Abstract Baseball: FIP

I like FIP. Thanks to Fangraphs, I can tell you that it’s a stat that shows what a pitchers ERA should look like when looking at the results that a pitcher can control: strikeouts, walks, HBPs and HRs. It is a predictive statistic, and it does a better job illustrating a pitcher’s ability than ERA, which relies on variables that are beyond his control. The results are presented on the same scale as ERA, so it’s read the same way – the lower, the better. For example: a 2.90 FIP is excellent, 4.00 is average, and a FIP of 5.00 is awful.

I was curious to know what happened to a pitchers’ FIP over time. I wanted to see whether or not it would go up after a certain age, if there was a season in recent history that FIP was down across the league, and who had a better overall FIP, starters or relievers.  Again, turning to Fangraphs I pulled the average FIP for Starters, Relievers and Both aged 21 to 45 from 1997 to 2011. I did not include this years’ data because it is only June, and that’s just too small a sample size to mean anything. 
Rather than just putting up spreadsheets (which can be found here), I decided to do something a little more visually appealing, which I have dubbed Abstract Baseball: FIP. Here are the results:

[all pitchers aged 21-45, 1996-2011]

[starters aged 21-45, 1996-2011]

[relievers aged 21-45, 1996-2011]

Each 'canvas' contains 16 columns and 25 rows. The columns (from left to right) represent the years 1996 to 2011, and the rows (from top to bottom) represent pitchers age 21 to 45. As you might imagine, the lighter the square is, the lower the FIP for that age group in that particular year. The absence of colour represents a year where no pitchers in that particular age group made an appearance.
I was hoping to see a definite trend in either age or season, or a major difference between starters and relievers, and I was surprised to see a relatively flat ‘canvas’. In retrospect, there should have been a few more qualifiers in place, as there are a few very dark spots which indicate aberrations in those year’s results.
Next time, I’ll look at xFIP (a regressed version of FIP) and make some changes to see what it looks like.

I plead the fifth... and the ninth

As of this writing, mere hours after handily beating the Yankees, the Blue Jays hold the best run differential in the American League East, a +22. Their run differential is second in the AL in fact, behind Texas who is currently holding a run differential three runs higher than the entire AL east at +78.

It's early in the season yet, and the Jays are still in fourth place in the division, but a healthy and positive run differential is a very encouraging sign. They are scoring a decent number of runs in a variety of different innings, the most (37) coming in the third, which is also the inning in which they score most frequently (15 times). What is discouraging to me are the runs being scored against the Jays in two particular innings on a seemingly regular basis. In the 38 games played so far, the opposition has scored 41 runs in the fifth inning and 30 in the ninth. In those 38 games, 17 of them had at least one run cross the plate in the fifth and 14 had at least one in the ninth.

See the nifty table below.

Blue Jays	1	2	3	4	5	6	7	8	9	X	Totals
Runs	10	6	37	26	10	32	14	24	9	7	175
Instances	9	5	15	14	6	15	9	12	7	2	94
Opposition	1	2	3	4	5	6	7	8	9	X	Totals
Runs	10	21	5	11	41	12	10	8	30	5	153
Instances	8	12	5	9	17	9	6	5	14	2	87

Note: Runs are runs, instances are innings where at least one run is scored, and the X represents extra innings.

Yes, Sergio Santos struggled before his injury, and the fun times that were had with KoKo B. Ware should sufficiently explain the ninth inning issues, but the concern is not with the bullpen, it is with the starting rotation. The starters have pitched through the fifth inning in all but one game - when Kyle Drabek was pulled after getting one out in the fifth - he was responsible for three of the four runs posted in that inning.

As I said before, it is still very early in the season, and this could be a glaring example of trying to glean answers from a small sample size, but what could cause a scoring spike in the same inning on a somewhat regular basis? Could it be that the starters are wearing down by the fifth and giving up too many good pitches or walking too many batters? Maybe by that point in the game, the opposition has had a good look at their pitch selection and delivery and they are taking advantage of familiar patterns. If that's all true, then why have the Jays only scored 10 runs compared to the opposition's 41?

