Baseball Musings
Baseball Musings
June 11, 2008
Chipper and the Changing Game

Tom Verducci pens an excellent article on why it's tougher to hit .400 today. He makes a great point about the number of different pitchers a batter faces:

Brett was hitting .287 as deep into the 1980 season as May 30, then erupted on a 31-game tear in which he hit a ridiculous .496, raising his average to .390. The chase was on. Brett was hitting .400 as late as Sept. 19. But his quest died over the next seven games. Brett went 4-for-27 that week and wound up at .390. Turn just four of those outs that week into hits and he would have hit .400.

But when you look at those seven games that killed the quest, you understand how much things have changed from Brett to Jones. In those seven games Brett never faced a relief pitcher. Think about that for a minute. A full week of games seeing only one pitcher per game.

Opposing starting pitchers threw every inning but two (63 of 65) against Brett's Royals in that seven-game stretch. Those starters were Matt Keough, Mike Norris, Floyd Bannister, Jim Beattie, Rick Honeycutt, Geoff Zahn and Jerry Koosman. Brett had to be concerned with only one pitcher per night. No closers and no lefthanded specialists. Jones typically will face three or four different pitchers a night, facing constant adjustments in velocity, style, release points and such. Expansion and interleague play have added to the variety.

He also offers a chart showing the number of pitchers faced by Williams in 1941, Brett in 1980, Larry Walker in 1999, and Chipper Jones last year.

On the other hand, seeing more pitchers may mean seeing more pitchers who aren't as good. That may even things out a bit.


Posted by David Pinto at 12:34 PM | Records | TrackBack (0)
Comments

And Verducci doesn't even get into defensive positioning, which is far more sophisticated than it was in George Brett's heyday. With the proliferation of data systems and information, teams perform at least a subtle defensive shift on nearly every hitter in baseball, baseball upon pitch and hit f/x data.

Teams are taking away a lot of hits that wouldn't have been taken away 20 years ago.

Going back even further, in the first half of the 20th century some fences were 450 feet away, or more. By necessity, outfielders played deeper than they do today, because a ball that rolled to the wall meant at least a triple and perhaps an inside-the-park HR. Today's shorter fences mean less triples, less incentive for outfielders to play conservatively, and more hits taken away.

Posted by: notsellingjeans at June 11, 2008 01:01 PM

It is worth mentioning that Chipper already has over half the required number of plate appearances to qualify. Given his injury problems, he may end up with just enough plate appearances to qualify, which obviously helps him hit .400.

Nate Silver has a very good article today at BP where trying to come up with an estimate of Chipper's chances using a lot of relevant information. He ends up with a surprisingly high estimate, about 13%.

Posted by: Blackadder at June 11, 2008 03:29 PM

the more pitchers you face, the more BAD pitchers you face.

Posted by: shthar at June 11, 2008 04:14 PM

Did you see Nate Silver's projection at BP on the chance Chipper hits .400? His methodology is much different and he gives it a 12-13% chance.

Posted by: Joe at June 11, 2008 08:59 PM

No, I haven't had a chance to look at it yet.

Posted by: David Pinto at June 11, 2008 09:19 PM
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