Comments on: Jose Bautista and his 50 home runs

By: Jimbo

Jimbo — Sat, 25 Sep 2010 18:57:02 +0000

Another thing we would see more of in bigger stadiums.

By: Richard

Richard — Sat, 25 Sep 2010 18:35:32 +0000

Hank Aaron was wrong. It's the inside the park HR 🙂

By: Jimbo

Jimbo — Sat, 25 Sep 2010 16:42:21 +0000

I think the varying dimensions is a beautiful thing in baseball. All those cookie cutter 330/370/400/370/330 stadiums with 9 foot high wall all the way round were terrible. I wish they varied more than they do.

By: cheese

cheese — Sat, 25 Sep 2010 11:28:59 +0000

Personally, I'd love to see LeBron on a longer court and let him run wild...oh wait, they have standardized dimensions. Scratch that.

Boggles my mind that a sport so ingrained in statistics and measuring/comparing players through the decades would allow vastly different dimensions to their playing fields.

By: anon

anon — Sat, 25 Sep 2010 11:20:32 +0000

Hank Aaron thought the triple was the most exciting play in baseball. Good enough for me.

By: Jimbo

Jimbo — Sat, 25 Sep 2010 08:06:05 +0000

@45

I of course would not say the home run is boring. The hit is exciting, the ball travelling through the air is exciting...

But when I see a ball smoked into the gap, and I see the outfielders in pursuit, I always want to see that ball bounce off the wall, the outfielders getting it in as fast as possible, while the runner is either held at 2nd by good defense, or perhaps attempts to stretch out a triple. That's about the most exciting play in baseball.

But when that ball disappears over the fence, there will be no defense, no throws, no running, no diving, none of some of the great things baseball has to offer. I feel the same way about ground-rule-doubles. When a ball bounces over the fence, it sucks. No running, no defense, no throwing, no diving, no unpredictable outcome.

Baseball players today are much stronger than they ever were in the past. Balls (as I heard at least) are tighter. Bats are probably better too. If anything, the fields should've gotten bigger, but instead, they got smaller.

By: Richard

Richard — Sat, 25 Sep 2010 04:21:46 +0000

@ 38 I'm pretty sure most hitters TRY to hit line drives. The highest average on a ball in play is from a line drive. The fences being further away wouldn't suddenly give hitters the ability to do one of the hardest things in baseball. Also, Jose hit 51 and 52 tonight. Just amazing. I'm still surprised by your description of a HR being boring. That's just ludicrous. I've NEVER seen a home crowd react to a HR by a member of its team in the way you describe. It's always excitement and a lot of cheering. In your baseball world, we should heavily reward fast guys, but not strong guys?

By: BSK

BSK — Sat, 25 Sep 2010 03:43:51 +0000

FWIW, I knew he was leading the league and was up there, but when I saw the title of this post, I said, "REALLY!?!?!" And that's kind of cool. But kind of cool. As a 27-year-old, 50 has always been pretty attainable as long as I've really know what's going on. I remember the first time I looked back and saw that Strawberry won a HR title with 37 or something once and was like, "That was stupid."

By: Neil L

Neil L — Fri, 24 Sep 2010 23:13:43 +0000

This year home runs as a percentage of plate appearances (excluding IBB) in the ML is 4339/173355 = 2.50%, including the Jays' numbers. Jose Bautista's home run rate as a percentage of plate appearances, again excluding IBB, this year is 50/638 = 7.84%. He is hitting home runs at 3.14 times the league average. In 2001, Barry Bonds HR % was 73/629 = 11.6%. The comparable ML average that year was 5458/185577 = 2.94%. Bonds hit HR at 3.95 times the league average. In 1998 the ML HR % was 5064/187190 = 2.71%. Mark McGwire's rate was 70/653 = 10.7%, also 3.95 times the league average. Sosa's rate was 66/708 = 9.32%, 3.44 times the league average. Just wanted to put Jose's performance in some kind of perspective. Measured against the two best home run seasons in baseball history, he is hitting dingers at only 79.5% the rate of Bonds and McGwire in their best years. Given that there are no park adjustments here, how do we compare Bond's 2001 and McGwire's 1998 seasons to the one Bautista is having. Did steroids aid former stars by 20%?

By: Richard

Richard — Fri, 24 Sep 2010 22:20:52 +0000

Richard @20 asked, "Was it the weak pop outs you liked more or what?" Well, if you mean, "Would you rather see a weak pop out than a strikeout?", I say: Yes, I surely would. --------------- Then there is zero point in debating you since both outcomes are worthless.