Games » Cleveland Indians
Aug28A comfortable 0 for 4
Lee Judge
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So we’re playing in a Men’s Senior League game and my second baseman pops up to short. He comes into the dugout, sits next to me and says, “That pitcher’s got nuthin’.” I then asked him if that was so, why he was in the dugout. And that story leads me to Bruce Chen: he’s the Rodney Dangerfield of pitchers. He gets no respect.
Ozzie Guillen has a conniption fit when the White Sox lose to Bruce. (I actually have no idea what a conniption fit is, but my Mom warned me about them.) After the game Alex Gordon admitted that nobody around the league considers Chen an ace, but look who’s got a 3.94 ERA, has won twice as often as he’s lost (10-5) and is sticking it teams trying to make the playoffs.
Just like the pitcher my second baseman thought so little of, Bruce Chen does not impress you with his stuff. He doesn’t throw in the upper 90s, he doesn’t have a pitch you’d describe as nasty, he just knows how to pitch.
Hitters go back to the dugout knowing they can hit Bruce Chen, but they’re just not doing it. And that’s what major league players mean by a ‘comfortable 0 for 4’. You never feel overmatched…until you look at the scoreboard.
Sunday, Bruce Chen won his fifth game in a row.
Game stuff
Frank White & Ryan Lefebvre said Justin Masterson throws a heavy sinker and I know just what they mean. Danny Jackson, who played for my amateur team, threw the same kind of pitch and when I’d play catch with him, it felt like he was throwing me a shot put. Then I’d throw the ball back and it would appear that I’d thrown a Stay Puft marshmallow. There must be some scientific explanation for it, but I don’t know what it is.
In the first inning the Royals put Alex Gordon in motion on a 3-2 count with Melky Cabrera at the plate. The downside of this move can be a line drive double play, the upside, staying out of a groundball double play or going first to third on a base hit. The manager needs to trust the batter at the plate to not swing at ball four or strike out on a fastball. If the hitter strikes out on something off-speed, the runner has a good chance to steal the base. (By the way, Melky walked.)
Hard to tell on TV, but it appeared the Indians were playing a deep outfield. Over the series we saw several flares fall between the infield and a charging outfielder and a couple of balls that appeared to be doubles off the bat held to singles. This is the baseball version of football’s “prevent defense.” Play deep and keep the action in front of you, force the other team to get three or more hits to score a run. But just like football, you can get burned by letting too much fall in front of you for too long.
Just to make my defense of the stolen base look bad, Jeff Francoeur has decided to get thrown out at every opportunity. (You’re killing me, Frenchy.) This time he became one of the few human beings on earth to get caught by the fake-to-third-throw-to-first pickoff move. Melky was on third and probably did the right thing by breaking for home. You’re most likely screwed no matter what, so if there’s going to be a misplay, it might as well be at home so you can score a run.
Oh, and Melky probably broke at the right time, also (I’ll ask Doug Sisson when he gets back). Cabrera took off when the pitcher threw to second which puts the ball as far away from home as possible. It still didn’t work, but it was better than standing there watching Frenchy get run down.
In the top of the 4th, Melky Cabrera came up with one out and runners on first and second. Melky hit a hard grounder to the first base side. Whether he did it intentionally or not, Alex Gordon, who was on first, did a good job blocking out Matt LaPorta. Alex stopped and waited for the grounder to roll through, screening La Porta. Look for this play in the future from heads up base runners: they’ll intentionally slow down in front of a fielder and screen him from the ball as long as possible.
Kauffman Stadium may rob hitters of home runs, but the dimensions can give hitters more doubles. If I heard right, four of the Royals are among the top seven hitters in the league when it comes to doubles and as a team, the Royals are second in doubles to the Boston Red Sox. And some of that can be attributed to a more athletic lineup that has more speed and runs the bases well.
Jim Thome is 41 years old and they were talking about how much stretching he has to do to get ready for a game. That reminded me of George Brett. The winter before he retired George and I hit together once a week. (Turned out he mainly needed someone to unclog the pitching machine while he hit.) He told me he thought it might be his last season and I asked why, he could still hit better than a whole lot of other people in the big leagues. George said at his age it took him hours to get ready to play and hours of treatment after he played. He was tired of it. So, assuming he’s not hurting the Royals, enjoy Jim Thome’s career while it lasts. He’s getting near the end.
