Projecting the 2013 Cubs: Bill James

I enjoy looking at the projections for the upcoming season when they're released. Sometimes I enjoy it more than others. If the Cubs are going to be good I'm excited. When they aren't, not so much. This is one of those years.

Despite that, Berselius and I have posted projections for the Cubs going back to 2007 so we'll do it again for 2013. Because we have to.

The Bill James projections are usually the first to come out. They're published in his annual and that usually comes out in early November (Nov. 1 this year).

Position players

Hitter AB 2B 3B HR BB SO Avg OBP Slg wOBA
Anthony Rizzo 604 40 1 33 55 126 0.283 0.346 0.517 0.368
Bryan LaHair 314 20 0 14 32 89 0.268 0.335 0.465 0.347
Starlin Castro 629 35 10 12 38 86 0.304 0.346 0.448 0.345
Brett Jackson 302 16 4 11 39 111 0.242 0.328 0.430 0.333
Alfonso Soriano 530 32 1 27 40 142 0.245 0.304 0.462 0.326
Ian Stewart 143 7 1 6 16 37 0.238 0.327 0.427 0.324
Luis Valbuena 261 16 1 7 29 54 0.253 0.330 0.402 0.323
David DeJesus 489 26 4 9 52 86 0.264 0.345 0.389 0.322
Welington Castillo 333 18 0 13 30 85 0.252 0.316 0.423 0.322
Steve Clevenger 226 16 1 3 19 31 0.265 0.322 0.385 0.314
Josh Vitters 487 31 1 15 28 89 0.251 0.293 0.411 0.305
Darwin Barney 555 28 3 5 31 59 0.268 0.311 0.357 0.296
Tony Campana 152 5 1 0 10 32 0.276 0.321 0.322 0.292

 

People have a tendency to say the Bill James projections are overly optimistic, but that's not necessarily true. Everything is relative so a .340 wOBA in a league projected to have a .450 wOBA is pretty damn bad. Obviously nobody would project a league to have a .450 wOBA. The point is that without knowing the average we can't know how optimistic a projection system is for various players.

It's no surprise to anyone that Rizzo is projected to hit better than any Cub. What is a little surprising is how much better he's projected to hit than everyone else. What's most surprising here is that the Cubs 4th best hitter is Brett Jacikson. Despite the strikeouts last year, Jackson was actually passable as an MLB hitter. He wasn't good, but he wasn't terrible either. Luis Valbuena is projected to be a significantly better hitter than Josh Vitters, but that also is not surprising. Stewart is too, but I'm much more pessimistic about him based on what he's done the last couple years.

Pitchers

Pitcher IP H HR BB SO HBP ERA FIP
Shawn Campe 75 80 6 21 50 4 3.96 3.91
Jeff Samardzija 193 177 21 63 169 6 3.78 3.94
Matt Garza 198 186 22 62 171 7 3.68 3.96
Carlos Marmol 62 43 4 46 80 6 3.63 3.97
Alberto Cabrera 43 48 4 21 40 2 5.02 4.15
Travis Wood 196 191 22 66 159 9 3.90 4.18
Rafael Dolis 32 33 2 17 23 1 4.50 4.26
Manny Corpas 59 61 6 19 40 4 4.12 4.34
Chris Rusin 76 81 8 25 50 4 4.38 4.40
Justin Germano 119 125 16 24 80 8 4.01 4.41
Michael Bowden 60 55 7 27 50 1 3.90 4.45
Chris Volstad 155 171 18 53 99 4 4.59 4.54
Brooks Raley 56 65 7 20 37 2 4.98 4.68
Jason Berken 45 54 6 15 31 2 5.20 4.69
James Russell 67 74 11 19 49 2 4.84 4.81

 

I included anyone who was on the Cubs last season. Volstad is gone and so are some of the others.

Bill James does not like James Russell. He sees him as slightly better than he did a year ago, but still terrible. That seems odd to me, but he's been consistent. Something in his system doesn't like Russell.

