In response to nhsteven's comment:

I was thinking this as well. I can't ever remember him making a "bad"defensive play in the clutch (although I've seen good, i.e, the flip play, one of the greatest plays in BB history, and if he doesn't make that play, they don't go to the WS), but I'm sure this has happened.

Most of the times, I bet the fans don't even realize when he has made a bad defensive play.  It's not that he actually made a bad play, but more so that he failed to make a play at all.  No error is assigned, and most fans just take it as a hit by the opposition.

Sometimes his plays look spectacular, but are they really?  A player with poor range can make a routine play seem spectacular, whereas a great defender with good range and agility will make the tough plays look routine.

Costing a team runs defensively does not just mean making a bad play in the clutch.  If Jeter allows a groundball hit that the average SS would have turned into an out, he is indirectly costing his team runs. 

Maybe a run scores on that play.  Maybe a run scores two batters later.  Maybe no runs score but the pitcher has to throw 20 extra pitches.  How many repercussions can that have, not just in that game but possibly in the next day's game?  Maybe no runs score that inning but it turns the line up over so that the big bats get an extra AB later in the game and drive in the game winning run.

It's hard to quantify, because we're not talking necessarily talking about a bad play that results directly in a Yankee loss.  However, Jeter, on average, has cost his team about 1.5 games a season because of his defense.

In response to moonslav59's comment:

I was thinking this as well. I can't ever remember him making a "bad" defensive play in the clutch (although I've seen good, i.e, the flip play, one of the greatest plays in BB history, and if he doesn't make that play, they don't go to the WS), but I'm sure this has happened.

We sometimes don't remember or even recognize plays not made that other great-ranged SSs might have made easily or otherwise.

Jete rarely botches plays right to him. He does have a great relay arm both in strength and accuracy. He does have great leadership qualities. But, all of these combined, in my opinion, do n.ot come close to outweighing his horrible range.

Over the last 3 years combined, Jeter has made 1,465 total plays (PO+A) in 3537 innings at SS.

Others:

B Ryan  1,777 in 3359  (1871 pro-rated to 3537 innings that Jete had) +395

A Ram   2,083 in 4151  (1774 vs Jete)  +298

Andrus 1944 in 3885   (1770)  +294

Penning 1726 in 3382  (1805) +329

Peralta  1377 in 2915   (1670) +205

Y.Esco  1823 in 3551   (1816) +340

Hardy     1826 in 3430  (1883) +407

Aybar     1778 in 3631  (1732) +256

Reyes    1722 in 3669  (1660) +195

A Esco  1912 in 3918   (1726) +250

Desmond 1743 in 3665  (1682) +217

S Castro  1961 in 3875  (1789) +313

Rollins  1384 in 3315 (1476)  +11

Jeter        1465 in 3537

Jeter is in last place out fo qualifying SSs over the last 3 years.

Here are the play differentials per season:

B Ryan   +132

A Ram     +100

Andrus   +98

Penning  +110

Peralta   +68

Y.Esco   +113

Hardy      +136

Aybar      +85

Reyes     +65

A Esco    +83

Desmond +72

S Castro  +104

Rollins   +4

If these SSs played the same innings as jeter over the last 3 years, this is how many more plays they'd have made per season that Jeter. 

It is not a stretch to say that there are SSs making 80-120 more plays over a season than Jeter. Yes, there are other factors involved, and these numbers aren't absolute numbers uneffected by other influences, but the sample size is large and the UZR Range factor numbers backs up the evidence that Jeter just doesn't get to as many balls hit in his area than other SSs.

 A lot more!

did you also factor into the math that Jeter plays in Yankee stadium...where as a rule players try to go the other way, and most teams try to stack thier lineups with left handed bats...which could also account for the amount of chances. Also in terms of the number of balls that he failed to get to how many of them resulted in a run scoring? I'm not debating his range vs others because again if you simply access his athleticism vs say Ryan in Seattle it's a no brainer...Jeter was never and will never be in the class of Pokey Reese. Just not sure that I buy your contention that whips lack of range negates every other of his attributes...that not even s considering what he does with the bat.

