Batting order

[The Wolf]

Originally Posted by VanillaGorilla

No, that is an opinion...and you are entitled to your opinion. However, you are not entitled to your own facts....or does that dictum only apply to others?

You can blindly accept what others say as you choose....and be a sheep.

Or, you can evaluate what the self-titled experts offer and conclude that their work is of merit or that it is flawed and the conclusions reached are perhaps suspect.

I choose the latter.

No, you choose to posture as a self-appointed expert that you are not. Get back to me when you have published your own research and are a recognized expert on baseball instead of just a poseur with delusions of grandeur.

[kehowey]

I just looked at "Lineup Selection" in the OOTP manual. You have the choice between traditional and sabermetric. Sabermetric in this case means using L/R split data to make decisions. I would like to see an option for using the "By The Book" approach. I would also like to have the ability to apply this new option to at least the sub league level. Thus moving lineup selection from AI Options to League Rules - like the DH rule.

[The Wolf]

Originally Posted by kehowey

I just looked at "Lineup Selection" in the OOTP manual. You have the choice between traditional and sabermetric. Sabermetric in this case means using L/R split data to make decisions. I would like to see an option for using the "By The Book" approach. I would also like to have the ability to apply this new option to at least the sub league level. Thus moving lineup selection from AI Options to League Rules - like the DH rule.

Good idea. Please post it in the Suggestions forum for OOTP 15.

[The Wolf]

if you don't care about that one extra win you can get from optimizing, then remember that whatever batting order you want to use is totally up to you.

Personally I need every win I can get. You might not.

[The Wolf]

Tom Tango, lead author of The Book:

"Actually, you get a slight (2 or 3 runs per season) gain by putting your pitcher 8th."

[Matt Arnold]

I'd love a way to tell my manager that I don't want my weak hitting SS or 2B who projects to a barely .300 OBP hitting leadoff. Give me a lineup mode based on that and I'm happy.

[VanillaGorilla]

Originally Posted by The Wolf

No, you choose to posture as a self-appointed expert that you are not. Get back to me when you have published your own research and are a recognized expert on baseball instead of just a poseur with delusions of grandeur.

Because you are unable to evaluate the research you choose to denegrate anyone who disagrees with it.

It is ironic. The Sabermetric movement took on the established "truths" and was met with ridicule and name calling. Traditional baseball people dismissed them for never having cashed a check from actually playing the game. Now the Sabermetrician conclusions are not to be questioned by anyone who does not call himself a Sabermatrician? Rich.

Since you are incapable of defending why you agree with Tango, James, etc, you simply cite them and say "case closed."

The works of Tango, James, etc are to be considered and reviewed and to stimulate thought and discussion, not end it.

You may continue to accept that pitchers have nothing to do with BABIP because Voros McCracken said so...and published this assertion.

What a dilemma it must have been when Tango smacked his idiotic, but "expert" (according to your standards) "research". Now you had to choose between which "expert" was right.

I am a fan of Tango and James. That doesn't mean that they are right in everything that they posit. However, James and Tango both, are much more measured in their conclusions than you are regarding their conclusions. James particularly uses the phrase "the data show x" repeatedly as opposed to the mentally lazy who say "x is fact. Argue with James, Tango, etc."

As was previously posted here, there is a difference between "proven" and "hypothesized".

Some people understand that.

Some get defensive when it is made clear that they cannot differentiate between the two.

[The Wolf]

LOL. You are out of your mind.

I work in the world of engineering and science. Experts publish. Experts write the defining books. But if you don't publish, you're just another guy, like you and me.

You want to challenge the experts of sabermetrics? Then do so. In press. But don't pose as their equal here or as someone who can sneer at their work, because you aren't and you can't.

I'm a trained professional. I can do the math and the statistics. But I at least, unlike you, do not pose as a bogus expert because I understand about expertise and limits.

