Bias or Insight?
You’ve probably heard by now that Dejan Kovacevic, a beat writer for the Pittsburgh Post Gazette, filed a National League Rookie of the Year ballot that included two players from the Pirates, but did not include Jason Heyward. Kovacevic put both Neil Walker and Jose Tabata ahead of Heyward, but behind the guy who won the award, Buster Posey.
As is usual whenever there’s an odd ballot, it didn’t take long for there to be something of a brouhaha over Kovacevic’s choices. Initially, the question was how someone could leave Heyward off the ballot entirely. Once it was discovered that he left him off in favor of two guys from the team he covers on a daily basis, the presumption switched from idiocy to bias. A Pittsburgh writer votes for two Pittsburgh players? His job obviously cost him his objectivity.
Except, there’s a problem.
Kovacevic is a pretty well-respected beat writer, has penned a number of thoughtful articles (including sabermetric-friendly pieces that show he’s got a decent grasp of the value of statistics), and has spent the last hour explaining his rationale for the selections on Twitter. Across the board, he comes off as far more sensible than those accusing him of some kind of bias.
He makes some points that I wouldn’t agree with, and his perspective is certainly colored by that of someone who was around Walker and Tabata for the entire season, watching them on a near-daily basis. But Kovacevic argues a point that I completely agree with – there is a difference between insight and bias. Being close to a story comes with positives and negatives, and yet, too often only the downside of being close to a source is highlighted.
Beat writers do see and hear things that those outside of the daily grind of an organization do not see. Fans of a certain team often have a better understanding of a situation relating their specific organization than someone who follows all teams from a broad perspective. These things that can only be gleaned from close proximity to a single organization can often be valuable, and provide necessary insight to a discussion. However, too often perspectives held by those groups or individuals are marginalized because of the assumption that bias is coloring the view rather than that information is being passed along.
I don’t agree with Kovacevic’s opinions, but I’m also not going to ignore them simply because he’s from Pittsburgh and he voted for two guys from Pittsburgh. Too often, the assumption of bias is used as a tool to disregard potentially valid opinions that go against the consensus. The broad perspective is not always right, and it often takes someone close to the scene to shed light on a misconception of the outside.
Do I think Neil Walker or Jose Tabata was better than Jason Heyward this year? No, I don’t. However, I do think Dejan Kovacevic is a good beat writer and a valuable source of information. To disregard his opinions simply because of the appearance of bias is foolish. We would all do better to argue the facts more often and focus less on the perceived credibility of the person making the point.
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There just might be subtext here.
Best comment ever.
Oh so thinly veiled. Except Cameron picked an awful spot. While I think it’s truly up to the voters to pick whomever they’d like, if you were to analyze and critique their selections, it is quite literally the definition of BIAS, and certainly not insight, that lead Dejan to vote for Tabata.
Oh well. #6org lives on. I’d wager Dave has the record for biggest chip on his shoulder of any sportswriter I’ve ever read. It comes through in at least 50% of his articles.
I’d say you guys have the biggest chip on your shoulders for never letting anything go, even stuff you didn’t understand properly to begin with.
But ultimately, what is the “insight” he’s providing? The Rookie of the Year ballot isn’t over an obscure matter like who is the best tipper or the best guy to share a cab with. I’m all for local insight, but I just don’t see how local or insider insight, can, in any way, justify this ballot.
So in the end, this seems like a pointless distinction to draw.
It’s indefensible really and the fact that Dave Cameron wrote an article absolving him based on some phantom immeasurable such as “insight” is shocking.
Insight belongs no where near the judging of a season no more than words like “clutch” or “grit” or “clubhouse guy”.
Kudos to Kovacevic for being willing to engage in a conversation about his choices. But I think the problem here is captured by your title. This isn’t insight OR bias — it’s a bit of both.
I would like to learn more about his process. Did he establish criteria objectively and then find the guys who bets met them or did he come up with a list of candidates subjectively and, consciously or not, come up with a set of criteria that favored his favorites?
I think sometimes the local guys give their players extra credit for things they’ve seen the player do, but don’t do that same diligence for the other candidates. So for example, Tabata’s great season plus him being a team leader and role model makes him better in the writer’s mind than Heyward’s greater season. But he doesn’t even consider Heyward’s intangibles, because he doesn’t have that insight.
For what it’s worth, he’s going to be on Kevin Goldstein’s podcast (recorded tomorrow) so he may talk about his process then.
This is the exact point I made (insight rather than bias) in the comments back when Dave was defending the #6org thing, and I can see why he’d be sensitive (not in a pejorative sense) to this issue. Wouldn’t you agree Dave?
I do applaud his defending his choice on twitter rather than running and hiding from it but his defense is weak, to say the least. The only thing he really says in defense of Tabata and Walker is that, “(he) Felt firmly that my first-hand view of Walker/Tabata merited their ROY votes.” He doesn’t say what he saw that merited their ROY votes. Is this bias or is it insight? If there was any insight there, he certainly hasn’t provided anyone with what it was.
It sounds to me like he wanted to reward Walker and Tabata for working hard and having pretty good seasons. He was swayed by the fact that he’s in the locker room with them and on the road with them; he saw their work habits and whatever that gave him the “insight” to determine that they were the 2nd and 3rd best rookies in the NL.
Unfortunately, he wasn’t in the locker room and on the road with Jason Heyward, Jaime Garcia, Starlin Castro, or any of the other rookies eligible for this award. Is it possible that they worked as hard (or harder) than Tabata and Walker? Are their character as good (or better) than the 2 Pirates? Is it possible that they offered whatever intangibles that led Kovacevich to vote for his hometown players in greater quantities than the 2 Pirates did? We’ll never know because he didn’t spend the time with the other rookies that he spent with Tabata and Walker.
My guess is that he does have some insight into their work habits, character or whatever led him to vote for them as the 2nd and 3rd best rookies in the NL this year. But he also, pretty clearly, has some bias as well. The bias may be only in the fact that he didn’t spend the time “getting to know” the other rookies that he spent getting to know Tabata and Walker. It may be that he erred in using his insight as a basis for his vote. Let’s face it, shouldn’t any voter make his decision objectively, making apples-to-apples comparisons of the players. If he used the insight he gained by following these players day in and day out and did not try to gain similar insight about the other rookies, he didn’t make an objective decision. (Of course, I’m using the word “insight” here as a proxy for whatever instructed his decision making.)
