A(n OOTP) Catchers' Conundrum

AJFO · 05-03-2020, 06:42 PM

Been doing some digging about this evening in baseballsavant and wandered upon their fielding metrics.

Thought to myself, "I wonder where Realmuto ranks alongside other players" - after all, he's considered to be one of the more well-rounded top players in baseball.

Sure enough, right at the pinnacle of the "poptime" fielding metric. Whether you're little obsessive like me, or just shrug it off and continue along with your day, I got comparing OOTP's "arm" rating to the stats provided, for instance the Statcast pop-time avg.

Some interesting tidbits, Realmuto's arm is consistent with his poptime ratings, whether for a SB or a CS. Using both helps argue that even when he doesn't catch a baserunner it's likely not because the throw was *too errant* (or he didn't have a good grip on it), or else the SB throw would be much slower.

See Francisco Mejia's values for why he might have a great arm, but possibly rushes throws or has inconsistent mechanics behind the plate. As such, you should adjust his arm rating accordingly and baseballsavant do a pretty good job.

A person who immediately stands out to me as having a very different 2019 "pop-time" than their OOTP "arm" rating would suggest is Willson Contreras. He not only has a cannon of an arm, at ~86 MPH from home to 2B, but a decent transfer time too at 0.68 sec.
His OOTP rating of a 60 grade arm as opposed to being closer to the 70-75 grade might need to be reconsidered.
(Disclaimer: He used to have a longer transfer time and really improved on that alongside consistently harder throws in 2019. So it's fair to argue that Contreras' rating is a minor nitpick.)

All told, I'm not 100% sold that OOTP catcher ratings could be overhauled to include, for instance, transfer time as an underlying metric, but it might behove future iterations to have a less static catcher rating system - even as it stands - and one that, like Contreras' career pop-times, evolves over time on a smaller scale.

endgame · 05-03-2020, 06:58 PM

I always appreciate it when folks prove deliberate and curious. Even better when time is taken to share their experience and take on what they've discovered, tentative or not. As someone who still has volumes of Dewan's Fielding Bible still with only a few pages turned, some not at all, I applaud this kind of OOTP comparison and outlook.

05-03-2020, 06:42 PM	#1
AJFO Minors (Rookie Ball) Join Date: Aug 2018 Location: Norwich, England Posts: 48	A(n OOTP) Catchers' Conundrum Been doing some digging about this evening in baseballsavant and wandered upon their fielding metrics. Thought to myself, "I wonder where Realmuto ranks alongside other players" - after all, he's considered to be one of the more well-rounded top players in baseball. Sure enough, right at the pinnacle of the "poptime" fielding metric. Whether you're little obsessive like me, or just shrug it off and continue along with your day, I got comparing OOTP's "arm" rating to the stats provided, for instance the Statcast pop-time avg. Some interesting tidbits, Realmuto's arm is consistent with his poptime ratings, whether for a SB or a CS. Using both helps argue that even when he doesn't catch a baserunner it's likely not because the throw was too errant (or he didn't have a good grip on it), or else the SB throw would be much slower. See Francisco Mejia's values for why he might have a great arm, but possibly rushes throws or has inconsistent mechanics behind the plate. As such, you should adjust his arm rating accordingly and baseballsavant do a pretty good job. A person who immediately stands out to me as having a very different 2019 "pop-time" than their OOTP "arm" rating would suggest is Willson Contreras. He not only has a cannon of an arm, at ~86 MPH from home to 2B, but a decent transfer time too at 0.68 sec. His OOTP rating of a 60 grade arm as opposed to being closer to the 70-75 grade might need to be reconsidered. (Disclaimer: He used to have a longer transfer time and really improved on that alongside consistently harder throws in 2019. So it's fair to argue that Contreras' rating is a minor nitpick.) All told, I'm not 100% sold that OOTP catcher ratings could be overhauled to include, for instance, transfer time as an underlying metric, but it might behove future iterations to have a less static catcher rating system - even as it stands - and one that, like Contreras' career pop-times, evolves over time on a smaller scale.

05-03-2020, 06:58 PM	#2
endgame Hall Of Famer Join Date: Aug 2002 Posts: 16,842	I always appreciate it when folks prove deliberate and curious. Even better when time is taken to share their experience and take on what they've discovered, tentative or not. As someone who still has volumes of Dewan's Fielding Bible still with only a few pages turned, some not at all, I applaud this kind of OOTP comparison and outlook. __________________ "Try again. Fail again. Fail better." -- Samuel Beckett _____________________________________________ Last edited by endgame; 05-03-2020 at 07:59 PM.