Enjoy your hyperinflated ego. Go on about how wonderful and expert you are if you like, it's amusing. But don't expect to sell it to me. I'm just laughing at it.

Go publish something and get back to me.

[The Wolf]

Oh, and look up the works of Karl Popper. You will discover that nothing can ever be "proven."

[David Watts]

Originally Posted by UWHabs

I'd love a way to tell my manager that I don't want my weak hitting SS or 2B who projects to a barely .300 OBP hitting leadoff. Give me a lineup mode based on that and I'm happy.

Or a catcher batting leadoff when your regular leadoff hitter is resting simply because said catcher normally hits 7th in the order.

[The Wolf]

Another thing: VG keeps on trying to make this about me. It's not. It's about his inability to accept the conclusions of published experts because of his ego.

I have nothing to do with any of that.

[VanillaGorilla]

Originally Posted by The Wolf

Another thing: VG keeps on trying to make this about me. It's not. It's about his inability to accept the conclusions of published experts because of his ego.

I have nothing to do with any of that.

Here you are wrong.

What I was attempting to elicit was something more than "Tango said so." It is a nonargument and a logical fallacy.

I offered why I thought the conclusion was questionable, namely that championships are not won on the basis of runs scored in a season but runs scored in discrete games relative to the opposition's runs scored. The Tango work offers no evidence that hitting a pitcher 8th increases game winning chances.

There is an opportunity cost to batting a pitcher 8th which doesn't exist when there is a DH. And this is not properly accounted for in this part of his work.

The proper rebuttal to that is something other than "Tango said so, Shut up. I'm an engineer."

What Tango, et al, offer is that there is an aggregate run advantage gained by hitting the pitcher 8th, based on the model used. That is fact. They did the research, and I do grant that they reported their results accurately.

However, those are results based on their model, not RL data. There isn't any meaningful size of MLB data for this exercise. The conclusion involves conjecture.

The bottom line is: Does this strategy win more games?

In some cases, I think it does. But as a blanket truth, no, I don't think it does, and there is nothing from the Tango data that supports this leap of logic that sufficiently accounts for outside variables.


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BTW, I don't need to look up Popper. I am familiar with his world view. I am not a subscriber (though I don't think he is wrong about everything, just as I don't believe anyone is right about everything, including Tango).

[Walsh06]

Why did it take so long to make a real reply??

[mpejkrm]

I've chosen to ignore yet another argument involving Wolf from above and will try to get this thread back on track.

Here is who I typically set my lineup:

1: Fast player with high OBP
2: High OBP, good contact (I like to bat switch-hitters at #2)
3: Best all-around hitter on the team (best contact+power+eye)
4: Best power
5: Best remaining contact/power
6: Ditto #5
7: One of the weakest hitters
8: Clone of #1 hitter, speed and OBP
9: Pitcher/Weakest hitter (I hate the DH so mostly pitcher :P)

[The Wolf]

VG:

Put up or shut up.

Tom Tango's forum is here: Tangotiger Forum | Baseball

Go there, sign in and start a thread stating, as you did above, that batting the pitcher 8th in an optimized lineup gives an advantage to the opposing team, and try to defend that claim.

I know that you won't dare do that, because all that you are doing here is spouting hot air, spite and ego and they would crush you like a roach.

Yes, I do believe and respect experts who have track records and use proper methodologies and who publish their work. I have none for the likes of you.

[The Wolf]

Originally Posted by mpejkrm

I've chosen to ignore yet another argument involving Wolf from above and will try to get this thread back on track.

Don't blame me. If you read this thread you will see clearly that I didn't start it.

[VanillaGorilla]

Originally Posted by The Wolf

VG:

Put up or shut up.

Tom Tango's forum is here: Tangotiger Forum | Baseball

Go there, sign in and start a thread stating, as you did above, that batting the pitcher 8th in an optimized lineup gives an advantage to the opposing team, and try to defend that claim.

