The link is an effusive thanks to Sean for creating and developing and then pretty much perfecting baseball-reference.com. All the more important because it’s all true. The HOF waits, though I suspect Sean will be in the class of 2022.
Statistics
PHILLIES go to the World Series
For the first time since 1993: MLB.com: Gameday
One league, sixteen teams. Going to the World Series once in 15 years seems pretty normal. All things being equal.
Frank Thomas Statistics
Tonight, the newly-minted Athletic Frank Thomas tripled for the first time since 2002. I think I might have blogged back then about how that triple was Thomas’s first since 1998 (when he had 2!), which were his first since 1994. Put it this way: Frank Thomas has not been a triples machine. Ever.
Does rejection make his heart beat harder? His legs pump faster? Gamecast only says the ball was hit to Vladdy, so I don’t know what miscue prompted it, but a triple is a triple. Go Frank.
Changes in home run rates during the Retrosheet years
Tom Tango methodically and revealingly demonstrates, using information gleaned from Retrosheet and MLB’s ball-testing lab, that there is real evidence that the home run boom that began in 1993 was a product of a juiced ball. Don’t believe me? Read the story.
Which isn’t to say that this is the final word. Tom’s data relates to balls put into play as they relate to home run rate, which is the best way to figure out the effect of hitting the ball farther, but not so good for determining changes that might stem from the umpires’ calling of the strike zone (in which case the ball might be hit less often).
Plus, I find it hard to believe that given the potency of Mile High in Denver, that the control group of players had a similar increase in home runs to those who didn’t play in Colorado. That’s something to think about while reading Tom’s story.
David Pinto, of baseballmusings.com, says that manufacturing standards tightened up for the ball manufacturers in 1993, and that balls were tested more often. His theory is that the manufacturers established a more tightly wound ball (but still within the official specs) as the de facto standard. Unlike times past, when the equipment would slide and the balls would loosen up and a range of tightnesses were created, the modern ball is uniform and tightly wound.
In no way does this argument rule out the possibility that other factors played a part in the recent power boom (Tom doesn’t publish the numbers after 1998 for one thing), but it does establish that only modest changes to the ball could readily explain much if not all of the changes. That’s worth remembering when it is tempting to overreact.
Web based PITCHf/x tool
Josh Kalk has taken the first big step toward taming the PITCHf/x data that MLB collects and allows researchers access to. MLB’s freeness with the data promises to be a boon for sabermetrics and Kalk’s database front end, which allows you to compare how pitchers throw to different hitters and vice versa, with results displayed graphically is an inspiring beginning.
Kalk is talking about having splits ready by Christmas, and non-graphical data sometime soon, too.
I don’t have time right now to sift through all of this, but it’s potential importance makes me give thanks.
Thanks, Josh. Keep up the good work.
The Bill James Handbook
Every year I get a package from my friend Steve Moyer. Sometimes it comes when we’re together in the beginning of November at Ron Shandler and Rick Wilton’s First Pitch Arizona conference (which is a blast, a chance to see many of the next year’s rookies up close, and did I mention it was fun?) and sometimes it comes in the mail at home. What I know is that if it’s the first week of November it’s the Bill James Handbook.
What I remember, back in the day, was the Red Book from Stats, which also had Bill James’ name attached and which, for a while, Steve worked on, too. But Stats was sold to Fox and niceties like really useful baseball reference books became too small scale for them.
Steve has made a business off of the opportunities Fox threw away when it bought Stats, which isn’t to say that Fox was wrong, just that as a baseball fan I really much prefer what comes from Steve’s company, Baseball Info Solutions.
The Bill James Handbook, under the BIS aegis, has become a comprehensive statistical review of the previous baseball season, and it comes out less than 30 days after the season is over. It now has fielding rankings, managerial tendencies, home-road splits, batter and pitcher splits, projections for hitters and pitchers, and an assortment of other really interesting baseball data.
You can support this site by buying the Bill James Handbook from Amazon through the link below, or you can buy it somewhere else. My point is that there isn’t another baseball book that is more useful all season long.
Race for NL Batting Title Goes to Extras
This story has a concise rundown of the major records for this year, but it’s notable for some other comments. Chipper Jones says he’s going home to prepare for a nice postseason, a funny choice of words for a guy who should be used to playing in the postseason.
Also, to say that “Detroit’s Curtis Granderson legged out 23 triples, most in the major leagues since Cleveland’s Dale Mitchell had 23 in 1949,” ignores the fact that 23 and 23 are the same. When did someone have 24 triples? The correct sentence would be: Detroit’s Curtis Granderson legged out 23 triples, most in the majors since Pittsburgh’s Kiki Cuyler hit 26 in 1925 (Cleveland’s Dale Mitchell had 23 in 1949).
Of the Top 25 triples totals only Granderson, Mitchell and Stuffy Stirnweiss (1945, NYA) rank from the post World War II era.
Minor League Baseball Statistics and History
Sean Forman has got a draft of minor league history up since 1992. As usual the pages are elegant and easy to digest, and fast. Kudos, even though this noble second step indicates just how much more work there is to be done.
(No knock intended to thebaseballcube.com, which was the first step.)
Bacsik in Play
I took note of this little chart in part because Mike Bacsik was noted the other day as a guy who had held Barry Bonds to 1-15 in his career (the 1 was a dinger). Looking at the chart I got to thinking about the difference between the two extremes of balls put into play. 27 percent seems like a lot, but when hitters can be expected to hit about .300 on balls in play, it amounts to nine extra hits per 100 batters faced (or roughly about two and a half per game).
That could be a lot. The difference between a 1.2 WHIP and a 1.4 WHIP reflects those 2.5 hits. The issue here, as we so often see, is really baserunners allowed. If you don’t walk many the extra hits you allow pitching to contact aren’t a problem, just as the hits you don’t allow by not pitching to contact don’t help much if you give up a lot of walks.
The other issue is the type of ball put in play. Some pitchers do better than others controlling line drives (which almost always result in a hit). As we accumulate data about all these things we may well get a better idea of what works best, but I suspect that pitchers like Mike Bacsik, who simply get things done, will still find work.
Nothing succeeds like success. (In Bacsik’s case, recently.)
Location, Location, Location
The Baseball Analysts: Joe Sheehan
What we’re going to do with all the data baseball is throwing off beggars my imagination, but I know that Joe Sheehan’s excellent survey of pitch location data in this study simply scratches the surface. So for now just let the data wash over you, figure out the perspective on these intriguing charts, and wallow in the possibilities.