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Red White
08-16-2007, 10:41 AM
I'm a regular baseball fan who is not well-versed in the intricacies of newer statistical analysis and sabrmetrics. I follow the discussions just fine, but I don't study such things myself. I've got no axe to grind; rather, an honest question:

Correct me if my premise is incorrect, but it seems to me that those who are advocates of these newer statistical analyses consider strikeouts to be an importment metric for pitchers, but dismiss strikeouts as irrelevant for batters. Why? What is the difference? Why are strikeouts "not important" regarding batters, but "very important" regarding pitchers?

SMcGavin
08-16-2007, 11:09 AM
I'm not an expert but I can give you a reasonable answer I think. The short answer is that studies have shown that strikeouts (by a hitter) are only incrementally worse than outs where the ball is put in play. The outs where the ball is in play category includes the so called "productive outs" (which are better than strikeouts) and double play groundballs (which are worse than strikeouts). The difference is so small that if Adam Dunn replaced 100 of his Ks with outs where the ball was put in play, the Reds would gain only one run (which correlates to about 1/10 of a win I believe) on the entire season.

The theory behind pitcher's Ks being an important stat is the idea that a pitcher cannot control the fate of batted balls in play. That is, the batting average on balls in play (BABIP) is not controllable by a pitcher. He can only control his strikeouts, walks, and home runs allowed. I believe there may be some newer data that says pitchers can exert some slight control over BABIP, but I think the general consenus is that large deviations from the league BABIP is mostly luck. Someone correct me if I'm wrong on this.

Like I said, I'm no expert, but most of the ones who would give you a perfect answer are probably on the ORG. I'm pretty sure most of what I said is correct. The quick answer to your question of "what's the difference" is that studies show that strikeouts don't matter for hitters, and studies show that they do matter for pitchers. The stuff above is my attempt at explaining why that's the case.

texasdave
08-16-2007, 12:56 PM
I'm not an expert but I can give you a reasonable answer I think. The short answer is that studies have shown that strikeouts (by a hitter) are only incrementally worse than outs where the ball is put in play. The outs where the ball is in play category includes the so called "productive outs" (which are better than strikeouts) and double play groundballs (which are worse than strikeouts). The difference is so small that if Adam Dunn replaced 100 of his Ks with outs where the ball was put in play, the Reds would gain only one run (which correlates to about 1/10 of a win I believe) on the entire season.



This assumes that 100% of the time a hitter puts the ball in play instead of striking out, the result is an out. This doesn't seem very likely to me. Doesn't it seem more likely that if a player puts the ball in play more often, that he is going to get some hits? The real question should be this. In making more contact how much power does the hitter lose? Is there a tradeoff? And, if so, how much power can a hitter sacrifice, in an effort to make greater contact, before it becomes detrimental?

SMcGavin
08-16-2007, 03:55 PM
This assumes that 100% of the time a hitter puts the ball in play instead of striking out, the result is an out. This doesn't seem very likely to me. Doesn't it seem more likely that if a player puts the ball in play more often, that he is going to get some hits? The real question should be this. In making more contact how much power does the hitter lose? Is there a tradeoff? And, if so, how much power can a hitter sacrifice, in an effort to make greater contact, before it becomes detrimental?

Sure, if a player could adjust his swing to strike out less AND keep the same level of power he had before, more hits would result. I think if any player was capable of this they would do it. Your analysis of the issue is correct, the issue is the tradeoff between contact and power. It's an interesting argument, but not one I was trying to start in my post. While we're on that subject though, it's my belief that sacrificing power to make more frequent power is a poor strategy in general. Over history I believe teams that strike out alot actually score more runs than teams who rarely strike out (it's a really weak correlation though, it's probably more accurate to say that strikeouts have no effect on runs scored).

My point in the earlier post was simply that an out is an out. Evaluating a hitter by the types of outs he makes (e.g. putting any weight on how often a guy Ks) is a poor approach. The only thing about outs that is important is how often a hitter makes them.