Prospectus Idol Entry

The thing that most bothered me was what Christina noted, "Take a player like Carl Crawford, who enters Friday hitting .318 with a .380 Babip. Crawford's Babip is above his average, which means he's finding a lot of holes and figures to come down some."

The only players who have BABIP's below their actual batting average are people who hit more home runs than times they strike out. Off the top of my head, maybe only Carlos Lee and Albert Pujols come close to that. Bonds back in the day, and maybe Randall Simon during one of his incredibly low strikeout seasons are other possibilities, but the above quotation conveys no information since it's true for basically everyone.

I'm also 100% in agreement with Christina that it's a strange mix of things that doesn't really function as a well-flowing article. I think that's why John Perrotto's so good; he can make these sorts of "notes" columns function in a useful way, but part of that is acknowledging the separation in topics explicitly.

I do not think this is a BP quality article for the reasons that have been mentioned, especially by Christina. Edwin Jackson's stuff may be that of a #2 starter, but has the performance over his career reflected that? What does Jackson will improve throughout each game mean? That he is better after the first few innings? I see no proof in the article.

I'm sorry, there is a lack of analysis that is pervasive, and BP has people who write as reporters very well.

Also, picking up Ludwick last *June* indicates some sort of broken league. Ludwick had an OPS of over 1.000 in April and May. That's not luck. That's taking the awesome guy. He didn't just pop in June.

That's pretty grim, I'm afraid.

I'm not sure how Brittany could write a whole article on GB/FB ratio and not know how to incorporate that into a BABIP discussion. Crawford has a high BABIP because he puts the ball on the ground and runs like the wind. Do you really think his average is lucky and Cabrera's isn't? I feel like I'm taking crazy pills.

Buchholz's no-hitter was from two years ago.

Once again, I think the author comes to a poor conclusion to the data in the 1st half of the article. I think it is flat out the wrong answer to the question for the second week in a row.

I actually liked the second half of the article. May or may not be a BP type article, but would have had a much better chance to get a thumb if the entire article were like the 2nd half.

Brittany, I've yet to see an article of yours that I liked. Indisputably, you're an excellent writer. I'm just not sure that you're best suited for BP, where subscribers such as me value quantitative insight over the finer points of writing. You know baseball; you know stats; it's just that your vision of how to provide new insight through statistics may be less than I want as a BP Idol voter.

I might as well start out with the good... I think the section on the Tigers was the best written section of this piece that was the easiest to understand and made the most logical sense.

As I was reading this article, I wasn't really convinced that Brittany played fantasy baseball. I do not see how a Pujols injury would lead her to pick up Ludwick since they play different positions. In addition, by mid-June last year, Ludwick was hitting so well that he would only be available in the weakest leagues.

Similarly, it's a very weak league if some team didn't draft Wieters and stash him on their bench. Catchers who have the potential to hit are the best players to take fliers on.

There were unsubstantiated assertions, poor assumptions, or times when I wondered where the material was being cited from:

"When news of Albert Pujols' calf injury broke last June, I immediately scooped up Ludwick." - Besides the earlier comments, it was Chris Duncan who was called up from the minors once Pujols went to the DL. http://cbs11tv.com/sports/Albert.Pujols.Calf.2.746131.html

"With a payroll already maxed out – and borrowed from future years— Wade Davis could be the answer." - Who said the Tampa Bay payroll was maxed out?

"A must for keeper leagues, Jackson is still available in more than 30 percent of leagues..." - Where are you getting that he is available in 30 percent of leagues? If you're looking at ESPN.com (which is what I am guessing, based on the 30% number), they don't run public keeper leagues. And while Jackson might be valuable in a keeper league, he does not have the track record to be a "must have"

"The Cubs' Jake Fox answered any questions about whether his eye-popping Triple-A numbers would translate in the Majors, going 2-for-3 with an RBI in his first two games since Wednesday's promotion...My guess is if Fox continues to hit, manager Lou Piniella won't have a problem getting him at-bats." - Going 2 for 3 in one game doesn't answer any questions! By that logic, Wieters should be demoted after his 0-4 debut! Then you have to figure out how he would get regular atbats with Soriano in left, Bradley in right, Lee at first base and Ramirez at third base! Yes, you indicate playing time is an issue, but then you make this haphazard guess where you refute your own analysis.

