Pitching Framing Runs

[nikkachez]

Jonathan Judge, from Baseball Prospectus/the top tier evaluators of catching defense thus far, breaks down the number of runs each team saved or gave up due to pitch framing. 

 

Dodgers: 25.6
Cubs: 24.1
Giants: 22.2
Mets: 21.9
Astros: 19.1
Toronto: 16.2
Yankees: 9.4
Nationals: 9.1
Cardinals: 8.2
Rays: 7.1
Pirates: 6.0
Padres: 5.1
Brewers: 4.4
Orioles: 1.3
Braves: -0.2
Indians: -1.0
Angels: -3.9
Red Sox: -3.9
Rockies: -4.9
Marlins: -6.1
Tigers: -8.5
Rangers: -11.1
Phillies: -11.3
Royals:-12.0
Twins: -16.3
Diamondbacks: -16.8
Athletics: -16.9
Mariners: -17.7
Reds: -22.7
White Sox: -26.4

 

If Chicago feels like Miguel Montero is too pricey as a backup catcher, I'd be happy to take him off their hands. Just something to think about moving forward, the Angels improved going from Bandy to Maldonado, but they're still a mid-tier team. Upgrading over Perez could be worth following. Don't think it's a coincidence a lot of elite teams are at the top. 

Edited December 17, 2016 by nikkachez
Added content

[Oz27]

For a little more information, here are the framing scores for catchers with a connection to us.

Perez: -2.5

Bandy: -1.3

Soto: -0.4

Maldonado: 2.1

Graterol: -0.1

And for overall fielding runs above average...

Perez: -0.8

Bandy: 0.6

Soto: 0.0

Maldonado: 4.3

Graterol: -0.1

It's worth emphasizing that Perez is not the plus defender people seem to believe he is. His throwing game is above average (+1.4 runs this year, +1.2 in 2015) but he is a below average framer and a roughly average blocker. Over a longer sample he might prove to be an average defensive catcher but the stats don't support the idea that he is particularly good.

[nikkachez]

3 minutes ago, Oz27 said:

For a little more information, here are the framing scores for catchers with a connection to us.

Perez: -2.5

Bandy: -1.3

Soto: -0.4

Maldonado: 2.1

Graterol: -0.1

And for overall fielding runs above average...

Perez: -0.8

Bandy: 0.6

Soto: 0.0

Maldonado: 4.3

Graterol: -0.1

 

Dude, awesome, thank you so much for this. Wish they could've done Perez for Maldonado instead, but I'm sure Milwaukee wanted to take a chance on Bandy's better, albeit not spectacular, bat. I am curious to know if Eppler has intentions on trying to improve Perez's spot, but with the current group in the free agent market, I'd be surprised if he goes that route. Like I said, I know Montero was unhappy about his role with Chicago at the end and I know they want Contreras to get plenty of time there, I'd love to have him. 

 

Just curious, where'd you find those numbers? I'd like to check out the total rankings, see if there are more "secret" alternatives Eppler could be looking at. 

[Blarg]

I sure would like to see more complete data on umpire calls regarding pitchers tendencies to be closer to the strike zone on their missed pitches and strike calls on the corners as opposed to pitchers that their misses are well outside the zone and if they get the same borderline calls. Some of the catcher stats may be more linked to the quality of the pitcher on the mound than their framing abilities. The Angels did not have much quality take the hill last season on a consistent basis.

[Troll Daddy]

I'd like to see stats posted for accuracy on umpires calling ball and strikes.

 

[AngelsLakersFan]

Some of the earlier work in this field had the number of runs affected much higher. I wonder what adjustments have been made that move the results closer to 0?

[AngelsLakersFan]

Just now, Troll Daddy said:

I'd like to see stats posted for accuracy on umpires calling ball and strikes.

 

The union will never allow it. That said there is probably enough publicly available data to reverse engineer it.

