from Amazon
Wednesday, June 24, 2009
Batting Order and the pitcher
I reply to a thread at Primer:
Batting the pitcher 8th, or moving everyone down a spot in the order and putting the guy you originally decided to bat 9th (when you moved the pitcher to 8th), into the 1 spot?
If this is the choice, it’s a no-brainer, and it’s the former. In no way can you put one of the worst hitters on the team at the top of the order.
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As for the general issue, my research in The Book (see it for free on Amazon’s Look Inside) using Markov chains is that moving the pitcher from 9 to 8 will add roughly 2 runs in a 162 game season. MGL’s research via his simulator is that it’s a break-even or a slight advantage to keeping the pitcher in the 9th slot.
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The most egregious thing you can do is move the pitcher to the cleanup slot. This would cost you 0.1 runs per game (about 16 runs in a season). Basically, moving the pitcher up the order costs you around 4 runs per slot. Move pitcher from 8 to 7 to 6 to 5 to 4 and remove 4 runs each rung. That’s the impact of a batting order. And remember, this is by far the worst hitter on the team. That’s the impact here.
I presume most people would think that moving the pitcher to the cleanup slot would cost you half a run a game.