Two Week Stat Review - Pitching is tops

by Aparicio11 on Apr 20, 2005 6:35 AM PDT

The more things change the more they stay the same. Despite losing two great pitchers the A's are still one of the top pitching teams in the AL.
-#1 in batting average against
-#2 in ERA
-#2 in WHIP
- - the one downer is a high percentage of unearned runs....A's make costly errors - not many but we yield almost a run per error.

Alot of scouts claim this team is the most pure Moneyball theory offensive team - if so it is a Titanic looking for a chunk of ice. The A's offense is BAD.
-last in team OPS
-2nd to last in OBP
-last in SLG
-2nd to last in AVE
-last in stolen bses of course
-2nd to last in runs scored - the A's have scored 67% fewer runs than the Tigers.

It is only two weeks but statistical trends are difficult to reverse. Going in I would never have guessed the A's pitching would maintained its now traditional position.
I also would not have guessed trading Miller and Melhuse for Kendall and Swisher for Dye and the forced substitution of Ellis for Crosby would have deflated the offense so much. I know others aren't performing - but those are the personnel changes which is all you can manage.

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SSS!!!!!

We are two weeks in, you can't say all those things have deflated the offense. The whole offense is just sucking there is nothing you can do about it. It will come around.

Kielty, rejuvenated by his new genetically created St.Pats Day/Oktoberfest, shows us why Billy and Ohad are geniuses.

by ohad on Apr 20, 2005 6:49 AM PDT reply actions

Hitting Coaches

Any opinions out there on Dave Hudgens's performance as a hitting coach?

"Put a Milo on him."
-Billy Beane

by kaweahkaweah on Apr 20, 2005 7:19 AM PDT reply actions

Hudgens

I don't know enough to say he's good or bad, but I remember Swisher saying that Hudgens told him to be more "aggressive". This has led to an OBP. of .231, striking out 17 times, and walking just once. That is terrible advice from our hitting coach!

Let's Go Oak-Land!

by Colorado Fan on Apr 20, 2005 9:05 AM PDT up reply actions

hmmm...

That sounds like bad advice to me too. I thought one of Swisher's main strengths was his patience.

"Put a Milo on him."
-Billy Beane

by kaweahkaweah on Apr 20, 2005 9:12 AM PDT up reply actions

yep

It's been in the back of my mind for the last week or so...

I'm not worried b/c I figure he'll start walking soon, but I can't wait to see him start doing so.

by Sharon on Apr 20, 2005 9:50 AM PDT up reply actions

starters

What's particularly amazing is that we still have three starters among the top ten in the AL in ERA - and Barry Zito is not even one of them.

by matthias on Apr 20, 2005 8:08 AM PDT reply actions

Enjoy it while you can

It won't last. :-(

"Put a Milo on him."
-Billy Beane

by kaweahkaweah on Apr 20, 2005 8:10 AM PDT up reply actions

Moneyball offense

In theory it would be a pure Moneyball offense, if everyone were performing to historical average. Hatteberg should be hitting .275 with a .350OBP, he is .275 with a .310 OBP. Chavez and Durazo should be up around .350-.360 OBP and .270 BA. There are only 3 guys who are really performing Kotsay, Ellis, and Scutaro. Everyone else is looking bad. I don't expect them to stay that way. I don't see hwo Durazo and Chavez can go through a season hitting ~.200. Even Swisher and Byrnes should worst case be around .250.

So, let's see what happens when things start to avergae out.

by Donner on Apr 20, 2005 8:40 AM PDT reply actions

Its "pure" b/c it disproves Moneyball

and its anti-conventional wisdom, which is what scouts want. They don't want computers telling them who to draft, they want to go off of their gut. If our offense was putting up big numbers they would say it wasn't related to moneball.

Too bad you can't buy a voodoo globe so that you could make the earth spin real fast and freak everybody out. - Jack Handy

by Awesomus on Apr 20, 2005 9:46 AM PDT up reply actions

I Love That ...

the small sample size argument only counts for offensive stats and not for pitching stats!

by Eck on Apr 20, 2005 8:48 AM PDT reply actions

offense. we forget

how productive our catchers have been the past few years. ramon was a nice offensive player. and the back-ups had some pop. greg myers and adam melhuse would each give you 6-7 hr's and some ribs in real limited duty. last year did you know miller/melhuse hit 20hr's, drove in 89, scored 62? we seemed to have given up a lot of power and pop for a batting second in the order great avg doubles hitter. the offense has to suffer. which is not to say i'm not a kendall fan.

by oakath on Apr 20, 2005 12:50 PM PDT reply actions

Statistics.

>"It is only two weeks but statistical trends are difficult to reverse."

In one sentence you have proven that you know very little about statistics (read: you don't know what the hell you're talking about).

The "statistical trends" show that the hitters are far better than they have performed thus far. So if by "difficult to reverse" you mean "it's hard for them to keep hitting so poorly because throughout their careers they have hit a whole lot better" then yes, you'd be right. But you didn't mean that. So you are wrong.

Sorry, I hate to be harsh, but it's starting to get old. Numbers have been popping up everywhere to support every argument, and 95% of the time the people are presenting numbers that don't say what they think they say, or even worse, say the exact opposite.

by Inquisitor on Apr 20, 2005 2:34 PM PDT reply actions