Column on PAs

[jdwexler]

One of the elements that drives scoring in my points league is plate appearances. eg, Jose Reyes is only an elite SS in my league because he gets so many damn hits from his extra PAs. Otherwise, his somewhat pedestrian rate stats (OBA, SLG) would make him a 2nd tier guy.

I wonder if we could pay greater attention to PAs. Specifically, I'd like to see a column that identifies players who should expect to see a change in PAs- due to a shift in lineup order (eg, I believe Hanley is expected to move out of the leadoff spot), a significant change in a team's ability to turn the lineup over, playing time issues/platoons, injury risk, and history of inconsistent PAs.

Perhaps there's just not enough predictive value to take this into consideration. And perhaps this would involve too much overlap with the attention HQ already pays to injuries and PT issues. But, it's something I think about a lot when looking at the CDG results and various projections.

[NICK@HQ]

I know that HQ has always talked about the importance of increased ABs leading to increased counting stats; as you say, the more you have of the one, the more you tend to get of the other. I suppose a simple way to handle this is to take last year's result, then take this year's projections, correlate the two lists and see where the big increases or decreases in ABs are expected to be. An article could come out of that result set where certain players are highlighted.

Yes, I could see an article in the spring covering this once a year could be useful.