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Wednesday, January 05, 2011
This time, Millsy is giving us the walk-through.
***
As an aside, for variable names, perhaps periods (.) is the standard for R and other languages, and I’ve seen hyphens used as well in other languages. But, those characters are sometimes considered invalid in a field name (because after all they mean something specific, like a period in a decimal, or a hyphen would be a minus sign). You can save yourself the trouble and use an underscore (_). I’ve never come across any language that doesn’t like the underscore. If I’m wrong, then let me know.
He’s right about never starting a field name with a numeric. Some languages are ok with it, but most are not. For something like double, I simply do B2, and triples is B3, simply inverting 2B and 3B. Then, to complete it, you can do B1 for singles, and either stick with HR or go to B4 for consistency sake. Then you can expand that for other things like BE for reaching on error, and so on. BB is walks obviously. They all follow the form “base on”.
Anyway, what I’ve said here is a footnote of a footnote compared to what Millsy is telling you, so, spend your time following his tutorial instead.
Friday, December 17, 2010
Ricky Zanker is helping us out.
Friday, December 10, 2010
I found this interesting:
I had to break out my copy of Robert Adair’s book, The Physics of Baseball to get the numbers. After converting some graphed data in equations, I came up with the following values:
For a 85 MPH pitch a 1 MPH increase in bat speed = 5.6 ft gain in distance
For a 70 MPH bat speed a 1 MPH increase in pitch speed = 0.66 ft gain in distance
Bat speed is much more important than pitch speed when determining batted ball distance.
Saturday, December 04, 2010
Jeremy with the review.
Wednesday, October 20, 2010
Fun interactive application.
Glove-slap: Mike.
Thursday, October 14, 2010
Research indicates the reason:
Our central vision can only focus on two degrees of our entire field of vision, which Lu said means our eyes can only focus on something the size of the tip of a thumb held at arm’s length. When the ball is about two-thirds of the way to home plate, the batter’s eyes switch focus to peripheral vision, which can’t register the ball’s spin as well as central vision.
At that point, the batter’s eyes perceive the ball’s trajectory to deviate from its actual path by as much as a foot. So when the batter’s central vision refocuses on the ball’s true path in the last few feet of the pitch, the ball appears to drastically shift directions, or “breaks.”
I think we must have linked to their graphic, because I remember this (it won some award didn’t it?):
Lu and Shapiro tested their hypothesis by having students watch a falling, spinning disk on a computer monitor. The disc fell straight down, and when subjects followed the disk with their central vision, no change in trajectory was noted.
When subjects were told to track the falling disk with their peripheral vision, however, they reported that it fell at an angle. The faster the disk fell, the greater the deviation became.
And the answer to hitting a curve ball:
Lu said his conclusions suggest the solution to overcoming the eyes’ weaknesses is to follow age-old advice given by baseball coaches: “Don’t take your eyes off the ball,” or, “Always track it with your central vision.”
If a batter can keep their eyes focused on the ball for the entire pitch, then no break should be detected, he said. But doing so proves to be mighty difficult…
Go to Alan’s site to download the paper. (link fixed)
Wednesday, September 29, 2010
Excellent!
By the way, bad programming on my part in not creating arrays. There was a good (bad) reason for that. Originally, my Markov calculator was just for me as an Excel spreadsheet. And, if you can imagine, it was hard to follow. Anyway, being lazy, I wanted to port that to Javascript with as little manual intervention as possible. So, I converted all the formulas in the spreadsheet into text, which I then just copied over to a text file, made a few changes, and voila, Javascript.
After I did that, it was so obvious that I should have turned it into arrays. For example, this is b.s. programming on my part:
state_1b_0_0
It should be:
state_bro[1][0][0]
Anyway, any of you math teachers out there who want to have a good programming example that uses baseball for your kids, I would recommend this. It’s got alot of good stuff in it, and you can get them to turn the code into arrays, and, if you want to have fun, tell them to do this: assume there are n-outs in an inning, and m-bases.
Thanks to Sobchak for rewriting it. You can view my original Javascript code by going to my Markov page and doing “view source”.
Monday, September 20, 2010
Here we go from the world of cricket:
One such product is called Extratec. It has been approved by the International Cricket Council (ICC) and is now preferred by nearly all professional cricketers today.
