Were the 2014 Angels a fluke?

[Second Base]

Something to definitely think about right now.

http://monkeywithahalo.com/2015-articles/were-the-2014-angels-a-fluke.html

[mtangelsfan]

Can you really have a fluke over 162 games? 

 

Did any players from last year vastly outplay their career numbers?

 

I don't think the term fluke fits at all.

[Second Base]

If you read the article I think you'd see that yes, given history and this year's performance, quite a few players vastly outperformed their expectations.

I think the mistake we made was building the 2015 team based of 2014 production, not career norms.

[mtangelsfan]

I think you are really reaching for all of those save possibly Shoe.

 

I think the mistake made going into this year was to basically assume Hamilton would be back at a decent level and also assume they could absorb the loss of Howie.

 

Pitching should be better.  Wilson is better, Santiago is better, the back end of the pen is solid.

[QuinlansMinion]

No they werent a fluke this team just got unlucky in the playoffs and the bad luck has carried over into this season.

[Guest]

You can't be a fluke and win 98 games. They were a well rounded team–incredible offensive power and solid pitching. 

 

Unfortunately, they were also a bit streaky (as they still are today), and their bats got cold during that last series with SEA. 

[halobob]

Yes.

[Chuck]

I'm with MT and others on this one. 

 

Players contributed last season, this year they've gotten off to a slow start. Arguably Trout had a better rookie and second season than he did in his MVP year last season. 

 

Losing Kendrick and having players underperform is the issue. Shoemaker has the same stuff. He's just not commanding his fastball as well and he's getting tattooed. That said, he's had a handful of starts that rivaled what we saw in 2014. 

[Blarg]

It is really hard to fluke your way to 98 wins and really easy to play at .500 when your team is suffering with 3 or more players underperforming.

Edited May 28, 2015 by notti

[ukyah]

fans really need to stop thinking in these terms. the truth is, and you will hear this from players of every team sport, that every year is an individual year. they are not groupings. fans and sportswriters are aware of this intuitively, they call it chemistry, but they get it wrong. it's not about whether guys like eachother or not. it's the idea of complimentary parts making the whole function. that "chemistry" is very difficult to quantify, but it's plain as day on the field. right now the angels don't have the right chemistry, if dipoto makes a few shrewd moves it can alter the entire dynamic as a whole.

[Homebrewer]

Better than expected (although they didn't exactly out-play their salary level, except for the starting pitchers) during the regular season....

Non-entity, non-factor, flat.. in the post season.

Pretty much what I expect under this manager...

So...

No, not a fluke, IMO. 

[Docwaukee]

they didn't build the team off of one seasons worth of statistics.  Sure, last year can weigh into the discussion, but all of the projections were appropriately normalized.  We have a team of sabermetricians analyzing tons and tons of data.  they are hovering around .500 not because a bunch of guys regressed to their expected levels, but because a bunch of guys are performing well below that.  

 

let's use iannetta, pujols, joyce and freese as examples.  

 

we're a shade over a quarter of the season.  

 

for Albert, it would be reasonable to assume he'd be right around where he was last year.  I am not sure how what you wrote would disprove that.  his current BABIP is .229.  The lowest of his career by far.  

 

Chris Iannetta played half a season last year.  His platoon mate was brutal at the plate.  So why wouldn't we expect that is Chris regressed a bit it would be to about the level of last year's combo as he was set to get the lion's share of the workload.

 

Aybar had a wRC of 68 last year and wRC+ of 101.  he's had three above and three others below.  he was pretty much dead on balls in the middle of is average and again, why would we think he couldn't perform at his career averages?

 

Joyce has been a disaster.  his recent avg year was about 110-115 wRC+.  again, can someone give me a good reason why it wouldn't have been at least 100?  

 

Pretty much the same story with Freese.  He was at his average last year.  He should be at or slightly below this year.  his peripherals support that as well.  

 

replacing Howie was going to hurt no matter what.  they expected that.  

 

What they likely didn't expect was handing over an above average LHed LFer.  pretty much exactly what we'd trade for right now if we could minus the baggage.  

 

the pen was putrid in the first half and unhittable in the second half.  Somewhere in the middle of that gives you a reasonable expectation.  Which means that who we had left could regress a bit and still fine.  

 

Shoemaker hasn't pitched well but is better than we've seen as you mentioned.  Wilson and Santiago won't sustain their current levels but we have depth, missed richards for a few starts and weaver is coming back to normal so that's why the pitching is fine.  

 

It's not that Dipoto was enamored with 98 wins last year, it's that we were.  

 

we went into the season being a 90ish win team.  some things went right, and some not so much.  the whole was better than the sum of the parts.  

we went into this season being a 90ish win team and the opposite is happening 

 

neither is a fluke.  it's just baseball.  

[SoWhat]

I'm tired of hearing the words "underperforming" and "track record". The majority of these guys have been declining for years and now they've all hit a point where they aren't even league average. Bring up the kids and give us something entertaining to watch 

[mtangelsfan]

I'm tired of hearing the words "underperforming" and "track record". The majority of these guys have been declining for years and now they've all hit a point where they aren't even league average. Bring up the kids and give us something entertaining to watch 

 

People say this but then if it does happen chances are they are the ones complaining about how bad the team is and how it is made up of a bunch of nobodies and scrubs.

