defense

[rgimbel]

With my small amount of experience 6th league, i find that you can get away with a less than stellar def in a pitchers park with the bp ratings balancing out the outs you give away with bad defense however in a hitters park where you need to get all the outs you can get a bad defense will sink you. have the vets experienced the same thing?

[jodynadu]

this is far too general of a question, so allow me to answer like this--

Your goal as a manager and GM of a team should be to score more runs than your opponent in more games you play than your opponents score in their games.
You should notice that the team in the league with the most runs scored don't necessarily win the league. This holds true for pitching and defense as well.
The team that wins the championship is usually the team that does the combination of these 3 areas better than the rest of the teams in the league.

"Bad" defense in any park will cause more runs to be scored by your opponent. If your pitching and hitting can overcome this deficit, then your team will win more games.

[PAULMINICUCCI]

The more I play the game the more apparent it is that defense is one of the key components. However, it does not show up in the box like HR's, RBIs, OBP or ERA. Bad D is a silent killer. You notice that stud pitchers ERAs are wondering into middle 4's it is probably defense.

The other sin I commit is not paying attention to OBP as much as I should. I have two teams with league leading (or close) HRs and Batting average and yet they have fewer runs than other teams. I look at the stats and the big difference is BBs that I am not getting. There was a great thread on hits verus BBs and where they are important in the lineup but high OBP really advances baserunners and gives you the Earl Weaver 3 run HR.

I totally agree with Jodynadu above. The key to good teams (not that I have first hand experience) is balance. I think the discussion about the secret formula (I think it was 47 on hitters and 33 on pitching) has some merit because, you have to pay for defense and while I do not have any sense of how much of a factor it is (for example is a 1 at ss worth 20 runs in let's say Bank One versus a 2 or 40 versus a 3) I know it is very very important. The evidence is in the stats from winning teams. I have not seen a division winning team that had 3's much less 4's at 2nd or ss. Even OF counts more than you might think, not just throwing rating. That's why I asked the question on drafting because I wanted to know if the pros here really draft defense guys who can hit first even above SP. the answer is they do, to get Castillo at 2nd you have to use a 1 or 2 on draft day.

So my last teams have been about defense. You have to think defense on draft day, there are so few players who can hit and defend you really have spend high draft choices getting them and worry about the glitz guys later. Thast's my two cents owrth anyway.

[Detroit-Tigers]

I think the key thing is- TSN still doesn't value defence enough, hence defensive players can be a bargain (not always 1's, but more 2's)

[rgimbel]

I guess I brought this up because in a theme league I was in the petco team that won my division had no stud pitching a weak hitting team and a terrible defense yet kicked my butt and led the league in pitching with a 3.79 era its top pitchers were wright peavy and r lopez with a lousy bullpen its def was as follows
1b nevin-poor
2b loretta- not great
ss guillan- crappy
3b mora- adequate at best
lf klesko- junky
cf kotsay- pretty good but not a 1
rf giles- fine
my team had much better def had bonds guerrero schmidt oliver perez
yet in pnc pitched to a 4.88 era last in the league
a good example was he had meadows in the pen have a 3.63 era
I had torres in the pen have a 6.14 era
I dont mind if a team goes for hitting ignores def and beats you by outscoring you but a team that beats you with lousy d and beats you because they give up more than a run a game less than you burns me up

[PAULMINICUCCI]

Peavy may not look like a stud but I tracked him through ten leagues and he had the highest winning percentage (next to RJ) and was terrific at Petco. I have him on several teams and he is out-pitching Zambrano and Schmidt on the same team(s).

Although I have to say I share your pain. I have this team in Miller than has 2's at 2nd, ss and catcher and Santana is 12-18 and Schmidt is 11-14 with a ERA at 4.07. Then there is a Miller team in another league that has 3's and 4's bad outfield and Santana is kicking butt. Who knows, it does get frustrating.

I guess I am learning here the same lesson that I learned in Basketball, that little things win. I have studs galore on some teams that suck and I get beat by "trick" pitchers who just match-up great in my park. It is bewildering, like I know that Bonderman has pitched two no-hitters in the leagues I am in. I just got shut-out by Moyer with a great line-up that was balanced LH and RH. Who knows.

[Roscodog]

Just cause it seems to be relevant to this post I'd like to mention that I've had 2 pretty good teams that did not have great def. at 2nd/ss.

91 win team-Jeff Kent at 2nd
94-win team- Eckstein a SS/Loretta at 2B

Most of my other teams I admit I usually have 2's at 2nd and short and a 1 in center, but depending on who's available sometimes you're better off with a good hitter like Loretta at 2nd that worrying about D.

I'd also like to mention that my teams seemed to do better when I picked with my gut instead of listening to all the advise on this board???

[Roscodog]

further to my last post I'll round out the rest of the D on the 94-win team, still my only 05 team to make it to the finals.

1B-Tino Martinez
2B-Mark Loretta
SS-David Eckstein
3B-David Bell
LF-Matt Lawton
CF-Jim Edmonds
RF-Sean Green
CA-Brian Schneider
DH-Chad Tracy

-not exactly a gold glove bunch (except for Edmonds)

[rgimbel]

you must of had a heckuva staff roscoe because that is not a really impressive lineup

[jodynadu]

your definition of a weak hitting team is definetly different than mine

take note that everyone of the hitters you listed from that PETCO team are capable of hitting .300. Who was the C for that team? Pudge :?:

they might not have hit a ton of homeruns, but I'm sure they were sending at least 6 batters to the plate in 4 or 5 different innings a game. That translates into RUNS.

Wright, Peavy, RLopez... all fine pitchers that will allow baserunners, but in PETCO those runners must be moved along by extra base hits or multiple hits in an inning.

A team with Bonds and Vlad in the outfield is horrible defensively IMO
They will give up 12 errors apiece and cost you alot of games in PETCO