DAVIDs AND GOLIATHs (Part 1)

DAVIDs AND GOLIATHs

(Or) HOW THE JAYS, RAYS AND O’S ARE TRYING TO COMPETE WITH THE YANKEES AND RED SOX




In a perfect world, everyone would be equal. The playing field would always be level, and no special privileges would be given to the elite. Hmmm. Then again, there are certain levels of joy and satisfaction resulting from those situations in which the underdog defies seemingly insurmountable odds to defeat his adversary. The NCAA’s March Madness is a perfect example of this. We all want to see the “Cinderella” teams knock off the top seeds. It makes for good entertainment to have powerful teams to root for or against, whether or not those teams seem to have undeserved advantages.

The Bible tells the story of young David, a lowly shepherd boy who risked his life for his nation. Armed with just a sling, he volunteered to fight the towering Goliath, a massive, mocking giant clad in armor. When David took down Goliath with a well-placed stone to the forehead, a rejuvenated Israel routed the Philistines, David eventually became king, and history was changed forever.

In Major League Baseball, there are Davids and Goliaths. Because there is no salary cap, the franchises that have the most power also have an uncompetitive advantage on the playing field. The teams from New York (Mets and Yankees), the Boston Red Sox, and Chicago’s White Sox and Cubs are the “Goliaths”. They have huge fan bases, high ticket proceeds, lucrative TV deals, tons of marketing revenue, and thus have rich owners who can afford to outbid any of the other teams for top talent. The remaining teams are the “Davids”. Because of the financial inequality of teams in the league, they are competing at a serious disadvantage.

The American League’s Eastern Division boasts two of the Goliaths, the Red Sox and the Yankees. In the last 10 seasons, only Boston and New York have won the division crown, with the Yanks finishing first nine times (Boston finished first in 2007). Those two teams have also taken five of the ten World Series Championships in that tenure. To illustrate the slanted playing field, one only has to look at the (total roster) salaries for those teams in 2008:

New York Yankees $209,081,579
Boston Red Sox $133,440,037
Toronto Blue Jays $98,641,957
Baltimore Orioles $67,196,248
Tampa Bay Devil Rays $43,820,598

The top team, New York, is in a class by itself. Owner George Steinbrenner has outspent his nearest competitors by over 50%. Imagine running a diner, and only cooking with imitation ingredients, while the restaurant down the street is using the real thing. Compared to the Yankees, that’s what every other team in Major League Baseball is doing. In fact, the Yankees are paying third baseman Alex Rodriguez more than the Florida Marlins’ entire roster is earning in 2008. Of the thirty baseball teams, Rodriguez’ salary exceeds 30% of the entire payroll for 23 of those clubs.

Although the Boston Red Sox are a true Goliath, their 2007 division title was their first in many years. It might be more correct to label them a “lesser Goliath”. The Red Sox have done their best to keep pace with the Yankees, placing in the Top 8 for team salaries each of the last ten years. The Sox’ team salary has been second only to the Yankees each year from 2004 – 2007, and also in ’01 and ’02. While the Yankees have outpaid Boston for much of the game’s top talent, the Sox have been wiser, avoiding some of the aged veterans that the Steinbrenners seem to covet. Boston’s shrewd roster management has paid off in World Series titles in 2004 and 2007.

The Toronto Blue Jays enjoyed great success in the 1990’s, winning two championships. However, since the 1992-93 campaigns, the franchise has struggled to put a winner back on the field. Recently, they have finished above .500 more often than not, but the Jays cannot seem to finish within ten games of the Yankees or gain a wild card spot. For the last 10 years, Toronto has typically placed in the middle of baseball’s salary scale, ranging from 10th highest to 25th.

