TDA Bullpen - Our Writers' Blog

Saturday, September 18, 2004

League Leaders and Milestones: Homeruns

I thought a little bit about the remarks The Crank made about what sort of stats are the type that someone can achieve career milestones the same year they were among the league leaders. Ultimately I think this phenomenon will be fairly independent of the type of statistic, and here's why. Let's formulate the problem in the following way:

M = milestone in question for whatever category
N = eventual career total for a player in the same category

It should be obvious that the smaller M/N is, the more likely the player will also be among the league leaders during the season he achieves M. To take one specific example, it should make sense that Hank Aaron would have a much better chance at being among the league leaders in homers the year he hit 500 (M/N = 0.66) than Eddie Murray (M/N = 0.99). This reasoning should hold up for any sort of counting statistic that breaks into the hundreds, I'd think.

Let's take a look at all the guys with at least 500 career homers and see how they did the years they achieved 500, 600, or 700. I'll give a name, the particular milestone achieved, the year he achieved it, where the guy finished if in the Top 5 (which is the cutoff for the archival data at baseball-reference.com), the league leader & league-leading total, and M/N. In order of career homers to date:

Aaron/500/1968/29/#5/McCovey@36/0.66
Aaron/600/1971/47/#2/Stargell@48/0.79
Aaron/700/1973/40/#4/Stargell@44/0.93

Ruth/500/1929/46/#1/--/0.70
Ruth/600/1931/46/T1/Gehrig/0.84

Bonds/500/2001/73/#1/--/0.71
Bonds/600/2002/46/#2/Sosa@49/0.86
Bonds/700/2004/43/#3/Beltre@45/0.999

Mays/500/1965/52/#1/--/0.76

Robinson/500/1971/28/T5/Melton@33/0.85

McGwire/500/1999/65/#1/--/0.86

Killebrew/500/1971/28/T5/Melton@33/0.87

Palmeiro/500/2003/38/T5/Rodriguez@47/0.91

Foxx/500/1940/36/#2/Greenberg@41/0.94

Ott/500/1945/21/T4/Holmes@28/0.98

The real surprise is Ott sneaking in there in 1945. Foxx had a fairly dramatic drop off in his performance at the end of his career, and then everyone else on the list will have at least 550 career homers, at which point M/N = 0.91. If I may generalize from this case, it seems clear that for M/N < 0.9 there's a decent chance that someone can bag that milestone and be among the league leaders the year the milestone is bagged. In the case of homers, the only M/N < 0.9 milestones that are missing from the league leaders the year they occurred are #500 for Sosa and Jackson. If Sammy reclaims his slugging form next season he could be in the somewhat odd position of not being top-5 in homers the year he hit 500 but top-5 the year he hit 600. That's a pretty big if, though. Also note that Bonds hit nos. 500, 600, and 700 in 2001, '02, and '04, respectively. Yikes.

posted by Tom Renbarger 7:12 PM

Bonds and OPB - The Stretch Drive

Since Bonds' amazing start, we've been keeping track of how he would have to perform to hit certain OBP marks. He's stayed at just above .600 for most of the year, what does he have to do in the last 13 games? I'm assuming another 50PA for a total of 615.

Target	Needs	Comments
600	500	Almost in the bag.
582	280	What he needs to break his own OBP record
553	000	He's already clinched #2 ahead of Ted Williams

What about slugging? Well, after #701 Barry was sitting on a fat .827 slugging average. Here's what the top five single seasons look like:

1.	Barry Bonds	.863	2001
2.	Babe Ruth	.847	1920
3.	Babe Ruth	.846	1921
4.	Barry Bonds	.799	2002
5.	Babe Ruth	.772	1927

Unless the Giants fall flat on their faces, I think we can also chalk up MVP #7.

posted by David 4:23 PM

Friday, September 17, 2004

Unfrozen Caveman MVP

Tonight's extremely entertaining Red Sox-Yankees game resulted in a 3-2 Sox victory, and I'd like to use it to again start the agitation for Johnny Damon as MVP.. He hit a homer to leadoff the third to put the Sox on top, stole a base when the game was tied, and ended up hitting the go-ahead RBI with a bloop hit in the ninth inning off Mariano Rivera. Damon's having a season, and the Manny-Ortiz MVP talk is misplaced. Damon's pacing this team, rest assured.

