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Who uses their closers in tough situations?

Does it seem to you, like it seems to me, that the only way managers use their closers these days is to start the ninth inning? Usually the best pitcher on the team is the closer. If I were managing, I’d use him when it matters most, whether that’s the ninth inning, eighth inning, or even the sixth inning. For example, it’s a key game and we’re up 3-2. My starter gets me to the sixth, but he gives up a two-out double to put runners on second and third. I want my best pitcher right there. He’s much more valuable there than he would be to protect what might become a three-run lead at the start of the ninth. But that would be the rare early “closer” appearance. I could see where I’d use the closer often in an eighth-inning tough situation, and often in the ninth after my second or third best reliever got in trouble with a two-run or three-run lead. For the record, here’s the percentage of saves this year where the pitcher enters at the start of the ninth inning (or the start of an extra inning). Percentage of saves – pitcher enters at the start of the 9th inning (or the start of an extra inning): 82 % Here are the managers who use their closer most often in the toughest situations (enters the game with the tying run on base):

Minimum: 10 Saves
Source: Baseball Info Solutions (through the games of Thursday, July 31, 2008) The save became an official Major League Baseball statistic in 1969. We looked at Retrosheet data back through 1974 to see the rise of the three-out save (regardless of whether or not they were the only pitcher in that inning). The increase has been steady and strong over the years from a low of 16% to a high of 83%. Here’s a clear-cut case where the statistic is determining usage. Is that a win for us analytical types? Maybe so, but I sure don’t agree with it. The table below shows the percentage of all saves in a year that were three-out saves:

Used with permission from John Dewan’s Stat of the Week™, www.statoftheweek.com.

Who are baseball’s best baserunners this year?

July 23, 2008

In the last three editions of The Bill James Handbook, we introduced a new statistic to measure baserunning.  It’s called Net Baserunning Gain and it’s simply how many extra bases beyond average a player gains.  For example, a runner goes first to third on a single about 30 percent of the time.  The average is three out of ten.  If a given player goes five out of ten, he is plus two.  We look at all the situations like this, scoring from first on a double, scoring from second on a single, and so on and so forth. If a player is thrown out on the bases, he receives a triple penalty (-3).  And we count stolen bases, but it’s only a plus if it’s better than a success rate of two out of three (67 percent).It makes a difference.  The top ten baserunning teams are a collective 58 games over .500 and the bottom ten are 51 games under .500.

Here are the best (and worst) baserunning teams so far this year:

Here are the best and worst baserunners:

For a complete discussion of this new statistic, The Bill James Handbook 2008 has an essay by Bill James that goes into detail.

Source: BillJamesOnline.com (through the games of Tuesday, July 22, 2008)

Used with permission from John Dewan’s Stat of the Week™, www.statoftheweek.com.

Who has the cannons in the outfield so far this year?
July 18, 2008

In my book, The Fielding Bible, we came up with a way to evaluate outfielder arms. We look at two elements: Runner Advance Percentage — how often do runners succeed at taken an extra base on a single or double, and Baserunner Kills — how often does an outfielder directly throw out a runner at a base (no relays). Based on these two statistics, here’s how we evaluate players in the first half this year.

Starting in left field, the player with the most kills so far this year is Raul Ibanez with five. Also with five kills out of left field are Delmon Young and Ben Francisco. Ibanez has allowed only 35.8 percent of baserunners to take an extra base, which is above average for left field. However, Pat Burrell, while he has only four kills, has only allowed 29.9 percent of baserunners to advance. Based on his better advance percentage, we select Pat Burrell as the left fielder with the best throwing arm in baseball so far this year.

In center field we have former second baseman B.J. Upton with eight kills thus far. That ties him with right fielder Nick Markakis for the most baserunner kills in baseball. However, Upton’s 71.4 percent advance percentage is one of the worst among all center fielders. The best throwing center fielder for 2008 might come as no surprise. It’s former pitcher Rick Ankiel, who along with four kills, has only allowed 47.1 percent of baserunners to advance, the best figure among center fielders with 40 or more opportunities.

In right field, we already mentioned Nick Markakis with eight kills, but somewhat similar to B.J. Upton, his advance percentage of 54.7 percent is below average. The best throwing right fielders in baseball this year are Hunter Pence and Michael Cuddyer, each with five kills and each with a 46.3 advance percentage. They’re tied for second in best advance percentage among all right fielders. Kosuke Fukudome leads the way with a 45.2 percent advance percentage but only two kills.

In summary, here are the best so far this year (click for readable size):

Source: BillJamesOnline.com (through the All-Star break)

Used with permission from John Dewan’s Stat of the Week™, www.statoftheweek.com.

Which All-Stars earned the trip to New York?

July 10, 2008

There’s an old saying in Chicago: Vote early, vote often. Well, that certainly seemed to be the case for Cubs fans this season, as seven representatives of the Cubs were selected to play in the All-Star Game. You get the feeling there may have been some ballot-stuffing going on…Which of course is within every fan’s right. (Boston fans, by the way, voted in five of their own, which is no small feat in the American League, competing against Yankee fans.) But how close did fans and players actually come to selecting the most-deserving all-stars based on Win Shares and OPS? Here are the starters selected for the All-Star Game, broken down by league, compared to leaders in Win Shares and OPS at their respective positions:

Used with permission from John Dewan’s Stat of the Week™, www.statoftheweek.com.

Is it harder to steal on lefties?