There’s no insight involved in voting for clearly inferior players because you watched them more. That’s the very definition of bias. It may not be conscious bias on his part, but clearly there is some form of bias involved when someone has a basic understanding of modern stats chooses Walker and Tabata over Heyward. I mean Heyward was 3 wins better than both this year. He simply destroyed them. It wasn’t close. But because DK watched the Pirates everyday he came up with a way to rationalize voting for his guys over Heyward.
There’s no insight involved in [ranking] clearly inferior [franchises] because you [know more about them]. That’s the very definition of bias. It may not be conscious bias on his part, but clearly there is some form of bias involved when someone has a basic understanding of modern stats chooses [Seattle] over [Atlanta and Colorado and Philly]…. But because [Dave] watches the [Mariners] everyday he came up with a way to rationalize voting for his guys over [other, better organizations.]
Please start including some other teams like the Giants (#23) when referencing oversightly, bias, etc with respect to those rankings and comparisons to #6Org…
Really helps too that we can see how the season played out – how the Mariners stunk up the joint, and Giants won the Series – to continue this claptrap about an article from six months ago…
so you don’t think there is any value at all in comparing actual results to expectations?
I guess what I’m getting at is that ranking the M’s number 6 is so indefensible (in hindsight). But ranking the Giants #23 looks even more so today. That team that won a WS with young pitching, and a ROY winner, was ranked #23. There seems to be more of crush to make fun of the #6 ranking than there is to see what did the community miss with the #23 ranking.
@Nitram I kind of agree, but even as a Giants fan, I can understand the low ranking at the start of the season. Remember, the Giants replaced Schierholtz, Rowand, Bowker, Wellemeyer and Molina with Ross, Torres, Burrell, Bumgarner and Posey. If they hadn’t made those mid-season moves (which are completely impossible to predict before the season begins, at least in the case of Ross and Burrell, as they were under contract with different franchises at the time), who knows where they would have ended up.
I have no problem with complaints lodged about whatever team’s ranking – just saying that:
(a) complaints lodged then hold more water than ones lodged now about any particular team’s ranking. It’s easy to play MMQB.
(b) the “rightness” or “wrongness” of the rankings isn’t predicated on any team’s successes or failures during one season; that’s not what the rankings were intended to show. And,
(c) it’s one man’s opinion. Time to moveon.org already. Turn the page. There are 5,407,226 other more timely and newsworthy baseball-related storylines.
Wait, some dude voted Tabata over Heyward? And he’s a Pirates’ writer? Make that 5,407,227. :)
I’d find revisting some of the other ranking much more fascinating than complaing about the whole #6 org discussion. I like to try and figure out if I was just agreeing with the writer or had opinions that differ, etc. I’m sure there are many people that feel the same way. If this community thinks it is a group with above average intelligence was there something that we missed during the rankings that can be corrected? Was there someting that was over/under valued? We can only answer some of these questions by looking at results and comparing them to original expectations.
How is it “indefensible” after one season?
If the giants go one and done and come in last in the west this year, does that make the #23 ranking incorrect? or correct? no.
If the mariners win the WS next year, are you still crying about them being ranked #6 this year?
Hindsight is not intelligence. You are not smarter and your opinion does not carry more weight because Dave made an seemingly (in a small single season sample size…) judgment call 7 months ago.
Tom B. – how do you defend the number 6 ranking looking at the Ms now? I’m not sure why you are making a big deal out of that statement. It is pretty easy to see a 100 loss team and say they probably should not have been ranked 6th. oh wait, i remember Jack Z. is a genius, he’ll turn them into an 80 win team, that’ll justify the #6 ranking.
80 wins should not be difficult to attain, and they improved their prospect situation with the Lee deal, no?
I appreciate Kovacevic’s openness re. the matter, but agree with other posters upthread who don’t see much of a distinction b/t “insight” and “bias.” I was especially puzzled by this statement from D.K.: “Obviously saw way more of Walker/Tabata than others, but that also gave perspective on them performing at high level in poor lineup/setting.”
Is that really something voters should be considering? Conversely, should Posey and Heyward have been dinged for playing on good teams?
Dave, come on now. We all know this is related yet again to that stupid Mariners ranking. However in that case not only were some accusing you of bias, but a great deal of well thought out arguments were laid out.
This article seems to be biased…….towards Dave Cameron.
This doesn’t strike me as a coincidence either. That being said, I would say that Dave likely has more insight (read: expirience) in seperating bias from an argument than most of us. This article adds a lot more to a discussion that had previously been solely about home team bias.
I am just mad that Troy Renck of the Denver Post didn’t at least give Chachin a 3rd place vote
I think this is brilliant, because it draws a lot of attention to the years Neil Walker and Jose Tabata had. Both of those players had more-than-acceptable seasons as rookies, and their performances would have been lost had Dejan Kovacevic done this.
It kind of strikes me similarly to what Keith Law did for the NL Cy Young last season.
Actually, I think it is perfectly reasonable for a writer to cast a vote just for this reason. It’s similar to a fell shout-out votes for the Hall of Fame on a veterans one and only time on the ballot.
Using your voting privileges to “make a statement” or to “draw attention to your organization’s rookies” is flat-out wrong. It’s an abuse of the privilege and if that is what Kovacevic was doing by putting the two Pirates on his ballot then he needs to have his priveliges taken away, pure and simple.
If he wants to cheerlead for the Pirates in his column or in a blog, that’s fine, but if he votes for players higher than he truly believes they rank among rookies, that’s inappropriate. It could easily rob a deserving player of the award.
That being said, there sure was an unbelievably strong crop of rookies in the NL this year!
Except Keith Law didn’t vote for Vazquez to draw attention to the season he had – he voted for him because he felt Vazquez had the second-best season, unless you think he’s lying.
^^^ This.
Yeah, that’s not what Keith did. And it strikes me as a pretty flagrant misuse of the vote. Throwing a HOF vote to a guy you liked when there aren’t ten worthy HOFers is totally fine, and totally different. He’s competing against 75%, not other players, and it’s not going to affect anything. Here, his decision to leave Heyward off completely rather than rank him second might have cost Heyward the award — everybody knows it didn’t NOW, but at the time Kovacevik was doing it, it sure seemed possible — and, unless he really, honestly believed those guys were better, strikes me as irresponsible.
