July 4, 200719 yr Actually, speedy guys are able to influence their BABIP a bit more than most. And as for how hard you hit the ball, no that doesn't really matter at all. If you hit more line drives you have a better chance of sustaining a high BABIP, but for the most part, a player has very little control of whether he gets a hit or an out once it's put in play. This is shown by the numerous amount of balls that are just stung but right at someone or the defender makes a bad play, whereas a guy can hit a little bloop that drops and he'll get a hit.
July 4, 200719 yr You know the cold-blooded stat guys are in trouble when they find a stat that takes into account "bad luck". I mean seriously. I thought I had seen it all. News flash folks. Sustained bad luck does not exist. I will maybe agree that one can experience "short term bad luck" but seriously, some of you must be joking. If you don't want to call it luck, call it statistical aberrations, career years, whatever. Whatever "IT" is, it does exist. There's no other way to explain career .500 guys winning 20 games one year, or .260 hitters hitting .310. All BABIP does is somewhat quantify that for the hitters. It allows you to say, "well, when he starts finding grass instead of gloves, he's going on a tear." Just like WHIP tells you how flukey an ERA is for a pitcher, BABIP gives you more ways to analyze a batting average.
July 4, 200719 yr Actually, speedy guys are able to influence their BABIP a bit more than most. And as for how hard you hit the ball, no that doesn't really matter at all. If you hit more line drives you have a better chance of sustaining a high BABIP, but for the most part, a player has very little control of whether he gets a hit or an out once it's put in play. This is shown by the numerous amount of balls that are just stung but right at someone or the defender makes a bad play, whereas a guy can hit a little bloop that drops and he'll get a hit. I completely disagree. See, when I see guys like Miguel or Utley with really high BABIPs and then I see guys like Alex Gonzalez or Jack Wilson with low BABIPs to me what that tells me is that Miguel and Utley hit the crap out of the ball while Alex and Jack are pretty crappy hitters but based on what you've written according to you Miguel and Utley are not better hitters than Alex and Jack, they are just luckier hitters.
July 4, 200719 yr Actually, speedy guys are able to influence their BABIP a bit more than most. And as for how hard you hit the ball, no that doesn't really matter at all. If you hit more line drives you have a better chance of sustaining a high BABIP, but for the most part, a player has very little control of whether he gets a hit or an out once it's put in play. This is shown by the numerous amount of balls that are just stung but right at someone or the defender makes a bad play, whereas a guy can hit a little bloop that drops and he'll get a hit. I completely disagree. See, when I see guys like Miguel or Utley with really high BABIPs and then I see guys like Alex Gonzalez or Jack Wilson with low BABIPs to me what that tells me is that Miguel and Utley hit the crap out of the ball while Alex and Jack are pretty crappy hitters but based on what you've written according to you Miguel and Utley are not better hitters than Alex and Jack, they are just luckier hitters. Actually, you are right. I apologize. Obviously there are players who are simply better than others. Where the luck comes in is when a player like Gonzalez has an uncharacteristically high average or Cabrera's is low. You can't really use BABIP to judge different players since they are all different, but you can use it for judging whether one player is having a flukey season or an unlucky season. Although home runs and strikeouts will significantly affect your BABIP, which is a partial explanation for why Cabrera's is so high.
July 4, 200719 yr Call me the new guy, call me slow, even call me stupid, but what the f*** is a BABIP?!
