Where the Inefficiencies Are
Jeff Sackmann has an article up at The Hardball Times (full disclosure: I am a contributor to THT) called “The New Inefficiency.” In it, Jeff identifies risk acceptance as the current market inefficiency. Identifying and exploiting such inefficiencies is a key strategy employed by “small-market” teams to help reduce the effect of budgetary imbalances between them and their richer counterparts.
For example, as chronicled in Moneyball, the Oakland A’s at one time were able to exploit teams’ lack of demand for players with high on-base percentage. Now that this is common knowledge, they are no longer able to use that particular inefficiency to their fullest advantage.
But the A’s, as any smart organization will do, have adapted and found new ways to help level the playing field. And they’re not the only ones. Here are some concrete examples from the article:
That could mean, as in Cleveland’s case, starting the year with a bunch of platoons with the understanding that some halves of those platoons won’t be available for a month here and there. For Toronto, it means fully expecting to use eight or nine starters to get through the year. For Oakland, it means accepting that you may have to improvise to put three outfielders and a designated hitter in the lineup every night.
Fascinating concept. The San Diego Padres have been doing this with their bullpen for years. While other teams are throwing money at guys with more of a track record, the Padres tend to gravitate toward pitchers that are flawed in some way. Grab enough of them, and you increase the odds that you’ll make it through the season with a decent aggregate performance from your relievers. It doesn’t always work perfectly, but that’s where “risk” comes into play — and why these players don’t cost as much as Danys Baez or Jeff Suppan.
How will teams exploit this “new inefficiency”? This is an excellent question; however, I expect that we’re a bit late in asking it. Jeff has pointed out several examples where organizations already are using risk to their advantage, which most likely means that organizations only just now getting around to it may have missed the proverbial boat.
The good news is, there will be other inefficiencies down the line to exploit. Such is the nature of markets…
Tags: baseball, danys_baez, hardball_times, inefficiency, jeff_suppan, mlb, risk, san_diego_padresRelated Stories
POSTED IN: Strategy
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