I think it’s cool that Kovacevik is responding to people on Twitter and such, but unless he can actually lay it out and say “no, I really believe Walker and Tabata were both better than Heyward, and this is why,” including whatever combination of stats and “insight” it takes to get him there, it seems pretty problematic.
good beat writer? he’s the best in the business for my money. he’s been extremely judicious covering the team and there’s no reason to think this is foul play. it’s worth noting he didn’t vote for alvarez. kinda
Dave, I think you’re misrepresenting the issue at hand. You seem to be assuming that people are dismissing his opinions from the outset because he is from Pittsburgh and therefor must automatically be biased towards Pittsburgh players, when what I think is actually going on is that people see a ballot that is totally incongruous with reality by just about every measurement possible, and looking for an explanation for why that is – the logical answer is that the man is biased towards his home team. I appreciate the subtext here and think it’s a valuable message, but this is NOT a good case to be using as an example to make the point you’re trying to make. The man is clearly biased in some form or another, no other way around it.
There’s always a subtext if you’re looking for one from the outset.
There is a reply button too, if you look.
Good line.
There’s also a reason or justification for everyone’s opinion. No one holds an opinion that they believe to be inferior to others’ opinions.
But, that doesn’t mean that each opinion is equally valid.
I can appreciate the guy’s perspective, but the conclusion is off. I can make a case for Wainwright to be both the CYA last year and this year. My conclusion would be off, even though I might have some decent reasons for arriving at it.
Let’s not get to the point where there are “no wrong answers”. We already went through that in the 90s.
‘But, that doesn’t mean that each opinion is equally valid.’
So very true – Calcaterra made the same point yesterday over at NBC Sports. Everyone is entitled to their opinion, and no opinion can be definitively shown as the “right” one, but some sure can be shown to be more “right” than others.
Kovacevic is one of the few good writers we have in Pittsburgh. Believe me, he’s nothing near a homer. I’m not saying I agree with the pick, but he’s no homer.
Neil Walker isn’t a completely indefensible, especially if you don’t totally buy into his defensive numbers, as a 3rd place vote. Tabata over Heyward is terrible.
My thoughts exactly. I could easily buy into a ballot with Walker behind Heyward and Posey in some order, although I would go with Garcia third. But Tabata, while having a perfectly acceptable rookie season, simply doesn’t fit in a “top three” ahead of any of those four guys (and 3-4 others).
Not the first time something like this happened. Ichiro missed out on being a unanimous ROY when the local Cleveland writer put CC Sabathia first. Of course his flawed logic was pointed out immediately. Said he didn’t put Ichiro first because he didn’t consider him to to be a true rookie. Problem was, he had him 2nd on his ballot.
I would have lauded and supported that voter if he had actually left him off the ballot entirely. I wouldn’t consider a 30-year-old coming over after five full seasons in Japan a rookie, either. (I know Ichiro wasn’t 30, but you get the point…I think that’s a perfectly legitimate argument, I just wouldn’t have listed him at all, rather than docking him from 1st to 2nd.)
If I had a vote in that election, Ichiro wouldn’t have been included on it at all. not a real rookie, unfair competition.
Whether it was insight OR bias, it was wrong. The ROY award is not about who he *thinks* is better, its about who had a better season. There is next to no argument for either of the pirates players over the posey/heyward combo under this light.
Homer voting like this by the writers is exactly why they should not be allowed to vote. In this case it didn’t matter, in the past it has.
Ask Derek Jeter, or the writer from St Louis who stole his MVP award about how bias can effect things..
Actually, I would say it is about who the voter thinks is better.
No Yankees player–EVER–should complain about non-New York homer voting depriving them of something valuable.
Way to completely miss the point.
Except that it was kinda the point – a long way around getting to complaining about an MVP award allegedly “stolen” from a beloved Yankee, what, 3-4 years ago?
… or an exact example of bias effecting the outcome of awards because a writer wanted to make a “point” rather than just voting on who the best players are.
As the team’s beat reporter his job performance is tied greatly to access – isn’t this vote just a way to get better access? I’m sure there are a lot of votes (and stories) that are like this, take nearly every Jon Heyman article about a Scott Boras article.
How much if it is insight and not unintentional bias? I mean after watching someone or someone(s) after a long time, sometimes you become disillusioned with how great they are just from a good or okay performance.
Kovacevic’s insight led to bias. That’s neat that he has insight on some of the behind-the-scenes/off-the-field stuff. But it doesn’t appear he considered this with the rest of the candidates, just the one’s he’s familiar with. That’s bias.
Ding ding ding! We have a winner. Thanks for the succinct verbalization.
If you have more “insight” into one team because you follow it more closely than all the others, it probably biases you.
This phenomenon should be known as “Dejan vu”.
Classic.
Why is this site analyzing beat writers.. I could understand the article if this ballot somehow impacted the ROY final results, but it didn’t change anything other than point totals…. Had the writer put Heyward 2nd (or first) it wouldn’t have mattered.
Is Fangraphs now analyzing beat writers? Or is the point of the article that people have bias? (Much like Dave saying Felix should win Cy based on advanced metrics, and then saying things are ‘close’, when it is pointed out that Cliff Lee had better advanced stats than Hernandez this year?)
Beat writers? I’ll drink to that!
What if every beat writer did this for their local rookie(s)? The results would be ridiculous. That should tell us that these picks were ridiculous.
The guy keeps defending himself with the claim that he’s a local, so he’s seeing his team do what other writers aren’t. So you can’t say that Kovacevic was still being objective. Maybe he even [rightly] told himself that he couldn’t be objective, but then [wrongly] didn’t even try.
Just because you know sabermetrics doesn’t mean you’re immune to the “escalation of committment” bias. Knowing sabermetrics should give one reason & the means to question biases! But as you can see with the current state of Kovacevic’s twitter feed, some folks pick & choose sabermetric stats to confirm their biases.
I think the argument that Tabata and Walker played for a terrible team has value. Walker was third in OPS and Tabata was an excellent fielder. While I agree that Heyward should was more deserving of second place than Walker, I think Walker deserved to be third. Point is his picks weren’t so wild.
Why exactly should a player get extra credit for being on a horrid team? Color me confused.
