One of the new features that will be available in the upcoming version of the PI will be the ability to search games for multiple matching criteria. This means that we can pick a stat and find the number of times it occurred for both (or one) teams in a game. I thought it might be fun to preview this feature by taking a look at some of the best pitching duels of all time.

For starters here are the games which featured Games Scores of 100 or more by both pitchers:

The third game listed was actually the best duel of the three. On October 2, 1965 Chris Short and Rob Gardner went head to head in the second game of a double header. (In game 1, Phillies starter Jim Bunning had recorded a game score of 92 by throwing a 2 hit shutout.) Neither team was able to score that game and it was called after 18 innings of scoreless ball. Both Short and Gardner went 15 and put up these lines:

            IP     H   R  ER   BB  SO  HR    ERA   BF  Ct·Sw·Lk   GB·FB·LD· ?   GmSc
C Short     15     9   0   0    3  18   0   2.82   56  49·21· 9   17·13· 2· 5    114
R Gardner   15     5   0   0    2   7   0   3.21   53  49· 6· 5   18·22· 5· 4    112

 
The other 2 games did reach a conclusion, albeit after many, many innings. On August 13, 1954 Al Aber and Jack Harshman exchanged zeros for 15 innings until a Minnie Minoso triple off Aber in the bottom of the 16th drove in the winning run for Chicago. Both pitchers pitched the entire game, giving them the following lines:
                        IP     H   R  ER   BB  SO  HR    ERA   BF  GB·FB·LD· ?   GmSc

A Aber, L (4-7)        15.1   9   1   1    3   8   0   3.47   57  23·14· 2· 9    101 
J Harshman, W (10-6)   16     9   0   0    7  12   0   3.02   65  20·17· 0· 9    109
 

The last of these games was the also the longest. However, the starters did not last as long. On July 9, 1971 Rudy May and Vida Blue squared off for 11 innings, with neither yielding a run. Blue exited after 11 and May pushed on for another inning. However, both were long gone by the time Angel Mangual drove in the games only run in the bottom of the 20th inning. Here are the lines for the starters:
          IP     H   R  ER   BB  SO  HR    ERA   BF  Pit-Str  Ct·Sw·Lk   GB·FB·LD· ?   GmSc
R May     12     3   0   0    6  13   0   2.86   43     -       ·  ·      7·14· 1· 3    103
V Blue    11     7   0   0    0  17   0   1.42   40     -       ·  ·      5·11· 3· 7    100  



			

Finally got around to fixing some things on the site. Should be live within the hour.

*The Park Factors now have the 2009 numbers incorporated into them.
*The similarity scores have been re-run for the end of the season
*2009 Transactions and Salaries are updated
*Various bug fixes
*Re-ran all of the pages (excluding old previews and box scores) on the site, so the nav bar is now consistent
*High School played for is now on the site.

Play Index should have an update later this week.

This is an interesting post by Dave Cameron over at FanGraphs... Jason Bay is going to get massively paid this winter, we all know that -- but what if there was another player on the market who was equally valuable, but would cost you far less money? Does that sound like a player you might be interested in?

My predictions this year haven't been all that good.

On July 7th, I predicted the playoff teams here. I really missed on the AL East teams, prediction that the Red Sox would win the division and the Rays would win the Wild Card. I had the Yankees missing the playoffs (when in fact they had the best record in baseball...oops). I also missed the AL West where I picked the Rangers, which I'm less embarrassed about, as well as the Giants winning the NL Wild Card (actually won by the Rockies.) I did get all the other division winners correct, though.

Anyway, regardless of my lack of success there, I'm going to make some bold predictions for this off-season. These are based on only my own gut feel and not any inside information. If I am correct on 2 or 3 of these, I'll be proud.

