Last week, baseball lost former Cy Young winner Mike Flanagan. This post is not a eulogy for Flanagan. I’ll leave that to writers more skilled than myself. One of those, Joe Posnanski, wrote a tribute to Flanagan in a column entitled “The Crafty Lefty Hall of Fame.”

I’ve always been fascinated by crafty lefties, and Posnanski’s story made me wonder: why don’t we ever hear about crafty righties? Perhaps “crafty” is an adjective that — due to some old baseball tradition — is used exclusively for southpaws. The other possibility is that there just aren’t as many crafty righties. It turns out, this is one historical baseball saying that holds up under statistical analysis.

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Mercifully, the Mariners’ historically bad 17-game losing streak is over. Sure, Seattle didn’t play well for the last three weeks, but it found itself on the wrong side of probability on an incredible level.

If Seattle had a 50/50 chance to win every game, the chances that they would lose 17 games in a row can be calculated by using a probability chain. Taking 50-percent to the 17th power results in 0.0008-percent, or 1-in-131,072 odds.

However, the Mariners are not expected to win 50-percent of their games. Read the rest of this entry »

Because FanGraphs wasn’t around in 1998, a golden opportunity was missed. That year, Sammy Sosa launched 20 home runs in June, the most for any month in baseball history. However, he did not have the best offensive month of all time. He was not even the best hitter in June of 1998. Hop in the time machine and follow me back to the age of steroids, The Truman Show and Master P in order to re-examine the month Slammin’ Sammy rose to stardom.

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A few weeks ago, with his team streaking back into contention, Tampa Bay manager Joe Maddon tweeted about a key to his team’s success:

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Adam Dunn is one of the most durable, consistent power hitters in baseball. When Chicago inked the 31-year-old to a four year, $56 million deal last offseason, there was no reason to suspect anything less than the .250/.380/.520 that he puts up seemingly every season. However, through the first month of the season, Dunn is hitting .171/.308/.316. Is The Big Donkey going to rebound, or should the White Sox be concerned about their DH?

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When St. Louis signed Lance Berkman this offseason, it raised a lot of questions:

“Don’t the Cardinals still have Pujols?”

“Wait, he’s going to play outfield?”

“Can he even hit anymore?”

Through the first two weeks of the season, the Cardinals’ gamble on the man called “The Big Puma” is paying off.

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Ahh, the joys of small samples. Home runs are up, Kansas City is a contender and Howie Kendrick somehow pulled a Vice Versa with Albert Pujols. Thankfully, there are some statistics we do not have to wait until May to analyze. The average Major League salary is up 1.2-percent from last season, and, unlike Jorge Posada’s 162-homer pace, it’s for real.

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Colorado will never lead the league in payroll. It’s unlikely that someone will write a book about its front office or coaching staff. Yet, the Rockies have been to the playoffs two out of the last four years and should contend for the next several seasons. Above-average results with average resources is what makes Colorado a Top 10 organization in baseball.

Present Talent – 85.00 (T-5th)

Rockies Season Preview

Future Talent – 80.00 (T-15th)

Rockies Top 10 Prospects

Financial Resources – 78.85 (13th)

Baseball Operations – 78.33 (T-16th)

Overall Ranking – 80.74 (10th)

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In a couple of recent posts, I created and then tested a regression model which helps explain the variance in home run per fly ball rate. I ended up with a model which performed really well, so it’s time to turn it loose on the question that sent me down this path in the first place: can Dave Righetti really coach his pitchers to a better HR/FB rate? It turns out, the answer may be “yes”, and it could be more emphatic than I would ever have guessed.

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While the top of the National League Central figures to be competitive in 2011, the Houston Astros will be fighting their own battle this season: to stay out of the basement. The Astros might not be a complete doormat this year, but it’s hard to envision a scenario where they compete for a division title. That being said, Houston has a few position players to watch and a pitching staff that might surprise in 2011.

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