A CITIZEN'S BLOG

I've lived in the Pittsburgh region for the better part of thirteen years now. I first came to the 'Burgh back in 1995 to attend the University of Pittsburgh and, despite brief absences to live in Washington D.C. and with my parents in the Philadelphia suburbs, I've lived here since. I've never forgotten my allegiance as a Philly sports fan - a fact that oftentimes causes me to stick out in Western Pennsylvania, where allegiance to the Steelers ranks right up there with god, the American flag and, in lieu of apple pie, the Primanti Brothers Cheesesteak. My wife, patient spouse that she is, tries to indulge me by helping me see my favored sports teams whenever possible. Catching the Phillies when they play the Pirates is typically in the cards for us. Baseball tickets are pretty reasonable, when compared with football and hockey tickets, though I do suffer through one odd historical fact that I've noticed. Whenever we go to see the Phillies and Pirates play typically two things happen:

1. It rains.
2. The Phillies lose.

Case-in-point: the last Phillies - Pirates game I attended was Sunday, August 19, 2007, at PNC Park. After leading the game 4-0 going into the bottom of the seventh inning, the Pirates reeled off seven runs in the bottom of seventh on their way to a 8-4 win. The game took several hours to complete as we sat through several rain delays. A loss and rain.

So last week, for my birthday, my wife handed me two tickets to the Phillies and Pirates. Brett Myers vs. Paul Maholm. The tickets were great: Section 29, right along the third base line.

Rain? Defeat? Would we be greeted by either yesterday?

Labels: Bruntlett, Bunting, Burrell, Coste, Howard, Myers, Pitching, Ruiz, Taguchi, Utley, Werth

When Bill Clinton declared that the era of big government was over in his 1996 State of the Union, he was wrong. When Bill Clinton left office five years later in 2001, he was replaced by a President who created the biggest government that America has seen since Lyndon Johnson embarked on his Great Society in 1964. From Medicare Part D to hiking tariffs on steel to invading Iraq to listening into domestic conversations without a warrant to Federalism (i.e., Terri Schiavo), George Bush’s government has been the biggest Big Government in four decades. Arguably Bush’s decisions have been good for America. Arguably they haven’t. The point I am making is that nobody can predict the future with any reliability and we haven’t a clue how events now will shape the world to come. People who have looked at macrotrends and have been wildly off in their predictions.

In 1996, Bill Clinton wanted to make a clean break with the Democratic Party’s tax-and-spend past and he was largely successful: his second term saw record fiscal surpluses and a dearth of federal spending. Bill Clinton became the most conservative Democratic President since Grover Cleveland held office in 1893 – 1897. But events like 9/11 and the primacy of conservative, evangelical voters in the political calculations brought about big changes in the governmental landscape. You could see emerging trends in 1996 that never achieved fruition in 2006.

So too I see emerging trends in the game of baseball and in the Phillies approach to it, but I am loathe to go out on a limb and make a definitive declaration about what baseball and the Philadelphia Phillies will look like in 2017. I think the trends I see are significant, but we shall see.

Specifically, I see a definite trend towards small ball in 2008, based on what I saw in 2007, and I think you’ll definitely see teams change their strategies in the coming years.

What is small ball? Well, basically small ball is the strategy teams employ to score runs by means like bunting, base-stealing, sacrifice flies, aggressive base-running, etc. I’ll be referring to Bill James section on Manufactured Runs contained in the 2008 Handbook. James divides Manufactured Runs into two categories: the bunting / base-stealing kind (Type-1) and the sac fly / base-running kind (Type-2). Managers and old school-types love the idea of the manufactured run – the grit, the toughness shown. Clay Davenport has a nice bit entitled “Durocher’s Obsession: Static Versus Dynamic Offenses” in the new book from the writers of Baseball Prospectus called It Ain’t Over ‘Til It’s Over. Davenport sums up the appeal of the dynamic, small ball offense thusly: “Managers have often preferred the active teams, the dynamic ones, partly because these teams let the manager do something.” Managers like Leo Durocher, the skipper of the 1951 New York Giants, and modern managers like the Angels Mike Scioscia like to utilize these tactics. Scoiosca, for example, has seen his Angels lead the American League in stolen bases attempted the last five seasons and lead the A.L. in runners moving at the pitch the last four.

