re: Jeter To The Outfield??

With the range that Cano has, I don't think Jeter's range needs to be HUGE. Why go so far when Cano has no problem fielding it?

stat geeks are about to murder you with that response. But i agree, he isnt as bad as they are about to make out.


but anyway, the yankees want to move him from SS. They think he will eventually too old to play there, yet they want to move him to another position that relies on athleticism.

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They think he will eventually too old to play there, yet they want to move him to another position that relies on athleticism.

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Gotcha.

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With the range that Cano has, I don't think Jeter's range needs to be HUGE. Why go so far when Cano has no problem fielding it?

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It doesn't have to be huge, but watching Yankee games last year, if he literally wasn't right on it, it was a single. I'm not saying move him to the outfield, I'm saying he better hope his bat keeps making up for his very small zone (A Rod isn't a spring chicken on the other side anyways).

FWIW, Cano's UZR and UZR/150 are pretty terrible too.

It's not just the stats... watch Jeter play the position. He's friggin' terrible. He doesn't make errors because he doesn't get to any balls. He doesn't make errors. Big whoop. He doesn't make outs, either.

The enxt time he stops a ball up the middle will be the first. He's miserable going to his left. He's decent going to his right, but he also has A-Rod there to soak up balls. He's sure-handed and has a good arm, but my God, his range is pathetic. I don't see how anyone can watch a bunch of Yankee games and think Jeter is good defensively.

That's just observation. His stats are also bad, though they have improved from God awful to merely below average. Of course defensive metrics aren't perfect, but Jeter scores poorly in all of them, and its bourne out by observation. There's no reason to throw out the numbers. They support just watching his play.

Jeter is below-average defensively, but makes up for it a little bit by being very well-positioned all the time.

All things considered, he is not THE worst defensive shortstop in the MLB. Bottom 5? Still maybe no. Bottom 10? Yes.

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Look, I probably watch close to 1000 MLB games a year. I dont just look at the stats. In fact, I rarely do.

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I highly doubt you watch 1000 games a year. there simply isn't time. That's over 5 games a night, every night of the season. Unless you don't work or sleep, that's not true.

I watch about 100-150 games a year. Which is still only a tiny fraction of the games played. Not looking at stats, to me, is just being willfully ignorant. I think looking at only stats is also ignorant, but to ignore the record of what happened isn't a virtue. Stats remove our perception bias.

And I said Jeter has gone from terrible to merely below average. He's obviously worked on his game. Like I said, he's sure handed and has a good arm. He just has miserable range. So saying he's not been terrible in the last 3 years doesn't refute my point: I already said that.

What good is it to get to more balls and make more errors? Because even a lot of errors is balanced out by making outs. Compare Jeter to Andrus, a rangy player who does make a lot of errors.

Jeter played 1303 defensive innings at short. He only made 6 erors, but he made 182 PO and 365 A. That's 547 outs.

Andrus played 1291 defensive innings, about the same. He made 16 errors, which is a lot, though not Jose Offerman levels. He had 242 PO and 401 A for 643 outs.

So.. would you trade 10 errors for 100 outs? I certainly would.