I’m just glad to hear it wasn’t the same writer who left Posey off the ballot. Does anyone know who that was?
His name is Yasushi Kikuchi. He basically said Posey didn’t play enough games. Here’s a link with his quotes
http://hardballtalk.nbcsports.com/2010/11/15/the-posey-and-heyward-omitters-speak/
Giving Walker a vote is defensible, Tabata much less so.
It’s much worse for this writer if it is in fact insight and not bias. If his insight led him to honestly believe that Walker or Tabata had better seasons that Heyward, then he’s a poor baseball analyst, that’s BAD insight. If it’s bias, well of course he’d vote for his guys. Nothing to see here, move along.
I’m troubled with the sentiment seen here: “Well, I disagree with his choice, but he has an opinion and it’s deserving of respect.” This ballot is no different from someone saying that the just know that Derek Jeter (or Mark Teixeira or whoever) is worthy of the Gold Glove because they watch him everyday.
I appreciate Fangraphs for its objectivism and appeals to rationality. But the fact that something is against the mainstream doesn’t make it worthy of defense.
How about the guy who left Posey off his ballot?
Gaby Sanchez first? Really?
i suppose it *may* be more defensible than voting for 2 pirates on one ballot, but still pretty shocking
“Posey was left off the ballot by Yasushi Kikuchi of Kyodo News from the Los Angeles-Anaheim chapter. Kikuchi chose Florida first baseman Gaby Sanchez first, Heyward second and St. Louis pitcher Jaime Garcia third.”
Question:
Why is it that when i submit a reply, instead of the page refreshing and my post showing, i get a blank white screen?
if i then manually hit “refresh” i get an error message stating that “my reply has already been submitted”
so i have to either close the tab and open a newr Fangraphs tab, search for the article, and scroll down to see if my post was submitted;
or hit back several times then manually refresh etc.
im using firefox 4.0 Beta7 so im not sure if its an issue with my browser or the site
sorry for the hijack. figured this was as good a place as any to ask
If there’s a wrong answer that can be given, that player shouldn’t be on the ballot.
This vote can be explained only by bias and/or ignorance. While a case can be made for Tabata if he had played more, there is no excuse for Walker being ahead of Heyward.
None.
My dogs barks at other dogs but not at each other. They may have a certain insight that these dogs are the devil incarnate, or they may be biased against dogs they don’t know well. IMHO my dogs are biased, and so isn’t this Kovacevic.
You can put lipstick on a pig, but it’s still a pig. My dogs also bark at pigs. Ruff, Ruff.
meant is, not isn’t
I think that he already knew that Posey was going to win it so why not use his 2nd and 3rd votes to garner some attention to two players who otherwise wouldn’t have gotten it. Both had good years and it doesn’t matter who finishes 2nd or 3rd in ROY voting, only who finishes 1st and he chose Posey.
But he couldn’t have known that Posey was going to win. This is one of the most talked-about and debated awards of the year. It wasn’t a sure thing at all.
Well, Posey won by a substantial margin and ( this is just speculation, mind you) Dejan probably had a feel for what other voters were going to do.
Honestly, though, it’s not like his vote would have changed the result. If he hadn’t voted for Tabata or Walker, no on would have, and it’s kind of a shame to think that their pretty nice seasons would have gone unnoticed. Does it really matter than Heyward lost by one more vote?
He couldn’t have possibly known that his exclusion of Heyward wouldn’t matter. Everyone knew it was going to be a close vote and by putting Walker and Tabata on the ballot at Heyward’s exclusion he, potentially, helped “rig” the ballot in favor of Posey.
Your argument is like saying an intentional walk (for example) was a good decision because the next batter hit into a DP when the IBB lowered the pitching team’s WE by 5%.
Well stated, Chuck.
Hmmm, I would have gone with Heyward, yes, but the case for Walker over him is not hard to see:
Walker: .811 OPS at 2B
Heyward: .849 OPS in OF
That right there is a pretty big mountain to climb for Mr. Heyward, and that on it’s own is more than enough justification for a Walker vote over Heyward. A rookie posting an .850 OPS in the OF is very nice. A rookie posting an .800+ OPS at second base is phenomenal.
The Tabata thing, on the other hand…
You’re joking right? No, that is not on its own “more than enough” justification. How about the fact that Heyward was putting up an .850 OPS at age 20 for most of the season, while Walker was 24? What about their WAR numbers, which has Heyward a full 3 wins better? There is no justification for either being voted over Heyward, who quite simply had a historic season.
Firstly, no I’m not joking. It’s defensible. I would have went with Heyward, but I can see the justification for Walker.
Secondly, their ages are irrelevant if a voter sees the award the way I do, which is: “Which player who is a rookie had the best season?” If a 13-year-old came out and had a season two steps behind Posey, I’d still go with Posey.
Let’s look at some other numbers, in addition to WAR, eh?
Heyward VORP: 33.3
Walker VORP: 29.8
Heyward VORPr: .229
Walker VORPr: .260
Walker had a better batting average and slugging percentage than Heyward. **Despite the fact that the former played second base and the latter was in a prime offense slot.**
i feel like you are both missing the point. to me, a pittsburgh writer voting walker over heyward is defensible. the problem is that he also voted tabata over heyward.
walker has a decent case for earning some votes. a .351 woba from a second basemen is actually pretty solid. about 1.5 of the WAR difference is a result of positive UZR for heyward and a rough UZR for walker, and the rest is due to the fact that heyward got about 150 more at bats. if you aren’t taking that playing time difference from posey then you can’t take it from walker.
as for age, i really don’t think that should be factored in. ichiro is an example, and even ryan howard won it at 25. it is great that heyward has accomplished what he has at his age, but just being young doesn’t mean you should get a performance bonus. if awards were given for performance relative to age then jamie moyer would have to win the cy young most years.
I’m not trying to be a jerk, but I think you’re on the wrong site for using batting average and VORP. Batting average is obviously not a good measure of a player, otherwise I would think Omar Infante is an elite player.
As for VORP, I really don’t know a whole lot about it, but I know it’s based off of flawed stats, such as the aforementioned batting average. VORP also doesn’t factor in defense at all, which from all accounts has Heyward as at least above average and Walker a butcher.