The reason why sabremetricians, and the rare manager like the Baltimore Orioles Earl Weaver, dislike small ball is that teams need home runs to generate offense. Davenport (page 267):

The trouble is that you can’t get a really good offense without home runs. It’s like trying to lose weight without exercising, or running for office without raising money. The gain from home runs is so enormous that any other way requires exceptional – and unsustainable – performances.

I see the trend towards small ball in part because of the focus on steroids in the game of baseball has tainted the home runs records of Barry Bonds, Mark McGwire and countless other players. The era of the home run was done in by Barry Bonds chemically enhanced body. The sight of Bonds jacking a 455-foot home run has left teams with a bitter taste in their mouths. Steroids don’t make you a better base-stealer, so teams are moving in that direction, I believe.

What’s my proof? Well, I’ll cite to three pieces of evidence:

#1 – Manufactured Runs are up. According to Bill James (see, 2008 Handbook), Manufactured Runs were up 2% over 2006. It’s not a smoking gun – and hey, it might be statistically insignificant – but it is there and it is worth considering;

#2 – The total number of home runs were down in 2007. MLB hitters bopped 4,957 home runs in 2007, the first time since 1997 that the total number of home runs did not exceed 5,000.

#3 – The Phillies ran a lot in 2007 and seemed to embrace a hybrid fusion of small ball with big ball. Maybe the Phillies are unique, but they might be a barometer for the rest of baseball. If the team with Ryan Howard and Pat Burrell (two classic big ball slugger types) moved towards small ball in 2007, can the rest of the major leagues be far behind?

Let’s start with Manufactured Runs: the Phillies ranked twelvth in 2006 in MR, with 148. The break-down was rather interesting. The Phillies were dead-last in all of baseball – not just in the N.L., but in all of baseball – in Type-1 MR with 33. Even American League Small-Ball allergic teams like the Toronto Blue Jays (42), the Boston Red Sox (39) and the Oakland A’s (37) had more. Given that the Phillies boasted one of the finest base-stealers in baseball in Jimmy Rollins on the roster, this was a mild surprise. Simply put, the 2006 Phillies tried to bash their way to the pennant and came close when teams actually pitched to Ryan Howard. The Phillies were actually third in the N.L. with 115 Type-2 MR, which suggests that the team was aggressive in many respects.

The 2007 Phillies were quite the change from the previous season. The ’07 Phillies were fourth overall in Manufactured Runs with 169. They were fourth in Type-2 MRs with 106 in 2007, but they doubled their output of Type-1 MRs with 63, ranking them sixth in the N.L. James includes individual data on MRs in 2007, so we can see that two Phillies ranked in the top ten of Manufactured Runs. Jimmy Rollins, the 2007 N.L. MVP ranked fifth in MRs with 32 (15 are Type-1, 17 are Type-2), while Shane Victorino tied for ninth with the Rockies Troy Tulowitzki with 26 MR’s (13 each). The MLB and N.L. leader in Manufactured Runs, by the way, was the Mets Jose Reyes with a whopping 52. Reyes had 35 Type-1 MRs alone.

… As an aside, Pat Burrell and Aaron Rowand, surprisingly, ranked third on the Phillies roster in MRs with 14 each. Interesting, Rowand had all 14 of his MRs as the Type-2 “hustle” variety. Burrell split his 7 each for Type-1 and Type-2. I thought this was a misprint, and I might be right: Pat Burrell had zero sac bunts in 2007 and zero stolen bases attempted. That has to be wrong.

Let’s look at the Phillies numbers next. On stolen bases, the Phillies ranked second is successful steals and third in attempts in 2007 with 157, a change over 2006, when they ranked eighth in successful steals and ninth in attempts with 117. With Shane Victorino and Michael Bourn helping J.Roll, the Phillies took 138 bases and were caught just 19 times, the fewest in the N.L. and possessed the best success rate of any MLB team: 88%. The average N.L. team was successful 76% of the time.

