In a technical sense, Game 3 wasn’t a must-win for the Astros. In a practical sense, the odds of Houston winning four straight games against the Nationals are under 10%. The Astros needed the win, and they got it with a 4-1 victory. For those purists of the game who enjoy pitchers batting, Game 3 of the World Series highlighted one of the big differences in strategy between the American and National Leagues: pitchers as hitters.

Greinke’s Bunt

The first potentially important pitcher plate appearance occurred in the top of the second inning. Zack Greinke came to bat with one out and runners on first and third. Greinke’s season wRC+ of 123 doesn’t really represent his true hitting talent, but his career 60 wRC+ also understates his value in this situation. Greinke got down a successful bunt and advanced the runner to second, but the Astros’ win expectancy went down about five percentage points. If Greinke had done nothing, it would have only gone down a single percentage point more. While a double play would have dropped the win expectancy by about 10 percentage points, a sac fly would have moved the Astros up four percentage points, while a single would have moved them up six.

Greinke’s career wRC+ indicates he isn’t a particularly good hitter, but it’s mostly due to his inability to walk or hit for power. With a .225 lifetime average, he hits a decent number of singles, which is what the Astros needed in this situation. With a runner already on third, moving a single runner to second doesn’t help much when there are two outs. The expected situation is a Greinke out, which drops win expectancy by six. The bunt is only one percentage point so we’re really dealing with the chances of a double play versus the chances of a single. Given the large bump from a single compared to the expected out, versus the small drop from the bunt to a double play, the double play would have to have been much more likely than the single to make bunting the right choice. That isn’t in the case here, particularly with Aníbal Sánchez giving up a bunch of loud contact in the first few innings. George Springer followed the bunt with a groundball out to keep the game at a one-run deficit for the Nationals. Read the rest of this entry »

The great starting pitching of these two teams was the headlining feature heading into this edition of the World Series. The matchup of two historically good rotations promised a fiercely competitive series with runs at an even higher premium than they already are in the postseason. We are two games in and the Astros’ two best starters have allowed a combined nine runs while the bullpen has allowed an additional eight. It’s been an ugly start for the Houston pitching staff.

The Astros will hand the ball to Zack Greinke in Game 3 while the Nationals counter with Aníbal Sánchez. ZiPS gives the Astros an overwhelming 58.3% chance to claw their way back into the series in Game 3. After his relief appearance in Game 1, Patrick Corbin draws the start on Saturday in Game 4. While Sánchez doesn’t approach the level of the Nats’ top three starters, his presence on the roster gives them the flexibility to rest their best pitchers should the series stretch longer than five games. And to Sánchez’s credit, he held the Cardinals scoreless and nearly hitless in his Game 1 start in the NLCS.

After Greinke, the Astros’ plan is a little less clear. When Houston needed to call on a fourth starter in the ALCS, they instead leaned on their bullpen, using seven different pitchers in the deciding Game 6. At that point in the series, they held a 3-2 advantage over the Yankees and were coming off an off day in the schedule. If they had lost Game 6, they had a rested Justin Verlander and Gerrit Cole available for Game 7. They don’t have that luxury in the World Series. Read the rest of this entry »

As the World Series shifts to Washington, the Astros already find themselves in a two-games-to-none hole, and now they have to contend with another loss, namely that of the designated hitter slot. While Yordan Alvarez hasn’t been able to replicate the impressive regular season showing that’s made him the presumptive favorite to win AL Rookie of the Year honors, he’s shown signs of emerging from a slump by getting on base a team-high five times in the series’ first two games. Given his defensive limitations, playing him in the field is no trivial concern, but the Astros — whose offense in October has rarely resembled the juggernaut it was during the regular season — probably need his bat more than they do a better outfield defense.

In Thursday’s media session, manager A.J. Hinch conceded that he was wrestling with the problem:

I do like the at-bats he’s had specifically in the last game or two. The balance of where to play defense, where to keep your weapons on the bench, playing a National League game where you anticipate a few pinch-hits, having some resources on the bench in order for a big at-bat. I put Tucker in that at-bat yesterday with first and second with Strasburg at the end of his outing.

I’m weighing all of that. This is a really big left field, and I’m taking that into consideration… I can probably talk myself in and out of every scenario. I don’t think we play all three games here without him seeing the outfield. I’m not sure that will be tomorrow. Right now I’m kind of leaning against it. But I’ll make that decision when I have to.

