WAR: what is it good for?

Written by: JJ Stankevitz on 26th May 2009

WAR: what is it good for? | read this item

When I checked FanGraphs’ value statistics prior to yesterday’s 17-3 drubbing of the Angels, the White Sox were the only team in baseball that had total team WAR that was negative (for those that don’t know what WAR is, it calculates how many wins a player is worth above or below a replacement level player. If you want more info, take some time to read Dave Cameron’s series on win values on FanGraphs). By that definition, the White Sox could have run a team of replacement-level players out every day and had better results than the lineup they were fielding.

Luckily, that 17-3 win brought the White Sox out of the negative WAR doldrums and into the positive, although not by much. The team now sits with a 0.3 WAR, still the worst in baseball.

That’s not to say the White Sox are the worst team in baseball. WAR does not calculate pitching, which has been one of the few general strengths for the White Sox this year (Mark Buehrle, off-and-on John Danks, DJ Carrasco, Octavio Dotel, Scott Linebrink, Matt Thornton, Bobby Jenks, etc). It only calculates for batting and fielding, which have been two major deficiencies for the White Sox this year.

Josh Fields (-1.0 WAR), Chris Getz (-0.6 WAR), Brent Lillibridge (-0.6 WAR), and Wilson Betemit (-0.6 WAR) have been the worst offenders this year, and it’s really not surprising that these players showed up here. Fields and Getz haven’t hit a whole lot while not playing very good defense, Lillibridge never hit and wasn’t great with the glove, and Betemit…well, you all know how bad he has been in the field, at the least.

Surprisingly, Jermaine Dye has a negative WAR, sitting at -0.1. His fielding has really hurt his value this year—which is nothing new for Dye—but his offense hasn’t picked up to the point that he’s making up for his deficiencies in the outfield. In the end, it probably will, but it’s not exactly comforting to see a player like Dye sit in the negative area of WAR after Memorial Day.

WAR isn’t everything—especially early in the year—so take this all with a grain of salt. But it’s just an interesting way to quantify all the struggles the White Sox have had in the few months of the season.

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Topics: White Sox