Yes, Walker had an ever so slight advantage in SLG (.006), but Heyward blew him out of the water in OBP.
Why is it that the ROY ballot only has 3 names max to vote. Other awards allow for more slots and I believe generally get just as fair or fairer results.. If this guy had listed Heyward as a 4th place vote there wouldnt be such a furor as that would be a minor difference of viewpoint. And if he had 5 slots to list votes and then left Heyward off the ballot, a claim of bias would be much more evident.
What worried me a lot on all of this is that it seems we have decided in advance who is the correct winner and vilify anyone who has a different opinion. Why even bother to vote if it is already predetermined that if you see things differently than group think you are a moron.
I assume there are fewer voting slots because there are generally fewer viable rookies to choose from.
A lot of the furor is because it’s the Pirates. We wouldn’t be having this discussion if some Chicago beat writer had put two Cubs ahead of Heyward
I would flatly disagree.
Where was this outrage when Andrew Mccutchen, who had similar stats to Posey, finished 4th last year? Oh wait, he is a Pirate.
Also, no outrage for the 3 writers who didn’t have Posey or Heyward as #1?
McCutchen was actually good last year. He SHOULD have gotten votes, probably more than he did He had similar stats to poseys season (although not being a catcher doesn’t help the case) sure, but they only get compared to the stats that season, not this year or previous years.
You don’t have to live up to the last ROY to win the award.
I think you’ve got the point backwards — the point is that McCutchen should’ve finished higher than fourth. CF isn’t as high on the defensive spectrum as C, but it’s still a premium defensive position. Yet McCutchen got left off a lot of ballots, and wound up finishing behind Chris Coghlan, who had basically the same wRC+ (BABIP-fueled) while providing very poor defense in a corner outfield spot.
Now I think the story there is that a lot of people voted on batting average and didn’t consider the difference in value between LF and CF (or maybe forgave Coghlan because he’s supposed to be a 2B, though I think that ought not to count when you’re measuring his performance this year — and if it does count, then it counts for Walker too). But that still ought to be a bigger deal that a single writer’s ballot this year.
Why is it so incredulous that Walker be voted for over Heyward?
For those saying that Heyward “clearly” had the better season….in what terms?
Heyward played in 32 more games had 94 extra at bats (166 PA) and for all of those extra attempts, he hit 19 pts lower in BA (.299/.2)78, had 6 HRs more (18/12), 6 RBIs more (72/66) and his OPS was only .038 pts ahead (.849/.811) even with the extra power. He also committed only 1 less error (6 for Heyward vs. 7 for Walker) playing a position (OF) that is infinitely less likely to generate errors than the position (2B).
He was also more consistent. Heyward hit .181 in June (to go along with his .287/.245 for a .532 OPS) where Walker’s lowest monthly BA was .270. Walker had 10+ RBIs in every month except May (he only played in 7 games) whereas Heyward had 3 months where he didn’t get past 8 RBIs.
Walker had a higher RISP (.313/.306), a dramatically higher OPS w/RISP (.927/.797) and hit higher when men were on and not in scoring position (.358/.308).
If anything, those screaming so loudly for Heyward have been biased due to the media love fest for him and the Sportscenter highlight reels with his anointment as the sure-fire RoY winner after his first AB.
OPS is a flawed statistic. OBP isn’t weighted nearly enough in it and Jason had a .393 OBP versus Walker’s .349. Their SLG was virtually identical meaning almost the entirety of the difference between their OPS is in Heyward far superior OBP. The difference between these two players is much different than “only .038″ in OPS.
This isn’t even to speak to Heyward being the best RF in the game and Walker being a butcher in the field. Or the fact that Heyward is one of the better baserunners in all of baseball. Or that PNC is more hitter friendly than Turner. Or that Heyward played in the much better division.
Heyward blows walker away in some stats. Some stats they are only close but Heyward still has the edge.
Tell me, in what phase of the game was Walker better than Heyward. Just one phase?
How does someone that is a “butcher in the field” end up with a .985 Fldg % at a position he’d never played before this year?
In what alternative world/reality is Heyward the “best RF in the game”?
http://www.fangraphs.com/leaders.aspx?pos=all&stats=fld&lg=all&qual=y&type=1&season=2010&month=0
As for your statements about the different ball yards, you do realize that there are more HRs hit in Turner than PNC (1.023/gm @ Turner vs. 0.798/gm @ PNC), and that there are only slightly more runs/gm at PNC (1.026 vs. 1.007) which I’m guessing had a lot more to do with the Pirates pathetic pitching than the park itself with the Pirates being the only team in MLB with a collective ERA at 5.00 this year while Atlanta had the third best in all of MLB at 3.56.
http://espn.go.com/mlb/stats/parkfactor
Interesting how you use fielding percentage to try to prove that Walker is a good fielder, and then switch to UZR for Heyward. Heyward was in fact the 4th best by UZR, which is still pretty damn good. It’s not that far-fetched to say he’s one of the best.
Walker, on the other hand, was a complete butcher, being the 3rd-worst 2nd basemen by UZR, with players over 500 innings.
“best RF in the game”
Hmmm. My “insight” as a result of watching Jay Bruce 100+ times this year begs to differ. At the very least it’s not clear cut.
You are really on FANGRAPHS sighting Fielding % and errors?
Dewans +/- had Heyward as the best RF for 90% of the season but it seems that Jay Bruce overtook him late with a +24 mark (Heyward was +23)
Once again, Walker played a defensive position that had 463 chances in 104 GS (894.2) while Heyward played a defensive position that had 246 chances in 136 GS (1196.1 innings) and Walker finished with 7 errors whereas Heyward finished with 6 errors!
And if you are going to try to argue that catching a pop fly is harder or even on the same degree of difficulty as fielding a ground ball, I think that I need to stop after this.
Also, I noticed that you completely left the “Turner is more of a pitcher’s park than PNC” argument alone.
You are using ERRORS as your argument. The most bassackward way of judging a defensive player. Neil Walker gets to far less balls than an average second baseman does. He never even has the opportunity to make an error on them. BECAUSE HE IS AN AWFUL, AWFUL SECOND BASEMAN.
And you are saying that a guy that makes an error every 41 attempts to balls that he does get to is light years ahead of a guy that makes an error every 66.14 attempts at balls that he gets to on plays that are usually harder to make in the first place.
