The Yankees’ ceremony for retiring icon Derek Jeter on Sunday was “undeniably nice,” but “sort of weird,” FOX Sports’ Ken Rosenthal writes. The ceremony felt “grim,” Rosenthal opines, and underpinning all the celebration was the fact that the Yankees likely aren’t going to the playoffs this year. Jeter is the last remaining player of the Yankees’ “Core Four” that also included Jorge Posada, Mariano Rivera and Andy Pettitte, and it might be awhile before the Yankees are again able to reach the lofty heights they did when those players were in their primes. Here’s more from throughout baseball.
- The WAR statistic currently used by many fans as an all-encompassing evaluation tool needs to change, Yahoo! Sports’ Jeff Passan writes. Most of Passan’s criticisms have to do with assigning win values to defensive performances in ways that aren’t suitably sensitive to context and that vary too widely. Passan thinks WAR might value good defensive corner outfielders (like Jason Heyward) too highly. Also, different types of WAR are calculated differently, which sometimes leads to large differences in how the two key types of WAR (Fangraphs and Baseball Reference) evaluate both position players and pitchers.
- The Mets will select the contract of veteran outfielder Bobby Abreu and promote reliever Gonzalez Germen this week, but they will not promote pitching prospect Noah Syndergaard, Andy Call of MLB.com reports. “[Not calling up Syndergaard] was definitely a decision we talked about a lot,” says Mets assistant GM John Ricco. “If there were some starting pitching opportunities left, it might have been different. But there are no starting opportunities here the rest of the season.” Newsday’s Marc Carig reported in late August that the Mets were unlikely to make Syndergaard a September call-up. Syndergaard, the Mets’ top prospect, posted a 4.60 ERA with 9.8 K/9 and 2.9 BB/9 in 133 innings at the Mets’ hitter-friendly Triple-A affiliate in Las Vegas this season. Las Vegas was eliminated from the Pacific Coast League playoffs Saturday.
What is honestly annoying is the fact that fans and the media act like Jeter (or Mo, really) is the first player to get this kind of treatment. Ripken had his little farewell tour and got that cookie from Chan Ho Park in the All-Star Game. Chipper got gifts from other teams too. If Pujols was still in St. Louis and was still an elite player till the end, he’d definitely get this treatment.
I think its a bit over the top to give this treatment to anybody, over the course of the entire season. Chipper didn’t get even close to this, neither did Ripkin. Mo and Jeter’s retirement seasons have made me sick, and I am so happy no-one of note is retiring next season.
I think Mariano deserved his tour. He was and will always be like no other. The best closer.
Jeter’s situation can be argued but he was the poster child of MLB for a long time. Chipper and Ripkin were great but they don’t hold a candle to either of those two in terms of fan idolization because they didnt play in an era where technology has made exposure and information availability so easy and fast.
In what era do you think Chipper Jones played?
Chipper’s whole career can be encompassed from 1995-2012
In comparison Jeter’s stretches from 1996-2014…
I thought he was going to say Chipper did not play in a market like NY
I’m a Yankee fan and I agree, though I think what the team did yesterday was very nice and he deserved it.
Something people don’t take much thought into however, is that a lot of the gifts Jeter is getting is money for his charity. Yes some of the other gifts he got may not have been necessary, but he’s been getting a good amount of $ for charity from all teams, including the Yankees ($222,222.22)
The other side of that argument is that according to the Trust 2 Foundations 990 report there are 4 members of their board of directors – Derek Jeter, Charles Jeter, Dorothy Jeter and Sharlee Jeter who are all well compensated by donations made to the charity.
It is always dangerous to give money to an organization that is 100% controlled by a singular family since they can do whatever they want with it without the checks and balances that exist with other charity organizations.
The Jeter tour is over the top, but bear in mind that MLB is a business, and this sort of thing drives eyeballs, fannies in seats, advertising dollars, and merchandise sales. That’s the nature of the game we watch, and Jeter wasn’t the first, nor will he be the last, to get this type of goodbye.
This. And just wait until Mike Trout retires. That would be over the top
Only if Trout stays with the Angels, wins some titles, doesn’t decline too much through his thirties, and continues as the face of MLB without any controversies. It’s rare for the face of a sport to go without anything tainting his resume, as Jeter has done.
You are right, not taking anything away from Jeter. Everything he has done is remarkable. But a big reason MLB is going over the top with these retirement tours is because they generate tons of revenue. In merchandise alone I can’t even imagine how many “RE2PECT” shirts have been sold.
Nothing away from your point – I agree – but isn’t it re2pect?
Hahah, yes RE2PECT. Thank you
Not unprecedented – I remembering attending a game in Mickey Mantle’s farewell trip around the league and there were plenty of days given to Willie Mays and Hank Aaron in their final trips to various cities. Tribute loot may have varied from plaques and certificates and keys to a city to cars and portrait photos, but the idea goes back even before Babe Ruth I am sure
I agree with Mr. Passan, the WAR is not a very effective tool because of the defensive mechanism used. I also question WHIP or at least weigh the WHIP like the FIP. Ballparks and good defensive players affect the WHIP too much.