Since arriving in the majors in early June, Alvarez has been one of the game’s most productive hitters. From his debut on June 9 — during which he homered off Dylan Bundy, the first of nine longballs in his initial 12 games — to the end of the season, his 178 wRC+ (via a .313/.412/.655 line) was virtually tied with Nelson Cruz for third in the majors, behind only Ketel Marte (183) and Alex Bregman (182); his slugging percentage ranked fourth in that span, his on-base percentage fifth, his 27 homers tied for 10th, and his 3.8 WAR tied for 11th — and that’s with the positional adjustment penalty that comes with regular DH duty. Read the rest of this entry »

In Game 1 of the World Series, the Nationals found themselves with an interesting decision. They were up three runs on the Astros, but Max Scherzer had labored mightily to hold Houston to two runs. After five innings, he’d thrown 112 pitches. He wouldn’t be heading back out for the sixth.

The Nationals don’t really trust their bullpen. Sure, they could get innings from Sean Doolittle and Daniel Hudson, but they had four innings to cover. Tanner Rainey? Break glass in case of emergency only, and that still leaves an inning. Here is a list of all the relievers the Nationals had used this postseason (as of Game 1) who aren’t Rainey, Doolittle, or Hudson:

Yeesh. Strickland wasn’t on the World Series roster, Suero only made the NLCS roster as a replacement during Daniel Hudson’s paternity leave, and Fernando Rodney — well, we all know the Fernando Rodney Experience. Rainey is no great shakes, either — he was fine this season but uninspiring. Javy Guerra would later pitch an inning in Game 2, but the cupboard was pretty bare.

But Dave Martinez had an answer. Patrick Corbin stepped to the mound to start the sixth. He did his job admirably, striking out two Astros on his way to a scoreless inning, the only blemish a single to Yordan Alvarez. And then he was gone, replaced by Rainey.

Rainey wasn’t good (his four batters: homer, strikeout, walk, walk), but Hudson and Doolittle held on, recording four outs each as the Nationals won 5-4. Martinez squeezed just enough out of the bullpen to make it through the game. Corbin’s inning loomed large: the final margin was one run, and while it’s not automatic that a lesser pitcher would have given up a run in his place, his inning was important. Read the rest of this entry »

“He who never made a mistake, never made a discovery.” – Josh Billings

The Cincinnati Reds used an unusual strategy during the 2018-2019 offseason: trying. OK, that’s a bit hyperbolic, but while last winter’s actual weather was mild, we saw a veritable blizzard of excuses in baseball. As top free agents remained unsigned going into spring training, we heard all sorts of reasoning from teams about why they couldn’t sign this guy or couldn’t afford that guy or why that player over there in the corner was impossible for them to acquire. No, the Reds didn’t pursue Bryce Harper or Manny Machado, but they did make aggressive moves to turn the team into a winner in the short-term, seeing an opportunity in an NL Central where every team had serious flaws. It didn’t quite work out, but many of the reasons they looked like a promising team in 2019 apply to the club in 2020 as well.

The Setup

I appreciated Cincinnati’s ambition last winter, even if I didn’t like every move they made. To be fair, the Reds didn’t go into the offseason intending to please one particularly sarcastic, overweight, middle-aged baseball analyst. But as noted above, there moves were a refreshing departure from baseball’s version of Rasputitsa.

Cincinnati went 67-95 in 2018, and adding 25 wins in one offseason was always going to be difficult. To start with, they needed all of their returning players to be the best versions of themselves. That meant Joey Votto needed to hold off serious decline for another year. Scooter Gennett had to play like an All-Star again. Ideally, Nick Senzel and Jesse Winker would have both been healthy and All-Star candidates themselves. Second-half Luis Castillo would have to become both-halves Luis Castillo. Read the rest of this entry »

Mark Trumbo has always had pluses and minuses as a hitter. He’s consistently hit for power, but at the same time he’s displayed sub-par on-base skills. A free-swinging approach has been the major culprit. The 33-year-old slugger has walked just 299 times in 4,419 big-league plate appearances, largely because of a 50.6% Swing% and a 37.1% 0-Swing%. When he does make contact, he hits bombs. Trumbo has 218 home runs, and that includes a 47-home-run season.

