Pickering hit as well as Sweeney did last year and hit better than Harvey by a wide margin. The problem wasn't that he "didn't beat" Harvey. The problem was KC management's myopia in not seeing that he did beat Harvey like a drum.
He wasn't even all that close to Sweeney's production and he did not outproduce Harvey. Pickering had the one big call-up game and then pretty much tanked the rest of his playing time. It was too bad that he didn't get to play an entire year. It would have been interesting to see a player challenge for the all-time single season records in both K's and GIDP. It would have given Royals fans something to cheer for at least.
Pickering hit as well as Sweeney did last year and hit better than Harvey by a wide margin. The problem wasn't that he "didn't beat" Harvey. The problem was KC management's myopia in not seeing that he did beat Harvey like a drum.
He wasn't even all that close to Sweeney's production and he did not outproduce Harvey. Pickering had the one big call-up game and then pretty much tanked the rest of his playing time. It was too bad that he didn't get to play an entire year. It would have been interesting to see a player challenge for the all-time single season records in both K's and GIDP. It would have given Royals fans something to cheer for at least.
The facts don't lie.
OBP: Harvey .338; Pickering .338; Sweeney .347
SLG: Harvey .421; Pickering .500; Sweeney .504
OPS: Harvey .759; Pickering .838; Sweeney .851
EQA: Harvey .262; Pickering .283; Sweeney .286
RARP: Harvey 8.2 in 494 PAs; Pickering 5.8 in 142 PAs; Sweeney 19.9 in 452 PAs. Standardize them to 500 PAs and you get:
Pickering had close to an .800 OPS in September and October, with 14 extra base hits and a near .350 OBP. yes, he didn't match his August OPS of .936, but he didn't "tank" in any sense of the word.
Harvey 8.3; Pickering 20.4; Sweeney 22.0
Pickering hit as well as Sweeney did last year and hit better than Harvey by a wide margin. The problem wasn't that he "didn't beat" Harvey. The problem was KC management's myopia in not seeing that he did beat Harvey like a drum.
He wasn't even all that close to Sweeney's production and he did not outproduce Harvey. Pickering had the one big call-up game and then pretty much tanked the rest of his playing time. It was too bad that he didn't get to play an entire year. It would have been interesting to see a player challenge for the all-time single season records in both K's and GIDP. It would have given Royals fans something to cheer for at least.
The facts don't lie.
OBP: Harvey .338; Pickering .338; Sweeney .347 SLG: Harvey .421; Pickering .500; Sweeney .504 OPS: Harvey .759; Pickering .838; Sweeney .851 EQA: Harvey .262; Pickering .283; Sweeney .286 RARP: Harvey 8.2 in 494 PAs; Pickering 5.8 in 142 PAs; Sweeney 19.9 in 452 PAs. Standardize them to 500 PAs and you get:
Pickering had close to an .800 OPS in September and October, with 14 extra base hits and a near .350 OBP. yes, he didn't match his August OPS of .936, but he didn't "tank" in any sense of the word. Harvey 8.3; Pickering 20.4; Sweeney 22.0
The stats don't lie, but Pickering's 2004 stats are a very small sample and really easy to misinterpret. Again, he had a great call-up game and after that he really wasn't any more productive than Harvey was and nowhere near Sweeney.
And how do they compare if you take away Sweeney and Harvey's four best games (since they played nearly 4 times as much) and throw them out of the sample, too?
Sorry, Tav, you cannot just choose to ignore that Pickering did have that big game, and those stats count just like the rest of them. Even throwing that game out, Pickering still tops Harvey by almost 20 points of OPS. If I cheat and sample select Harvey's 4 best games and throw them out, his OBP drops 20 points and his slugging drops 30 points.
You have to use the same rules for all players, Tav. You count all their games.
GotowarMissAgnes wrote:And how do they compare if you take away Sweeney and Harvey's four best games (since they played nearly 4 times as much) and throw them out of the sample, too?
Sorry, Tav, you cannot just choose to ignore that Pickering did have that big game, and those stats count just like the rest of them. Even throwing that game out, Pickering still tops Harvey by almost 20 points of OPS. If I cheat and sample select Harvey's 4 best games and throw them out, his OBP drops 20 points and his slugging drops 30 points.
You have to use the same rules for all players, Tav. You count all their games.
Sure I can choose to ignore it. I'm not sure how many times I've stated my argument is that after his first game he was no better than Harvey. That first game definitely counts in the record books, but (once again) his sample size is so small that one game greatly inflates the image of how he performed in the rest of the season which was very unimpressive.
GotowarMissAgnes wrote:And how do they compare if you take away Sweeney and Harvey's four best games (since they played nearly 4 times as much) and throw them out of the sample, too?
Sorry, Tav, you cannot just choose to ignore that Pickering did have that big game, and those stats count just like the rest of them. Even throwing that game out, Pickering still tops Harvey by almost 20 points of OPS. If I cheat and sample select Harvey's 4 best games and throw them out, his OBP drops 20 points and his slugging drops 30 points.
You have to use the same rules for all players, Tav. You count all their games.
Sure I can choose to ignore it. I'm not sure how many times I've stated my argument is that after his first game he was no better than Harvey. That first game definitely counts in the record books, but (once again) his sample size is so small that one game greatly inflates the image of how he performed in the rest of the season which was very unimpressive.
It no more greatly inflates his performance than if you take away a similarly unrepresentative sample of Harvey's or Sweeney's or any other player's at bats as a proportion of their overall performance.
Of course you can choose to ignore it, but objective observers will recognize that selectively sampling in that fashion represents a bias in your analysis, which is why any empirical analysis characterized by biased selection is suspect.
Not to mention that fact that your statement is simply false. Even ignoring that game, he was clearly better than Harvey, unless the laws of mathematics have suddenly been repealed and .776 is no longer > than .759
DK wrote:Wow. It's like watching Bill James vs. Pete Palmer.
Someone get the popcorn.
Hell I hope that he is right and that I am 100% wrong. The problem I have is that I went to almost every home that Pickering played in 2004 (hard to pass up a nose-bleed ticket price that you can turn into your choice of seat because there are only 8 people in the stadium) and after the first couple of games Pickering built up great hopes. After a couple of weeks whenever he came up with a runner on first you prayed he stuck out so he wouldn't hit into a double play.
GotowarMissAgnes wrote:Not to mention that fact that your statement is simply false. Even ignoring that game, he was clearly better than Harvey, unless the laws of mathematics have suddenly been repealed and .776 is no longer > than .759
Sure he still had the higher OPS, but the difference between the two is very small. A much higher portion of Pickering's OPS is generated from walks (as opposed to Harvey's), he generates a much higher amount of unproductive outs, and he creates a great deal higher amount of extra outs through his "ability" to ground into double plays. I'm not in any way claiming Harvey is better than Pickering, Harvey's second half slide was as frustrating as Pickering's slide. But Pickering wasn't more productive than Harvey, and most definitely not as productive overall as his final season stats show.
Last edited by Tavish on Sat Feb 05, 2005 1:38 am, edited 1 time in total.
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by Tavish » Fri Feb 04, 2005 10:25 pm 