[AngelsFaninGA]

I'm tired of hearing the words "underperforming" and "track record". The majority of these guys have been declining for years and now they've all hit a point where they aren't even league average. Bring up the kids and give us something entertaining to watch 

 

This. The problem with having aging, mediocre players like Joyce, Freese, Iannetta, Pujols, etc on the team is that their performance is liable to sharp, even permanent, dropoffs. Sometimes players are just done. It comes with the territory and it doesn't mean any one year is a fluke. 

[ettin]

The 2014 Angels had a team .305 BABIP, which as we all know is pretty close to average (.300). This year they are collectively at a .271 BABIP clearly underperforming as a group with several members slumping early.

 

If they were running right we'd have a few more wins to date. The "fluke" is this year to date. Regression to the mean is likely as we progress further into the season.

[Inside Pitch]

If you read the article I think you'd see that yes, given history and this year's performance, quite a few players vastly outperformed their expectations.

I think the mistake we made was building the 2015 team based of 2014 production, not career norms.

 

 

Dude...  I haven't read the article, but based on your comments in this response -- shoot whoever did the analysis.   Since you are talking about team performance, you need to look at the team results, not individual players..   It's NORMAL for teams to see an individual players performance fluctuate.   So how did the team itself do last year .vs previous years in order to determine if last year was a fluke?

 

Team OPS+ the previous three years....  

 

2012 - 114,

2013 - 110,

2014 - 109....  

 

So far in 2015 it's 86.

 

Slap whoever did the research and edit the article to read, "Is the Angels 2015 season a fluke so far?"  FTR, I'm focusing on the offense because the ERA+ has carried over from last year.

 

You're welcome.

Edited May 28, 2015 by Inside Pitch

[Inside Pitch]

I'm tired of hearing the words "underperforming" and "track record". The majority of these guys have been declining for years and now they've all hit a point where they aren't even league average. Bring up the kids and give us something entertaining to watch 

 

Their offensive track record actually shows how much people underrated the offense in recent years.  It also shows there was reason to believe there would be a continued decline, not to the point where it is now but enough so that the idea of moving Kendrick and relying on Hamilton to pick up the difference was wishful thinking.

 

Ultimately shitting the bed this year may end up pushing the team forward long term.

[Lou]

I'm tired of hearing the words "underperforming" and "track record". The majority of these guys have been declining for years and now they've all hit a point where they aren't even league average. Bring up the kids and give us something entertaining to watch 

 

declining for years? Pujols, Aybar and Iannetta all had higher ops' in 2014 than they did in 2013.  Trout and Calhoun were fine.  JG is better this year than last year.  

 

Which kids would you like to see? 

[Jay]

Many times throughout 2014 I wondered how the Angels who looked mediocre at best on the field, could possibly have the best record in MLB.

[Angelsjunky]

I haven't read the article yet but will later, and will comment again after, but one thing that comes to mind is that the 2002 Angels could be considered a fluke. They won 75 games in 2001 and 77 games in 2003 and just caught lightning in a bottle in 2002. The 2004 team that won 92 games was a very different team than in 2002 and was, in a way, less flukey than 2002.

 

I remember last year thinking that the team offense shouldn't be scoring as many runs as it did. I think the team last year was just balanced, good in all ways and without any major weaknesses. On paper it was probably an 88-90 win team, good but not great. Couple that balance with a dose of good luck and you get 98 wins. Take the same team, reduce the talent a bit by replacing Howie with Gio, Hamilton with Joyce, and then see continued decline and some off years, and you have a .500 ball club.

 

To quote Al Pacino from "Any Given Sunday", football is a game of inches - the same is true of all professional sports.

[SoWhat]

declining for years? Pujols, Aybar and Iannetta all had higher ops' in 2014 than they did in 2013. Trout and Calhoun were fine. JG is better this year than last year.

Which kids would you like to see?

Aybar has been consistent for the most part. Iannetta overachieved last year, IMO. Last year was the first time he hit over .250 in 6 years, his .ISO has been in decline for the past 5 season and his BB% for the past 3. Pujols played 99 games while injured in 2013, of course he'd bounce back the following season. Whether you use advanced stats or the eye test, it's easy to see he's in decline.

[stormngt]

I wouldn't say a fluke but they definitely over achieved. Aybar and Ianetta had thier best year. Cowgil, Navarro, and Green had great streaks in limited action. Richards and Shoemaker better than ecoected.

Something to definitely think about right now.

http://monkeywithahalo.com/2015-articles/were-the-2014-angels-a-fluke.html

[Troll Daddy]

Let's not forget the other side of the equation ... other teams improved in the off season and got healthy (ex. Texas).

[Second Base]

How is it possible that the only person here that actually read the article and constructed an appropriate response for debate is dochalo.  Come on AW!