Overmanaging

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  • Blzer
    Resident film pundit
    • Mar 2004
    • 42520

    #16
    Re: Overmanaging

    Originally posted by Olson-for-Heisman
    Overmanaging 101 is probably the whole idea of "batting orders."

    This is actually one of those instances where the traditional crowd is making things 100 times more complicated than they should be by insisting upon an algorithmic batting order, whereas the sabermetrics' crowd says, "Make sure to get your best players the most at-bats; it's not that complicated."
    I definitely believe in a rhyme and reason to batting orders if you build your team around such a plausible algorithm and identify their roles from the beginning of Spring Training so they can work on them as often as possible. If you're thrown into the mix and you are working with the AL All Star Team, the batting order won't matter too much. But there are some teams, including the Giants, where a specific batting order can work to their benefit if their roles are defined early on and they are efficient where they are at.

    EDIT: What happened to imapotato?
    Last edited by Blzer; 08-18-2010, 09:34 PM.
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    • snepp
      We'll waste him too.
      • Apr 2003
      • 10007

      #17
      Re: Overmanaging

      An over-reliance on roles can be bit of over-management.

      "6th inning man"
      "7th inning man"
      "8th inning man"
      "Closer"
      "LOOGY" (when mis-used, which is often)
      "crappy hitter that bunts a lot and hits 2nd no matter what" man


      Get your good hitters more plate appearances, get your good pitchers the most important innings. There's no role that excuses the use of .600 OPS hitters at the top of a lineup, or inferior relievers in the most important spots, yet managers will let these pre-defined roles of theirs dictate their decision making.
      Member of The OS Baseball Rocket Scientists Association

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      • Blzer
        Resident film pundit
        • Mar 2004
        • 42520

        #18
        Re: Overmanaging

        Originally posted by snepp
        An over-reliance on roles can be bit of over-management.

        "6th inning man"
        "7th inning man"
        "8th inning man"
        "Closer"
        "LOOGY" (when mis-used, which is often)
        "crappy hitter that bunts a lot and hits 2nd no matter what" man


        Get your good hitters more plate appearances, get your good pitchers the most important innings. There's no role that excuses the use of .600 OPS hitters at the top of a lineup, or inferior relievers in the most important spots, yet managers will let these pre-defined roles of theirs dictate their decision making.
        I suppose I would defer more to offensive lineups than pitching rotations (including the bullpen) when it comes to positional roles. You see, if you have your top slugger (probably the player with the highest OPS on the team) batting lead-off, either they may pitch to him and he can jack one out for a solo home run, or they can walk him and just go to the rest of the inferior lineup. Therefore you go for a guy with great speed and patience at the plate to bat lead-off. You want him to get over more before your big hitters? Get a #2 hitter who has good control of the bat to stay out of the double play if possible, put on a hit-and-run, or simply sacrifice his at-bat so that the runner has time to steal and get over or bunt him over.

        Now that your lead-off hitter is potentially over, you get to your bigger hitters. If the #3 hitter fails, there is the #4 hitter to "clean up" whatever is left on the bases (hence the reason for that term). The top four hitters are the most important "role-defining" positions to place players in my opinion. Also, in the National League the #8 hitter is very important, and in the American League the #9 hitter is very important.

        The rest of the players and their "roles" come from the assumption for how else the inning will pan out or potentially reset, and how you would want to group the rest of the guys accordingly to best fit how the most runs can cross the plate as possible. It's not worth getting your big guys up as much as possible if it doesn't maximize your run count. There is an algorithm which can be put in place if you have the right players who are willing to fill in said roles. You can tell when this works for teams and when it doesn't.