125 thoughts on “Projecting the 2013 Cubs: Bill James”

  1. That seems odd to me, but he’s been consistent. Something in his system doesn’t like Russell.

    Probably his terrible and short career as a starter. Are there any starter innings mixed in to his projection?

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  2. If the Cubs can’t pick up someone decent on the FA market (Youk?), I’m fine with giving Ian Stewart another shot. Then again, I’m the last person to give up on anyone that was decent at any point in their career (cf. Randy Wells).

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  5. @ Berselius:
    I’m usually with you in that way, but not here. Stewart has been so bad the last 250ish plate appearances that it’s very difficult for me seeing him as anything that would even approach being above replacement level at this point. I think he’s better than Vitters, but that’s about the best thing I can come up with.

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  7. What’s most surprising here is that the Cubs 4th best hitter is Brett Jackson.

    I’m actually more surprised that Bryan LaHair is 2nd.

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  8. @ Aisle424:
    He was the best hitter entering last season so that doesn’t surprise me too much. Add in his 109 wRC+ from last year and he probably is the team’s 2nd best hitter. Probably not as far behind Rizzo as the Bill James projection would indicate.

    The Cubs offense sucks.

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  10. @ mb21:
    I’d rather go out and get a real 3b, but if the “choice” is between Stewart, Valbuena, and Vitters I’d hold my nose and go with Stewart. At least he has an injury excuse.

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  13. @ Berselius:
    True, but that injury excuse is also not a more serious problem than it once was. I don’t think it matters much. i think even Stewart rebounded he’d barely be better than Valbuena, but there is that possibility. I just think it’s a very slim possibility.

    We can all agree that even at their worst, Valbuena and Stewart are better than Vitters. (dying laughing)

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  15. Aisle424 wrote:

    What’s most surprising here is that the Cubs 4th best hitter is Brett Jackson.

    I’m actually more surprised that Bryan LaHair is 2nd.

    I’m not.

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  26. Bill James predicts the Cubs offense will suck? Anyone can do that. Can he predict how the election will turn out?

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  27. Hamilton wants 7 years, $175M.

    Sounds a bit high to me, but he’s probably basing it on Fielder’s ridiculous contract. I think teams are going to shy away b/c of addiction and his injury history.

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  28. @ josh:
    Can there be a clause in the contract that says if he misses games or has a loss of performance due to drugs then contract can become null and void?

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  29. @ WaLi:
    I think there are character clauses within contracts that could account for this. They could also put him on the restricted list and therefore not pay him if he engages in conduct detrimental to the team.

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  37. I slept through most of the second half of the Bears game (the baby was being all warm and snuggly), but I definitely enjoyed waking up and seeing the team take a knee with 51 points on the board.

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  38. I know MO was lamenting the poor analysis of the game, but one thing I thought they nailed was that nice almost touchdown return by Hester. They pointed out that the Bears were double-teaming the sprinters, and that meant the return was on. I thought Devin was going to get the TD, but it was still awesome.

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  40. Four posts, no response. Time to go to bed.

    *Checks clock*

    Damn you Daylight savings time! Or Not Daylight Savings Time. I don’t know how that works.

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  43. No way Vitters gets 487 big league ab’s next year. Jackson probably doesn’t even get that 302 he was so incredibly bad. I wish instead of putting out predictions before the rosters are even close to set, James would take this time to quantitatively evaluate the various projection systems and state which did best projecting the 2012 baseball season. Of course, I also wish soft serve would come out my bathtub faucet.

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  51. WaLi wrote:

    @ WaLi:
    Kidding.. My phone has a macro that converts (dying laughing) to (dying laughing). I guess it converts L-o-l to (Dying laughing)

    Wait….your phone has the same macro as OV? Did you program that in yourself?

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  53. @ Carne Harris:
    You can ignore plate appearances in any projection system. It’s based on what they’ve done in the past and it doesn’t take into consideration what we know as fans (how those players will be used). Going back to ACB we’ve been running playing time projections in February or March for several years now and will do the same for next season.

