WARPed on WAR: How each site’s WAR views the Colorado Rockies

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In terms of fielding, it’s him vs Matt Chapman for the top spot. UZR and DRS (and Fangraphs’ Defensive factor) ranks Chapman as having being the more convincing fielder over Arenado. Whereas FRAA gives Nolan the edge as the better fielder by a slim margin.

With all factors considered, Nolan’s WARP in 2019 finished at 7.1 (5.9 fWAR, 5.7 bWAR). We shouldn’t be surprised by this considering we already know that Baseball Prospectus likes Rockies hitters much better than the other two, but it’s also going to generally be lower on pitchers.

For instance, Antonio Senzatela did not have his best season and we all know that. His WARP sits down all the way at -1.9. Comparatively, his fWAR is 0.7 and his bWAR is -0.1. When compared to Fangraphs that’s nearly a 3 game difference and that’s pretty drastic.

A large contributor will be DRA- (Deserved Runs Allowed). Baseball Prospectus had Senzatela’s DRC- at 146.5 (essentially he’s 46.5% worse than your average pitcher). Whereas Fangraphs has Senzatela’s ERA- (park factored ERA) at 133. The double-digit difference is a huge reason for the gap and because of it Baseball Prospectus is significantly lower on Senzatela than Fangraphs and Baseball Reference.

That’s not always going to be the case, though, as a few other pitchers on the Rockies happen to have similar fWAR/bWAR/WARP splits. When looking at a Rockies pitcher’s WARP, though, you should always keep in mind that it’s likely undervaluing him compared to Fangraphs and Baseball Reference. And keep that in mind for hitters as well as it can overrate them just as much comparatively.

Final Thoughts

As I stated before, none of this is an argument either for or against each site as each have their own reasons for viewing players the way they do and each is right in their own regards. Just try not to use one site as your sole source of truth as you may be missing some value in a player that the other sites capture (or you could even be overvaluing a player by only relying on one source).

Hopefully there will be a single formula that’s agreed upon in the future to create an official WAR stat that the MLB recognizes to help introduce it further to casual fans. Until then, always try to view it from as many angles as possible to capture everything you need.