Comments on: Lindstrom to Houston http://www.fangraphs.com/blogs/index.php/lindstrom-to-houston/ Daily baseball statistical analysis and commentary Sun, 12 Feb 2012 19:00:05 +0000 hourly 1 http://wordpress.org/?v=3.3.1 By: gnomez http://www.fangraphs.com/blogs/index.php/lindstrom-to-houston/#comment-112944 gnomez Thu, 10 Dec 2009 17:32:42 +0000 http://www.fangraphs.com/blogs/?p=12828#comment-112944 Is Bono's strikeout rate the reason scouts are so low on him? To me, he projects about like Al Levine 2.0, which wouldn't make him an all-star, but enough to get a job for a couple years. Is Bono’s strikeout rate the reason scouts are so low on him? To me, he projects about like Al Levine 2.0, which wouldn’t make him an all-star, but enough to get a job for a couple years.

]]> By: Michael http://www.fangraphs.com/blogs/index.php/lindstrom-to-houston/#comment-112803 Michael Thu, 10 Dec 2009 03:13:44 +0000 http://www.fangraphs.com/blogs/?p=12828#comment-112803 Here's the thing, Jack. 2008/2009 Lindstrom were basically the same in terms of K's and BB's (which is to say, not good). 17% K% and 11% BB%. The only value he really brought was the GB/HR. But even at the decent GB rates he posted so far his career, his 2007/2008 HR/FB% were very low. I suspect relievers can do a better job of suppressing HR/FB, but it seems beyond reasonable to expect rates of around 2.6% to stick long term. Give him 5% and K and BB rates of the last two years and you have maybe a 3.9 FIP (I'm just guessing, didn't run the numbers necessarily). That's just an OK reliever if leveraged correctly (at 1.3 index using Rally's chaining and pythagenpat for WAR, I get around 1 WAR in 70 innings). He could figure it out and start looking like 2007 Lindstrom. But my guess is that he keeps walking too many people, his BABIP regresses to a better rate (he was getting tons of singles up the middle this season, hence the inflated ERA), and he ends up OK. In my example above, he gives up something like 3 home runs in 70 innings. But since his "skill" is in the least repeatable of the three TTO's, I would say the expected variation around that projected FIP would be high. Here’s the thing, Jack. 2008/2009 Lindstrom were basically the same in terms of K’s and BB’s (which is to say, not good). 17% K% and 11% BB%. The only value he really brought was the GB/HR. But even at the decent GB rates he posted so far his career, his 2007/2008 HR/FB% were very low.

I suspect relievers can do a better job of suppressing HR/FB, but it seems beyond reasonable to expect rates of around 2.6% to stick long term. Give him 5% and K and BB rates of the last two years and you have maybe a 3.9 FIP (I’m just guessing, didn’t run the numbers necessarily). That’s just an OK reliever if leveraged correctly (at 1.3 index using Rally’s chaining and pythagenpat for WAR, I get around 1 WAR in 70 innings).

He could figure it out and start looking like 2007 Lindstrom. But my guess is that he keeps walking too many people, his BABIP regresses to a better rate (he was getting tons of singles up the middle this season, hence the inflated ERA), and he ends up OK. In my example above, he gives up something like 3 home runs in 70 innings. But since his “skill” is in the least repeatable of the three TTO’s, I would say the expected variation around that projected FIP would be high.

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