What about bunting? Well, the Phillies attempted 84 sacrifice bunts in 2007, a slight increase over 79 in 2006. Clearly the sacrifice is not a major weapon in the Phillies game-plan. The Phillies also had the runners moving 90 times, 3 under the N.L. average, but significantly more than the 69 they tried in 2007. My conclusion is that the Phillies incorporated some more small ball into their plans in 2007, but they chose to emphasize speed. Here I credit former Milwaukee Brewers manager and current Phillies first base coach Davey Lopes, who worked with J.Roll, Bourn, Victorino and other Phillies to improve the team’s speed. Certainly the uptick clearly shows that the Phillies are running more, but aren’t bunting runners over.

Incidentially, for the second year in a row the Rockies led the N.L. in sacrifice bunts. I’m continually surprised that the Rockies are such aggressive practitioners of small ball.

That’s the Phillies small-ball index. As I said earlier, I see emerging trends in the game towards speed and small ball tactics, but I could be very wrong. Time shall tell.

Labels: Base-Stealing, Bunting, Speed

I thought I might look at the Phillies small-ball index today …

A little while ago I wrote that a new deadball era is emerging in baseball. No, baseball isn’t going back to the days prior to World War I, when the Philadelphia Athletics were the best team in baseball and hitting twenty home runs eclipsed what most teams did in a season, but the game is being deadened a little. I credit not only the increased scrutinty on steroids, but also the backlash against the book Moneyball and the success of small-ball teams like the Anaheim Angels. Let me talk a little about the influences on the game before turning to what the Phillies are doing:

Sports Illustrated’s piece on baseball’s second-half of the season labeled the Angels as a contender for this season – noting their impressive pitching staff – and also named them as a potential powerhouse into the future – noting their aggressive and savvy owner, their robust payroll and their well-stocked minor league system. Don’t underestimate the influence that an Angels pennant this season could have on baseball’s future. Baseball is like any sport – success breeds imitators. After the San Francisco 49ers won Super Bowl XXIX in 1994, every team suddenly was enthralled with the West Coast offense and jumped to employ it in their offensive sets. Like many who read this blog, Moneyball was a major influence on my thinking, as were the writings of Bill James. I’ve always admired people who have ideas that change the world around them. Walsh has always been a hero of mine because his West Coast offense has utterly changed the way NFL teams approach the game of football. Teams adopted the 49ers short-passing style and now virtually every team in the NFL runs some sort of variation of the West Coast offense.* There isn’t a single team in the NFL who hasn’t felt the effect of the spread of Bill Walsh’s philosophy through the league.

* Moneyball author Michael Lewis has a book out entitled The Blind Side: Evolution of a Game, where he traces this evolution, which really was a product of the AFL, the upstart league that challenged the NFL in the 1960’s. According to Lewis, the true author of the West Coast offense was Sid Gillman, the coach of the San Diego Chargers, who utilized the vertical passing game to stretch the field when he coached the Los Angeles – later San Diego – Chargers. Guys like Don Coryell and Bill Walsh took Gillman’s ideas and fleshed them out. Coryell and the Chargers of the 1970’s and early 1980’s tried to stretch the field vertically, while Walsh and the West Coast offense stretched the width of the field, utilizing the short passing game to spread the defense out.

Same thing with baseball. The success of the Oakland A’s and the spread of the gospel of Moneyball has had tremendous effect. Teams moved to embrace On-Base-Percentage (OBP). The A’s philosophy to employ the home run as a team’s primary offensive tool has had tremendous effect throughout the league.

The Angels are the anti-Moneyball team. They bunt, they steal bases, they hit-and-run. They thrive on doing “the little things” that apparently Moneyball teams don't do. They draft high school players rather than college players like the A’s. An Angels triumph in 2007 will shape the thinking of teams for years to come. Suddenly, the A’s are no longer the blue-print for success.

Don’t under-estimate the anti-intellectual backlash against Moneyball. While many embraced the book and suddenly discovered the writings of Bill James, others covered their heads in the sand and embraced what was familiar, what they were taught. I’ve compared the differences between the Moneyball and anti-Moneyballers as being akin to the Protestant / Catholic split. The Protestant Moneyballers questioned the dogma of baseball’s Holy Church and the Catholic anti-Moneyballers clung more aggressively than ever to their faith. We are today at the beginning of baseball’s counter-reformation. Expect to see the writings of Bill James lose influence in the minds of baseball executives. All the counter-reformists need is a writer to crystallize their own beliefs in print. (Calling Joe Morgan?) Buzz Bissinger’s Three Days in August comes the closest, and could still becoming the bible of Anti-Moneyballers if a much-discussed movie ever gets made.

(In the interest of full disclosure I am a Catholic. Not to ignite a religious war here, but I am going to say that I’ve found that the Catholic Church, for all its faults, is a more progressive and intellectual institution than most fundamentalist Protestant Churches. I note that so that my foregoing comments aren’t perceived as being anti-Catholic.)

And steroids. I already talked about them enough yesterday in reference to Barry Bonds. Let’s move on …

I think there is ample evidence to show that the home run is in decline. According to The Sporting News, at the start of the season 33.3% of all runs scored in baseball games came via the home run, a decline from 36.9% in 2004. According to The Sporting News, home runs accounted for all of the runs scored in baseball games:

1957: 30.6%
1961: 33.7%
1967: 28.9%
1968: 27.2%
1976: 23.4%
1977: 30.8%
1987: 35.3%
1997: 33.9%
2004: 36.9%
2007: 33.3%

Notice the evolution here: ’61 was the year of Roger Maris and expansion. The home run declined in the 1960’s with the rise of the pitcher, but teams were still adjusting. In the 1970’s teams had adjusted to the end of the pitchers era with an embrace of bunting, base-stealing and the hit-and-run. Notice how home runs had declined in 1976. The rise of steroids, smaller parks and the like shows in the 1980’s and 1990’s. The year 2004 is the apex of the home run. Any coincidence that this was also the year that the Red Sox won the World Series? The year after Moneyball was published?

Now let’s look at the Phillies. If there was ever an N.L.-Moneyball team it is the Phillies of the recent past. (The availability of the DH in the A.L. helped to facilitate the rise of the Moneyball team.) The Phillies bashed home runs, worked counts, and were a powerful offensive juggernaut in their cozy little ballpark. Last season the Phillies hired Davy Lopes to be their first base coach. Don’t underestimate the impact Lopes is having on the Phillies. With the team’s current struggles placing manager Charlie Manuel on the hot-seat, Lopes would be an easy replacement option should the Phillies decide to make a change this season or next in the dugout.

Lopes was a speedster when he played baseball in the 1970’s, back when teams had reacted to the end of the home run era by emphasizing small ball. That clearly has weighed on Lopes mind as he has sought to reintroduce the Phillies to the joys of small ball. Lopes blames the Moneyball revolution for this calamity. Says Lopes:

Those people [i.e., the Moneyball types, sabremetricians] that came into the game and said the stolen base is a negative part of the game and took the running game out of it have just made it more boring. Too many teams are sitting back waiting for the three-run homer. You’ve got a bunch of guys who are slow afoot, go one base at a time, clog up the bases, and that’s pretty much
what the game has become. A nonathletic-type game. We’ve got too many DHs.

Lopes can’t control what the team’s overall strategy is – Charlie Manuel is the manager and makes the ultimate decisions about bunting, and the like – however, Lopes clearly is having an impact in that he’s getting the Phillies to run more. Thus far in 2007, the Phillies are averaging 0.91 attempted steals a game. Last year they averaged 0.72. His encouragement has seen Michael Bourn go 14-for-14 in steals this season, Shane Victorino go 28-for-31, and J.Roll go 16-for-20.

So are the Phillies actually playing small ball? We are going to look at three major categories: stolen bases, hitting with runners in scoring position and sacrifice hits (i.e., sac bunts).

Batting Average with Runners in Scoring Position. This is not an area of the game that the 2006 Philadelphia Phillies excelled at. The ’06 Phillies had a .255 BA/RISP, below the .264 N.L. average. Only the Astros (.253), the Nationals (.250), and the Reds (.243) did worse. Naturally, defenders of Moneyball, like myself, note that this is a somewhat irrelevant stat because the Phillies led the N.L. in runs scored in 2006 with 865. When you can sting the opposition with a 400-foot home run at any moment of the game, relying on getting runners on base is pretty much irrelevant.

The ’07 Phillies are doing pretty decently at this: .266 BA/RISP, fifth in the N.L., and better than the N.L. average of .260. Aaron Rowand is leading the way at .348 (32-for-92, with 36 RBIs), followed by Chase Utley (.311) and Ryan Howard (.309). The much-maligned, much-unloved Pat Burrell is hitting .279 with 31 RBIs in 68 At-Bats. Wes Helms (.197) and Rod Barajas (.111) are, quite frankly, terrible at moving runners this season and are really dragging on the Phillies offense.

By the way, the L.A. Dodgers are once more leading the N.L. in BA/RISP at .291, which is what they did last season (.286). Over in the A.L. the Angels are hitting just .275 with runners on, only .005 better than the A.L. average. The Moneyball teams are predictably not doing well:

BA/RISP (A.L. rank of 14 teams)
Boston: .267 (9th)
Toronto: .266 (10th)
Oakland: .234 (14th)

Moving on … Sacrifice Hits. The Colorado Rockies led the N.L. in them is 2006, with 119, which is surely a shock to those who remember the 1990’s, when the Rockies had four or five guys in the lineup who could hit 40 home runs. The ’06 Phillies ranked dead-last in sac hits with 57, well off the N.L. average of 74.

The ’07 Phillies aren’t trying the sacrifice more. They have 33 sacrifice hits, which puts them in a four-way tie for eleventh in the N.L., five off the N.L. average. This is one area of the team where Charlie Manuel’s mind appears to be made up and he’s resisting change.

Stolen bases … the Phillies rank third in the N.L. with 74 steals, just behind the Dodgers (81) and the Mets (115). What is interesting to me is how successful the Phillies are: an 86% success rate. The Mets aren’t far behind at 82%. The ’07 Phillies should easily surpass the ’06 team in terms of stolen bases. The ’07 Phillies are on a pace to take 126 bases, while the ’06 team took just 92. Here is where you are seeing Lopes influence being felt.

At the end of the season I’ll be curious to see two things:

1. How the Phillies did in terms of Manufactured Runs
2. How the Phillies did in terms of base-running.

In his 2007 Handbook, Bill James tried to define Manufactured Runs and figure out which teams did it the most. James delineated between Type-1 Manufactured Runs (a run coming directly or indirectly as a product of a sac bunt, a stolen base, a bunt hit or a hit-and-run), and Type-2 Manufactured Runs (all others, including runs scored on doubles or triples, sacrifice flies). After James ran the numbers on the ’06 campaign he determined that the Phillies ranked dead-last in the N.L. in the pure small-ball Type-1 runs with 33, 1/3 that of the Chicago Cubs with 99. Overall the Phillies had 148 Manufactured Runs, enough to rank them 12th in the N.L. The ’06 Angels ranked second in the A.L. in both the Type-1 Manufactured Runs (80, four less than the Twins), and in overall Manufactured Runs (190, 34 less than the Twins).

Obviously I don’t have the ability to pour through the stat sheets and get a rough idea about how many Manufactured Runs the Phillies will have in 2007, but I strong suspect it will be greater than what they did in 2006.

James has also sought to quantify base-running in the ’07 Handbook too. Unfortunately he didn’t rank teams, but he did rank players and we got to see that while Chase Utley is terrific (James ranked him the second-best base runner in 2006), the Phillies had a lot of slow-footed plodders on the team (Ryan Howard, Pat Burrell), those DH-types of player that Lopes was complaining about.

I am very curious to see how Utley, Jimmy Rollins, Shane Victorino and Michael Bourn change the Phillies numbers. Bourn is completely new. Victorino barely played in 2006 and still ranked as one of the top base-runners. The Phillies are trying to bench Burrell more and more. The Phillies have to be a speedier team and I hope that Bill James ranks teams as well as individuals in the 2008 Handbook.

Alright, tomorrow expect a far shorter opus on the Phillies minor leaguers.

Labels: Bourn, Bunting, Burrell, Helms, Howard, Managing, Speed, Utley, Victorino

We'll lead-off with a little discussion of the Phillies 2-1 series victory over the Cincinnati Reds, which concluded with a 9-3 win yesterday. Were it not for a horrific collapse by closer Tom Gordon on Friday night that transformed a 1-0 lead into a 2-1 loss, the Phillies would have emerged with a sweep and would be 7-10 right now, within striking distance of a .500 record.

The Phillies, by the way, will have to go 5-3 to finish the month to have a 11-14 record, which is basically what they've had the last two Aprils (10-14).

It was basically a good weekend for the Phillies, topped off by Cole Hamels stunning complete-game, 15-strikeout dominaton of the Reds on Saturday night. Aside from a fluke home run, Hamels utterly dominated the Reds lineup, mixing curveballs and changeups with his blazing hot fastball. It was one of the most dominating performances I've seen a pitcher hurl. The highlight of the game was the dramatic 5-4-3 triple play, the first one the Phillies have turned in eight years and the first in the majors in 2007. Finally some good glovework to go along with a nice pitching performance.

Back to Hamels. How good is he right now? For every walk he allows he's throwing five and a half strikeouts. 33 strikeouts and six walks. With Myers in the bullpen, Hamels is the Phillies best pitcher without a doubt. This is his opportunity to show the baseball world that he's a dominant hurler. Alright, let's get to today's topic ... I am watching Baseball Tonight the other day and I hear John Kruk complaining about the Phillies inability to drive in runners in scoring position. To hear Kruk tell it, the Phillies overriding Achilles heel, what is killing the team the most, is their inability to drive in runners from second and third.

There are a lot of reasons why the Phillies are struggling right now. Tomorrow we are going to talk about two that are pretty obvious: starting pitching (not as good as advertised, though getting better: see, Hamels, Cole) and the bullpen (as lousy as everyone feared: see, Gordon, Tom). These reasons, not the Phillies inability to drive in runners sitting on base, are the reasons why the Phillies enter the latter half of the month of April with a 6-11 record.

Clutch hitting.

Long one of the cherished beliefs held by traditionalists, clutch hitting’s very existence is a cherished belief, an article of faith held by major leaguers. When the game is on the line, the stars shined. It made sense, until a researcher at SmithKline French named Dick Cramer used the company computers at night to prove that clutch hitting didn’t exist. (see, Moneyball, page 79) As Baseball Between the Numbers states: “Sabremetricians have conducted dozens, if not hundreds, of studies on clutch hitting, going back to Dick Cramer … All of them have come to the same conclusion: Clutch-hitting ability either doesn’t exist at all or is so rare that it is hardly worth talking about.” (see, page 15) I agree with that assessment and want to make a few observations about what these facts mean for the Phillies:

-Clutch-hitting is important for some teams, like the L.A. Dodgers or the Anaheim Angels or the Colorado Rockies. Teams built around base-stealing, bunting and all of that fun stuff. In 2006, for example, the Rockies hit 157 home runs, under the N.L. average of 178 (an amazing stat given how exceptionally friendly Coors Field is to home run hitters), but led the N.L. in sacrifice hits (a.k.a., bunts) with 119. The Dodgers had 153 homers, but stole a lot of bases – 128, 33 more than the N.L. average of 95. Both teams relied on their leadoff guys to get on base, then the Rockies bunted them over while the Dodgers had them steal second or third, and relied on the RBI guys to drive them in with timely hits. The Rockies did not particularly do this well – their .267 BA/RISP is just .003 better than the N.L. average, and partly accounts for why the Rockies scored just 813 runs, despite having 1,518 At-Bats with runners in scoring position, best in the N.L. The Dodgers excelled at this and were rewarded handsomely, hitting .286, which was by far the best in the N.L. (the Braves were second with .275) and accounts for why the small-balling Dodgers scored 820 runs in 2006.

(The Angels, by the way, looked like a clone of the Dodgers statistically…)
The Phillies followed the opposite tack offensively. They hit 216 home runs, second-best in the N.L., stole just 92 bases and sac bunted just 57 times. The Phillies, to put it bluntly, sucked at driving in runners in scoring position, hitting just .255, which was better than the Reds, Nats and Astros. Didn’t hurt them offensively though. They scored 865 runs in 2006, which was the best in the N.L.

Why? I’ve made this point before – so cover your ears if you’ve heard it – but small-ball teams need to build links in a chain to score runs. Gotta get on base, gotta steal second base, gotta get a good hit up the middle to round third and run for home … Lots of thing have to click to score one run. The Phillies? Let’s see … Jimmy Rollins strikes out, Shane Victorino flies out, Chase Utley walks and Ryan Howard hits a two-run home run. That’s two runs right there. The Dodgers have to have Furcal and Garciaparra and Kent all clicking together. I’m reminded of the scene in the movie Heat where Jon Voight warns Robert DeNiro that Al Pacino’s cop has lots of chances to catch DeNiro while DeNiro will lose if he slips up. “He can hit or miss,” Voight warns, “You can’t miss once.” The Phillies can hit or miss, they can take their shots at will and rely that sooner or later things will click. The Dodgers (and the Rockies and the Angels) can’t afford to miss. An out is poison, a base not taken is a disaster, an RBI lost is a fatal failure. The Dodgers are DeNiro's master thief, unable to make a mistake; while the Phillies are Al Pacino's cop, someone who can patiently bide their time, waiting for their opportunity to land the killer blow.

So the Phillies success in 2006 suggests that clutch-hitting is vastly, vastly over-rated. If it mattered then why did one of the worst clutch-hitting teams in the N.L. score the most runs? Why does it matter now?

Answer: It Doesn’t. As I write this the Phillies have scored 4.46 runs per game, which is pretty good. Better than the league average (4.22) and good enough for sixth in the N.L. And they are struggling in terms of clutch hitting, batting just .191 BA/RISP … .191 is bad too … The league average is .242 and just two teams trail the Phillies: the Pirates (.178) and the Nats (.168). Yet the Phillies have opportunities to score runs.

Meanwhile, the Dodgers keep relying on that clutch hitting. Their .264 BA/RISP is fourth-best in the N.L., and yet they are just a little above the league average for runs scored with 4.40. The real difference between the Dodgers and Phillies is that the Phillies have .139 Isolated Power at the plate, while the Dodgers are .124, behind the league average of .135. That’s the Phillies bread-and-butter and they aren’t doing particularly well at it. I blame the weather, which has thrown many of the Phillies off their home run stride. Wait a few weeks and watch the balls sail off the Phillies bats and see the Phillies close the offensive gap with the Mets, the N.L.’s powerhouse at 5.85 runs per game. So maybe the weather is the real issue here, and not the Phillies struggles.

As an aside, I’d like to note who is hitting well in the clutch: Shane Victorino is hitting .429 with runners on second and/or third. Well done. Pat Burrell, that target of ridicule and shame by many fans, is a .357 hitter in the clutch. Chase Utley? .077 … That is no misprint: .077 …

Oh., I use the terms “clutch-hitting” interchangeably with “batting average with runners in scoring position” for this article. This is a little inaccurate because clutch-hitting is really defined as hitting in later innings with runners on … I used the word “clutch” because many treat it as being interchangeable and … well, I’d have gotten carpal-tunnel syndrome if I bothered to computate the numbers otherwise.

Tomorrow, pitching. Probably talk about Cole Hamels again. I am eager to see what Adam Eaton will do against the Astros hitting tonight.

Labels: Base-Stealing, Batting, Bunting, Burrell, Clutch-Hitting, Speed, Utley, Victorino