    There are all kinds of articles out there comparing the results of the various projection systems. They’re all about the same. None of them do well with playing time projections, but that’s the last important part of a projection. We can’t expect those running the projections to look through thousands of players (PECOTA and CAIRO do something like 4000 players)

    Also, the roster doesn’t have to be set to project the players. We can adjust the projection if they move ballparks and some systems have only park neutral projections.

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  55. GBTS wrote:

    @ Suburban kid:
    It’s an OV phone, we’ve recently breached the wireless telecommunications market. If you send me $399, I’ll send yours out first thing next week.

    It’s $399 for the .5 GB model, right? I wasn’t present at the meeting when we set prices, but my understanding was that it was like this.

    .5 GB: 399
    1 GB: 499
    1.5 GB 599
    2 GB 699

    all the way up to 64 GB, which costs $13,099. We’re going to cut that down to $13,049 though, correct?

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  57. @ mb21:

    all the way up to 64 GB

    The first thing I thought of when I read this was how many games back the Cubs were at the end of the season…

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  58. @ Berselius:
    That was last year’s model. You should buy a new one. For you we’ll cut the price of any model by $20. Consider it a gift. There are tens of apps that work on the phone too. (dying laughing)

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  61. all the way up to 64 GB, which costs $13,099. We’re going to cut that down to $13,049 though, correct?

    I don’t think we should insult our best customers by offering a discount.

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  77. @ mb21:
    This comment says it all, to me:

    “Could it really just be the sum of a bunch of irrationalities?”

    Darn straight it is.
    Your unacknowledged assumption (shared my all macroeconomists) that also begs the question is that the demand curve is a line. But all the behavioral research we have shows that it is not a line, at all. Some parts of the demand curve are flat, some are quite steep, and there may be discontinuities, as well. In an economic model, we may approximate a demand curve as a continuous function, but that’s a simplifying assumption that distorts reality when you are focused on something like the $.01 question.

    Your latter question is interesting philosophically – it’s the one grain of sand question. If you have a mountain and take off on grain of sand, is it still a mountain? If you keep doing that, is there the one single grain of sand that is the breaking point between a mountain and a hill or non-mountain? How could a single grain of sand by that difference?
    This stuff is dealt with in Newton’s discrete mathematics with derivatives and integrals, and is also a common philosophy puzzle. In fact, if I recall, your previous post had something to do with a well-known philosophical paradox relating to categories – seems to be on your mind!
    I think you might really enjoy reading up on what people have said about very similar issues. The Stanford philosophy encyclopedia is a good resource. http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/sorites-paradox/

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  79. @ josh:
    I don’t agree that each penny would reduce the number of sales, but a penny is important. 9.99 sounds better than 10.00 even though it’s really not. I’m not sure 10 sounds any better than 10.01. I think maybe at that point we’re looking at the nickel interval (maybe). Obviously for a car that interval would probably be larger, but I have no clue what it would be and, as mentioned, it wouldn’t be the same with all increases.

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  80. @ mb21:
    Yeah, agree, there’s a psychological effect, but I think it’s on the round number side. I think we ignore everything after the first two numbers. I’ve seen psychological tests to that effect. It’s not the penny so much as the round numbers in front. Just based on what I’ve read about psychology etc.

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  81. I’d be more willing to wager the that the jump from 9.99 to 10.00 costs 100 consumers, than increases from 9.00 -10.00 in penny intervals costs 1 buyer per penny, except on average.

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  82. @ josh:
    I think that’s true when you get to something over $100, but before that I do think the .49 to .50 makes some difference. Probably not as much as .99 to .00, but it probably makes some.

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  83. @ josh:
    Would Al bitch less if bleacher seats were reduced by 1 penny for the Cubs’ not-best customers?

