Burriss looks like he should be a great defensive 2B, but somehow, I’m not surprised that (so far) he’s not.

Interesting that Johnson > Zito even though his ERA is nearly 2 runs higher. I know that ERA can be misleading, but could one of our beloved statlympians explain this to me?

I expected Rowand and Johnson to be worse

My face hurts.

I’m surprised Molina’s win value has only dipped .1… May has been a disaster for him.

So, you’re telling me that Rich Aurilia isn’t good?

Panda is awesome. That is all.

Alas, the stats have started to reflect Lewis’ error prone catastrofucks.

catastrofuck… that’s the word I’ve been looking for!!!

Lewis at .5 wins at the end of April. He played at replacement level for all of May.

It seems we have another data point in favor of the “Randy Winn can’t hit in April” hypothesis.

Schierholtz owes us 1.6 mil

Fred Lewis makes my heart hurt. I have long defended Lewis’ boneheaded fielding by pointing to the stats. Alas, the stats have started to reflect Lewis’ error prone catastrofucks.

Huh? So far, UZR has him as completely average for the season. Also, using 300 innings of UZR is the equivalent of using maybe 80 of PA’s of some fancy hitting stat. Overall, in almost 1,400 career innings in LF, Lewis is at +7.9 runs per 150 games played, comfortably above average.

Anyway, I still say that you don’t have to be a stat guy in order to agree that Lewis is average or better in LF, or at least to understand why a case could be made that he is. Lewis is very bad at judging the ball and taking routes, one of the worst in the majors. Lewis is also very fast. Most LF are really not fast. In fact, Lewis is the fastest LF in the majors, except for Carl Crawford, who is really a CF playing LF. Judging the ball and then running to it is all you have to do in order to get to the ball. Lewis is one of the worst at the first, and one of the best at the second. I’m not sure which is more important, nor do I know how one would find out. We should all agree, though, that they are both very important, and that whichever is more important, it’s most likely not by a large margin. Therefore, a player who excels in one field and sucks at the other, like Fred, is probably around average, in terms of getting to the ball.

I think we should all also agree that Fred has very bad hands, and a good arm for a LF. Thing is, having good hands, while pretty important for IF, isn’t really important for OF, because they have such a relatively long time respond to the balls they have to catch, and because they don’t get funny bounces or anything. Having a good arm, on the other hand, is pretty important. Not as important as catching the ball, but definitely more important than having good hands.

So you’ve got a guy who’s somewhere around average at catching the ball – maybe a bit above average, maybe a bit below – and has an arm that’s worth a few extra runs. That adds up to a fielder who is somewhere between average and above-average-but-not-great.

Lewis is in no way a smooth fielder, and he does not look good on the field. Sometimes it feels like every ball hit to him is an adventure. He can also be pretty frustrating to watch, because you feel that he has the physical tools to be not just a great LF, but a good CF too, and yet he lacks the “mental” tools one needs for that. But the thing is – I don’t care. I don’t judge a fielder by how nice he looks on the field, or by how confident he looks with the glove, or by what he could or should have been. All that matters is that he makes outs. Preferably more outs than the average fielder at his position. If he can do that, then it doesn’t matter if he’s classy like Randy or butchery like Fred.

Back to the stats – like I said, UZR has him at about 8 runs above the average LF over his career. The sample size is pretty decent, but far from great. Overall, I’m willing to say that Lewis is somewhere between 0 and 8 runs above the average LF. They might be the ugliest 8 runs in the majors, but that really doesn’t matter.

earning his keep. Next step: a positive offensive RAA.

you cannot list Andres Torres UZR as +1.8 runs. He’s played less than 23 innings! His UZR/150 is 148! That would be like 6 Ozzie Smiths all in the same year.

He’s made 7 Putouts. 7! How does 7 outs = 1.8 runs? And that’s assuming that they were all impossible catches no CF makes!

…and Miranda Kerr.

If was picking a Victoria’s Secret model, I would have gone with Alessandra Ambrosio, but hey, to each his own.

but I seem to be reading this table to say Rich Aurilia owes Giants fans $3,200,000.

I’d like mine in $10s and $20s.