The Value of a Perfect Baserunner

How does this theoretical player score? Is he capable of stealing home with a 100% success rate? Does he still need to be driven in? If so, his value decreases substantially, mostly because it limits the opportunities in which he can be maximally effective. He should then only be used where he is the only runner on base—don’t want anyone clogging him—with fewer than two outs (if there are two outs and he’s on third, he still needs a base hit to be driven in—he’s exactly as valuable as the slowest player in this situation).

If he can steal home with a 100% success rate, his run value per game is 1.0 – the probability of an average runner scoring from first, plus whatever he’s able to contribute on defense. If he’s consistently used with no outs, he’s worth 0.12 runs a game or so, just with his running. If he’s consistently used with one out, he’s worth 0.47 runs or so. With two out, he’s worth 0.78 runs per game.

If he can’t steal home with a 100% success rate, he’s about as valuable as the difference between an average runner on first and an average runner on third, since he’s able to steal second and third with no impunity. With no out it’s about 0.43 runs. With one out, it’s about the same. With two out, it’s a little less than 0.10 runs. (Assuming he’s used correctly, he’s worth roughly 7 WAR a season, just as a pinch runner.)

The second big factor is this: how much worse than Jeff Francoeur is he at getting on base? If he’s capable of getting on base at even a .250 clip (assuming four PAs a game) and he can steal home 100% of the time, it’s worth playing him everyday, and he’s worth about 16 WAR (just shooting from the hip) on offense/running (1 run a game completely manufactured by his own abilities) , plus his defense, plus however more often than once a game he gets on base. If he’s getting on base significantly less than 25% of the time, he’s actually hurting his value by playing more often (again, depending on how ridiculous you want to make his defense). If he gets on base 0% of the time, he’s absolutely worthless as an everyday player but maintains the above value as a pinch runner.

If such a player existed, he’d easily be worth a roster spot. The problem is that player doesn’t exist, and real pinch runners are not that good. But in the playoffs, when margins of victory are expected to be smaller and you can get away with a smaller pitching staff, it’s not a bad idea to have a Dave Roberts-type on staff.

One. Million. Dollars.

Players like that are useful if a) you can’t find a better way to use the roster spot (in almost every case, you can) and b) you leverage their abilities perfectly.

The best range Runs this year was Franklin Gutierrez at 28.7. So, I’ll give these guys 25, with -1 ErrorR and 0 ArmR and 0 DPR, so that’s 24 runs. Then, they score 162 runs a year, so that’s 186 runs. Adding in replacement thats 206. That’s 20.6 WAR. Even if they DH, they’re still worth 18 WAR which is about $81 Million, at $4.5 Million per WAR. Of course, no team would pay that kind of money to this player, but he’s worth offensively a run a game.
If it was a whole team, it would be 164.8 WAR, so they could have a crappy pitching staff, and still be a playoff team.

circa 1974 A’s…see if that helps. That is exactly what you’re talking about. (he was a track star whom Charlie Finely signed for exactly that purpose. Of course, the perfect base runner (he’s really a base stealer, not a base runner) is dependent on the perfect manager who can put him in the game in the right situation every game, not to mention that you’re burning two players off your bench every time (three players if he’s running for a pinch hitter).

then his .250 OBP would be a liability assuming 2nd or 3rd are occupied. Not to say he wouldnt still be a valuable player, but certainly not worth a run ever 4 at bats as previously stated.