Cyber Me This

The White Sox and MLB.com ran a story the other day about Sox centerfielder Adam Engel.  According to the gibber folks at Statcast, Engel was tied for third among centerfielders last year in recording sixteen Outs Above Average and in catch probability.  Now, let’s try translating that into English.

I take my cybermetrics with a huge grain of salt, namely that any measurement of performance based on an “average” baseline isn’t in the least bit objective, as in one and one are two.  No, the measurement reflects the biases of the person(s) defining the parameters of the measurement.  That said, Statcast may prove Engel deserves a Gold Glove.  Whatever he accomplished happened over little more than half a season, 95 games to be precise.

In terms of Outs Above Average, Statcast rates Byron Buxton of the Twins as the best, with an OAA of 25 in 137 games played.  So, I wonder what Engel would do in 137 games, or 162.  Or compare Engel to Braves’ centerfielder Ender Inciarte, who finished Buxton with a 19 OAA.  Inciarte did that in 156 games.  Again, you can only imagine how Engel would do playing that many games.

Buxton and Inciarte were Gold Glove winners in their respective leagues last season, with Buxton recording 400 chances to Inciarte’s 420.  By my primitive calculations, Engel would manage 443 chances in 162 games, considerably more than Inciarte (vs 473 for Buxton over a full season).  The man may not be able to hit it, but he sure can pick it.

One last thing.  According to Statcast, Engel played the second shallowest centerfield in all of baseball, on average standing just 305 feet from the plate.  That’s one foot less than the leader, Billy Hamilton of the Reds.  My point?  I just hope the kid learns how to hit before he’s relegated to spending the rest of his career as a fourth outfielder.