Do you not see the flaw in your logic?
You are not even worth arguing with. Walker was the 3rd worst defensive second baseman in all of baseball. Heyward was the second best RF or there abouts. Not to mention a far better baserunner. And a better hitter. All of that is demonstrated in their fangraphs pages, in the WAR column.
Heyward= 5.0 war
Walker = 1.9 war
If you continue to struggle with those facts, you can take your confusion there.
http://www.fangraphs.com/statss.aspx?playerid=4940&position=OF
http://www.fangraphs.com/statss.aspx?playerid=7539&position=2B
It’s amusing that you say that I am not worth arguing with b/c I am not able to look at “objective statistical analysis” and see the obvious, yet you keep throwing out your OPINION that Heyward was the 2nd best RF (or there abouts) based on the stats that you “objectively” chose to give validity to.
Pot, meet kettle.
The fact of the matter is that there isn’t even a consensus on what stats are best suited to be the most reliable predictors of how good a certain player is and you have buried yourself in a bunker defending the couple that you value the most.
It’s almost like this is your religion and the stats that you have chosen to abide by are your bible and no one can tell you any different no matter how much empirical evidence they present. Good luck with that. I’m sure it’ll carry you far.
It’s pretty easy to see that Heyward is in the top 5 in his position. If you can’t see that regardless of defensive metrics then you shouldn’t be arguing with anyone about baseball.
It doesn’t matter how you rank the top 5, just that they are there and part of it.
Did you actually argue above that Turner being a pitchers park somehow makes Walker a better 2B?
Do you realize that this site has Walker ranked something like the 140th best 2B in the league, which is hard to do since there are only 20 teams…
You can fight this all you want, but coming to this website and then using the wrong stats or trying to fudge stats like you did above is pretty dumb. Who do you think you are fooling?
Pointing out flaws in someone elses logic does not somehow magically make your logic correct.
or 30 teams… bah
I’m not arguing whether or not Heyward is in the top 5, top 2 or even the best. I’m not evening arguing that DK was write to leave him off of his ballot.
What I am arguing is this stupid notion that Walker, with similar stats to those of Posey and Heyward didn’t belong in the discussion.
Here is where Walker ranked compared to Heyward & Posey:
H – 2nd behind Heyward and above Posey
R – 3rd – Heyward led the NL rookie class while Posey had +1 over Walker
2B – 1st tied w/Heyward and +6 over Posey
3B – 2nd – 2 behind Heyward +1 over Posey
HR – 3rd – -6 behind both
RBI – 3rd – -6 behind Heyward and -1 behind Posey
SB – 2nd – -9 behind Heyward and +2 over Posey
BA – 2nd – .008 behind Posey and .019 ahead of Heyward
OBP – 3rd – .047 behind Heyward and .002 behind Posey
SLG – 2nd – .043 behind Posey and .006 ahead of Heyward
OPS – 3rd – .051 Behind Posey and .038 behind Heyward
The point I’ve tried to make isn’t that Heyward wasn’t/isn’t better, it’s that it isn’t so out of the realm of possibility that Walker can be included in the conversation.
The only person that has a right to be peeved is Gaby Sanchez….not any of us internet stat geek tough guys.
Oh, I forgot to mention that I wasn’t arguing that PNC made Walker a better defender. Russell made the claim that Heyward plays in a tougher hitter’s park and I was refuting that by showing him that Heyward has the “benefit” of playing in a park that is much more of a hitter’s park than PNC is.
Kobe, tell me how my *ss tastes…oops! Wrong thread.
So your entire premise was based on something that wasn’t actually argued by anyone?
Dejan lost all of the credibility he has gained on a national level yesterday. It’s not just that Tebata was a poor choice over Heyward. He was a poor choice over any of 7 or 8 other candidates. It’s not even close. Insight can push you from a B- to a B+. It could push you ahead of Travis Wood (who was more valuable than Tabata) but can’t even get you to Heyward’s coat tail. Only bias can.
I have read a countless number of Dejan’s articles (I am not a Pirates fan) but will never click another one of his link’s again knowing that how he so easily lets his bias cloud his objectivity. It’s indefensible really and the fact that Dave Cameron wrote an article absolving him based on some phantom immeasurable such as “insight” is shocking.
Insight belongs no where near the judging of a season no more than words like “clutch” or “grit” or “clubhouse guy”.
Agree completely. It might be a little different if their performance was similar, and his “hometown insight” led him to vote. It wasn’t though. Heyward was better than both of them combined, and at a younger age. Tabata and Walker were clearly not among the top 5 rookies in the league.
Also agree on your statement regarding the opinion on this site. When I heard about the Dejan’s vote “controversy”, I came here assuming I would find an article ripping him to shreds for his indefensible opinions.
Aren’t you overreacting just a little bit?
Overreacting how? I posted on a website, I don’t know if I would call that overreacting. I don’t think it’s overreacting to want to see some measurable reason why Dejan made two very questionable votes.
I’m also just very surprised that a website like FanGraphs, which always has a sabermetric opinion and a good and informed reason why they have an opinion, suddenly decides that it’s ok that Dejan voted the way he felt, even though it’s clearly not the best choice.
What is this, Myanmar? Let the man vote for who he feels is best. Walker and Tabata had good seasons, and he voted Posey first. Sounds like the only reason anyone knows about this is a slow news day.
I think the reason people care is because the situation highlights some flaws with how the awards are decided. How many other sportswriters voted for the guy from their hometown, not based on his performance, but because of unmeasurable things that they noticed by being around them?
I wonder if the hometown ATL guy voted for Heyward over Posey?
It was pretty clear that Posey had the better overall year in every aspect. Was his/her vote considered strictly homerism also?
Yes, it was so clear that the site you are on lists Heyward as more than a win better than Posey.
Their isn’t a source in America other than Dejan that lists Walker better than Heyward, which is the point.
Well first you would have to assume that Posey was clearly better, which is in fact blatant homerism. Arguments can be made either way, and I’m not going to fault someone for picking between Heyward or Posey. They’re both very good young players.
If the guy from Atlanta voted for Heyward, I’m sure he could find some facts to back it up. For example, Heyward’s WAR (5.0), wOBA (.395), elite walk rate and OBP, Heyward’s age while putting up these fantastic numbers (20/21). All that in addition to his awesome mental makeup, and there wouldn’t be a problem. Just like there wouldn’t for Posey.