After two outs were made on four pitches in the top of the 8th, Johnny Giavotella swung at the first pitch he saw and grounded out. This would usually be considered bad baseball: someone’s got to take some pitches to keep the opposition from having an easy inning. It’s not as bad if the other team is already into their pen (you’re not trying to build up a starter’s pitch count), but it did force Bruce Chen to go back to the mound in the bottom of the 8th without much of a breather.
Jeff Francoeur made an error, but it wasn’t like he dropped a pop-up. He was in full stride, racing back on a line drive, looked back into the sun and the ball hit him in the heel of the glove. It was definitely an error, but not an easy play.
Wow, lucky Ned didn’t waste Greg Holland last night, huh? (If you can’t beat ‘em, switch sides and hope nobody notices.)
You were right, I was wrong
I recently posted a piece about the odds of scoring a run by having Jeff Francoeur steal third and Johnny Giavotella swing away vs. leaving Francoeur where he was and letting Giavotella and Salvador Perez swing away. I said it was a no-brainer and several readers disagreed.
You were right, I was wrong. (I’ve been married 27 years so I’ve had lots of practice saying that.) I turned the problem over to a friend of mine who taught statistics and probability, he did the math and the odds were closer than I realized. Stealing and hitting away was still a better bet, but not by as much as I thought. My friend also added some advice we should all remember: there are far too many factors in reality to totally depend on math. The people, situation and conditions involved will change the equation. It’s easy to go to Fangraphs or any other website featuring metrics and get an overall answer to a question, but the coaches and players have the best idea of what the odds actually are in any given situation.
In the future, I’ll try to stay out of the more complicated cases of odds and probability unless I hire a math-inclined Sherpa to guide me through the numerical wilderness.
But I’ve got this piece on sacrifice bunts I’ve been working on…
Chen
Soria
Pena
This weekend was a pretty good example of why Fangraphs has Butler as a better baserunner than Francouer. He just threw away an entire inning worth of outs. And in three close games, we got 26 innings of outs to their 27. Outs on the basepaths are devastating to an inning, when the effort to get runners on is wasted.
When it works, the aggressiveness creates runs. But the success rate has not been high enough to offset all of the outs we are leaving on the bases.
Lee: I have a question. With all the walks our bullpen seems to give up, what is the job of the bullpen coach and catcher. Am I wrong to think it is their job to tell Yost when a reliever can't find the plate with a GPS unit and it is not his night. Or does everything change when they hit the field? I think these things should show up when the reliever is warming up.
Curtis: I am not into Fangragh or any of that but if the final result are even the same by being aggressive or by being conservative I vote for aggressive. At least aggressive makes the other team make a play with a chance to make a mistake. I think you should push an team until they prove you wrong. You see teams do it all the time with our outfield. You need to find out if the other guy is having an off day.
Larry: Most baseball people don't take the bullpen warm-ups too seriously. There have been too many cases of guys being awful in the pen and then lights out on the mound and vice versa.
I don't know if it still goes on, but some teams used to make sure the visiting bullpen mounds and game mounds were different, just to make the visiting pitcher uncomfortable.
Curtis: Any guy who loves the novels of Patrick O'Brian has a warm place in my heart, but if Fangaphs has Billy Butler rated as a better baserunner than Jeff Francoeur I'd see that as more of an indictent of Fangraphs than Frenchy.
Jeff had a bad weekend running the bases for sure, but is still stealing them at a .655 rate. Not awesome, but far beyond anything Butler could achieve.
Frenchy also takes the extra base where Billy can't. Butler has a hard time going 1st to 3rd or 2nd to home, tends to clog the bases when he gets on and has made mental mistakes on the basepaths.
As I've said before (and will apparently say again) even failed base stealing attempts have benefits: more fastballs, distracted pitchers in the slide step, which hurts velocity and location, and defenses out of position.
Lee, I'm guessing that Frenchy has developed a 'tell' that pitchers are reading to let them know he's going, about the only explanation for going 0-for-August on the base paths.
As for fangraphs, it's useful history but is limited by the official scorer, who can label a play an out but not a hustled extra base, so metrics counts outs and concludes Frenchy bad, Billy good. They have the same problems with defense, although Bill James and others are trying to fix that one.