It's the specific bad plays (not scored as errors) that we need identified.  If a log of these plays was readily available then UZR would be much more transparent for the average fan.

We'll probably get that kind of data eventually.  But it'll be after Jeter retires. :-)

In response to nhsteven's comment:

I was thinking this as well. I can't ever remember him making a "bad"defensive play in the clutch (although I've seen good, i.e, the flip play, one of the greatest plays in BB history, and if he doesn't make that play, they don't go to the WS), but I'm sure this has happened.

Most of the times, I bet the fans don't even realize when he has made a bad defensive play.  It's not that he actually made a bad play, but more so that he failed to make a play at all.  No error is assigned, and most fans just take it as a hit by the opposition.

Sometimes his plays look spectacular, but are they really?  A player with poor range can make a routine play seem spectacular, whereas a great defender with good range and agility will make the tough plays look routine.

Costing a team runs defensively does not just mean making a bad play in the clutch.  If Jeter allows a groundball hit that the average SS would have turned into an out, he is indirectly costing his team runs. 

Maybe a run scores on that play.  Maybe a run scores two batters later.  Maybe no runs score but the pitcher has to throw 20 extra pitches.  How many repercussions can that have, not just in that game but possibly in the next day's game?  Maybe no runs score that inning but it turns the line up over so that the big bats get an extra AB later in the game and drive in the game winning run.

It's hard to quantify, because we're not talking necessarily talking about a bad play that results directly in a Yankee loss.  However, Jeter, on average, has cost his team about 1.5 games a season because of his defense.

did you also factor into the math that Jeter plays in Yankee stadium...where as a rule players try to go the other way, and most teams try to stack thier lineups with left handed bats...which could also account for the amount of chances. Also in terms of the number of balls that he failed to get to how many of them resulted in a run scoring? I'm not debating his range vs others because again if you simply access his athleticism vs say Ryan in Seattle it's a no brainer...Jeter was never and will never be in the class of Pokey Reese. 

2012  NYY  Putouts:

LF   283     Avg 294  21st in MLB

RF  303     Avg  312    15th 

(((  Home and away, and of course YS RF is smaller  ))))

Just not sure that I buy your contention that whips lack of range negates every other of his attributes...that not even s considering what he does with the bat.

Who said that?

did you also factor into the math that Jeter plays in Yankee stadium...where as a rule players try to go the other way, and most teams try to stack thier lineups with left handed bats...which could also account for the amount of chances. Also in terms of the number of balls that he failed to get to how many of them resulted in a run scoring? I'm not debating his range vs others because again if you simply access his athleticism vs say Ryan in Seattle it's a no brainer...Jeter was never and will never be in the class of Pokey Reese. 

Actually, the Yanks have more LH'd starters than most teams, so they probably see more RH'd batters than average. I don't have the numbers in front of me, so I am just speculatiing on this.

In response to moonslav59's comment:

did you also factor into the math that Jeter plays in Yankee stadium...where as a rule players try to go the other way, and most teams try to stack thier lineups with left handed bats...which could also account for the amount of chances. Also in terms of the number of balls that he failed to get to how many of them resulted in a run scoring? I'm not debating his range vs others because again if you simply access his athleticism vs say Ryan in Seattle it's a no brainer...Jeter was never and will never be in the class of Pokey Reese. 

Actually, the Yanks have more LH'd starters than most teams, so they probably see more RH'd batters than average. I don't have the numbers in front of me, so I am just speculatiing on this.

aside from Sabathia not sure i agree...Petitte Is the only other lefty that's toed the rubber for them and his numbers are better vs righties. Nova, Burnett, Hughes, Kuroda and Colon all are right handed and represent the lion share of games started in the last few years for the Yanks. 

