TheRealMattKain

Absolutely. I was by no means implying that this is something that we should be worried about, but rather, as you mentioned earlier, a very descriptive (not predictive) set of numbers detailing how we performed with the bases loaded in April - terrible. That's an interesting thought. Here's what the numbers look like for each possible bases occupied scenario over the past 5 years. Each row represents a bases occupied scenario (--3 is runner on third, 12- is runnners on first and second, --- is no one on base, etc) followed by the league average OPS for that scenario. "All" is the league average OPS for that season.: 2008 All .749 --- .733 1-- .770 -2- .766 --3 .787 12- .736 1-3 .772 -23 .862 123 .763 (OPS is .014 above average with bases loaded) 2007 All .758 --- .741 1-- .778 -2- .784 --3 .807 12- .724 1-3 .800 -23 .886 123 .786 (OPS is .028 above average with bases loaded) 2006 All .768 --- .753 1-- .796 -2- .790 --3 .786 12- .736 1-3 .809 -23 .837 123 .796 (OPS is .028 above average with bases loaded) 2005 All .749 --- .730 1-- .778 -2- .764 --3 .828 12- .731 1-3 .795 -23 .845 123 .751 (OPS is .002 above average with bases loaded) 2004 All .763 --- .751 1-- .778 -2- .761 --3 .834 12- .742 1-3 .796 -23 .865 123 .757 (OPS is .006 below average with bases loaded) Hmmm... in 2008, 2007, and 2006 the OPS with the bases loaded sits comfortably above average. In 2005 it's just about average. In 2004 it's a little below average. There might be a correlation between bases loaded and OPS, but I'm not sure that we can attribute it to bad pitchers loading the bases more often. And, in fact, the correlation seems to get thrown off in 2005 and 2004. In general, pitchers across the board do worse with runners on base (often attributed to pitching from the stretch among other things). If you look at the numbers, pitchers appear to do a little better with the bases loaded than with other bases occupied. It could be argued that managers are more likely to bring in a relief specialist or bullpen stud with the bases loaded, hence complicating your argument (a bad pitcher might load the bases, but a good pitcher might do the actual pitching with the bases loaded). Another interesting point is that in 4 of the 5 seasons hitters do better with a runner on first than with the bases loaded. Even the best pitchers average this scenario (runner on first) several times a game. If your theory was correct, wouldn't the many cases where good or great pitchers have a runner on first bring this OPS average down? Anyway, we would need to run some more years to make any real conclusions (maybe a 30 year window?), but I'm too lazy to do so.

Sure, 162 games will definitely tell you that the Red Sox are better than the Nats, but, this should be pretty obvious, teams often miss the post-season by a hair. Looking briefly over the past three seasons: 2008 Twins finish 1 game behind division lead 2008 Mets finish 1 game behind wildcard lead 2008 Diamondbacks finish 2 games behind division lead 2007 Brewers finish 2 games behind division lead 2007 Mets finish 1 game behind division lead 2007 Padres lost 1 game playoff for wildcard 2006 Astros finish 1.5 games behind division lead All it would have taken was a single bad call in a close game or two and any of the above teams could have seen the post-season... including the Brewers in '07. Having 162 games gives the umps plenty of chances to screw up. In most cases, it won't matter, but in close divisional and wildcard races (which happen almost every year), a single blown call at any point during the season can change who plays in October and who sits at home. So, yes, I'd rather have correct calls 100% of the time rather than 95% of the time (or whatever the numbers may be). And, if anyone really think umps call balls and strikes correctly 99% of the time or better, they need to do some serious research. I suggest looking into the strides that have been taken with Pitch FX or QuesTec and the many umpire studies out there on the web. Here's a quick analysis from last year's World Series: http://www.baseballdigestdaily.com/blogs/2008/10/29/pitchfx-reasonable-doubt-and-world-series-game-5a/

Prince's bases loaded single last night made me wonder if the Brewers really have been struggling with the bases loaded or if it's just a matter of fan bias. It also seems that there have been a surprising number of grandslams this year throughout MLB. With the help of baseball-reference, I found the splits comparing the Brewers to all of MLB: Brewers with bases loaded in 2009: BA: .222 OBP: .190 SLG: .278 OPS: .468 OPS+ 10 21 Plate Appearances, 0 HR, 0BB All of MLB with bases loaded in 2009 (these numbers would be even higher if we took the Brewer stats out): BA: .299 OBP: .342 SLG: .512 OPS: .853 691 Plate Appearances, 26 HR, 57 BB Yeah, it's early, the sample is small, and things will surely balance out as the year progresses, but for now it's pretty comical how futile the Crew has been with the bases loaded in the first month of the season.

