Alfonso Soriano's Endless Contract

[Rice Cube]

I'm cool with using the word "arguably" but the way it qualifies a statement doesn't automatically make you correct.

You can argue that Soriano is one of the 10 best in the league, but if you want to be objective, you can use WAR to rank position players. I can't access the B-Ref comprehensive Play Index by WAR for some reason, but FanGraphs is pretty good about that so that's what I'm using, with the caveat that fWAR and rWAR use different metrics to measure offense and defense in their calculations. I have some issues with fWAR putting so much emphasis on UZR in their calculations (which is why Soriano's fWAR is so high) but whatever, it's a start.

We'll ignore Soriano's 1999 and 2000 seasons as he was a September call-up in those years. We also won't do 2011 because it's a partial season and WAR is a cumulative stat that will ebb and flow as his performance does.

On B-Ref, Soriano:

2001 -0.5
2002 4.7
2003 4.0
2004 0.8
2005 1.7
2006 5.7
2007 3.6
2008 2.2
2009 -0.9
2010 1.6

Now we can look at FanGraphs, and you can actually use the "leaders" tab to sort based on year. I'll put his WAR totals as well as his rank if he's in the top 20.

2001 0.2
2002 5.7 (18th)
2003 5.0
2004 2.1
2005 2.3
2006 5.3 (20th)
2007 7.0 (9th)
2008 4.1
2009 -0.1
2010 3.0

Don't get me wrong...when he was younger and Mike Quade hadn't thrown him against the bricks in Wrigley Field (that's another story), Alfonso Soriano was fast and very valuable. He wasn't Bonds/Pujols valuable, but a very solid player. In 2006 and 2007, when he first switched to LF, he was good defensively primarily because of his arm and his speed making up for his inexperience. But you can argue all you'd like that he was a top 10 or top 20 player and you'd be far from the consensus. I'm using WAR here as an all-encompassing statistic of value. Soriano has received MVP votes and has deservedly been an All-Star, but he isn't so full of awesome that you can make a far-reaching statement like he was a top 20 player. It's simply not true.

I like Soriano, but even back then I thought they overpaid. I was okay with it because he was so good in 2007 and 2008. You can't evaluate a contract except at the moment that it's signed, because you have no control over injuries or whatever weird luck may befall that player, but at that time, Soriano had no major injury history and he was still in his prime. It's easy to look back and say it was stupid, but at the time, it was no more stupid than the contracts that Carl Crawford and Jayson Werth signed this offseason.

Edit: Soriano was 15th in rWAR in 2006, the only time he shows up in the top 20 on B-Ref's leaderboards in his career so far.

 

[FirstTimer]

That's probably fine, and maybe you can do this since you have the statistics, but how did Soriano, Byrd and Fukudome do in 2008? How did Soriano do pre-2008 as well? Because in a vacuum, the numbers definitely bear out that Soriano is better by the EqBRR metric than the others, but there are a couple caveats other than low OBP/high SLG. One is that towards the middle of 2009, Lou Piniella switched Soriano from leadoff to batting sixth. The other is the kinds of hitters behind Soriano once he IS hitting sixth. Also important is realizing that, as discussed earlier in this thread, Soriano is losing his speed, which means less stolen base attempts. If the ball can't be put in play because Tyler Colvin or Koyie Hill or Tony Campana suck, Soriano cannot advance on the ground. If there are slow dudes in front of Soriano, he cannot advance on the basepaths more than a base at a time. All these things matter.

I agree with you that EqBRR is important to consider and it does bear out that Soriano isn't terrible as a baserunner, but you have to consider the context as well. I don't think you have.

My point being that Soriano is not a better baserunner; he simply runs into less outs because he doesn't have as many opportunities to advance these days based on his teammates and his new batting position.

This. As usual the sabre **** don't think about context. Imagine that.

One can very easily say that Soriano was a top 10 player.

No "one" can not because it isn't even close to being true. I've blown this up about 5 times already.

He definitely was a top 15 player.

He absolutely was not.

He wasn't even a top 20 player


I say again:

I'm just not a huge fan of BR's WAR. I'm a fangraphs guy.

Fangraphs WAR says:

Posey>>>Soto in 2010. 3.8 to 3.0.