July 4, 200719 yr Call me the new guy, call me slow, even call me stupid, but what the f*** is a BABIP?! Batting average of balls in play
July 4, 200719 yr Call me the new guy, call me slow, even call me stupid, but what the f*** is a BABIP?! the next HYPHY
July 4, 200719 yr Actually, speedy guys are able to influence their BABIP a bit more than most. And as for how hard you hit the ball, no that doesn't really matter at all. If you hit more line drives you have a better chance of sustaining a high BABIP, but for the most part, a player has very little control of whether he gets a hit or an out once it's put in play. This is shown by the numerous amount of balls that are just stung but right at someone or the defender makes a bad play, whereas a guy can hit a little bloop that drops and he'll get a hit. I completely disagree. See, when I see guys like Miguel or Utley with really high BABIPs and then I see guys like Alex Gonzalez or Jack Wilson with low BABIPs to me what that tells me is that Miguel and Utley hit the crap out of the ball while Alex and Jack are pretty crappy hitters but based on what you've written according to you Miguel and Utley are not better hitters than Alex and Jack, they are just luckier hitters. Actually, you are right. I apologize. Obviously there are players who are simply better than others. Where the luck comes in is when a player like Gonzalez has an uncharacteristically high average or Cabrera's is low. You can't really use BABIP to judge different players since they are all different, but you can use it for judging whether one player is having a flukey season or an unlucky season. Although home runs and strikeouts will significantly affect your BABIP, which is a partial explanation for why Cabrera's is so high. I think it's nuts to assume luck is the reason for players yearly fluctuations in BABIP. Is luck also the reason for their yearly fluctuations in Ks and HRs? Also, HRs and Ks are removed when calculating BABIP so why would HRs and Ks impact a guy's BABIP?
July 4, 200719 yr Actually, speedy guys are able to influence their BABIP a bit more than most. And as for how hard you hit the ball, no that doesn't really matter at all. If you hit more line drives you have a better chance of sustaining a high BABIP, but for the most part, a player has very little control of whether he gets a hit or an out once it's put in play. This is shown by the numerous amount of balls that are just stung but right at someone or the defender makes a bad play, whereas a guy can hit a little bloop that drops and he'll get a hit. I completely disagree. See, when I see guys like Miguel or Utley with really high BABIPs and then I see guys like Alex Gonzalez or Jack Wilson with low BABIPs to me what that tells me is that Miguel and Utley hit the crap out of the ball while Alex and Jack are pretty crappy hitters but based on what you've written according to you Miguel and Utley are not better hitters than Alex and Jack, they are just luckier hitters. Actually, you are right. I apologize. Obviously there are players who are simply better than others. Where the luck comes in is when a player like Gonzalez has an uncharacteristically high average or Cabrera's is low. You can't really use BABIP to judge different players since they are all different, but you can use it for judging whether one player is having a flukey season or an unlucky season. Although home runs and strikeouts will significantly affect your BABIP, which is a partial explanation for why Cabrera's is so high. I think it's nuts to assume luck is the reason for players yearly fluctuations in BABIP. Is luck also the reason for their yearly fluctuations in Ks and HRs? Also, HRs and Ks are removed when calculating BABIP so why would HRs and Ks impact a guy's BABIP? So what would you say is the culprit behind yearly fluctuations? Why does Ichiro Suzuki hit .372 one year with 49 walks and 66 k's and then hit .303 the next with 48 walks and 63 k's? Why does Mike Lowell hit one year .234 and .284 the next while having only a 1 walk and 3 k difference? More precisely, what I meant to say was HR and K's will show a bigger discrepency between your actual average and your BABIP. Also, HR's and K's generally don't fluctuate year to year as much as average does.
July 4, 200719 yr Great another meaningless stat to overuse! Batting Average? RBI? batting average balls in play
July 4, 200719 yr Great another meaningless stat to overuse! Batting Average? RBI? batting average balls in play Thats strange, because batting average is just as useless as BABIP and it's way more overused. Odd...
July 4, 200719 yr Call me the new guy, call me slow, even call me stupid, but what the f*** is a BABIP?! Batting average of balls in play Wow, I like statistics and all, and baseball is a game of numbers, but that's just an idiotic stat. It says more about defenses than the player. It'd be more meaningful to keep track of the percentage of times a player gets the ball in play when at bat.