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  84. @ mb21:
    Probably, yeah. I think it’s more spiky than smooth. I just don’t buy the argument that going from 10,000.00 to 10,000.01 necessarily makes any difference. I think there is a weighting you have to apply to the pennies. Using his 50-50 analogy – maybe that particular penny is more like 49.999999999-50.0000000001 (i.e., a difference, but no actualization in terms of buyers, because there aren’t enough buyers for it to show up), but you hit 10,000.49 to 10,000.50, and it jumps to more like 49.999 – 50.001 and you see a slight drop off. Something like that.

    I just think that not all pennies are equal in people’s minds.

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  87. josh wrote:

    I just think that not all pennies are equal in people’s minds.

    I agree with this, but the argument against it is that if it wasn’t true, merchandise would be priced higher. That makes sense too. If there’s no drop off in sales between 10.00 and 10.49, why not sell something for 10.49?

    So that argument makes plenty of sense to me, but at the same time I don’t believe that every single penny would see a reduction in sales. I really don’t know. It’s an interesting article and a fun idea, but I’m not sure there’s any way to confirm it.

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  90. @ mb21:

    I feel the same way about Breaking Bad. I want to watch it, but I haven’t ever gotten started on it. I think Breaking Bad is probably the better show. Season 2 of Walking Dead was pretty tedious most of the time with brief spikes of action until the last few episodes of the season, which were awesome. but this season has been pretty uniformly awesome.

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  94. @ josh:
    We can’t bust heads like we used to, but we have our ways. One trick is to tell ’em stories that don’t go anywhere – like the time I caught the ferry over to Shelbyville. I needed a new heel for my shoe, so, I decided to go to Morganville, which is what they called Shelbyville in those days. So I tied an onion to my belt, which was the style at the time. Now, to buy a pop cost a nickel, and in those days, nickels had pictures of bumblebees on ’em. “Give me five bees for a quarter,” you’d say.

    Now where were we? Oh yeah: the important thing was I had an onion on my belt, which was the style at the time. They didn’t have white onions because of the war. The only thing you could get was those big yellow ones…

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  97. @ Aisle424:
    WD has the better ratings (I think better than Mad Men too), but the critics generally like BB better though they seem to all like WD too. I’ll watch it at some point. Maybe I’ll do that when BB ends next summer.

    I’m pleasantly surprised that AMC picked up Hell on Wheels. Not the greatest show on tv, but I like it.

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  99. @ josh:
    I don’t remember what it cost at a grocery store because, well, I wasn’t buying groceries (dying laughing) but at machines it was 45 cents. Cigarettes were 1.45.

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  103. mb21 wrote:

    It makes me feel old when I think about the prices of various items.

    I remember when a piece of Bazooka bubblegum went from one penny to two pennies.

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  107. What I find interesting is that the price of gas (in real dollars) hasn’t changed much in the last 100 years:
    null
    The 90’s were really a golden age; too bad I was too young to appreciate them.

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  113. @ uncle dave:
    Yeah, there was one year in about 1999 where gas was stupid cheap in Missouri, which I had to drive through. Somewhere around .75 cents. It was fairly brief though. It was like $1.25 elsewhere. My Honda Civic would fill up half a tank for $5.

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  114. @ josh:
    It didn’t stay that low for too long, but at the time I figured out that gasoline was cheaper than any other liquid commodity that was available at the ol’ Kum & Go. Which is just silly, when you think of it.

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  119. @ AB:
    I’m not sure what he was getting at with the second paragraph, but the first paragraph makes the point that there is more than one path from A to B. The OP assumes one and claims it is reality, but it’s not proven without more work.

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  120. Rizzo the Rat wrote:

    The 90′s were really a golden age; too bad I was too young to appreciate them.

    You aren’t participating in the “Beer” discussion legally, are you, whippersnapper?

    /sheesh

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  121. @ josh:

    haha I still can’t tell if anyone got my pun.

    I had to read Zadeh in grad school and he always used that paradox as the theoretical basis for Fuzzy Set Theory.

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  122. @ Rice Cube:
    I recall when I was living in Iowa in 2008 gas got down to like $1.65 or something obscene like that.

    That’s when I really knew we were fucked. (dying laughing)

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