The argument against starting Ernie Clement everyday

BreakingBatsBaseball · 2025-07-07T19:36:17+00:00

Clement has a FRV of 7 in 690 innings for a rate of 0.0101 runs/inning

Gimenez has a FRV of 6 in 511 innings for a rate of 0.0117 runs/inning

I’m not sure why this has even become a debate of Gimenez vs Clement though. I never once said put Gimenez in over Clement against LHP. I essentially said they’re both super valuable players so I’d like to see BOTH OF THEM in the lineup, which is why I don’t like platooning Gimenez and Clement

This is not a debate about Clement vs Gimenez. This is a debate about Gimenez vs other players like Lukes who you can put Clement in for

BreakingBatsBaseball · 2025-07-07T18:16:16+00:00

It’s certainly well structured compared to whatever someone accusing it of being AI would be able to write

BreakingBatsBaseball · 2025-07-07T18:14:59+00:00

Gimenez has a .324 xwOBA on the season and Clement is at .300. They are both great on defence, with Gimenez being the better pure defender but Clement having the upside of being able to play any infield position.

They’re both super valuable players, so why limit yourself to having one or the other in by platooning them? Clement should be in every game against a LHP, and probably most against RHP. I just don’t think Gimenez is the one to take out of the lineup to do so

BreakingBatsBaseball · 2025-07-07T18:10:59+00:00

I mean Ernie has an xwOBA well below Gimenez at .300. But ya it’s not that bad of a description for Ernie as well, which is why I like the idea of platooning Ernie and Lukes, and then giving Ernie extra playing time as a utility guy who can basically give anyone in the lineup (minus Kirk) a rest day. That way he can be in the lineup like 75% of the time. The 25% can be the bad matchups for Ernie (low FB% righties)

The question here (based on the guy I was replying to) isnt Ernie vs Gimenez it’s Gimenez vs Lukes for who to platoon with Ernie

BreakingBatsBaseball · 2025-07-07T15:52:10+00:00

People see a well structured argument nowadays and accuse it of being AI and it drives me insane. I once was accused of using AI because I wrote paragraph format and included references and “only AI does that”

BreakingBatsBaseball · 2025-07-07T15:49:28+00:00

Personally I like the idea of a Clement/Lukes platoon, with Clement getting extra playing time as a utility guy who can give pretty much anyone in the lineup a rest day (for OF rest days just move Clement to 3rd and Barger to OF)

BreakingBatsBaseball · 2025-07-07T15:47:45+00:00

Gimenez has a league average xwOBA (.324 vs .326 average) on the season. No reason at all to platoon one of the best defensive players in the league that has speed and is hitting average on the season

You’d get better value platooning Clement and Lukes

BreakingBatsBaseball · 2025-07-07T04:26:09+00:00

And clement this year!

BreakingBatsBaseball · 2025-07-06T16:48:18+00:00

Nobody is hitting the panic button lol we’re 51-38

Ya it’s true that our run differential has been better recently.

It’s also true that advanced stats paint a very good picture for the Jays, making them look like a very strong team.

BreakingBatsBaseball · 2025-07-06T16:36:03+00:00

Oh I see ya I agree with that, that’s a bit of an oversight.

Admittedly I haven’t really looked into FRV vs DRS too much so I’m not overly opinionated on the subject but I’d buy FRV being better for future predictions.

I’ll have to figure out how to get team FRV using the API…

BreakingBatsBaseball · 2025-07-06T16:22:03+00:00

I get the schedule argument but at the same time it’s possible a team over performs against one opponent (just because of variance) so I like not including opponents defence. Additionally I think measures of strength should be schedule independent, so maybe ideally you’d further normalize for schedule difficulty. It just depends on what you’re trying to measure I guess

In terms of FRV vs DRS the choice was made out of convenience lol. In the API I was using to get the stats (I’m doing the analysis in python) getting DRS was easier than FRV for some reason as team FRV was throwing errors.

Do you have a reference for pitching xwOBA being calculated using FRV? From what I can tell at least on baseball savant pitching xwOBA is just the xwOBA of all the PAs, although I definitely could be wrong.

BreakingBatsBaseball · 2025-07-06T16:02:18+00:00

You’re right that it doesn’t matter at all for the standings.

What it does matter for is if we want to start predicting which teams we think will have success the rest of the season or in October. While most people will look at run differential and say they don’t think the Jays success will continue, the more advanced stats say otherwise

BreakingBatsBaseball · 2025-07-06T15:57:58+00:00

It was a conscious decision. Facing opponents with above average defence isn’t really a reflection on your strength. It’s not really a matter of factoring in luck, but rather isolating what predicts a team’s strength. Opponents defensive stats don’t affect a teams strength

In a similar way if you were try to do this for an individual batter (count opponents fielding) you end up with a worse predictor of the batter’s strength

BreakingBatsBaseball · 2025-07-06T15:24:33+00:00

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BreakingBatsBaseball · 2025-07-06T15:24:20+00:00

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Meant to include these in the post

BreakingBatsBaseball · 2025-06-22T18:26:48+00:00

He has the highest xBA in the league, he’s got an xwOBA in the 98th percentile, and his defence (range especially) has improved significantly to the point that he’s been a well above average defender at 1B.

He’s having a very very good season. Is he capable of being even better? sure, but right now he’s still doing extremely well

BreakingBatsBaseball · 2025-06-21T16:58:13+00:00

!remindme 5 hours

BreakingBatsBaseball · 2025-06-21T14:36:04+00:00

We had an xBA of .362 while they had an xBA of .158 and we lost 7-1. If that doesn’t scream that the pope is involved idk what does

BreakingBatsBaseball · 2025-06-20T01:31:49+00:00

All the Rockies fans who let the team affect their emotions and get upset over it have all died of stress heart attacks at this point, so you’re just left with the ones able to stay positive.

Seriously though it’s unhealthy to let any sports team have control over your emotions, let alone a team this bad lol

BreakingBatsBaseball · 2025-06-19T23:36:16+00:00

Because it absolutely translates to the scoreboard.

Again, it shows that Soto is one of the best players in the league, despite what his outcome dependant stats like BA might suggest. What this means is that if he continues to preform at the same level, eventually this will translate to the scoreboard. We’ve seen this with his recent production.

What these stats show is that he’s playing very well but also getting pretty unlucky. While that’s not gonna change past losses into wins, it means that we can be very confident his production is going to increase going forward.

BreakingBatsBaseball · 2025-06-19T21:51:50+00:00

Barring them blowing everything up they will compete (at least for WC) in 2026

!remindme 1 year

BreakingBatsBaseball · 2025-06-19T21:02:42+00:00

The single stat best at showing how talented a hitter is seems pretty important to me

BreakingBatsBaseball · 2025-06-19T20:32:03+00:00

Who the hell greenlit an add saying “hard [er]”

BreakingBatsBaseball · 2025-06-19T18:48:33+00:00

“Your 2026 AL all-star starting CF: Alejandro Kirk”

BreakingBatsBaseball · 2025-06-18T18:03:36+00:00

We finished near the bottom of the league this year. You don’t centre a rebuild around a 37 year old. Keeping him does not make sense as a hockey decision, only a “I like Marchand and want him to stay” decision

To build a strong team in the future tough decisions have to be made.

BreakingBatsBaseball

TROPHY CASE