Braves Defense by PMR
Many of you are probably aware of David Pinto‘s fantastic new defensive metric, Probabilistic Model of Range (PMR). Using many factors affecting balls-in-play he evaluated the fielding of players based on actual outs versus predicted outs of MLB players. I’m not going to go into the specifics of his methods, but you can read more about it here. I got tired of going to look for the Braves numbers so I compiled a list here. In addition to the PMR “Difference” (Actual DER – Predicted DER) I include Runs Saved Above Average (RAA) conversion as calculated by Chronicles of the Lads. The ranks are by position.
| Player | Position | Difference | Diff.-Rank | RAA | RAA-Rank |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Johnny Estrada | C | -0.00031 | 35 | NA | NA |
| Eddie Perez | C | 0.00061 | 20 | NA | NA |
| Andruw Jones | CF | 0.0034 | 3.5 | 17.9346 | 2 |
| Adam LaRoche | First | 0.00179 | 27 | -1.7168 | 25 |
| Julio Franco | First | 0.00254 | 19 | -0.3547 | 19 |
| Brian Jordan | RF | 0.00622 | 4 | 5.8728 | 11 |
| Rafael Furcal | SS | -0.01189 | 35 | -17.1837 | 37 |
| Marcus Giles | Second | -0.0076 | 29 | -5.6248 | 29 |
| Nick Green | Second | 0.00416 | 2 | 29.8582 | 2 |
| Chipper Jones | Third | 0.01259 | 8 | 14.2803 | 3 |
There are certainly a few surprises here. Chipper and Jordan do a lot better than I expected. LaRoche and Furcal are much worse than I expected.
If I’m reading this correctly–I think I am–Furcal’s defense costs the Braves slightly over 0.1 run/game, compared to an “average” ML shortstop?