[Oz27]

21 minutes ago, nikkachez said:

Dude, awesome, thank you so much for this. Wish they could've done Perez for Maldonado instead, but I'm sure Milwaukee wanted to take a chance on Bandy's better, albeit not spectacular, bat. I am curious to know if Eppler has intentions on trying to improve Perez's spot, but with the current group in the free agent market, I'd be surprised if he goes that route. Like I said, I know Montero was unhappy about his role with Chicago at the end and I know they want Contreras to get plenty of time there, I'd love to have him. 

 

Just curious, where'd you find those numbers? I'd like to check out the total rankings, see if there are more "secret" alternatives Eppler could be looking at. 

Montero is an epic framer (+109.4 runs for his career), I can't imagine the Cubs would give that up cheaply.

Anyway, that information I posted is all from Baseball Prospectus. If you go to the website, search the player you want and then go to the 'catching' tab on their player page you should find it there. (although I'm a subscriber so I'm not sure what info is freely available and what isn't).

[Oz27]

3 minutes ago, AngelsLakersFan said:

Some of the earlier work in this field had the number of runs affected much higher. I wonder what adjustments have been made that move the results closer to 0?

There has been a bit of research out later suggesting that the field is narrowing. The worst framers aren't anywhere near as bad anymore, which of course drags the average level up. I expect we'll see this trend continue. At most teams have been monitoring framing for a decade, so the focus on improving it is pretty new. The longer that goes on, the more condensed the field should get.

[AngelsLakersFan]

2 minutes ago, Oz27 said:

There has been a bit of research out later suggesting that the field is narrowing. The worst framers aren't anywhere near as bad anymore, which of course drags the average level up. I expect we'll see this trend continue. At most teams have been monitoring framing for a decade, so the focus on improving it is pretty new. The longer that goes on, the more condensed the field should get.

That makes a lot of sense. Someone comes in and tells you you're 30 runs below average with your framing, you might not believe it but you sure as hell start thinking of ways to improve.

[nikkachez]

4 minutes ago, Blarg said:

I sure would like to see more complete data on umpire calls regarding pitchers tendencies to be closer to the strike zone on their missed pitches and strike calls on the corners as opposed to pitchers that their misses are well outside the zone and if they get the same borderline calls. Some of the catcher stats may be more linked to the quality of the pitcher on the mound than their framing abilities. The Angels did not have much quality take the hill last season on a consistent basis.

 

I see where you're coming from, obviously, the quality of pitching will improve just by starters coming back healthy and, hopefully, a few more improvements through FA/trade. But there was one piece from an article I was reading that might help answer your question (assuming I read it correctly). It used Zack Greinke as the example, and Greinke's really interesting because, while he does have a reputation as a finesse pitcher, he lives outside of the strike zone and does his best work when he throws outside the zone. During his amazing 2015 season, Greinke had a career-low in pitches thrown in the zone with only 39.9%. That would make sense, if hitters are swinging at pitches outside of the zone, they're either going to miss or make weak contact. Having a catcher that can frame those properly and even steal you a couple calls is a nice luxury to have, and a huge reason the Diamondbacks essentially swapped out a horrible pitch-framer (Castillo) for a very strong one (Mathis). Another Diamondback, Patrick Corbin, is another guy who lives on the edges of the K Zone. It helps pitchers paint the zone, obviously leading to harder pitches to square up. 

 

The difference between Castillo and Mathis in terms of pitch-framing?

 

Quote

A Dbacks catcher tends to appear. And he tends to fall short of Mathis in the called-strike department. In 2016, Mathis converted 16.4 percent of pitches taken in those zones into called strikes, compared to Castillo’s 13.6 percent.

With those rates, you’d expect Mathis to secure 411 called strikes for every 2,500 pitches taken in those zones while Castillo gets 339 calls.

