Sox Machine: Chicago White Sox blog

Evaluating Jeff Cox's first season

Until knoxfire had called him "flat-out bad" in the last discussion, I can't say I gave a whole lot of thought to the job Jeff Cox did in his first year coaching third base.

Good sends, bad sends -- I know he had his share, but otherwise I can't say Cox made a particularly strong impression on me.  Part of it's a hangover from Joey Cora's kamikaze ways.  Razor Shines and Cox look like four-way stop signs in comparison.

After mulling it over for a minute, my initial guess was that Cox played it safer with the plodders, but also held back the faster runners a little too often.  By and large, that's about the gist of it.

First, here's the hard data according to Bill James Online, starting from the last year of Cora:

Year	1st to 3rd		2nd to home		1st to home
	Moved	Chances	Moved	Chances	Moved	Chances	Bases taken	BR outs	BR Gain	SB Gain	Net
2006	60	237	124	226	13	50	162	49	-29	-1	-30
2007	50	184	101	157	16	58	116	32	-28	-12	-40
2008	62	209	91	173	14	51	168	40	-19	-1	-20

(Quick note: "Bases taken" is defined as advancing on a wild pitch, passed ball, balk, sac fly or defensive indifference.)

I guess you could say the Sox were either twice as good or half as bad last year.  Here are some quick conclusions from that chart:

• Cora was indeed the most aggressive of the bunch.
  
• 2007's awfulness is inflated by Juan Uribe's 1-for-10 performance stealing bases, which was the result of getting hung out to dry on plenty of hit and runs.
• "Baserunning outs" is a little misleading for '07 because they were so bad at getting on base in the first place.
  
• Cox did hold runners more -- the 52.6 percent "2nd to Home" rate is the lowest in the seven years of data Baseball Info Solutions has.

Expounding on that last note a bit more, I was partially right that the Sox's sloths were given the stop sign far more often. 

Paul Konerko	Moved	Chances	A.J. Pierzynski	Moved	Chances
2007	9	19	2007	5	9
2008	4	14	2008	7	20
Jermaine Dye	Moved	Chances	Jim Thome	Moved	Chances
2007	9	19	2007	7	15
2008	8	17	2008	8	16

However, it's hard to really compare the jobs done by Shines and Cox because they had a far different group to work with.  Those four are the only real constants -- the other starters on whom the Sox relied for speed differed greatly:

2007:  Joe Crede, Juan Uribe, Scott Podsednik, Jerry Owens, Darin Erstad, Tadahito Iguchi, Danny Richar and Josh Fields scored from second 68 percent of the time.

2008:  Crede, Uribe, Carlos Quentin, Nick Swisher, Alexei Ramirez and Orlando Cabrera scored from second 57 percent of the time (Ramirez is the big surprise here, going only 5-for-12 in this category).

Say what you will about Owens and Erstad, but when they got on base, they took advantage of it.  They combined to 21-for-26 in the second-to-home department, combining for a +25 value when leaving stolen bases out of it.

The Sox didn't really have anybody that compared to them -- especially since Cabrera and Swisher really dropped off in terms of their overall baserunning scores.  Cabrera went from +26 to -5 (due to making six more outs on the basepaths), and Swisher went from +23 to -1.

I have a feeling Cabrera isn't a good indicator of any coach's talents, because he's been schizophrenic in this department.  Between 2003 and 2004, he went from +16 to -10, and considering the way he often made his own decisions on the basepaths, the career year in 2007 was probably due to a lot of good luck and legs that were a year fresher.

Swisher also had a career year in 2007, but he had a solid record of baserunning values well in the positives (+7 and +9) beforehand, so it'll be interesting to see which direction his performances goes in New York.

Imagine where the Sox would've been without Brian Anderson (5-for-5) and Dewayne Wise (3-for-3).

OK, so what does that tell us?

There's no argument that Cox was stingier with his windmills in 2008 compared to his predecessors.  That was to be expected, because Pirates fans criticized him for being too conservative in his final year in Pittsburgh with a similarly bucket-footed team.  (For what it's worth, one of my first impressions of Cox in the spring was that he was "ultra-cautious.")

Still, I don't think he was much of a factor, which is really what most third base coaches hope to be.  Going through the game logs, I only singled him out for a handful of bad decisions.

The worst was testing Jose Guillen's arm with A.J. Pierzynski July 20 -- there's still no explanation for that one.  The others:

June 10:  Quentin is thrown out easily by Brent Clevelen.

August 15:  Anderson tries scoring from first on a bad pickoff due to Oakland's expansive foul territory, but first baseman Daric Barton makes a perfect throw.

March 31 and July 12:  Cabrera blows through Cox stop signs and scored easily.

But looking through the other times I mentioned Cox, there are a few times I complimented his decisions.  So I can't really find much of a reason to fault Cox.  He might have hurt the Sox's chances to win a couple games, but in some instances he helped greatly.  One example was a ballsy send of Anderson in the Eddings! game -- Anderson would've been out if Shawn Riggans held onto the ball, but considering the Sox's problems with runners in scoring position against Tampa, it was better to take his chances on a rare hit.

Cox will probably naturally look worse for two reasons:

No. 1:  Watching half the Sox roster try to score from second is as agonizing as trying to drink a Wendy's Frosty through a straw.  When Ken Griffey Jr. replaced Quentin (who had an excellent season taking the extra base) and he and Konerko forced Swisher out of the starting lineup, calling second base "scoring position" could have been grounds for a false advertising lawsuit.

No. 2:  The Sox hit so many flies that there aren't a lot of natural chances to advance.  They're literally the flyballingest team in the majors.

So ultimately, I have to disagree with knoxfire that Cox was "flat-out bad."  Personally, I think a more accurate label would be "decent, considering the circumstances."  Ultimately, though, I don't think there's enough compelling data -- and compelling baserunners for that matter -- to make any big judgments from one year.

(And you could say that I went from not thinking about it to thinking too much about it, using 1,000+ words to express how I don't feel that strongly about something.  But hey, it's the offseason.)

***********************

Kenny Williams, meanwhile, answered one of Fundman's questions in Barry Rozner's latest column:  What does the budget look like?


"These are serious issues and we can't live with our heads in the sand.''

On the bright side, the Sox have one more quarter than they did last year.  They'll have to update their Christmas cards!

The Cheat has a nice write-up assessing what it could all mean.