So true. Altman doesn't exist without Renoir. Great addition. I can't think of another film that more clearly displays a quantum leap in acting style.

Wow. JAWS absolutely has to be on that list. JAWS pretty much single-handedly invented the summer blockbuster, revolutionized the way movies are marketed on a national level and through ancillary products and tie-ins, and established the wide-release distribution structure now used by all major studios for about 99.9% of their movies. And as much as I like seeing BREATHLESS on that list, part of me wants to argue that L'AVENTURRA has had a greater and more lasting influence on the style of art cinema or "auteur cinema". I don't really see much of BREATHLESS in today's films (despite what Tarantino wants us to believe), but L'AVENTURRA's legacy can be seen in some of the most critically acclaimed of contemporary art cinema: Kiarostami, Hou Hsiao Hsien, Tsai Ming Liang, Breillat, Jia Zhangke, Bela Tarr, Angelopoulos, etc., etc. Furthermore, in terms of establishing the explosion of the whole New Wave/Cahiers du Cinema/Left Bank craze, I think just as much, if not more, of an argument can be made for THE 400 BLOWS or HIROSHIMA MON AMOUR as can be made for BREATHLESS. MK

But the numbers from THT that you used to compute Theriot's BABIP do NOT have homeruns factored out. The article basically says that the Average Batting Average of Batted Balls is .340 (this includes homeruns) whereas the Average Batting Average of Balls in Play (BABIP, which does not include homeruns) is .310. That is a huge difference, and these are very different stats. All of the numbers that you used to compute Theriot's expected BABIP were based on the first table (see the link) which has numbers with homeruns factored in. According to the table in the link, the number of flyballs that are turned into outs is listed at 79% and the number of line drives that are turned into outs is listed at 26%. Both of these numbers would go up if you took homeruns out, and, as a result, if you were to recompute your table based on these new numbers (with homeruns factored out), Theriot's true expected BABIP would go down.

This FanGraphs article makes similar claims. Theriot's high BABIP resulted in inflated slash stats. His xBABIP indicates that his line should have been more in the vicinity of .266/.348/.309/.657. If not for terrific luck, his offensive line would have looked abysmal. They're predicting a huge dropoff for Theriot: http://www.fangraphs.com/.../index.php/the-lucky-riot

Indeed. Theriot has never hit more than 3 homeruns in a season in any of his 8 professional seasons at the major or minor league level. I think it's safe to say that a jump in Theriot's HR totals is unlikely.

But you still haven't answered the question. If BABIP is unrelated to BA, then please explain (in your opinion) what the predominant factor is that is causing a drop in Theriot's BA in the projection systems. BA and BABIP are absolutely related. True, as you showed in your example, they are not the same thing. Maybe I'm misunderstanding you, but based on your example, your argument is akin to saying OBP is not related to OPS because I can take a player's OBP, adjust it, and with an additonal adjustment in the player's SLG, still obtain the same OPS. Player 1: OBP = .300, SLG = .400, OPS = .700 Player 2: OBP = .250, SLG = .450, OPS = .700 OBP changed and OPS did not. Therefore OBP is not related to OPS. Makes no sense, right? So please explain how your example justifies the claim that BA and BABIP are not related?

