So over the past week, we looked at the hitting/pitching splits for CBS and LABR. Lots of tables and lots of data. Tables are pretty and data are fun, but ultimately we now need to ask the difficult question: what conclusions can we draw from the data presented?
1. Home leagues do not follow "expert" models, but instead follow projection models.
Frankly, I cannot speak for your home league, since I do not play in it. I can tell you, however, that my home leagues appear to be projection model leagues rather than expert-oriented leagues (a quick thank-you to Mike for the terminology, by the way...I had a different description for it, but Mike used it in a conversation today, and I liked it enough to adopt it). There are very few people in either of my leagues that just pick up a magazine or grab The Leviathan and come to the auction. Patton, BP, and other systems are well-represented, but those bids come from the projections behind those systems, not from the touts themselves.
This is important for a specific reason: know your league. If you know that your league bases its prices off of the experts, then use that information to your advantage. If not, well, then you can use the experts for some guidance. As Mike pointed out in this examination of expert leagues versus home leagues, for all of the complaining about expert league pricing, the experts do come closest to reflecting the true value of the various tiers of hitters and pitchers.
2. Expert Pricing Splits Are Trending to Hitters
Even with the limited data presented, I think we can safely conclude that expert pricing splits are creeping more toward hitters and away from pitchers. Several questions arise, however, as to the "why" behind the conclusion. Here are some possible answers:
A. Hitting is more predictable than pitching.
This is certainly one possibility. Mike spent a lot of time writing about the predictability of pitching here. Ultimately, while the top tier pitchers are more predictable than the crapshoot pitchers, hitters do tend to be more predictable than pitchers overall. Therefore, it makes sense to spend more on hitting than on pitching. There comes a time, however, where pitching prices must stop dropping, which leads to the next possible conclusion....
B. The trend toward hitters is part of a larger cyclical trend.
It strikes me that, in an auction pricing format, that there comes a point where prices can only drop so far for either hitters or pitchers. Seemingly, there is a moment in time where you can only let a pitcher drop to your opponent at so much of a value. Therefore, it is possible that, if we were to extend the data out further, we would find that there is a "back and forth" between particular cap splits, and that the hitting/pitching splits tend to be on a sliding scale between those caps.
On the flip side, perhaps the move from pitchers to hitters is an historically significant one. As Mike reminded me in a conversation this morning, the early league splits were closer to 50/50. Over the course of thirty years, we have now finally reached splits around 70/30. Historically, then, there is a continuing trend to hitters, no matter how incremental in the recent past. Perhaps the money will continue to flow in this direction. The question then will be: how will it impact prices? I tend to think the best pitchers will continue to get paid, but the second tiers and below will continue to get discounted.
C. The trend is negligible in the overall context of league budget.
The changes in splits is relatively small. In fact, the changes work out (with the exception of the CBS N.L. change of $12 from 2010 to 2011) to a paltry $2-$4 per team. Such changes can be easily explained by teams dumping saves, by a LIMA plan, by a Sweeney plan or any other number of factors. If these changes continue to be incremental in the short term, they are likely insignificant. If the changes should continue year after year, however, well, then we need to keep an eye on things and re-evaluate.
The reality is that the data do not support any definitive conclusions. My best advice is to track the splits of your own league on a year by year basis. You certainly want your bid prices to reflect the splits of your league (at the very least, have a rational relationship to those splits) so that you do not become an auction outlier (aside from any specific strategy, of course). This is not to say you should not pay attention to the experts, for the reasons set forth above, but in terms of splits, I would not be too concerned given the small differences between your home league and the expert leagues.
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