Just took a look at some old school stats and contrasted win results to loss results for MLB 2012. Here are some interesting conclusions; batting average matters, .290 in wins, .218 in losses this is a huge gap in performance. Stolen bases matter, 1962 SB in wins, 1267 in losses, also SB% was much better in win games, 69.1% in wins, 58.2% in losses (The Wakefield effect). Walks don't help...in wins, .343 of all PA's resulted in walks, in losses it was .358. Strikeouts or DP's which would you rather have? Each is not good, and each occured as frequently in wins, SO/PA's .181 and GDP .0181.In losses there were not surprisingly, more SO's, .215 and almost as many GDP .0211. What about ROE? Very small effect from the defensive team's shortcomings, ROE/PA in wins 0.010, in losses, 0.088. (The Jeter effect) There was a significant difference in performance in a particular category; IBB, 787 IBB in win games vs just 268 in loss games. Not surprisingly, XBH had a huge impact upon winning games with almost 3200 more XBH's in games that were won. So, putting this on the back of a baseball card, here's what we get; BA, HR's, XBH, SB's and IBB matter. BB's, and ROE don't. It's important to build a team that hits for average, slugs, has speed and adequate defense. Agressiveness helps too, not waiting for a walk, and attempting more stolen bases leads to more wins, than sitting back and going station to station especially via the walk, which apparently is a formula for losing. Source for data was baseballreference.com 2012 batting stats.

In response to youkillus' comment:

Just took a look at some old school stats and contrasted win results to loss results for MLB 2012. Here are some interesting conclusions; batting average matters, .290 in wins, .218 in losses this is a huge gap in performance. Stolen bases matter, 1962 SB in wins, 1267 in losses, also SB% was much better in win games, 69.1% in wins, 58.2% in losses (The Wakefield effect). Walks don't help...in wins, .343 of all PA's resulted in walks, in losses it was .358. Strikeouts or DP's which would you rather have? Each is not good, and each occured as frequently in wins, SO/PA's .181 and GDP .0181.In losses there were not surprisingly, more SO's, .215 and almost as many GDP .0211. What about ROE? Very small effect from the defensive team's shortcomings, ROE/PA in wins 0.010, in losses, 0.088. (The Jeter effect) There was a significant difference in performance in a particular category; IBB, 787 IBB in win games vs just 268 in loss games. Not surprisingly, XBH had a huge impact upon winning games with almost 3200 more XBH's in games that were won. So, putting this on the back of a baseball card, here's what we get; BA, HR's, XBH, SB's and IBB matter. BB's, and ROE don't. It's important to build a team that hits for average, slugs, has speed and adequate defense. Agressiveness helps too, not waiting for a walk, and attempting more stolen bases leads to more wins, than sitting back and going station to station especially via the walk, which apparently is a formula for losing. Source for data was baseballreference.com 2012 batting stats.

Good stuff; I guess it pays to intentionally walk hitters!

In response to royf19's comment:

I haven't read all the posts yet, but I just wanted to weigh in with a thought or two.

Regardless of whether or not they're old school or new school, any one stat is useless unless they're used in context with other stats.

For example, OPS is a great stat, but if the batter has a low BA w/RISP -- Drew a couple of years ago -- then in my opinion that great OPS loses some luster. If a hitter has 40 HRs, that looks great, but if he's batting .210 with 70 RBIs and a .280 OBP in 600 PA, then those 40 HRs aren't so great.

ERA is a great stat and a lousy stat. A low ERA tells a lot about a pitcher. It's hard to distort a bad (or even mediocre) ERA with two or three great starts. Yeah, those great starts will help but only two a point. On the other hand, two or three really horrible stats can easily distort an otherwise great ERA. Look at Lester and Beckett last year. I forget the exact numbers, but Beckett and Lester each had ERAs in the mid- to high 4.00s (maybe even low) after 13 starts for Beckett and 15 (maybe 17 starts) for Lester. But if you took away their two worst starts, Beckett's ERA was around 2.50 and Lester's 3.50 -- something like that. (WHIP is the same way).

