Official Offseason Thread

[clvclv]

Pretty sure players will hit where you tell them to and not pout about it. These are professionals.

How do you make the jump from Acuna feeling more comfortable (or preferring) to hit in the leadoff spot to him pouting and/or causing problems if he doesn't? I don't recall anyone suggesting that. He has stated openly that he prefers to hit there, but I don't remember him opening his mouth at all when he was hitting 4th at the beginning of last season.

Of course he'll hit wherever Snitker pencils his name in. If the numbers guys made a strong enough argument that AA turned up the heat under Snitker about wanting Freddie to move into the cleanup spot, that would happen too. Donaldson originally resisted the lineup shuffling last season more than anyone else.

I'd argue that the problem with lineup positioning lies with Snitker, not the players. As mentioned earlier, if the analytics staff were to go to Ozzie, Acuna, and Freeman and lay out why they should hit in a different spot they'd be much easier to convince than the guy filling out the lineup card.

[Metaphysicist]

I'm pretty sure lineup construction is just not that important; unless there is a bunch of new research or something, "the Book" said the value of an optimized lineup vs. a really dumb one is worth like maybe a single win over the course of the year.

If a good player actually cares enough to believe they are playing "better" or "worse" in a certain spot, just let them hit there. Baseball is partially a mental game; the minor reward doesn't really outweigh the similarly minor risk that the player is gonna mess themselves up by changing their approach or something.

[Snowman]

What do you mean by bunting or something? That is really the only way to "get a runner over" with a runner on first other than getting a base hit and bunting is ALWAYS a terrible idea in those situations. The problem with Ozzie hitting 2nd is that he is probably the 4th best hitter for that slot when you should be putting your best or 2nd best hitter there. Acuna is tailor made for the 2 hole. Placing Ozzie in an optimized lineup is probably the biggest challenge that I would face if I were a manager. I think you could make reasonable arguments for him to hit in the 1, 3, or 6 hole, especially against RHP. The fact that he has significant R/L splits makes it even more challenging, because you could also argue that he should be in the 2, 3, or 5 holes against lefties since he is so good.

Against RHP, he's about league average, but he'll still get on base a little and give you a little pop here and there. So the 1, 3, or 6 hole should play fine to his strengths, since he is still probably our 4th or 5th best hitter against RHP. But he is literally one of the best hitters in baseball against LHP, easily capable of putting up a 1.000+ OPS. So at that point you may start considering pushing Ozuna to the 1, 3, or 6 hole while letting Ozzie take his spot at 5, or switch things around to put him at 2 while moving Acuna to 4th and Freddie to 5th.

Ozzie is a complicated player to place in an optimized lineup.

FWIW, what I'm virtually certain he means is a few bunts mixed into a whole lot of weak grounders behind the runner. It was what everyone used to think a #2 hitter should do every time a runner was on back before the Pirates starting batting Bonds there.

[Snowman]

I'm pretty sure lineup construction is just not that important; unless there is a bunch of new research or something, "the Book" said the value of an optimized lineup vs. a really dumb one is worth like maybe a single win over the course of the year.

If a good player actually cares enough to believe they are playing "better" or "worse" in a certain spot, just let them hit there. Baseball is partially a mental game; the minor reward doesn't really outweigh the similarly minor risk that the player is gonna mess themselves up by changing their approach or something.

You're somewhat right, but this is baseball; literally everything you do is trying to pick up one or two extra wins. We got Ozuna to pick up an extra 2 wins over Nicky Singles, and that's worth $18 million.

[BeanieAntics]

I'm pretty sure lineup construction is just not that important; unless there is a bunch of new research or something, "the Book" said the value of an optimized lineup vs. a really dumb one is worth like maybe a single win over the course of the year.

If a good player actually cares enough to believe they are playing "better" or "worse" in a certain spot, just let them hit there. Baseball is partially a mental game; the minor reward doesn't really outweigh the similarly minor risk that the player is gonna mess themselves up by changing their approach or something.

Over the course of a full season its probably more like 1.5 wins if we're talking about a perfectly optimized lineup vs. your average dumb old school lineup. But even at just one win, that's significant enough not to ignore. Like Snowman said, literally everything you do in baseball is trying buy a couple extra wins here or there. If you can win one extra game by having an optimal lineup, you're essentially buying yourself ~8 million dollars in value for free.

