Explaining PEVA - #2 Run Production

Thought it was about time we delved a bit further into the PEVA Major League Baseball Player's Rating system as the 2009 baseball season moves further and we begin to see player value in view again. Back in February, we discussed the girth of the system in our article on Ben Sheets (see Durability and Why the Baseball Evaluation System Values It So Much. The two factors that go into that girth provide 1/3 of the player's value, both for a pitcher or position player. This is true no matter the era or season the player played in, too.

But, oh, that's not very sexy. Girth. Isn't that something only sumo players and offensive lineman find attractive. That's a good point. But the point here is, the PEVA system may gain it's weight from those unsexy girth stats such as Games, Games Started, Plate Appearances, and Innings Pitched, but the alluring stats flesh out the system, and begin to tell us who the stars of the game truly are, not only for a season, but for their careers.

And the first one we'll discuss for Position Players and Batters is likely the most important of them all, ... Run Production. How do we define Run Production? Runs and Runs Batted In combined. No, this is not the Runs Created Stat that many use, where they delete Home Runs from the number so as not to count it twice. We count it twice, as a batter who can not only score that run, but knock it in is more valuable than the other player dependent on a Run Producer, too. There might be some disagreement on our take on this, but after those 5,000 hours of developing the system (and an initial thought to use Runs Created instead), Run Production became the first dependent production stat used in the PEVA index.

Like the value placed on the Durability Stats, the Run Production factor of a player is measured on a scale from the MAXIMUM for the year in question vs. the AVERAGE for the year in question. A player below the average is weighted down to a percentage of the value, based on the same scale. After calculation, this factor becomes one of the six multiples that will make up the PEVA Rating (Scaled between 0-64).

But is Run Production Only as Valuable as Innings Pitched or Plate Appearances, that doesn't seem right?

No, it isn't. Run Production is the Factor which plays a part in other factors as well, which will be discussed further in another Explaining PEVA installment. But for now, it affects the remaining three... Field Factor, On Base Percentage, and Slugging Percentage. While all three of those categories have their own inherent factor, they are modified by Run Production if Run Production reaches a certain threshold and the factor for those categories fall below the Run Production factor.

So, for the position player, you can say that Run Production becomes the most important factor of the six categories, although for most players, it is only equal to the others. However, in special circumstances, depending on the type of player and their value to the team, it rises in importance to the PEVA index and to the way players have been paid.