Because they don't. Barton is at 22nd and Pennington is at 27th.

 

Beyond that, both have been good defensively this year and both have been solid offensively. Barton may not hit for much power (35 XBHs and 5 HR in 497 PAs), but he gets on base a ton, and getting on base is the biggest part of scoring runs. Cliff Pennington isn't a special player by any means, but he's OK offensively (.334 OBP and he's hit for enough power to keep his OPS over .700), good defensively, and he plays a premium defensive position. On top of that, both have played quite a bit...Pennington has played in 110 and Barton in 113 of the Athletics' 116 games. Barton has only played 3 more games than Pennington, but has 80 more plate appearances, and that difference is largely because he has hit 2nd for most of the year, whereas Pennington has hit 9th for most of the season.

 

This is all pretty much the same exact reasoning as to why Alexei Ramirez has the highest WAR on the White Sox (among offensive players), even though Alex Rios has had a great season and Paul Konerko has quite easily been the Sox best offensive player. Alexei has played phenomenal defense this year, has been a pretty good hitter (though he hasn't gotten on base much of the time), and he's played almost every game (114 of 118), and he's done it playing SS, which is a much more difficult position to find good offensive players.

 

And, because he's played as much as he has and as well as he has defensively, he's been the 3rd best SS in the entire game, even with his relatively mediocre offensive numbers.

 

The rankings I had were only for hitters on baseballreference.com. If Alexei is so good at defense, I can't see how Pennington has a higher WAR, when most of his offensive numbers are worse than Ramirez's, other than OBP and SBs.

 

Konerko's (3.8) WAR is higher than Alexei's (2.7) from what I can gather on that site.

The rankings I had were only for hitters on baseballreference.com. If Alexei is so good at defense, I can't see how Pennington has a higher WAR, when most of his offensive numbers are worse than Ramirez's, other than OBP and SBs.

 

Konerko's (3.8) WAR is higher than Alexei's (2.7) from what I can gather on that site.

 

BR's WAR doesn't incorporate defense at all, at least I don't think.

 

On FanGraphs, where the better version of WAR is used, Alexei kills Pennington by .7 WAR.

 

Alexei's well deserved 12.4 UZR is why he's the most valuable position player on the Sox.

Edited August 16, 201015 yr by chw42

I was a Saber hater a couple years ago. It was just too much thinking for me. I'm a brotha. And brothas don't like to think. The traditional stats were so much easier to understand. But I must say, I've become a semi-Saber lover (mostly because I understand most of them now). I wouldn't get down and have sex with them like chw42. But they're good for the game and are great at breaking down individual seasons and the true talent level and value of players.

It's nothing more than a study of probabilities dressed in fancy names. Much like the comprehension of probabilities allows actuaries and gamblers to successfully predict an outcome more often than those unaware of probabilities, they are still surprised when John Doe has a heart attack at age 32 or 3 aces pop up in the flop of a game of Texas HoldEm.

 

I guess my point is that I feel that Sabr has value to the game but not nearly as much as is impressed upon us by its rabid community of followers. Some of the stats are deserving of the praise while others are not even close to ready for mainstream acceptance.

Extremely well said, I agree.

Edited August 16, 201015 yr by Tmar

I was a Saber hater a couple years ago. It was just too much thinking for me. I'm a brotha. And brothas don't like to think. The traditional stats were so much easier to understand. But I must say, I've become a semi-Saber lover (mostly because I understand most of them now). I wouldn't get down and have sex with them like chw42. But they're good for the game and are great at breaking down individual seasons and the true talent level and value of players.

I've heard of his legendary all night orgies with FIP, UZR, and xBABIP.

I've heard of his legendary all night orgies with FIP, UZR, and xBABIP.

 

Hearing is nothing like doing.

Okay.

 

But I post on a website everyday and I know I am cool. A lot cooler than you are. A s*** ton cool.

 

I won't believe that until I see a stat that quantifies internet coolness.