Speaking of that bloop hit -- when was the last time you saw Kenny Lofton dive for a ball? It's hard to believe he's not stretching out for that kind of ball in a tie game with the Yankees' lead slipping away. I didn't buy the rep Kenny had with Cleveland for dogging it, but I'm beginning to wonder.

The game was delayed by rain twice, while the Yanks were down 1-0, and the glacial pace at which Orlando Hernandez and then Tanyon Sturtze worked was something to behold. The Yanks took a 2-1 lead in the fifth, and it's amazing how the pace of the game perked up once it was legal. The remnants of hurricane Ivan held off the rest of the game, but we can imagine that the first horrible stirrings of Hurricane George, due to hit New York hard about October 5th, are working themselves up in Tampa Bay.

Tomorrow's game looks like it will be rained out due to Ivan's last gasps. I will sound like a broken record here, but I'll say again it's time for baseball to stop washing out partial games that get rain and don't get to four and a half or five innings. Just count them and make up the rest of the game instead of rescheduling the whole thing, and these end of the season jams baseball is having now won't be nearly so bad.

Pat Robertson, Calling for Barry Bonds

I've heard of the 40-40 club, and in recent years the 500 club, but who ever heard of the 700 club until now? I don't remember anybody referring to the 600 club when Bonds was coming close. (I just did a google search on "600 club" and couldn't find a single baseball reference in the first 13 pages among 5,870 hits on the term. Lots of references to car clubs, though.) I think somehow the pop culture reference to the religious program wormed its way into the sportscast vocabulary, and we now have a club we didn't know about. So...for those of who remember "Alice's Restaurant"...how many people does it take to make a club? Why are some achievements referred to as being a 'club' and others not? These aren't rhetorical questions, I just can't make heads nore tails of it.

Congratulations to Barry, though. There aren't enough exclamation points on the internet to truly describe having this kind of a season at his age and stage of his career, much less be reaching milestones like this while being among the league leaders in the stat. That would make an interesting study sometime: players who reach significant career milestones while being among the league leaders in the same category. Strikeouts seems the category most amenable to this phenomenon: Ryan, Johnson, and Clemens all reached top-10 career numbers the same year they were first or second in Ks.

One of these Things is Not Like The Other

...one of these things just doesn't belong. You know how to play! Shoeless Joe Jackson, Pete Rose, George Steinbrenner. Steinbrennner's eligible for induction into the hall of fame, despite his felony conviction on election law violations and his suspensions from baseball for tampering with Dave Winfield, not even to say his important role in destroying the economics of the game to turn it from a middle-class sport to one for the champagne set. Perhaps that last is a bit too harsh, but I'll let history judge. Which is not what the New York Times' Buster Olney is doing today in a piece for ESPN that argues Steinbrenner should be in the Hall of Fame! Bill Veeck had to be dead for five years before they elected him. Among categories of Hall of Fame inductees -- players, managers/coaches, broadcasters, writers, owners, the "owners wing" is the least selective as it is.

I won't impugn Buster Olney's motives, although he current has a book on the best-seller list on the Yankees that was based on years of exclusive "insider" access -- I'm not sure Steinbrenner would stoop to that kind of quid pro quo, although who knows. But I might question Olney's judgment or perhaps his sanity at arguing that Steinbrenner has been important or even good for the game of baseball. (One is tempted to blame Stockholm syndrome.) The most ludicrous assertion is that all Steinbrenner really cares about is winning, not the billion-dollar enterprise. I'll give Steinbrenner plenty of credit for being a smart businessman, but it's a distinction shared by many scalawags and few honest criers. He's just the latest strong-arm in the history of sports business, and I'm not even sure Ban Johnson deserves to be in a Hall of Fame that doesn't include Marvin Miller or Curt Flood.

posted by The Crank 9:53 PM

Thursday, September 16, 2004

MLB AND ITS FANS NEED TO CLEAN UP THEIR ACTS

By Diane M. Grassi

Major League Baseball as well as its fans took a collective literal blow on Monday, September 13th at Oakland Coliseum at a game between the Oakland Athletics and the Texas Rangers. A melee unfolded between players and fans when what appeared to be hostile fans in close proximity to the Texas Rangers' bullpen were purposely antagonizing the pitchers as they sat in the bullpen.

But most reports and opinions about this unsettling display which sports fans and non-sports fans alike witnessed on their evening's news have failed to address the big picture. As fans of pro-sports we have not escaped viewing on-field, on-court or on-ice brawls between players, between players and umpires or referees and unfortunately but less often between a player and a specific heckler in the stands.

Yes, we have had instances such as in 1991 when Cleveland Indians outfielder Albert Belle threw a ball at a fan in the stands and hit him. But more frequently players get involved with fans when they appear to be acting in self-defense such as when Chicago Cubs pitcher Randy Myers knocked out a charging fan in 1995. In 2000, Los Angeles Dodgers players took on Cubs' fans at Wrigley Field after a fan allegedly struck a Dodgers' catcher and stole his hat while he was in the bullpen.

We also have the case of the attack of Kansas City Royals' first base coach Tom Gamboa in a game at Chicago's U.S. Cellular Field in 2002. A father and son ran onto the field unprovoked and caused permanent injury to Gamboa. Sadly, they both got off on probation. Umpire Laz Diaz was attacked by fans in 2003, while standing near right field. These are only some of the documented incidents which have occurred in MLB, and do not even begin to address all of the other professional sports leagues where various types of physical slugfests or mob scenes transpire.

More importantly, the event of September 13th reminds us of the need for accountability on the parts of spectators, Major League Baseball and its respective organizations and managements. Before it becomes necessary for us to legislate common decency and rules of behavior in public, people have to take a good look in the mirror. In this instance, MLB alone is not the problem, but rather the combination of the public's general lack of adhering to rules and appropriate behavior along with MLB's fear of offending its patrons.

However, fans don't reserve bad behavior for baseball games alone, but rather subscribe to unruly ways which just escalate when they get to the stadium, irked on my a mob and/or by over imbibing. Fans screaming and miming indecent gestures at ballplayers on a field or throwing things on the field can be analogous to someone acting out their road rage. It is unfortunately imbedded in our society as "acceptable" behavior.

Craig Bueno, the fan in the middle of antagonizing the bullpen players and husband of the injured fan, Jennifer Bueno, freely admitted that "Heckling is part of the game." (I am sure that Abner Doubleday would take issue with that.) Bueno reserves the right to act unruly but obviously forgot that other people could get hurt in the process, other than himself or his family. He cannot have it both ways. He wanted a reaction, he got one, but it was not the reaction he wanted and now he is crying foul.

On the other hand, there is no excuse for pitcher Frank Francisco's behavior in throwing a chair across the stands. He appeared to be having a full-blown temper tantrum and acted totally inappropriately for which he should be suspended and fined by MLB and face the authorities. His crime was lacking any forethought of possibly permanently maiming someone and showed an indifference to the safety of those around him including his teammates.

As concerns Major League Baseball, with all of the security issues we must now deal with in a post-9/11 world when going into any public building or space these days, why are the fans allowed such close proximity to the players in bullpens in many of these stadiums, especially given the amount of problems which have occurred over the past few years?

And if the owners of these teams cannot spare eliminating these seats near bullpens, why then is security in those areas virtually invisible? After all, the latest such bullpen brawl prior to September 13th took place during the Yankees-Red Sox playoffs of 2003 between Yankees players and a groundskeeper in the Fenway Park bullpen, mistaken for a fan given his tasteless behavior. The Oakland A's management after reviewing the videotape stated that the fans’ behavior "was not over the line according to baseball’s rules of conduct" but that posture does little to quell such behavior in the future, and is also an unsuitable response.

