Joe Christensen Can't Win

As noted by cmathewson below, the Strib's Joe C. was tweaked on Thursday by colleague Patrick Reusse for his advocacy of the "make-believe" OPS statistic. As the link above shows, poor Joe has also suffered the wrath of the OPS/sabrmetric enthusiasts at Fire Joe Morgan. (NOTE: some harsh language and anti-Morneauism at the link)

about 2 years ago RandBall's Stu 9 comments 0 recs |

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Joe's one of those guys on the fence

which means he gets criticized by both sides. He quotes OPS, which is everyone’s least favorite stat. The traditionalists think its made up, and well, so do the sabers. It’s a better measure of offensive value than BA and RBI, but not as good as wOBA.

It’s sad that you have to be on one side or the other (kind of like politics) or you get criticized by both sides. I like Joe, and I like the fact that he’s in the middle. Level-headed analysis is often missing in this day and age, and should be appreciated when it comes around.

by lookatthosetwins on Nov 27, 2009 3:16 PM EST reply actions

On the Fence

And on the fence is the best he could do for a newspaper. He can’t go quoting more advanced metrics in the paper because people won’t know what he’s talking about, so he uses the best ones he can.

"You can't sit on a lead and run a few plays into the line and just kill the clock. You've got to throw the ball over the damn plate and give the other man his chance. That's why baseball is the greatest game of them all."
~ Earl Weaver
"In God we trust. All others must provide evidence."
~ Billy Beane

by AdamOnFirst on Nov 28, 2009 3:11 PM EST up reply actions

OPS

may not be the best, but it is pretty good and logically accessible. It is sensible and intuitive. Any fan can understand it, even those fans that don’t do well with numbers, and/or don’t give a hoot about ‘statistics.’

by montanatwinsfan on Nov 27, 2009 4:20 PM EST reply actions

We like Joe

Yeah, Joe’s a good guy. I wish his article was still up there to compare to the mocking of it. I’m curious how it stands on its own.

I personally think MVP should be an individual award based on individual contributions, but there are no guidelines, so it’s an equally valid approach to judge it based on who’s more valuable to his team. Morneau really carried the Twins to the playoffs that year, and I agree with Joe’s (apparent) point that he meant more to the Twins than Jeter did to the Yankees.

I also happen to agree with the criticism of this approach that rewarding and penalizing Jeter and Morneau for what the Blue Jays did doesn’t make much sense, but it’s a value judgment, and you can’t rule out the other approach, judging a player’s irreplaceability to his team, just because it’s not yours. I don’t think Morneau had a really dominant MVP year that year, but I think the Twins would have missed him more than the Yankees would have missed Jeter, and if that’s your criteria, the vote is defensible. And you can’t just scoff at power numbers like the writer does. OBP may be more important, but that doesn’t mean slugging doesn’t matter, and Justin delivered big time.

by by jiminy on Nov 28, 2009 12:00 AM EST reply actions

FJM

I wish his article was still up there to compare to the mocking of it. I’m curious how it stands on its own.

FJM’s format is to quote the article in bold, sentence by sentence (or sometimes paragraph) and follow it up with sarcastic commenting. If you want to read Joe Christenson’s article from start to finish just read the bold lines only.

by montanatwinsfan on Nov 28, 2009 11:14 AM EST up reply actions

Reality is

that Justin Morneau was nowhere near the most valuable player in the league in 2006, and anyone other than a complete homer ought to be able to see that at this point. And even then, a complete homer should still be able to recognize that Joe Mauer and Johan Santana were more valuable to the Twins than Morneau was.

by DK on Nov 28, 2009 12:03 AM EST reply actions

Santana?

you have to be kidding me! How can a “every 5 day” pitcher be more valuable than Morneau, who was out there every day and carrying the team. Morneau was the MVP and I seriously think that pitchers should not even be considered in MVP, but only position players.

"Don't take life for granted, because tomorrow isn't promised to any of us." - Kirby Puckett

by BCTwins on Nov 28, 2009 11:34 AM EST up reply actions

well, just because you heard someone else spout off about "every 5 days" crap

doesn’t make it true.

WAR 2006:
Santana = 7.0
Mauer = 7.0
Morneau = 3.8

WARP 2006:
Santana = 7.6
Mauer = 7.1
Morneau = 4.6

VORP 2006:
Santana = 79
Mauer = 67.4
Morneau = 52.5

+WPA 2006:
Santana = 17.70
Mauer = 11.36
Morneau = 15.87

WAR 2006:
Santana = 7.3
Mauer = 6.1
Morneau = 4.4

I don’t know. I suppose there are other stats out there that might show that Morneau was somehow more valuable than Santana or Mauer in 2006, but I don’t know what/where they are. I am not even sure exactly what all of these stats mean exactly. I also am a firm believer that stats only tell part of the story – a large part maybe – but still only part. (i.e. – no stat that I’ve seen can capture Kurby Puckett’s energy, enthusiasm, and leadership, or how those things helped his team)

I do know however, that closing your eyes tightly and demanding something is true, doesn’t make it true.

by montanatwinsfan on Nov 28, 2009 1:21 PM EST up reply actions

Rather than

looking at it as a matter of “days”, I prefer to look at hitters and pitchers in terms of plate appearances and batters faced. For instance, in 2006, Justin Morneau had 661 PAs; Joe Mauer had 608. Johan Santana faced 923 batters. Just because those were more concentrated doesn’t make them less valuable on the whole, in my opinion.

Anyway, whether you want to count pitchers or not (and I don’t think they should be categorically dismissed; it’s not a “Most Valuable Player Other Than Pitchers” Award, and there’s nothing in the official voting rules that excludes pitchers, but whatever) the main point is that Morneau was just not close to being the MVP by any objective measure in 2006. In WAR, for example, he was 17th in the league, among batters only. Joe Mauer was 4th in that measure, without accounting for his defensive value.

by DK on Nov 28, 2009 5:47 PM EST up reply actions