1) The Blue Jays will not trade Roy Halladay during this off-season

The reason for this is pretty simple--trading for one year of a star pitcher is very expensive in terms of talent the acquiring team must surrender and most teams would prefer to wait until the trade deadline to make sure they are in the race before giving up all that talent. The only thing worse than not making the playoffs is trading for a guy like Halladay, giving up your 3 best prospects, and THEN not making the playoffs. Oops. I don't think the Blue Jays will find any takers during the off-season unless the new team is allowed to negotiate a contract extension with Halladay, something that now-fired GM J. P. Ricciardi would not allow at the 2009 trade deadline. Make no mistake--Halladay will be traded by the trading deadline in 2010, just not before the season starts.

2) The Red Sox will dump either David Ortiz or Mike Lowell and sign/acquire two of the following: Jason Bay (free agent), Matt Holliday (free agent), Adrian Gonzalez (trade from San Diego)

When I say "dump" I mean trade or release. Jason Bay did a great job filling in for Manny Ramirez but is now a free agent. And while Ortiz and Lowell had excellent periods during 2009 both are showing significant deterioration. The Red Sox resemble the Yankees circa 2006, with some very old players (Lowell, Wakefield, Varitek), inconsistent starting pitchers (Matsuzaka, Beckett), an enigmatic youngster (Buchholz), a few strong younger players (Pedroia, Ellsbury, Lester, Bard) but an aging core team. The other way in which the Red Sox resemble the Yankees is making the playoffs but getting bounced.

The time has come for this team to get younger and they need to start by getting rid of some of their older, unpredictable talent. They might get nothing in return but this is still a better strategy than standing pat and perhaps getting little or no production from guys on the decline who may be injured. The 3-4 hitters for this team next year are going to be some combination of Bay, Holliday, and Gonzalez. With Jed Hoyer, a former assistant GM in Boston, now running the show in San Diego, the trade of Gonzalez to Boston is as much of a lock as any possible trade. Hoyer knows the Red Sox propsects and there is a trustful relationship between the GMs.

3. The Yankees will not re-sign Hideki Matsui or Johnny Damon

I'm going to hedge my bet right away and say that there's a chance that they'll bring back Damon, but if so, only on a one-year contract. Let's start with Matsui. He's been an outstanding player for the Yankees since they acquired him in 2003. His performance has been excellent and, as with virtually all MLB players born in Asia, he is professional and very hard-working. (Note to Americans...we can all learn something here.) He has two big knocks, however: 1) He's going to be 36 before the All-Star break in 2010 and has had serious injuries in 2 of the last 4 seasons and 2) At this point he can only play DH. Having given Jorge Posada a long contract, the Yankees need to give him probably half the season at DH next year. Look for Francisco Cervelli to catch more. As A-rod and Jeter age (seasonal ages of 34 and 36 next year) they will also benefit from some time at DH. The Yankees simply need to get younger and need to protect Posada.

In the case of Damon, the question will probably come down to whether Xavier Nady will be back in 2010, ready to take over in the outfield. Damon has been outstanding offensively in 2008-2009 but is not a good defensive player. If Nady can take over, I think the Yankees will hand him Damon's spot and move on. Keep in mind that 4 of the Yankees 9 positional starts this year were already 35 or older: Matsui, Damon, Posada, and Jeter. We know that Posada and Jeter aren't going anywhere.

4. The Phillies are going to make some major changes to their pitching staff

What a mess for the Phillies. Brad Lidge was horrendous and Ryan Madson wasn't much better. Cole Hamels was enigmatic both on and off the field. Jamie Moyer was inconsistent but more bad than good and is signed for another year. Their best starting pitcher in the regular season, J. A. Happ, started only one game in the playoffs and pitched a total of 6 innings over 7 appearances. And finally, Pedro Martinez, a guy with no future in Philadelphia, started 2 games in the World Series.

As much as I loved seeing Pedro pitch, it's very odd for a defending champion to rely so heavily on a scrap-heap kind of player. That's what happens, though, when a guy like Hamels becomes unreliable and so many starters from the previous season (Myers, Kendrick, and Moyer) are not available to start in the playoffs.

