How Pat Murphy Evaluates the Brewers' At-Bats From the Dugout

[Jack Stern]

Image courtesy of © Charles LeClaire-Imagn Images

Sit in on just a few Pat Murphy media sessions, and you'll learn that the Brewers manager regularly goes off on tangents. Many of those asides have nothing to do with baseball, but sometimes, when Murphy is dissatisfied with the pregame questions he's received from the press, he'll keep the baseball talk going himself. That's what he did one day in April, in response to a question about Joey Ortiz's recent at-bats.

"I'll let you in on this," Murphy said to the writers and broadcasters assembled in his office, gesturing to one of the many papers strewn across his desk.

When he assesses the Brewers' at-bats during his postgame interview, Murphy often consults that sheet of paper, which, at first glance, appears to be a traditional scorecard. It's more than that, though. The card, Murphy explained, is filled with shorthand symbols. It's his method of evaluating at-bats in real time.

"I make notations on the type of at-bat it is," he said. "If it's a dot, that means solid at-bat. If it's a plus, that means really good. If it's a minus, that means ******. If it's an equal sign, that means, 'Meh.'"

Box scores date back to the beginning of professional baseball, but today's players, coaches, and analysts have more information than ever to quantify process, not just outcomes. Rather than chasing results, hitters are better off focusing on actions they can control—swinging at the right pitches and making the right kind of contact—that produce good results more often than not.

That's what Murphy is doing. In essence, his notations are his simplified version of a live Statcast feed. He's tracking the process, not just the results. At times, there's extra nuance due to the game situation or other less tangible factors.

"If it's an 11-pitch strikeout, I might give them an equal sign. Good battle," Murphy said. "But the key is to not have too many minuses. That's what gets guys in trouble, the minus, minus, minus. Poor at-bats, at-bats that hurt us."

A hitter's Statcast overview on their Baseball Savant page includes several metrics evaluating how well they impact the ball. There's hard-hit rate, which is based solely on exit velocity. Sweet spot rate focuses more on launch angle, reporting how many batted balls are hit at the best trajectories for line drives and fly balls to the outfield gaps. It won't give a hitter credit for hard-hit ground balls or pop-ups.

Murphy doesn't read Baseball Savant pages. He'll say that his eyes can see what the technology tracks. There's a good chance he doesn't know that sweet spot rate is a stat, but he tracks a crude version of it on his card.

"Hard contacts are usually a plus," Murphy said. "If it's straight down or straight up, I can't give you a plus. I can give you a dot, not a plus."

He even tracks his own version of what Statcast defines as a barrel: a ball hit at least 98 mph within a certain launch angle range (in other words, a very hard-hit ball in the air). It's not the same term, nor exactly the same criteria, but it's the same concept.

"If you get one good and it goes on that perfect trajectory… I'll give you a plus with a circle," Murphy said.

As with most information gleaned from the eye test, it's not nearly as accurate as numbers tracked by state-of-the-art technology. It's probably safe to say the Brewers don't build their models to include direct input from Murphy's scorecards.

"It's not scientific," Murphy said with a laugh. "It's really for me to remember without putting the actual scoring down there."

There's still a benefit to it, though, and it reinforces how a manager with an old-school background continues working productively with an analytical front office. Even if Murphy's evaluation method is less scientific, he and the ivory tower often value the same skills and the same approach to the game. He just needs that information to be tracked and packaged in a language that makes sense to his baseball mind.

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[cragi]

great, now explain the rope given to Yelich when he's at our deepest position

[Trax]

3 hours ago, cragi said:

great, now explain the rope given to Yelich when he's at our deepest position

Exactly.   I would have had Yelich resting on pine for some time now, platooning him at DH when I did put him in the lineup.  I'd also have him batting 5 or 6, not in the top 4.   Shouldn't everyone have to earn their spot in the lineup?   Not considering money paid he still is mediocre.  Become the master of topping the ball.   Considering what he's paid he has royally sucked.   