Over .340 does appear to be very, very rare. http://reconditebaseball....extreme-career-babip.html Highest Career BABIP, Minimum 3000 PA, 1913-2007 Ty Cobb, .3785 Rogers Hornsby, .3655 Derek Jeter, .3613 Rod Carew, .3585 Ichiro Suzuki, .3572 Miguel Cabrera, .3538 Harry Heilmann, .3511 Joe Jackson, .3507 Tris Speaker, .3503 Bill Terry, .3500 Bobby Abreu, .3489 Ron LeFlore, .3466 Riggs Stephenson, .3459 George Sisler, .3458 Kiki Cuyler, .3456 Ross Youngs, .3454 Wade Boggs, .3438 Roberto Clemente, .3429 Kirby Puckett, .3421 Tony Gwynn, .3414

One more little thing. Raines had the "Rock" nickname long before he turned 31 (not sure where you got that from). I found this 1981 source about the "Rock" nickname on wiki: "Raines received this nickname at an Expo rookie camp when he was seventeen, based on his physique." - Abel, Allen (1981-05-28), "Raines defies Doubleday", The Globe and Mail He looked pretty buff as an Expo back in the '80s: http://i.a.cnn.net/si/2007/baseball/mlb/11/29/bp.raineshalloffame/t1_timraines_si.jpg

Wah? So because Raines found a little bit of extra power in his 30s he must have juiced? Mind you, we're not talking about Brady Anderson power here, we're talking about a guy who peaked at 16 homers during the "suspicious" seasons that you mention. So we automatically assume that anyone that hits a few extra dingers in their 30s MUST be a juicer?? Anyway, I spent about 10 minutes on baseball-reference, and (using your logic) I found some more guys that surely juiced: Paul Molitor: Career high in homers at age 36. Slugged over .500 only 3 times during career - 2 of those were at ages 36 and 37. Carlton Fisk: Career high in homers at age 37 (11 more than previous high). Second highest slugging percentage of career at age 40. Wade Boggs: Slugged .353 and .378 at ages 34 and 35. Slugging suddenly jumped to .433 at age 36 when he had his second highest career homerun total. Tony Gwynn: Hit 17, 16, and 10 homeruns at ages 37, 38, and 39. Prior to this he had only had 2 seasons with double-digit homeruns. Two highest slugging percentage numbers of his career came at ages 37 and 34. Dave Parker: Had the highest single season home run totals of career at ages 34 and 35. Craig Biggio: Highest single-season home run totals at ages 38 and 39. Al Oliver: Career high of 22 homers at age 35 (had hit 4 the year before). Also had the only season in career with a slugging percentage over .500 at age 35 (his career slugging was .451 - that's 50 points higher than his career line). Julio Franco: Career high in homers and slugging at age 35 (he slugged almost 100 points higher than his career line at age 35). Omar Vizquel: Career high of 14 homers at age 35 (that's the same as the total number of homers that he had in all three seasons before this)

The young offensive group of 1992 might have been as talented as our current group, but the big advantage that we have now is that our current stars are hitting their prime at the same time. It's true, the '92/'93 players that you listed all had some good years, but it's not as if those peak years that you listed happened in '93 or that there was any indication in '92 that those players would have great years. John Jaha: Jaha had his great years in 1995, 1996, and 1999 (as an A). In 1992, he put up a lackluster OPS+ of 70 in 133 AB. In 1993 he was slightly above average. Pat Listach: Yeah, he won ROY in '92, but his numbers weren't really that great. The award was more of a product of a poor rookie crop (and I think you can argue that someone like Lofton or Fleming should have won the award). In 1993, Listach was downright terrible. Greg Vaughn: Again, Vaughn was an all-star in '93, '96, '98, and '01. He didn't hit 40 homers until '96. His best year where he hit 50 homers wasn't until '98 as a Padre. He was coming off of a .228/.313/.409 season in '92 - not a lot of reason to get excited. Dave Nilson: Nilson didn't put up an OPS+ above 100 until '95. His best seasons were '96 and '99. His '92 line of .232/.304/.354 wasn't much to write home about. Nothing against these players, but they certainly were not hitting their prime or even putting up above average numbers around 1992/1993. However, Fielder, Braun, Hardy, and Hart have already proven that they are star players (or at least close to it).