Anyway, oddly for a team that's been to 2 straight World Series, the only thing that is certain for next year is that Cliff Lee will be the opening day starter. Who else will be in that rotation or that bullpen remains a mystery. I would not be surprised to see Lidge bumped to middle relief and Myers (a free agent) back as the closer. I also wouldn't be shocked if Hamels isn't back with the team next year.

5. There are going to be some bizarre free-agent signings

This year's free agent class is one of the most interesting for a long time. It's the first one taking place after the slow economy hit baseball really hard. This past season was the first full one since the U.S. economy has been so bad and there were big drops in revenue from ticket sales, advertising, and merchandising. Teams are going to have less to spend. On top of this, the class of free agents is one of the weakest, talent-wise, in a long time. John Lackey is the best starting pitcher available and he's a solid #2 type guy.

I predict that during this off-season we'll see some better name free agents go to some smaller market teams and a little bit more balance then we've seen in the past. Don't get me wrong...the Yankees and Red Sox have the AL East and AL Wild Card for 2010 locked up already. But because there aren't as many impact players available and all revenues are down, I think we might see teams like the Royals and Pirates dip into free agency and get some of the better players for smaller dollars.

One of the themes in the media during last week's World Series was the  "core four" , the four players who linked the Yankees championships of the '90s to this year's team. Several of those players moved up the charts for playing time in the World Series and I thought it might be interesting to see whom they passed and who is still in the lead.

Read the rest of this entry »

Bobby Abreu re-signed with the Angels for 2 years yesterday,which surprised me. He had a nice year for a 35-year-old guy and I thought would have wanted to test the open market. Of course, he did that last year after having a good year and had to wait until just before spring training to get signed. Maybe he was happy to jump at a 2-year contract offer.

Anyway, most people know that he's got a long active streak of 100-RBI seasons. Here are the guys with the most 100-RBI seasons in the last 7 years:

                   From  To   Ages Seasons Link to Individual Seasons
+-----------------+----+----+-----+-------+------------------------------+
 Alex Rodriguez    2003 2009 27-33       7 Ind. Seasons
 Albert Pujols     2003 2009 23-29       7 Ind. Seasons
 Bobby Abreu       2003 2009 29-35       7 Ind. Seasons
 Mark Teixeira     2004 2009 24-29       6 Ind. Seasons
 Miguel Cabrera    2004 2009 21-26       6 Ind. Seasons
 Carlos Lee        2003 2009 27-33       6 Ind. Seasons

Only Abreu, A-rod, and Phat Albert have 100-RBI seasons each year.

The PI doesn't yet enable us to search for seasonal streaks, although I am hoping that this is coming down the pike. (I can tell you for sure that many significant additions are in fact coming down the pike, as I have seen the beta of the new version...) I don't know how many players have had 7-season 100-RBI streaks, but it's probably been done a fair amount.

Anyway, the last time Abreu didn't have 100 RBI in a season was 2002, but check out his stats that year. He played in 157 games, had 685 plate appearances, batted .308, slugged .521, and had an OPS+ of 151 (a career best.) And yet, he totaled only 85 RBI. Isn't that crazy? If he got 100 RBI that year, he'd have a streak of 9 such seasons going into next year.

Check out the guys over the last 20 seasons to have at least 600 PAs and an OPS+ of 150 or better but not reach 100 RBI:

