Jacoby Ellsbury: League Leader
Right now, Jacoby Ellsbury is presumably focused on helping the Red Sox, but a few months from now, Ellsbury should become a free agent. He probably isn’t thinking too much about that right now, but you could forgive other people for giving it a lot of attention, fans of non-contending teams, and even high-ranking employees of them. Ellsbury looks like an impact player who’s going to hit the open market, like the kind of player who can turn a decent team to a good team, and those who feel like he had just one fluke season would be wise to consider what he’s done in 2013.
Any talk about Ellsbury as a free-agent acquisition has to begin with his statistics. It’s those statistics that explain what he is as a player, and it’s those statistics that give the best indication of what he might become as he ages. Ellsbury, this year, is the owner of a 112 wRC+, and for his career, he’s the owner of a 109 wRC+. He routinely posts positive base-running values, and he also routinely posts positive defensive values. Through Wednesday’s action, Ellsbury’s running a .358 2013 OBP. A lot of people are going to be looking at that OBP. But what would you say if I told you that’s not actually his 2013 OBP at all?
What you might say is, “I don’t understand, what is his OBP, then?” What you should say is, “yes it is.” By definition — by the official OBP formula — Ellsbury’s 2013 on-base percentage is .358. According to FanGraphs, it’s .358. According to Baseball-Reference, it’s .358. According to ESPN, it’s .358. According to MLB.com, it’s probably .358, but I don’t know for sure because I can’t stand trying to navigate their statistical pages. There is no disagreement on the matter of Ellsbury’s OBP.
But the point is that there are other times Ellsbury has reached base, times that aren’t included in the OBP formula, times that are virtually invisible. So far this season, there have been 20 instances of catcher’s interference. Sixteen different players have reached on catcher’s interference one time. Jacoby Ellsbury has reached on catcher’s interference four times. It is a small league lead, but given the overall infrequency of the event, it is a significant one.
Last November, we talked about Tyler Colvin’s 2012 league lead in the same category. Colvin reached on catcher’s interference six times over 452 official plate appearances. Ellsbury’s at four and 567, so clearly, he’s off the Colvin pace, but a leader is a leader and I wasn’t about to let this pass by unacknowledged.
Not that it’s necessarily gone entirely unacknowledged. A control partial Google query:
Now, the same query, with Ellsbury instead:
People have caught on. Hell, Pete Abraham has written about it, more than once. In July, Abraham wrote about Ellsbury and the catcher’s interference call, and then he reached the same way again on August 19. It isn’t often one thinks about catcher’s interference as a baseball play, but Ellsbury has made it happen just often enough. Ellsbury has made people ask Google about it.
Ellsbury’s actually reached this way ten times in his career, which almost certainly isn’t a fluke, given how rare it is. The active leader is Carl Crawford, having reached on catcher’s interference 13 times. I didn’t make .gifs of all ten of the Ellsbury instances, but here are .gifs of the four 2013 instances, with a couple slow-motion replays. I’ll list the dates and the catchers because why not?
June 8
June 13
July 6
- Chris Iannetta(!)
August 19
Catcher’s interference occurs when the bat hits the glove during a swing. In one of the examples above, the catcher prepares to try to throw out a base-runner, and in so doing might have reached too far forward for the ball. In the other examples, there’s no such catcher movement, so there’s just accidental contact. Above are the only two times Iannetta has been called for interference in his career. Wieters has been called for interference two times in his career — once with Ellsbury in 2013, and once with Ellsbury in 2011. This, probably, isn’t just noise; this, probably, has to do with Jacoby Ellsbury.
And it — probably — would have to do with a few things. Historically, catcher’s interference has been called a lot more often with left-handed hitters at the plate. Ellsbury stands pretty far back in the box, and there’s also a lot of length to his swing behind the plate. Or at least sometimes there is, maybe when he’s trying to do something in particular. Abraham asked about this very thing, and from the link above, here are a couple of the responses he received:
“I know I get it called a lot. But I really don’t know why,” the Red Sox center fielder said in July. “It’s hard for me to give a reason behind it.”
[…]
“It’s not something I’m trying to do,” Ellsbury said. “It just happens. But I’ll take it. Nine more times getting on base is a good thing, right?”
Offering more detail, the manager:
“There’s some length to his swing. In his case, his length is not so much out front, it’s behind him,” Farrell said. “It’s a natural swing path.”
Farrell believes that the kind of pitch being thrown has something to do with it, too. He has noticed that when catchers reach for breaking pitches to frame them for the umpire, that’s when they tend to interfere with Ellsbury.
Farrell even said he warned his catchers about this possibility when he was in Toronto. Prior to this season, Ellsbury had reached on catcher’s interference just six times, so Farrell saw something where few others would’ve. Farrell noticed Ellsbury’s swing path and tried not to let it make a difference. Baseball managers have to worry about a whole lot of details. Or Farrell is just pulling our legs.