 

If you want to read more into the thinking behind it, I looooved this article Beyond the Boxscore did to evaluate the Mathis signing, aside from actually signing or trading for quality pitchers, this seems like a good way to help out in-house options, namely guys who live in the bottom-of-the-zone and produce groundballs (Garrett, Tyler, and Nolasco). I think Maldonado will mostly benefit Garrett, he's such amazing movement on all of his pitches, being able to go lower in the zone will only help the amount of weak contact-induced. Really, it sounds like a beneficiary to guys who live low in the zone. Another reason I really wanted a Brad Ziegler type of pen arm.  

[nikkachez]

Put it another way, Judge mentioned on MLB Network that he estimates moving Chris Sale from the White Sox catchers to the Red Sox catchers (still not a great pitch-framing team, but certainly better than Chicago) would've saved him 6 runs. That doesn't sound like much, but if you scratch off 6 runs, that lowers his ERA from 3.34, down to 3.10. That should benefit the pitching staff, and improve them without adding anybody else (but they should add somebody else). 

[Blarg]

30 minutes ago, Troll Daddy said:

I'd like to see stats posted for accuracy on umpires calling ball and strikes.

 

There is that but to be honest an umpire sees a lot of pitches and they are not perfect on every call. Sometimes they get fooled. Sometimes they see a pitch on the corner enough that they are prone to allowing another inch or two outside that line be that same strike call. But if there is no established area the pitcher is throwing to then it is all guesswork to the umpire when the pitch is close after a couple were either in the dirt or in the other batters box.

 

[Blarg]

If baseball went to electronic strike counting the entire catching core in both leagues would change to more offensive minded players. No more .220 hitters since defense would be a lesser premium need.

[Docwaukee]

19 minutes ago, Blarg said:

I sure would like to see more complete data on umpire calls regarding pitchers tendencies to be closer to the strike zone on their missed pitches and strike calls on the corners as opposed to pitchers that their misses are well outside the zone and if they get the same borderline calls. Some of the catcher stats may be more linked to the quality of the pitcher on the mound than their framing abilities. The Angels did not have much quality take the hill last season on a consistent basis.

I agree.  While I think the ability to frame is certainly a valuable skill, the amount of value being placed on it might be a bit off because of the factors you mentioned. 

[ettin]

1 hour ago, nikkachez said:

Jonathan Judge, from Baseball Prospectus/the top tier evaluators of catching defense thus far, breaks down the number of runs each team saved or gave up due to pitch framing. 

 

Dodgers: 25.6
Cubs: 24.1
Giants: 22.2
Mets: 21.9
Astros: 19.1
Toronto: 16.2
Yankees: 9.4
Nationals: 9.1
Cardinals: 8.2
Rays: 7.1
Pirates: 6.0
Padres: 5.1
Brewers: 4.4
Orioles: 1.3
Braves: -0.2
Indians: -1.0
Angels: -3.9
Red Sox: -3.9
Rockies: -4.9
Marlins: -6.1
Tigers: -8.5
Rangers: -11.1
Phillies: -11.3
Royals:-12.0
Twins: -16.3
Diamondbacks: -16.8
Athletics: -16.9
Mariners: -17.7
Reds: -22.7
White Sox: -26.4

 

If Chicago feels like Miguel Montero is too pricey as a backup catcher, I'd be happy to take him off their hands. Just something to think about moving forward, the Angels improved going from Bandy to Maldonado, but they're still a mid-tier team. Upgrading over Perez could be worth following. Don't think it's a coincidence a lot of elite teams are at the top. 

Love the discussion in this thread by the way.... Unfortunately I think the Miguel Montero train has passed. It was something I thought about for the Primer in terms of Montero being a possible "two birds, one stone" Eppler trade candidate where we send a long term controllable piece in exchange for Montero's remaining one year of control plus another prospect (I was thinking Zagunis to fill LF long term). However the Angels only have about $10M-15M left to spend off of payroll in terms of Average Annual Value (technically they are about $21M-25M away from the CBT threshold) and Montero's AAV is $11M so unfortunately this ship seems like it has sailed.