  Cnt Player            Year OPS+ RBI  PA Age Tm  Lg  G   AB  R   H  2B 3B HR  BB IBB  SO HBP  SH  SF GDP  SB CS   BA   OBP   SLG   OPS  Positions
+----+-----------------+----+----+---+---+---+---+--+---+---+---+---+--+--+--+---+---+---+---+---+---+---+---+--+-----+-----+-----+-----+---------+
    1 Joe Mauer         2009  177  96 606  26 MIN AL 138 523  94 191 30  1 28  76  14  63   2   0   5  13   4  1  .365  .444  .587 1.031 *2D
    2 Adrian Gonzalez   2009  163  99 681  27 SDP NL 160 552  90 153 27  2 40 119  22 109   5   1   4  23   1  1  .277  .407  .551  .958 *3/D
    3 Todd Helton       2004  165  96 683  30 COL NL 154 547 115 190 49  2 32 127  19  72   3   0   6  12   3  0  .347  .469  .620 1.089 *3
    4 J.D. Drew         2004  157  93 645  28 ATL NL 145 518 118 158 28  8 31 118   2 116   5   1   3   7  12  3  .305  .436  .569 1.005 *9/8D
    5 Bobby Abreu       2002  151  85 685  28 PHI NL 157 572 102 176 50  6 20 104   9 117   3   0   6  11  31 12  .308  .413  .521  .934 *98
    6 Ryan Klesko       2002  152  95 625  31 SDP NL 146 540  90 162 39  1 29  76  11  86   4   1   4   7   6  2  .300  .388  .537  .925 *39/D
    7 Brian Giles       2001  150  95 674  30 PIT NL 160 576 116 178 37  7 37  90  14  67   4   0   4  10  13  6  .309  .404  .590  .994 *78
    8 Edgar Martinez    1999  152  86 608  36 SEA AL 142 502  86 169 35  1 24  97   6  99   6   0   3  12   7  2  .337  .447  .554 1.001 *D/3
    9 John Olerud       1998  163  93 665  29 NYM NL 160 557  91 197 36  4 22  96  11  73   4   1   7  15   2  2  .354  .447  .551  .998 *3
   10 Mo Vaughn         1997  152  96 628  29 BOS AL 141 527  91 166 24  0 35  86  17 154  12   0   3  10   2  2  .315  .420  .560  .980 *3/D
   11 Barry Larkin      1996  154  89 627  32 CIN NL 152 517 117 154 32  4 33  96   3  52   7   0   7  20  36 10  .298  .410  .567  .977 *6
   12 Bobby Bonilla     1995  151  99 614  32 TOT ML 141 554  96 182 37  8 28  54  10  79   2   0   4  22   0  5  .329  .388  .576  .964 5973
   13 Andy Van Slyke    1992  151  89 685  31 PIT NL 154 614 103 199 45 12 14  58   4  99   4   0   9   9  12  3  .324  .381  .505  .886 *8
   14 John Kruk         1992  150  70 607  31 PHI NL 144 507  86 164 30  4 10  92   8  88   1   0   7  11   3  5  .323  .423  .458  .881 *39/7
   15 Will Clark        1992  150  73 601  28 SFG NL 144 513  69 154 40  1 16  73  23  82   4   0  11   5  12  7  .300  .384  .476  .860 *3
   16 Rafael Palmeiro   1991  155  88 714  26 TEX AL 159 631 115 203 49  3 26  68  10  72   6   2   7  17   4  3  .322  .389  .532  .921 *3/D
   17 George Brett      1990  153  87 607  37 KCR AL 142 544  82 179 45  7 14  56  14  63   0   0   7  18   9  2  .329  .387  .515  .902 *3D/975
   18 Fred McGriff      1990  153  88 658  26 TOR AL 153 557  91 167 21  1 35  94  12 108   2   1   4   7   5  3  .300  .400  .530  .930 *3/D
   19 Eddie Murray      1990  158  95 645  34 LAD NL 155 558  96 184 22  3 26  82  21  64   1   0   4  19   8  5  .330  .414  .520  .934 *3

Most of these guys either had fewer PAs than Abreu's 685 or got a lot closer to 100 RBI.

So why did Abreu fall short of 100 RBI in 2002? The Phillies were an average team that year with a record of 80-81. Abreu batted 3rd almost the entire season except for a stretch where he hit 4th. It would seem that he was in good position to drive in 100 runs.

It seems to me that the key is the guys who were hitting in front of him. Jimmy Rollins hit 1st or 2nd almost the entire year but managed only a .306 OBP, a pathetic value for a leadoff guy and Rollins' worst until this year's abysmal .296 OBP. The guy hitting second was often Doug Glanville, he of the .292 OBP that season.