I know that you won't dare do that, because all that you are doing here is spouting hot air, spite and ego and they would crush you like a roach.

Yes, I do believe and respect experts who have track records and use proper methodologies and who publish their work. I have none for the likes of you.

You are the poser. You are the one that admits you can't tell the difference between what is a good study and what is not, and, therefore, cannot judge a track record, either.

You post opinions as facts and pull the passive aggressive tactic of saying "Don't argue with me, argue with THIS guy" yet continue to argue.

I started nothing here, I merely pointed out that you pull that "Don't argue with me crap" regularly.

It is YOUR insecurity in the fact that you cannot formulate your own support for a POV that causes you to project your insufficiencies unto me and others. You resort to name calling and do not address the topic in discussion. This is your MO.

I repeated my point regarding the issue of 8th place pitcher batting.

Here, you AGAIN deflect away from the topic because you are incapable of formulating your own support for the point.

"Go argue with Tango!..I dare you!...I know you won't..."

You don't know jack about jack or about me.

And all you do is regurgitate whatever you google and hold it as fact (Darrell Porter sucked as a hitter...that was a classic).

It is with that same depth of thought you carry on here.

You malign any who do not subscribe to your accepted point of view.

You say it is my ego that keeps me from accepting these "expert" conclusions? No. I am capable of thinking for myself. You, on the other hand, find comfort in following whatever anyone might put out on Saber-site, like a sheep.

And when you see others who choose not to be sheep, this bothers you so much that you find it necessary to attack them, but never once, here, have you made a substantive argument for your position...just "Tango said."

"Darrell Porter was a lousy hitter....don't argue with me, argue with Bill James and math!"....yeah, you know all about getting crushed like a roach.

You can accept "research" by "experts" who have devoted time and published their "facts" simply because they have credentials. I choose not to.

Other "experts" I disagree with:

The Population Bomb - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
The Facts Speak For Themselves | 911 Truth News
The Case for Eugenics in a Nutshell - Future Generations
Amazon.com: Earth in the Balance: Ecology and the Human Spirit: Albert, Jr. Gore: Books

But what do I know? I am not published, like these people are. They all must be right.

Thanks for the link to Tom's forum. I haven't checked it out in some time. I will post if I want and when I want, not because someone told me to.

I will decide on my own. It's a neat concept. I can tell you more about it, if you like.

Baa for now.

[The Wolf]

Baa is right. You lie, you insult, and when told to put up or shut up, you run.

You will happily attack me here but you are gutless to face Tango and company with your nonsense, because you know they would crush you. Coward.

I will continue to respect baseball experts, and to ignore and no respect at all for the likes of you.

[The Wolf]

And to the rest of you: I am sorry that VG has pulled this nonsense and apologize for him. I will continue to post useful information from experts - useful information which, despite VG's babbling, are not my opinions, because, unlike some people with no more qualifications than I have, I'm not a big enough egotist to think that I'm any kind of expert.

I'm just an average Joe. Like VG.

[rpriske]

Twice in one week that I agree with The Wolf? What is the world coming to?


I am just jumping back in and it see VG saying that my claim that this has been 'mathematically proven' is untrue.


I am sorry, but that is not the case. It is a very simple mathematical model, in fact. The only weakness is the side that will ALWAYS be a weakness: how accurate your prediction of results by individual players.... but that is the case no matter what model you use.

You plug in appropriate .OBP and .SLG and it calculate the average number of runs scored using that line-up. There is nothing magic about it.

What does that leave out? Intangibles? The outdated notions that you need speed at the top of your order? Line-up 'protection'?

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Related but side note... I was watching a Jays/Tigers game the other day and in the first inning Toronto had gotten the first two batters out and Miguel Cabrera came to the dish. BUck Martinez said, "This is how you want Maiguel Cabrera to come up - with two out and nobody on."

I just started to laugh... that is EXACTLY why he shouldn't be batting third!