Team Clutch Hitting
As Eric and I have been illustrating over the last few days, there’s some really cool stuff in the new team pages that you guys should be checking out. Here’s one more example – a graph of all team’s Clutch scores, which measure the portion of their WPA that came from their performance in high leverage situations. Essentially, this is how team’s performed when it mattered.
Notice how most teams aren’t that far from zero? 23 of the 30 teams had scores between +3 and -3, meaning that they won three more or less games thanks to their high leverage hitting. It helps, but clearly, it’s not the thing that makes or breaks a ballclub.
But look at those two big bars on the far left hand side, especially the biggest one – that’s a clutch score of +7.32. That’s the 2008 Los Angeles Angels of Anaheim, who added almost seven and a half wins to their total by performing well in high leverage situations. That’s 2.6 standard deviations from the mean – a true outlier if ever there was one. A huge portion of Anaheim’s success in 2008 was directly due to clutch hitting.
Guess what – they led the league in 2007, too, posting a +5.19 clutch score. That’s 12.5 wins in two years thanks to timely hitting. Yes, it’s probably random variation, but it’s interesting random variation.
Just for kicks, here are their clutch scores and MLB ranks for the entire decade, which happens to be the length of Mike Scioscia’s managerial reign.
2000: -2.08 (21st)
2001: -5.41 (25th)
2002: 4.54 (3rd)
2003: 0.13 (11th)
2004: 1.33 (6th)
2005: 4.28 (2nd)
2006: -1.85 (21st)
2007: 5.19 (1st)
2008: 7.32 (1st)
This probably doesn’t mean anything, and I certainly wouldn’t advise betting on the Angels to be among the league leaders in clutch hitting again next year. But a +20 clutch score over the last seven years sure is eye opening. If you keep looking at those rosters and trying to figure out how they won so many games, here you go.
Dave is the Managing Editor of FanGraphs.
It’s worth noting the Angels threw in another +7 wins in Clutch pitching too this year, which made them an amazing 15 some games better because of their timely performance! Clutch wins made the AL West crazy lopsided.
I remember this time last year everyone was talking about the Diamondbacks and how they outperformed their record. They were only +11 clutch wins.
Pretty interesting how symmetrical that graph is.
ikr? i guess cuz once 1 teams goes up one the other goes down 1? kinda hard 2 put in words but i hope u get it hahaha. where do the phillies rank in here?
Please tell us what the other teams are!
Meaningless.
Luke: you can see what the other teams are in Clutch wins by going here and sorting by Clutch: http://www.fangraphs.com/teams.aspx?lg=all&stats=bat&type=3&season=2008&month=0
I’m actually doing a psychology research project on clutch hitting and am trying to validate a scale to measure players on this frequently used but not well defined or studied concept. It would be really helpful if you could fill out (and possibly disseminate) my survey so that I can try to more accurately define this puzzling, yet fascinating, concept. Here is some background information:
http://www.surveymonkey.com/s.aspx?sm=VUWValhJzb65tk1lZoMMEQ_3d_3d
What is “clutch� What players are considered “clutch†performers? What players are “gritty†or have natural talent? Are these players also “clutch� These frequently cited terms in the game of baseball have never been objectively studied, but I am trying to change that. I’m a University of Pennsylvania psychology student who is doing an honors thesis about clutch performance in baseball. I have created a survey asking about some Major League players’ characteristics and it would be great if some of you, being huge baseball fans, could fill it out! It should only take a maximum of 15 minutes. Also, I would love to hear any comments that you have about my survey! Thanks so much for all your help!
Here is the website for my survey: http://www.surveymonkey.com/s.aspx?sm=VUWValhJzb65tk1lZoMMEQ_3d_3d
Kristin
FWIW, The angles have are +4 clutch wins this year so far, 1st in the majors, again.
I know it’s generally frowned upon in the saber community, but perhaps small-ball baseball actually has a positive correlation with what we refer to as ‘clutch’. Though, yes, I am aware that the angels are not playing anywhere near the amount of small-ball productive outs baseball this year as they have in the past.
Still, the continued trend seems like more than noise to me for sure.