Smuckers beat you to the punch: http://www.americansweets...rs-goober-grape-759-p.asp

Baseball Library claims it was arm troubles. No details though: http://www.baseballlibrar....php?name=Moose_Haas_1956

Wow, I just watched some Campus Ladies on YouTube. That show is brilliant. Thanks for the tip. I'm surprised there hasn't been any love for Robot Chicken or Sealab 2021. Some other good ones that haven't been mentioned: Mighty Boosh: Xtacles: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jFU2hFZ1wko Garth Marenghi's Darkplace (the intro alone is genius): http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SjmJWVc1RGY Fat Guy Stuck in Internet (in all of its low budget glory): http://www.youtube.com/wa...hAQbs&feature=related edit: I guess I spoke too soon. Looks like Fatter than Joey has Robot Chicken on his list.

But when Prince does make a good play doesn't it just leave you in a state of shock/amazement/happiness for the rest of the game? Like that diving catch he made on a bunt attempt in Manny's start against (I think) LA a week ago. He also had an amazing leaping grab to end an inning a few weeks ago (wish I could remember the game). Does anyone have any links to Prince's fielding gems (especially the one in the game with Manny)? Edit: I only look at the bright side of Fielder's D: http://milwaukee.brewers....o.jsp?mid=200808163317210 http://milwaukee.brewers....o.jsp?mid=200808033247107

There appears to now be some dispute over who has the rights to release a movie version of the Watchmen: http://movies.yahoo.com/mv/news/va/20080818/121911997700.html

When Kendall was playing out here for Oakland, a friend of mine who is a big A's fan loved to mock Kendall's power by giving him the nickname "The Dribbler". I'll never forget sitting at an A's game and watching Kendall sneak two weak dribblers up the middle for basehits. The two of us went nuts on both plays - standing up, clapping, and yelling out "DRIBBLER!" much to the surprise and confusion of the fans sitting nearby. No matter what he does for the Brewers, he'll always be "The Dribbler" to me.

With all this talk about former Brewer pitchers like Grant Balfour and Dana Eveland, has anyone been keeping an eye on Mike Adams? 2.18 ERA, 46 Ks in 41 and a third innings, only 14 walks, 1.11 WHIP. His current numbers even eclipse the excellent '04 season he had with Milwaukee (granted he's in pitcher friendly Petco, but his home/road splits are nearly identical). If I recall correctly, wasn't it more of a personal issue rather than an on-the-field issue that kept Adams from continuing with the Crew? Didn't he handle Turnbow's promotion to closer and his subsequent demotion to AAA pretty poorly? It's a shame - he's really putting together a superb season. At least one former Brewer closer is still getting the job done.

Well, I was going to make another post arguing that Branyan over Counsell is the correct choice, but now I see what I'm up against. Come on, man. Socrates? You're kidding, right? I recommend reading this: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Socratic_method And then watching this: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0096928/

This was posted a little earlier in the thread, but I'll update the numbers with a few more details. Here are the pitches per plate appearance for our third base options: Counsell: 2006: 3.8 2007: 3.9 2008: 4.1 Branyan (my 2008 number from thehardballtimes is different than what the earlier poster listed) 2006: 4.2 2007: 3.9 2008: 3.8 Hall 2006: 4.2 2007: 4.0 2008: 4.2 Basically identical. If anything, you can put forth a pretty decent argument that Bill Hall sees the most pitches (in fact, it's not an argument - it's a fact). Counsell sees .3 pitches more per plate appearance than Branyan. Over the course of a game that is going to translate into one more pitch (.3 P/PA * 4 PA = 1.2 pitches) than Branyan sees. 1 extra pitch. Do we really think that that one extra pitch is going to tire out the pitcher or reveal some secret about his delivery that will help the other hitters? This is another case of perception vs. reality. People *think* that Counsell is a gritty battler that works the count, fouls off balls, and hangs in there for the good of the team, but the numbers show that this just isn't true. I still love Counsell's defense, but it doesn't make up for the fact that he brings absolutely nothing to the plate.

