Is Cron quietly having a good year?

[Second Base]

56 minutes ago, ukyah said:

with all due respect to a fair opinion, and acknowledging that you said, "just enough". 

excluding defense, if he could do that at the plate he would be a top player in mlb. it's the same for pitchers and overall team performance, as well. play, pitch, or hit decently in your down streaks and ride the hot streaks for as long as possible and you'll be a 92+ win team, a cy young candidate, or an mvp candidate.

baseball is all about streaks. avoid the bad ones and maximize the good ones. i know that's not new information to anyone reading this.

as far as cron goes, mlb is unique, among sports, because all the fields aren't the same. i'll never understand why player's don't put more consideration into their home parks, when given the opportunity. look what it's done for trumbo, and so many others.

Exactly.  The Trout vs Donaldson debate last year really never took into account what Trout does in Toronto.  Park factors added an additional 5 doubles, 4 homers and 6 points in batting average. That would bring Trout's line from last year to a .305 BA 37 doubles 45 homeruns.

Now consider the fact that Donaldson is surrounded by Tulo, Bautista and Encanacion last season.  All of which are threats, or in Bautista's case a very serious threat.  So pitching around Donaldson, isn't an option much of the time.  That like translates to another 30 points in batting average  and probably 5 homeruns and a couple more doubles.  consider that Donaldson hit .255 the year before he came to Toronto and .297 when he arrived in Canada.

So if we follow that same train of thought, it puts Trout at something completely stupid like .335/.440 40 doubles and 50 homers, compared to Donaldson's .297/.371 with 41 DB and 41 HR's.  Add in the fact that Trout's a better defender and a better baserunner and tell me who the frick the MVP is. 

The AL East makes a HUGE difference. 

[Angelsjunky]

You're making up numbers, Scotty - especially with the whole protection argument. There's no conceivable way to translate that sort of thing into numbers, but we can look at actual stats that neutralize context: like wRC+, for instance.

Anyhow, advanced statistics clearly show that Trout and Donaldson were very similar in overall value, with only 0.3 fWAR separating them. That is essentially negligible (I believe Fangraphs says that WAR within about 1 is basically equal or similar in value, due to margin of error). Meaning, according to advanced statistics either one would have been a worthy MVP choice.

But the reason Donaldson won the MVP has little if anything to do with advanced metrics, and really comes down to two things: One, he had 33 more RBI. Two, he played for a contender. That is really it.

For a player on a non-contending team to win the MVP, he really has to be head and shoulders above everyone else in performance. Trout wasn't head and shoulders above Donaldson last year, at least if you buy fWAR's defensive component. This year will likely be the same, and come down to where the year ends in terms of hot and cold cycles for Trout and Donaldson. The only way Trout wins over Donaldson is if he ends hot and Donaldson cool, so Trout's numbers jump ahead a bit.

(This assuming that Altuve and Machado aren't serious contenders)

[Billy_Ball]

Lets hope Trout doesn't go to one of those hitters' parks of the AL East when he hits free agency.

[Second Base]

1 hour ago, Angelsjunky said:

You're making up numbers, Scotty - especially with the whole protection argument. There's no conceivable way to translate that sort of thing into numbers, but we can look at actual stats that neutralize context: like wRC+, for instance.

Anyhow, advanced statistics clearly show that Trout and Donaldson were very similar in overall value, with only 0.3 fWAR separating them. That is essentially negligible (I believe Fangraphs says that WAR within about 1 is basically equal or similar in value, due to margin of error). Meaning, according to advanced statistics either one would have been a worthy MVP choice.

But the reason Donaldson won the MVP has little if anything to do with advanced metrics, and really comes down to two things: One, he had 33 more RBI. Two, he played for a contender. That is really it.

For a player on a non-contending team to win the MVP, he really has to be head and shoulders above everyone else in performance. Trout wasn't head and shoulders above Donaldson last year, at least if you buy fWAR's defensive component. This year will likely be the same, and come down to where the year ends in terms of hot and cold cycles for Trout and Donaldson. The only way Trout wins over Donaldson is if he ends hot and Donaldson cool, so Trout's numbers jump ahead a bit.

(This assuming that Altuve and Machado aren't serious contenders)

Saying there's no such thing as protection is s lot like a physicist saying it's impossible for a fastball to actually rise. The math says that, and you think that, right up until the point that you actually put on a helmet and step up to the plate. Then you see a Craig Kimbrel fastball and say, "Holy Crap! It rises!"

The numbers say protection doesn't exist, and you're probably right, but there's a big freakin' difference between facing Trout knowing the man on deck in Bautista vs Pujols. It changes the way a pitcher approaches a specific AB.

[eaterfan]

Yes. But you act like Trout can't adjust to that. Trout gets fewer pitches in the zone to hit. That means there are more pitches out of the zone to take for walks. Trout gets out well over half the time he puts the ball in play. He never gets out on a walk.

Just to give some numbers... If Trout walks every time his OPS would be 1.000. He has never put up an OPS that high. Not only that OPS underweights the OBP components production value.

[AngelsLakersFan]

Trout's best year is still the year Pujols got hurt and everyone was pitching around him.