And finally why has the Commissioner of Major League Baseball only given lip service to its fans and its players over the past decade whenever these events happen? Players, owners, spectators and MLB all need to be on the same page about what to expect when going to the stadium. It needs to be clear about what will be tolerated by fans and players alike and a precedent needs to be set before something really tragic transpires. For starters, unruly fans should be escorted out, and baseball players need to be counseled on what to do before they find themselves in big trouble.

Provocation which leads to mayhem is unacceptable. Whether it be in the stadium, in the arena or on the freeway, we must all work on being decent human beings to each other again first, and not take our cues from out of control ballplayers or especially from unruly fans who seemingly get away with being so, only to later surface looking for a big payday.

posted by Diane M. Grassi 7:42 PM

More on the Ichiro Watch

Forget George Sisler: Ichiro is closing in on Willie Wilson's all-time single season record for most at-bats. The mark is 705, and Ichiro is sitting on 630 with 144 games played. If he keeps up his average of 4.375 AB per game the rest of the way, he'll finish out at 708. Somehow I think it's in the bag as long as Sisler is in his sights: is Ichiro going to take a walk? Will anybody be pitching around him with the rest of the last-place Mariners hardly threatening anything other than another ofer? Ichiro, it should be noted, reached an incredible 692 AB in 2001, and walked only 30 times that year. Wilson walked only 28 times in his record-setting 1980, batting .326 and with an OBP of .357. Ichiro has already walked a whopping (!) 40 BB and a great OBP of .409, thanks to that .370 BA.

Not to bring up the old asterisk debate, but Ichiro would have to get 24 hits in the next ten games to equal Sisler's mark in 154 games. Sisler did play the full 154 that year.

Since we're hearing a pleasant revival of the name of Sisler, let's remember he came up as a part-time pitcher for the Browns. He was pretty decent as a spot starter in eight games and with seven releief appearances, and he contineud to make an occasional pitching appearance over the years. He ended his career with 111 IP and a 2.35 ERA, the second-greatest-hitting-pitching combo after one George Hermann Ruth. (Of course, Dante Bichette might still make it back to the big leagues, so watch out, you Georges.)

How the Giants Have Stayed in the Wild-Card Race

Yesterday, MLB had its annual teleconference of coin flipping to determine home-field advantage among all possible contenders for wild-card and divisional spots, should a playoff game be necessary. In the NL, the flips were held between the Dodgers, Giants, Marlins, Astros, and Padres (not to rain on any Philadelphia Phillies' fan's parade).

Brian Sabean won all five of his coin flips for the Giants. If I'm doing my probabilities correctly, the chances of that are around 3%.

Is it better to be lucky, or good? Or have Barry Bonds?

posted by The Crank 10:43 AM

Wednesday, September 15, 2004

Tempests in Teapots

Baseball's Misplaced Security Concerns

One of my favorite scenes in the movie "The Blues Brothers" is where the band, masquerading as The Good Old Boys, shows up at Bob's Country Bunker and finds that the stage is covered with chicken wire. Why? When they start to play a song the crowd hates, they find out: because the crowd throws bottles and garbage at them when they are displeased. Then they switch to a C&W set that the crowd really likes, and the crowd responds by throwing bottles and garbage.

We live in deeply paranoid times, in which the great mass of people are automatically suspected -- nay, assumed guilty -- of the worst motives. Texas reliever Frank Francisco couldn't put up with some heckling in Oakland and threw a chair into the stands (surrounded by his own team-mates) which broke a woman's nose. Let's just get this very clear: in response to mere words, a baseball player assaulted a fan. There have been other incidents with whacko fans, but just as many with whacko players. Considering the number of games a year, given that on-field incidents of fighting between players vastly outnumber incidents involving fans, it's a remarkably small number of incidents where fans initiate the violence. And virtually all of them are associated with alcohol consumption.