He’s long recognized his limitations. Moreover, he’s owned up to them. An interview that ran here in April 2016 was titled “Mark Trumbo on Home Runs and (Not) Drawing Walks“. How to change for the better has been the issue, and truth be told, Trumbo’s reached a point in his career where that probably can’t happen. Not because he’s incapable of adopting a more disciplined approach — that would actually be a priority now — but rather because his playing days may be coming to an end. Trumbo played in just 12 games with the Orioles this year due to a knee injury, and even if he does return to full health, he’s somewhat of a square peg in a round hole. Today’s game is anything but kind to one-dimensional boppers.

Trumbo talked about the art and science of his craft, including his recent role as a mentor and the likelihood of one day becoming a hitting coach, on the last weekend of the 2019 season.

——

David Laurila: You’re a veteran player on a young team. Do you see yourself as a mentor?

Mark Trumbo: “I enjoy talking hitting. As far as being a mentor, just by age alone there’s probably an element of that. But hitting is the thing I’ve done the longest in life, and it’s what I’m surrounded by the most, so I find myself naturally segueing into conversations that delve into all aspects of it — be it the mental, or physical, component. Adjustments have always been particularly interesting to me. That’s whether they come over the winter, or in-game. Regardless of when that is, there are a lot of things that can allow you get to another level.”

Laurila: Adjustments obviously vary in size and scope.

Trumbo: “Yes. The bigger changes usually happen over the winter. People are making fairly drastic swing changes, or their entire approach becomes different from what it was before. The day-to-day adjustments usually relate more to timing, rhythm, and pitch selection. As someone who has taken quite a few at-bats, I can usually offer insight into those topics.

“That said, I’m very much interested in the mechanics of a swing. I’ve always looked at guys who are getting it done at a highly-consistent level, and tried to see if I can steal some of their moves, so to speak. I’ve tried to figure out what is allowing them to be as productive as they are, in hopes that I can incorporate some of those things into my own game.” Read the rest of this entry »

I thought that with the advent of the World Series, the intentional walk beat was probably done for. The Astros famously didn’t intentionally walk anyone all year, and Dave Martinez seems to use intentional walks sparingly, albeit at wild times — his intentional walk of Max Muncy was one of the worst of the playoffs.

Imagine my surprise, then, when both managers intentionally walked players last night. The Nationals are always a threat to do that, sure, but the Astros?? If the Astros are intentionally walking someone, you know it’s serious. Let’s dive in.

First, the Nats walk. This one was a classic spot — Yordan Alvarez was at the plate in the sixth with a man on second in a tie game. With Carlos Correa on deck, it’s not as though it got a lot easier, but intentionally walking someone with first base open to switch the platoon matchup is a tactic as old as time.

Being as old as time doesn’t mean a tactic is good, though. Intentionally walking someone with only one out is almost never a good decision — there are just so many ways the inning can go wrong. Indeed, the walk bumped Houston’s win percentage from 60.5% to 62.8%. That 2.3% of a win is a lot to give up with a walk — could it possibly be worth it?

Alvarez has only a tiny platoon split, but with so few plate appearances, he looks like a basically average hitter when it comes to the platoon advantage after regressing his stats. He’s a good hitter overall, though, regardless of handedness. How good of a hitter? Well, Depth Charts doesn’t quite buy the hype; it projects him as a .363 wOBA hitter overall, which works out to .372 against righties. Pretty solid, if not quite Alvarez’s .437 wOBA against righties this year.

How about Correa? He’s a good hitter in his own right; a .355 wOBA per our projections. After applying platoon splits, that works out to .350 against righties. This decision doesn’t look merited unless Strasburg has huge platoon splits — and he emphatically does not. Strasburg has a huge sample of split-less pitching — so much of one, in fact, that even after regressing his line, he’s hardly worse against lefties than righties. Overall, he projects to allow a .278 wOBA to righties and .282 to lefties — basically a scratch. Read the rest of this entry »

With one swing of the bat, it appeared that Alex Bregman and the Astros had turned a corner. In the bottom of the first inning of a World Series Game 2 in which his team already trailed the Nationals 2-0, the 25-year-old third baseman pounced on a poorly located Stephen Strasburg changeup, sending it into the Crawford Boxes for a game-tying home run. The shot offered the promise of a fresh start — the superstar snapping his slump, and the powerhouse club washing away the memory of its opening night loss, if not the unending debacle that is the team’s handling of the Brandon Taubman case.

