Range no Factor?
houston reaction to the beltran defection, part one and part two. astros' bleak outlook at mlb.com.
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worried about david eckstein’s lack of range at ss? maybe you shouldn’t be. of the last 20 pennant winners (10 in each league going back to 1995), only six had shortstops with a better-than-average range factor.
that list does not include the 2004 st louis cardinals, by the way: edgar slid just below par last season, at 4.41 plays per 9 innings (pp9) versus a league average of 4.45. his al counterpart, orlando cabrera, was even more laggardly, with 4.16 pp9 vs a league average of 4.56.
you have to go all the way back to 1998 to find a pennant-winner whose ss beat the league average in range factor: the san diego padres. the shortstop? chris gomez. you have to go a year further back to find same in the american league: the 1997 cleveland indians and omar vizquel. in the interim, such nondescript glovemen as rich aurilia, alex gonzalez, mike bordick, and (yes) david eckstein have anchored world-series-worthy infields.
eckstein has never bested the league average in range factor; he made his best showing in 2003, coming within 0.10 pp9 of par. but he was truly awful last season, falling shy of the a.l. average by 0.73 pp9 — nearly a play a game. over his career, though, eck’s deficit in range factor — 0.33 pp9 below league average — is consistent with the performance of most pennant-winning shortstops of the last decade.
does that mean card fans can stop fretting about the loss of range in the middle infield? . . . . . . . not so fast. the caveat is that many of the range-challenged shortstops we’ve been discussing played behind strikeout-oriented power pitchers who could succeed in the absence of tight infield defense. the ’04 boxos had schilling and pedro; the ’01 dbacks, schilling and big unit. the giants? jason schmidt. the marlins? josh beckett in ’03, livan hernandez in ’97. the yanks have had clemens, mussina, el duque, dave cone, et al over the years.
the cardinals’ staff does not fit this profile; our guys put the ball over the plate and rely on their defense. eckstein is not going to have their backs like edgar did — and the diff’nce is going to show up on the scoreboard and in the staff’s eras. a reasonable guess is that over the course of a season eckstein might cost the cardinals between 35 and 100 base hits — ie, fail to reach 35-100 balls that edgar would have gloved.
in a season comprising about 5,000 plate appearances by the opposing team, can the fate of 50 ground balls really make a difference? we may learn the answer in 2005.
SS FOR PENNANT WINNERS, 1995-2004
NL: renteria (04 cards), alex gonzalez (03 marlins), rich aurilia (02 giants), womack (01 dbacks), mike bordick / rey ordonez (00 mets), walt weiss the elder (99 braves), gomez (98 padres), renteria the younger (97 marlins), jeff blauser (95-96 braves).
AL: cabrera (04 boxos), jeter (03 nyy), eckstein (02 angels), jeter (98-01 nyy), vizquel (97 indians), jeter (96 nyy), vizquel (95 indians).
* * * * * * * * * * * *
worried about david eckstein’s lack of range at ss? maybe you shouldn’t be. of the last 20 pennant winners (10 in each league going back to 1995), only six had shortstops with a better-than-average range factor.
that list does not include the 2004 st louis cardinals, by the way: edgar slid just below par last season, at 4.41 plays per 9 innings (pp9) versus a league average of 4.45. his al counterpart, orlando cabrera, was even more laggardly, with 4.16 pp9 vs a league average of 4.56.
you have to go all the way back to 1998 to find a pennant-winner whose ss beat the league average in range factor: the san diego padres. the shortstop? chris gomez. you have to go a year further back to find same in the american league: the 1997 cleveland indians and omar vizquel. in the interim, such nondescript glovemen as rich aurilia, alex gonzalez, mike bordick, and (yes) david eckstein have anchored world-series-worthy infields.
eckstein has never bested the league average in range factor; he made his best showing in 2003, coming within 0.10 pp9 of par. but he was truly awful last season, falling shy of the a.l. average by 0.73 pp9 — nearly a play a game. over his career, though, eck’s deficit in range factor — 0.33 pp9 below league average — is consistent with the performance of most pennant-winning shortstops of the last decade.
does that mean card fans can stop fretting about the loss of range in the middle infield? . . . . . . . not so fast. the caveat is that many of the range-challenged shortstops we’ve been discussing played behind strikeout-oriented power pitchers who could succeed in the absence of tight infield defense. the ’04 boxos had schilling and pedro; the ’01 dbacks, schilling and big unit. the giants? jason schmidt. the marlins? josh beckett in ’03, livan hernandez in ’97. the yanks have had clemens, mussina, el duque, dave cone, et al over the years.
the cardinals’ staff does not fit this profile; our guys put the ball over the plate and rely on their defense. eckstein is not going to have their backs like edgar did — and the diff’nce is going to show up on the scoreboard and in the staff’s eras. a reasonable guess is that over the course of a season eckstein might cost the cardinals between 35 and 100 base hits — ie, fail to reach 35-100 balls that edgar would have gloved.
in a season comprising about 5,000 plate appearances by the opposing team, can the fate of 50 ground balls really make a difference? we may learn the answer in 2005.
SS FOR PENNANT WINNERS, 1995-2004
NL: renteria (04 cards), alex gonzalez (03 marlins), rich aurilia (02 giants), womack (01 dbacks), mike bordick / rey ordonez (00 mets), walt weiss the elder (99 braves), gomez (98 padres), renteria the younger (97 marlins), jeff blauser (95-96 braves).
AL: cabrera (04 boxos), jeter (03 nyy), eckstein (02 angels), jeter (98-01 nyy), vizquel (97 indians), jeter (96 nyy), vizquel (95 indians).
posted by L Boros at 3:48 AM
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