Mike Trout Monday: We probably don't deserve Mike Trout

[Ace-Of-Diamonds]

1 hour ago, floplag said:

I'm sorry, but no, dont buy it.  

It isn't just a matter of blacks/hispanics/etc.... its a matter of baseball not attracting the top athletes it did in that time which none of the articles never seem to address. 

Yes, the pool is larger, and includes a much more diverse pool to choose from, but the simple fact of the matter to me is that the pool of American players is not the quality at the top it once was regardless of race or color.    The top guys for the most part in going for the faster money in the NBA/NFL over toiling in the minors for a few years, it doesn't matter what color they are, that's just the reality of it.  

That more than anything else is what has hurt the quality of the game in general, the rise of other professional sports.  

Any way to prove your assumptions? The population in the US is 150,000+ more than it was 50 years ago. The NBA takes the taller athletes, the NHL has limited pool to chose from, that leaves MLB, and NFL of the major sports. I doubt the players from 50+ years ago were better than today's on the average. The players used to have regular jobs in the off season to make ends meet, leaving less time to condition and work out over the winter.

Just my opinion cause I have no to prove it anymore than you do to prove your opinion.

 

[floplag]

22 minutes ago, Ace-Of-Diamonds said:

Any way to prove your assumptions? The population in the US is 150,000+ more than it was 50 years ago. The NBA takes the taller athletes, the NHL has limited pool to chose from, that leaves MLB, and NFL of the major sports. I doubt the players from 50+ years ago were better than today's on the average. The players used to have regular jobs in the off season to make ends meet, leaving less time to condition and work out over the winter.

Just my opinion cause I have no to prove it anymore than you do to prove your opinion.

 

Only the eyeball test and my opinion.  
Ill let it go at that so as to not sidetrack the thread any more than i already have.  

[ten ocho recon scout]

4 hours ago, tdawg87 said:

One of the best scenes, from the best movies, ever.

Wilford Brimley as a cajun. Beautiful.

[ten ocho recon scout]

2 hours ago, Ace-Of-Diamonds said:

In 1917, a Bridgeport, Connecticut munitions laboratory recorded Johnson's fastball at 134 feet per second, which is equal to 91.36 miles per hour (147.03 km/h), a velocity which may have been unmatched in his day, with the possible exception of Smoky Joe Wood. Johnson, moreover, pitched with a sidearm motion, whereas power pitchers are usually known for pitching with a straight-overhand delivery.

Smoky joe wood was the name i picked when I did porn, but with that name I ended up doing things I wasnt prepared to do.

As far as the argument that todays guys are better, its the absolute truth. That shouldnt be an argument. The only argument is whether guys from back then would adjust if you made sports training, supplements, analytics etc available. Im sure a lot of them would. Maybe even some of the lesser known guys.

Ill throw out another one, in terms of talent pool. We know blacks werent allowed. We know latin players were kept out (mostly). Etc. Dig deeper...

Ive mentioned on here before WW2 (and maybe even the first war) drained the talent pool. But what about the guys who were good athletes....who had other talents?....

Salaries have completely changed. Aside from a handful of guys who made a lot of money, most back then didnt get paid a whole lot. So how many athletic dudes who also had a brain or at least some kind of "in" at a good job were skipping college or some good job to play a sport that didnt pay a whole lot, and you only made money 7 months out of the year? Its not like baseball paid lifechanging money back then....

Lastly. Back then, spring training was for guys to get back in shape. I can attest that today, these guys take about 4 weeks off when the season ends. After that, theyre flying somewhere to work out with a hitting coach. Theyre paying personal trainers. Etc etc. 

Go back and watch UFC 1. 2. The first decade or so. Then watch today. Not like punching and kicking have evolved.

Thats the difference.

[ettin]

3 hours ago, Taylor said:

It's an interesting discussion, but 100 years from now, people might be saying, "Meh, Mike Trout wasn't that great compared to [2118 sensational player], because Trout never had to face alien ballplayers."

Or blistering 250 mph fastballs and curveballs with 58" of vertical break

[101halo]

4 hours ago, Chuckster70 said:

Fangraphs writers have been lacking in talent, but I'll take the love they give.

Btw, Sullivan who is a Mariners fan is awful on podcasts. Take notice.

Some have neither a face or voice for radio.

Can't speak to the podcast part (I just would rather read than listen to news/blogs), but the one defense I do have for the ex-Lookout Landing dude is that despite his M's fandom, background and that his preferred club was the last finalist along with the Halos, he has been pretty clearly in awe of Ohtani and has written a ton of glowing analysis already this season at FG. So, I have to give credit on that point. 

[T.G.]

Do we deserve Mike Trout?

 

 

We are very fortunate right now.  We have the best player in the world, our team is in first place, we have an elite shortstop and one of the most fascinating and gifted ball players in Shohei Ohtani.  Angels baseball is definitely fun. 

