White Sox Acquire James Shields

[Balta1701]

At the end of the day it doesn't matter what is paid for. It matters what performance you get. Surplus value is worthless on the field. Having a ton of surplus doesn't get anyone out or drive anyone home.

I feel this has basically become a tautology at this point, because basically you're saying "it doesn't matter what is paid for, it matters you get performance, but even though you can't pay for performance I don't like your language". It's a distinction without a difference. It's saying "people pay to see runs scored, they don't pay to see hits and walks".

[Dick Allen]

Another interesting fact - this is only true if you go to fangraphs, which does have some issue with how it handles strikeouts and perhaps defense at the pitchers' spot. If you go to B-R, Vazquez put up 43.3, Buehrle put up 59, which is right on the edge of HOF-worthy.

Then why when people were talking about how disappointing Shark was last year, did you use his fangraphs WAR to point out he pitched as expected and not the 0.2 on BR?

[southsider2k5]

I feel this has basically become a tautology at this point, because basically you're saying "it doesn't matter what is paid for, it matters you get performance, but even though you can't pay for performance I don't like your language". It's a distinction without a difference. It's saying "people pay to see runs scored, they don't pay to see hits and walks".

 

That is false because all three things are related to on the field performance. In your example, only actual performance is related to actual performance. Surplus is not.

[caulfield12]

Well, the odds of the White Sox getting "surplus value" out of their 25 random internal prospects aren't high at all.

 

We all know the surplus value is coming from Sale, Eaton and Quintana, primarily. At a point there, it seemed like Abreu as well, but not so sure that's the case. Rodon, theoretically, as well. Anderson and Fulmer. Potentially Saladino. Lawrie.

 

That's why the White Sox being patient and holding onto Marcus Semien, Trayce Thompson and Montas (worst-case scenario, a very good high leverage reliever ala Herrera) definitely has an argument behind it.

 

I guess we'll have to wait and see what the RETURNING WAR for that 2018 team actually is, and whether the Sox made the playoffs either of these two seasons to determine if the Frazier move worked. (Or the possible trade return, which will be disappointing because it will mean no playoffs YET AGAIN.)

 

We missed a huge opportunity to sign Desmond at $8 million (really, $6 million in this year's resource allocations because you're stripping away that money from the draft pool, which surely JR doesn't mind) and settled for Austin Jackson instead. This is the same player who was offered around $110 million by the Nats less than 18 months ago.

 

But Hahn valued the draft pick (which will help MAYBE in 2020 or 2021 or 2022) and pool money over the short-term. Or was it that he didn't want to have something left to show for the Shark deal and his ego got in the way because they were selling the idea of "long term competitive winner" and "sustained success" for awhile there. Then we just threw it out the window with this 23-10 start, dumped Danks, traded for Shields and reverted back 100% to our old ways.

Edited June 7, 2016 by caulfield12

[flavum]

Pretty good segment on MLB Now today.

 

http://m.mlb.com/video/topic/49502780/v782...quiring-shields

[Balta1701]

Then why when people were talking about how disappointing Shark was last year, did you use his fangraphs WAR to point out he pitched as expected and not the 0.2 on BR?

Because I'm still trying to figure out how the 2015 White Sox as a whole unit had such a big disparity between their pitching bWAR and fWAR. If you go to bWAR, Chris Sale was a pretty weak starter last year, he'd have made a good #3 starter with a 3.3 bWAR.

 

Over the long term for Buehrle I think B-R is getting closer because I think that by focusing more on the runs scored and less on the K's it manages to take into account how he controlled the running game and how he managed the game/fielders behind him. But that's one specific player and how the algorithm works. Something extremely funny happened with the way those two counting stats managed the White Sox last year - one of them hung everything on the defense, one of them thought the pitching staff was terrible top to bottom.

[Balta1701]

That is false because all three things are related to on the field performance. In your example, only actual performance is related to actual performance. Surplus is not.

Surplus value is "not related to on the field performance"? So the total value generated by a person has nothing to do with how they actually play on the field? Ok then.

 

I'm out.

[Dick Allen]

The last time a team led the league in cumulative WAR and played in the WS was 2010.results are more important than surplus WAR.

Edited June 7, 2016 by Dick Allen

[caulfield12]

As we speak, the Tigers are in the process of tying us for 4th place.

