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Wednesday, August 18, 2010
Should a pitcher take three strikes, rather than (possibly) swing into a DP?
Asked of Bill James:
I have a feeling you covered this at some point, but… Bases loaded, one out, .120 hitting pitcher at the plate, .370 obp leadoff hitter on deck. Would it make sense statistically to have pitcher take 3 strikes rather than risk hitting into a DP?
Asked by: Tony K
Answered: August 14, 2010Well. . .the question assumes that attempting to bunt is not an option. As long as you have the option to attempt to bunt--which you always have--that seems to obviate this situation.
If, for some reason, you COULDN’T bunt. . .my guess is that you would be better off to accept the strikeout, rather than risk the double play.
Starting with an average baseline, we know that the run expectancy of BL (bases loaded), 1 out is 1.65 runs. A strikeout brings it down to .815 runs. Because the top of the order is batting, let’s say it’s .90 runs with 2 outs, BL. And because the pitcher was batting, let’s say it’s 1.35 runs.
So, a DP loses 1.35 runs, a strikeout loses .45 runs, and a weak single adds 1 run.
If you have a pitcher that gets 10% singles, 40% DP, and 50% outs, that’s a run value of -.665 runs. If he strikes out 100% of the time, it’s a loss of .45 runs.
So, yeah, you can easily construct a case to take the strikeout rather than swinging away. That you can construct a reasonable scenario for the “intentional strikeout” tells me how horrible it is to have the pitcher batting to begin with.
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You may enjoy this link as well (run expectancy by batting order):
http://www.tangotiger.net/retrosheet/reports/re_bo.htm
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