You could make a similar argument for framing. For years people thought that blocking and throwing were the key attributes of a good catcher. But we now know that those things will buy you a maximum of a half win per year even if you have an all time great blocker/thrower back there. We also know that framing can get you up to an extra 2 wins if your catcher is good enough at it. The teams that were ahead of the curve in that regard had several years where they were getting 2 wins per year more than the old school minded teams. Edit: So if you had a catcher who was focusing on developing his blocking/throwing while ignoring framing, it'd be a really good idea to encourage him to do the opposite or at least not neglect his framing skills. Even if the player doesn't understand or is a bit ambivalent about the idea.

Analytics have become so widespread in baseball, I think you have to look for every edge you possibly can. In the best case scenario you are netting yourself a win that other teams are ignoring. Once they catch up, lineup optimization becomes even more necessary because if you are the one team not doing it your giving up a win that every other team is giving themselves.

Point being, those small edges matter a lot nowadays. And if it means you have to sit down with a player and run through the numbers with them so they understand your reasoning, I think that's a small price to pay, even if you have a couple players disgruntled by it.

[BeanieAntics]

Here's something I'm kinda curious about: How many runs/wins could you buy yourself over the course of a 162 game season by having optimal tactics like never bunting, stealing less frequently, potentially using an opener, deploying ideal platoons, etc?

I know that the value of an optimized lineup is relatively small, but I'd still argue its significance. But I think this is where teams are probably giving away a TON of value over a season. Just as an example, this is just how bad bunting truly is. If you have a runner on 1st with nobody out, you should have an average run expectancy of about 0.86. With a runner on 2nd and 1 out, you should have an average run expectancy of about 0.66. So every single time you sacrifice a runner to 2nd with nobody out, you're giving up a fifth of a run on average. That is an extremely narrowly tailored situation and the same goes for every single other scenario where a manager may be inclined to bunt. The gap gets even more dramatic when talking about bunting with 1 out.

And that's just bunting. If you optimized your stealing, used an opener sometimes, used correct platoons, used correct shifts, and other things like that, my suspicion is that you could buy yourself dozens of runs and several wins of the course of a full season.

So if I had to choose between an optimal lineup and optimal tactics, I'd go with the tactics every time. But it'd be nice if we just optimized everything.

[Metaphysicist]

That's, again, maybe a single win over the a dumb old school lineup, 1-8. I.e., a lineup that looks like:

1) your fastest guy up top (regardless of OBP)
2) a slap hitter to "get em over" (e.g. Mark Lemke used to bat 2)
3) high BA guy at 3 to "get em in"
4) a slugger at 3 "clean em up." (regardless of OBP)
etc.

That's not what our lineup looked like at all last year. For much of the year we had our best guys hitting 1-4, which covers like 90% of "optimizing" your lineup by not having scrubs at 1 and 2.

[Metaphysicist]

Like for example, this game (link) is your classic "badly" constructed lineup:

1) Grissom, .318 OBP, .690 OPS, but fast!
2) Lemke, .674 OPS, but that bat handling skill!
3) Chipper, .799 OPS
4) McGriff, .850 OPS
5) Justice, .863 OPS
6) Klesko, 1.001 OPS
7) Lopez, .859 OPS
8) Blauser, .656 OPS

The one, huge, egregious problem with this lineup is that you have 2 of the 3 worst hitters 1 and 2. Just put any of the actual good hitters there and you've done basically all the work of "optimization."

[nsacpi]

Waters is a switch hitter

and hits better from the left side...ditto for Michael Harris...and Shewmake hits lefty

[nsacpi]

Like for example, this game (link) is your classic "badly" constructed lineup:

1) Grissom, .318 OBP, .690 OPS, but fast!
2) Lemke, .674 OPS, but that bat handling skill!
3) Chipper, .799 OPS
4) McGriff, .850 OPS
5) Justice, .863 OPS
6) Klesko, 1.001 OPS
7) Lopez, .859 OPS
8) Blauser, .656 OPS

The one, huge, egregious problem with this lineup is that you have 2 of the 3 worst hitters 1 and 2. Just put any of the actual good hitters there and you've done basically all the work of "optimization."