“Their isn’t a source in America other than Dejan that lists Walker better than Heyward, which is the point”
And we all know that the general population and general consensus is never wrong. We see how omnipotent they are every November.
Im not talking about the general population. I am talking about objective statistical analysis. You are much to dense for this site. Please go here. http://www.rbigooderrorbad.com
But this is where your argument falls apart…
1. You resort to name calling
2. There is no such thing as “objective” statistical analysis when it comes to any fielding measurements because the stats themselves are being generated by human beings that are tasked with deciding whether a certain player could/should/would be able to get to a ball when compared to that person’s opinion of whether some other player might have.
3. You somehow think that you are so enlightened and cannot possibly be wrong because the possibly flawed stats that you are basing your opinion on say so.
Sometimes, in spite of all of the evidence, things are quite what they seem. Keep an open mind and realize that you can be wrong once in a while even if the “evidence” says otherwise on the surface.
You have fun with all that. In the mean time all 30 GMs will take Heyward’s year over Walker’s not to mention their futures.
Heyward’s WAR = 5.0
Walker’s WAR= 1.9
While that may be at this point in time, go and ask those same GMs if they would rather have a +5.0 WAR OF (even though Heyward’s WAR wsa 4.4…not 5.0 according to baseball-reference) and a hole as 2B to fill with what’s available on the open marker or a switch hitting 2B that was a +1.9 while hitting .300/12/66 in 104 games and having to find an OF to pick up the slack.
There are a lot more OF that are available that can give you Heyward’s production than there are 2B that will give you Walker’s.
Again, I like how you switch to bWAR for Heyward for the 4.4 and back to fWAR for Walker cause its higher than his 1.5 bWAR. What a joke. WAR is adjusted for position, which I am sure you already know but are pretending to forget for the sake of your argument. Walker was only 1.9 wins more valuable than some random AAA second baseman you can have for the league minimum. Heyward was 5 wins better than a AAA RF.
The clear choice is Heyward with the AAA player at second as it is a 3 win gain.
There are a lot of 5 war OF’s? Are you insane Aristotle?
Forget about Walker. Every GM in the country would take Heyward over the ENTIRE Pirates roster.
Yes, I’m serious.
Here are 5 RF (including Heyward) from this year’s list of those that are “qualified only”:
http://www.fangraphs.com/leaders.aspx?pos=rf&stats=bat&lg=all&qual=y&type=6&season=2010&month=0
If I make it all OF instead of just RF, the list grows to 12.
But even if a few beat writers vote for their guys it has little effect on the outcome. That’s why the baseball writers of America vote for the Rookie of the Year, not just Dejan Kovacevic.
I see your point but I think that if writers are required to vote for who has the best stats/most press/what have you it’s not really a vote at all. Maybe Neil Walker and Jose Tabata were valuable to their team. Maybe they deserved a vote or two, if not the hardware.
That’s totally subjective Nolan. I can come up with a subjective view that says Craig Kimbrel deserved a third place vote. In any objective sense, Heyward was better. The privilege of voting for these awards comes with a responsibility to be objective.
It’s not the most valuable rookie award, its rookie of the year (ie. who had the better year).
Value to their particular teams should have nothing to do with it.
Three of Kovacevic’s tweets:
Re: ROY voting. Felt very firmly about Posey, thus chose him 1st. Felt Walker/Tabata had strong years, comparable to rest of class. (More)
and
Obviously saw way more of Walker/Tabata than others, but that also gave perspective on them performing at high level in poor lineup/setting.
and
Feeling always has been with voting that broadest variety of perspectives bring best results. Few can argue final overall tally, I’d think.
The premise that the vote is somehow more “pure” by him voting for off-the-wall players is ludicrous.
If he voted for who had the best seasons (like he is supposed to), regardless of his place of employment, he would have a hard time justifying this vote.
Instead his justification came through:
“they wouldn’t get votes so i voted for them”
“posey would win anyway”
2 things that he couldn’t have possibly known. and then the kicker:
“i saw them more, that makes them better”…
Indefensible.
I respect Kovacevic, and understand his points. Nobody would be talking about this if he included one of those guys on his ballot, even above Heyward and/or Posey. But 2 of them? That indicates bias. In the end, it would have made 0 difference, but I think that should be pointed out.
You could have written this differently, something like:
“You’ve probably heard by now that Cameron, a beat writer for the Fangraph website, filed a Organizational Rankings article that included the M’s ranked #6. Cameron put the Ms ahead of teams like the Braves 8th, the Phils 9th, etc. and had the Giants (WS Champs) around #23…”
That would be an example of bias…
Hello kettle, meat mr. black.
Because we all saw the Giants winning the series, right? So tiresome…
Your buddy Cameron definetly did not. He saw a non trivial chance that your Ms would win the WS.
Again, (a) the rankings weren’t “power rankings” of which team would win the most games or the world series in 2010. We’ve been over this and over this. (b) Dave Cameron is no “buddy” of mine – I’ve never met the man or shared any correspondence with him whatsoever. And (c) the Mariners are probably about my 25th or 26th favorite team, down in the lower depths amongst the BoSox, ChiSox, Nats, Indians, and Orioles, so I wouldn’t exactly call them “my M’s”. :)
He also wasn’t ranking teams for this season. Organizational rankings include the future, which is dim for the giants and good for the mariners. Is it that hard to understand? Winning now, or next year, is irrelevant to the topic you are referring to.
Jason and Oh Dear:
“The combination of a winnable division and a high variance roster gives the Mariners a legitimate chance at winning the World Series this year, even with a roster that has plenty of warts. They’re not the favorites, certainly, but if you ran the 2010 season 1,000 times, the Mariners would end up champions in a non-trivial amount of them. They’d also finish last a bunch of times, which is part of the risk they’ve had to accept. But we cannot ignore the fact that among the 30 MLB clubs, Seattle is more likely to win the title in 2010 than most of their competitors”
http://www.fangraphs.com/blogs/index.php/organizational-rankings-6-seattle/
this guy: if you ran the season 1000 times the giants would win some, too… i’m sure there is a scenario under which the orioles won as well.
thats how probability works.
is the scenario where the O’s win: BoSox, Yanks, Jays, and Rays all get into simultaneous airplane crashes, O’s make playoffs by default and get hot for two weeks?
