April 24, 2007
Clutch Belief
Dejan Kovacevic, one of the new breed of sabermetric sports writers, examines players and coaches beliefs in clutch hitting. He offers a good contrast between the statistical research, and what the players think pro and con. It strikes me that all the people in favor of the idea offer just anecdotal evidence.
Of those who feel otherwise, Pirates pitching coach Jim Colborn said, "Dead wrong. There is an element in certain people that allows them to focus at their peak and get into a zone when the situation is more important."
He cited, from his playing days, Joe Rudi, a career .264 hitter who had a reputation of elevating his level every postseason for the Athletics, at least as measured by the intangibles of timely hits and key defensive plays.
"Believe me: For all the great players in that lineup, Joe Rudi was not the one you wanted to face. He just had a knack."
I like Jason Bay's explanation:
"It's not so much a matter of raising your level in a clutch situation. It's a matter of keeping your level the same," Bay said. "Baseball is predicated on the idea that the people who are the most successful are the ones who do things the same way most consistently. It's not an emotion game like football or hockey, where you can go bust some skulls."
Which jibes with what researchers sees in the stats:
Some players, the argument can be made, do become better in trying situations. But those cases -- and this is one area where statisticians and those inside the game tend to agree -- are much rarer than those where performance decreases.
Maybe it can be summed up as the great players don't choke.
Thanks to Dan Fox, who is quoted in the article, for the link.
Posted by David Pinto at
08:11 AM
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This might explain why it's not scary when Jason Bay steps into the batters box with the bases loaded and two outs... as opposed to freddy sanchez, who is terrifying.
I've often wondered about this. In situations like coming to the plate with the bases loaded in the late innings of a tie game with 50,000 people cheering, I wonder how anyone keeps their composure.
Bay's comment makes me wonder about hitters vs. pitchers and platoon splits. When people talk about having a "closer mentality," they really are talking about a good-to-great reliever who does what Bay describes: he treats the critical situation the same as any other situation.
Outside of closers, when folks talk about clutch players, they are almost always talking about hitters rather than pitchers. It strikes me that hitters are forced to perform against-platoon in clutch situations far more often than pitchers, which would tend to make players with average performance in clutch situations produce below-average stats in clutch situations.
It would be interesting to break down the classic clutch splits (RISP, close&late, etc.) by vs-LHP and vs-RHP. We may well find that players who seem to do poorly with clutch splits actually have very ordinary numbers once you compare them in that fashion.