That's kind of ridiculous since we've only lost 4 games in the past 2 weeks that Counsell played in, and by no means can we pin those losses on a single player. However, if you want to play by those rules and try to assign a loss to a specific guy, then we can come up with all sorts of ways to "blame" Counsell for losses: August 4th: 6-3 loss to Reds 4th inning, runner on second, Counsell struck out 6th inning, runners on first and second, Counsell grounded out Extra base hits in those at bats would have won or tied the game July 11th: 6-5 loss to Reds 7th inning, Counsell grounded out Homerun would have tied game July 7th: 4-3 loss to Colorado 2nd inning, runner on first and second, Counsell grounded out Big hit would have won or tied game July 3rd: 6-5 loss to Arizona 8th inning, Counsell flied out Homerun would have tied game June 25th: 4-3 loss to Atlanta 3rd inning, runner on second, Counsell grounded out 8th inning, runner on third, Counsell grounded out Hits in one or both of those situations would have won or tied the game May 25th: 7-6 loss to Washington 2nd inning, runner on first and second, Counsell grounded into double play 6th inning, runner on second, Counsell lined out Big hits in those at bats would have won the game Now I know the above is ridiculous, but that's sort of the point. In baseball, you can very rarely, if ever, assign the win or the loss to a single player. You never really know what would have happened with a better hitter, a better fielder, a better pitcher, or a faster runner in any of the dozens and dozens of plays that comprise a baseball game. That being said, we do know that baseball is an additive game - the end result is comprised of a whole bunch of plays involving a team of players with different skills. It seems pretty logical that if you maximize the skills of the players on the field during the course of a game, you will win more games (What really confused me is when people say stuff like "we have enough power". No you can NEVER have enough power. In baseball you are not penalized for hitting more than 5 homeruns, you don't lose runs after every 7th double, you don't forfeit the game if your team hits two grandslams. Where does this strange argument come from? If you score more runs, you will win more games. There will always be 1 and 2 run losses that a homerun here or a double there could have won.). With all that in mind, if I was a gambling man, I'd prefer Branyan in each of the above scenarios. Who knows? We might have one or two more wins if that had been the case.

This guy uses the same method as the original poster (he does, however, factor homeruns out of the equation), but determines LOB as a percentage. He has the Brewers ranked below average in LOB% at the All-Star Break: http://reconditebaseball.blogspot.com/2008/07/mlb-lob-data-through-all-star-break.html

Good start, but I'm skeptical of your method. There are too many important factors that you leave out: 1. Your method should deal with percentage left of base not total left on base - otherwise you're unjustly punishing teams that hit well. Scenario: Brewers get shutout by Dempster and in the process have 3 walks and 3 hits for a total of 6 runners (by your method) left on base. However, they stranded 100% of their runners. The Cubs demolish the Crew and score 13 runs on 20 hits. The Cubs left more on base (7) than the Brewers, but scored more runs and stranded only 35% of their runners. Obviously the Cubs did better in driving in their players despite leaving more on base. 2. Your method counts homeruns as potential baserunners. An at bat that results in a homerun is a hit, but can never result in that player being "on base" after the at bat. I *think* you need to subtract homeruns out of the equation. 3. Your method doesn't take into account if multiple hitters stranded the same runner. Take the follwing scenarios that your method treats the same: Scenario 1: Gabe Kapler hits a double with 2 outs. Next batter strikes out. Kapler was stranded by one batter (i.e., only one batter missed a chance to bring Kapler in). Scenario 2: Rickie Weeks gets a lead-off double and then the next three Brewers strikeout. Weeks was actually left on base 3 times by each of the three subsequent batters. 4. Your method doesn't take into consideration what base the stranded runner was on. The follwoing scenarios should be treated very differently since in one case the runner is in scoring position and was stranded (I would think we might want to penalize a team more for this) and in the other the runner was not in scoring position and was stranded: Scenario 1: Ryan Braun gets lead-off walk. Next three Brewers strikeout. Scenario 2: Ryan Braun gets lead-off triple. Next three Brewers strikeout. This case seems much worse when talking about clutchiness and stranding runners. Just some thoughts. I'll have to have a closer look at Rluz's equation. MK