All stats have a flaw or two it’s why we use as many as we can to cross check and make an actual assessment of skill, we shouldn’t discredit any of them completely because it’s not someones favorite.
I mean should we discount K% because not everyone faces the same schedule, against the same lineup, on the same day?
Stats allow you analyze many players over short period of time which lead you in the right direction. Then scouting takes over from there. This particularly true when it comes to relievers.
One of the major problems with the individual season WAR is that we use 3 years of UZR data when looking at defense, but WAR only takes into account that one season. Then you got someone like Gordon who is a decent, but not elite bat, and decent but not elite glove and stick him at a position where some of the competition is pretty bad with the glove he will just rack up the WAR.
I would contend Gordon is a pretty elite defender; this isn’t his first season as an excellent defender. He’s good with the bat and elite with the glove, which makes him a very good overall player. I would say he’s one of the three or so best leftfielders in the sport.
WAR is a great tool, especially for players that might get a little too much attention for fancy plays and home runs. But places like Fangraphs took it too far with trying to establish the FA monetary value of a win that is too arbitrary to ever be used by an actual GM, even Beane.
Many teams have long undervalued certain types of players though. Just plainly sticking a $ value on a win though is poor thinking though. Free agent salaries are all supply and demand, it is a half bell curve, not a constant value. 1 WAR players shouldn’t be getting the same $/WAR as a 4 WAR player. On the flip side a 7 WAR and 10 WAR player won’t get that much different salary because there gets to a point where the team won’t justify giving up more money to that player.
A bigger problem I see though is trying to compare between positions. Having every position getting to be the same WAR is a fallacy, and then you have players that move to an easier position and get more WAR, because compared to the competition their defense is so off the charts.
Easier defensive requirements is somewhat counterbalanced by more difficult offensive requirements, though.
The problem with WAR isn’t that it’s used as a measuring tool. It’s that some people use it as the preeminent or only measuring tool, and given that it remains a work in progress (particularly on the fielding side) it can mislead. I like it better for players who don’t play full time, because it gives you a little extra window into their contributions in a way that counting stats might not fully accomplish. We can always use more data.
I love baseball and find stats interesting at times. I was all for more insightful statistics. But I came to watch baseball, not argue about what combination of esoteric calculations are more important than others. I played the game, have watched MLB for over 50 years, and have been subscribing to the MLB subscription service for 8 now – usually watching at least parts of 6-10 games a day. I have a pretty good idea of the value of players – I see those that play to help their team win, and I see those that play to pad their stats and get more salary. That’s fine. It happens in this life.
It’s bad enough that there are 2 major organizations quoting WAR to me. Now a guy wants to come up with another way.
I enjoy watching the games.
It wasn’t just the Core 4
Bernie Williams gets so ignored IT’S SAD
I don’t think so. It is just because of the timeline. All of the core 4 made their debut in 1995, and lasted until the 2010’s. Bernie had a great career, but he debuted in 1991, and was a holdover from some Yankees teams that were pretty bad. The 4 became regulars right around the time they started winning it all.
Bernie, Tino, O’Neil and Brocious made those guys sooo much better.
The issue with WAR isn’t that defense is over valued for some positions, the problem with WAR is that defense is much harder to measure for those without access to tools like Field f/x and Hit f/x. UZR was a nice attempt 15 years ago to try and create measurements based on watching games with the naked eye. Total Zone tried to improve on it.
Yes there are also different calculations for WAR, notably Fangraphs uses UZR while B-Ref uses TZ. Brett Gardner is going to grade out super high as a left fielder because his defense is so far and away above most left fielders. But as a CF he only grades out as very good compared to the rest. So yes, WAR can inflate some players because defensive metrics aren’t great still (at least for the general public). But they are still pretty OK for most players. It also shouldn’t be an end-all-be-all for player evaluation, but is handy when comparing two seemingly similar players.
Jason Heyward is an incredible defender. Yes, he should be a CF over BJ Upton. Lagares is even better. Anybody who says otherwise has clearly not see them play. Compared to a Ryan Doumit or a Matt Holliday these guys are just THAT much better
If anything, WAR drastically undervalues defense.
Playing SS, C and CF are undeniably more important defensive positions with an undeniably lower mean offensive production than corner spots…
DHs are valued right where they should be, IMO. They provide no material defensive value and are the easiest position to replace on the field. COF defensive requirements are far less. A league average defensive shortstop usually gets moved off shortstop to an easier position. It’s not usually to COF because under most circumstances they can still handle harder positions, like 3B or CF. I can only think of Ernie Banks as an example of a SS moved to an “easy” defensive position, in 1B. Ripken, A-Rod, Tejada and Hanley are going/went to 3B, Yount went to CF, etc.