You like fangraphs because it helps you in Soriano's case. Not that it really matters because outside of fangraphs WAR stat there is NOTHING indicating that Soriano was a top 10 player in 2007.

Don't you think that's a little odd?

Any rational person would think the following:

"Hmm. In 2007 Soriano didn't rank in the top 10 in the major in any significant statistic. In most cases he wasn't even in the Top 20 and in some cases he wasn't ranked in the Top 50. Behind such amazing players as Renteria, Hawpe, Dmitiri Young, and Jack Cust. Yet fangraphs WAR metric has him as the 9th "best" in the entire MLB. Something doesn't seem right here and something is drastically off in that WAR assesment."

I'm also going to point out the sheer idiocy of the following statement:

I'm just not a huge fan of BR's WAR I'm not going to say that what you are saying is wrong because I simply am not familiar with BR's WAR and it's not fair to compare the two.

1. You're not a huge fan of BR's WAR? Why not?..oh wait.

....

2. You say you aren't familiar with BR's WAR. Ok then how can you not be a "fan" of it if you aren't familiar with it? One would think that in order to not be a fan of something you'd have to be familiar with it to begin with because through that familiarty with it you'd be able to point to specific aspects of it that would lead you to not being a "fan" of it.

3. How can you say it's not fair to compare the two if you aren't familiar with one of them to begin with? What's the basis for this decree? By your own admission you aren't familiar with BR's WAR so how can you possibly make the assessment and judgement that it's unfair to compare the two?

I think this thread just set baseball back 20 years.

.

We beg of you to please go back to PSD so we can keep stupid shit like this localized to there. Much like "The Hive" in Resident Evil games.

 

[FirstTimer]

His first year he was a top 10 player in baseball.

:rofl:

By what measure?

He barely cracks the top 10 in stat catagories, wasn't in the Top 10 for MVP voting, etc.


Soriano's Top 10's that season and his place(NL Only):

SLG%: 10th
Total Bases: Tied 8th
HR's: Tied 8th
XBH: 6th
Power-Speed #: 8th
AB/HR: 10th

He wasn't even top 10 in OPS.



I remind you again...that's just on the NL side of things and doesn't even begin to bring pitchers into the equation.


Name your top 10 players from that 2007 season. Where does Soriano slot in? And what's the reasoning?

 

[FirstTimer]

According to WAR, he was a top 10 player. Including pitchers. WAR takes into account hitting and defense.

Not on baseball reference.

He wasn't even top 20 there. Then as I've already covered he wasn't top 10 in any other stat in the majors that season. So there isn't even a consensus on WAR because baseballref doesn't use UZR it uses DRS.

Try again.

Players better than Soriano:
A-Rod, Wright, Pujols, Mags, Utley, Granderson, Holliday, Chipper, and CC

Better than Sori in 2007?
LOL.

Try AT LEAST these guys:
Pujols
A Rod
Magglio
Miggy
Matt Holliday
Wright
Utley
Chipper Jones
Granderson
Rollins
Sizemore
Hanley
David Ortiz
Carlos Pena
Ichiro
Braun
Fielder
Lowell
Dunn
Ryan Howard

That's around 20 right there. No pitchers.


So if you are using only one WAR metric to put Sori in the Top 10..sorry, it doesn't work. Another WAR metric doesn't even have him top 20. For Christ sakes, I covered in the other thread that he is behind guys like Renteria and Hawpe in wOBA, wRC he wasn't even in the top 50.

I ask again:There are PILES of stats that Soriano doesn't rank in the top 10 of, the top 20 of, some in the Top 50 of and your argument for Soriano being Top 10 is one WAR metric? LOL.


You're such a homer it's pathetic.

Soriano was not anywhere close to a Top 10 player in 2007.

Give it up.

Do this board a favor and go back to PSD.

 

[CODE_BLUE56]

de ja vu

 

[Rice Cube]

de ja vu

Yeah, it's some really circular "debate" going on here.

I'm a proponent of advanced statistics, but I think one should also be cognizant of what context they should be used in. Also good to know why WAR calculations are different between systems and realize that just because one system tells you Alfonso Soriano was possibly a top ten player one year, doesn't mean it's right.