 

Meanwhile, their top pitching prospect, Michael Fulmer, is clearly outpitching Carlos Rodon. Actually, I'm not sure who has been the most disappointing between him and Abreu this year (and Carson Fulmer). This last month has been such a downer, but NOTHING compared to that feeling in August/September of 2005 that the Indians were going to run us down from behind.

 

At any rate, that's some DISAPPEARING surplus value.

[Dick Allen]

2005 the Imdians payroll was over $30 million less than the White Sox and they had a higher team WAR. Do they get a trophy or something?

[Bob Sacamano]

I think if you had a database you could run some vlookups off of with salary / war / etc all, there it would work and that includes a list of all players traded and received, etc. I'm not spending the time to do it, but theoritically a solid blog type piece from someone. There is some extent a difference between pre arb and post arb guys and the reality of what should be expected and clearly there is more value in a guy who puts up a higher WAR than two or three guys who equate that same total, but in general, I agree with your previous post. Theortically, best thing the Sox could have done is trade every positional prospect we had drafted over the past 15 years...only upside

 

 

God I hate that Excel function. I wish it wasn't so useful.

 

I have a finance degree and have worked a finance and now accounting job...I know your pain.

[Chisoxfn]

Surplus value is "not related to on the field performance"? So the total value generated by a person has nothing to do with how they actually play on the field? Ok then.

 

I'm out.

Lets spin it another way. The only way a team with a $130M payroll is going to win the world series is if they generate significant surplus value. They can't possibly pay the market rate for WAR (if we are going to focus on WAR) or the market rate for wins as they could never possibly get it in budget, so the importance of having surplus WAR when you have a confined payroll is it actually allows you to beat those teams with greater payrolls (not a novel concept). Best chance at producing surplus WAR is by developing your own internal talent (and we could say WAR or we could just say surplus performance). Guys like Sale / Q deliver that in buckets (so does Rodon & Eaton). It also provides you the means to add additional WAR more at the going rate (as you are going to pay market rate in FA and reality is FA is not your place to get surplus value, especially on big contracts and if you go dumpster diving, you have potential for more surplus value, but you also have super wide variability of performance which clearly isn't a goal either).

 

Reality is the Sox benefit from having as many good, cost controlled players as possible (don't care what stat you want to measure it by) and to do that you need to develop internal talent (which you supplement through trades and free agency...i.e., to construct a roster that gels better and fills voids that you can't fill from within). Our current approach to roster development has largely been to develop position talent via trades and FA and that just doesn't provide the same value as if you can do it successfully internally and it puts us in a tough position. To some extent being awesome at developing pitchers helps combat that, but even than, when we have used FA resources, we have struggled (see: Adam LaRoce / Adam Dunn / PY Melky (CY Melky is producing just fine) and when we have tried via trade, we have largely missed (see: Matt Davidson / Avi Garcia....Frazier I'll give some credit there even though we clearly also gave in that deal with Trayce being a damn good performer with the Dodgers this year and Lawrie looks like an early win). Wendleken is with A's but wasn't blowing it out in AAA (too soon to say anything) and Erwin right now is struggling in A ball (not a good sign). That said, Lawrie hasn't been a total stud either. We talk highly about him but he hasn't been some awesome player by any stretch of the imagination. He's a league average player at best.

[Chisoxfn]

The last time a team led the league in cumulative WAR and played in the WS was 2010.results are more important than surplus WAR.

Call it WAR, call it whatever you want. But you are best served by having good players who are cost-controlled, especially, when you have real salary confines. WAR is the easy stat for people to throw around, but it obviously isn't the end all, be all. Kind of like people are so focused on FIP, which has inherent limitations in its own right vs. the reality that the real driver of actual performance for any one season is by actual runs allowed and actual runs scored.

[caulfield12]

At this point, I'm not even sure what you guys are arguing.

 

Sounds like you're just looking at it from your own perspectives and you feel you're both right but there actually isn't any argument to be made, just different equally valid perspectives on the same topic.

 

At any rate, the White Sox have that pitching niche (although not seeing it with Rodon and Carson Fulmer this year yet) and they have that other niche, which is extracting or maximizing WAR by keeping all their players healthy and on the field as often as possible.

 

While you can question the talent selected, at least we haven't had to replace them with a roster of mostly AA/AAA suspects.

 

 

And 2012 is a good example, we HAD huge surplus value from 11-12 rookies on that roster. We got positive WAR contributions from Youkilis for virtually free for 3-4 weeks there. The problem is that we didn't have the talent overall to beat the Tigers, regardless of our more efficient allocation of resources/WAR. You can argue it was Leyland vs. Ventura or Addison Reed choked or Dunn and the rest of the offense wore down (same with Q in his rookie year). You can argue Cooper got nothing out of Liriano whereas the Pirates figured out a way to completely turn his career around 6 months after Cooper gave up on him and threw in the towel.

