THE BOOK--Playing The Percentages In Baseball

Thursday, January 24, 2008

Clutch (and other) project(s) redux

I don’t know if Tango has officially launched his clutch project or not, or will in the near future (obviously well before the season starts), but, I would really like to see this thing happen.  However, I want to up the ante a little and expand the project.  I want to get sportwriters (and TV and radio commentators) and possibly some baseball insiders, like coaches, managers, and even players, involved, as well as the fans.

We will need to enlist the help of someone like Rob Neyer and/or any other “insiders” that we know or can get a hold of (Bill James, Peter Palmer, Gary Gillette, etc.).  And get some exposure on the other blogs and sites of course.

I would also like to extend it to at least one other thing and possibly more.  Pitcher/batter matchups, as I explained in another post, should be easy.  Each participant, like with the clutch and choke players, would choose X (maybe 5) good and X bad pitcher/batter matchups.  As I said before, is there any fan or commentator/sportswriter/player/manager/coach that does NOT think that some batter/pitcher matchups are better than others (besides the platoon advantage of course)?

I would also love (since this is the thing that commentators talk about - incessantly - most during game broadcasts, and this is the thing that people claim they can “see") to see something done with hot and cold players.  The only way I can think of to do that would be to have a website where any participant can log in, input their “user id” and classify someone as hot or cold until further notice.  That should be easy enough for all those pundits who think they can tell when someone is “pressing” or “seeing the ball well” or “locked in” or whatever you want to call it.  Again, is there anyone but an analyst or saber person who does NOT believe in players being hot or cold?

Here is the kicker.  I am willing to donate a substantial sum of money to a charity chosen by one side of the debate - the “non-sabermetric” side of course, if they win.  We would have to define “winning” - maybe best of 3, if we do 3 things, like clutch, batter/pitchers, and hot/cold.  Or we can do each one separately.

If the sabermetric side wins, I will also donate money, but that will be to a charity of our choice and it will be less money.

I’m not sure how much, but it would be on the order of $10,000 for them and $5,000 for us.  What the heck.  Anything to make a point.  If this flies, let none of my/our detractors/naysayers EVER say that I won’t put my money where my mouth is!  This should generate some good publicity and might encourage the media and perhaps some insiders to participate.

Any other ideas?