2013 MLB Regular Season running thread

I'm sure you know this, but the 1972 season started about two weeks late due to the first player's strike.

 

Brace yourselves, folks. The Yankees are expected to activate Captain Intangibles from the DL today.

http://msn.foxsports.com/mlb/story/Derek-Jeter-to-return-to-New-York-Yankees-071013

 

It was interesting to hear Buster Olney on ESPN Radio yesterday say that every clubhouse he's been in this year, the players can't seem to stand Ryan Braun, and WANT to see him suspended. Olney even went so far as to say players consider him a "disgrace" to the game. Q

 

Yes, there's some more metrics in my post. If you don't like them, just skip it entirely. Thanks. Just trying to have some decent discussions. I know it's possible.

I wanted to talk about park effects, illusions and their extreme examples.

Speak about the respective cases of Chuck Klein, Mel Ott, George Sisler, Ken Williams, Joe DiMaggio, Ted Williams, Lou Gehrig, ect.

Or even talk about some pitchers, like Sandy Koufax, who benefited from Dodger Park's built-up pitching mound and deep OF fences.

Its going to be important to me whether the player simply had more offense because of his park, but proportionately to what other players got there, or if the player particularly benefited compared to other players.

And a third category which is players who's approach was different, but who still put up equal relative value on the road and at home.

Category 1 are guys who did get a relative boost as well as an absolute boost from a park
Wade Boggs who projects to only a 121 OPS+ if we use his road rates to estimate
Jim Rice I believe although I'll have to run the rates.
Chuck Klein
Carlos Gonzalez
Bichette

Category 2 would be players who have better rates at home, but only in line with how other players did in that ballpark. These players may have better career rates, but their WAR or OPS+ or anything ballpark adjusted will not be higher because of their park. Example of players who got better rates from their home park, but not a relative boost are:

Ted Williams
Larry Walker
Todd Helton
Troy Tulowitski
Yaz.

Williams is almost dead even in relative home and road hitting.
Walker is may be a point or two lower on the road
Helton and Tulowitski both actually have better road relative rates than Coors/home relative rates
I ran Yaz from 1962-1980 and his overall OPS+ was 135 while his road relative OPS+ was 136, and he actually was probably was a point higher on the road given that he didn't have Fenway as a road park to hit in some of the time. It could be up to 2 points more.


Category 3 is guys who put up equal value but did it in a different way at home and on the road. Mel Ott falls into the third category. His OPS+ relative to road and home was virtually identical, actually better on the road than at home, but he did it differently.

Here are Ott's home road OPS+ splits. The home OPS+ is relative to ALL hitters at home, and the road OPS+ is relative to ALL hitters on the road. I used his road sOPS+ to get the road half of the equation, and then assumed that his total OPS+ would be the average of the road sOPS+ and the home sOPS+ if it was ballpark adjusted (which it isn't).

Here are Ott's home and road OPS+ splits from 1928-1945. These are adjusted to the average of all players in their home and road parks, and to his particular home park.

Home/Road
28:109/169
29:127/208
30:155/145
31:116/186
32:165/183
33:130/146
34:118/218
35:166/148
36:182/172
37:130/170
38:191/165
39:173/175
40:132/142
41:197/103
42:210/120
43:160/108
44:188/180
45:179/123

Average from '28 to '40: 145.7/171.3
Average from '41 to '45: 174.8/126.8

Total averages: 153.8/158.9

His home production doubled, and adjusted to full time play, half with a normal road deduction:
Avg: .291
Hits: 2662
2B: 366
3B: 38
HR: 632
RBI: 1799
Walks: 1875
OB%.411
Slg%: .542

His road rates doubled and adjusted to full time play, half with home field advantage:
Avg: .318
Hits: 3090
2B: 625
3B: 104
HR: 384
RBI: 2010
Walks: 1560
OB%: .420
Slg%: .523

You could actually say that Helton falls somewhat into category 3 because his relative on base percentage is better on the road than at home primarily because he draws more walks on the road.

Perhaps we have 4 basic category which is guys who were hurt by their home parks either on an absolute basis or a relative basis. Clearly Joe Dimaggio had better absolute and relative rates on the road. It looks like he would have had about a 165 OPS+ had he hit as well relatively at home as on the road. That turns out to be a lot of relative value, like 8 WAR for the sabr people out there.

I will also check on Mike Piazza but it looks like while he was hurt in absolute rates, he was not hurt nearly as much in relative rates. He just played in a low offense park. The same may also be true for Koufax.

 

Good point on the 90th or 95th game or whatever. So I'll modify a bit:

Miguel Cabrera is good.

Over the last 20-25 years, what hitter -- excluding Bonds -- has terrorized pitchers for this long of a stretch in terms of power, patience and general hitting excellence.

I think Jose Bautista is the most recent example. In 1,338 plate appearances from the start of 2010 thru '11, Bautista had 97 homers, 227 RBIs, 232 walks and 300-something hits with an average of *only* .281 (and that's a pretty nice average for a slugger who had all those BBs). He played only 92 games last year and only now is he starting to pick it up again. He should finish with 35-40 homers. But the injury last year really stopped that crazy momentum. He was the most feared hitter in the game those 2 seasons. Would that have continued last season without the injury?

Since the start of the '11 season, Cabrera has 1,797 PA, 290 runs, 431 hits, 108 doubles, 103 homers, 337 RBIs, 229 walks and averages of .344, .330 and .366 (and rising).

This is his 11th season and he has 350 homers with 1,216 RBIs. I don't know if he'll break the HR record (whichever one people choose to recognize) but 2,000 RBIs is well within his reach.

Hank holds the RBI record (2,297 in 23 years) followed by Babe (2,220, 22) and Cap Anson (2,075, 27) -- the only guys in the 2,000-RBI club.

Let's say Miggy plays at least 20 seasons, minimum, and why not? He has played at least 157 games every season except his rookie season (87 in '03). If you add 9 more full seasons with Miggy's career RBI average (123) you get 1,107 which puts him at 2,323 -- and that's not with the number of RBIs he'll have thru the rest of this season so it could be close to 2,400. (Bonds finished with 1,996) and A-Rod is at 1,950.

 

Cabrera's been pretty durable thus far, but if the Tigers don't come to their senses and move him off third base pretty soon, the second half of his career may be filled with leg and foot injuries the way Chipper Jones' was.

 

Videos are spotty here at work, so I can't post, but did anyone see that Philly fan take the home run ball right off his face last night?

 

Yeah. ... Nice hands, pal.

 

Here we go...

http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/dc-sports-bog/wp/2013/07/11/anthony-rendon-home-run-hits-phillies-fan-in-the-head/

 

Rare color photo of Babe Ruth in 1947, via PBS' Michael Beschloss on Twitter:

https://twitter.com/BeschlossDC/status/355155507348140032/photo/1

 

Beschloss is a great follow.

 

Danny Salazar of Cleveland lighting it up so far in his MLB debut - no hits through four, six Ks.