Defense at Third

As Westbay-san has pointed out previously, many people are quick to conclude that a lot of the Japanese players are poor fielders. Since Norihiro Nakamura almost became a Met, and Hiroki Kokubo and Akinori Iwamura both could be headed to MLB in the near future, I've decided to start my examination of this at the hot corner.

The following tables -- one based on 2002 stats, the other on career stats -- are sorted by range factor first, followed by fielding percentage. Why? Because it's more important to field a lot of balls than it is to field the balls that you happen to reach cleanly. That is, fielding range is generally more important than fielding reliability. There are still problems with range factor, of course. The pitching staff can significantly influence an infielder's score, both in what kinds of balls are hit (ground vs. fly) and where they're hit (left-handed pitching means more balls to the left side of the infield, and vice versa). But it's the best we're going to get with the available data, and I trust defensive statistics more than the naked eye despite their drawbacks.

A couple more things: Only MLB players who played 100 or more games at third in 2002 are on the list, and I used (A + PO) / G to calculate range factor. I would've used the preferred method, 9 * (A + PO) / Inn, but innings played data is not available for the Japanese players. So the scores for the MLB players are lower -- and less precise -- than what you'll find listed elsewhere. Can't be helped; comparing players using two different formulas would be next to useless.

2002 Name G PO A E DP FP RnF Rolen, Scott 155 133 335 16 41 0.967 3.02 Chavez, Eric 143 120 301 17 24 0.961 2.94 Alfonzo, Edgardo 134 95 278 12 22 0.969 2.78 Polanco, Placido 131 90 271 8 33 0.978 2.76 Iwamura, Akinori 140 114 269 8 19 0.980 2.74 Lowell, Mike 159 150 286 14 36 0.969 2.74 Koskie, Korey 138 118 254 12 16 0.969 2.70 Ventura, Robin 137 109 261 23 22 0.941 2.70 Boone, Aaron 154 90 324 20 42 0.954 2.69 Randa, Joe 129 108 234 10 12 0.972 2.65 Beltre, Adrian 157 120 294 20 18 0.954 2.64 Truby, Chris 120 84 229 16 26 0.951 2.61 Batista, Tony 154 111 289 16 35 0.962 2.60 Blum, Geoff 104 68 199 8 27 0.971 2.57 Ramirez, Aramis 131 78 255 19 32 0.946 2.54 Zeile, Todd 139 87 257 21 23 0.942 2.47 Hillenbrand, Shea 156 101 282 23 27 0.943 2.46 Glaus, Troy 156 100 281 20 30 0.950 2.44 Perry, Herb 112 83 189 14 16 0.951 2.43 Castilla, Vinny 139 75 256 6 23 0.982 2.38 Nakamura, Norihiro 138 106 222 14 22 0.959 2.38 Hinske, Eric 148 103 246 20 14 0.946 2.36 Cirillo, Jeff 141 112 217 9 23 0.973 2.33 Bell, David 139 78 244 9 21 0.973 2.32 Kokubo, Hiroki 135 101 199 7 16 0.977 2.22 Mueller, Bill 104 62 159 6 19 0.974 2.13

Career Name G PO A E DP FP RnF Rolen, Scott 897 745 1,796 94 160 0.964 2.83 Nakamura, Norihiro 1,017 858 1,872 105 169 0.963 2.68 Ventura, Robin 1,793 1,411 3,393 214 342 0.957 2.68 Castilla, Vinny 1,153 737 2,314 120 242 0.962 2.65 Batista, Tony 446 326 851 51 100 0.958 2.64 Boone, Aaron 542 359 1,057 72 103 0.952 2.61 Lowell, Mike 529 420 954 39 103 0.972 2.60 Chavez, Eric 556 391 1,054 56 83 0.963 2.60 Beltre, Adrian 654 487 1,186 101 103 0.943 2.59 Cirillo, Jeff 1,186 803 2,252 108 246 0.966 2.58 Glaus, Troy 672 455 1,276 98 116 0.946 2.58 Randa, Joe 930 661 1,713 103 155 0.958 2.55 Alfonzo, Edgardo 515 351 956 42 85 0.969 2.54 Iwamura, Akinori 479 336 883 48 64 0.962 2.54 Koskie, Korey 516 348 954 47 71 0.965 2.52 Perry, Herb 337 253 587 40 50 0.955 2.49 Zeile, Todd 1,388 897 2,535 209 219 0.943 2.47 Polanco, Placido 279 168 519 13 57 0.981 2.46 Ramirez, Aramis 448 236 861 70 87 0.940 2.45 Truby, Chris 229 152 408 36 45 0.940 2.45 Mueller, Bill 725 476 1,264 71 126 0.961 2.40 Blum, Geoff 232 143 412 20 45 0.965 2.39 Hinske, Eric 148 103 246 20 14 0.946 2.36 Hillenbrand, Shea 285 189 483 41 43 0.942 2.36 Kokubo, Hiroki 463 334 724 25 70 0.977 2.29 Bell, David 466 262 769 44 59 0.959 2.21

Iwamura more than held his own in 2002. No surprise there, his defense has been improving each year. (I hope you're paying attention, Jim Hendry.) And while both Nakamura and Kokubo finished toward the bottom in 2002, Nori's career stats paint a different picture. He might not be pretty to watch, but his defense has been steady at the very least during his tenure. The same cannot be said of Hiroki, who's lack of range is a concern despite his high fielding percentage.