I initially created Baseball Graphs to develop new and better ways of presenting baseball statistics. The 2003 season was my first full-season attempt, and it turned out pretty well. I now spend a lot of my time creating and formatting the baseball stats at The Hardball Times.
Along the way, I've also picked up the writing bug. I spend most of my energy writing for THT, but sometimes I like to write about more geeky stuff, baseball research and things like that. That's what this blog is for.
I'm very interested in graphics and other information display, so I'll probably post links to creative stuff like that. I also plan to write historical articles that complement the historical graphs. And I have inexplicably developed an interest in baseball win-related stats, such as Bill James's Win Shares and something called Win Probability Added. So you can expect a few posts about that stuff too.
If you're interested, I've created a complex spreadsheet full of WPA logic, which you can download at ftp.baseballgraphs.com/wpa. If you'd like to read more about Win Shares, try these links:
Win Shares Intro
More data!
I've got a new article at The Hardball Times with more batted ball stats for pitchers. If you'd like to see a table for a specific pitcher, leave a comment here and I'll post it.Okay, here's Dontrelle Willis. Note the HR/OF percentage from last year.
Willis, Dontrelle | |||||||||||||||||
| Net Runs per Ball | % of Batted Balls | %/OF | %/PA | Total Net Runs | |||||||||||||
| BFP | OF | LD | GB | OF% | LD% | GB% | HR | K | BB | OF | LD | GB | IF | NIP | Tot | R/G | |
| 2003 | 668 | -0.03 | 0.35 | -0.10 | 32% | 23% | 41% | 7% | 21% | 9% | -4.5 | 37.0 | -18.7 | -4.5 | -22.1 | -14.9 | -0.8 |
| 2004 | 848 | 0.12 | 0.25 | -0.08 | 32% | 19% | 45% | 11% | 16% | 8% | 23.6 | 29.0 | -22.9 | -6.5 | -18.6 | 1.6 | 0.1 |
| 2005 | 960 | -0.05 | 0.32 | -0.12 | 27% | 24% | 45% | 4% | 18% | 7% | -10.3 | 54.3 | -38.0 | -7.8 | -29.4 | -35.6 | -1.4 |
| Avg. | 825 | 0.01 | 0.30 | -0.10 | 30% | 22% | 44% | 7% | 18% | 8% | 2.1 | 39.5 | -26.4 | -6.2 | -23.6 | -17.7 | -0.8 |
| MLB Avg. | 0.03 | 0.36 | -0.10 | 31% | 21% | 44% | 11% | 17% | 10% | 6.4 | 43.8 | -26.0 | -6.1 | -15.2 | 1.4 | 0.1 | |
If no one else is going to make any requests, could we see Jake Peavy, Jeremy Bonderman, and Dontrelle Willis?
I suppose extreme groundballers Brandon Webb, Derek Lowe, and Jake Westbrook would be interesting.
Or I could just buy the HBT Annual…
Studes:
This is a great format (and great information). One final (?) suggestion: Make the last line “vs. MLB Avg” instead of presenting the average in every table. The reason we want to see the average is to make that comparison, so why not do it for us? Then we could quickly see that Dontrelle’s net runs vs average pitcher are:
OF: -4.3
LD -4.3
GB +0.4
IF -0.1
NIP -8.4
TOTAL -19.1
We can then also see the relative contributions each factor makes to overall performance. For example, 44% of Dontrelle’s advantage over an average pitcher comes from NIP. (For Schilling, NIP is actually 108% of his value-above-average!).
On Mariano, it’s interesting that he gives up so few HR/FB, yet his FB runs is average. Is that the Yankee OF giving up a very high % of singles and doubles on FB?
Hey Guy,
Sure, I believe that’s your final suggestion…
Just kidding. I think that’s a great idea.
And what a great point about Rivera’s flyballs. I looked up the percent of his non-HR outfield flies were caught for outs, and it’s only 77%, vs. an MLB average of 84%. It’s wild that there would be such a difference between his HR and out rate.
The Yankee outfield is something to consider, for sure. But I also wonder about the classification of his batted balls—might the scorers be logging some of his line drives as outfield flies? That would account for his great performance with line drives.
How about Zach Duke?
Here ya go:
http://www.baseballgraphs.com/main/index.php/site/article/zach_duke/
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