This is for illustration purposes I am using the total of this group of qualified players instead of the actual league average which would include starters and reserves. Plays above average is found by finding the league average ZR, multiplying by Chances, and comparing to total plays made.

To get a feel for how the new feature, balls out of zone, affects a player’s rating, let’s take a look at the shortstops for 2006, using the new data but calculated the same way as the old Zone Rating: THT has data for the 2004 to 2006 seasons, and will add 2007 data as soon as the games begin. The new Zone Rating is now available on The Hardball Times website. Balls in zone counts only those hit into your zone, and there is a separate category for balls fielded outside your zone. The new Zone rating treats these plays differently.

For Billy, its 2/3, even though both players have had the same opportunities, and recorded the same number of outs. The zone rating for Jason is a perfect 2/2. Billy makes one play in his zone, makes an error on the other, but makes a great play on the ball hit up the middle. Jason makes plays on the two hit in his zone but cannot reach the other ball. Both players have three ground balls hit near them, two in the shortstop zone and one just beyond it, hit straight up the middle. Take two shortstops, call them Billy and Jason. The effect of this is to underrate players with outstanding range. In the original Zone Rating, if a ball is hit outside of your zone but you range far enough to make a play anyway, that ball is added to both your plays made and your chances. Dewan happens to be the guy who came up with the old Zone Rating when he worked for STATS, and he was able to add an improvement in the treatment of plays fielded outside of the zone. Last winter John Dewan and Baseball Info Solutions published The Fielding Bible and introduced a new version of zone rating. You can look at how many plays were made compared to an average fielder to get a plus minus rating, and that can easily be converted to runs to help us measure the overall worth of a ballplayer. You divide the first number by the second, and you have zone rating. It’s a simple concept you just need to know two things: How many plays a fielder makes, and how many were hit into his zone. Zone rating has been around for 20 years now as a way to measure defensive players.

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