I would flip flop Justice and Blauser

[clvclv]

and hits better from the left side...ditto for Michael Harris...and Shewmake hits lefty

This is the name (along with Vaughn Grissom, Jared Johnson, and Bryce Ball) that has to give us hope that last year's draft strategy can be successful IMO - hit on a toolsy high school kid that slides early, and hope a couple college kids can live up to the high-end of their projections.

That's the main reason I'm not overly concerned with having lost one net pick with the Smith and Ozuna signings - the organization as currently constructed has no need for any fast-movers, and if we get lucky and Riley somehow can make the necessary adjustments the system arguably won't need to produce anything other than "fill-in" arms over the next 2-3 years.

Of course that's going to take a good bit of luck, but what doesn't?

[MadduxFanII]

Like for example, this game (link) is your classic "badly" constructed lineup:

1) Grissom, .318 OBP, .690 OPS, but fast!
2) Lemke, .674 OPS, but that bat handling skill!
3) Chipper, .799 OPS
4) McGriff, .850 OPS
5) Justice, .863 OPS
6) Klesko, 1.001 OPS
7) Lopez, .859 OPS
8) Blauser, .656 OPS

The one, huge, egregious problem with this lineup is that you have 2 of the 3 worst hitters 1 and 2. Just put any of the actual good hitters there and you've done basically all the work of "optimization."

Ryan Klesko, leadoff hitter.

[Eyeman]

I'm not saying that I want Albies to bunt or hit a weak grounder behind the hitter, I just assume the stats would support that a pop up with runners on is just as bad as a strike out. And only better than not hitting into a double play.

Glad to read that Waters is a better from the left side switch hitter.

[Snowman]

I'm not saying that I want Albies to bunt or hit a weak grounder behind the hitter, I just assume the stats would support that a pop up with runners on is just as bad as a strike out. And only better than not hitting into a double play.

Glad to read that Waters is a better from the left side switch hitter.

Then I'm just confused now. Albies career major league IFFB% (I do assume you mean infield pop ups, right?) is 7.6%, which is better than average.

[Hudson2]

The Red are seen as the front runners for NC. If they do sign him could Senzel really be available?

[CrimeDog247]

Like for example, this game (link) is your classic "badly" constructed lineup:

1) Grissom, .318 OBP, .690 OPS, but fast!
2) Lemke, .674 OPS, but that bat handling skill!
3) Chipper, .799 OPS
4) McGriff, .850 OPS
5) Justice, .863 OPS
6) Klesko, 1.001 OPS
7) Lopez, .859 OPS
8) Blauser, .656 OPS

The one, huge, egregious problem with this lineup is that you have 2 of the 3 worst hitters 1 and 2. Just put any of the actual good hitters there and you've done basically all the work of "optimization."

Didn’t this lineup win a World Series?

[BeanieAntics]

The Red are seen as the front runners for NC. If they do sign him could Senzel really be available?

Okay somebody is gonna have to explain this Senzel **** to me. I know the Reds are kinda dumb, but why in God's name would they trade a guy that they control for another 5 or 6 years, on a rookie scale contract, who has a top 5 prospect pedigree, is super versatile, and has the upside of an all star caliber hitter. I've seen his name come up over and over and over again. This seems like one of the dumbest rumors that this board has come up with.

[Hulavol]

Okay somebody is gonna have to explain this Senzel **** to me. I know the Reds are kinda dumb, but why in God's name would they trade a guy that they control for another 5 or 6 years, on a rookie scale contract, who has a top 5 prospect pedigree, is super versatile, and has the upside of an all star caliber hitter. I've seen his name come up over and over and over again. This seems like one of the dumbest rumors that this board has come up with.

Yeah- what he said

[Snowman]

Didn’t this lineup win a World Series?

The 95 team was also below league average in offensive production. The pitching moire than carried that team.

[rico43]

Okay somebody is gonna have to explain this Senzel **** to me. I know the Reds are kinda dumb, but why in God's name would they trade a guy that they control for another 5 or 6 years, on a rookie scale contract, who has a top 5 prospect pedigree, is super versatile, and has the upside of an all star caliber hitter. I've seen his name come up over and over and over again. This seems like one of the dumbest rumors that this board has come up with.

On top of that, he's proven he can play 2-3 positions well enough.