Cricket as a sport has a long and rich history similar in a lot of ways to baseball. Extratec is a clear adhesive which is applied to the face and edges of a cricket bat, like a sticker or decal, giving it a protective coating to stop the bats from splintering or breaking. The great thing about Extratec is that it does not add or take away any of the characteristics of the bat itself. By this I mean that it won’t enhance performance or stop the bats from doing its natural thing. You don’t want to lose that “natural” sound of the ball hitting the bat, but also you don’t want to see any rebound qualities that Extratec does not have to give batters an advantage.
Extratec in its original state was developed in the United States to protect the blades of helicopters. it is both extremely tough and lightweight. The thickness of the adhesive is 0.35mm and weighs less than an ounce. Tests and trials were carried out by the ICC on the ping and performance of a range of cricket bats with Extratec as opposed to a normal bat and there was absolutely no reduction or enhancement on the bats performances. If a bat splinters or breaks it would normally be held together by the adhesive or drop to the ground close to the batsman.
This is what I always talk about, that there is a world outside of USA where we have real-life usage to compare against. Alan, if you are out there, what say you?
Monday, September 13, 2010
Summary:
A baseball bat filled with cork can hit a baseball farther than a normal bat.
busted
This myth operates under the assumption that cork-filled bats can be swung faster because of their lighter weight, and that the springiness of the cork could propel the ball farther. To eliminate the human factor of the myth, Adam and Jamie constructed a special batting rig and used a pressurized air cannon to launch the baseball at it. Tests showed that the cannon could launch the ball 80 miles per hour, which is the average speed of most MLB pitches. Regulation bats could propel the ball away at 80mph while corked bats could only propel the ball 40mph, half the speed of regulation bats. The reason was because cork bats have less mass to transfer force into the ball, and the cork actually absorbs some of the ball’s impact. The Mythbusters concluded that using a cork filled bat will not improve your performance (it will in fact hurt it), and the major league batters who were caught using cork-filled bats risked their careers for nothing.
...
A dry baseball can be hit farther than a ball stored in a humid environment.
confirmed
The Build Team started off with a small scale test by dropping dry and humid balls from a certain height. The results showed that the dry balls tended to bounce higher than the humid balls. For the full scale test, the Grant built his own rig (dubbed “The Mad Batter”) that could both swing the bat and pitch the ball at the same time. They then tested the rig at a baseball field using humid balls, dry balls, and control balls stored in a normal environment. The results showed definitively that the dry balls were hit the farthest distance and the humid balls being hit the least distance.
...
A fast ball can lift itself higher into the air.
busted
Despite the testimony of some pitchers, the myth would defy the laws of physics because in order for a fast ball to actually rise, it must exert more force upward than its own weight. However, the maximum force a fast ball can exert is only half of its weight, making a rising fast ball impossible.
...
On bases that you can’t overrun, it is faster to slide into them.
confirmed
While a popular tactic used by baseball players, some speculate that sliding will actually slow a person down due to the friction being exerted between their bodies and the ground. With some coaching, the Build Team learned how to slide like baseball players. They then timed how long it would take to run to a base and slide to a base. The results showed that all Tory, Jamie, and Grant reached the base faster by sliding rather than running by several fractions of a second. The reason was because as they ran, the Tory, Jamie, and Grant had to slow down at the last second so that their momentum wouldn’t carry them past the base. With such definitive results, the Mythbusters agreed that sliding to a base is faster than running.
...
A baseball’s stitches can tear and the hide of the baseball will fall off if the baseball is thrown fast enough and hit hard enough.
busted
The Mythbusters modified their cork bat rig to fire the baseball at much higher speeds. It fired the ball at a static bat with speeds over 200mph, which is twice as fast as the fastest pitch ever recorded. However, the ball remained intact. The Mythbusters then fired the cannon at maximum power. The hide of the ball did come off, but the ball was fired at about 437mph, four times faster than any human could pitch.
Wednesday, September 08, 2010
Cy asks. Let’s see, there’s almost 300 pitches, and that’s going to take 3 seconds each. You’ve got 60 balls in play, and that’s 3-15 seconds each (say an average of 10 seconds), depending on runners on base. All told, that’s 1500 seconds, or 25 minutes a game. Let’s make it 30, or 2 games per hour. You watch for 7.5 hours a day, so 15 games a day. Yeah, you can do it.
Hockey is 60 minutes of game time, so you can watch 7.5 games a day, or 164 days to watch the whole season. You can do that to. Basketball is even shorter (though you need to add the free throw time).
Football? 150 plays or so, at 10 seconds a play, meaning 25 minutes a game. Make it 30. You can do that too.
