Understanding Minor League Baseball

In For A Round Of Overexposure

The minor leagues begin today. For the next five months, you’ll receive my daily recaps and commentary covering a total of 694 games (weather permitting). First, I’d like to offer a few thoughts that might aid your understanding and enjoyment of the games themselves and my reports:

Winning Isn’t Everything

Despite having one of the best farms in baseball in 2009, Texas’s US-based minor-league teams finished 13 games below .500. Last summer, I found zero statistical correlation between Baseball America’s organizational rankings and each MLB team’s aggregate minor-league winning percentage. Texas certainly wants its minor leaguers to win, but it also challenges its prospects more than many teams. Year after year, the Rangers tend to have younger-than-average teams at every level of the minors. Martin Perez will be the youngest player in the Texas League, and grizzled veteran Blake Beavan is still among the youngest five.

Sometimes a large disconnection exists between a minor-league team’s record and the quality of its prospects. Pitchers with at least 40 innings on the 2005 Frisco RoughRiders include current Major Leaguers C.J. Wilson, Scott Feldman, John Danks, Edinson Volquez, Nick Masset, and Jesse Chavez, plus Wes Littleton, Josh Rupe, and A.J. Murray. Those Riders finished last in the league at 58-82.

That said, I don’t want to gloss over the disappointments. Last year’s young but promising Hickory squad finished 63-76, and several prospects had unsatisfying seasons. The defense as a whole was terrible, and not just because it led the Sally League in errors.

Defense

It’s worse in the minors. Sometimes, much worse, as displayed in this chart (mistakes). Don’t worry, it’s work-safe. In fact, leave it up. Your boss will think you’re being productive. Here’s the average number of “mistakes” (errors, wild pitches, passed balls, HBPs) made by each team at each level of professional baseball last year:

American (MLB) – 1.4

Pacific Coast (AAA) – 1.7

Texas (AA) – 2.1

California (high-A) – 2.5

South Atlantic (low-A) – 2.7

Northwest (short-A) – 3.1

Arizona (rookie) – 4.1

That table doesn’t tell the whole story. At the lower levels you’ll witness many more overthrown cutoffs, ill-advised attempts to gun down the lead runner, and misplayed balls that don’t count as errors. I’m not suggesting that the Bakersfield Blaze are bumbling around like your Tuesday-night softball team, but the difference in precision at that level versus the Majors is immense.

Intentional Walks

They’re rare in the minors, exceedingly so at the lower levels. In 2009, the American League averaged 29 IBBs per team; the low-A South Atlantic League (home of the Crawdads) averaged nine. Texas’s rookie and short-A staffs didn’t issue a single intentional pass last year. Sluggers will get pitched around in critical situations, but rarely will they be outright gifted first base.

Batting Orders

Last year, Engel Beltre’s .281 on-base percentage was the lowest of anyone on the Blaze for more than a few weeks, yet he spent the entire season batting leadoff or second. Would Bakersfield have scored more runs with, say, Matt Lawson (.350) or Davis Stoneburner (.333) setting the table? Undoubtedly, but Beltre was one of Texas’s top ten prospects and has the raw tools of a leadoff hitter, so management wanted to maximize his plate appearances.

For Hitters, It’s All About The Slash Stats

If I say Mitch Moreland is batting .324/.400/.536, it means his batting average is .324, his on-base percentage is .400, and his slugging percentage is .536. These “slash stats” tell most of the story pretty accurately. Walks and strikeouts are also important, particularly among younger hitters who might be struggling. For example, back in June 2007, 18-year-old Marcus Lemon was batting only .213 and slugging .287, but he was also walking at an excellent rate (11%) and not striking out too much (18%). Despite the low average, he was seeing plenty of pitches and making contact, both indicating that he wasn’t overmatched at that level.

I mention players who score and drive in several runs in a game, because they’re the heroes on that day, but season-long run and RBI totals don’t matter much. They say as much about the team as the individual. Bakersfield’s middle-of-the-order hitters would have driven in more runs last year if they’d had someone more effective than Engel Beltre at the top of the order.

Please, Please, Please Ignore the Pitcher’s Record

Martin Perez was born in 1991. Nobody else in the Texas League is that young, and only three other players among the 200 in the league were born in 1989 or 1990. In 176 professional innings, he’s allowed only eight homers while fanning 172. In two seasons, he has established himself among the top pitching prospects in baseball.

Perez’s career won-loss record is 7-10.

In short-season ball, starters rarely attain the five innings needed to qualify for a win. The scorekeeper has no choice but to hand the win to a reliever, even if the starter pitched 4.2 perfect innings with 14 strikeouts. Last year in Hickory, seven pitchers combined for 122 of the team’s 139 starts. They averaged only 4.5 innings per start, and only 62 times did they reach the five innings needed for a win.

