An epic (saber-metric) showdown of backyard baseball, Game 3

By Mike Moritz

As stated in the post before, if you missed the first post about Simon and I's best-of-seven-series, click here to find out what the rules are in the kind of baseball that Simon and I play.

Game three of the Dickle-Doos (Simon) versus The Crookers (Me) was a very intense one, and arguably the most intense of the series thus far. We played 6 innings due to time constraints.

Coming into the series, we had been knotted at 1 game a piece. Simon had sent left-hander D.D. Dickbathia while I had sent the nasty yet command-less Crook Colquez. With Colquez, it seems to either be a strike out or a walk in this league. In 310.1 innings during the 2011 regular season, Colquez posted a fantastic FIP of 5.79 but that number was good considering his 11.72 BB/9. His 19.26 K/9 seemed to help offset his walk rate but it was his 88% ground ball rate that really help him out in the FIP department...it was insane. His also good 6.21 ERA was inflated by a .342 BABIP and a 67% LOB.


Colquez seemed to have better command of his pitches in game three than in any other start of the year...or it could have been Simon's terrible plate discipline and eagerness to swing at every pitch (which was extremely strange considering he is generally more of a Crooklos Santana rather than a Jeff Crankcrookore). Simon's O-Swing% was definitely north of 50% while his O-Contact% was about 90%.

• In just 2 1/3 innings, Colquelz walked just one batter but he only struck out one as well. Instead of avoiding hits with walks and strike outs, Colquez got hit hard. He gave up two homers, a double and a total of 8 hits for 7 runs. 
• SwStr% was where Simon really struggled in the first two games of the series, but he turned that around today as reduced his mark from (just a guess) around 17% to probably around 6%. This dramatic improvement really stemmed from his ability to layoff the curve and wait for more hittable pitches, like...
• The high fastball. Simon hit four of his total seven home runs off of fastballs that were left up in the zone, sending them over the right field fence each time.
• As mentioned before, Colquez had just one punch out, putting a little more pressure on Yovani Crookardo, who came in to pitch 3 2/3 innings in relief. Crookardo did not have a single strike out and gave up the four homers that were hit off high fastballs, three of which were solo shots and the other being a two-run shot.
• In total, The Crookers pitching had a 48% ground ball rate and a 29% fly ball rate, both rates being very good. The 23% line drive rate was where the pitching staff struggled. 
• Even though we gave up just a 29% fly ball rate, The Dickle-Doos HR/FB rate was 78%. Even that number is way above the 60% average in Mike's Cold Hard Lemonade Stadium. Expect that number to regress back to the mean.
• Although their HR/FB rate was way high, The Dickle-Doos really got unlucky, posting a mere .194 BABIP compared to the (about) .350 average. The fact that his HR/FB would regress down and his BABIP would regress back up says that, excluding the walks, The Dickle-Doos could hit just as well in following games. This low BABIP is essentially the reason as to why The Crookers were able to stay in this game and not let it slip away. 
• The fact that The Crookers struck out just hitter all game, the low BABIP was even more help.
• The Crookers just could not hit in Game Three. They had just seven hits. We had a below average 17% line drive rate, 39% fly ball rate, and a 28% ground ball rate. The remaining 16% were infield fly balls, something that needs to be worked on. The Crookers BABIP was right around average, at .333.
• Despite not being able to hit, The Crookers were able to support the pitching by getting hit by pitches 10 times and getting walked 7 times. 
• While The Dickle-Doos had seven long balls, The Crookers had just one, a rarity. The one home run was a three-run shot in the top of the 6th inning. The pitch was on the outer half of the plate and I went with it, sending it over the house in left field, making the score 17-12, The Crookers in the lead. 
• The Crookers brought in Crook Halladay to lock up the save since in this league, "no lead is a safe one".  The Dickle-Doos got the inning under way very quickly, sending the first offering into the center field trees. 17-13, The Crookers. 
• Let's just say that two hit by pitches, a few singles and three walks later, the bases were loaded and the score was tied at 17. You could probably guess what happened next.
• The count was 3-2 with two outs. After walking just three in the first 5 innings, I was in a tough situation having already given up three walks in the inning alone. The pitch came, a fastball that I just didn't know where to throw. It ended up just missing the outside corner. Ball four and the winning run could walk home, literally. Game three was given away by The Crookers and the Dickle-Doos have taken a 2 games to 1 lead