So let's look at all the violence that happens at ballparks that involves players, counting on-field brawls, the majority is inititated by players. Not fans.

So what's the reaction from the baseball community? Why -- you have to keep those pesky fans as far away from us millionaires as possible!

Here's what Jayson Stark says:

"There's no such thing as too much security."

Yes, Jayson, there is. It's called a police state.

"But we need to protect all these folks from themselves -- and from each other. There is no better way to do that than to assign real security, and lots of it, to any areas of the ballpark where fans are right on top of players. Bullpens. Dugouts. Whereever.

What passes for security in some parks is absurd. A middle-aged woman in a blue usher's suit is no deterrent. A tough-looking guy in a blue, policeman-like suit works a lot better. A dozen tough-looking guys is way, way, way better."

Who are "these folks"? It's the PLAYERS who started this brawl!

Why not just have background screening checks for everybody who can purchase a box seat? Fingerprinting?

To be fair, Stark makes some good suggestions, but at the heart of this is a mistrust of the fans.

Here's what Joe Morgan says:

"One of the problems with the older stadiums is that the bullpens are exposed. Most of the bullpens at newer stadiums are not as close to the fans, so confrontations between fans and visiting players are less likely. At Oakland's Network Coliseum, the stands are right on top of the bullpen.

"Monday night, the players and fans were far too close."

Buck Showalter, Francisco's manager, said that the heckling was "over the line" that night. I'm not sure what that means. he also said the fans were too close to the players.

I could go on citing examples.

I'm not going to defend yahoos of fans, nor anybody who disrupts things by throwing stuff on the field, whether it's paper cups or fisticuffs.

If MLB wanted to solve this "problem", just cut off alcohol sales altogether. They'd never do that, because they'd lose too much money. Of course, there wasn't a beer vendor in the Texas bullpen the other night.

What's going on here is that the extremely well-paid people in the sport are so divorced from their fans, and so whipped up by paranoia, that they have seized on an incident where the blame lay squarely with the player, and have used it as an excuse to further separate fans from the players and action. That kind of call for removing fans further away from the players, for having a screen of security -- whether in person or in the form of barbed wire -- is unwarranted either by this incident or the preponderance of evidence of good behavior by fans at the vast majority of ballparks and games.

That's the mentality of a police state. The first reaction to any incident is "more security, more distance". It's already a hassle to go to the ballgame these days, with security checks at the gate, the disingenuous no backpack policies at many ballparks, restricted movements during the games, and a wall of security people blocking the action down below while ushers fail to enforce simple rules of courtesy (like not getting up in a row in the middle of a play) that would make the game more enjoyable for everybody.

And again, baseball seems to have no perspective. In the NBA, fans are inches away from the players. They heckle them mercilessl -- just ask Spike Lee what he says. There are few to no violent incidents, perhaps because the players themselves rarely fight. We won't get into the strange dynamic of hockey, where fighting is a tolerated part of the game and fans are already walled off from the players, and where occasionally a player does go up into the stands after a fan (but not the other way around, to my recent recollection).

Baseball's worst problem with violence remains fighting on the field. Until they step up and put on a zero tolerance policy on fighting on the field, this call for "security" that plays to the paranoia of the elites on the field is pure hypocrisy.

posted by The Crank 10:16 AM

Sunday, September 12, 2004

How Do The Rotations Look?

With Matt Clement's early departure necessitating some relief help from Glendon Rusch last Tuesday night, the Cubs had to go with a variant of the alternate plan I outlined in the second part of my post on Monday, one in which Wood and Prior both started on Friday and Rusch took Clement's spot today. The Cubs look pretty confident that Clement will be able to go on Tuesday, given that the most likely emergency starter beyond Rusch, Sergio Mitre, just came in to pitch relief in the 7th. There's no way Mitre comes in this afternoon to throw two innings and then turns around and starts on Tuesday.