I could be wrong. Typically teams like to maintain some payroll space heading into a new season but maybe Eppler, in the particular case of 2017 and where we are on the win curve, might forego maintaining that reserve and will use all of the remaining payroll space (the full $21M-25M) to improve the team as much as possible pre-season without exceeding the threshold.

If he did that then a Montero-based trade could be a remote but possible event.

 

[nikkachez]

2 minutes ago, ettin said:

Love the discussion in this thread by the way.... Unfortunately I think the Miguel Montero train has passed. It was something I thought about for the Primer in terms of Montero being a possible "two birds, one stone" Eppler trade candidate where we send a long term controllable piece in exchange for Montero's remaining one year of control plus another prospect (I was thinking Zagunis to fill LF long term). However the Angels only have about $10M-15M left to spend off of payroll in terms of Average Annual Value (technically they are about $21M-25M away from the CBT threshold) and Montero's AAV is $11M so unfortunately this ship seems like it has sailed.

3

Yeah, it's mostly wishful thinking. He's a free agent next winter, might make sense as a veteran stopgap to help out with run prevention, catcher's another position of uncertainty moving forward.  Maldonado's only under control for two seasons. I don't think Perez has a spot long-term. Just another thing Eppler's going to have to piece together. 

[ettin]

13 minutes ago, Blarg said:

If baseball went to electronic strike counting the entire catching core in both leagues would change to more offensive minded players. No more .220 hitters since defense would be a lesser premium need.

I think part of the reason we traded for Maldonado is because Eppler believes that this will not happen anytime soon, based on the new CBA, thus having someone with his abilities is still important.

The two years of remaining control allows the Angels to not invest too fully if MLB institutes a strike/ball tracking system over the next handful of years.

[Oz27]

5 minutes ago, nikkachez said:

I don't think Perez has a spot long-term. Just another thing Eppler's going to have to piece together. 

I'm starting to agree with this. His 2016 was awful - he was a Mathis-like hitter and an average defender. Catchers like that aren't hard to find. To have a future he's going to need to come much closer to matching his 2015 offensive performance but I'm guessing his leash is pretty short.

One strange thing about Perez is his AAA catching stats, before coming here, were pretty good. He was +6.2 in 2013, +8.6 in 2014 and +2.7 in 2015. But he has been below average in both his MLB seasons. Maybe that ability is still there and with some good coaching he can get it back.

[tdawg87]

What's Maldondo's sQUAT%? 

[ettin]

Notably @nikkachez I could see the Angels trying to trade for Tony Wolters from the Rockies. They need a catcher that can play more games as their current projected tandem of Wolters and Murphy have barely just cracked the Majors. They could prefer someone like Perez who is a more established catcher in terms of repetitions. If the Rockies 1B free agent choices fall through (Encarnacion and Trumbo) I could possibly see a trade of Cron and Perez for something like McGee, Wolters, plus ? to fill other areas of need on the team and then pick up someone like Lind on the free agent market. Just a thought (among many, many, many, many possibilities).

[nikkachez]

15 minutes ago, ettin said:

Notably @nikkachez I could see the Angels trying to trade for Tony Wolters from the Rockies. They need a catcher that can play more games as their current projected tandem of Wolters and Murphy have barely just cracked the Majors. They could prefer someone like Perez who is a more established catcher in terms of repetitions. If the Rockies 1B free agent choices fall through (Encarnacion and Trumbo) I could possibly see a trade of Cron and Perez for something like McGee, Wolters, plus ? to fill other areas of need on the team and then pick up someone like Lind on the free agent market. Just a thought (among many, many, many, many possibilities).