So yes, game three went to Simon, 18-17. But there were still some other smalls things to keep note, some of which were rather humorous:

• Simon's LOB% seemed to be something like 92%. In the first three innings, he lucked out when I had left the bases loaded twice. The other inning ended with two of my men on base.
• As I stated before, I had walked just three hitters in the first five innings before walking four in the bottom of the sixth. I suddenly just lost my command at the wrong time.
• Simon hit a double that was literally an inch away from going out. It hit off the very top of the Aqua Monster and stayed in the park. There was no one on base so it was just your average double but it could have gone out.
• Perhaps the most embarrassing moment of the game came in the top of the third inning. On a 2-2 count and after two consecutive foul balls, Simon threw a high fastball and I swung, only to foul it off again. But this time, the ball, after going off the bat, hit my face, more specifically my eye AND my nose. This then triggered many tears and a shit load of sneezes, five in about two minutes to be exact.

Game Four will be played Monday, May 9th. In a must win game for The Crookers, we will be sending Max Crookzer while the Dickle-Doos will be sending Felix Dickhandez.

An epic (saber-metric) showdown of backyard baseball, Game 2

By Mike Moritz

If you missed the introduction to this game of baseball that co-writer Simon and I play, click here to read over the rules of the league and how Game 1 went.

After coming off an 11-6 win over Simon and his Dickle Doos, my team, The Crookers were feeling confident going into Game 2 of the best-of-seven series. Simon sent R.A. Dickle Doo to the bump against Crook Canks. 


To be honest, due to the fact that this game took place back on Wednesday, I really just don't remember a lot of the details of the game. So I do apologize if I have already disappointed you as a reader. So if you wish to know some of the details that I DO remember, read on!

Some first notes:

The rain was on all day and at some points came down very hard, potentially slowing down any ground balls that might have had a chance to go through for base hits.

We also decided to play seven innings instead of the usual six.

• I smashed four home runs en route to a 57% HR/FB rate, which, considering the park, is about average. Simon and I have decided that 60% seems about average for HR/FB in Mike's Cold Hard Lemonade Stadium but further play with not only us, but other kids will help decide the true average.
• Simon had two homers and two doubles. One of his homers was a three run shot and the other was a two run shot in the forth inning that gave Simon his first lead of the game, 8-6. 
• Simon's total HR/FB% was a total 67%.
• In the bottom of the first inning, I sent three hitters to the plate to lead off. The first hitter had a line drive single to center, the second hitter walked and then I launched a three-run shot that went well into the forest in left field, 3-0, The Crookers lead.
• Later in the inning, there were two away and a runner on first. A pitch was left right in the middle of the zone and I got what seemed to be "all of it" but for what ever reason, the ball died in center field, missing a home run by a matter of inches and becoming the final out of the inning.
• Skipping to the bottom of the 7th, Simon is winning 12-9. On the first pitch of the inning, I send a line drive home run over the fence in right field. Next at bat, I ground out. Then, I hit a lined shot just over the "first basemen's head" for a single. I then draw a walk. In the next at bat, Simon throws a ball away and the runners move up to second an third with one out. He then drops a curve ball and I whiff for the second out.
• The next at bat was a Brett Gardner type of at bat, fouling off pitch after pitch. The count got to 2-2 before I fouled off the next four pitches. The last foul ball made things exciting. Simon throws a heater inside and being the natural pull hitter I am, I pull the ball to the right side. But I also got a lot of this pitch, I crushed it. If the pitch had been a tiny bit more over the plate, I would have won. 
• Nonetheless, the next pitch I hit is grounded to first base to end the game.

In total, this was definitely a game that should have been won by The Crookers but my striking out eight times and just five times reached via the walk versus Simon's five whiffs and nine walks seemed to be the turning point in this game. If I end up swinging at a three or pitches that I took and/or vice versa, this was mine for the taking. 

Game Three has already been played so look for a post on that within today or tomorrow.