There’s not a lot to really learn from this exercise. One thing to learn is the frequency with which Ellsbury has reached base on catcher’s interference. Another thing to learn is that the signal for catcher’s interference is hilarious. “This guy right here. This guy messed up. This is the guy who just messed up.” A third thing to learn is that Ellsbury has done this often enough to make people aware of it. The usual response to catcher’s interference is confusion on the part of the fans and the announcers. With Ellsbury, now it’s familiar. For his career, he’s reached on catcher’s interference more often than he’s been intentionally walked. He’s reached on catcher’s interference more often than he’s stolen against the White Sox, Twins, or Mariners. With Ellsbury, the response now isn’t “was that catcher’s interference?” The response is “there’s catcher’s interference, again.” It’s weird that that’s not weird.
Whenever I look at this, I think there might be a way to make this happen intentionally. It’s along the same lines as the theory that sometimes hitters swing at wild two-strike pitches intentionally. I don’t think that happens — I think certain players are just more prone to it. Jacoby Ellsbury happens to be more prone to reaching base on catcher’s interference. Probably, it has a lot to do with his swing. It doesn’t really make a meaningful difference with regard to Ellsbury’s value as a player, and front offices around the league aren’t going to think about this when they prepare their free-agent contract offers. But like Ellsbury says, more times getting on base is a good thing, right? It doesn’t not matter.
Jeff made Lookout Landing a thing, but he does not still write there about the Mariners. He does write here, sometimes about the Mariners, but usually not.
These all look like pitches he is fooled on. His timing is off, and he resets his timing in the middle of the swing. As such, he is keeping his weight back (on a proper swing your weight goes forward) and swinging deeper in the box. Maybe Ellsbury is slightly more prone to getting fooled by offspeed pitches?
Or maybe he’s better at keeping his weight back when he does?
I like that hypothesis. Wonder if he swings and misses at breaking stuff less than average.
Good piece to write on Jeff. It may interest you to know that he’s actually been interfered with by the catcher more than 4 times this year, but it has only been called 4 times this year. If you search around you might be able to find the other uncalled instances. No games jump out off the top of my head, but there have probably been another 3 or 4 instances where it was uncalled by the umpire, despite the instance of Ellsbury some of the time. The Sox broadcasterse are very aware of it too.
Very interesting, thanks.
I always try not to miss Jeff’s articles. But I sometimes miss reading them, but usually not.
And I rarely try to read about the Mariners. And I prefer it that way.
Partial Google search on “Jeff Sullivan C”:
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So why isn’t this included in OBP? Not like it’s hard to add +CI to the formula.
Presumably because it is similar to other times reached on base, like Fielder’s Choice, Reached-on-error, etc. Because it wasn’t actually anything the hitter did, but a mistake on someone else’s part
You are correct of course, Sam. Still, I would like to see all these plus reaching on dropped 3rd strike included. Some players seem to have a knack for reaching in these odd ways. For instance, I noticed that in 2010 Juan Uribe of the Giants reached base a lot on errors and the kind of FC that doesn’t involve an out. I never counted them, but it was certainly 10, maybe 20. That seems like a heck of a coincidence.
I think it’s technically ruled reaching on an error on the catcher, and reaching on errors isn’t included in OBP.
No it is not, it is a separate category. Reaching on error counts as an AB and as such against against one’s batting average, OBP and so on. Reaching on an interference is simply ignored.
From OBR
10.21 Determining Percentage Records
[…]
(f) On-base percentage, divide the sum of hits, bases on balls and times hit by pitch by the sum of at-bats, bases on balls, times hit by pitch and sacrifice flies.
Rule 10.21(f) Comment: For the purpose of computing on-base percentage, ignore instances of a batter being awarded first base on interference or obstruction.
I looked it up, the catcher is charged with an error allowing the batter to “advance” to first, but the batter is not charged with an at bat.
If I remember correctly, there was at least once instance this season where there should have been catcher’s interference called in favour of Ellsbury against the Jays, but the ump didn’t catch it
Ellsbury got a hit on the play, I think ti was against Baltimore but I could be wrong. Interestingly enough the manager has the choice on whether to take the play as it stood or the CI. They took the hit obviously. So really Ellsbury should have 5 this year.
If we changed the OBP stat to measure the times a player reached base without the teammate being forced out, we should also be including the times a player reaches on error.
For someone like Norichika Aoki, who reached on error 11 times both in 2012 and this year, this would be a boost of 20 points in each year, much bigger effect than a CI (also a sort of a defensive error) has.
ahh the inanity of fangraphs….
FG readers are some of the most thin skinned people you’ll ever see. hysterical nancies.
So thin-skinned that they come back to an article they’ve already read just to see if anyone liked their comment and then make a separate butthurt comment when they find out no one did.
didn’t realize there was a one view limit to each page.
face it, any time I’ve ever made any sort of remark about this place that might be less than glowing even as benign as the one above, it invariably gets attacked. and there is always someone to add the requisite, “well if you took the time and effort to come here, then it can’t be too bad…” etc. As if merely showing up = approval.
