Player Rater Formula

[DOUGHBOYS]

If you're like me, and my condolences if you are, you find player raters frustrating. I'm not talking of the pre-season rankings of players, I'm talking of the in season and finished product of rating players.
They are a little like those credit card machines we run our credit card through.
Each one has the same purpose, but there is no uniformity in them. In some stores we sign, some we don't. Some we push the green button for credit, some red.
The majority of player raters seem to feature speed more than other categories and the final outcome just doesn't look correct.
Last year, Michael Bourn finished 11th on the NFBC player ratings for hitters. Bourn is a nice player to have. A three category player who right now is probably king of the judys. The rub is that you and I both know that Michael Bourn did not finish the year as the 11th best hitter to roster, nor will he start 2012 as the 11th best hitter to roster.

So, I've been messing around with numbers trying to get a grip on how a ratings system should look for hitters.
I don't speak numerish and I'm not spreadsheet savvy so bear with me in tolerating my simplistics (shuddup spellchecker, you and I both know that should be a real word!).
The first thing I did was divide batting average by three. In effect, this groups the field closer together, but still offers an advantage for those deserving. Also, if a player has a .360 average over just 200 at bats, he isn't rewarded as much as the guy hitting .340 over 600 at bats. There is also another reason for this that'll be disclosed later.

Runs and rbi are left alone.
Home runs are THE category in fantasy baseball. One home run has a good effect on four different categories, no other outcome off the bat can match that.
So, for our formula, we will give home runs a x3.
We do this to try and set a base line of 100 points as excellence. This is the other reason for whittling batting average by one third. 33 home runs is an excellent power year. Batting .300 is an excellent average year, as is scoring and knocking in 100 runs.

Stolen bases is where we deviate a little from the system. Only one category is helped by stolen bases. That, is stolen bases. Sure, the thief is more apt to score from second base rather than first, helping runs a little, but the effect is small.
Still, stolen bases must be rewarded. For them, we will shoot for a baseline of 50. 25 stolen bases is a good year, so we will give stolen bases a x2.

So, 450 points provides us with an excellent year.

The NFBC rater has the following top 12 Hitters:
Kemp
Ellsbury
Braun
Granderson
Bautista
Kinsler
Cabrera
Pedroia
Upton
Pujols
Bourn
Ad Gonzalez

A swell list. All, first or second round picks in the coming year, except Bourn.
Let's see how this list looks with the formula above.

1. Kemp- 546 points
2. Granderson-516 points
3. Ellsbury- 505 points
4. Braun- 496 points
5. Bautista- 456 points
6. Kinsler- 439 points
7. Pujols- 433 points
8. Cabrera- 425 points
9. Upton- 425 points
10. AdGonzalez- 421 points
11. Pedroia- 411 points
12. Bourn- 370 points

This looks a lot better to me. To see if it's fair, I matched up Bourn vs. the best power hitting three category guy in Mark Teixeira.
Teixeira came out ahead 409-370.
I think that is fair, in that most view Teixeira's three categories as more important than Bourn and Teixeira is selected before Bourn each year.

I haven't looked at the pitching side yet, but closers seem to be the judys on the pitching side of things.
Although they do contribute a little more in other categories than judys. Still, they are given too much credit.
I'll look into a simplistic approach on pitching and get back on that.
As far as hitting, the formula above looks more appealing to me than the NFBC's and other sites.

[Navel Lint]

Dan, I'm sorry.

I'm really, really, really sorry.

But after all that you have written over the past couple of years about "experts" and projections and rankings and all the rest that goes with them, to now read that you have created your own system that ranks players in just another one of the uptenth different ways that I've seen.........

well, that deserves an




(And somewhere Zola knowingly smiles to himself and says "welcome to the club Dan")

[DOUGHBOYS]

I actually gave that some thought before posting.
If anything though, I thought that I'd get teased for the simplistics in another ranking scheme.
Sometimes I just look at player rankings after the year, which is the ONLY time the word value should be used, since it is known, and just shake my head.
Craig Kimbrel was not the seventh best fantasy player last year!
The madness has to stop!
The Yahoo Kid knows that Kimbrel was not the seventh best player, why doesn't the NFBC rankings?

I guess my thing is that if we're going to do something, do it right.
I'd rather see the NFBC have no rankings than to use the ones currently in place.
Now see what you did, Russel? You got me in my 'Clear the room, another rant' mode.
I hope you're happy with yourself!

[DOUGHBOYS]

As for projections....I'm still a pen and paper guy.
No system, no projections.
Most of the time I go to drafts looking like Snoopy, two feet in the air with a new bone.
Most of the time I leave drafts looking like Charlie Brown with that black squiggly stuff over his head.