July 4, 200719 yr Actually, speedy guys are able to influence their BABIP a bit more than most. And as for how hard you hit the ball, no that doesn't really matter at all. If you hit more line drives you have a better chance of sustaining a high BABIP, but for the most part, a player has very little control of whether he gets a hit or an out once it's put in play. This is shown by the numerous amount of balls that are just stung but right at someone or the defender makes a bad play, whereas a guy can hit a little bloop that drops and he'll get a hit. I completely disagree. See, when I see guys like Miguel or Utley with really high BABIPs and then I see guys like Alex Gonzalez or Jack Wilson with low BABIPs to me what that tells me is that Miguel and Utley hit the crap out of the ball while Alex and Jack are pretty crappy hitters but based on what you've written according to you Miguel and Utley are not better hitters than Alex and Jack, they are just luckier hitters. Actually, you are right. I apologize. Obviously there are players who are simply better than others. Where the luck comes in is when a player like Gonzalez has an uncharacteristically high average or Cabrera's is low. You can't really use BABIP to judge different players since they are all different, but you can use it for judging whether one player is having a flukey season or an unlucky season. Although home runs and strikeouts will significantly affect your BABIP, which is a partial explanation for why Cabrera's is so high. I think it's nuts to assume luck is the reason for players yearly fluctuations in BABIP. Is luck also the reason for their yearly fluctuations in Ks and HRs? Also, HRs and Ks are removed when calculating BABIP so why would HRs and Ks impact a guy's BABIP? So what would you say is the culprit behind yearly fluctuations? Why does Ichiro Suzuki hit .372 one year with 49 walks and 66 k's and then hit .303 the next with 48 walks and 63 k's? Why does Mike Lowell hit one year .234 and .284 the next while having only a 1 walk and 3 k difference? More precisely, what I meant to say was HR and K's will show a bigger discrepency between your actual average and your BABIP. Also, HR's and K's generally don't fluctuate year to year as much as average does. You already agreed that how hard a player hits the ball will impact his BABIP. Given that, don't you think fluctuations from year to year can be attributed to a player hitting the ball harder one year compared to the other year? These guys aren't robots. Your position is that Lowell put up bad numbers in '05 because he had bad luck and that his '06 numbers improved because his luck improved. I disagree. Looking back at his '05 season I think his numbers declined because his power went down the tubes. His line drives and flyballs that used to go out or bang against the wall were getting caught at the warning track. His '05 BABIP was .253. Assume that in '05 he had his normal power year and hit 25 HRs rather than only 8. That's 17 extra outs in the BABIP denominator. Now assume that a few, say 8, of his flyballs and line drives that in a normal year would bang against the wall ended up getting caught. That's 8 extra hits in the BABIP foumula. Recalculate the .253 with these two changes (adding 8 hits & subtratting 17 balls in play) and his BABIP jumps up about 30 points. It has very little to do with luck.
July 4, 200719 yr Call me the new guy, call me slow, even call me stupid, but what the f*** is a BABIP?! Batting average of balls in play Wow, I like statistics and all, and baseball is a game of numbers, but that's just an idiotic stat. It says more about defenses than the player. It'd be more meaningful to keep track of the percentage of times a player gets the ball in play when at bat. I also like stats and think this is a useful one but the problem people misuse it.
July 4, 200719 yr Your position is that Lowell put up bad numbers in '05 because he had bad luck and that his '06 numbers improved because his luck improved. I disagree. Looking back at his '05 season I think his numbers declined because his power went down the tubes. His line drives and flyballs that used to go out or bang against the wall were getting caught at the warning track. His '05 BABIP was .253. Assume that in '05 he had his normal power year and hit 25 HRs rather than only 8. That's 17 extra outs in the BABIP denominator. Now assume that a few, say 8, of his flyballs and line drives that in a normal year would bang against the wall ended up getting caught. That's 8 extra hits in the BABIP foumula. Recalculate the .253 with these two changes (adding 8 hits & subtratting 17 balls in play) and his BABIP jumps up about 30 points. It has very little to do with luck. I think you're completely misunderstanding how BABIP works and what exactly we mean by "luck". You basically just described him having an "unlucky" season in the part I bolded, yet say that it wasn't an unlucky season. As far as his BABIP goes... So taking away 17 outs and adding 17 HRs, his BABIP goes up to .258 (.010 increase...his babip was .248, not .253). Adding 8 hits, his babip goes up to .277. His career BABIP is .281. With his new-found babip, his numbers for the 2005 season: .286 BAA, .342 OBP, .462 SLG His career numbers: .275 BAA, .340 OBP, .465 SLG By adding what you said to add, his BABIP is .004 within his career BABIP, and his numbers are nearly identical to his career numbers.
