MVN: Most Valuable Network

You're probably looking around going, "Where's my roundtable?" And you will have a roundtable. Probably Friday. In the meantime, I'm laying out some finger sandwiches and lemonade - a light afternoon snack, if you'd like. Partake if you wish.

So I have a baserunning evaluation metric, measured in runs above/below average. Nothing fancy or special, really. Dan Fox has covered this ground a lot better than I have. (And that's just the tip of the iceberg.) So here's how I dos it:

1. Start with Retrosheet play-by-play data.
2. Calculate run expectancy separately for each base, like this, for each season.
3. Looking only at the lead baserunner, calculate the average destination run expectancy for each event. Everything was broken down by the following categories:
   • Number of outs remaining,
   • Event code (single, double, out, wild pitch, etc.),
   • Batted ball type,
   • Whether the batter was bunting,
   • Whether the ball was hit to the battery (pitcher/catcher), an infielder or an outfielder,
   • Whether the ball was hit to the left or right side of the field.
4. Compare what a player did to the average.

Let's say you have a runner on first, no outs. Most of the time a runner ends up on second, some of the time on third, when a ground-ball single is hit into left field. If a runner ends up on second, he gets a (very slight) debit. If he ends up on third, he gets a credit. All of these changes are tracked and totaled up.

Simple and easy, right? Here's the top ten baserunning +/- seasons, 1953-2007:

You'll note that the best baserunning season of the Retroera was only worth 12 runs above average. Obviously you'd prefer a good baserunner to a bad baserunner, all else being equal, but it definitely takes a backseat to hitting and defense.

Ten worst seasons?

UPDATE: This is too large for an EditGrid, so here's a full spreadsheet, including career totals. Requires something that can read Excel files. Best I can do for y'all right now.