If I were a real statsasabrmetrigician I might know the answers, but I am just a fan who happened to notice that his favorite team has been giving up runs in roughly the same spot in about half of the games they've played so far. One of these days I'll look up more than box scores to try and sort it out. Until then, I'll try and forget about the 41 runs in the fifth, and enjoy the +22 run differential.

Home runs in Anaheim: nighttime, anytime, it's alright

Baseball analysts on television are a funny breed. They mix stats and narrative to help package a product, to provide insight on what is happening in the field of play. Recently, the Blue Jays were in Anaheim to play the Los Angeles Angels of Anaheim at Angel Stadium of Anaheim while Anaheim peppers were being grown miles away in New Mexico.

During a night game, Edwin Encarnacion flied out to center field which caused Gregg Zaun, former Blue Jays catcher and current Rogers Sportsnet analyst, to reason that it would have been a home run had it not been for the 'marine layer'. He purported that a layer of air forms in the Los Angeles area at night which keeps the ball down, turning extra base hits into easy outs. I had heard this theory before, but never in such detail. After a cursory glance at the Wikipedia entry on the marine layer, I was led to believe that the phenomenon would be dispersed by the heat of the sun, and there would be more of an effect on home runs hit in day games, while the dense layer of air was still hanging around.

I didn't take Zaun for much of a meteorologist, and for my first foray into baseball spreadsheetery (a term I just coined), I wanted to prove him wrong. I pored over game logs for Angel Stadium of Anaheim from 2002 to 2011. For my theory to be correct, there would have to be more home runs hit during night games, and for Zaun to be the next Harold Hosein, the opposite would have to be true. Here are the findings:

Year	HR/Day	HR/Night
2002	2.09	1.69
2003	1.95	1.82
2004	2.17	2.10
2005	2.17	1.68
2006	2.04	1.62
2007	1.30	1.71
2008	2.36	1.73
2009	2.43	2.38
2010	1.68	1.69
2011	1.44	1.67

As you can see, with the exception of 2007, 2011 and by the slightest of margins 2010 - Zaun was right. There is a definite decrease in number of home runs hit in night games compared to day games. It should be noted that over the ten-year span, there were fewer home runs hit in Angel Stadium (1495) than in games played by the Angels on the road (1666).

Stupid numbers not backing up crazy theory I had about a ballpark a week and a half ago...

— brendan mcknight (@toysubmarine) May 15, 2012

...at least I now have a somewhat comprehensive workbook on home runs hit at Angel Stadium of Anaheim from 2002 to 2011.

— brendan mcknight (@toysubmarine) May 15, 2012

That's one instance of an analyst that's not completely off the mark when it comes to facts and narrative. Now if we could only get Buck Martinez to stop calling Ben Francisco a 'veteran'.

I'm back, baby!

It's been about three quarters of a year since I've written here - that's a perfectly reasonable amount of time between posts, isn't it? A lot has happened in the past nine months, some of which I will probably most definitely get in to eventually if it strikes me maybe. You'll be mostly subjected to very amateur baseball analysis, recipes that I've either swiped from the internet or come up with on my own, and snippets of my life with my wife our cat. Our cat named Elephant.

That's right, a cat named Elephant.

Buckle up for a wild ride.

Dreamin'...

When the Blue Jays have week-long west coast road trips, I fall asleep late in the game, usually around the 7th or 8th inning. This usually leads to baseball related dreams and panic at 3 in the morning, when I can't quite read the already-too-small box score on my too-small-for-late-night-score-reading 13" TV (I have entered, but obviously haven't won yet).

