rluzinski

I meant, who's going to do the play-by-play in this thread? http://forum.brewerfan.net/images/smilies/wink.gif

Who's going to do the play-by-play?

Well, crap. We need another league! http://forum.brewerfan.net/images/smilies/smile.gif Any chance of starting up another one?

Total Bases = H + 2B + (2 x 3B) + (3 x HR) That's the correct one when using hits.

Well, I've finally unlocked the some of the mysteries of PBP data from retrosheet.org. You have to use the bevent.exe file to preparse the data. It's a comamnd line program, so I recommend writing a batch file if you want to spit out the whole league's worth of data. You can read the resulting file right into Excel. Admittantly, I should probably be using Access (or another database prgram) but owell. Event File Page If are just looking for seasonal data, the Lahman database is great. They even have an excel version loaded up and ready to go: Lahman Database, Version 5.3 - spreadsheet version Sure would be nice to have a partner in crime for this stuff! If anyone needs help, shoot me an email: rluzinski@hotmail.com

Your Father-In-Law is my hero http://forum.brewerfan.net/images/smilies/tongue.gif

It was buried in the article, but here's the link to Dan Fox's blog. Pay particular attention to the right-hand sidebar. If you want to get into sabermetrics, read that entire blog and everything at tangotiger.net and hardballtimes.com

Just how significant the skill of base-running is in the grand scheme of things is also anyone's guess. I think the data required is going to be too hard to gather, but it would be interesting to see if someone could even design a satisfactory 'thought experiment' Dan Fox has done some decent work to try and quantify base running. It's certainly a decent start: "Circle the Wagons: Running the Bases" Part I Part II Part III

If I find "a lot" of people that are "pretty knowledgable" that agree with me can i just dismiss other people's opinions too? What I'm dismissing is your characterization of the study as having "no semblance of reason". I respect the collective knowledge of the BTF community and the magnitude of your dismissal of the author?s techniques doesn?t seem to jive with the overall response to the article there. It is quite possible that the adjustments the author makes still doesn't accurately model the problem at hand. As a result, your criticisms may be perfectly valid. My "issue" is that you reject any model that makes inferences based on aggregate data. By having that stance, you reject a statistical technique that, when done correctly, is widely accepted within the statistical community. Unless you are a renowned statistics professor, I find it hard to take seriously that level of dissidence. The fact is the first part of the study rests on the assumption that you can judge the affect of a base-stealer on first base by comparing it to all other batting situations the batter following them faces. ... after making several adjustments, correct. Part 2 of his study attempted to validate that methodology by comparing the relative improvement from having a prolific base stealer at first vs. a non-prolific base stealer. It certainly didn't disagree with the conclusions from part 1. Now, it used aggregate data to do so, so I'm sure you would reject part 2's conclusions as well.

It must be hard to live life like that... Not at all. Having a background in Mechanical Engineering (and the corresponding science-centric education) has taught me how useless anecdotal evidence is. My background has taught me the importance of using elements of the scientific method in formulating opinons that I deem valid enough to share in a public forum. I learned long ago (well, I'm only 29, but you get the point) that opinions derived from personal observation are often completely wrong. I've never seen 10 million dollars...but I know it exsists. That seems more like a start to a philisophical conversation than a scientific one. It has nothing to do with my above comment, IMO.

The 03/04 info seems to show different pull data than the 03-05 It does and I'm not exactly sure why. Lefties would have to be hitting just about all their OF groundballs to LF (in the second chart) to account for their GB distribution in the first. I was hoping a reader would point me in the right direction if it was just me missing something. Maybe I'll email Dan Fox for a better explanation of his program. Are all balls fielded by the SS, 2B or CF considered in the "center" region? I can only assume as much.

To be honest, I think any kind of speculation on anecdotal evidence is next to worthless. I only made the statement to illustrate that there are valid logical arguments to counter the "of course there's clutch players" rational.

How then can the author of this study say "Most GB are pulled"...oh that's right, that's the side of the arguement he needs to make in order for his study to work. He clearly shows what effects he's talking about and proves his assertion with his own table: [b]Percentage of ground balls fielded, left/right splits[/b] +--------------+-------+------+------+------+------+------+------+ | Situation | GB | Bats | 1B | 2B | 3B | SS | OF | +--------------+-------+------+------+------+------+------+------+ | All GB | 41034 | L | 0.22 | 0.31 | 0.06 | 0.15 | 0.17 | | All GB | 54460 | R | 0.04 | 0.14 | 0.26 | 0.30 | 0.17 | +--------------+-------+------+------+------+------+------+------+53% of a lefties groundballs were fielded by either 1B or 2B. 56% of righties groundballs were fielded by the SS or 3B. It's all explained clearly. You just skimmed the article looking for "inconsistencies" and grabbed onto his "pulled" statement. I guess you should have looked a little harder. Nobody says the assumptions have to be perfect, they just have to have some sembelance of reason behind them. So the study's assumptions have "no semblence of reason"? Alot of pretty knowlegable people felt many of his assumptions were pretty reasonable at Baseball Think Factory. Your criteria for "reasonable assumptions" continues to be unreasonable and inpractical.