[Stradling]

12 hours ago, Scotty@AW said:

Turns out a majority are operating under the belief that major leaguers now are better than they were 100 years ago.

Yeah that's weird. 

But yeah, your belief that Babe Ruth is better than anyone ever despite being fat and never training holds up. 

If he faced Shohei Ohtani he'd hit a 700 foot 6 run homer while eating a hot dog and if he pitched against Trout he'd strike him out in one pitch while drinking a beer.

Well since we can’t go back in time I’ll just say he’s the most dominate against his peers.   

[NorCal Halo]

15 hours ago, Taylor said:

It's an interesting discussion, but 100 years from now, people might be saying, "Meh, Mike Trout wasn't that great compared to [2118 sensational player], because Trout never had to face alien ballplayers."

Trump considers them aliens.

[Second Base]

1 hour ago, SuperTroopers said:

Well since we can’t go back in time I’ll just say he’s the most dominate against his peers.   

I think we can both agree with that. 

[krAbs]

14 hours ago, Chuckster70 said:

Fangraphs writers have been lacking in talent, but I'll take the love they give.

Btw, Sullivan who is a Mariners fan is awful on podcasts. Take notice.

Some have neither a face or voice for radio.

I actually really enjoy the podcast - he seems to have very little interest in the Mariners at this point, and honestly comes off as closer to an Angels fan than a Mariners one. He will occasionally mention how he used to follow the Mariners, but then spend most of his time talking about how fantastic Trout and Ohtani are, how fun Simmons is to watch and how his offensive improvement is amazing and almost unique in the history of baseball (I believe it was Simmons that they called objectively one of the five most improved established players in the history of baseball), and occasionally how Richards is fun to watch when possible. The consensus on that show is that if you don't know what game to watch, you should be watching whatever Angels game is on.

Besides that though, its a good way to keep tabs on the league in general, and the "latest and greatest" sabermetrics and ways of thinking about the game.

[Second Base]

If you want to learn exactly how to pitch, watch Shohei Ohtani do it.

If you want to learn exactly how to hit, watch Mike Trout do it.

If you want to learn how to steal a base, watch Mike Trout do it.

If you want to learn how to player defense, watch Kinsler, Maldonado, Cozart or Trout do it.

If you want to learn how to lead a group of men that come from very different backgrounds, watch Albert Pujols do it.

If you want to learn how to deal with people you constantly disagree with, without constantly losing it, watch Mike Scioscia do it.

If you want to learn how to build a team on a budget while developing the long term success of the organization, watch Billy Eppler do it.

But pretty much....just watch Mike Trout.

[Torridd]

2 hours ago, True Grich said:

Do we deserve Mike Trout?

 

 

We are very fortunate right now.  We have the best player in the world, our team is in first place, we have an elite shortstop and one of the most fascinating and gifted ball players in Shohei Ohtani.  Angels baseball is definitely fun. 

Hey Grich! I went through the thread to see if someone posted this and was going to ask one of you post gurus to do so if it wasn't here! My favorite movie!

[krAbs]

11 minutes ago, Scotty@AW said:

If you want to learn exactly how to pitch, watch Shohei Ohtani do it.

If you want to learn exactly how to hit, watch Mike Trout do it.

If you want to learn how to steal a base, watch Mike Trout do it.

If you want to learn how to player defense, watch Kinsler, Maldonado, Cozart or Trout do it.

If you want to learn how to lead a group of men that come from very different backgrounds, watch Albert Pujols do it.

If you want to learn how to deal with people you constantly disagree with, without constantly losing it, watch Mike Scioscia do it.

If you want to learn how to build a team on a budget while developing the long term success of the organization, watch Billy Eppler do it.

But pretty much....just watch Mike Trout.

Honestly, what is Simmons even doing on this team? haha

[Stax]

Kyle Glaser‏Verified account @KyleAGlaser 2h2 hours ago

Mike Trout is on pace to hit .336 with 57 HR, 114 RBIs and a 1.178 OPS. With him leading the way, it’s the Angels - not the Astros - in first place in the AL West and on track for 100 wins

[Second Base]

24 minutes ago, Stax said:

Kyle Glaser‏Verified account @KyleAGlaser 2h2 hours ago

Mike Trout is on pace to hit .336 with 57 HR, 114 RBIs and a 1.178 OPS. With him leading the way, it’s the Angels - not the Astros - in first place in the AL West and on track for 100 wins

F Yeah!!!

[AngelsLakersFan]

20 hours ago, floplag said:

As said i didnt see where he addressed the fact that the overall pool has been lessened by the rise of other and currently more popular pro sports. 

He actually references this early in the article when discussing another method. His method theoretically addresses this by comparing change year to year. If the talent pool is decreasing players will perform relatively better over time.