So no matter what stats you are looking at, you need to look at more than one stat and you have too look deep into individual stats to see what's going on.

Don't quite understand taking away their two worst starts, or figuring, for example,

Beckett's ERA taking away his first innings.  The bad starts, the bad innings, count.

In response to soxnewmex's comment:

In response to royf19's comment:

I haven't read all the posts yet, but I just wanted to weigh in with a thought or two.

Regardless of whether or not they're old school or new school, any one stat is useless unless they're used in context with other stats.

For example, OPS is a great stat, but if the batter has a low BA w/RISP -- Drew a couple of years ago -- then in my opinion that great OPS loses some luster. If a hitter has 40 HRs, that looks great, but if he's batting .210 with 70 RBIs and a .280 OBP in 600 PA, then those 40 HRs aren't so great.

ERA is a great stat and a lousy stat. A low ERA tells a lot about a pitcher. It's hard to distort a bad (or even mediocre) ERA with two or three great starts. Yeah, those great starts will help but only two a point. On the other hand, two or three really horrible stats can easily distort an otherwise great ERA. Look at Lester and Beckett last year. I forget the exact numbers, but Beckett and Lester each had ERAs in the mid- to high 4.00s (maybe even low) after 13 starts for Beckett and 15 (maybe 17 starts) for Lester. But if you took away their two worst starts, Beckett's ERA was around 2.50 and Lester's 3.50 -- something like that. (WHIP is the same way).

So no matter what stats you are looking at, you need to look at more than one stat and you have too look deep into individual stats to see what's going on.

Don't quite understand taking away their two worst starts, or figuring, for example,

Beckett's ERA taking away his first innings.  The bad starts, the bad innings, count.

Who said the starts didn't count? (And I never said, take away a bad inning.) The point was how horrible starts affect an ERA. For example, let take two pitchers in this hypothetical example:

Pitcher A: 20-10 in 30 starts. In the 20 wins, he went 7 IP with 2 ER every start for an ERA in those 20 starts of 2.57. In his 10 losses, he went 5 IP, 4 ER in every start for an ERA of 7.20. For the season, his ERA is 3.78. (190 IP, 80 ER). An excellent season by any standard.

Pitcher B: He also went 20-10 in 30 starts and in the 20 wins, he went 7 IP, with 2 ER every start. And in 8 of his 10 losses, he went 5 IP, 4 ER in every start. However, in his last two bad starts, they were horrible starts -- 2 IP, 8 ER both starts. So for the season, his ERA is 4.35.

A 3.78 ERA vs. a 4.35 ERA looks like a big difference, but can we honestly say Pitcher A was that much better than Pitcher B. They were equal in the number of good starts and equal in eight of their 10 bad starts. The only difference was that Pitcher A was simply bad in his last two bad starts while Pitcher B was horrible.

Back to Beckett and Lester -- no one is saying don't county those bad starts. The point is, if they were simply bad -- which still means two bads starts and losses -- instead of horrible, their ERAs would have been much lower and thus, a better indicator on  how they've pitched.

Yeah Moon, good post. That's why I alway say that no matter what stat you're looking at, you have to look a bit more in depth.

My example, I kept it simple to make my point. In real life, you can look at Lackey and Lester from 2010. Looking at their ERAs, it looked as if Lester was considerbly better than Lackey. But it you look at their starts, Lester had just two more good starts (22-20) if memory serves me correctly and they had about the same number of bad starts. The difference was Lester was a bit mroe dominant in his good starts -- (Lackey was very good, however, in his good starts) while Lackey's bad starts were worse than Lester's bad starts.

So in the end, there was a big difference in ERA but less of a difference in giving the Sox the chance to win. Lester's ERA accurately showed how good he was, while Lackey's ERA was a bit distorted.

Bad 1st innings often render a team out of the game.