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February 22, 2006

Team Health Report Review

Evaluating the Results

by Marc Normandin

How accurate is the Team Health Report system? Any system can be analyzed in retrospect, as odd as that seems for a predictive system. 2005 was a season filled with a variety of fluke and freak injuries, as well as what seemed like an abnormal number of pitchers hit by line drives. This included Matt Clement, who took a shot to the head over the summer, and Roy Halladay, who had his Cy Young caliber season ended by a comebacker as well. Many of the players on the Disabled List made their annual appearances, but there were some who made their first appearance, like Todd Helton, who normally plays through back pain all season. Various players escaped the disabled list, even with serious injuries, due to the roster expansion at the end of the year. Ken Griffey Jr., a perennial red light at this stage of his career, was one of those players who enjoy messing with the accuracy of the Team Health Reports. It's likely that if Griffey had a choice, he would have avoided injury, the red light, and the disabled list altogether.

The system itself is easily explained: red lights signify high risk (50% and above), yellow lights signify moderate risk (between 26 and 49%), and green lights signify low risk (25% and below). Having a light in a particular color does not mean a player will or will not be injured; rather, the light system measures risk of injury, which is not a certain thing. Teams can take steps to preserve one of their red light players, rather than run them into the ground and cause additional injury problems, which would fulfill the risk prophecy presented in the early spring. With that in mind, let’s take a look at the data from 2005:

               DL Stint   No DL     Total    % of Total
Red Light        58         55       113        51%
Yellow Light     70        110       180        39%
Green Light      52        144       196        27%

The percentage of accurate red lights dropped from last year by 8%, but there are a few reasons for this. The aforementioned instances with players like Ken Griffey Jr., who were injured late enough to avoid the disabled list altogether, sort of throw a wrench into the entire operation. Jason Giambi was a red light in 2005, but proved himself to be up to the task of playing 139 games. He was a red light because no one knew if he would be able to come back and play at all. No one crashed into Marcus Giles in 2005, which means he was able to stay off of the DL. Teammate John Smoltz was given a red light since no one was entirely sure how his arm was going to hold up after returning to the rotation for the first time in over three years. He survived, and threw 230 regular season innings to boot. Johnny Damon most likely should have gone on the disabled list to recover from his various minor injuries, but with Adam Stern as the fourth outfielder after Gabe Kapler’s leg injury, and the Red Sox fighting for a playoff spot, that wasn't really an option. Scott Kazmir was kept under 200 innings in his first full major league season, which most likely kept his awkward mechanics from sending him to the DL. Kudos to Tampa Bay’s people on that one. Jay Gibbons, who has chronic hip and back problems, played in 130 games and posted his best offensive season, with an OPS well above the league average and the best season of his career. Joe Mauer’s knee held up during the season, and he even stole 13 bases while only getting caught once, good for a 93% success rate.

On the other side, a few of the red light players were guaranteed to hit the DL, since that was where they began the season. Curt Schilling, Lance Berkman, Carlos Guillen (although he made an additional trip to the disabled list later, as did Schilling) Jason Kubel, Rocco Baldelli and a few others all had major injuries or surgeries that needed additional time to recover, and started (or ended, in a few cases) their seasons disabled. This makes up for some of the inaccuracies caused by players avoiding the DL, although it could swing too far in one direction or the other in the future.

A few players made multiple trips to the disabled list for reasons that had nothing to do with their lights. Nomar Garciaparra returned from his wrist and leg troubles, and then proceeded to have a horrific injury where his tendon “literally tore away from the bone,” to quote Will Carroll in his Under the Knife article. Mike Cameron started the year on the disabled list, then visited it again after his collision with Carlos Beltran. You know, the one that makes me sort of squeamish even writing about it.

Yellow Lights