While we are waiting for the playoff teams to get their post season roster
in order, here's some stat analysis.  One thing I like to do is determine
how much players are worth.  I have my own little system which reflects
what I value in a player.  The following is an evaluation of the players
of the league.  Here's  the formula I used for a  hitter's value in
"points" (or dollars, or in 100K amounts, or whatever).  This formula plus
the pitching formula should give a 60%/40% split hitting/pitching for a
total of $400 for a 30 man team.  This was used for another league, but
I thought it might be good for comparison here (although we won't be using
a dollar based system any time soon).

Anyways, here's the hitter formula:

VALUE($$) = (OBP + SBSLG) * (AB + BB) * .025 + R * .09 + RBI * .09

Where SBSLG  = Slugging Percentage with Net steals (SB-CS) factored in.

Anyways, here's the top three at each position (min 40 games played at
that position).  By this system, Jay Bell beat out Cal Ripken!

And, according to this, the most valuable hitter was Howard Johnson,
with Frank Thomas a close second.

NAME         POS        OBP     SBSLG   VALUE   AB      R       RBI     BB
Bell          SS        0.378   0.484   32.1    636     103     87      61
Ripken,C      SS        0.367   0.511   31.9    658     84      99      43
Smith,O       SS        0.397   0.429   26.3    606     101     30      95
Dawson        RF        0.300   0.519   34.9    667     95      137     19
Buhner        RF        0.353   0.546   33.5    568     92      124     59
Sierra        RF        0.363   0.487   32.4    680     107     78      59
Bonds         LF        0.377   0.558   31.6    572     101     79      87
Kruk          LF        0.339   0.464   30.3    623     88      97      59
Vaughn        LF        0.339   0.492   28.9    578     78      94      68
Gant          CF        0.325   0.568   35.4    602     105     124     62
Griffey       CF        0.375   0.545   33.5    613     102     100     53
Henderson,D   CF        0.329   0.481   31.8    635     108     92      48
Tettleton,M    C        0.363   0.458   26.6    524     92      63      93
Fisk           C        0.312   0.406   21.2    505     64      63      38
Surhoff        C        0.327   0.397   21.1    522     63      62      22
Johnson,H     3B        0.340   0.595   38.9    630     120     131     68
Williams      3B        0.326   0.568   33.1    597     97      115     31
Pendleton     3B        0.349   0.507   31.8    651     100     88      42
Franco        2B        0.357   0.449   29.4    648     115     52      65
Alomar,R      2B        0.361   0.443   27.2    635     93      51      72
Samuel        2B        0.327   0.457   27.2    639     89      64      44
Thomas        1B        0.420   0.512   36.5    577     112     110     13
Clark         1B        0.374   0.515   31.1    576     85      105     54
Palmeiro      1B        0.395   0.495   30.3    554     94      86      80

And now, the all-pitching team.  The formula here was a bit wicked:

VALUE = 5 X (WINS/6 + SAVES/7 + IP/200 * (3.81/ERA + 1.447 / WHIP)

Some of it was taken from this league's data, others from another league,
and lots of fudge factors.

Overall, hitters accounted for $4797, and pitchers for $3605.  Hitters
compromised 57.1% of the value.

NAME    WHIP    VALUE   ERA     W       S       IP      
Ward    0.97    39.4    1.16    3       40      70      
Gray    0.85    34.7    2.44    8       33      55.1    
Smith,L 1.38    30.9    4.43    4       34      69      
Berenguer1.08   28.1    2.15    3       29      62.2    
Eckersley1.05   27.8    3.69    6       26      70.2    
Maddux  1.21    32.5    3.27    20      0       269.1   
Clemens 0.99    31.5    2.71    17      0       242.1   
Bosio   1.07    31.4    2.68    19      0       225     
Erickson1.21    31.3    2.96    17      0       277     
Sanderson1.01   30.7    2.56    16      0       238.2