Saturday, December 04, 2010
Forecast Mat Latos
Latos is a year and a half younger than Felix, with 130 fewer MLB starts. If we had to hand out a 100MM$ contract, I think most of us would give it to Felix, not Latos. But, I could be wrong.
Bill James has Latos forecast for a slightly lower ERA and slightly lower FIP. (Yes, Petco, but that’s still extremely close.) I remember Brian/Oliver having Latos as much better than Felix.
Now, this is not to say that Latos is not in fact better than Felix. He could very well be. But the uncertainty level around Latos is simply much wider than Felix (if you limit yourself only to performance data). You can include “toolsy” data, but, well, it’s not like Felix is skating by here. I don’t see how the uncertainty level will be reduced here. So, this is what is being forecasted:
——|———o———|————————————- Latos
———-|—-o—-|——————————————Felix
The “o” is the mean forecast point. The “|” is the uncertainty range of the mean forecast. Put simply, Latos has a much better chance of being a true talent best pitcher in the league than Felix. Personally, without doing much work on this, I’d expect something like this:
———-|———o———|———————————Latos
———-|—-o—-|——————————————Felix
I think the best you can give is that they both are equal true talents at best, with Felix being likely better on average. Or, I think most people would see it this way:
—————|———o———|—————————- Latos
———-|—-o—-|——————————————Felix
That there’s a chance that Latos is better than Felix, but not that much. It’s still there.
So, I ask the forecasters out there, what do you have for the mean forecast for Latos and Felix (and Josh Johnson, and Halladay and Lincecum), and what is the uncertainty range (90% to 10%) of that mean forecast?
I would like you guys to present BOTH pieces of data.
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