A look at Francisco Liriano's No-Hitter

By Mike Moritz

In a post that I wrote back in March, I explained why I thought Francisco Liriano could do even better than his fantastic 2010 season. To be honest, I thought I was somewhat right. As we know now, Liriano's season has made me look like a complete and utter idiot. But if some baseball fan out there believed that was right and then also believed that "I got unlucky because no one could have guessed that Liriano would get off to such bad start" and then knew that my hypothesis would eventually come true, then I thank you for putting trust in me. But as much as I would love for someone to believe that in March, I would be right, I am sorry but you just should not keep your trust in me for Liriano.

Liriano's much heard of no-hitter last night made his season look so much better than it actually is. Honestly, there were so many things that Liriano was just bad at last night. Coming into his start, he's been disgustingly terrible, as we all know. A casual fan of baseball would say "Hey, Dad! Look, Fransico Liriablahblah threw a no-hitter!" and saber-metric nerds would say "Jesus, he got more BABIP'd than anybody could have ever gotten BABIP'd".

Well the Luck Dragons decided to give Liriano a break from being his terrible, 2011 version of himself.

There is NOBODY in the major leagues with a true talent level of .000 BABIP. ESPECIALLY the 2011 version of Liriano.

Ok, so a maybe "a no-hitter is a no-hitter" after all. But seriously? 6 walks and just 2 punch outs?

Those numbers brought his season K/BB ratio to .83, which is way below the 2.14 league average. He is now averaging just 5.51 K/9 and 6.61 BB/9. And this guy threw a no-hitter?

Liriano's O-Swing% dropped from 34.4% in 2010 to a mere 22.6% mark this year. Hitters are overall, being more patient, swinging at just 41.7% of Liriano's pitches, which is a career low. His opponent Contact% has reached a career high at 61.4%.

Looking at Liriano's pitch type values, his fastball is his only pitch that is negative, and since pitch type values do not take into consideration how much a player relies on one specific pitches, that is why his fastball value is only -.46 instead of lower.

Because of that, we can't use statistics to see exactly why hitters are laying off his pitches.

Rather, we use our eyes.

And we then come up with the conclusion that Liriano is a pitcher that relies on his fastball and works his other pitches off of the heater. But now that Liriano's fastball has lost 2 mph, hitters can tell much more easily whether to take it or swing. And they are keeping the bats on the shoulders to no end thus creating Liriano's walk rate that is higher than his what's-supposed-to-be-high strike out rate.

So basically this no-hitter says what kind of state the White Sox offense is in. And it probably contributed as much, if not more, to Liriano's no-hitter than Liriano's actual skill.

And the worst part? He's on my fantasy team...and I benched him.

(Statistics in courtesy of: fangraphs.com)



7.6 2011

An epic (saber-metric) showdown of backyard baseball

By Mike Moritz

As spring time blooms, a couple of things come to mind, one of which is not very good. And that's hay-fever and backyard baseball. Hay-fever obviously is the bad one, and to be honest, I just have a wall of snot in my nose and my eyes have hit a perpetual stage of itchiness. But backyard baseball has brought a level of saber-metric thinking that I never would have thought had been possible.

Fellow Baseball Jungle writer (despite the fact that he doesn't post much anymore) Simon and I have had a rivalry at many different things, and baseball is no different. We play 7-game series and game one was on Sunday.

My house seems to have the perfect dimensions for a game of baseball. You see, we have a sort-of long driveway, and in "right field", there is a stone wall that is about 3 feet tall, which leads to center field, where the wall is represented by a bunch of trees. In left field, we have my actual house. When hit over the house, it is declared a home run, but you can hit it off what has been nicknamed "The Aqua Monster", for its extreme similarities to that of the Green Monster in Fenway Park and it is called "The Aqua Monster" for my house's light blue color. The name of the house (or stadium): Mike's Cold Hard Lemonade Stadium.

The game is played with tennis balls to ensure that no windows and other things are not broken. On the left and right sides of the property are two groups of bushes, and when hit into, it is declared an out. If a ball hits a car, it is also out. There is a small skateboard ramp that my brother uses which resides right where the pavement of the driveway meets the outfield grass, and if the ball hits it, it is considered an out and a Top 10 play on Sportscenter.Anything that is hit over the house, in the the threes or over the right field wall is a home run. The hits are declared hits depending on where the ball landed and how it was hit. The runners are assumed to be your Average-Joe runner, meaning that they would score on a non-bloop hit to the outfield from second base. The game is played in six innings.

I can not recall every moment of the game but the final score was my team (The Crookers) over Simon's team (The Dickle-Doos) 11-6. That is actually a pretty low scoring game, usually the games would end up in something like a 30-27 offensive brawl.

The more notable things that happened were as follows:

• I had a 100% HR/FB rate. That is "luck" to the extreme. More specifically, I had a grand slam and two solo shots. The grand slam and the second solo shot were both hit into the center field trees while the other solo shot just barely went over the right field fence, A.K.A. Dustin Padroia type homer. The ball was left up high in the zone, and I knew that that I had gotten under it, but as I stated before, luck was on my side and the ball cleared. 
• Simon struck out a total of eight times, seven of which came on the curve that I would drop in. If I had to guess, I would say that Simon's SwStr% was probably around 25%...he was bad. 
• Simon also used a combination of  his good eye and my inability to consistently throw strikes to draw walks, getting on nine times via the free pass. Yes, he had more walks then strike outs.
• He even squared up on a ball once and sent a two run shot that over the house left. I put a fastball low in the zone, just as I wanted but he put a good swing on it and sent it out. 
• Not only did I have a lot of help from the homer runs, I also really lucked out on stranding runners. If I had to guess, I would say that my LOB% might have been around 90%. That was a huge reason why I was able to limit his runs despite all the walks (I walked in two runs).
• In the bottom of the 4th, I was in a high leverage situation. I had the bases loaded (again) and two outs with a 1-2 count on me. Knowing what happened last time, Simon was trying to keep the ball low and hope that I would hit the ball to the bushes, or the cars or to the ramp. Well, not only was I getting my way with my HR/FB%, I also got BABIP'd and I put a nice swing on a low fastball, sending a ground ball right back up the middle that missed the ramp by probably about six inches. If I hadn't gotten so lucky, the scored would have stayed at 8-5 and Simon could have still been in the game. Instead, two runs scored and I went up 10-5. 

I took the first game of the series on the back of "Crook Lee's" fantastic 5 inning, 7 hit, 5 run, 8K performance. You must remember that this was an pretty low scoring affair so that is actually considered a good start. "Crook Halladay" pitched the last inning, giving up one walk, a hit (which went through both cars for a BABIP-type hit) and one run.

Game 2 will be on Wednesday, May 4th at 2:45 at Mike's Cold Hard Lemonade Stadium. The Crookers will be sending "Crook Canks" to the mound while Simon has yet to decide on his starting pitcher.

*NOTE: Being the baseball nerd we are, I would like to clarify that Simon and I pretend to be these pitchers but with different names. Hey, don't make fun, if you played in this baseball league, you would be tempted to do that too.

David Freese is red hot (right now)

By Mike Moritz

Both Matt Kemp and Andre Ethier (among many others like Jose Bautista and Joey Votto) have been getting full-fledged attention for getting off to hot starts this season without the help of 100% luck (in other words, not all of their performance has been BABIP'd for the better). David Freese is one of the overlooked players that has been red hot right off the bat (no pun intended).

Freese has looked to be legitimately good so far. He's hit .342/.378/.474 and a .374 wOBA. His BABIP is obviously unsustainable, sitting at .444 but he is leading the league in line drive rate at 35.7%. A ridiculous rate that seems to be carrying Freese right now. There is no doubt in my mind that he is also getting pretty lucking but still, the fact that he is hitting line drives at a staggering rate helps a crap load. I also highly doubt that he can keep this up, I don't think he is this good, but yes, he is a good player. We often tend to attribute a hot streak to complete luck, but this is not always the case. And Freese can be used as a good example because he is doing well and not just getting lucky. Hits come at complete randomness so I guess you could argue that Freese has gotten lucky that he is hitting line drives at such a high rate, but when a player gets lucky, we mean that hits are dropping in that should not be.

He could also just be seeing the ball well.

You could say that, but this is where Freese is in a danger for hitting a huge slump.