For the past decade or so, the Baltimore Orioles have been best known as a team that annually underachieves, spending big money on players who quickly make the front office regret it. After they won the division in 1997, Baltimore has finished 4th nine times and third once. Obviously, that hasn’t gotten them into the playoffs, and O’s fans must be wondering when the next post-season appearance will be. Baltimore had the highest paid roster in 1998, but has drifted down to the middle of the pack since then. Last year’s fourth place finishers “earned” $93 million.

Look up futility in the dictionary, and you’re likely to see a Devil Ray. Tampa Bay has finished last place in the AL East every season except one. In 2004, they won 70 games for the only time in franchise history and finished fourth. The franchise winning percentage hovers around 40%, and that makes the team a really bad draw. However, plans for a badly-needed new stadium are being drawn up, and an influx of young talent might be making Rays’ fans excited for the next few years. The Tampa franchise has at least not spent much money, placing last or next-to-last on the payroll scale for the last six years.

In light of the disparity of resources, talent and fan interest, how can the Davids in the AL East beat the Goliaths? How can the Orioles, Blue Jays and Devil Rays possibly rise up and challenge the Bronx Bombers and BoSox for those elusive playoff spots? Let’s start by drawing up a general blueprint for success, and applying it to each of the three David teams.

First, let’s examine the correlation between various statistics and actually making the playoffs, which is the primary goal of our three David teams. Obviously, the secret to winning baseball games lies in scoring more runs than your opponent. Do this enough times, and the result will be a winning record, with a potential playoff berth. Since 2004, the four American league playoff teams have scored an average of 120 runs more than their opponents during the season. This works out to a difference of about .74 runs per game. Those are big numbers. The worst playoff team statistically during that stretch was the 2006 Oakland A’s, who only managed a positive differential of 44 runs. However, the low differential can be partially explained by the fact that there are only four teams in the AL West, which makes it easier to make the playoffs. That’s a luxury our AL East teams don’t have, since the division has five teams. It looks like the 2004 Minnesota Twins were the next lowest-ranking playoff team during that time period, so let’s use their run differential of 65 as the baseline for realistically challenging for a playoff spot.

To build a blueprint for success, we need to discover what a playoff team looks like. After reviewing the team rankings for the past four years in various categories, an old adage holds true: Pitching Wins Ballgames. The correlation between pitching and winning games is stronger than that of hitting, base running or fielding. The most important single statistic turns out to be ERA. The sixteen playoff teams since 2004 have averaged an AL ERA rank of 4.3 (out of 14 teams), compared to an average slugging rank of 5.7, and a 6.3 average stolen base ranking. The importance of pitching is further illustrated by looking at the average ranks for the sixteen playoff teams in other categories: Walks Issued (4.6), Home Runs Allowed (4.6), and Strikeouts (5.1). On the offensive side, On Base Average is the most important stat (4.8), with Batting Average (5.1) and Slugging Percentage showing less of a correlation to winning.

The tie between getting effective pitching and winning games is not quite strong enough to ignore the other facets of the game. However, in building our model of a playoff team, we can confidently say that building a good pitching staff is our top priority. Since the starting pitchers contribute more to a team’s ERA (innings pitched) than the bullpen does, our David teams need to address the rotation first and foremost. This will give the Rays, Jays and O’s the best chance to compete.

To find an existing model of our “dream team”, we have to look back a couple of years. Prior to the 2000 season, the Oakland A’s had not made the playoffs for 7 years. Then they inserted three guys into their rotation by the names of Hudson, Mulder and Zito (Tim Hudson actually started some games in 1999). Known forever after as the Big Three, these players became the cornerstone of the A’s success for the next seven years. From 2000 to 2006, the A’s finished first or second in their division each year, winning the division four times, and securing the AL wild card berth once. The team never ranked lower than fourth in ERA during those seven seasons. (Although the A’s traded Mark Mulder away before the 2005 season, they got pitcher Danny Haren in return, who was a catalyst in the rotation for the next two seasons.)