By the way, I should add that if anyone disagrees with opinions expressed here or sees a statistic that makes sense to them that doesn't make sense to me, that's OK.
There are too many people in the world insisting that everyone needs to agree with their view of the world and I don't want to add to that.
If anyone thinks Billy Butler is a better base runner than Jeff Francoeur, be my guest, it's your right. I don't happen to agree, but nobody put me in charge of what everyone is supposed to think.
Jim: I see what you're saying: a defender who doesn't move makes few errors, but that doesn't make him a good defender. Same with a base runner who goes station to station and never attempts the extra base.
It's not that these statistics are bad, but so many times they seem flawed and lead people to erroneous conclusions.
But once again, I don't want to tell anyone else what to think. I'm just trying to explain my point of view and the point of view expressed by players and coaches.
good points, good post. thanks lee. i didn't get to see the game today and always enjoy picking up some of the finer things here.
Lee: good point on numbers. As they say you can prove anything with numbers. Just depends on what you are looking for. I grew up in Michigan and Willie Horton of the Tigers always had a low amount of errors in the outfield. If you didn't look closer you didn't see that he did not make many errors because if the ball was not hit right to him he never touched it. Thus a hit and no error. Guess that's why we play the game on the field and not on paper. Also do you think the invention of fantasy baseball has put undo expectations on Players, GM's and owners. Again paper game not real thing or real money.
Luke: Thank you, I'm glad you find what I'm doing of interest.
Hi, Lee. I'd like to tentatively dip my toe into the water here and try to explain the reasoning behind Fangraphs as raking Butler ahead of Francoeur when it comes to base running. Basically, their base running stat awards (or subtracts) runs based on how a player performs on the bases when the ball is put in play. (That ball in play part is an incredibly important distinction.) Taking the extra base is good, while getting thrown out trying to take that extra base is bad.
Some basic facts about the 2011 Royals: Francoeur leads the team in making outs on the bases. He's been thrown out eight times. Butler has been thrown out five times. (Remember, this is when the ball is in play so caught stealings don't count.)
Also, Butler has taken 20 bases this year. That is, he's advanced 20 times on fly balls, passed balls, wild pitches, etc. (Fangraphs only counts the fly balls.) That's the second best total on the team. (I know... I triple checked.) Francoeur has taken only 14 bases. Jim is mistaken about Fangraphs not counting the runner taking an extra base. A runner advancing two bases when the batter behind him laces a single or three bases on a double... That's included.
I don't think anyone who watches the Royals and has half a clue would ever say that Butler is a better base runner than Francoeur. What Fangraphs is saying is that Francoeur has made more mistakes on the bases this year and has ultimately cost the Royals more runs through those mistakes, than what Butler has done.
My theory: Butler has severe limitations, and usually realizes those limitation, so he takes fewer risks on the bases. Fangraphs actually penalizes Butler for not advancing in certain situations as well... That's another reason why his base running number is low. Francoeur, on the other hand, can get reckless from time to time and try to do too much. (Or as the Royals would say, he's agressive.) The end result is the player who takes risks and is unsuccessful is penalized more than the player who takes fewer chances. Probably because costing your club an out on the bases is one of the worst things you can do to your team. (I would put sac bunts as the very worst. :) But that's just me.)
In a game where I needed a run, I'd much rather have Francoeur on second than Butler. However, both have been less than stellar base running citizens this year. That's all Fangraphs is telling us.
I don't think this stat is flawed... It does what it does, which is measure a player's contribution when running the bases.
One final thought... Lee, you pointed out that Francoeur is successfully stealing bases at a 66% clip. Yes, that's better than Butler would do if they had the same number of stolen base attempts, but studies have shown that if a runner is successful on less than 75% of his stolen base attempts, he's hurting his team. Comparing Francoeur's stolen base rate against Butler's accomplishes nothing. Again, an out on the bases is a larger negative than an advanced base is a positive. And Francoeur is making far too many outs on the bases.
Larry: I think any statistic is a piece of the puzzle, but looking at a single number and leaping to a conclusion is a mistake.
And, frankly, I think fantasy sports has made some people a little nuts: I had a guy tell me a player was no good because nobody in his fantasy league wanted him. The player's main strength was defense and that league didn't measure defense. So bad fantasy player, pretty good one in reality.