 

 

[CB2.0]

2005 the Imdians payroll was over $30 million less than the White Sox and they had a higher team WAR. Do they get a trophy or something?

 

There was nearly a double digit pitching delta in rWAR in favor of the Sox in 2005 which, if you remember that last series, proved to be a big deal.

Edited June 7, 2016 by CB2.0

[ptatc]

SF has 3.

 

Heck, the Marlins won two in 1997 and 2003, but not sure we want to emulate them.

 

At least through 2012, we could have said we had a Top Five winning percentage in all of baseball from let's say 1990 or 1993 through 2010/12 except for the Yankees, Braves and Cardinals.

 

That was the argument used to justify not teardown...that the White Sox at least have been competitive over most of those seasons...but that argument doesn't hold water with fans anymore, certainly not over the last 3 years and after the disappointment of 2011, 2012 and 2015 all fizzling despite high fan hopes.

Sorry, I'm in the medical field, can't count.

 

I agree it hasn't been effective lately which is why if the stated discussion is the "last few years..." however, there are far too many people saying KW hasn't produced.... and this discussion was in response to a post comparing KW to the 2 previous GMs. I was just comparing KW's record to the last 2. For all the KW bashing, he is by far the best GM for the sox in the modern era.

 

I find myself really contradicting myself. In the 70's, 80's and 90's, I kept saying "I just want to see 1 world series champ for the White sox: because we never though it would happen with those teams. Now that it happened and they have struggled the last few year I want to change that line of thought.

[mmmmmbeeer]

Pretty good segment on MLB Now today.

 

http://m.mlb.com/video/topic/49502780/v782...quiring-shields

 

Really enjoyed this....thanks for posting.

[ptatc]

Really enjoyed this....thanks for posting.

Very good. An interesting was the stats professor discussing why WAR is so flawed especially for pitchers. He had an interesting take on it. One I hadn't thought of.

[Soxfest]

Pretty good segment on MLB Now today.

 

http://m.mlb.com/video/topic/49502780/v782...quiring-shields

Thank you enjoyed the segment.

Edited June 7, 2016 by Soxfest

[Bigsoxhurt35]

Pretty good segment on MLB Now today.

 

http://m.mlb.com/video/topic/49502780/v782...quiring-shields

 

Great video thanks!

 

I'm really trying to find positives from this season but it's just so hard now that they've fallen to what they really are with the exception of some of the outings from the pen. I know they're better than that. This team needs another good pen arm and a bat.

[Chicago White Sox]

Very good. An interesting was the stats professor discussing why WAR is so flawed especially for pitchers. He had an interesting take on it. One I hadn't thought of.

Yeah, I was surprised to hear his view on WAR. While it's no doubt a great stat, it is ultimately flawed. Shields is a great example why too. His one horrific start brings his total value down significantly, but in reality that one start is contained to that day. He could give up a 100 runs in a given start and it would only be worth one loss, but would f*** up his WAR for the season no matter how well he pitched in all other games. While that's an extreme example, he only gave up 22 runs in his first 8 starts this year, while giving up 10 in his most recent. Those quality starts are worth more than 0.4 wins, even if you account for the one game he lost in epic fashion.

[caulfield12]

WAR, WHAT IS IT GOOD FOR?

 

ABSOLUTELY NOTHING!

 

 

Flashback to Chris Rock/Jackie Chan scene in Rush Hour.

 

 

[Chicago White Sox]

WAR, WHAT IS IT GOOD FOR?

 

ABSOLUTELY NOTHING!

 

 

Flashback to Chris Rock/Jackie Chan scene in Rush Hour.

Isn't that Chris Tucker in Rush Hour?

[Chisoxfn]

WAR, WHAT IS IT GOOD FOR?

 

ABSOLUTELY NOTHING!

 

 

Flashback to Chris Rock/Jackie Chan scene in Rush Hour.

I lold. Love me some rush hour. Tucker and chan had such fantastic chemistry and energy in those movies.

[BigHurt3515]

WAR, WHAT IS IT GOOD FOR?

 

ABSOLUTELY NOTHING!

 

 

Flashback to Chris Rock/Jackie Chan scene in Rush Hour.

 

I prefer this one: