"We're Dealing with a lot of Sh*t" (Crash Davis, "Bull Durham")

Last week Rob Neyer posted a very interesting article about Melky Cabrera, and in the piece Rob was using detailed hit data to perhaps explain the difference in Cabrera this year versus prior years.   [Here is the article for your reference ( http://mlb.sbnation.com/2012/8/17/3248066/melky-cabrera-testosterone-2012-season-giants-suspended ) ].   Now Rob, as you know, has spent the last 20 years being one of most recognized and respected baseball writers; first working for Bill James, then for over a dozen years at ESPN, and now he resides at SB Nation in his pretigous role as National Baseball Editor.   Thus it would be impossible to think that he is trying to minimize the decision of Melky's use of PEDs, or the impact that it had on the game and its fans.    And in fact he says as much in his piece.   Rob did have some very interesting points, and he also referenced some excerpts from a posting by @jackdickey from deadspin.

Here are some of the tidbits:


"The only big spike for Cabrera came with his BABIP. His career BABIP is .309, but he hit .332 on balls in play last year and .379 on balls in play this year..... Cabrera got faster after losing 20 pounds during the offseason. In 2011, he set career highs in infield hits—with 26—and bunt hits—with 8. Those balls would have been outs in past years, but because of his new physique they were hits in 2011. His BABIP and batting average increased accordingly" (Dickey)
  
"Again, hardly enough to explain a .346 batting average....  Maybe he's actually been hitting the baseball harder these last two seasons.... it feels overly simplistic to merely assign all of them to good luck. But if he's actually hitting the ball harder, wouldn't we expect to see a significantly higher line-drive rate? Wouldn't we expect to see more home runs per fly ball?  Cabrera's line-drive rate has gone up just slightly in the last two seasons. But his home runs per fly ball has skyrocketed from 6 percent before 2010 to 10 percent in 2011-2012 ... ah, but again we run into a sample-size issue, because we're talking about 29 home runs over two seasons. Take away just 11 home runs over those two seasons and we're right back to 6 percent." (Neyer)

Clearly the data found on www.fangraphs.com is opening up new worlds for the average (or perhaps the 'above-average') fan to gain detailed perspectives on the numbers we are seeing.   This is exactly what we were discussing on our Sunday night "Just Talking To The Cornfield" show.   A lot of what we were discussing was geared towards being able to project performance trends, yet clearly I was just catering to my own interest and desire to understand how the 2012 Andrew McCutchen differs from the 2011 version.     As we often like to quote movies to explain things, the sensitivity of statistics is best explained by Crash Davis as he wished to explain what it takes to be a .300 hitter:

"That means if you get just one extra flare a week - just one - a gorp... you get a groundball, you get a groundball with eyes... you get a dying quail, just one more dying quail a week... and you're in Yankee Stadium."


So how did Andrew McCutchen (who we nickname "McFly" based upon a contest submission) go from being a slick fielder with above average power and an incredible consistentcy in getting on base (prior 3 years OBA .365, .365, .364) to being an MVP candidate and a flat-out superstar.    A couple of years ago I'd be satisfied with the ole "Well as a player approaches his late 20's he begins to enter into his prime offensive years".    Blah... Blah....Blah.   Explain Jeff Francouer with that logic and I will buy you an Official Red Ryder Carbine-Action Two-Hundred-Shot Range Model Air Rifle.  And you will DEFINITELY shoot your eye out kid.   

So I dug into McCutchen's fangraphs page and found something quite interesting.   Expectedly, you will find that McCutchen's line-drive % has risen in the last 3 years from 19%, to 20% to 22%.   This stat was used in part to explain Melky's increased performance as well.     You can also see that while McCutchen's flyball rate has gone down, his % of home runs to flyball has gone up, and that was merely a result from his spike in power.   However the stat that stood out to me was the trend in his Z-Swing % (defined as "The percentage of pitches a batter swings at inside the strike zone.")     In 2010 McFly's Z-Swing % was 56%, and it rose to 61% last year, yet his average decreased from .286 to .259.    In addition, between 2010 and 2011 his ground ball ratio went from 43% to 38% while his fly ball rate went from 38% to 42%.  His BABIP also decreased from .311 to .291.    Clearly Andrew was swinging for the fences.   But why??

In 2010, 67% of McCutchen at-bats came from the #1 or #2 spots in the lineup, with 33% coming from when he was in the 3-hole.   In 2011, he spent most of the season batting 3rd or even cleanup, which he had a combined 68% of his at-bats, with the remaining 32% as a leadoff hitter.     However, in 2012, he is fully entrenched into the 3rd spot in the lineup, and to a degree he returned to the type of hitter that he was accustomed to being, and his ground ball ratio increased back to 44%.   Yet one other thing happened in 2012.   McCutchen's Z-Swing score (once again defined as the % of pitches a batter swings at inside the strike zone) skyrocketed to almost 70%.    This seemingly changed everything about McCutchen's game.   His line-drive % jumped from 19% to 23% and while his fly ball rate dropped from 42% to 'only' 32%, his FB/HR ratio leaped from 12% to 22%, and his BABIP climbed to .400.

Putting this into words..... McCutchen was a very good, and a very consistent hitter.   His power dictated that he would become an effective #3 hitter in the lineup.   In moving down from leadoff to the 3 or 4 spot in the lineup, he began to forego his hitting style and began to try to produce more power.  This resulted in more flyballs, less ground balls, a lower BABIP, and a lower batting average.   In 2012, he returned back to his hitting style, yet began to swing at more pitches in the strike zone.   While always a very consistent OBA guy, his pitch recognition seemingly increased vastly, all while becoming a more aggressive hitter.   The results.... he became "the shit".  

All of this theoretically has been well understood by baseball people for years.   Yet the baseball-stat nuts of the world can now easily find mathematical evidence to help explain what we see in the leaderboards.    And man I could do this all day.   Here are some more items that I noted:

Chipper Jones - Hit 20 homers a year from 1996-2008, but since has his 18, 10, 18.  His batting average in the last three years has been around .270.   In 2012 he has had a bit of a resurgeance in power, all while carrying a batting average greater than .300.   But how??    Per the fangraphs data, Chipper has historically been an incredibly consistent hitter, extremely disciplined.    However over the past few years his O-Swing % (% of Swings on pitches 'outside' the strike zone) has climbed to 25%, after not reaching 18% at any other point in his career.   In addition, his fly ball % has decreased to under 33%, which is the lowest point in his careeer.   Thus, one can deduce that after 3 years of decreased performance and decreased power output, Jones has evolved into a bit more of a slap-style hitter, and he has begun to swing at more pitches outside the strike-zone.  In turn his well-regarded batting-eye has allowed him to make consistent contact with those pitches, and increased his line drive % to over 22%, the highest since 2008.    Result is a 40 point increase in batting average. 

Want more??   Take a look at Dustin Pedroia.    His batting average is down about 25 points from his career average.   His home run rate appears to be somewhat consistent, but he's knocking a bit less doubles than he was back in 2008-2009.    What you also can note is that his walk rate (as well as his BB/K ratio) is the lowest of his career.    Most of his "swing" %'s appear to be consistent, but as the case is, one stands out.    Pedroia's Z-Contact % (or the % of pitches in the strike zone that he makes contact with) is down from his career average of 94%, down to 90% this year.  

Going back to Rob Neyer's piece for a moment, he states:  "His (Cabrera's) ground-ball rate this season is 52 percent; his career rate is 49 percent. Please feel free to correct me, but while a three-percent increase might be significant, it sure doesn't seem significant to make Cabrera one of the better hitters in the National League."

It may not seem significant, and at first to me I wasn't sure if it did either.   But lets use Pedroia to summarize what we've learned.     Pedroia's Z-Contact rate is down 4%.   Assuming that Pedroia sees 1,200-1,400 strikes per year thats approximately 56 pitches that he is no longer making contact with.   Now lets assume 75% of those pitches are put in play (i.e. not foul or not home runs).   With a .311 career BABIP thats about 13 extra hits per year.   Those 13 extra hits return Pedroia to his typical .300 batting average.   Yeah, I'd say in this case that 4% is pretty signifcant.

And man that Crash Davis sure knows his hitting.


Thanks for listening,

Colonel Sunday


Just Talking to the Cornfield is baseball talk show that often goes horribly wrong.  Join Earl and the Colonel as they talk about baseball and all things baseball-related. We're mostly on Sunday nights at 9PM EST, but sometimes we prefer to do a post-Happy Hour show on Friday nights because normally we're idiots. But after a few cocktails we're geniuses. Until we listen to the show the next day. Sigh


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