Harvard Sports Analysis Collective

As a huge Red Sox fan, I’m a bit hesitant to post the second article on the Rays in a row, especially now that they’ll be facing each other the ALCS.  Hopefully it doesn’t jinx the Sox.  This is an article I wrote for the Harvard Independent, our fifth article published in their weekly newspaper.  It’s a bit dumbed down for the general audience, but still has some good stuff on the differences in VORP by position for the Rays of 2007 and 2008, and an analysis of previous teams that have made a huge jump in one season from a very poor record to the playoffs.
The biggest surprise of the 2008 baseball season has to be the Tampa Bay Rays.  Their success has astounded players and fans across the country as they have transformed in one short season from perennial bottom-dwellers to American League East Champions.  Although some knew they would be better this year than they have been in years past, a turnaround this large was unexpected.  How many publications or experts picked the Rays to finish first in the division this year, or even second or third?   This is a franchise that, in their previous 11 years of existence, has won 70 games once (they went 70-91 in 2004) and finished out of last place only once (fourth place in ‘04, ahead of the Blue Jays).

I’d like to examine a few reasons why this turnaround has been so sudden and complete.  One suggestion I have is that they’ve found favor with God.  No, seriously.  Since they dropped the “Devil” from their name, these Rays have been playing more like (the Los Angeles) Angels (of Anaheim).  They have confessed their sins (Greg Vaughn, Jose Canseco, etc.) done their penance (new GM Andrew Friedman has beefed up their farm system) and made a vow to keep a simple life of pitching and defense.  They’ve even had a few “miracle” come-from-behind walk-off wins this year.

Another more plausible and less divine reason is that the Rays are now getting contributions from every spot in the lineup, the starting rotation, and the bullpen, something they’ve never had all at the same time before.  This consistency and depth can be seen in the VORP by position of all the Rays players.  For those of you not familiar with baseball statistics (sabermetrics), VORP  (Value Over Replacement Player),  calculations show how much better a player would be than the average minor leaguer (a replacement player) who could come up to replace him.  VORP counts the number of runs produced over the course of a year (or runs saved, for pitchers), as compared to a replacement player.  The big differences with VORP from 2007 to 2008 are seen on the pitching staff.  Last year, they had two studs in the rotation, James Shields and Scott Kazmir.  While those two have stuck around and continued to pitch very well, the rest of the staff are having career years.  The Rays had 5 of their top 10 pitchers last year with a negative VORP, meaning they played worse than the average minor league replacement would have.  This terrible statistic shows why their pitching staff was so poor in 2007.  In 2008, all five starters (Shields, Kazmir, Andy Sonnanstine, Matt Garza, and Edwin Jackson) have a VORP above 20, and two of the relievers, J.P. Howell and Grant Balfour also having excellent seasons with VORPs of 27.8 and 27.3, respectively.  The Rays’ offense has not had nearly as much of a dramatic improvement as their defense, but they too are getting more consistent production up and down the lineup.  Although Carlos Peña, B.J. Upton, and Carl Crawford are not having the magnificent seasons that they did in 2007, the rest of the team has picked up the slack.  Except for Crawford, who has been out of the lineup for the second half of the year with an injury, the other eight starters on offense have a VORP of at least 12.  The two biggest differences on their offense have been breakout seasons from Dioner Navarro, who has raised his VORP from an abysmal -4.0 to a +17.2 this season, and sensational rookie Evan Longoria, the leading rookie of the year candidate with 27 homeruns and an .874 OPS, who is a huge upgrade over last year’s third baseman Aki Iwamura.

This type of reversal from one season to the next is not unheard of in Major League Baseball by any means.  Including the Rays, (and excluding strike years) 10 different franchises have had seasons at some time in their history where they won at least 30 games more than they did the year before.  Eighteen of the 30 MLB franchises have had turnarounds of at least 25 games in their history.  Another reason that this Rays season seems so improbable is that they have been so bad for so long, and in fact, never been good before.  However, of the 13 other expansion franchises, six had gone longer before their first ever playoff appearance.  The Rays have only had to wait 11 years for their first taste of the postseason since their inception in 1997, but the Angels, Astros, and Mariners (nee Pilots) each went 18 seasons without a playoff appearance, and the Rangers franchise went an astounding 35 years without playing any meaningful games in October.  The difference between those clubs and this year’s Rays is that they all had multiple winning seasons before they broke through and made the playoffs.  The Rays of 2008 are more like the expansion New York Mets in that they had never finished higher than second to last place before vaulting to a division championship.  It only remains to be seen if the Rays can finish off their season like the Miracle Mets did with a World Series title, and should be interesting to watch.

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Table 1

RAYS VORP – listed by most AB or IP at each position

Statistics taken from www.baseballprospectus.com.

 

        2008         Player               2007         Player            Change

SP +42.7         Shields             +45.4         Shields                -2.7
SP +20.2         Sonnanstine      +47.2         Kazmir              -27.2

SP +27.4         Jackson              -8.4         Jackson            +35.8

SP +35.3         Garza                 +0.2         Sonnanstine      +35.1

SP +36.8         Kazmir                -1.7         Hammel           +38.5

RP +27.8         Howell               +7.4         Glover              +20.4

RP   +4.1         Hammel            -20.3         Fossum            +24.4

RP +16.6         Wheeler              -7.5         Stokes             +24.1

RP +27.3         Balfour               +5.6         Reyes               +21.7

RP   +3.3         Percival               -6.3         Camp                 +9.6

 

C   +17.2         Navarro              -4.0         Navarro           +21.2

1B +31.7         Peña                   68.5         Peña                 -36.8

2B +16.6         Iwamura             11.2         Wigginton           +5.4

3B +36.0         Longoria             15.3         Iwamura           +20.7

SS +13.3         Bartlett               25.2         Harris               -11.9

LF   +6.8         Crawford           38.0         Crawford          -31.2

CF +28.6         Upton                46.9         Upton               -18.3

RF +12.1         Hinske                 5.7         Young                +6.4

DH +13.7         Floyd                  7.9         Gomes               +5.8

 

 

 

Alex is a junior Applied Mathematics and Biology concentrator in Winthrop House. His main interests with the club are improving baseball strategy, including pitch counts, managerial decision-making, and ideal use of players. He is also interested in doing research on college sports, mainly basketball and baseball. He has worked on research projects with the Arizona Diamondbacks and Major League Baseball.