The rest of the night did not go so well, either for the Astros, who only managed to score a single run more, or for Bregman, who did not collect another hit and whose suddenly shaky defense figured prominently in a six-run seventh inning rally by the Nationals. The Astros now trail the Nationals two games to none as the series heads to Washington, and Bregman, whose play during the regular season might well garner him the AL MVP award, is still among the Astros whose offensive output this postseason has left something to be desired.

Bregman spent the past six months as merely the AL’s best player this side of Mike Trout, and thanks to the combination of his durability and versatility — he played 156 games overall, including 65 at shortstop while Carlos Correa was on the shelf — as well as the Astros’ success relative to the Angels, he may take home MVP honors. In his fourth major league season, he set across-the-board career bests with a .296/.423/.592 line, a 168 wRC+, 41 homers, an 8.5 WAR. Among AL qualifiers, his on-base percentage, wRC+, and WAR all ranked second, his slugging percentage and home run total third; he also led the league with 119 walks. While he started the postseason on a tear, hitting .353/.450/.647 with a homer in 20 PA against the Rays during the Division Series, he slipped to .167/.423/.222 in the ALCS against the Yankees, walking a series-high seven times but doing little else.

In Tuesday night’s World Series opener, Bregman went 0-for-4 with three strikeouts, two against Max Scherzer and one against Sean Doolittle, plus a walk against control-challenged Tanner Rainey. “I’ve got to be better,” he told reporters after the game. “Starts with me. I was horrible all night.” Read the rest of this entry »

I had a recap half-written in my head after six innings of last night’s pivotal Game 2. It focused, as expected, on the pitching matchup of Stephen Strasburg and Justin Verlander; on how, perhaps more unexpectedly, both struggled in the first inning, each giving up two runs; and how they both settled, despite a tight strike zone and a steady stream of baserunners, into the familiar, soothing rhythms of solid-but-not-dominant pitching performances. (There was a little meditation, too, on the already-iconic Verlander leg throw.) Strasburg struck out seven, and Verlander, with his six, cleared the record for the most postseason punch outs of all time.

In the sixth, Verlander pitched his first clean inning of the game, and Strasburg escaped unscathed from a Yuli Gurriel double and an intentional walk of Yordan Alvarez. Through six, and the two teams were knotted at 2-2; Strasburg, with 114 pitches, was surely done for the night, and Verlander would just as surely be coming in for the top of the seventh.

As the broadcast faded to commercial, I settled into my nest of blankets. I know what this game is, I thought, like someone who doesn’t know what’s about to hit them.

***

The seventh inning, for whatever reason, always carries with it a sort of mystique. It’s the time when you rush to grab your last beers, when everyone stretches and you hear the creaking of your sad, aging joints, when the strange little ritual of “Take Me Out to the Ballgame” is performed. It doesn’t have quite the tension of the eighth and ninth, but the mood is clearly distinct from, say, the fifth; if you’re at the game, you’re probably a little tired, a little out of it, getting a little chilly. On midsummer nights, it’s around the time the sun fades away. And ever since I witnessed the life-changing devil magic of the Jose Bautista Bat Flip Inning, I’ve been unable to stop myself from paying a little more attention when the seventh rolls around. It’s usually normal, just another inning in another baseball game. But you never know. You never know when the fabric of the game will begin to rip — or when it might be rent asunder. Read the rest of this entry »

Please note, this posting contains multiple positions.

Position Title: Data Scientist

Department: Baseball Research & Development

Primary Purpose:
The Cleveland Indians are seeking a data scientist to join the team’s Baseball Research and Development group. The data scientist will use their machine learning expertise and the Indians proprietary data to develop statistical and machine learning models that support baseball operations decisions across all facets of the organization. This position will work closely with other members of the R&D department as well as key stakeholders across the organization to design and build cutting edge models and tools that help the Indians stay ahead of the competition. The ideal candidate will possess experience working with large data sets and advanced machine-learning models. Strong applicants will demonstrate curiosity, creativity, and the ability to learn new concepts.

