Projections using MP/MW

by MADness on Nov 23, 2006 10:56 AM MST

Disclaimer: I am not a stats guru and am a total rookie feeling my way through this as I immerse myself in this field/area/world.

I stumbled upon a post over at Bucco Blog http://buccoblog.mlblogs.com/my_weblog/2006/11/marginal_margin.html that has a table of calculations for Marginal Wins and Marginal Payroll and uses those to come up with 'efficiency ratings' for team management groups. The efficiency ratings amount to Marginal Cost/ Marginal Win.

I won't explain more of that since most of you already are familiar with these metrics and there are much better definitions and explanations at the provided link.

I have been playing with this data to extrapolate what kind of records the 'efficient' small-market teams like Minnesota and Oakland would have posted if they had been able to match the Rockies higher payroll averages during this span (1999-2006).

I ended up calculating what type of average record Minnesota would have had with the Rockies average payroll and I also calculated what type of average record St. Louis (a team with a greater payroll than us) would have had with the Rockies management efficiency.

Anyone care to check my math (I apologize for bad form, improper nomenclature, etc.)?

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Data/Figures:
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COL Avg M Payroll = 51,081,393
MIN Avg M Payroll = 33,988,126
STL Avg M Payroll = 67,637,492

COL M Cost/M Win = 2,082,829
MIN M Cost/M Win = 955,394
STL M Cost/M Win = 1,568,406

COL Avg. M Win = 24.5
MIN Avg. M Win = 35.6
STL Avg. M Win = 43.1

COL Avg. Win % = .452
MIN Avg. Win % = .520
STL Avg. Win % = .566

Marginal Win (M Win) baseline record = 48.6 Wins (every win above 48.6 is equal to one M Win)

Marginal Payroll (M Payroll) = 7,150,500 (Payroll beyond the cost of fielding a team of replacement level players)

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St. Louis with the same payroll but with Rockies management efficiency (MCost/MWin):

STL M Payroll / COL (MCost/MWin) = (67,637,492)(2,082,829) = 32.47 M Wins

162 game season * STL Avg. Win % (.566) = 91.69 actual Avg. Wins.

32.47 M Wins (Adjusted M Wins for Efficiency)
48.60 Wins (Baseline for M Wins stats)
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81.07 Average Wins [91.69 currently]

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Minnesota with the same management efficiency (MCost/MWin) but with Rockies payroll:

COL Avg M Payroll / MIN (MCost/MWin) = (51,081,393)(955,394) = 53.47 M Wins

162 game season * MIN Avg. Win % (.520) = 84.24 actual Avg Wins.

53.47 M Wins (Ajusted M Wins for Payroll)
48.60 Wins (Baseline for M Wins stats)
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102.07 Average Wins [84.24 currently]

Eat. Drink. Be Merry. But the above FanPost does not necessarily reflect the attitudes, opinions, or views of Purple Row's staff (unless, of course, it's written by the staff [and even then, it still might not]).

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Comments

Retrospect:

The chart definitely shows that management hasn't been up to par with arguably the most efficient in the majors over the time-frame you've chosen to look at this, but it doesn't really go into the why's or what-could-have-beens. I think looking back, you can point to key mistakes that completely derailed the whole period. Obviously, chief among them was the week of December 4-11, 2000 when we signed Denny Neagle and Mike Hampton. I'm going to suggest however, that the Rockies weren't going to be competitive in this time frame regardless, due to the gross incompetence of the previous regime. Of course it was mostly the same ownership and O'Dowd exacerbated the problem when he came in, certainly, but I don't think we can lay this all at his feet.

Look at the 2001 Athletics and you can see how their success even then was the result of over a decade of building from the ground up. St Louis is a slightly different model, but even their 2001 team shows them benefitting from a successful farm that had long been producing talent. Minnesota has a similar story of the franchise already producing a healthy return from the minor league system graduating quality players who they could then trade for more prospects.

O'Dowd inherited a nice looking facade of a franchise without any depth to build on. It's no wonder we were inefficient given the lack of talent that was there to begin with. His misjudgement on what talent was there didn't help -getting fleeced by Cleveland for Josh Bard and Jody Gerut and Anaheim for Chone Figgins still irks me- but even these players, though solid in their roles, aren't franchise players of the magnitude of Albert Pujols or Miguel Tejada or Torii Hunter and David Ortiz that the other teams you mention had to work with that were already in the system before the period in question even started.

I think the history of the Rockies until recently has been one of flash on the upper crust without substance within. Now we seem to have that substance, but I don't know if we'll hold on too long like the Cubs, or not long enough like the Giants, or play it right like these other teams.

by Rox Girl on Nov 24, 2006 10:24 AM MST reply actions