I do think all the statistical information available has made some people think that's all there is to the game. But reality has so many unmeasured factors: is the guy good in the clubhouse? Does he put up meaningless numbers when the game's not on the line and fade when it matters?
There are thousands of factors that can't be measured and players, coaches, managers and GMs have to try to take them into account.
Craig: Thanks for your input and you understand what Fangraphs is trying to measure far better than I ever will.
And you're raising an important distinction: is Billy Butler really a better base runner or has he just made fewer mistakes than Jeff Francoeur? Which is not exactly the same thing.
Once again I'll say that whatever Frenchy's stolen base percentage ends up being, if it's better than the alternatives available at that point, then it's still a good idea to go.
But then I like the sac bunt in certain situtation's also.
And once again, even an unsuccesful steal has a positive affect on other numbers.
"Jim is mistaken about Fangraphs not counting the runner taking an extra base."
From fangraphs' on UBR: "2) A batter getting thrown out trying to advance an extra base on a hit (if he successfully does, we don’t know it, as he is simply awarded a double, for example, on a usual single where he advances an extra base)."
There seems some confusion on what is counted and what isn't, so we can look at that on your site, not wishing to clog up Lee's excellent blog with our quibbles.
Another fan got hit by a wicked line drive foul ball yesterday. I think it's obvious MLB is eventually going to have to put up netting down the first and third base lines. As Ryan said, I just hope it isn't one fan too late. Maybe the Royals can put up netting on top of the dugouts in a vertical louver pattern with the louvers angled to deflect line drive foul balls and thrown bats back onto the field. That way, the fans are protected, but they can still stand behind the dugout before the game and get autographs, and the players can still toss balls to the kids who run down the aisles after a foul ball or after the third out.
More than once in the past few days I've seen people holding little kids on their lap while sitting in the first row of seats near the dugout. One guy in Cleveland actually had the kid, about 3 years old, stationed between himself and home plate where he would have no chance to shield the kid if a line drive had been hit at them. An usher might have suggested to him to switch with the kid, but that would have interfered with his sight line.
It would only take one line drive to kill a kid (or an adult) and devastate a player. MLB needs to look at this issue before a tragedy, not after.
Blair: There are a couple of situations that really worry people around baseball: bats and balls going into the stands and bats exploding.
Fans are told to pay attention, but then are distracted by scoreboards, vendors and mascots. To say nothing of the distractions fans bring with them: cell phones and so on.
The new bats are supposedly made out of harder wood, but seem to explode, not crack and that means shards of wood are flying all over the place.
Jim: I want to thank you for the information, point of view and humor you bring to this website. When I see your name pop up I'm always interested in what you have to say.
Over the weekend I thought I let things get away from me, but it was my fault. I started talking about odds (and chances are I'm out of my depth) and that set off one of those 'how-many-angels-can-dance-on-the-head-of-a-pin' debates about base running.
I think those debates are worthwhile, but it made me think about whether this site is the best place for that discussion.
I'll continue to give that some thought and post something soon on that subject. But thanks for your presence, it's much appreciated.
Just wanted to say that Patrick O'Brian is one of the greatest writers very few people know about. Enjoyed your take on Chen. Although he seems to be overrated because of the slow fastball, he just keeps winning. He meets the definition of crafty lefty (Posnanski just wrote a blog post about it).
Thanks, Gaines. Yeah, Patrick O'Brian's stuff is sneaky good. I wish I knew more about sailing because I think he's slipping a few jokes past me. It takes a while to relaize how funny he's being.
I'm reading all the Aubrey/Maturin books straight through this summer and I'll be sorry when I'm finished.
As for Chen: there's another guy it takes a while to appreciate. No high-end velocity, but he's got all the other tools and he's making that work.
Thanks, Gaines. Yeah, Patrick O'Brian's stuff is sneaky good. I wish I knew more about sailing because I think he's slipping a few jokes past me. It takes a while to relaize how funny he's being.
I'm reading all the Aubrey/Maturin books straight through this summer and I'll be sorry when I'm finished.
As for Chen: there's another guy it takes a while to appreciate. No high-end velocity, but he's got all the other tools and he's making that work.