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Oh yeah, Nerdlinger, Bill James projections are the best!

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Yes, it's that time of year... projections are already coming out. Dan Szymborski from Baseball Think Factory has already published his ZiPS projections for a few teams, and I may (or may not) do some very basic projections once Baseball Databank's database is posted.

The first public player projections usually publicized in full in the offseason are the Bill James (maybe you've heard of him?) projections that are also included in the Bill James handbook. That's right, the 2010 Bill James Handbook is already available for pre-order from Acta Sports, so check it out. The projections are fun to look at, but there's much more the Handbook than that -- it usually includes cool extras like possible "career path" projections (e.g., how likely certain players are to hit certain milestones), Bill James' baserunning numbers, player win shares, the annual Fielding Bible Awards, and more. This season the  Handbook is featuring new stuff on instant replay and pinch hitting analysis.

In the meantime, they've distributed their player projections to some SBNation staff for a preview. I imagine your team site may or may not be posting about that, but for my purposes, this couldn't come at a better time, as I was planning on doing a post on the two of the biggest free agents on the 09-10 market: Matt Holliday and Jason Bay. Here are the James hitting projections for the players -- I've calculated the wOBA myself, of course, using the Tango's original weights

Assuming something like this season's run environment (.329 league wOBA), over 700 PAs, that would make Bay about a +29 runs above average, and Holliday about +38. The James projections often seem optimistic, and, if the internet has taught us anything the last couple of seasons, it's that it isn't all about offense. And if it's taught us anything else, it's that there's a lot of different ways of projecting players... so let's see how "my" crude projections (based solely-on unadjusted wOBA) stack up against the Big Bad Bill James projections when combined with estimates of each players' other skills to get their individual True Talent Wins Above Replacement (WAR), and, even better, see how much they might get in contracts in the offseason.

It's not just Bay vs. Holliday, it's James vs. fingers. Bring it.

Jason Bay

#44 / Left Field / Boston Red Sox

Height: 6-2

Weight: 205

Bats: R

Throws: R

Born: Sep 20, 1978

d_f Hitting projection: Bay's been a good hitter, although he had real hiccup in 2007. From 2006 to 2009, his wOBAs have been .394, .326, .387, .397. Adjusting for age (very slightly) and regressing to the mean, we estimate his current true wOBA talent level at .367, or about 22 runs above average per 700 PA.

Fielding: Some wonder if Fenway has adversely affected Bay's fielding, given his -18.2 UZR/150 in 2008 and -8.7 in 2009. But he wasn't exactly David DeJesus or Carl Crawford out in left in 2007 in Pittsburgh, featuring -11.4. He was only in 2006. The Fans have been a bit schizo according to my translations, having him slightly below average in 2009 (-3.6) and 2007 (-2.1) but loving him (post-Manny?) in 2008 (+8.4) and 2006 (+12.4). And that's why we combine sources and regress. We estimate Bay's current true talent in the field to be about 4 runs below average.

Total Value: +22 hitting - 7.5 positional adjustment -4 hitting + 25 AL replacement = 35.5 runs above replacement times 85% playing time minus half a win (5 runs) for a player 30 or older = about a 2.5 WAR player according to my crude calculations.  How about he James projection with our other stuff? It's a bit strange, since we did all our aging (post-2009)  in one lump 0.5 sum, and the James projections for offense have it already figured in, so we'll just turn the 5 runs into 3 runs.  So we get +28.5 hitting - 7.5 positional adjustment -4 hitting + 25 AL replacement = 42 runs above replacement times 85% playing time - 3 runs aging = ~3.3 WAR player.

Matt Holliday

#15 / Left Field / St. Louis Cardinals

Height: 6-4

Weight: 235

Bats: R

Throws: R

Born: Jan 15, 1980

d_f Hitting projection: Holliday got off to a rough start in Oakland, but recovered more than people think, and was awesome in Saint Louis. It's not all Colorado, folks... From 2006-2009  his seasonal wOBA's have been .409, ,428, .418, and .390. Adjusted and regressed, we estimate Holliday's true wOBA talent at .390, or about 36 runs above average.

Fielding: Yes, he had quite the miscue in the playoffs. But have you seen the average corner outfielder in the major leagues? Holliday's actually been pretty good (according to UZR) compared to his peers, having UZR/150s of -5.5, 14.7, 10.9, and 3.2 from 2006-2009. His fans have been a bit more consistent than Bay's, and have tracked his UZR better, with -5.8, 2.3, 4.9, and 3.0 according to my translations. Altogether, that makes him about a +4 fielder in LF.

Total Value: + 36 hitting + 4 fielding -7.5 positional adjustment + 20 NL replacement level = 52.5 runs above replacement times 85% playing time minus 5 runs aging = about a 4 WAR player. How about with the James numbers? + 38 hitting + 4 fielding - 7.5 positional adjustment + 20 NL replacement level = 54.5 runs above replacement times 85% playing time minus 3 runs aging = about 4.3 WAR. That's good, but I'm not sure it's quite in Mark Teixeira territory, as Holliday's agent Scott Boras asserted (although their Fangraphs WAR numbers are similar, keep in mind that it doesn't yet take into account league differences; moreover, outfield defense is subject to greater measurement error. Also keep in mind that Holliday will be  year older than Teixeira when he is reaching free agency).

Me, Bill, and the Money

Even adjusting for league, Holliday is the far superior player -- not Teixeira, but probably the best free agent positional player on the market, and far better than Bay, who is above average, but not much better than that.

So it's all fun, but what difference does it make? I mean, we'll see who was "right" (probably neither of us... let's see what CHONE, ZiPS, and PECOTA say) after the season. Biut what we are reallyl interested in is the money, right? It's hard to tell what the dollar-to-projected WAR rate will be after the turbuelent offseason last year. I haven't researched it, but I'll guess $4.8 million per WAR (Keep in mind that we have to add in the $400,000 replacement salary for each year). Assuming 10% a year salary inflation and the "normal" 0.5 WAR a season decline for position players, the difference is this.

Bay on the "d_f projection" (2.5 WAR) can except contracts in this range: 1/$12M, 2/$24M, 3/$33M, 4/$40M, 5/$44M

But if he's a 3.3 WAR player (on the James figure), we'd estimate something like: 1/$16M, 2/$32M, 3/$46M, 4/$58M, 5/$67M, 6/$74M...

You get the idea...millions at stake. It may not seem like much at first, but especially on the longer deals, it really adds up.

How about Holliday at 4 WAR (d_f)? 1/$20M, 2/$39M, 3/$57M, 4/$73M, 5/$88M, 6/$100M, 7/$108M...

At 4.3 (James): 1/$21M, 2/$42M, 3/$62M, 4/$80M, 5/$86M, 6/$111M, 7/$122M...

This assumes that the projections are in the right ballpark, and, even more difficult, that it's $4.8 for WAR. And these are just estimates, not taking into accoujnt long-term security, etc. This is the alleged "fair market" value given the above caveats. But should a team pay that? For most teams -- no. A team on a budget, with a budget comparable to most of their peers, has to be getting more than the average baseball dollars worth for their money. This is what an average team will pay.

Average teams finish .500.

On average.

Now we'll see what the Red Sox, Yankees, Cardinals, and who knows who else thinks.