Creating Runs

In my last post, I compiled a bunch of stats that the Twins could, on average, be expected to amass in 2009. I guessed, based on individual players' career numbers, that the team would end up with 814 runs, 15 fewer than in 2008. But there are better ways of projecting how many runs a team should score based on their other stats, so I decided to take what I'd found and apply it to the various formulae for Runs Created.

In addition to what I'd put together already (AB, Avg/OBP/Slg, H, R, RBI, 2B, 3B, HR, SF, K, BB, HBP), I needed SB, CS, IBB, SH, and GIDP in order to plug all the numbers in. Here are those additional stats for my projected Twins lineup, again using career averages for the players aged 25-35 and 2008 numbers for the younger guys, adjusted for the projected number of AB:

Span: 34 SB, 13 CS, 6 IBB, 15 SH, 6 GIDP
Casilla: 11 SB, 3 CS, 0 IBB, 20 SH, 11 GIDP
Mauer: 8 SB, 2 CS, 13 IBB, 1 SH, 17 GIDP
Morneau: 1 SB, 2 CS, 12 IBB, 0 SH, 15 GIDP
Cuddyer: 7 SB, 3 CS, 4 IBB, 0 SH, 17 GIDP
Kubel: 3 SB, 1 CS, 2 IBB, 1 SH, 15 GIDP
Young: 14 SB, 5 CS, 7 IBB, 1 SH, 19 GIDP
Buscher/Harris: 2 SB, 2 CS, 0 IBB, 4 SH, 16 GIDP
Punto: 18 SB, 7 CS, 1 IBB, 7 SH, 9 GIDP

Redmond: 0 SB, 0 CS, 0 IBB, 0 SH, 5 GIDP
Tolbert: 15 SB, 2 CS, 0 IBB, 4 SH, 11 GIDP
Pridie: 8 SB, 2 CS, 1 IBB, 2 SH, 2 GIDP

Team Total: 121 SB, 42 CS, 56 IBB, 55 SH, 143 GIDP
2008 Twins: 102 SB, 42 CS, 48 IBB, 52 SH, 142 GIDP

Add those to the totals from the other categories:

Team Totals: 5598 AB, .285/.349/.426, 1595 H, 814 R, 768 RBI, 291 2B, 48 3B, 134 HR, 67 SF, 925 K, 555 BB, 35 HBP
2008 Twins: 5641 AB, .279/.340/.408, 1572 H, 829 R, 791 RBI, 298 2B, 49 3B, 111 HR, 72 SF, 979 K, 529 BB, 36 HBP

and I've got everything I need to calculate 4 different flavors of Runs Created.

RC: 826
RCSB: 840
RCTech: 840
RC2002: 850

I was surprised to find that, in every variation of the formula, my estimate of 814 runs proved to be conservative.

I'm not satisfied that I've given so many AB to Jason Pridie, or with the minor league numbers I had to use in his projection. Now that the Twins' have signed Luis Matos to a minor league deal, I think his MLB experience makes him a likelier bench OF for the Twins than Pridie. Better yet, he has MLB stats from which I can derive averages:

189 AB, .255/.312/.375, 48 H, 25 R, 16 RBI, 10 2B, 1 3B, 4 HR, 1 SF, 35 K, 13 BB, 3 HBP, 0 IBB, 8 SB, 3 CS, 3 SH, 4 GIDP

While Matos' MLB averages don't quite measure up to Pridie's minor league averages, they don't make a significant difference in the team projections. I'm sticking to my guess that the 2009 Twins, if healthy, should be able to surpass 800 runs scored, as they have done in 2 of the last 3 seasons.