A look at his plate discipline stats suggest to us that he is actually seeing the ball badly. His O-Swing% has jumped from 24.3% in 2010 to 32% this year. What makes that statistic even worse is that his O-Contact% has also jumped up from 52.9% to 63.8%, meaning that he is probably making a lot more of "bad" contact then he was last year. To make matters even worse, his Z-Swing% has gone down from 67.1% to 63.1% meaning that he actually struggling to make contact on pitches that stay in the zone (mostly fastballs). And because fastballs tend to be one of the few pitches that are meant to stay in the strike zone when thrown and because pitchers are throwing fastballs to Freese 63.3% of the time, we can say with confidence that Freese is struggling with the fastball. Sure enough, his pitch type values rate Freese's "fastball hitting" at -0.53 wFB/C. To finish things off, his Z-Contact% in 2010 was 84.4% and is now 73.7%. His SwStr% has gone up from 10.5% to 12.9% and overall, his Contact% has dropped from 76.1% last year to 70.1% this year.

In total? His punch out rate this year is 27.6% and his walk rate is an abysmal 4.9% and a slim 36 points separate his batting average and OBP.

The thing is, it's kind of a wonder to me why he is hitting so well yet he is performing so poorly with his batting eye. In fact, it is a HUGE wonder to me.

Not only will Freese stop getting lucky in time, but it does not seem as though he will be able to sustain this kind of absurd-type line drive rate, partly because I doubt he is this good and mostly because his plate discipline is just so bad so far this year.

The catch is that we are, once again, dealing with small sample sizes so all we can do is say "we have to keep a close eye on him" just like we are keeping an eye on his teammate, Albert Pujols (or at least I am). If you haven't seen my post on why we should be on the look out for Pujols, click here.

I just wanted to take the time to have people recognize a player that is off to a similar kind of hot start along with Kemp, Ethier, Votto, Bautista, Matt Holliday and others....and then tell why I think he might not only regress, but crash too.

"Only time will tell."

(Statistics in courtesy of: fangraphs.com)

Let's not worry about Pujols...yet

By Mike Moritz

As crazy as it sounds, we could possibly see the beginning of a decline for Albert Pujols. In fact, this decline that we MIGHT be witnessing started in September of 2010, when his line drive rate dropped off to a below average 14%. And this year, Pujols has a mere 13% line drive rate as his ground ball rate has risen to 48.1%, a 7.5% increase from his career mark. Woah. Is this seriously happening? At age 31?

Well we shouldn't worry for another two-ish weeks. Line drive rates tend to stabilize around 150 PAs into the season and ground ball rate doesn't stabilize until 200. So far Pujols has 94.

His walk rate is also down considerably, to 8.5% compared to his 13.4% career mark. But then again, walk rate doesn't stabilize until 200 PAs as well.

While his power is in line with what it should be for Pujols (.262 ISO, 39% fly ball rate), his batting average is has been taking a hit from a really low .200 BABIP.

Although some of this can blamed on the scary-low line drive rate, some of this can be possibly be blamed on Mark McGwire, the Cardinals hitting coach. The McGwire-as-Coach experiment has not looked good so far. Brendon Ryan being a "big project" last year really fucked them over, and now he's a Mariner. I am not sure what exactly McGwire is doing, if anything, but the attempted approach that he has going might be having a negative affect on Pujols. 


What ever the case may be, this is a somewhat shaky situation. ZIPS updated projection for Pujols is now projecting him for a .299/.397/.572 slash line. It would be the first time that Pujols would hit below .300 (.312 to be exact), the second time that he would have an OBP below .400 and the forth time he would have a SLG below .600. As amazing as it is, it is still scary to think that one of the greatest players of all-time MIGHT be hitting his decline. His BABIP has been under .300 in the past two seasons in a row (2009 and 2010) which suggests that something could be happening soon, but I am probably wrong about that.


Normally, we would not really keep a tight note on Pujols's hitting peripherals, we just assume that he is doing his usual thing, but for at least the next month-ish, we should be carefully examining his statistics. Small sample sizes are really a pain, but we just are not used to seeing Pujols struggle to hit for a good average. Chances are that he returns to form soon enough and that his luck will change back to normal. And honestly, even if his peripherals return to normal, he might still get "BABIP'd" (a term that I have officially coined). Almost every player in the majors, through out somewhere in their career, gets BABIP'd for either better or worse for the length of about a season. This might be the year that he gets hit by a really low BABIP. Or maybe this is indeed the beginning of a decline for one the greatest in baseball history. And if this is the beggining of the end for Pujols, the question becomes, "How much will this affect his new contract for the 2012 season and beyond?"


