Posted by MikeT23 on 2/11/2014 3:50:00 PM (view original):
To summarize:
If EM swung more, he'd have less walks. We all agree on this, correct?
Some of us believe he'd have had more hits.
Others believe none of those swings would have produced anything but an out.
Some of us believe he took good pitches to hit.
Others believe that every pitch he took was unhittable due to umpires giving "vicinity" strikes or pitchers simply painting the black with cutters/sliders.
Is this about right?
If I had to guess, I'd say that an elite-level hitter like Martinez might have been able to hit close to .200, maybe .220, on the pitches he took. Elite hitters hit about .175-.190 on pitches outside the strike zone, so you figure he took some hittable pitches, give him a boost on top of that.
So your argument is that it would be better for him to swing at less pitches, take less walks (which happen 100% of the time when you take 4 balls), and get more hits at a 20-22% success rate?