THE BOOK--Playing The Percentages In Baseball

Ditto Bobby Abreu.

And I have to hear one more time about how heads up Jeter is for doing the most simple fundamental thing, I am going to vomit.

Agreed regarding Abreu. In game two, Jeter was Larry Bird. Today, he’s Brett Favre. (McCarver used a football reference.) Jeez, when will Timmy quit fellating the Jeter Fathead hanging in his office?

When McCarver can no longer form an intelligent sentence. Oh wait, he can’t do that. I mean when he can no longer say words.

I was going to start another thread for this next point, but it is a little bit of a nitpick.

Leadoff double and Rivera comes in.  Aybar is likely bunting.  Rivera has two locations for both RH and LH batters - inside and outside.  Why does he choose to throw two outside fastballs to Aybar?  First, it is easier to bunt an outside pitch.  Second it is much easier to bunt an outside pitch to third base (for a LHB).  You want to force the batter to pop up or bunt to first base or back to the pitcher.  The inside fastball is the clear way to go.

Can’t is a word used way too often in sports. Here’s things you can’t do:

- Win a game while scoring 0 runs.

Not a lot of other things you “can’t” do. But to humor your point about how you “can’t” steal on Pettitte (period), let’s look at career stats:

Base runners have stolen 174 bases in 259 attempts… or 67% success rate. That’s a lot of success for something you “can’t” do… PERIOD!

So, I think statistically we have proven you CAN steal on Pettitte. PERIOD! I mean we have to draw that conclusion, right?

If we don’t we’d have to recommend that batters don’t swing at pitches from Javier Vazquez since their contact% is only 73% and that’s pretty damn close to this “can’t” you are talking about (considering “can’t” is 67% success, right?)

While we’re at it, batters should never swing at a first pitch since only Carl Pavano, Roy Halladay and Javier Vazquez were the only pitchers to reach a 67% First Strike % and that means that even the best “can’t” throw first pitch strikes.

I know, I know… don’t let the facts get in the way of a good hindsight is 20/20 questioning of a “stupid” player or manager’s decisions, right?

Or I guess instead of being condescending in my argument I could have just pointed to the fact that Erick Aybar stole in the same game against the guy you said you “can’t” steal on. Then again, what would be the fun in providing a counter without being totally condescending, right?

Spike - you should probably read this:

http://tiny.cc/epi7g

Spike,
Pettitte has 95 career pickoffs. That is not included in stolen base totals. That makes the career success rate 49%* which is way below any acceptable break-even point for stealing bases. The only situation where it would be wise to steal against Pettitte would be with some combination of an outstanding base stealer, poor catcher and a point in the game where an extra base has extra utility.

*Even if you add in Pettitte’s balks, you only get to 51%.

Actually, I meant hyperbole, not sarcasm.

It was neither hyperbole nor sarcasm (my use of “can’t").  OK, a little bit of hyperbole.

It is that you “cannot” steal against Pettitte with enough of a success rate (including pickoffs and balks of course) to make it correct in almost any situation.

Phil, most of that 51% was likely against poor catchers (although I think Posada and GIrardi mostly caught Pettite) and with very good runners.  So I don’t think you can assume that the success rate would be much higher with a bad catcher/good runner combo.  I also think that some or even much of that success is when he doesn’t really care about a steal.  Of course all you have to do to have a 51% success rate against any LHP is go on first move.  You will be safe almost 100% of the time unless the pitcher throws to first, in which case you will be out 90% of the time.

Pettitte, in today’s game, already showed that he was going to throw to first a lot with any potential base stealer on base.  That pretty much shuts down the running game against Pettitte, period, because you have to guess.  If Pettitte has at least a 35% chance of throwing to first on any pitch, you can’t just take off on first contact. I think he throws over greater than 50% of the time per pitch with a potential base stealer on first.

I have said this many times.  With a LHP on the mound who is tough to steal against, it is the manager’s responsibility to tell his players, “No stealing today, gentlemen (with so-and-so on the mound).” That should have been exactly what Scioscia should have said before the game.  There is NO way I let any of my players decide for themselves if or when to steal against Pettitte.  No stealing, period.

Kind of like when Mo Norman, the not-so-famous semi-autistic Canadian golfer who many say is one of the greatest golfers of all time, was standing on the tee of a par-3 during a tournament and the crowd was mercilessly taunting him for his poor putting earlier in the tournament.  He promptly got a hole in one, turned to the crowd and said, “Not putting today, folks.”

Not stealing today.

Aybar guessed right and did steal against Pettite.  Hunter does that a lot actually, guesses and gets such a huge jump that he makes it easily.  His success rate is good enough to make it reasonable, but when he guesses wrong it’s ugly.

As I said, if you guess right against almost any lefty pitcher, you make it.  But if the pitcher is going to throw over at least 35% of the time, you are not going to have the necessary success rate.  The Aybar steal attempt was just as wrong as the Hunter one.  Aybar made it because there was no throw over.  Hunter didn’t because Pettitte threw over.  What is your point?

Pettitte threw 12 times to first in the first three innings. That should have been a sign: don’t try today.
And, from memory, he seems to be much worse in defending 3rd base and home than 1st base. Does someone have numbers against him just for attempt at 2nd?

Re Phil D.’s comment (#1) on Abreu and Jeter (and a bit off topic):  In my view the real kudos on that play goes to Teix, who had the presence of mind to cover 2B.  I may be wrong, but I bet not too many other 1Bmen make that play.

My guess is that more or less all pitchers are worse at picking someone of 2nd compared to 1st.

In any case it is hard to see that it should be any advantage to beeing lefthanded when defending against steals of 3rd base. Just based on “geometry” I wouldn’t be suprised if there are some lefty pitchers you should never steal 2nd on, but where you should steal 3rd more than usual. (But this is pure speculation on my part.)

"I may be wrong, but I bet not too many other 1Bmen make that play.”

Yes, you are wrong (sorry).  In high school ball or lower, you teach that the standard “defensive alignment” for a “sure double, possible triple” is:

SS and 2B go out for the relay throw.  One is deeper than the other.  The deep one makes the catch on the throw from the outfielder and the other one yells at him what to do with the ball once he receives it (and also backs up the throw from the outfielder).

The second baseman trails the runner going to second to do two things:  One, make sure he actually tags second base, and two, be there in case the runner gets caught in between second and third or has to go back to second and there is a possible play at second.

That is a standard play. All major league first baseman cover second on a “double, possible triple.”

Bjorn, yes, as a general rule it is easier to steal third base off a lefty because he cannot see you and your lead real well.

Considering the sloppy and brainless play, I think it’s easy to see why we get so excited when a millionaire does his job.

When Damon covered the bad throw from Mo at 3B, I was in shock.  I figured that the typical (MLB) player would not back it up, and that Mo threw away the game.

mgl#15:  Thanks...I stand corrected!

Alan, sure, np.

I think that the typical LF backs up an IF throw to third base 95% of the time.  In this case, the ball just happened to go right to Damon. It could easily have gone out into right field and the runner could have easily scored.

I realize that Rivera is a heck of a pitcher, but he got awfully lucky in that inning when it was 1st and 3rd and no outs.