Nate Silver disses Rickie!

by balldeagle on Feb 13, 2007 11:17 AM CST

Nate Silver's recent article at Baseball Prospectus (subscriber only) analyzes his PECOTA rankings for 2nd base prospects (25 yrs old or younger). It came as a complete surprise to me that our very own Rickie Weeks is ranked 8th on the list, coming in below the likes of Eric Patterson, Josh Barfield, and the immortal Brooks Conrad of the Astros, when ranked for upside. Brooks Conrad has a brighter upside than Rickie Weeks!? Nate's one of my favorite BP authors, and PECOTA's my favorite projection system (it helped me to 4th place out of 10 for my fantasy roto league last year..), but that just doesn't make sense to me. Interestingly, PECOTA takes defense into account, so maybe Rickie's historically bad 1st half of last season biases the rankings. But he's going to get better, isn't he?

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It's not a short article

I guess Nate doesn't have a reputation for being concise.

That's why they call him Long Nate Silver.

"C'mon, boys, let's get 'em some RUNS!" --- Daron Sutton, pretty much every game of the 2005 season.

by roguejim on Feb 13, 2007 1:14 PM CST reply actions

Nate's explanation

Rickie Weeks' tepid rating might surprise some people, but it probably shouldn't; he just hasn't been a terribly effective major league hitter to date, and his defensive ratings have never been good at any level. PECOTA isn't writing him off completely; in fact, it thinks he'll add 70 points of slugging average between now and his peak. But there's a good likelihood that he ends up as sort of a supertweener, a solid regular who could be a star at second base if he could field the position, or at third base or the outfield with about five more home runs.

by battlekow on Feb 13, 2007 3:37 PM CST reply actions

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