from Amazon
Thursday, February 19, 2009
The effect on subsequent batters on seeing someone hit by a pitch
Colin gives it his all:
...but assume a league average batter faces a league average pitcher (using 2008 numbers, an OBP of .333). If a batter has been hit previously in the inning, the expected OBP for that plate appearance is .334. Not a huge effect. Apparently the effect of being fired up is an extra walk/base hit every thousand plate appearances.
But what of the hit batsman himself? ...Psychologically, it makes sense that the batter would be more likely to be scared if he were facing the same pitcher, rather than a new one, and the memory will be freshest on the same day. The effect was not significant, but favored the pitcher, and dropped the batter to a .326 expected OBP.
Probably would have been better to figured his wOBA, as his power might be the thing that would drop. Anyway, when a batter faces the same pitcher each time through the order, he gains 8 points in wOBA. So, the pitcher gets quite an advantage here. However, Colin reports the result as not statistically significant. (How much is 1 SD Colin?) Nonetheless, a great idea to research.