And what is the difference between BABIP for pitchers/hitters?

High variability between hitters......tight grouping among pitchers.

Posted by trsnoke on 7/4/2012 1:14:00 PM (view original):

Posted by tecwrg on 7/3/2012 10:25:00 PM (view original):
There's a chapter in "Baseball Between the Numbers" from Baseball Prospectus that talks about clutch hitting.  The conclusion is that clutch hitting exists, but that it's very minor.  And basically the "best" clutch hitters are the one with the best plate discipline . . . higher than average walk rate and lower than average strikeout rate.

Everything else is pretty much bullshit.

Do you remember what they measured?  Defining what a clutch situation and clutch perfmance is is important in all this.  It makes sense that good plate discipline guys are more successful but they should typically be more successful in every situation.  Did the study try to measure whether those players "elevated their game" in those situations are just performed better than other groups did?

 

IIRC, that article was trying to answer the question of whether or not David Ortiz was a clutch hitter.  They did it by looking to see if a clutch performance (I forget their measure for clutch) one season was predictive one in the next season.

My problem with clutch hitting is that every single player that has made it to MLB has been in countless clutch situations along the way.  Sure the stakes are higher in the bottom of the 9th in Game 7 of the WS than HS, College, and MiL clutch situations, but I've got to believe that 90% of MLB players have learned how to shut out everything when they're hitting or pitching in any situation.  I think of this:www.youtube.com/watch

I don't think there's any reason to believe that.   I think of guys like Ed Whitson(couldn't pitch in NY), Zack Grienke(missed year due to depression), Joey Belle/Milton Bradley(rabbit ears with fans), etc, etc.    All were/are pretty good players who couldn't deal with specific or general situations.   I don't know why you'd expect a player who hit game-winners in HS to automatically not feel differently when playing in a WS.

I said 90% of players and you bring up 4 players from the last 30 years as an example of "not clutch"?  Not to mention the fact that at least 3 of the 4 players had emotional issues and you didn't provide any evidence of them not performing in clutch situations.

No, I brought up 4 well-known head cases.

I've not argued results, at all, for clutch.   I've argued the ability to actually handle the situation.    Read.  The.  *******.  Thread.

I did read the thread....it's 25 pages of you not knowing what you're talking about.  Now you come up with a stupid response to my post and I call you on it.  Deal with it.

I'd say you came in late with no ******* clue.   Which is about par for the course.  Congrats.

If a guy closes his eyes, swings hard and hits a homer, is he clutch?    Is doing everything wrong and getting a positive result clutch?

Which player hit a HR with his eyes closed?

Are you implying, in the history of baseball at every level, that no player has hit a homer with his eyes closed?

I have no idea.  You apparently think it happens often enough to be statistically relevant.  So let's see your examples.

Let's see your examples.

That sounds like you're back to your "I know you are, but what am I" strategy....but ok, I'll play along.

It's obvious that Miguel Cabrera's eyes were open on both of his homeruns yesterday.  That's two.  Do you have any examples of players hitting homeruns with their eyes closed? 

Do you have a video I can see that proves this?

Yep, head to ESPN website.