The advanced statistics have less flaws than the traditional ones like batting average and ERA, but they still have flaws. Nothing's perfect. And that's why scouts are still employed, along with an increasing number of smart people with computers who are not necessarily hiding in their mom's basements.

 

[ZAN]

Hey, the Yankees were reportedly scouting Zambrano, Dempster, Soriano, Soto, and Marmol....just sayin'!

/sarcasm

Soriano isn't going anywhere. No GM wants anything to do with Jim Hendry, unless it involves taking a bad contract and only having to pay a small fraction of it. In Soriano's case, a small fraction is STILL overpaying him. Granted, he's showing a resurgence of power this year. But he still can't field, or run, or walk while chewing bubblegum. He can, on the other hand, spit more than any other player in the Major Leagues. He's really good at that.

 

[poodski]

I'm cool with using the word "arguably" but the way it qualifies a statement doesn't automatically make you correct.

You can argue that Soriano is one of the 10 best in the league, but if you want to be objective, you can use WAR to rank position players. I can't access the B-Ref comprehensive Play Index by WAR for some reason, but FanGraphs is pretty good about that so that's what I'm using, with the caveat that fWAR and rWAR use different metrics to measure offense and defense in their calculations. I have some issues with fWAR putting so much emphasis on UZR in their calculations (which is why Soriano's fWAR is so high) but whatever, it's a start.

We'll ignore Soriano's 1999 and 2000 seasons as he was a September call-up in those years. We also won't do 2011 because it's a partial season and WAR is a cumulative stat that will ebb and flow as his performance does.

On B-Ref, Soriano:

2001 -0.5
2002 4.7
2003 4.0
2004 0.8
2005 1.7
2006 5.7
2007 3.6
2008 2.2
2009 -0.9
2010 1.6

Now we can look at FanGraphs, and you can actually use the "leaders" tab to sort based on year. I'll put his WAR totals as well as his rank if he's in the top 20.

2001 0.2
2002 5.7 (18th)
2003 5.0
2004 2.1
2005 2.3
2006 5.3 (20th)
2007 7.0 (9th)
2008 4.1
2009 -0.1
2010 3.0

Don't get me wrong...when he was younger and Mike Quade hadn't thrown him against the bricks in Wrigley Field (that's another story), Alfonso Soriano was fast and very valuable. He wasn't Bonds/Pujols valuable, but a very solid player. In 2006 and 2007, when he first switched to LF, he was good defensively primarily because of his arm and his speed making up for his inexperience. But you can argue all you'd like that he was a top 10 or top 20 player and you'd be far from the consensus. I'm using WAR here as an all-encompassing statistic of value. Soriano has received MVP votes and has deservedly been an All-Star, but he isn't so full of awesome that you can make a far-reaching statement like he was a top 20 player. It's simply not true.

I like Soriano, but even back then I thought they overpaid. I was okay with it because he was so good in 2007 and 2008. You can't evaluate a contract except at the moment that it's signed, because you have no control over injuries or whatever weird luck may befall that player, but at that time, Soriano had no major injury history and he was still in his prime. It's easy to look back and say it was stupid, but at the time, it was no more stupid than the contracts that Carl Crawford and Jayson Werth signed this offseason.

Edit: Soriano was 15th in rWAR in 2006, the only time he shows up in the top 20 on B-Ref's leaderboards in his career so far.

I think there needs to be a happy medium between the two sets of WAR. I don't particularly like either sets use of defense because I think UZR is too highly dependent on range and over/under rewards players for their defense. Do I think Soriano was worth 33 runs above average in 2007? No, but I think he was better than 10 runs above average. I really am not a fan of TZ especially since we have stats like DRS and UZR out there. I also wish BR would come around and start using wOBA instead of OPS or whatever they use. I love Sean Smith but its time to realize that there are better stats out there.

As far as the contract take off the last two years the Tribune added and it wouldn't be bad. Even the 7th year wouldn't have been bad if he could have stayed in CF til at least 2010. As a CF he would have been very valuable even if he would have just given net zero defense. Instead Murton got shipped out and we had to try and find an OF for what seemed like the 8th year in a row.

I really hope field f/x changes everything, but we shall see.