:)
Mike –
NOOOOOO!! Not a plane crash involving my Jays! When we’re finally coming around to respectability! We have so little already… =)
Yeah, while it’s pretty hard to see how he didn’t feel like Heyward deserved a vote, it comes off as more of a protest vote to complain about how two good young Pirate players who had fine seasons were rarely discussed. It’s like conventional wisdom telling people they throw away their vote on a one-issue third party, when the two major parties are rarely affected. Perhaps he’s pushing the envelope with two votes, but as he says, the results were not actually affected, and he even was with the consensus regarding the winner. Voting is subjective.
I’m not sure whether it’s bias or the beginning stages of schizophrenia, but there’s no way Tabata nor Walker are on par with Heyward.
I said “on par”, not better…
I think the Pirate’s guy is humoring you, because anyone who would include either of those guys in the same sentence as Heyward isn’t someone impartial.
……..the Pirates of all teams.
Really?
I think Cameron just writes this trite to drive up the number of clicks. By trite I mean writing articles that can immediatly draw a parallel to his illlogical ranking of the Ms during the last offseason. More clicks, more comments, more ad dollars, etc.
*Rolls eyes*
If this is getting tiresome for you why do you feel the need to respond?
Who’s tired? It’s not tiresome, just asinine (in the sense that there’s no factual support, just baseless conjecture). Dave also just posted about Justin Upton. That’s somehow tied to #6org to get more responses, clicks, and ad dollars too! *Evil Dr. Claw laugh*
Locke – completely stupid opinions, like nitrams, should not be allowed to flourish. They should be squashed as to stop them from self-perpetuation.
Um, Jason, up above you were the one that started the tiresome nonsense.
The M’s were ranked #6. There was a long discussion in Cameron’s piece that one reason they were ranked #6 was because of their non trivial chance to win a WS in 2010. Please go back and read it if you’d like. You can’t have it both ways. Don’t say the rankings aren’t about XYZ, when the write up about the particular ranking is referencing XYZ.
I think its time for you guys to stop banging on this Mariners drum. You know there were like 20 other teams ranked above the giants that i don’t hear anyone crying about…
He said they had a CHANCE to win, just like 29 other teams had a CHANCE to win.
He didn’t say they WOULD win.
He didn’t even say they had the 6th best chance of winning.
Better yet, what does ANY of this have to do with a piece written in the ROY award?
The answer is nothing, but you guys see one idiot mention something you didn’t like from 7 months ago and try to jump all over it. It’s pathetic.
“that one reason they were ranked #6 was because of their non trivial chance to win a WS in 2010.”
Lookie, you answered your own question! It was *one* reason for their ranking. Not *the* reason. The 23rd ranked Giants also had a non-trivial chance of winning the 2010 series. The rankings weren’t 2010 power rankings. (I’ll say, again. We’ve been over this!)
“He didn’t say they WOULD win. He didn’t even say they had the 6th best chance of winning.”
^^^ This. Tom nails it (again).
The only defense I would have considered from Kovacevik would have been that Heyward was guaranteed either first or second place overall in the voting, and he wanted Walker/Tabata to be recognized and on the ballot (aka, receive at least 1 third place vote). I would have understood that.
I agree that there are definitely valid applications of insight to discussion of players. For example, so-and-so had a bad year because he was nursing an injury, or dealing with lots of personal problems, or didn’t get along with certain teammates (who are now gone), etc. Or for a more concrete example, people saying Adrian Beltre is going to have a good season for the Red Sox because he’s moving from a park that kills right-handed power (not something the average non-Mariner fan would likely know) to a park that aids it. Sounds fine.
But, all of that has to do with projecting future performance, not valuing past performance. I can’t think of any plausible insights one could have that would trump a significant difference in wOBA and one’s defensive metric of choice. And, even to the extent good or bad performances can be explained with insider information, it doesn’t change the reality of those performances. For example, the Giants were probably not the best team in MLB this year, but they’re the champions because they won their playoff games. A simulator run a few million times probably gives a higher percentage of titles this year to other teams, but it’s irrelevant to what actually happened. If award voting worked this way, Pujols would win every single MVP.
While it’s true that too often discussions veer away from facts to speculations regarding analysts’ character and motives, it’s difficult to come up with an alternative expanation for Kovacevic’s voting. Granted, as Keith Law has pointed out, there is no rule forbidding voters from factoring their expectations of future perfomance into their RoY vote, so insight could be used to justify a vote that way… but Kovacevic surely doesn’t think Tabata and Walker are going to have better careers than Heyward, does he?
“”Organizational rankings include the future, which is dim for the giants and good for the mariners.”"
Really? Based on…what, exactly?
“”Is it that hard to understand? Winning now, or next year, is irrelevant to the topic.”"
No, it wasn’t irrelevant to the topic…that WAS the topic: ‘what are the chances Team X wins over the next * years?’
‘Now (this year)’ and ‘next year’ are part of the ‘next * years,’ are they not?
Again, you answered some (most) of your own questions -
“Organizational rankings include the future…based on…what, exactly?”
You may not have agreed with Dave’s assessment of these teams’ future prospects (which is totally reasonable). He may have been looking at a 5-year timeframe, or 3, or 10. You may have preferred less, or more. You may not have liked his methodology for assessing their future prospects (which may have relied too heavily on an assessment of their GM’s aptitude for making quality forward-looking deals, for instance). But just because you don’t agree with his methodology, would have weighted the factors/components differently, or would have ranked the teams differently, doesn’t mean that future prospects weren’t factored into the rankings. The process, explanation of the process, or the results just may not have suited you.
“Winning now, or next year, is irrelevant to the topic.”
Wow, book chapter and verse making the point that we’ve been trying to make ad nauseum here, straight from the horse’s mouth. Thanks for taking the time to look it up.
And yes, “this year” and/or “next year” are a component of the “next yearS” but Dave’s point was that it wasn’t meant to be taken as a ranking predicated solely on expected success in 2010. (Although many are trying their best to make it so, and pointing to the results of a single season to expose some heinous flaw in the [totally subjective] process that was basically [one man's opinion] [delivered six months ago].”
Good to see people like Locke continue to prove the Greater Internet Fuckwad Theory right day after day after day….