Today I downloaded WAR data to see its leader board and found something interesting. Last season Adam Eaton was an outlier for this model (too low) or an outlier for the WAR model (too high). Here is his WAR results from last year and so far this year.
| Rank | WAR | Name_TeamID | Pos | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 16 | 6.2 | Adam_Eaton_CHA | RF-CF | 2016 |
| 285 | 0.3 | Adam_Eaton_WAS | CF | 2017 |
The rank above is amongst all WAR ratings. Here is his WAA results from last year and this year.
| Rank | WAA | Name_TeamID | Pos | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| XXXXX | -1.36 | Adam_Eaton_CHA | RF-CF | 2016 |
| +079+ | 1.32 | Adam_Eaton_WAS | CF | 2017 |
The two systems are opposite. His BA/OBP is 0.297/0.393 this year and 0.284/0.362 for last year. Even that is higher this year yet WAR tanked his rating. Washington is 26-17 which is a WAA=+11 and Adam Eaton represents +1.32 of that. Not sure what the 0.3 means in WAR but Eaton is definitely playing better this season than last and Washington is winning because of it. We’ll dive more into the WAR leader board later. Cubs status update tomorrow.
Note: Data taken from a snapshot that represents all games up to an including 5/21.