Predicting steals

[TS Garp]

I've always found steals incredibly difficult to predict. You'd have Corey Koskie of all people go from 5 one year to 27 the next, only to never top 11 again. Vladimir Guerrero went from 9 to 37 to 40 and then never went over 15. Recently, Mark Reynolds went from 0 to 11 to 24 to 7.

It's very early, but some of the surprises so far:

Mike Trout: 55 ab's, 16 hits, 4 walks, 1/1 sb
Jose Altuve: 51 ab's, 17 hits (14 singles), 4 walks, 0/0 sb

I'm sure there are others, but those two really stand out in the early going.

[Grinch]

Fast guys steal more than slow.......

Don't look at SB until the weather warms up, guys don't run in the cold.

[bryanbutler]

guys don't run in the cold.

except the ones that do. reyes (well, not any more, for a while), andrus, crisp.

i'd be interested in seeing a cumulative steals vs. date graph. where's MJ when you need him?!

[Controller Jacobs]

Steals certainly have the greatest variance of the standard hitting stats, which should reduce their value in your valuations. What you want to do is put yourself in the way of being able to get steals, in the same way you might do saves.

Actively work your reserve spots to keep guys with SB potential, and watch MI/OF injuries the way you would closers. Using that type of aggressive approach, last year I acquired Rajai Davis and Carlos Gomez by small trade/faab respectively. It doesn't always work out perfectly, but it's one of the few stats that lets you trade manual labor for low risk(salary-wise)/decent reward options.

[Gregg]

I think sometimes we can over think it. I try to keep it simple.

Get one (or two) of the guys who swipped 40 bags last year, expect 30, pray for no injuries, fill in with postion players that have some history of some sbs. If the 30 sb guys get 40 or more sell off excess for current needs.

[kldub4life]

My experience is tring to reach for that speed guy (one dimensional type) in a draft or auction is a recipe for failure. Not just because of the unpredicatable nature of steals, but best case scenario that one dimensional type might if you are lucky help you in 3 of the 5 standard categories. I have done much better through the years when I have been able to get solid across the board types that might be looking at at least 15/15 that will also fair better in the other 3 categories. Rarely do these guys under perform their steals projection (for me) and sometime they might bump it a little, as I also target players under 30. Just my 2 cents!

[Kevin Seitzer]

Jose Altuve: 51 ab's, 17 hits (14 singles), 4 walks, 0/0 sb

Minor quibble: Altuve was caught stealing last night, so he's now 0 for 1.

Altuve has been on first base 18 times this year with second base open. In 7 of those cases, we were either leading or trailing by at least 4 runs, and he did not attempt a steal in any of those situations. In the 11 cases where the score was within 3 runs, once he was thrown out attempting to advance on a ball that got away from the catcher, once he was caught stealing, once he ran and the ball was put in play, once he ran and the ball was fouled off, once he advanced to second on a wild pitch, once he advanced to second on defensive indifference, and twice he did not run on the first pitch but the batter put it in play so he didn't have any more chances. Three times he had two or more pitches to run and did not.

For what that's worth.

(edit to fix the numbers)