[krAbs]

Ironically: I'm not actually sold on the methodology of the article I posted. I kind of want to ask the creator of it about this.

If we assume a mental model that each player hits the majors hard, and is in steady decline after that, we get some interesting results (Note - this model is wrong, but as they say: all models are wrong, but some are useful). Lets give an arbitrary "absolute talent" scale that doesn't actually exist. I'm going to copy the prospect 20-80 scale. So, say the average player hits the majors at 24 and is an 80. Every year, they age and loose 5, and eventually age out of the majors when they are at about 20, at around 36. But, every year, you get a new wave of 80 grade players. If you measure the entire league, every active player would loose 5 each year. So, using the methodology of this paper (as far as I can tell), it would appear that the average player loses 5 "points" every year, so the league is 5 "points" harder to play in. But, in reality, every year you have the same number of people at each raw talent level - the amount of talent added exactly equals the drop in talent across the league.

So, lets take this a step further and try to fix the model. After all, that's not really how aging curves work. So, lets assume players come in at 60, rise to 80, and drop down to 40. same rate, ages 24-36. This intuitively feels a bit more accurate - you have players peaking out around 28 on average, and slowly declining until they hit their late 30s. If you have 100 players at each age, then it would appear that the average player lost 2.5 points - twice as many players are in decline as are on the rise. I haven't rigorously though through this yet, but it seems to me like it would be genuinely difficult to find assumptions that will NOT make it look like the league in general is getting better, even if it is staying totally the same overall. Basically, the inherent assumption behind the paper appears to be that there are an equal number of players in decline as there are getting better, and that seems obviously false to me.

I know the common knowledge among stat heads is that baseball talent level is going up, so they likely have a response for this (ideally, they just controlled for it, as average aging curves are fairly well known), but it is a nagging thought I can't quite shake.

[floplag]

13 minutes ago, AngelsLakersFan said:

He actually references this early in the article when discussing another method. His method theoretically addresses this by comparing change year to year. If the talent pool is decreasing players will perform relatively better over time.

I didnt get that from there at all, perhaps its me.  Regardless i would ask is it actually decreasing?  Or is the quality of the pool itself lower?  Thats my point.  
I dont think the pool itself is significantly smaller at all, not enough to account for the lack of league wide quality, i think its quality of the pool is lessened.  
Im largely looking at the last 50 years moreso than going back to Ruthian times, and since that time the league has expanded, and other sports have risen.  kids are growing up in the sandlot anymore, its the playground.  

[krAbs]

3 minutes ago, floplag said:

I didnt get that from there at all, perhaps its me.  Regardless i would ask is it actually decreasing?  Or is the quality of the pool itself lower?  Thats my point.  
I dont think the pool itself is significantly smaller at all, not enough to account for the lack of league wide quality, i think its quality of the pool is lessened.  
Im largely looking at the last 50 years moreso than going back to Ruthian times, and since that time the league has expanded, and other sports have risen.  kids are growing up in the sandlot anymore, its the playground.  

^^This is the relevant chart - the point of the article was that the previous statistical methods used to estimate previous ability were a bit overly aggressive (blue line), and if you control for some factors, the red line here is likely an accurate chart of "skill level" over time.

The article also has this throway line:
"The first comes from Bill James, in the New Historical Baseball Abstract. In the Bob Lemon comment, James lays out a list of “about a dozen” (actually 16) indicators to evaluate league quality, including hitting by pitchers, fielding percentage, and the average distance of .500. “From 1876 to the present,” he writes, “all of these indicia, without exception, have advanced steadily.”"
 

Which makes me really curious about the "New Historical Baseball Abstract" and how they approached this question.

[Angelsjunky]

You make a good point, floplag, but my issue with it is that you seem to assume that "athletes are athletes," and can be equally skilled at whatever sport they choose. Baseball is rather different from most sports in that a greater percentage of player ability is based upon hand-eye coordination and developed skills over pure athleticism.

Many great athletes have been terrible baseball players, and many great ballplayers have been poor athletes. The point being, it is a different pool of talents from other sports - some crossover, but not as much as you imply.

[AngelsLakersFan]

6 minutes ago, floplag said:

I didnt get that from there at all, perhaps its me.  Regardless i would ask is it actually decreasing?  Or is the quality of the pool itself lower?  Thats my point.  
I dont think the pool itself is significantly smaller at all, not enough to account for the lack of league wide quality, i think its quality of the pool is lessened.  
Im largely looking at the last 50 years moreso than going back to Ruthian times, and since that time the league has expanded, and other sports have risen.  kids are growing up in the sandlot anymore, its the playground.  

I totally get the perception, I just don't think you can construct a mathematical approach that would show evidence of it. As far as I know, all of the models for estimating changes in the difficulty of the league have found it to be increasing over time. While I agree that kids aren't playing the game as religiously as they once did, most of the other factors are going in the opposite direction.

