2013 cards - estimating Chris Davis' 2013 card

2013 cards - estimating Chris Davis' 2013 card

In one of the keeper leagues that I'm in - a new one, with a small ($70M) salary cap - I kind of backed into a trade where I acquired Chris Davis for 2012, and the right to declare him as a keeper for 2013.

I've got quite a few pitchers and batters where their 2013 baseball years were better than their 2012 years. I was emailing back and forth with one of the other managers in the league. We were chatting about what kind of issues my keeper team might have with the salary cap for the 2013 card year. He speculated that Chris Davis would have a monster card - "like Moss on steroids", and that the salary for Chris Davis in 2013 might be $12.2 million.

Well, it got me thinking...what will Chris Davis 2013 card look like???

So I did some number crunching. I found league stats for 2012 and 2013 for the AL, and I compared them to see what the overall stats looked like for rates of walks, singles, doubles, triples and homeruns. The rates were relatively constant from year to year, but I made notes on the averages and the changes.

I found split stats (vs. LHP and vs. RHP) for Chris Davis for 2012 and 2013. I also got the split stats for Brandon Moss for 2012.

I developed a methodology:
1. Calculate the rate of HBP in relation to total plate appearances. Check to see whether the distribution of HBP vs left/right is relatively constant. (It was).
2. Take the individual player's 2012 stats vs. LHP, and calculate the rate of occurrence for each of HBP, walk, single, double triple and homerun ("the events"). Then express the occurrence as a number over 216. I.e. multiply the rate of occurrence times 216. (216, because that is the number of die roll combinations with 3 dice - 6 times 6 times 6).
3. Calculate the average pitcher card results, by taking the league average for each event, and multiplying that times 108. Please note that it shouldn't matter whether the real life results occur from fielding (X chart) or from pitchers' effectiveness, since it's all "baked" into the same league average statistics.
4. For each type of event, subtract the pitcher card result (3) from the total result (2). The net difference is the theoretical number of die rolls for each event for the batter card vs LHP.
5. Add up the actual die roll chances for each type of event vs. LHP from his 2012 card.
6. Compare 4 and 5 - theoretically they should be the same. In fact, they were very close. However, I noted some trends for small differences that make common sense - more on that later.
7. Now for 2013 vs LHP - repeat the above process for 2013 exactly as it was done for 2012. Calculate the theoretical batter card totals for 2013 as though it was a new 2013 card (as I did for 2013 in step 4 above, except this time using 2013 stats).
8. Calculate the change in the theoretical batter card totals from 2012 to 2013 - i.e. step 7 result minus step 4 result. This number can be positive if 2013 was a better year for that event, or worse if 2013 was a worse year than 2012 for that type of event.
9. For each event, add the delta change (2013 minus 2012) from step 8 to the actual 2012 die roll card totals for each event from the 2012 card (from step 5). This is the theoretical estimated batter card totals for 2013, with adjustments for the "constant" differences (from step 6 above).
10. Calculate the estimated ballpark singles and ballpark home runs for the particular batter for 2013. For a batter like Chris Davis, this isn't so hard, since it's almost certain that he'll have normal ballpark singles vs. LHP and RHP, and also 8 ballpark homerun chances vs each of LHP as well as RHP. The trick with the ballpark chances is that you have to take an average of the "road" ballparks, and then take a simple average of the road parks together with the home park - in this case Camden Yards for Chris Davis. I am assuming that Camden (and other AL ballparks) are the same in 2013 as they were in 2012. Calculate the total singles and homeruns from ballpark chances for 2013 for Chris Davis vs. LHP.
11. Subtract the ballpark singles and home runs (10 above) from the total batter card singles and home runs (9 above). This net amount is the actual "pure" singles and homerun die roll chances for Chris Davis for 2013 vs LHP.
12. Repeat steps 2 through 11 using stats vs RHP for 2012 and 2013.

The results for 2012 were very, very close to his actual 2012 card -

HBP - calculated - 3.24 - actual 2012 card - 3

vs LHP
W vs LHP - calc - 0 actual - 0
SI vs LHP - calc - 16.5, actual 16.5 (includes est. BP singles)
2B vs LHP - calc 4.4, actual 4.2
3B vs LHP- calc - 0, actual 0
HR vs LHP - calc - 9.7, actual 11.2 (includes est. ballpark HRs using average BP HR rate).

Note the difference in HRs vs LHP - about 1.5 - card homeruns exceed estimated card. My explanation of this difference is that the average LH pitcher card will yield significantly fewer HRs to LH batters than the overall league average. Therefore, the strat batter card compensates for this by increasing the home runs for the power hitting lefty hitter. Hence the 1.5 HR difference compared to the calcs using overall league averages.

2012 - vs RHP:

W vs RHP - calc - 7.5 actual - 4
SI vs RHP - calc - 16.9, actual 17.75 (includes est. BP singles)
2B vs RHP - calc 2.55, actual 1.5
3B vs RHP- calc - 0, actual 0
HR vs RHP - calc - 9.6, actual 9.6 (includes est. ballpark HRs using average BP HR rate).

There are differences here in doubles and walks. The walks make sense to me - that a lefty hitter is more likely to draw relatively more walks off the pitcher card vs a RHP - i.e. a righty pitcher will give up relatively more walks to a lefty hitter on average. Therefore, there is less of a need for walks to appear on the batter card vs RHP, based on a simple league average. The difference in doubles is relatively small, and I haven't tried to explain it.

The main point is that, overall, the model produces estimates of the batter card that are pretty darn close to the actual strat card.