Moreover, the concept of assigning a team win to one pitcher is pretty silly, and the guy who gets the win often isn’t the game’s best pitcher. Here’s a perfect example from last Friday’s exhibition against Kansas City:

Wilson: 5 innings, 0 hits, 0 runs

Oliver: 1 inning, 0 hits, 0 runs

Eyre: 1 inning, 2 hits, 1 run

Nippert: 2 innings, 1 hit, 0 runs

Not only did Willie Eyre allow the Royals’ only run, he allowed two of their three hits. He helped the team less than anybody. But Texas retook the lead in the bottom of the 7th while Eyre was still the “pitcher of record,” so he vultured the win. This is technically correct. It is also very stupid and misleading.

This season, I’ll mention a pitcher’s won-loss record if there’s something particularly interesting about it, but I’m not going to post them on a daily basis. To be blunt, it’s a waste of time.

Don’t Sweat Minor-League ERAs Too Much

ERA only partially succeeds at separating the pitcher from his defense. As I mentioned, defense in the minors is spotty, and pitchers are more likely to be hurt by fielding miscues that still result in “earned” runs.

To knock down ERA a little more, here’s three examples, all beginning with two outs, none on, bottom of the 1st, Derek Holland on the mound:

Example 1: A Tulsa batter hits a sharp grounder to Esteban German, who makes a heroic diving stab and throws out the batter by a step to end the inning. In the second, Holland allows a leadoff homer. Scoring summary: 1 run scored, 1 run earned for Holland.

Example 2: A Tulsa batter hits a sharp grounder to Esteban German, who dives but can’t come up with the ball cleanly, and the batter reaches safely. The play is ruled a hit. The next batter homers off Holland. Scoring summary: 2 runs scored, 2 earned runs for Holland.

Example 3: A Tulsa batter hits a sharp grounder to Esteban German, who dives but can’t come up with the ball cleanly, and the batter reaches safely. The grumpy scorekeeper rules the play an error. The next batter homers off Holland. Scoring summary: 2 runs scored, 0 earned runs for Holland.

What’s this? Holland gave identical performances in each example but has 1, 2, or 0 earned runs depending on the fielder and scorekeeper. Similarly, a bullpen will affect a starter’s ERA in its ability to strand his bequeathed runners. Therefore…

Do Sweat The Peripherals

So, if ERA’s not all that, what should you watch? WHIP (walks and hits per inning pitched) isn’t a bad stat, certainly a better indicator of individual performance, but it’s best to focus on what defense and pitching changes don’t affect: walks, strikeouts and homers.

I usually express walk and strikeout rates as a percentage of batters faced rather than per nine innings. Per nine calculations can be a little deceiving. Let’s say Michael Main and Scott Lucas both strike out nine batters per nine innings. But Main allows just one baserunner per inning, while Lucas allows two. Main will have about a 25% strikeout rate, Lucas only 20%. Even though they have the same K/9, Main is better at striking batters out than Lucas. That 5% difference doesn’t seem like much but is actually very significant.

Sometimes, Don’t Sweat Anything

Although baseball is a ferocious meritocracy, in the minors it’s also a venue for learning and adjustments. As I wrote last year, half in jest, “the Rangers aren’t going to cut Michael Main if he posts a 6.00 ERA for Bakersfield.” Unfortunately, the ailing Main did just that. But yes, he’s still very much a Ranger.

Players are often trying new pitches, new swings, and new methods that corrode short-term performance. For example, a pitcher could be struggling to master his changeup, and he might be instructed to throw it in uncomfortable situations, and he’ll get slaughtered. Jamey or I might know this and mention it. Usually, we won’t know until after the fact, if at all.

Likewise, it’s tempting to agonize over slumps or cheer over streaks, but most of the time it’s just noise. Over the course of 30 at-bats, a proven .300 hitter has a one-in-six chance of batting .200 or worse. He has the same chance at .400 or better. Every player in baseball will have a bizarre two-week stretch at some point of the season. Be patient.

Field and League Context Is Critical

Relative to the competition, the player who slugged .380 for low-A Hickory was just as powerful as someone who slugged .420 for high-A Bakersfield. Hickory was a moderately hitter-friendly park in the very pitcher-friendly South Atlantic League. Bakersfield plays down the middle in an extremely hitter-friendly California League. Other Cal League venues, particularly Lancaster and High Desert, produce video-game numbers that make statistical analysis extremely difficult. Conversely, San Jose is a pitcher-friendly locale with a lousy hitter’s background, resulting many more strikeouts and fewer runs.

Frisco and the Texas League as a whole traditionally favor hitters, but in 2009 the Riders’ home park severely depressed home runs. Chad Tracy, for example, hit 17 of his 26 homers on the road. Oklahoma City is a pitcher’s oasis in an offense-heavy Pacific Coast League.

By Scott Lucas