"A bench player who was projected as a mid-to-late rounder in most drafts...But if I had waited to read fantasy analysis or tried to evaluate whether Ludwick could sustain his fast start." - How do you know he was projected as a mid-to-late rounder if you didn't wait to read fantasy analysis? Why draft him for your team without evaluating whether he could sustain his fast start?

"The ever-cautious Rays have limited Davis to 47 1/3 innings over nine games, and he could challenge for the slumping Andy Sonnanstine's spot or add much-needed relief in the 'pen." - Did you miss all the articles this week about Kazmir seeking a trade? Also, why waste a roster spot on someone who might end up in the bullpen?

"Take a player like Carl Crawford, who enters Friday hitting .318 with a .380 Babip. Crawford's Babip is above his average, which means he's finding a lot of holes and figures to come down some. He's going to continue to steal bases and score a lot of runs, but depending on your needs, you may want to sell high. But taking a closer look at a guy like Melky Cabrera, who is hitting .323 with a .345 Babip, shows that Cabrera is playing at an extremely productive rate." - How do you make this kind of argument? Melky Cabrera's fantasy stats are .323 BA/20 R/5 HR/20 RBI/4 SB. Carl Crawford is at .329 BA!/40 R!/3 HR/25 RBI!/40 SB!. Moreover, Crawford has shown he can keep up that kind of pace in SB while Melky's never hit that well before. How about I trade you Chad Fox for Matt Wieters while we're at it?

"Early whispers are Brad Penny could get dealt to clear room for the rehabbing John Smoltz, who is on track for a mid-June return." - Who is whispering and are you in a position to respond if reporters call BP.com and ask you for further details or the nature of your source? Also, you neglect to discuss if a trade to the NL (where he has more familiarity) or to a park other than Fenway will affect his stats. Also you go through this whole Red Sox discussion without mentioning Justin Masterson...

Then, there were just plain awkward sentences that made no logical sense:

"Keep in mind the league average for Babip hovers around .300, so if a guy is posting a higher average than Babip, it's likely his average will go up more as his Babip increases." - If BABIP(don't forget to capitalize abbreviations correctly) hovers around .300, then that would argue some regression to the mean will happen. Other than that, this statement made little sense.

"Do you believe in magic? Yeah, me either." - Some people _do_ believe in magic and would consider your statement offensive. Either way, it's "Yeah, me neither".

"Through 45 games, the Tigers arms are holding opposing batters to a League-low .247 average and boast a 3.86 ERA. If Detroit is going to continue to stay atop the American League Central, some unlikely heroes could emerge come summer." - If the Tigers are already holding opposing batters to a league-low average, then those "unlikely heroes" already emerged.

This is the third article appearing on BP.com where you've used the Devil Rays, probably because that was the team you did your internship with. While it makes sense to write about what you know, I saw little evidence in The Basics article and no evidence in this article that you were able to apply what you know about the Rays to bring some insight into the topics you write about.

Finally, and this is a pet peeve of mine, but most fantasy leagues, whether they are Rotisserie or Head-to-Head or points, generally count batting average, runs, home runs, RBI and stolen bases. You don't mention any of these stats when discussing Ludwick or Chad Fox and analyze Carl Crawford and Melky Cabrera solely on batting average without looking at other stats. None of your pitching discussions talk about WHIP.

Sorry, this article just does not work for me... After two unedited articles submitted to this competition, I am becoming less convinced that your writing style is a strength. I am unconvinced that you played in even a casual level fantasy league, leading me to believe you were in a really weak fantasy baseball league with maybe two other active owners, or never played at all and tried to fudge it. If I'm wrong, though, feel free to post a link to your league so I (and others) can better understand the nature of your competition and thus, have some context to your analysis.

I kind of missed the part where the title connects with the article.. How did you show us how to use names? and how can one ever use dumb luck?

If some of the glaring conceptual problems could be fixed, this would be a nice primer for new fantasy players on MLB.com or something. Let's not have this here, please.

I think that Brittany outlines her pieces really well. This piece flowed nicely and was structured in a way that makes it very (to use the word of the day) "readable". She gets a little tripped up on some of the substance, though. Particularly troubling was the Ludwick section. Not only would a fantasy player not be looking at an OF to replace a 1B (generally), but as I recall Ludwick was rock-solid much earlier than June. As a matter of fact he hit nine HR's in May and had 40 RBI's before June 1st.