June 27, 2008

If you ask my son Jason, it’s not just harder, it’s impossible.

I coached my son in little league throughout his grammar school years, eight years in all. I wouldn’t trade a minute of it. Here’s my favorite story:

Jason was about 11 years old. He was never a power hitter, but he was always one of my best baserunners. He stole bases pretty much at will, but on this occasion, he was on first base with a left-handed pitcher looking right at him from the mound. This was the first lefty he ever faced; it had always been right-handed pitchers on the mound who had to turn their heads to see him on first base. The pitcher made a couple of tosses over to first, and Jason shortened his normal lead to about three and a half inches off the bag. Nevertheless, I gave Jason the steal sign from the coach’s box at third base. I also gave the take sign to the batter so that Jason could steal second. Jason never missed my signs before, but this time he didn’t steal. Prior to the next pitch, I gave the sign again and, because the first pitch was a ball, I gave the take again to the batter. Once again Jason didn’t go. I called time out and waived my first base coach to talk to Jason. In the meantime, I told the batter that since the count was 2-0, to go ahead and take the next pitch so Jason could steal second.

The pitcher was oblivious to what was happening, but he made another token throw over to first to hold Jason close to the bag. I looked over to Jason at first, and I swear, I could see fear in his eyes. But I gave him the steal sign again. The pitch came in; the batter took the pitch again, but this time for a strike. And Jason was standing at first base.

Now I was flabbergasted and I decided to make my sign real clear. At the top of my lungs, I yelled across the diamond, “Jason, steal second! Jason, steal second!”, and I gave the take sign again to the batter. The pitcher looked over at me with a very surprised look on his face. And he started throwing to first over and over again. And after each throw, I yelled, “Jason, steal second!”. After about five throws to first, the pitcher finally delivered to home. The batter took the pitch, and Jason was off to the races. He slid in to second, easily beating the throw.

And the coach on the other team yelled over to me, “Hey coach, I think we know your signs!”

So, is it harder to steal on lefties in the majors? Yes. Here’s the data for the last six and a half years:

Here is the success rate for each year:

Source: Baseball Info Solutions (through games of Thursday, June 26, 2008)

Used with permission from John Dewan’s Stat of the Week™, www.statoftheweek.com.

Who can score from the 7-8-9 slots?

June 12, 2008
The Chicago Cubs have the best record in baseball. But here in Chicago the debate continues—where should Alfonso Soriano bat? It will be a moot point for the next six weeks or so because Soriano broke a bone in his left hand after getting hit by a pitch last night.

The key reason that many folks want to see Soriano bat further down in the lineup is his power. Soriano has a ton of solo home runs, and game lead-off home runs. It’s nice to get that 1-0 lead after your first batter of the game, but wouldn’t it be nicer if some of those home runs came with men on base?

The Cubs are winning and all things are rosy on the north side of Chicago. People are beginning to lighten up on Soriano. One of the reasons is that the hitters ahead of Soriano are scoring runs, despite the fact that it’s the weakest part of the lineup. The average National League team (not counting the Cubs) has scored 66 runs out of their 7, 8 and 9 slots so far this year. The second-best team, the Phillies, have scored 80 runs from their 7-8-9 slots. The Cubs have scored 92. They are scoring almost 50% more runs than the other NL teams from their 7-8-9

Even the nine slot is hitting .238 for the Cubs. Compare that to the average pitcher who hits about .140. Counting pinch hitters, double switches, and the Tony La Russa strategy of batting your pitcher eighth, the National League nine hole is averaging a .182 batting average overall.

Over in the American League, only two teams have a higher OPS than the Cubs out of their 7-8-9 slots. The White Sox have the best (.804), the Red Sox number two (.758), and the Cubs have the third best (.756) in all of baseball despite having their pitchers bat.

Source: Baseball Info Solutions (through games of Wednesday, June 11, 2008)

Used with permission from John Dewan’s Stat of the Week™, www.statoftheweek.com.

What’s better than ERA to measure a pitcher’s effectiveness?

June 5, 2008

For hitters, for years and years, it was batting average that was thought to be the best single statistic to look at to evaluate a hitter. In the last couple of decades, the weaknesses of batting average have been exposed and the value of getting on base and hitting for power have become better recognized. The stat that is becoming the new standard for hitters is OPS—On-base percentage Plus Slugging percentage.

For pitchers, the standard is ERA. Compared to batting average, it provides a much better representation of effectiveness. It measures the most important quality of a pitcher’s job, preventing runs. However, it too has its flaws. The biggest flaw is that a pitcher’s ERA can be greatly affected by the pitchers that immediately follow him in a game, both positively and negatively.

Enter Opponent OPS. This is a stat that you hardly ever see. It makes just as much sense to look at Opponent OPS for pitchers as it does to look at a hitter’s own OPS. We just recently added this as a leaderboard titled “Opponent OPS” to Bill James Online and I wanted to share it with you.ERA is going to continue to be the standard, and I will personally look at ERA for every pitcher, but I think Opponent OPS may be a better indicator of a pitcher’s overall effectiveness. In fact, in a way, we’ve been suggesting this for quite a while as we’ve published component ERA in the Bill James Handbook. Component ERA is, in essence, a restated Opponent OPS since it is based on nearly the exact same components that go into OPS, namely hits, home runs, walks allowed, and hit batsmen. Opponent OPS adds in doubles and triples allowed as part of the equation.Here are the Opponent OPS leaders thus far this year: