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9/8 Red Sox @ Phillies Series Thread
nomar
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Post by nomar on Sept 9, 2020 16:16:27 GMT -5
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ericmvan
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Post by ericmvan on Sept 9, 2020 17:44:22 GMT -5
JBJ had a 40 wRC+ in his first 62 PA and a 141 in his subsequent 80 going into today, ranking 46th out of 128 MLB players in that stretch. I don't get people who don't get that all you have to do to "make him a better hitter" is to lengthen his hot streaks and shorten his slumps.
And it's not like this notion is untested. I called Carlos Pena's career turnaround on that principle and I talked about it when we traded away Travis Shaw, and that's all he did his first year in Milwaukee.
In JBJ's case, he seems to have a really hard time recovering his mechanics once he has lost them. It seems unlikely to me that you could ever change that. I mean, he's spent more than half his career trying to get out of slumps. He must have tried everything.
So you need to give him a method of staying locked-in. And that's much more promising. The key thing would be to figure out what happens when he loses his mechanics, and try to figure out the cause and then avoid it.
He's lowered his pull rate this year a fair bit - 33% vs. a career average of 43%. He is also making less hard contact (28% vs. 35%) and hitting more ground balls (60% vs. 48%). I wonder if he's really committing himself to the opposite field approach more this year, as we are always screaming for him to do. His BABIP is up this year (.319 vs. .296 career). And here is his wOBA - xwOBA by season, along with shift percentages: 2015: .052 2016: .010, 30% 2017: -.013, 33% 2018: -.040, 52% 2019: -.013, 69% 2020: .028, 71% So allow me to attempt my ericvman impression and infer a detailed psychological narrative from these statistics . He was basically fine until they started shifting on him a bunch. And he recognized the issue right away. That led to an increasing emphasis on the opposite field approach. But it's not so easy as just willing it to happen, and maybe the attempt to change the approach is even what led to the cold streaks. (I seem to recall a quote where someone asked him "Why not go to the opposite field?" and his response was basically "Believe me, I'm trying to.") But the steady improvement in his wOBA vs. xwOBA stats implies he's being less and less penalized by the shift, i.e., his approach is working. He's finally put it together this season, as evidence by the notably different batted ball profile (which entails a moderate decrease in power that is more than made up for by a higher BABIP). The upshot is that he's been a league average hitter (102 wRC+ vs. ~90 each of the last three seasons), which plays very well with his defense. Either that or it's a SSS. His Oppo rate was .375 when he was slumping this year and has been .170 on his streak. His Pull rate is essentially unchanged (.350 to .322). His Center rate has gone from .275 to .508. And balls hit to Center have a worse wOBA - xwOBA than balls hit Oppo!
I think your narrative is sound as a description of his general approach and history, but the hot / cold stuff is a largely separate thing that is pure hitting mechanics. One is superimposed on the other.
My guess: the drop in Oppo is because they stopped pitching him outside, because those were the only balls he was hitting when he was slumping. If that's correct, then the decline in Oppo should start after he gets hot. Let's see! (I'd put my odds at 50%. Isn't this exciting? Live analytics!)
Slump versus
First 7 games of hot streak, 149 wRC+ versus
Remainder, 143 wRC+
.350, ,275, .375
.250, .450, .300 .359, .538, .103.
So, yes, most of the drop in Oppo seems to be because they're not pitching him there any longer.
This is, BTW, BIS data ecause it's simple to get (FG, Game Logs). Statcast will be a bit more accurate.
One could spend a week running all the numbers on JBJ's cold and hot streaks. But you'd be describing a) how they're pitching him, and b) the results. Both of those would be interesting, but if I'm right about it being purely mechanical, you'll never figure out the reason.
Now, here's a study worth doing, and it might work, but it would be very time consuming ... and maybe it tells you nothing.
Get all available data from Statcast and construct a log of every PA. See if there is a difference in the last N games before a slump starts, and in the first N games of a slump, versus the bulk of the hot streak and the bulk of the slump.
Here's an interesting thought. It seems very likely to me that when JBJ loses his mechanics it is a multi-component thing. It's not just one thing, like his shoulder flies out because he's trying to hit everything out of the park (Cecil Cooper in the '75 WS, Brian Daubach on one memorable occasion). One small thing goes wrong, and (perhaps from his efforts to correct it) another thing goes wrong. And within a few games he's messed up four different ways.
If you understood this sequence, you might be able to keep him hot. And the idea here is that he still hits OK with two of the four flaws, so that by the time its evident to anyone that he's messed up, he can't be easily fixed.
Basically, I've just described what JDM actually does to succeed! Monitor his swing constantly and prevent all the moving parts from getting out of synch.
And now I'm busy until 10 PM! (Zoom meeting to discuss Ugetsu, the 1953 film by Kenji Mizoguchi (the guy Kurosawa idolized) that contains what I think ios the single greatest shot in film history.)
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Post by manfred on Sept 9, 2020 17:56:57 GMT -5
He's lowered his pull rate this year a fair bit - 33% vs. a career average of 43%. He is also making less hard contact (28% vs. 35%) and hitting more ground balls (60% vs. 48%). I wonder if he's really committing himself to the opposite field approach more this year, as we are always screaming for him to do. His BABIP is up this year (.319 vs. .296 career). And here is his wOBA - xwOBA by season, along with shift percentages: 2015: .052 2016: .010, 30% 2017: -.013, 33% 2018: -.040, 52% 2019: -.013, 69% 2020: .028, 71% So allow me to attempt my ericvman impression and infer a detailed psychological narrative from these statistics . He was basically fine until they started shifting on him a bunch. And he recognized the issue right away. That led to an increasing emphasis on the opposite field approach. But it's not so easy as just willing it to happen, and maybe the attempt to change the approach is even what led to the cold streaks. (I seem to recall a quote where someone asked him "Why not go to the opposite field?" and his response was basically "Believe me, I'm trying to.") But the steady improvement in his wOBA vs. xwOBA stats implies he's being less and less penalized by the shift, i.e., his approach is working. He's finally put it together this season, as evidence by the notably different batted ball profile (which entails a moderate decrease in power that is more than made up for by a higher BABIP). The upshot is that he's been a league average hitter (102 wRC+ vs. ~90 each of the last three seasons), which plays very well with his defense. Either that or it's a SSS. His Oppo rate was .375 when he was slumping this year and has been .170 on his streak. His Pull rate is essentially unchanged (.350 to .322). His Center rate has gone from .275 to .508. And balls hit to Center have a worse wOBA - xwOBA than balls hit Oppo!
I think your narrative is sound as a description of his general approach and history, but the hot / cold stuff is a largely separate thing that is pure hitting mechanics. One is superimposed on the other.
My guess: the drop in Oppo is because they stopped pitching him outside, because those were the only balls he was hitting when he was slumping. If that's correct, then the decline in Oppo should start after he gets hot. Let's see! (I'd put my odds at 50%. Isn't this exciting? Live analytics!)
Slump versus
First 7 games of hot streak, 149 wRC+ versus
Remainder, 143 wRC+
.350, ,275, .375
.250, .450, .300 .359, .538, .103.
So, yes, most of the drop in Oppo seems to be because they're not pitching him there any longer.
This is, BTW, BIS data ecause it's simple to get (FG, Game Logs). Statcast will be a bit more accurate.
One could spend a week running all the numbers on JBJ's cold and hot streaks. But you'd be describing a) how they're pitching him, and b) the results. Both of those would be interesting, but if I'm right about it being purely mechanical, you'll never figure out the reason.
Now, here's a study worth doing, and it might work, but it would be very time consuming ... and maybe it tells you nothing.
Get all available data from Statcast and construct a log of every PA. See if there is a difference in the last N games before a slump starts, and in the first N games of a slump, versus the bulk of the hot streak and the bulk of the slump.
Here's an interesting thought. It seems very likely to me that when JBJ loses his mechanics it is a multi-component thing. It's not just one thing, like his shoulder flies out because he's trying to hit everything out of the park (Cecil Cooper in the '75 WS, Brian Daubach on one memorable occasion). One small thing goes wrong, and (perhaps from his efforts to correct it) another thing goes wrong. And within a few games he's messed up four different ways.
If you understood this sequence, you might be able to keep him hot. And the idea here is that he still hits OK with two of the four flaws, so that by the time its evident to anyone that he's messed up, he can't be easily fixed.
Basically, I've just described what JDM actually does to succeed! Monitor his swing constantly and prevent all the moving parts from getting out of synch.
And now I'm busy until 10 PM! (Zoom meeting to discuss Ugetsu, the 1953 film by Kenji Mizoguchi (the guy Kurosawa idolized) that contains what I think ios the single greatest shot in film history.) Enjoy the film. Question for later: I buy your analysis, so I’m curious if you can think of another guy who has been a starter as long as JBJ who was so prone to getting as out of whack as he is? I’ve always thought his swing looked stiff, and his head seems on and off. But I wonder more scientifically what his problem(s) is/are? He almost seems like a pitcher with a lot of moving pieces who keeps getting out of sync.
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ericmvan
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Post by ericmvan on Sept 10, 2020 1:18:17 GMT -5
Here's an interesting thought. It seems very likely to me that when JBJ loses his mechanics it is a multi-component thing. It's not just one thing, like his shoulder flies out because he's trying to hit everything out of the park (Cecil Cooper in the '75 WS, Brian Daubach on one memorable occasion). One small thing goes wrong, and (perhaps from his efforts to correct it) another thing goes wrong. And within a few games he's messed up four different ways.
If you understood this sequence, you might be able to keep him hot. And the idea here is that he still hits OK with two of the four flaws, so that by the time its evident to anyone that he's messed up, he can't be easily fixed.
Basically, I've just described what JDM actually does to succeed! Monitor his swing constantly and prevent all the moving parts from getting out of synch.
And now I'm busy until 10 PM! (Zoom meeting to discuss Ugetsu, the 1953 film by Kenji Mizoguchi (the guy Kurosawa idolized) that contains what I think ios the single greatest shot in film history.) Enjoy the film. Question for later: I buy your analysis, so I’m curious if you can think of another guy who has been a starter as long as JBJ who was so prone to getting as out of whack as he is? I’ve always thought his swing looked stiff, and his head seems on and off. But I wonder more scientifically what his problem(s) is/are? He almost seems like a pitcher with a lot of moving pieces who keeps getting out of sync.
I do know of a guy who was as prone as JBJ to get his mechanics out of whack. You probably remember him ... Manny something?
The catch is that Manny would fix his swing in 12 games (once in a while +/- a game or two). It was as predictable as midnight chiming. If you think back, Remy would always spot these slumps and notice when he started to come out of them.
Why was 2002 Manny's career year? He hit no better than he did in 2001 or in subsequent years (at least up to a point), when he was going well. But he only had one slump that year instead of 2 or 3.
The other fascinating thing about Manny ... after a day off he was a good hitter but nothing special. Playing for the second consecutive day, he was better. Three days in a row, better again. This trend continued ... by the time he was playing for the 12th day in a row, Manny Ramirez may have been as good a hitter as ever lived (we don't know if other great hitters did this as well, though). Furthermore, the point where playing another day started to hurt his numbers came sooner if he were on the road. IIRC, he peaked at the 12th game if on the road, but game 14 at home.
I don't have the visual processing to view JBJ's swing as having lots of components, but I can infer that it does by contrasting it with the way Devers looks to me, which is so beautiful. So I think your comparison is apt.
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Post by sarasoxer on Sept 10, 2020 7:17:24 GMT -5
Wow, this is getting to the quantum level....Interesting.
It contrasts with yesteryear Yogi, who when asked about his being in a slump famously said "Slump? I ain't in no slump. I just ain't hittin".
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ericmvan
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Posts: 8,881
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Post by ericmvan on Sept 10, 2020 14:58:15 GMT -5
Wow, this is getting to the quantum level....Interesting. It contrasts with yesteryear Yogi, who when asked about his being in a slump famously said "Slump? I ain't in no slump. I just ain't hittin". It's always a great day when you hear a new Yogi quote. The Yogi panel discussion at the SABR conference when it was in NYC was terrific.
I believe he was making an actual distinction, and if I had to guess, slump = he knows he's messed up mechanically, ain't hitting = just missing hittable balls at random.
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Post by sarasoxer on Sept 10, 2020 16:12:10 GMT -5
Wow, this is getting to the quantum level....Interesting. It contrasts with yesteryear Yogi, who when asked about his being in a slump famously said "Slump? I ain't in no slump. I just ain't hittin". It's always a great day when you hear a new Yogi quote. The Yogi panel discussion at the SABR conference when it was in NYC was terrific. I believe he was making an actual distinction, and if I had to guess, slump = he knows he's messed up mechanically, ain't hitting = just missing hittable balls at random.
Or it could be just a Yogism from a simpler time similar to his utterance when guys wanted to go to Toots Shor for dinner. Yogi's comment was "Nobody goes there anymore! It's too crowded." I don't know that Yogi or most even knew what hitting "mechanics" were back then. He might just as likely have said 'Mechanics? I don't need no mechanic. My swing just needs a little oil'. Yogi and Casey Stengel were two peas of the same bygone pod.
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ericmvan
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Post by ericmvan on Sept 10, 2020 23:08:44 GMT -5
It's always a great day when you hear a new Yogi quote. The Yogi panel discussion at the SABR conference when it was in NYC was terrific. I believe he was making an actual distinction, and if I had to guess, slump = he knows he's messed up mechanically, ain't hitting = just missing hittable balls at random.
Or it could be just a Yogism from a simpler time similar to his utterance when guys wanted to go to Toots Shor for dinner. Yogi's comment was "Nobody goes there anymore! It's too crowded." I don't know that Yogi or most even knew what hitting "mechanics" were back then. He might just as likely have said 'Mechanics? I don't need no mechanic. My swing just needs a little oil'. Yogi and Casey Stengel were two peas of the same bygone pod. Except that "nobody" in that legendary quote is shorthand for "None of the original clientele, of which my friends and I were a part." And everybody gets that!
One of the two themes of the Yogi panel was that he was smart. The other was that he was a terrific person.
I like your hypothetical Yogi reply! The language of baseball has certainly changed. IIRC, players used to describe a swing that was out of whack by just saying "I'm not swinging the bat well right now." And the generic problem was "my timing is off." There was more of a sense that "swinging the bat well" was a somewhat mysterious thing that came and went, and hitting coaches, I think, had a much smaller set of adjustments that they'd look for. I can recall talk of pulling your head off the ball, and letting your front shoulder fly open, but no talk of hand position or "load" or timing mechanisms being off. But it's possible that players just didn't use their own jargon with the press.
If that were true, that would have been a good bit for the bus scene in Bull Durham. "Never tells the press what's actually wrong with your swing, when you're slumping. They don't actually care. Just say 'my timing is off.'"
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