Check out Abreu's splits for the last 9 seasons batting with runners on base:

Yeah, it looks like Rollins and Glanville not getting on base too much was the difference. In 2002 Abreu had an average number of games with runners on base (145) but the fewest total plate appearances (313). He also had a low total of homers with runners on base (7) despite having an average year in total number of homers (20, not visible in the chart above.) This was a contributing cause to his low RBI total.

In the 8 years above other than 2002, Abreu averaged 93 RBI while hitting with runners on, getting the rest of his RBI each season on solo homers. In 2002, though, he got just 72 RBI with runners on despite having BA, OBP, and SLG just about smack dab on his averages for his entire career in that situation. Had he gotton just his average 93, he would have been over 100 RBI for the year.

Many months ago, back when the Mets were in the conversation as the best team in the National League, I posted a contest created by a reader named BoondockSaint. Prior to the start of the season he posted 40 questions and invited everyone to test their  prognostication skills. Now that the season has ended, I invited BoondockSaint to send me the results and here are the final scores:

1. Whiz - 26 correct
2. BoondockSaint - 25
3. Redsauce - 24
4. JohnnyTwisto - 23
5. Bunnywrangler - 22
6. PCG -21

BoondockSaint also sent me the questions with the final results: Read the rest of this entry »

You've all heard of Bill James' "power/speed number", developed back in the Baseball Abstract era, right? (We have it here on the site, btw.) Well, over at The Hardball Times, Brandon Isleib applied the same technique (taking the harmonic mean of two numbers) to Offensive and Defensive Win Shares to come up with what he calls the "Offense/Defense Number", or a measurement of those who excelled at the plate and afield. In Part I, infielder seasons are examined (spoiler alert: Honus Wagner was awesome).

Wow...what a World Series!

Lots to talk about. Let's start with Andy Pettitte.

From the post-season leaders page, we can see some of Pettitte's all-time post-season rankings.

He's first in wins:

Wins

Those 18 wins came over 249 IP in 40 games and starts. So that's a little over one regular season's worth of starts, and he's managed 18 wins, which is very good. (Remember that in the post-season, you're facing all good teams, so he has no doormats with which to pad his win total. Winning at a rate of 15-16 games for a full-year equivalent is impressive.)

Pettitte is also up there in losses:

Losses

At 18-9, he's won twice as often as he's lost, which again is very good.

Check out the all-time leaders in games pitched:

Games Played

This table summarizes the baseball playoffs nicely. In the Wild Card era, there are so many more games that all the records belong to modern guys, and over that same period, it's been pretty much all Braves, Yankees, and Red Sox.

Pettitte is number 1 in homers allowed:

Home Runs

However, 5 of the top 10 guys above actually allowed homers at a higher rate than Pettitte (including, obviously, Jaret Wright--wow!) Catfish Hunter sticks out as the only holdover from prior to the Wild Card era.

Anyway, the bottom line is that Pettitte has been very impressive. He's pitched in 8 World Series (including with Houston in 2005.) True, he's been lucky to be on such good teams, but A) he had a lot to do with them being so good and B) regardless of how he got the opportunities, he has done well with them.

It's interesting to debate his Hall of Fame credentials. His position as a top pitcher on 8 World Series teams goes a long way, in my opinion. He's got the 63rd-highest win total of all time, but only the 229th-highest loss total (translation: he's got a great winning percentage.) He has two 20-win seasons (actually 21 both times) and finished in the top 6 in Cy Young voting in 5 different seasons.

The marks against him are primarily these:

• He has only 229 career wins (as mentioned, 63rd all time) which would be a very low total for a Hall of Famer.
• His excellent W-L record seems to be at least partially a product of playing on such good teams. He came to the Yankees in 1995 when they made the playoffs for the first time in a long time and has never pitched for a poor team. His ERA+ is only 116 which, while very respectable, is not excellent. His neutralized pitching totals tell the story. They say his record should be (gulp) 162-146, a whopping 67 wins fewer than he has. This means that if he hadn't been on the Yankees, he'd be much closer to a .500 pitcher in all likelihood. This would give him numbers more like Tim Wakefield, Livan Hernandez, or Kevin Millwood. These are all good pitchers but clearly not HOFers.