Essential Duties & Responsibilities:

• Research, design, test, and deploy machine learning models to support all aspects of Baseball Operations
• Work with high-dimensional spatio-temporal data and other large data sets
• Share technical expertise with other members of department; communicate findings to Baseball Operations staff
• Maintain an understanding of emerging data science tools and research, as well as potential new data sources and technology options

Role Requirements and Preferences:

• Education & Experience Requirements
• Advanced degree and/or demonstrated work experience in a quantitative field (i.e. computer science, statistics, engineering, mathematics)
• Experience with a variety of modeling and statistical techniques, such as neural nets, deep learning, support vector machines, gradient boosting, adversarial learning, and computer vision
• Expertise with statistical programming languages (e.g. R, Python)
• Proficiency in a database language (e.g. SQL)

Preferred Experience:

• Experience with one or more ML libraries such as Tensorflow, Keras, scikit-learn, Theano, Spark MLib, H2O
• Experience creating data visualizations with tools such as ggplot, d3.js, Matplotlib and/or Tableau
• Experience working with baseball data
• Experience with computer vision, particularly image segmentation, object detection, and tracking algorithms

Standard Requirements:

• Reads, speaks, comprehends and communicates English effectively in all communications.
• Represents the Cleveland Indians in a positive fashion to all business partners and the general public.
• Ability to develop and maintain successful working relationship with members of the Front Office.
• Ability to act according to the organizational values and service excellence at all times.
• Ability to work with multicultural populations and have a commitment to fairness and equality.
• Ability to walk, sit or stand for an entire shift.
• Ability to work extended days and hours, including holidays and weekends.
• Ability to move throughout all areas and levels of the Ballpark.
• Ability to work in a diverse and changing environment.
• Occasional physical activity such as lifting and carrying boxes up to 25lbs.

To Apply:
To apply, please complete the application that can be found here.

Position Title: Sports Science Analyst

Department: Baseball Research & Development

Primary Purpose:
The Cleveland Indians are seeking an analyst to join the team’s Baseball Research and Development group with a focus on answering questions specific to sports science. The position will use data and statistics to provide research and analysis to support the Indians’ player development, medical, S&C, and sports science staff in helping Indians players perform at optimal levels. This individual will work closely with other analysts in the R&D department as well as sports science, player development, medical, strength & conditioning, and other staff members across the organization. The ideal candidate will possess a strong foundation in statistics and/or data science, the ability to effectively communicate findings to colleagues in non-technical roles, and a passion for learning more about baseball. Strong applicants will demonstrate curiosity, creativity, and the ability to learn new concepts.

Essential Duties & Responsibilities:

• Analyze and interpret baseball data with a focus on sports science
• Research, build, test, and deploy statistical models to support Baseball Operations
• Design and implement research studies to improve organizational knowledge in sports science
• Visualize data in concise, readable formats for non-technical staff members
• Communicate research findings to key stakeholders across the organization
• Work with sports science, strength & conditioning, and medical departments to capture player performance data
• Evaluate and recommend new data sources and technologies

Role Requirements and Preferences

Education & Experience Requirements:

• Bachelor’s degree or demonstrated work experience in a quantitative field such as statistics, mathematics, computer science, operations research, economics, or data science
• Demonstrated ability to solve problems in a data-driven way
• Creativity to brainstorm new avenues of research
• Demonstrated passion for baseball analytics and/or sports science.
• Proficiency in at least one statistical programming language (e.g. R, Python)
• Proficiency in a database language (e.g. SQL)
• Ability to communicate research findings and other technical concepts to non-technical audiences

Preferred Experience:

• Working knowledge of advanced baseball statistics and publicly available research
• Advanced degree in a quantitative field
• Experience working with baseball data
• Experience with data visualization
• Experience with experimental design and/or causal inference

Standard Requirements:

• Reads, speaks, comprehends and communicates English effectively in all communications.
• Represents the Cleveland Indians in a positive fashion to all business partners and the general public.
• Ability to develop and maintain successful working relationship with members of the Front Office.
• Ability to act according to the organizational values and service excellence at all times.
• Ability to work with multicultural populations and have a commitment to fairness and equality.
• Ability to walk, sit or stand for an entire shift.
• Ability to work extended days and hours, including holidays and weekends.
• Ability to move throughout all areas and levels of the Ballpark.
• Ability to work in a diverse and changing environment.
• Occasional physical activity such as lifting and carrying boxes up to 25lbs.

To Apply:
To apply, please complete the application that can be found here.

The content in this posting was created and provided solely by the Cleveland Indians.