I guess honesty is frowned upon if it’s not with an ear to ear grin.
Or maybe you have a problem, since it’s you and not everybody “getting attacked”.
Go drink some more cum.
“Everybody’s out of step but Johnny!”
Johnny is your gay lover, I take it?
The issue is that you criticism comes off as an attack because there is no substance behind your comment and then you follow it up by making a blatant attack. Some of the best comments here are ones that have a bone to pick with the author or the staff here, but only when they actually include substance.
Inane? Maybe. But baseball in general is pretty inane. Life too for that matter. So don’t get all upset when you only offer exactly what you’re criticizing.
post 2 above was not me. Someone else is using LaLoosh and thinks that’s amusing.
LaLoosh, look up “Everybody’s out of step but Johnny” on Google.
Scraps, since you’re so intuitive, what’s my problem? Is it that I dared to call this inane? minutia? I’m clearly a heretic.
… LaLoosh’s problem…?
You don’t get it when it’s clearly pointed out to you; why should we try a fourth time?
Meditate on Johnny and his mom and you might get it. But you probably won’t, because getting it would involve a certain amount of embarrassment.
(Assuming that LaLoosh = Spike)
CJones:
“The issue is that you criticism comes off as an attack because there is no substance behind your comment and then you follow it up by making a blatant attack. Some of the best comments here are ones that have a bone to pick with the author or the staff here, but only when they actually include substance.
Inane? Maybe. But baseball in general is pretty inane. Life too for that matter. So don’t get all upset when you only offer exactly what you’re criticizing.”
why do you feel that everyone has to toe a certain line? I made a throwaway remark and reliably a bunch of people got offended with their “Minus reviews”!
It’s amusing and I pointed out that it was predictable. And then predictably some got annoyed by *that.* Don’t you see the pattern here? Look at comments in every piece. It’s more or less the same pattern. Fawning gets raves, critiques get booed.
Sure everything here is minutiae to a great extent… I get that. I wouldn’t be here if that didn’t hold some appeal but sometimes it crosses into useless inanity and as this is still a free country, people have the right to point that out as they see fit, no?
and likewise others are free to dislike it when it’s pointed out.
No reason for people to get so bent out of shape. Some people just take these things way too personally.
Now he’s pulled out it’s “still a free country”! Gawd.
And also people get “bent out of shape”, and we “take these things way too personally”. Any more cliches, hm?
Don’t you realize that you’re the only one who’s getting bent out of shape? You’re bleating about “minus reviews”! Really. Calm down.
I am completely drawing a blank early this morning, and this question has nothing to do with the article, but if someone can help me out….
Why is it when you add up the batting, Base running, fielding, replacement, and positional value, those numbers do not equal the RAR exactly?
And then why does RAR not equal the WAR exactly?
Thanks for your help….
As to the former, I would guess rounding.
For the latter, WAR isn’t just RAR/10 (although it looks close in many cases) — it’s adjusted based on the run environment (which I believe includes park effects). So a player worth 20 runs above replacement in the AL in 2000 (5.3R/G) produced fewer wins than a player worth 20 runs above replacement in the NL in 2012 (4.22R/G).
I nominate this article as the most obscure baseball statistical analysis…………EVER!!!!
Clearly you are new to Sullivan’s oeuvre.
I remember a game in high school where the other catcher was way too close to the plate during the previous at bat, so I just walked up and took a long swing, tipped his glove and walked to first. Harold Reynolds would have scolded me for being selfish!
There’s an even chance he would’ve heralded you as a “true gamer,” like when Jeter sells a ball in the dirt as a HBP.
TWTW.
Maybe if Napoli will attempt hitting out of the catchers glove he’ll have better success than trying to see the ball.
That would require him making contact with something. Not part of his skillset.
Maybe it’s Jeff Sullivan’s new way of watching at-bats getting to me (Wildest Swings etc), but I’m looking at the catcher in all these at-bats, and both times the catcher’s Chris Iannetta, he’s saying “What? Oh, man, you’re not going to call that…. you are? Oh, man…. grumble, grumble.”
On the (I guess) other side of things, Josh Hamilton was called for interference twice in the last two games.
On Tuesday he struck out and interfered with catcher Yan Gomes while in the batters box resulting in the runner stealing second to have to return to first.
Then yesterday he struck out and fell over the plate, interfering with catcher Carlos Santana’s throw and resulting in the runner being called out.
It seemed to me very odd that two straight games would feature batter interference, let alone that both would be committed by the same player. Also, in the second case, where the runner was called out, is that counted as two outs (like a GIDP) for the batter as opposed to a strikeout for the hitter and a baserunning out for the runner?
I think Sully said it best: “There’s not a lot to really learn from this exercise.”
Amen.
I seem to recall Bill James writing years ago about Roberto Kelly getting on base a lot via catcher’s interference. It’s funny. It doesn’t happen a lot but every now and then someone writes a piece about it, and I find it interesting every time.
my question is why hasn’t he stolen more bases against the white sox
Pity?