Is the chance of brewerfan.net being recognized as a media outlet in any way by the Brewers still zero? Meanwhile a newspaper in the upper NW of wisconsin with a circulation of 14 can get a press pass? BTW, gratz, brewerjamie15 http://forum.brewerfan.net/images/smilies/smile.gif

I'm not gonna dig into it, but I'm guessing that dude, being a stat nerd, had data to back this up, or more likely was referencing data well-known in the stat nerd community. Being part of the nerd community, I have access to that data! 1003 - 2004, Groundballs Pull CF Opp Right Handers 38,382 12,828 10,320 Left Handers 6,195 20,894 8,472 ---------------------- 44,577 33,722 18,792 ---------------------- 45.9% 34.6% 19.4% Between 2003 and 2004, over twice as many groundballs were pulled than taken the opposite way. It's interesting to see that lefthanders spray grounders pretty evenly around the field, however.

You're right it's impossible to be objective unless you quote some stats...I forgot You freely admit a bias against statistical analysis of baseball. You couldn't possibly be objective in your critisism of this study as a result. It has nothing to do with using data to support an argument. How can you claim that a control is needed to remedy the possible bias due to difference in situations by measuring it agianst other situations that may or may not be the same? Because, like all just about all statistical models, you have to make assumptions and simplifications. In your world, where everything has to be exactly the same and aggregate stats can never be used, you would never be able to study anything. As for this study, I'm sure the author will try to improve his model in subsequent studies. Rarely is someone going to get it completely right the first try.

Baseball is a game played in real-time not in a spreadsheet... Wow, and I had the nerve to claim your criticism of the study wasn't objective.

Here we go with the condescension again....Do you think I'm some kind of uneducated hick? You didn't understand (or even read?) the study, yet dismissed it because you didn't agree with it's findings. If that's condescending of me to point that out and take you to task for it, so be it. You don't think a pitcher's mentality has any effect on his performance? That exactly what the study was trying to find; any possible effects in the pitcher's performance. He found little if none. That doesn't make him necessarily correct but your criticism of his study simply doesn't make sense.

But you can't just discredit the notions Blazer brought up and assume he didn't properly analyze the study because he didn't agree with it. I discounted them because his comments showed a lack of understanding of the study. In part one of his study, the author states: The first two points Blazer brought up (loss of velocity and changing type of pitch thrown) are only relevant if they cause the pitcher to perform worse in getting the batter out. That's exactly what the study is trying to measure. His third point (more pickoff attempts causing an error) is valid but insignificant. It is very rare that a pickoff attept results in a throwing error. His last comment (managers and fielders have to be actively "concentrating" on speedy runners) would also be picked up by the study if it has the effect of having a pitcher perform worse. I'm with Blazer, you can't prove statistically the mental effect a proven base-stealer has on a pitcher. This "mental effect" is only relevant if it hurts the pitcher's job of preventing runs. I'm not saying this study's findings are conclusive or undebatable, but any criticism of it is invalid if the person criticising it doesn't grasp the author's methodology in the first place. There's a discussion of the two articles (Part 1 and 2) at the Baseball Think Factory: LINK It contains some very well thought-out comments and criticisms of the article (includuing the guy who created UZR, MGL, who thinks the study was fatally flawed). His and others' criticisms stem from perceived flaws in the the study's methodology, not disagreement in it's findings. That's the correct way to challenge the findings.

These are the kind of statistical analyses that make me cringe...you cannot statistically prove or disprove the mental effect on a pitcher with a speedy runner on first. It makes me cringe when someone doesn't invest the time to properly analyze a study, yet sees it fit to criticize it's findings. What the author is attempting to do is see if the top base stealers give an advantage to a batter beyond what he already get's from the defense being shifted. Even having Geoff Jenkins at first is an advantage to the batter. You need to account for that (among many other things) before you can draw any meaningful conclusions on the effects a base stealer has on the game. While there's a posibility that the author's methodology could be flawed or he made a mistake somewhere, he went to great lengths to try and adjust for everything he could think of. After reading it carefully once, I certainly didn't find anything that screams, "bad study." I can't imagine you did anything more than glance at it and not like the findings. Not exactly objective criticism.

I wouldn't trust the ZiPS projections for pitchers either. Pitchers are alot harder to project.

So I don't think a statement like that adds anything to the debate, but I see it often I would counter that to list a bunch of possible sources of an ability no one has ever proven even exists isn't much of an argument either. For lack of existing evidence, the burden of proof is on the individual attempting to advance their theory, not the other way around. The media advances the notion of particular players being clutch hitters because it's an appealing concept, not because there's any real proof of it's existence.

It's definitely relative to the player's normal production, but I've never seen evidence that certain players consistantly perform better in clutch situations. I mean, aren't they doing a diservice to their team by not always performaing at that level?

He's saying that individual "runs" is a meaningless statistic. That's the way I took it, anyhow. Ahhh, that makes alot more sense. http://forum.brewerfan.net/images/smilies/smile.gif Runs and RBIs don't tell very much about the player, correct.

Is this a pretty useless stat (and if so, why do publications use it as a prominent stat), or am I overlooking something? Just so I understand, you are suggesting that OBP is a useless stat? Not exactly the correct forum to suggest that, but here goes: Teams score by getting runners on base and then advancing those runners to home (or by hitting a HR and advancing yourself). OBP is the "getting on base" part. The more base runners, the more opportunities to score. Second, the higher a team's OBP is, the more team plate appearances they have and the more opportunites to score, once again. OBP adds base runners and prevents outs. Outs are the currency of baseball. Besides maybe speed, it seems like runs pretty much depends on your OBP and how well the guys behind you hit. So if the only thing it depends on is OBP, why have it? Without "it" there would be no opportunities to score at all.