Now, when I complete the remaining steps to project Chris Davis' 2013 card, I get the following projected card die roll totals:

HBP - 3 die roll chances vs both LHP and RHP

vs. LHP:

W- 4
SI - total SI - 6.3, est. ballpark SI effects- 2.8, net "pure" single die roll chances -- 3.6
2b - 6.9
3b - 0
HR - total 10.6, est. ballpark HR's 4.4 (i.e. 8 times .55 average home and away), net "pure" HR's - 6.15

vs RHP:

W- 17
SI - total SI - 7.3, est. ballpark SI effects- 2.8, net "pure" single die roll chances -- 4.5
2b - 8.6
3b - .1
HR - total 17.15, est. ballpark HR's 4.4 (i.e. 8 times .55 average home and away), net "pure" HR's - 12.75

Estimated balance - 6R

^^

a check on my work - Moss 2012 - estimated card vs actual:

HBP - est. 3 (calc. was 2.58) , actual card 2

vs LHP :

W - est. 5, actual - 6
SI - est. 28.15, actual 28.5 (including est. ballpark singles)
2b - est. 2.08, actual 2
3b - 0
HR - est. 3.70, actual 4.65 (including est. ballpark home runs, average effect home and away)

vs. RHP:

W- est. 11.9, actual 10
SI - est. 6.9, actual 4 (including est. ballpark singles)
2B - est. 10.2, actual 9.4
3b - 0
HR - est. 14.6, actual 14.6 (including est. ballpark home runs, average effect home and away)

Again, the methodology does a really nice job of "predicting" Moss' 2012 card (after the fact, of course). The differences between estimated and actual card are in the same kind of places as they were for Davis' 2012 card (est. vs actual) - more homeruns against lefty pitchers than predicted (probably due to lefty pitchers allowing few HRs to lefty hitters), and fewer walks (and in Moss' 2012 case, also fewer singles and doubles) vs RHP than the method predicted (again, probably because RHP allow relatively more W, SI and 2b to LHB compared to the simple league average).

If you compare the estimate of Davis' 2013 card and the 2012 Moss card, they are quite similar. Davis has a few more walks vs Rhp. Moss has more singles vs lhp. Davis has more home runs vs Lhp. But overall, the cards are quite similar.

I must emphasize that this is only my estimate!!! Please don't base any keeper league decisions on my estimate!!! But I thought I would share this with everyone, because I find this to be extremely interesting!

Geoff

Well if you are right about Davis' card being similar to Moss' then you are good because Moss' salary was nowhere near 12M.

^^ Yes. Although, I am intrigued as to how Davis' salary would be set if I am right that his 2013 card may be more "skewed" toward RHP than Moss' card was in 2012 (debatably, see below re Davis vs LHP in 2013). Just how valuable is it to have such a high OB% vs RHP (due to the high walks vs RHP) as well as all those home runs??? Will Davis's salary be higher than Moss in 2012 due to that high OB% vs RHP??? If so, by how much???

I think Davis' card vs RHP will be somewhat better than Moss's card vs RHP, mainly due to more walks vs RHP for Davis in 2013 (see above). According to my run production model, Moss' 2012 card vs LHP would be rated slightly better than Davis' 2013 estimated card vs LHP, but they are somewhat different cards vs LHP. Moss hit far more singles vs LHP, while Davis hit more homeruns vs LHP in 2013 than Moss did in 2012.

I think Davis's defense will be about 1b-4 e8 (he had fewer errors in 2013, per inning played at 1b). Davis' range appeared to actually decline in 2013 vs 2012, but probably not enough to warrant a drop from a 4 range to a 5 range. Moss had a bad e rating at 1b in 2012 (more than offsets his slightly better range rating), but he's not so error-prone in the outfield. But I don't think fielding will have much impact on the salary, in terms of any fielding difference between Moss in 2012 vs. Davis in 2013. (My source for fielding data is baseball reference .com).

If I'm right about Davis's card, Davis' will be perhaps even more appealing than Moss's card was in 2012, in terms of game strategy, , because of Davis' really good HR power vs LHP as well as RHP. Davis will be a "no-brainer" in a homerun park, or a lefty power specialist park (like Progressive was in 2012).

For what it's worth - just for fun - I predict that strat's assessment of Davis's 2013 card balance will be 7R.

If you're correct on the card chances you are looking probably close to 10.5 million. They tend to overprice OB, and the 3 game injury max will track on 1.5-2 million alone. But he doest have the Def versatility of Moss either.

FWIW...

SOMworld is predicting for Davis (vs. RH's):
33.1 hit chances / 52.1 OB chances / 9.7 2B chances / 0 3B chances / 16.4 HR chances / MAXED OUT BPHR's / 92 TB's

Defensively:
4e6

With the 4 defense, I don't see how Davis could be much (if any) more expensive than the 2012 Cabrera. I"m gonna guess $10.20

10M is pushing it with a 70M salary IMHO. But people in the league have Trout and McCutcheon so what do I know...

FWIW...

SOMworld is predicting for Davis (vs. RH's):
33.1 hit chances / 52.1 OB chances / 9.7 2B chances / 0 3B chances / 16.4 HR chances / MAXED OUT BPHR's / 92 TB's

Defensively:
4e6

Hey visick - I haven't been to that site before, so I checked it out. It kinda seems like there's a delay to being able to register and login, so I'm waiting...

With those projected card readings for Davis, per the site, do those "chances" for hits, OB, and home runs include the ballpark effect chances? I'm thinking that they do (if they do include ballpark chances , that makes them close to my estimates as well).

Visick, can you confirm this?