Relay-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site utzoo.UUCP Posting-Version: version B 2.10.2 9/5/84; site philabs.UUCP Path: utzoo!decvax!ucbvax!ucdavis!lll-crg!seismo!cmcl2!philabs!dpb From: dpb@philabs.UUCP (Paul Benjamin) Newsgroups: net.sport.baseball Subject: Re: Re: Lineup dependency Message-ID: <477@philabs.UUCP> Date: Wed, 16-Oct-85 12:44:16 EDT Article-I.D.: philabs.477 Posted: Wed Oct 16 12:44:16 1985 Date-Received: Thu, 17-Oct-85 19:17:29 EDT References: <453@philabs.UUCP> <694@mmintl.UUCP> <769@fisher.UUCP> <472@philabs.UUCP> <389@gymble.UUCP> Distribution: na Organization: Philips Labs, Briarcliff Manor, NY Lines: 59 > In article <472@philabs.UUCP> dpb@philabs.UUCP (Paul Benjamin) writes: > >> he never had a runner on. Applying this to my rough guess that the > >> best teams have runners on about half the time, and the worst about a > >> quarter of the time, the advantage to be gained is no more than > >> 20*(.5-.25) = 5 BA points. Exactly what I mean when I suggest that > >> the difference is not something we ought to lose sleep over... > >> > >> David Rubin > > > >Another case of bad reasoning. This may be the average over all players, > >but certain players bat much more than 20 points better with men on > >base. For examples, Boggs batted .418 this year with runners in scoring > >position. This is about 45 points above his overall average, and about > >55-60 points above his average with the bases empty. I certainly don't > >lose sleep over this, but it is significant. > > I hesitate to stick my nose into this (and I am not taking sides) but > let me make one point about men on base. If Wade Boggs did the above > (I don't question it), couldn't this say at least at much about the > pitchers he faced in those situations as it does about him? Boggs > is much more likely to come to the plate with men on base against, say, > Dennis Martinez than he is against, say, Ron Guidry. The simple reason > is that *everybody* on the Red Sox is likely to get more hits (and thus > be on base more) against the inferior pitchers. And so Wade Boggs is > more likely to bat with men on against Dennis Martinez and with the > bases empty against Ron Guidry. This might go a long way toward > explaining the differential. > > UUCP: {seismo,allegra,brl-bmd}!umcp-cs!dday Dept. of Computer Science > CSNet: dday@umcp-cs University of Maryland > ARPA: dday@maryland College Park, MD 20742 > (301) 454-4247 I agree completely. These stats, as well as others, are influenced by the difference between starters and relievers. This has often been noted to be one of the major differences between modern baseball and that of previous eras - the emergence of the relief specialist. There is no question that everybody tends to face different pitchers in hot spots than during the rest of a game. But this could actually make it harder to hit with runners in scoring position than it otherwise would be, since managers usually try to bring in relievers who are best suited to face specific batters, e.g., lefties against lefties. But then, your point about facing Guidry with the bases empty can be rephrased as, "When a pitcher is doing very well, then batters will tend to face him less often with runners in scoring position, so that the situations with runners in scoring position will often be against starters who are in trouble." This makes good sense to me. So we have two opposing tendencies. The net is that (as someone posted) hitters tend to bat about 20 points better with men on. This could well reflect that the second tendency outweighs the first. However, this is not directly relevant to what the original argument was about, since I was stating that there are individuals who consistently perform above the average with men on base, and there are those who consistently perform worse, so that this factor cannot be dismissed by saying "the effect is randomly distributed", or something else to that effect. The individual differences between players' performances need to be taken into consideration.