[krAbs]

23 minutes ago, krAbs said:

Ironically: I'm not actually sold on the methodology of the article I posted. I kind of want to ask the creator of it about this.

If we assume a mental model that each player hits the majors hard, and is in steady decline after that, we get some interesting results (Note - this model is wrong, but as they say: all models are wrong, but some are useful). Lets give an arbitrary "absolute talent" scale that doesn't actually exist. I'm going to copy the prospect 20-80 scale. So, say the average player hits the majors at 24 and is an 80. Every year, they age and loose 5, and eventually age out of the majors when they are at about 20, at around 36. But, every year, you get a new wave of 80 grade players. If you measure the entire league, every active player would loose 5 each year. So, using the methodology of this paper (as far as I can tell), it would appear that the average player loses 5 "points" every year, so the league is 5 "points" harder to play in. But, in reality, every year you have the same number of people at each raw talent level - the amount of talent added exactly equals the drop in talent across the league.

So, lets take this a step further and try to fix the model. After all, that's not really how aging curves work. So, lets assume players come in at 60, rise to 80, and drop down to 40. same rate, ages 24-36. This intuitively feels a bit more accurate - you have players peaking out around 28 on average, and slowly declining until they hit their late 30s. If you have 100 players at each age, then it would appear that the average player lost 2.5 points - twice as many players are in decline as are on the rise. I haven't rigorously though through this yet, but it seems to me like it would be genuinely difficult to find assumptions that will NOT make it look like the league in general is getting better, even if it is staying totally the same overall. Basically, the inherent assumption behind the paper appears to be that there are an equal number of players in decline as there are getting better, and that seems obviously false to me.

I know the common knowledge among stat heads is that baseball talent level is going up, so they likely have a response for this (ideally, they just controlled for it, as average aging curves are fairly well known), but it is a nagging thought I can't quite shake.

https://www.fangraphs.com/library/the-beginners-guide-to-aging-curves/

Based on this, it appears that the second model I threw together is accurate enough to draw conclusions off of - surprisingly so, actually. Players start on the high side, rise, and then lower until they are FAR lower than they were when they started. This indicates that age really really needs to be taken into account when doing the method in the original article I posted - I would go as far as to say it would be one of the single biggest things we would want to control for. I also did a search of the original article, and there was no mention of age or aging curves...very disturbing, actually.

[AngelsLakersFan]

I think the method in the linked article is about as accurate as you can get - using on the field data. I think it would be interesting to see someone break it down from an economic / game theory perspective.

The way I would approach it would be to try and determine the population of individuals with serious baseball playing aspirations over time. You could break it down with the following factors which have changed over time.

Population of the US, not counting blacks pre integration to the population of the US and other baseball playing nations today.
The expected lifetime earnings for someone who pursued a career in baseball. From those who flamed out in the minor leagues to those who sign huge FA contracts.
The expected lifetime earnings of other career paths. These would include things like basketball, youtuber, plumber, salesmen, banana farmer etc.

Assuming everyone makes rational choices (i know... I know...) based on likely outcomes and their personal skill set I think we could create a pretty reasonable talent pool approximation. Then you simply map that population to the number of jobs in MLB. 
 

[AngelsLakersFan]

21 minutes ago, krAbs said:

https://www.fangraphs.com/library/the-beginners-guide-to-aging-curves/

Based on this, it appears that the second model I threw together is accurate enough to draw conclusions off of - surprisingly so, actually. Players start on the high side, rise, and then lower until they are FAR lower than they were when they started. This indicates that age really really needs to be taken into account when doing the method in the original article I posted - I would go as far as to say it would be one of the single biggest things we would want to control for. I also did a search of the original article, and there was no mention of age or aging curves...very disturbing, actually.

Interesting. Speaking of economic factors, you have to ask (control for) the economic incentives that keep declining players in the league while keeping better, improving players out. 

I think assuming that there are as many improving players as their are declining players is a fair assumption, but I also agree that it is probably not true in todays game. If we can come up with a list of incentives for that behavior you can control for them. I would say long term contracts and the advent of free agency (6 years old team control specifically) are primary factors, along with potentially conservative managing that gives declining players with a track record a longer leash and doesn't make room for younger players until they establish that they truly do belong. 

The first one... free agency, is probably the biggest of the two. If you look at the raw data in the graph there is an inflection point right around 1976, when free agency started. Of course there is still a steady increase in the estimated talent pool leading up to the advent of FA. I'm not totally sure how you would account for the second factor, but it would probably involve discounting the seasons of players in their final year, while projecting the performance of a similar number of rookies back half a season or so while they were in the minor leagues. In the entire pool of players though, this is not a huge deal, and the regressed line seems to attempt to address this.