This makes Clement's start on Tuesday pretty big. If he has more problems, the Cubs are left a bit in the lurch. To wit, if all goes well, the Cubs' rotation down the stretch (starting from Sept, 6th, the first game after the postponed series in Florida) will look like (a plus sign means both pitchers listed did/will pitch, a slash indicates an choice among multiple options):

6th - Zambrano
7th - Clement + Rusch
8th - Maddux
10th - Wood
10th - Prior
11th - Zambrano
12th - Rusch
13th - Maddux
14th - Clement
15th - Wood/Prior
16th - Prior/Wood
17th - Zambrano
18th - Maddux
19th - Clement
20th - Wood/Prior
20th - Rusch
21st - Prior/Wood
22nd - Zambrano
23rd - Maddux
24th - Clement
25th - Wood/Prior
etc.

Not too shabby, even with Rusch's struggles against Florida today. But if Clement has some problems, the Cubs would be looking at:

14th - Clement + Some Guy(s)
15th - Wood/Prior
16th - Prior/Wood
17th - Zambrano
18th - Maddux
19th - Clement/Rusch/Mitre
20th - Wood/Prior
20th - Rusch/Clement/Mitre
21st - Prior/Wood
22nd - Zambrano
23rd - Maddux
24th - Clement/(Rusch/Mitre assuming lingering effects of injury)
25th - Wood/Prior
etc.

One intriguing variant, though it seems unlikely this would play out, would be to have one of Friday's starters pitch in in relief if Clement encounters trouble on Tuesday, trouble which lingers for a while and may affect future appearances. For example:

14th - Clement + Wood
15th - Prior
16th - Zambrano
17th - Rusch
18th - Maddux
19th - Wood
20th - Prior
20th - Mitre/Clement
21st - Zambrano
22nd - Rusch
23rd - Maddux
24th - Wood
25th - Prior
etc.

Then Rusch fills in for Clement until he's ready to go again. The trouble for the Cubs is that if Clement falters, there's a reasonable likelihood that Mitre winds up making a start against Florida, and he's just given up four runs in his second inning of relief (actually he was pulled after 1 2/3).

This isn't to say that the Marlins are in any better shape than the Cubs after their troubles with the weather. Here's what they're looking at rotation-wise, with impending doubleheaders on the 14th and the 20th:

7th - Burnett
8th - Beckett
9th - Valdez
10th - Pavano
10th - Kensing
11th - Willis
12th - Burnett
13th - Beckett
14th - Valdez
14th - Some Guy/Kensing(?)
15th - Pavano
16th - Willis
17th - Burnett
18th - Beckett
19th - Valdez
20th - Pavano
20th - Kensing/Some (Other?) Guy
21st - Willis
22nd - Burnett
23rd - Beckett
24th - Valdez
25th - Pavano
etc.

Logan Kensing was the first emergency starter for the Marlins on Friday, and he only lasted 49 pitches against the Cubs. The plus side to that is that he's theoretically available on both the 14th and the 20th, the minus side is that he got knocked out in fewer than 50 pitches. I'm not sure of the identity of Some Guy, but they have to come up with someone if Kensing on short rest isn't an option. Maybe Nate Bump? One thing the Marlins will have going for them is that Carl Pavano will catch the Cubs again on the 20th.

If Clement has worked out the kinks, the Cubs will definitely be in better shape with their starters than the Marlins. If not, one of the biggest games in the NL Wild Card race, the nightcap between the Cubs and the Marlins in Pro Player on the 20th, could see a Sergio Mitre vs. Logan Kensing matchup. Stay tuned...

Update 9/14

I guess I screwed up the date of the Marlins-Expos doubleheader, as it's tomorrow, not today, or perhaps it was changed in the interim since I last wrote. Whatever the case, it now stands that Logan Kensing, if he's going to be the guy, is set up to start on the 15th and the 20th. I did notice that the nightcap starter for the Marlins is still listed as TBD.

On the Cubs' side, after a rough start Matt Clement settled down to give the Cubs 6 solid innings before being lifted. Now the Cubs need to get off the diet of donuts that Josh Fogg (Josh Fogg?!?!) has been feeding them...

posted by Tom Renbarger 1:30 PM