I noticed something on the latest road trip; when I fall asleep, nothing changes. I realize that my sleeping habits have no influence on the outcome of a game, much like an announcer commenting on a pitcher's no-hit bid is not going to start a rally by the opposing team, but one can dream, no? If my sleep cycle did affect the outcome, I could have turned in a lot earlier after the repeat performance of the Harden/Cecil show (in fact, I could have just said "I watched this game last Tuesday, didn't I?" and continued to watch Invader Zim on Nick). I should have gone to bed before the bullpen threw up all over the Jays' slim lead on Monday night, but no, I had to stay up to watch Jon Rauch give himself appendicitis. Once I did fall asleep, I tossed and turned all night with the words "small sample size" running through my head. Strange.

I also had two Blue Jay specific dreams this week, both of which will never come true. One was that the Jays would continue to win, while the Yankees and Red Sox split the rest of their games. That happened on Thursday night, just a day before the aforementioned Cecil v. Harden revisit. Thanks a lot A's.

The second dream was more about the division in which the Jays play - the AL East. I dreamt that instead of outright realignment, the Red Sox and Yankees would be forced to rotate divisions on an annual basis. That dream will never be realized, because as much as I hate those teams, they put butts in seats at the Skydome. It would be about as successful as putting the Detroit Red Wings in the Eastern Conference of the NHL. (That last sentence should be read: "It would be successful, but GMs from other teams will fight it tooth and nail because it would mean less money at their gate.")

So tonight is another late(ish) night game, the last one of the season, and I await the baseball sandman (Not Mariano Rivera - that would be creepy) to see what other wacky stuff I can come up with. That poses an interesting question. Does the baseball sandman use dirt from the warning track? If so, I think he needs to pay a visit to the Skydome to show the Jays' front office what it looks like.

The Farrell Formula

I wrote this post at around 8:30 this morning -- long before I found out about Jon Rauch's appendectomy. I feel bad for the guy, and this is more of a swipe at Farrell's managing style than Rauch's unfortunate pitching of late. I just wish I could have seen that appendix - it could probably feed a family of four.

In my last post, I was singing the praises of Jon Rauch and his dragon eating abilities. Things have changed. In the last ten games, the "closer" of our Toronto Blue Jays has posted an ERA of 6.75. For the month of August, his ERA is 7.50. He's given up 10 home runs on the season so far, only three off of his single-season record set in 2006. His WHIP was below 1 (0.9) in May, and it's steadily been creeping upwards ever since. His Fangraphs WAR is -0.6, the lowest in his career, yet John Farrell is still sending him out. Why? I call it the Farrell Formula.

Before I proceed, let me be clear: I am not a professional analyst, a fact that will become very clear over the life of this blog. I am just a fan who is concerned with the choices being made by the Manager of his favourite team.

It appears to me that no matter how the pitchers fared in 7th inning, more often than not, John Farrell will send out Frank Francisco in the 8th, and Jon Rauch in the 9th. It may be my selective memory, but it seems to me that in high leverage situations, Jon Rauch is in, and the game is in jeopardy. I hate the save stat - it just means your team is in too many close games - but when you have 11 saves in 16 opportunities, it means you've blown five of them. That's a blown save percentage of 31.25. These are not the numbers of a closer in my mind.

Are these the lingering effects of Farrell being a former pitching coach? They could be, and they may change over time, but Jesse Litsch has been lights-out as of late, and Casey Janssen hasn’t been bad himself. So what the eff, John? Why not give them a shot late in the game – you might be surprised.

I F***ing love Jon Rauch

He's going to eat you, and your mother and your dragon. That's what he has for breakfast. If you're an umpire and you're wrong, he's going to eat you next. Oh, he's going to eat your dragon first. Because he's just that big.

By all means, watch the video and tell me that your dragon can win a match against this beast. If you're lucky, your dragon is his breakfast.

It took one manager, three bench coaches and a catcher to restrain the beast that is Jon Rauch. In the end, only Jon Rauch could contain Jon Rauch. I would hate to be his intestines right now. They must be full of maple syrup, hate and logic.

Jon Rauch eats Dragons.