Tuesday, September 07, 2010
Here’s Bill James on a zero-tolerance policy of bats coming out of hitters hands:
There is a really, really simple solution to this problem that is absolutely certain to work. You make a rule that if the bat OR ANY PART OF THE BAT is thrown by the batter more than 40 feet from home plate, the batter is automatically out, and it goes as a strikeout. If you do that, I guarantee you that hitters will discover real quick that a) they CAN hold on to the bat, and b) they can find bats that don’t shatter on contact. The absence of such a rule allows the batter to get the benefits of a vicious cut and a bat designed for maximum bat speed, but excuses him the dangerous consequences of this combination. That’s unnatural. The natural thing is simply to hold the batter responsible for the bat.
From a baseball-fan perspective, I have no qualms with this. I like it for its inventiveness.
In hockey, if your stick shatters, you are required to IMMEDIATELY drop that stick. Players then lose several seconds skating back to the bench, or worse, staying in their own zones otherwise their team will be shorthanded.
So, it goes back to the test I was proposing with golf: (1) seriousness of offense, and (2) proportional remedy for offense.
In hockey, having a broken stick is dangerous. Same applies for baseball, though not as much. Hockey players are in closer proximity, always moving, and not necessarily focused on the player with the broken stick. So, I agree that it is a seriousness enough offense that it should be codified. Now, what about remedy? In hockey, as I stated, you are basically depriving your team of a skater for a short period of time. The remedy is pretty good there. I wouldn’t go to two minutes penalty, because that would be excessive for something that is essentially a fluke. But, there has to be a cost.
What about baseball? Automatic strikeout is excessive. Giving one strike seems perfectly in keeping with the proportionality of the offense, as well as being similar to what pitchers do that earn automatic balls (going to hand). This will nudge the batter toward getting a more shatter-resistant bat, and getting a better grip on the bat.
Tuesday, August 10, 2010
By Justin.
Friday, July 16, 2010
I didn’t realize Summer of Jeff blog was Jeff Sackmann. Anyway, for all of you who ask me about getting into the analysis game, Jeff recommends Python… and that’s it. That’s a pretty heady recommendation, seeing that I need SQL, PL/SQL (or some programming language), and Perl (or some scripting language) to do my stuff. I think David and BaseballMusings.com says that he also uses Python. So, I should look into it at some point as well if these guys are talking about it.
Thursday, July 15, 2010
Review of an MLB game.
Friday, July 09, 2010
What is the optimum range of speed for a baseball knuckleball?
Analysis compiled by NASA’s Ames Investigation Centre experts, who specialise in the field of aerodynamics, revealed that the Jabulani becomes unpredictable at speeds in excess 44mph.
Further criticisms voiced by a host of World Cup players, before and during the tournament, of the ball’s inconsistent flight patterns have been attributed to it’s ultra light weight of just 440 grams which makes it vulnerable to a force known as the ‘knuckle effect’.
NASA also believe that the effects of altitude could have increased the unpredictability of the ball with most stadiums in South Africa at least 1,000 metres above sea level.
Shades of the NBA introducing the new basketball that NBA players almost immediately denounced.
In corporate america, we follow a process: test, test, test. Not just unit testing (testing in isolation), but also stage testing (testing in a production-level environment, meaning actual real-world environment). It seems to me that alot of the sports testing includes the marketing department in its lifecycle. Marketing should only show up after final testing.
Wednesday, April 07, 2010
When Alan Nathan tests his baseballs, does he put mud on them?
Glove-slap Neyer.
Monday, March 29, 2010
Yup:
Sunday, March 28, 2010
Sydex Sports is the video outfit that creates BATS, which is used by all MLB teams. I didn’t think about them doing this for other sports, but, they do, and their hockey system is called PUCKS.
Glove-slap Gabe, and this article.
Thursday, March 18, 2010
Geoff Baker:
One interesting thing to remember about Saunders, which you may have noted on that video we posted a few weeks ago (seen above) about the changes to Seattle’s strength and conditioning program. In the video, Dr. Marcus Elliott points to some paperwork on Saunders and states that he has more vertical (or, lateral) force than horizontal force. The theory Elliott has, and which the Mariners are paying big bucks to implement over the next three years, is that athletes with horizontal power—like Dustin Ackley—have a better chance to maximize their potential.
With vertical power, Elliott adds, even big, strong hitters tend to have low home run totals because they are not maximizing the force they get on their swing and driving balls properly. So, the Mariners are in the process of training their hitters to get more horizontal force on their swings.
Glove-slap: Neyer.
Fangraphs featured in NY Times.
from Amazon
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