The A’s represent the model for what the David teams are trying to become. Oakland is a small-market, low budget franchise who must make superior roster decisions to have a chance to compete. They added three starting pitchers who each contributed 200 quality innings to their team for several years. The effect was that Oakland had a top-notch ERA, and this propelled them into position to compete every year. Keeping these three pitchers in the fold meant that they could supplement the pitching staff with good, but not great players mostly acquired in trades or free agency. Although the Big Three were homegrown, i.e. developed in the A’s farm system, there is not much evidence to support the idea that developing players is more essential to winning than acquiring those players via outside acquisitions.

Having established that starting pitching is our top priority, let’s look at the importance of the bullpen. The pitching statistics for the A’s from 2000 to 2006 reveal that the starting rotation had much more to do with the team’s low ERA than the ‘pen did. For example, in 2003, Oakland went 96-66. The team ERA was 3.63, ranking first in the American League. Starting pitchers contributed 1018 innings with an ERA of 3.62. The relievers compiled a 3.65 ERA in just 423 innings. Thus, the bullpen had less than half of the impact on ERA that the rotation did. In other years during their streak of success, the importance of the bullpen fluctuated slightly depending on whether the ERA was higher or lower than that of the starting pitching, but it should never be considered that the bullpen is just as important as the rotation. This is a common misconception that you will hear around baseball today. Even if the bullpen outperforms the rotation substantially, as was the case with last year’s Red Sox (3.10 ERA to the starters’ 4.21), it is the effectiveness of the starting pitcher which determines how much the bullpen must be used.

Based on the category rankings for teams that made the playoffs which we discussed above, it is important that we develop a priority list based on the correlations between those statistics and winning. We have established that the rotation is of prime importance. We also know from statistical evidence that the bullpen carries around 40-60% of the importance of the rotation. Since there is only a slight correlation between base running and winning, we can move speed to the bottom of our priority list. Defense is another area that does not show a strong tie to winning games. (Guess who had the majors’ best fielding percentage in 2007? Baltimore.) Therefore, I would rank the priorities of our roster assembly as follows:

1- Starting pitching
2- Hitting (emphasis: On Base Percentage over Slugging Percentage)
3- Bullpen
4- Defense
5- Speed (all-around)

This agrees with the method the A’s used to attain their success. Those teams combined low ERA and high OBP to win games, and were average or lower in other areas. As an example, the A’s 2006 squad placed 4th in ERA and 7th in OBP. In the other major categories mentioned earlier, they were 9th or lower.

It’s not enough to identify our priorities. It’s also necessary to construct a business plan of sorts. We’ll need to identify the current state of each roster, what kind of players each team needs to target, how much each team can spend, and how long it will take to become competitive. Bad teams stay bad because they don’t have a plan that makes realistic sense.

Consider the Baltimore Orioles, who have not made the playoffs in 10 years. Despite ranking average or higher in team salary, the O’s don’t win an average or better number of games. Looking at some recent history, we can see why the Orioles have maintained their mediocrity. Baltimore brass has repeatedly acquired players for large sums of cash who did not perform as expected.

2007 Jaret Wright ($7 million), Kris Benson ($7 million), Danys Baez ($6 million)
2006 Kris Benson ($8 million), Javy Lopez ($9 million), Bruce Chen ($4 million), Rodrigo Lopez ($4 million)
2005 Sammy Sosa ($17 million), Sidney Ponson ($8.5 million)
2004 David Segui ($7 million), Omar Daal ($4.5 million)
2003 Albert Belle ($13 million), Scott Erickson ($7 million)

Now, every team has injuries, and every team gets players that don’t perform well. But, as the above illustrates, the O’s have developed a bad trend into a way of life. They consistently pay too much for players that are either past their prime, have questionable talent, or are huge injury risks. This is the kind of behavior that a team must avoid to rise up from second-division finishes.

(In Part 2 of DAVIDs and GOLIATHs, I will examine the Toronto Blue Jays chances for success.)