July 5, 200719 yr Your position is that Lowell put up bad numbers in '05 because he had bad luck and that his '06 numbers improved because his luck improved. I disagree. Looking back at his '05 season I think his numbers declined because his power went down the tubes. His line drives and flyballs that used to go out or bang against the wall were getting caught at the warning track. His '05 BABIP was .253. Assume that in '05 he had his normal power year and hit 25 HRs rather than only 8. That's 17 extra outs in the BABIP denominator. Now assume that a few, say 8, of his flyballs and line drives that in a normal year would bang against the wall ended up getting caught. That's 8 extra hits in the BABIP foumula. Recalculate the .253 with these two changes (adding 8 hits & subtratting 17 balls in play) and his BABIP jumps up about 30 points. It has very little to do with luck. I think you're completely misunderstanding how BABIP works and what exactly we mean by "luck". You basically just described him having an "unlucky" season in the part I bolded, yet say that it wasn't an unlucky season. As far as his BABIP goes... So taking away 17 outs and adding 17 HRs, his BABIP goes up to .258 (.010 increase...his babip was .248, not .253). Adding 8 hits, his babip goes up to .277. His career BABIP is .281. With his new-found babip, his numbers for the 2005 season: .286 BAA, .342 OBP, .462 SLG His career numbers: .275 BAA, .340 OBP, .465 SLG By adding what you said to add, his BABIP is .004 within his career BABIP, and his numbers are nearly identical to his career numbers. I guess we'll never agree on this because if I understand you correctly your position is that Lowell's '05 power decline was due to bad luck and I don't think luck has anything to do with a player's yearly fluctuations in power. Thanks for crunching all the numbers. I guess if in '05 Lowell had his normal power year then his overall production would have been similar to his career average or in other words he had a bad year because his power went down the tubes and not because of bad luck.
July 5, 200719 yr Cool to see that because of a decent # of knuckleheads I have went from the worst poster on this board to just kind of crappy. Thanks fellas. Keep up the hate. Just making me look good.
July 5, 200719 yr Cool to see that because of a decent # of knuckleheads I have went from the worst poster on this board to just kind of crappy. Thanks fellas. Keep up the hate. Just making me look good. :notworthy :notworthy :notworthy :lol :lol :lol
July 5, 200719 yr BABIP is one of the lamest stats ever. Batters whiff.....plain and simple. lol good input
July 5, 200719 yr BABIP is one of the lamest stats ever. Batters whiff.....plain and simple. lol good input Thanks.....lol.
July 5, 200719 yr Cool to see that because of a decent # of knuckleheads I have went from the worst poster on this board to just kind of crappy. Thanks fellas. Keep up the hate. Just making me look good. Wait, I can't tell if you are calling me dumb or them dumb? BABIP is one of the lamest stats ever. Batters whiff.....plain and simple. And batters "whiffing" has what to do with seasonal fluctuations in the amount of balls a batter puts into play that fall for hits?
July 5, 200719 yr I guess we'll never agree on this because if I understand you correctly your position is that Lowell's '05 power decline was due to bad luck and I don't think luck has anything to do with a player's yearly fluctuations in power. Thanks for crunching all the numbers. I guess if in '05 Lowell had his normal power year then his overall production would have been similar to his career average or in other words he had a bad year because his power went down the tubes and not because of bad luck. Can you agree that a player can hit a ball extremely hard but right at a guy, whereas a guy can hit a ball extremely poorly and have it drop for a single or even a double? And can you agree that this would be attributed mostly to luck? And can you also, then agree that it is possible for a player to have this type of thing happen to him maybe 9-10 times a year, which would cause like a 30 point fluctuation in his batting average and OBP/SLG? Thats what BABIP tries to find out. You can also study line drive rates and infield fly rates and pop fly rates and all that and get a much better view, but BABIP does a much better job of explaining why a player may be playing below his career levels besides just "losing his power". Players don't lose the ability to hit for one year and then all of a sudden find it again the very next year. I think it's logical to assume some of it is based on luck.
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