More Jeter versus Teixeira
Tuesday, November 24, 2009 at 10:14 pm by SJK
For those who lack common sense...
Balls hit into Derek Jeter's zone: 326
Balls hit into Mark Teixeira's zone: 178
Data gathered at Hardball Times.
12 Responses to “More Jeter versus Teixeira”
Leave a Reply
Follow NoMaas on…
Latest Yankees News
Search NoMaas
Most of thsoe 326 were thrown to Mark Texiera and some of them were pulled out of the dirt. He’s part of a lot of plays, playing first base, and let’s not discount what he did over to the rescue Cano, Jeter, A-Rod, and the rest of the team from thorwing errors.
Teixeira is far and away the better fielder of the two and this stat is nonsense.
Great stat. The defense at 1B is criminally overrated. The problem is fans tend to see the few great (or poor) plays a 1B makes and so over attribute the cause.
Teixeira is a fine fielder. But he fields a position where there’s really not much fielding to be done. Even assuming Cano gets to none of those balls, we’re talking one ball a game.
From Posnanski’s blog post on future HOFers:
Well, I think Mark Teixeira will win many Gold Gloves for the same reason. He makes some great defensive plays … he has a reputation for it now. He’s good defensively, but the reputation is even better.
Give you an example: It has become something close to accepted fact that Teixeira’s ability to scoop bad throws out of the dirt was a huge factor in the Yankees defense improving in 2009 (and is often one of the keys mentioned when discussing Derek Jeter’s good defensive year). Only thing is, Dewan says that the one thing that former first baseman Jason Giambi was good at defensively was, yes, scooping bad throws out of the dirt.
Now, if you are a Yankees fan you may simply say Dewan doesn’t know what he’s talking about … you watch every Yankees game, and you saw Giambi and you watch Teixeira and you know … but I’m telling you, John studied this thing more thoroughly than you have. He has looked at every single play on video — every one. He has catalogued every play. He says that, yes, Teixeira is a much, much better defensive first baseman than Giambi. But it’s not because of his ability to scoop throws.
Still, with the Gold Glove, what you SEE is what matters. Teixeira make diving plays. And he looks so smooth scooping bad throws out the dirt. So in addition to BEING a good defensive first baseman — and he is good — he LOOKS like a good defensive first baseman which helps too. I think Tex will keep winning Gold Gloves for the next 10 years unless someone who looks better comes along.
http://joeposnanski.com/JoeBlog/2009/11/24/hall-of-fame-futures/
I don’t think Tex’s play over at first base is over-rated at all. Whether or not the SS position is more important than the 1st base position shouldn’t really be up for debate.
However, just for arguments sake: How much more confidence in throwing over to first base must Derek Jeter have had this season compared to the past few season? Knowing that there’s a large target with great hands over there must do wonders for you as the season develops.
If there is one “outside” influence to Jeter’s resurgence as a quality fielder this year I believe it most likely has to be the pitching. Specifically “consistent” pitching. Jeter said as much earlier in the season. When your pitchers hit there spots consistently you can position yourself more successfully. There’s a better chance that the ball off the bat is going to at least do something you can anticipate.
For all of the attacks on Jeter’s defense the last few years he always seemed to be up to snuff in games that Wang pitched (when Wang was arguably the best, most consistent, pitcher on the staff).
Jeter’s problem was never throwing. It was range. Teixeira at first does nothing for Jeter’s range unless he has magic pixie dust he puts on Jeter’s legs.
unless he has magic pixie dust he puts on Jeter’s legs.
That *would* have helped him get more on those jump throws…
I’m amazed that Giambi’s ability to scoop balls out of the dirt is even up for debate. He got good at it playing in Oakland because of the massive foul territory there. In NY, he was fine at getting to the ball if he didn’t have to venture off the bag. It’s not like Giambi only played in NY for one season. People who cover the Yankees for a living should know this.
The areas where Teixeira is clearly better than Giambi are mobility and throwing. Neither of those skills really helped Jeter.
Of course, most Yankee writers are so complacent that they think Teixeira is an improvement over Giambi in every way, and therefore he must have made Jeter a better shortstop.
In 2002, Giambi’s first season with the Yankees, he put up offensive numbers significantly better than Teixeira’s in 2009. Giambi came in 5th in MVP voting. So why did Teixeira get so much more MVP consideration? Because writers are convinced that he is winning games with his glove. Just don’t look at any defensive metrics, which tell you he didn’t make a positive contribution on defense (and that Jeter did).
Final note, here are Fangraphs’ value ratings for Teixeira and Jeter:
Teixeira: $23.2 million
Jeter: $33.4 million
Wow, that’s an egregious misuse of stats…
What’s a crime is when people use stats they don’t even understand, and just take it at face value… 33 mil vs 22 mil. How is value calculated and more importantly, do you agree with how value is assigned? If you don’t even know how it is calculated (doesn’t count if you look it up now), pls don’t use it in an arguement. And we should not be penalizing Tex because he plays 1b compared to jeters ss. Not to mention, MVP awards are mainly based on batting stats.
If your gonna use such a pointless stat as justification, why don’t you compare how many plays Tex is involved in compared to jeter. There is no doubt that Tex is at least 2:1 in his favor. Both terrible justifications of who’se more valuable
NoMaas Blog Comments: Where the idiots come to play. It’s like EVERYONE is Swisher Sweet!
Why Jeter is worth much more than Teixeira on fangraphs:
1. Tex created .5 win more with the bat
2. Jeter created 1 win more with the glove
You can see those two points are quite close, with a slight lead for Jeter, however…
3. Tex plays first base, which is expected to be a position of batting strength and Jeter plays shortstop, which is expected to be a position of batting weakness. Therefore, Jeter is more valuable because he is so much better than the average shortstop than Tex is better than the average first baseman.
And that is why Jeter was the more valuable player of the two.
Another way of looking at it is supply and demand is what creates value.
If the Yankees lost Tex, they could go out and get the 8 other players that are similar first basemen – many of whom are actually better.
If the Yankees lost Jeter, only Hanley Ramirez was a shortstop that even came close to being as good in 2009.