Platoon to the Moon!!!

The great Ty Cobb once said, “If a man pretends to be a major leaguer, he should stay in the lineup no matter who is pitching.”  This is coming from someone who was 1 of 2 guys to ever have over 4,000 MLB hits.  For the rest of the 99.99% who don’t have the highest... Continue Reading →

Zach Davies: What Changed?

In 2020, Zach Davies’ changeup was ranked #2/469 changeups based on run value.  In 2021 though, his changeup was dead last in the rankings at #590/590!  Many questions come to mind when you see such a drastic transformation like this. Did his changeup metrics like his movement differ from 2020-2021? Table 1 Table 1 displays... Continue Reading →

Snuffy Stirnweiss

Throughout the history of baseball, there have only been 2 players to lead their league in OPS and defensive WAR in the same season.  One of them is Willie Mays (in 1954) which should come as no shock to anyone.  The other...was Snuffy Stirnweiss (in 1945).  When we think of the year 1945, the ending... Continue Reading →

An Introduction to Point of Contact

One of the best tools available to programs around the country is HitTrax. With HitTrax, batters hit off a pitching machine or live pitcher and get feedback from the system that includes batted ball outcome (hit, ground out, fly out, etc.) and metrics like exit speed, launch angle, and even point of contact from home... Continue Reading →

Improving Pythagorean Winning %

The Pythagorean Win Percentage for baseball was created by Bill James to correlate a team's winning percentage to their expected win percentage. His initial equation was: Over the years this has held up with slight changes in the exponent to get a higher correlation between expected wins and actual wins.  Currently, on Baseball Reference the... Continue Reading →

Plate Discipline and Hit Tools

As the Tigers focused on pitching during the early stages of the rebuild, it has started to make its presence felt at the Major League Level. The organization has now started shifting its focus to positional talent. While this has resulted in a lack of starting pitching talent in the farm system, there are now... Continue Reading →

Sidearm Pitchers with Reverse Splits this year???

As a right-handed submarine pitcher, you hear countless times that you will be more effective against righties and will struggle against left-handed hitters.  The past data agrees with this, as do most (if not all) coaches and past players.  So why are submarine/sidearm pitchers having more success against opposite handed hitters than same-sided hitters this... Continue Reading →

The Curse of the Triple Play

Why was I screaming at my TV in agony as the Yankees turned their first triple play of the year on May 21st to get them out of a jam against the White Sox?  This may seem like a weird reaction from a lifelong Yankees fan...unless you knew about the Curse of the Triple Play.... Continue Reading →

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