average will be better than another hitter with a K% in the top 10% but can you assume anything when you compare him to any player with a 5% lower or higher rate? Of course not.

[Inukchuk]

Let me clarify, because I think people are misunderstanding. I am not saying nor have I ever said that Eric Hosmer should have gone for less than Josh Willingham. What I am saying is that the gap between the two players was too high.

There were lots of players in the same boat as Willingham, offering success in just 2 categories and not much else but going for a lot more in the average league. E.g. Nick Swisher

Out of curiosity, where would you have Willingham ranked for next year? I feel as if he'll go a good bit lower than his 2012 numbers would indicate due to the cliques writing this off as a flukish year. Seeing as you've been on the bandwagon all year, I would imagine you don't believe this. Just curious.

[OBPlover]

Out of curiosity, where would you have Willingham ranked for next year? I feel as if he'll go a good bit lower than his 2012 numbers would indicate due to the cliques writing this off as a flukish year. Seeing as you've been on the bandwagon all year, I would imagine you don't believe this. Just curious.

It's still too early to rank Willingham. A lot is going to have to do with offseason moves the Twins make (e.g. will they trade Mauer?).

I'm personally far more concerned with Edwin Encarnacion. You know a lot of folks are going to be in a hurry to write his 2012 off as a fluke. But it wasn't. He's a different hitter now as evidenced by his much higher walk rate. (That's how I knew Bautista was legit a few years ago and a lot of people wrote off his 2010 and as a fluke.) He used to swing for balls way out of the zone but he now lets them go. My personal theory on him is that back when he was a third baseman, all of his throwing errors got to his mind and made him want to overswing and put everything out of the ballpark just to make it up. But now that he's no longer a 3B, he can settle down and focus.

The problem with anyone breaking out to a really good year, which is why it is so dangerous, is that *Someone* will take that year on face value and draft them too high. Someone will take JW and Ee too high in your 2013 league just like everyone took them too low in 2012. It is not based on any kind of deep analysis , just simply looking at their previous year. That's why it often seems like you should "always avoid the career years". The best you can hope for is fair value.

[lastingsgriller]

A lot is going to have to do with offseason moves the Twins make (e.g. will they trade Mauer?).
.

is this a joke?

[Inukchuk]

Come on, you've been pimping Willingham out all thread, but now you don't want to make a definitive statement? How about we say nothing changes as far as the Twins roster goes. He's currently ranked in the late 30s. Would you take him in the early 4th? That seems to be fair value considering the fact that you don't find this year to be flukish...

[Element]

A lot is going to have to do with offseason moves the Twins make (e.g. will they trade Mauer?).
.

is this a joke?

ehh ... the Dodgers might take him.

[West]

Thanks for getting back on subject...that guy was brutal. K's are meaningless...what an inane argument.

You misread everything. I never said K's are meaningless. For pitchers they are crucial. What I said was that they are menaingless for hitters which was proven in the article I quoted. K's show little correlation to OPS.

The only debate is whether K's are meaningful to predict batting average.

No, I know you meant that K's are meaningless for hitters. It's still a stupid idea.

Two words: Contact rate.

Man, I have no wish to carry this argument any further than this. Let's get back to why Ian Desmond is completely underrated.