All that being said, there's little or no question that this article, post-edit, would be a fine piece on MLB.com or ESPN, and I'm sure that some people here will enjoy it, but not as many.



I also agree that

Not a big fan of this one. First, the BABIP stuff as mentioned above was awful. BABIP is a very basic indicator, a writer shouldn't be that off base with it.

Prospect talk always kills me. As one who follows prospects, I've noticed that everyone in sports are talking about them these days because of their value. Which is a great talking point. But, the Matt Wieters comment made me want to gag. It was as if he wasn't the top prospect in baseball and ESPN hadn't be running his name for the past month. Its like saying, great job for stealing Justin Upton from the rest of your league.

The was nothing new brought to the table in this piece. The Red Sox rumors are common knowledge, and most of us have noticed Porcello and E.Jackson's starts to 2009.

Ryan Ludwick getting picked up in June is her weakest fantasy note. He was rostered in most leagues well before that.

Re: "Hats off to those who scooped up Matt Wieters"....Really? What fantasy league are you playing in which Wieters was on the waiver wire after April 1st?

Echoing some of the previous comments, this might suit a beginner's site, but this is FAR from BP material.

I wanted to stop reading at "me either" (after all the comments about grammatical errors last week, you'd have thought we could get further than one sentence into the article this week without one). But I labored through it.

As to the predictions of Crawford's demise, and this is echoing Christina's comment: isn't every player with more K than HR going to have a BABIP that exceeds his overall batting average? And don't speed demons (see, e.g., Ichiro) tend to have higher than average BABIPs due to their ability to leg out infield hits?

I was also suprised that the discussion of Ludwick's "breakout" in '08 made no mention of his numbers in the minors from 2003-2007, numbers which were largely in line with -- and thus to some extent could have foretold -- his '08 performance. I think BP readers who are also fantasy players will agree that a key to success is to "anticipate what's coming." But for that not to be accompanied by something like a discussion of the (albeit imperfectly) predictive value of MLE's, but rather a vague reference to LaRussa's tendency to play all of his players, and a derogatory reference to "waiting to read fantasy analysis"? You're auditioning to *write* such analysis (at least this week)!

"Take a player like Carl Crawford, who enters Friday hitting .318 with a .380 Babip. Crawford's Babip is above his average, which means he's finding a lot of holes and figures to come down some."

I read this and *thought* she meant that Crawford's BABIP was above his average BABIP over his career. I know that was a big deal with CKs analysis and some of the other comments, but worth noting another view.

That said, the sentence wasn't very clear in the first place. I voted for it, only because I don't think this was a good topic for you.

"The Cubs' Jake Fox answered any questions about whether his eye-popping Triple-A numbers would translate in the Majors, going 2-for-3 with an RBI in his first two games since Wednesday's promotion."

this line drives me crazy... you're really going to draw a conclusion from his first three at-bats? even if he had been in the bigs all year long i'd still contend that it's a small sample size, but three at-bats? come on now...

all the prospects mentioned are owned in any competitive league. that being said, you should have focused more on trade value... for example, how much should i give up for david price, or should i sell wieters now with all the buzz around him (elite prospects often take a year or two to figure out big league pitching - see justin upton). even mentioning that hanson not being called up yet could make him a more attractive (cheaper) trade target than a guy like price, for an owner in need of SP. analysis like that would be relevant to any league.

I agree with Will. Well written, but I could have gotten this article from Yahoo Sports. Which is still saying something, but I normally expect a little more meat from BP. It's what my subscription pays for.

I can't help but wonder why Brittany is in the competition. It makes sense from her side, but I don't see BP's angle.

This piece was remarkably uneven.

This read like a decent espn.com article. Which is to say, I'm sure it's good for general audiences, but it's not the kind of thing I look for at bp.

I enjoy wide-ranging, general articles. I agree this feels more like an ESPN article. I never go to ESPN, and I only read here at BP, so that's a plus for me, and I'm giving a thumbs up.

That said, "me either" instead of "me neither" KILLS me.

This article lost me at "Hats off to those who scooped up Matt Wieters". This type of comment I expect to see on the front page of CBS, Yahoo, etc for the mass quantity of leagues out there. Those players are not here at BP and certainly are not paying for a subscription. I could go on about other comments in this article that seem almost cut and paste boilerplate or strangely unqualified against the traditional thinking at BP of sample size. I generally do not comment unless something appears really good or really off. This would fall in the really off.