 

I know that a hitter can't get out of their funk while on the bench, they need at bats.  I don't think it's a funk with Yelich, he's just declined to this point and don't expect it to get better for any stretch of time. Spurts maybe but we've seen the last of a long term heavy hitter with him.

[sveumrules]

4 hours ago, cragi said:

great, now explain the rope given to Yelich when he's at our deepest position

The front office will typically give players (especially ones making $26M) more rope than fans.

Frelick put up 199 PA of 214/284/295 (61 wRC+) with a .260 wOBA | .276 xwOBA under the hood through the end of May,

Many fans were calling for him to be sent down to figure it out, but the Brewers were patient with him and he's responded with 113 PA of 275/333/392 (103 wRC+) and a .322 wOBA | .295 xwOBA under the hood since June. Pretty close to the 1,341 PA of 270/337/369 (100 wRC+) with a .313 wOBA | .293 xwOBA under the hood that Sal posted from 2023 to 2025.

Yelich is currently at 216 PA of 229/321/367 (93 wRC+) with a .307 wOBA | .302 xwOBA since he began getting regular starts again on May 17th. Maybe they'll fiddle with the batting order out of the break to try and get him going. Perhaps something like...

Turang 2B | Chourio LF | Bauers 1B/DH/RF | Contreras C | Mitchell CF one through five.

Some combination of Yelich DH | Vaughn 1B/DH | Lara/Frelick RF in six and seven.

Then Pratt SS and Ortiz/Bunty 3B in the bottom two spots.

Either way I'd guess Yelich gets at least another 150 or so PA before they start to think about moving him out of the regular lineup. Maybe if their lead on the #2 seed (currently 3.5 games) or the Division (currently 5.0 games) gets more tenuous before then they'll act with some more urgency. 

[Jim French Stepstool]

I glanced at where Yelich was last year when we were hearing similar things from fans. In the middle of June his BA & OBP were both worse than what he's currently sporting while the OPS & slugging were higher. We all know how impressive the offensive numbers were by the end of the season. I don't expect the power to return to any great extent and IMO neither does Murphy or the organization. After the back surgery & being a year older, I wonder if there's a little bit of a re-invention going on with him. If there is, 96 games in it certainly hasn't worked because if you're no longer hitting for power you certainly can't be K'ing over 28% of the time while sporting what would be his lowest OBP of his career if it stays where it is.

Personally, I get the long leash as well as hitting him in the leadoff spot when he's in the lineup. With the diminished power & the strikeouts there's no way I want him hitting 5th or 6th. If the struggles continue, the only other spot that makes sense to me would be 8th or 9th but they might prefer more bench time to doing that (or the phantom IL stint). AFA regular ABs I think he's got another 2-3 weeks.

[CA John]

6 hours ago, cragi said:

great, now explain the rope given to Yelich when he's at our deepest position

No argument but Yelich is a vet. Murph treats them differently than yoots.

[Jim French Stepstool]

1 hour ago, sveumrules said:

 Perhaps something like...

Turang 2B | Chourio LF | Bauers 1B/DH/RF | Contreras C | Mitchell CF one through five.

Some combination of Yelich DH | Vaughn 1B/DH | Lara/Frelick RF in six and seven.

Then Pratt SS and Ortiz/Bunty 3B in the bottom two spots.

 

When he plays I'd much rather have Lara in one of the first couple spots in the order. Not just the speed/baserunning but the contact, ability to go deep into counts, and he seems to maintain those qualities from both sides of the plate.

Do I expect to see him continue to hit sixth? Probably.

[Trax]

2 hours ago, CA John said:

No argument but Yelich is a vet. Murph treats them differently than yoots.

He is a grossly overpaid vet.  I can see some leeway for underperformance involving vets but not to this extent.  We need to get our best players/hitters on the field and placed where they most help the team to win.   Play Lara more and ease him up the ladder of batting order.  Contreras, Turang, Frelick have had their plate struggles too but I have much more faith for them in the now and future.  Same for Vaughn.

I'd see much more of Vaughn/Bauers and an outfielder DH'ing based on matchups if it were me.  

Maybe a good long rest would do Yelich some good.