As Carson Cistulli of Fangraphs likes to say, "Only time will tell". 


(Statistics in courtesy of: fangraphs.com)

Justin Upton's small sample size

By Mike Moritz

Fangraphs lately have taken note of Justin Upton's hot start to the 2011 season. In these two recent posts (here and here), they have noted that perhaps this is the year that Upton puts all his god-given potential together and becomes a superstar. Upton, for years now, has been noted for his incredible tools on the field. His most impressive tool might be his unbelievable raw-power, as seen here.



What I am about to say would be completely going against Fangraphs, something that I would normally never do. But I do believe that they are making a mistake. In the second article that I have linked, Chris Cwik explains that Upton's change in plate approach (being more aggressive) in 2011 has led to his.... enormous luck? No offence to Cwik, I love his writing, he's one of my favorite baseball writers, but he failed to point out any statistical improvement that has had a direct correlation with his offensive output.

Cwik mentioned that Upton's plate discipline has been much different this year that past years. Upton has been more aggressive, as mentioned before. One big complaint from last year was that he was watching strike 3 go by way too often: 41.5% swing%. So this year, he has swung the bat more. His Swing% has gone up to 46.6%, his Z-Swing% has gone from 61.7% to 69.4% and his O-Swing% has risen from 24% to 29.7%. By being more aggressive, he has actually cut down on his strike outs by a lot. His 30.7% K% from 2010 was not that surprising considering the kind of team he was on last year. That number has fallen to a below-average 17.9% while the walk rate has gone to a career high 13.8%. So yes, being more aggressive at the plate has helped him cut down on the strike outs, so far. The problem is that we have so little of a sample size.

Swing% tends to stabilize at about 50 PAs into the season. Upton has 69, so it is basically a lock for him to keep swinging at the rate that he is right now. The big question is, even though his contact rate has not changed from last season, how long will this kind of Upton last? His contact rate was 74.3% in 2010 and 73.7% this year. So, you as the reader might be thinking "So Upton is just going to strike out the same amount?" But the truth is, we don't even have enough PAs from him to make that assumption (Contact% stabilizes at 100 PAs).

The aggressiveness is there, yes, but, again, it does not seem like we have enough of a sample size to tell if this is the real deal. Even if his plate approach has changed a lot for the better, his batted ball rates have actually been worse:

	LD%	GB%	FB%	HR/FB
2010	19.30%	41.40%	39.40%	12.40%
2011	20.00%	46.70%	33.30%	26.70%
Career	19.20%	41.70%	39.10%	14.70%

"Brace yourself, baseball fans, this could be the breakout season we’ve all been waiting for."

That is the last season in Cwik's article (the second link) and he is saying that "this is the year". The problem is that even for Upton's batted ball rates, they still haven't stabilized. Line Drive rate=150 PAs. Ground Ball rate=200 PAs. Fly Ball rate=250 PAs. Again, I really don't want to try to prove Cwik wrong, but if this is Upton's break out year, then Cwik is essentially saying that he is going to continue to hit home runs out the park at a 26.7% rate despite his lowly 33.3% fly ball rate. And Cwik is saying that this is his year without an adequate number of PAs.

My point is that we just don't have enough PAs to tell if this is "his year". We won't know until maybe at the All-Star break but Fangraphs have been getting a bit excited for Upton this year. I really don't know and I don't think anybody really does know that this will be his break out year considering we have not seen a consistent improvement in his hitting peripherals. We just don't know yet. But it seems like Fangraphs is trying to say that this is "the year" even without the right amount of PAs.

Look, I am not trying to rip on Fangraphs or Chris Cwik. As mentioned before, I love Cwik's writing and overall, I love Fangraphs. I am just saying, we don't have enough PAs to tell if Upton is breaking-out this year. Upton already has 1.1 WAR, that is something around 10 WAR in 162 games. I am almost positive that he will sustain this, but then again, we can't project this perfectly.

(Statistics in courtesy of: fangraphs.com)