THE BOOK--Playing The Percentages In Baseball

Does anyone know how great the effect of pitched velocity is on hitting distance?  If you hit a 95-mph fastball 400 feet, how far would a 78-mph fastball travel with the same swing?  (Assuming same placement, trajectory, break, etc.) Have any of the baseball-physicists looked at this?

Zack: please search the archives, look under the Technology category, and find an appropriate thread to post your question.  I’ll delete this question in one hour.

I can’t read the whole article (insider only) but Larussa biggest mistake IMO was when he double switched and took Holiday out of the game having the pitcher bat right after pujols. I believe there was two instances during extra innings where he had the bases loaded and the pitcher ended up having to bat.

John, that was a big mistake, but the relief pitcher only “had” to bat twice because LaRussa refused to pinch hit with his back-up catcher.  Twice.  The Cardinals had the bases loaded 3 times in extra innings and failed to score all 3 times.  However, those bases loaded situations are a little misleading because every time Pujols came to bat with men on, he was IBBed because the pitcher was on deck.

I don’t know if Eno mentioned this in his article, but Ludwick’s CS wasn’t a straight steal. It was a hit-and-run attempt, which might be even dumber with Pujols batting.

I read somewhere (forget where) that LaRussa removed Holliday because Holliday was still suffering from the flu.  It obviously cost him in this game, but it may have been the right long-term move.

I’m willing to give him the double-switch, actually, as long as he puts Anderson in where Hawksworth hit, and doesn’t send Ludwick to second in either a hit-and-run or steal situation. I heard that Holliday wasn’t healthy as well. Perhaps he should have just done a regular switch out if that was the case though. Definitely some serious overmanaging here.

If there was a decent chance that he was going to remove Holliday, why bat him behind Pujols?  Why not 6th or 7th?

Tango/8, LaRussa removed Holliday in the 11th inning.  About 2.5% of games go longer than 11 innings.

I remembered where I read about Holliday being removed because of the flu.  It was from one of the comments to Joe Posnanski’s post on the game:
http://joeposnanski.com/JoeBlog/2010/04/18/baseball-tweets-a-series

Let us remember that Holliday was pulled because he was recovering from the flu. Getting him out of the line-up may have been the humane thing to do. Winning isn’t everything. (For the record: This move was vindicated on Sunday when Holliday went 3 for 3).

I LOL’ed at that comment.  “Winning isn’t everything.” And then immediately, the “vindication” when he goes 3-3 the next day (and in a win).

Between LaRussa’s nit-pickery and Jerry Manuel’s addiction to sac bunts, those were three of the most excruciating innings of baseball to watch - and I only watched those three!  Imagine the poor souls who saw the whole thing, including three bases-loaded chances for the home side.

Jerry sac bunting with a position player pitching killed me lol

I’d like to see how the Lopez/Mather 3 inning combo compared to any other 3+ inning relief outings by positioned players historically.  I would also like to see if Kyle Loshe could be a better full-tile LFer than Carlos Lee.