Willy Taveras Does One Thing Well

by R.J. Anderson on Sep 9, 2008 2:13 PM EDT

Using Tango's linear weights chart I decided to see which base thiefs with more than 10 steals had earned the most runs for their teams. Here's how the results came out:

PLAYER	TEAM	SB	CS	Runs
Willy Taveras	COL	66	7	10.764
Jimmy Rollins	PHI	41	2	7.349
Ichiro Suzuki	SEA	40	4	6.592
Jacoby Ellsbury	BOS	44	8	6.236
Grady Sizemore	CLE	35	4	5.627
Jose Reyes	NYM	47	13	5.405
Michael Bourn	HOU	37	8	4.885
Juan Pierre	LAD	38	9	4.796
Matt Holliday	COL	25	1	4.543
Ian Kinsler	TEX	26	2	4.454
Randy Winn	SFO	25	2	4.261
Brian Roberts	BAL	36	10	4.128
B.J. Upton	TAM	42	15	3.876
Matt Kemp	LAD	33	9	3.831
Johnny Damon	NYY	28	6	3.712
Alex Rios	TOR	30	8	3.534
Rajai Davis	OAK/SFO	27	6	3.519
Shane Victorino	PHI	31	10	3.163
Alfonso Soriano	CHC	19	2	3.103
Carlos Beltran	NYM	20	3	3.014
Nate McLouth	PIT	20	3	3.014
Joey Gathright	KAN	21	4	2.925
Chone Figgins	LAA	31	11	2.881
Carl Crawford	TAM	25	7	2.851
Corey Hart	MIL	22	5	2.836
Carlos Gomez	MIN	29	10	2.777
Hanley Ramirez	FLA	31	12	2.599
Kazuo Matsui	HOU	19	4	2.539
Alex Rodriguez	NYY	17	3	2.435
Orlando Cabrera	CHW	18	4	2.346
Cesar Izturis	STL	19	5	2.257
Lastings Milledge	WAS	20	6	2.168
Fred Lewis	SFO	21	7	2.079
Rickie Weeks	MIL	18	5	2.064
Jason Bartlett	TAM	18	5	2.064
Coco Crisp	BOS	20	7	1.886
Torii Hunter	LAA	17	5	1.871
Brandon Phillips	CIN	23	10	1.619
Bobby Abreu	NYY	18	10	0.654
Ryan Theriot	CHC	21	13	0.387

The most surprising name for me was Matt Holliday. I can safely say I wasn't aware of his stolen bases this season. Lance Berkman also jumps off the page. Oh and Carlos Beltran, so good, so so good.

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Comments

Did you adjust this for stealing third?

by nimurray on Sep 9, 2008 4:28 PM EDT reply actions

I did not.

by R.J. Anderson on Sep 9, 2008 5:20 PM EDT up reply actions

how about the players who have cost their teams the most?

and maybe a list of players with the biggest discrepency between their raw SB total and their actual value added? (Not sure how you’d define that, though — raw subtraction doesn’t make sense.)

by Sky Kalkman on Sep 9, 2008 4:33 PM EDT reply actions

Lance Berkman?

Berkman jumped so far off the page I don’t see him…are you confusing him with Lastings Milledge?

My money would be on Theriot (worst percentage), with Hanley Ramirez or B.J. Upton running second. (Close futility ratio for the two—Ramirez slightly worse in the standard “take two off for every CS” ballparking.)

by klhoughton on Sep 10, 2008 10:39 PM EDT reply actions