        While we're on this topic, it really does transition over to the argument of how much weight a manager bears on the game's ending result. Does it really make the biggest difference how the lineup is set, whether you steal the runner, make the double switch, or pinch hit one player over the other? I can't necessarily say there's always a way to tell, but I sometimes don't like when managers get fired simply because they have terrible players to work with. Fire the hitting, pitching, and bench coaches while you're at it, because the team is obviously not doing the fundamentals correctly.
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        • Chip Douglass
          Hall Of Fame
          • Dec 2005
          • 12256

          #19
          Re: Overmanaging

          Originally posted by Blzer
          I definitely believe in a rhyme and reason to batting orders if you build your team around such a plausible algorithm and identify their roles from the beginning of Spring Training so they can work on them as often as possible. If you're thrown into the mix and you are working with the AL All Star Team, the batting order won't matter too much. But there are some teams, including the Giants, where a specific batting order can work to their benefit if their roles are defined early on and they are efficient where they are at.
          The algorithm is pretty simple. Make sure your best hitters are near the top of the lineup. There are a few other things that can be tweaked here or there (like avoiding lining up your left-handers in a row, batting a notorious GIDP hitter first instead of second, etc.), but the differences between even an ideal lineup and a completely laughable one are still negligible.

          EDIT: What happened to imapotato?
          I'm 99% sure that imapotato was actually Shakedowncapo's 2nd account and that he used his 2nd account to double-team me.

          He was either banned for that or launching personal attacks against me. Good riddance either way.
          I write things on the Internet.

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          • SPTO
            binging
            • Feb 2003
            • 68046

            #20
            Re: Overmanaging

            I will say something positive about the Texas Rangers and it's still a bit in flux but since last year when Nolan Ryan more or less had total control of the club he's instituted that pitch counts are a no-no for the organization. We'll have to see how this works out with their young pitchers coming out of the minors but curtailing pitch counts and making the starters work through difficulties eliminates the over reliance on relievers which leads to some of the worst cases of over managing.

            I wish Ryan and Maddux well in their attempt at this because if it's successful maybe more teams in the Majors will see that they've been babying pitchers way too much in the last 20 or so years.
            Member of the Official OS Bills Backers Club

            "Baseball is the most important thing that doesn't matter at all" - Robert B. Parker

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            • Blzer
              Resident film pundit
              • Mar 2004
              • 42520

              #21
              Re: Overmanaging

              Originally posted by Olson-for-Heisman
              The algorithm is pretty simple. Make sure your best hitters are near the top of the lineup. There are a few other things that can be tweaked here or there (like avoiding lining up your left-handers in a row, batting a notorious GIDP hitter first instead of second, etc.), but the differences between even an ideal lineup and a completely laughable one are still negligible.
              I suppose we could always agree to disagree then, as I have no problem with what you're saying and it makes perfect sense, but I am about theorizing what ideal lineup would get me the most amount of runs possible. Sometimes that "equation" doesn't come in the form of bulking everybody in one place. Now I'm not advocating that your two best hitters should be in the 7 and 8 positions, but I am saying that a #2 hitter with a .260 average is completely feasible provided that he is being utilized the correct way.

              Furthermore, I would always like to see some magic happen at the bottom of the order as well. After all, if you don't want your pitcher to always be an automatic unproductive out, you would like to have somebody on base for him to sacrifice over and turn it back over to the top and give yourself a chance.

              This all being said, in both leagues the #7 hitter should be the worst in your lineup. In the AL the #8 hitter should be a "last resort" kind of power guy who pitchers may sandbag a little bit because he's in the bottom of the order, and in the NL your #8 hitter should be decent enough to keep an inning alive at all costs (hopefully quicker than "slowest speed" to prevent double plays). And the #9 hitter in the AL would be a "second lead-off hitter" type purely in the speed department only. If his OBP isn't quite there, that's why he's hitting #9... but if he can get on base, you can now start working magic with him again as the lineup card flips over.

              I give this much thought and I see it work best when the hitters actually do play as a team, in the sense that they know their place on it. I don't want every hitter to be for himself, because sometimes it is not purely about getting a hit. Sometimes you must manufacture in other ways because you know when it's your place to swing and when it's not. You should always be aware of who's behind you and who's on base, and there are teams who aren't utilizing this property to maximum potential. Those teams are the ones with seemingly good players but are underdelivering in the win column.
              Last edited by Blzer; 08-19-2010, 11:10 AM.
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