What do you think?

I'm getting geared up for tonight's game and was curious to see who the oldest Game 6 starters are in World Series history:

  Cnt AgeY.D                   Date          Series G Tm   Opp GmReslt App,Dec    IP   H  R ER BB SO HR Pit Str GmSc IR IS BF AB 2B 3B IBB HBP SH SF GDP SB CS Pk BK WP   ERA
+----+------+-----------------+-------------+------+-+---+----+-------+---------+----+--+--+--+--+--+--+---+---+----+--+--+--+--+--+--+---+---+--+--+---+--+--+--+--+--+------+
    1 40.167 Dennis Martinez   1995-10-28    WS     6 CLE @ATL L  0-1  GS-5       4.2  4  0  0  5  2  0  82  44   53       21 16  1  0   1   0  0  0   1  0  1  0  0  0   0.00
    2 39.275 Early Wynn        1959-10-08    WS     6 CHW  LAD L  3-9  GS-4  ,L   3.1  5  5  5  3  2  1           29       18 14  1  0   0   0  1  0   0  0  0  0  0  0  13.50
    3 39.225 Pete Alexander    1926-10-09    WS     6 STL @NYY W 10-2  CG 9  ,W   9    8  2  2  2  6  0           67       38 36  2  1   0   0  0  0   0  1  0  0  0  0   2.00
    4 38.159 Tommy John        1981-10-28    WS     6 NYY  LAD L  2-9  GS-4       4    6  1  1  0  2  0  48  33   48       18 18  0  0   0   0  0  0   0  0  1  0  0  0   2.25
    5 38.054 Randy Johnson     2001-11-03    WS     6 ARI  NYY W 15-2  GS-7  ,W   7    6  2  2  2  7  0 104  66   62       29 27  1  0   0   0  0  0   0  0  0  0  0  0   2.57
    6 37.200 Don Sutton        1982-10-19    WS     6 MIL @STL L  1-13 GS-5  ,L   4.1  7  7  5  0  2  2  67  45   27       21 20  2  1   0   0  1  0   0  1  1  0  1  0  10.38
    7 37.168 Warren Spahn      1958-10-08    WS     6 MLN  NYY L  3-4  GS-10 ,L   9.2  9  4  4  2  5  2           58       42 39  0  0   0   0  0  1   0  0  1  0  0  0   3.72
    8 36.246 Dave Stewart      1993-10-23    WS     6 TOR  PHI W  8-6  GS-6       6    4  4  4  4  2  1 120  68   46       28 24  1  0   0   0  0  0   0  0  0  0  0  0   6.00
    9 36.182 Claude Passeau    1945-10-08    WS     6 CHC  DET W  8-7  GS-7       6.2  5  3  3  6  2  0           48       32 26  1  0   2   0  0  0   0  1  0  0  0  0   4.05
   10 35.309 Bob Shawkey       1926-10-09    WS     6 NYY  STL L  2-10 GS-7  ,L   6.1  8  7  6  2  4  0           33       29 24  3  0   0   0  3  0   0  0  1  0  0  0   8.53

After tonight, Pedro Martinez is going to be #6 on this list and Andy Pettitte will be the new #8, slotting between Spahn and Stewart (who slide down one spot after Pedro goes in at #6.)

Among the top 10 games above, we don't see a lot of great performances. Only 3 of the starters went at least 7 innings and half the guys gave up at least 4 ER. The starters earned a cumulative 2-4 record and the teams went 4-6 in the 10 games. We know that after tonight, the top 10 record will still be 4-6, as the current #9 and #10 are 1 win and 1 loss, and the same game will slot on the new list with a win for one team and a loss for the other.