 

Interesting idea, he ranks very well in terms of catching defense, offensively, he's kind of like another Martin Maldonado. He does another thing Eppler seems to be trying to improve: baserunning. It's catcher, so obviously you're not looking for a burner, but using FanGraphs' baserunning metric (BsR), they made a huge upgrade from Bandy (-3.5) to Maldonado (-0.3). Wolters runs very well for a catcher, and it showed (+2.0 BsR). The Angels were 27th in baserunning last year, Maybin, Espinosa, and Malonado replacing Bandy will help with that, but it's another subtle way to improve a team. You get that much better defensively, Wolters is an improvement over Perez with the stick, and he adds value on the bases. 

 

I wouldn't trade Cron in that deal (not even really that keen on trading Cron), but maybe kill two birds with one stone? I'm sure they'd like to get rid of one of their left-handed outfielders, and at the top, I'm sure Gerardo Parra's there. Send Perez with an "Austin Adams of the world" for Wolters and Parra? Get your left-handed hitting 4th outfielder, another catcher to complement Maldonado, and you clear up the catching situation. He's their starting catcher, so I'm sure they're not eager to deal him, but I like the idea. 

[ettin]

9 minutes ago, nikkachez said:

Interesting idea, he ranks very well in terms of catching defense, offensively, he's kind of like another Martin Maldonado. He does another thing Eppler seems to be trying to improve: baserunning. It's catcher, so obviously you're not looking for a burner, but using FanGraphs' baserunning metric (BsR), they made a huge upgrade from Bandy (-3.5) to Maldonado (-0.3). Wolters runs very well for a catcher, and it showed (+2.0 BsR). The Angels were 27th in baserunning last year, Maybin, Espinosa, and Malonado replacing Bandy will help with that, but it's another subtle way to improve a team. You get that much better defensively, Wolters is an improvement over Perez with the stick, and he adds value on the bases. 

 

I wouldn't trade Cron in that deal (not even really that keen on trading Cron), but maybe kill two birds with one stone? I'm sure they'd like to get rid of one of their left-handed outfielders, and at the top, I'm sure Gerardo Parra's there. Send Perez with an "Austin Adams of the world" for Wolters and Parra? Get your left-handed hitting 4th outfielder, another catcher to complement Maldonado, and you clear up the catching situation. He's their starting catcher, so I'm sure they're not eager to deal him, but I like the idea. 

I thought about Parra previously, because he checkmarks a lot of boxes you want in a 4th OF, but he has an AAV of $9M which is really pricey for a 4th OF type. Also you'd essentially be taking on negative value because his stock has plummeted since his free agency signing. Heck you never know it could be 3 or 4 birds, 2 or 3 stones type of situation. Most trades are one-for-one's or two-for-ones. More moving parts the more unlikely the trade becomes to be honest but Parra does fit the 4th OF bill. Wolters would fit the pitch framing bill (and honestly in Coors Field I'm not sure a pitch framer is quite as valuable in that environment).

[ukyah]

i have serious doubts as to the validity of the "pitch framing" stat, much less it's accuracy. i would be interested in hearing an educated argument for it.

i'm willing to believe in the base principle, but i have a very hard time discounting the importance of the caught stealing percentage, while fully acknowledging that it's far from an individual statistic, meaning the pitcher and receiving fielder play a part in it.

[nikkachez]

20 minutes ago, ettin said:

I thought about Parra previously, because he checkmarks a lot of boxes you want in a 4th OF, but he has an AAV of $9M which is really pricey for a 4th OF type. Also you'd essentially be taking on negative value because his stock has plummeted since his free agency signing. Heck you never know it could be 3 or 4 birds, 2 or 3 stones type of situation. Most trades are one-for-one's or two-for-ones. More moving parts the more unlikely the trade becomes to be honest but Parra does fit the 4th OF bill. Wolters would fit the pitch framing bill (and honestly in Coors Field I'm not sure a pitch framer is quite as valuable in that environment).

5

Can't see why teams would undervalue pitch-framing just because of where they play (especially a team trying to extract as much value from their pitching staff as possible).