Squaring it up
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The Hardball Times found this 9/4/2007 on www.hardballtimes.com [flag] |
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MLB
Comments (17)
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imrich +1It would be fun to see Ichiro's rate stats for balls in play.-
walshj58 Here are Ichiro's numbers on balls in play (sorry for the formatting. Ballhype: can you implement a "code" tag or something that uses a fixed-width font?)
+--------------+--------+-------+-------+
| inStrikeZone | swings | AVG | SLG |
+--------------+--------+-------+-------+
| N | 73 | 0.370 | 0.479 |
| Y | 126 | 0.365 | 0.452 |
+--------------+--------+-------+-------+That is pretty fun. Ichiro seems to do just as well on balls out of the zone, with the usual caveats about sample size, of course.
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ChadBradfordWannabe loved the article, John.-
walshj58 Thanks, Carlos. Your piece on Kennedy and Buchholz was great.
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skyking162 Excellent analysis. I really like using the PITCH f/x data like this. Any chance of creating more zones in addition to just balls and strike? Maybe turn the strike zone into three concentric rectangles and the "ball zone" into almost-strikes and definitely-not-strikes? I'm sure you could find hitters who are very similar in how well they make contact depending on zone, but that have different rates of swinging at balls in different zones.-
walshj58 Thanks.
Sure, we could create more zones, but at the batter level, we are already limited by the number of pitches. Any more slicing and dicing of the data will have to wait until we have quite a bit more.
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mlentzner Awesome work. I can't wait until the PITCH f/x data has been collected for a few seasons and has full park coverage.-
walshj58 Thanks, Matt.
Well, mlb has been saying that they hope to cover all parks by the end of the season. Don't know if that will happen, but I believe they are getting close. There are still a few quality issues (which I detail in previous articles), but, yeah, another year or two of data will really open things up.
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tangotiger I agree that you definitely want three zones, not two. A guy can get alot of down-the-middle strikes that is really just noise in some analysis.
Since John already has the fantastic charts that shows where the discretionary zones are, those should be used.
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walshj58 hey tango,
Welcome to ballhype!
thanks for the kind words (as always). Agree that the intermediate "transition" zone should be added.
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pizzacutter Outstanding work.
One question I have is whether contact rates vary by pitch location. Vlad swings at everything, but is he (or anyone else) better at actually making contact when the ball is in the strike zone than if it's not?
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walshj58 Hey Pizza,
yes, the contract rates are given in the article, the first table, called "Swing Outcomes". I call contact rate "inPlay" in that table. The following two tables show the results for some individual batters: here missRate is 1-contactRate (if you consider foul balls "contacted".
If you want a complete list of players, email me.
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notsellingjeans John,
Terrific work as usual - the work that you and Sal are doing with that data is simply required reading for anyone who wants to learn more about the game.
The Ichiro bit was particularly interesting, and left me with more questions that we won't be able to answer until the sample size grows, but merit monitoring in the interim:
What types of out-of-strike-zone pitches, specifically, does Ichiro tend to hit well? Yes, his average is higher on pitches out of the strike zone...but perhaps just as important would be to specify even further (when the sample's large enough) - what's his average on high fastballs? Low pitches?
This data would be especially valuable with a hitter as metacognitive as Ichiro, who also has great bat control. For example, he could be consciously looking for a high pitch out of the zone that he can hit the top half of, beat into the ground, and leg out the high chopper. Certainly Ichiro is capable of planning that and executing it occasionally.
It's valuable to know that Ichiro still hits for a great average (.370) on balls out of the strike zone. It would be even more valuable to know eventually, for example, that he hits .230 when he puts a low ball in play, and .415 when he puts a letter-high fastball in play. Then we could make a more specific, accurate statement about what types of out-of-the-strike zone pitches that Ichiro does well with.
That's obviously on a micro level, but on a macro level:
Can we make generalizations about types of hitters and how they perform in these parameters?
Do power hitters fare worse than Ichiro-slappers on balls out of the strike zone?
Do the power hitters have the upper hand over slap hitters when a strike is put into play?
Intuitively, I'd guess both of those hypotheses are true even if not overwhelmingly so; A power hitter (longer swing plane) should have a harder time getting to pitches out of the strike zone than a short-swinging slap hitter, but a power hitter is also better able to make a pitcher pay for location mistakes in the strike zone.
One important thing this study doesn't discuss (but perhaps doesn't need to) is that not all balls are created equal, and that's important given the small sizes. A middle-of-the-plate fastball just over the belt is a ball, but it's also a good candidate to be crushed. The same is not true of a slider diving away from the plate that the batter reaches out and stabs at. Both pitches get swung at, both were balls...but should we treat them equally? Obviously one is far more hittable than the other. I'm sure this phenomenon evens out over time( confirm?), but over the sample sizes we're looking at, a hitter could've gotten an inordinate number of slightly above belt high fastballs. John definitely mentioned that...I just think it's interesting to consider that not all swung-at balls are really the same in terms of their "hittability".
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walshj58 Thanks, Jacob.
Lots of good stuff in your comment. For now, we won't be able to do much with slicing individual batters' data, as you yourself mentioned. But, there probably is enough data to start grouping types of batters, a very good suggestion.
Agree on the definition of "ball" -- they are not all equal. I'm not sure they even out, so going to a finer division of the data (when we have enough) will be the way to go.
thanks, again.
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Duke I'd be curious to see this broken down into different counts as well in the future (I'd imagine a larger sample is needed.)
Links (5)
Swing and miss
Published 9/4/2007 by Tangotiger (tangotiger@yahoo.com) at THE BOOK--Playing The Percentages In Baseball
... More great stuff from John Walsh. ...
Saber Bomb: Swinging at Strikes Is Good, Swinging at Balls Is Bad
Published 9/4/2007 by Pat Lackey at FanHouse
... One great and entirely overlooked aspect of sabermetrics is that it's not all just newfangled stats that are hard for the casual fan to understand. They can just as easily take a look at what seems to be a common baseball truth and see if there's actually any truth behind it. That's what makes this Hardball Times article about swinging at strikes so great. Swinging at strikes is a basic baseball tenant, but haven't you ever wondered just how important it is? (Warning: if you haven't, just stop reading now) ...
The Top 25, 25 and Under
Published 9/5/2007 by Nick Underhill at I'm Writing Sports
... Awesome article at Harball Times: Squaring it up ...
LINKAGE WEDNESDAY
Published 9/5/2007 by The Zoner at Zoner Sports
... I’ve harped on plate discipline on this blog, not just drawing walks but getting ahead in the count to get a strike to hit. The Hardball Times has the data on this topic as well as some players that swing at bad balls (Alfonso Soriano–go figure!) and the good ones. ...
More on plate discipline
Published 9/14/2007 by Justin at On Baseball and the Reds
... certainly indicates that this will tend to result in higher BABIP than swinging at balls out of the zone, as does John Walsh's recent study. ...
