managed to avoid all the fielders and turn a rare pitching feat into just another forgettable one hitter?" Being the curious sort, this got me wondering, is a no hitter really a masterful pitching performance or just a statistical anomaly that every ball put in play is, against the odds, imminently playable by the defense?
How do we make sense of a baseball universe where up is down and down is up, that is, a world where bloops fall in - line drives in the score book - and actual screaming line drives are caught for outs? They say these are all suppose to even out over time so if this randomness is true, then something like a no hitter is just the luck of the draw that happens periodically and is something that we can mathematically demonstrate with computer models. I say "we" of course, but I don't really mean you and I, we're not that smart. The geniuses over at the Society for American Baseball Research (SABR) are however and indeed, completed such an investigation just a few years ago and published the results in the spring of 2011.
The idea was to simulate games with a computer program based on statistical knowledge from the previous 133 seasons (1879-2009) and see how many no hitters occurred. Secondly, SABR wanted to see if they could predict which players were most likely to accomplish a perfect game or no hitter. In reality, there were 250 no hitters in that span but when SABR ran their first simulation of 133 years of games, the model only produced 123 no hitters. In other words, if no-hitters were completely random events, they would happen only about half the time they actually do. The SABR guys don't give up that easy so rather than use average probabilities based on the 133 year data set, they tweaked the program to use each year's probabilities for hits/outs/etc, as they rolled through the 133 year simulation. This time the model produced 214 no hitters, better but still far short of the 250 actual number. Realizing they were on to something, they then tweaked the program on the other side of the ball and got more specific with the statistics for the pitchers, using their probabilities for each year as they rolled through the simulation. The third attempted model produced 243 no-hitters, just a 4% differential from the real world result of 250. Pretty good shootin' if you ask me. To summarize, if SABR simply used a flat rate of probabilities based on the history of baseball, no hitters would happen far less often than they do but when the simulation took into account year-to-year pitching statistics, the model simulated a true number of no-nos.
So what does it mean? The conclusion from the study said, "using year by year data improved the results a bit while including pitcher-by-pitcher data from each year of his career greatly improved the results...This indicates that those who have pitched no-hitters and perfect games had, in general, far superior pitching ability than the average pitcher in baseball history." Duh! My thought that no-nos are just dumb luck might seem like a dumb question, but why then did SABR have the curiosity to complete this study? Because these guys are years ahead of "Baseball Rules! by JT"...and that's ok with me. I'm glad I asked the obvious question and now, don't we all feel better the obvious answer is backed up by science? (Check out the list of no-nos HERE, funny how they're mostly well known names.)
But it's not that quite black and white, while the simulation tried to predict which pitchers were most likely to throw a perfect game, the only one who showed up on the list who actually did was Sandy Koufax. There are many very good pitchers capable of this feat but there is no predicting who will actually do it. In the end, while you have to be very good to pitch a no-no or a perfect game, there indeed is an element of randomness - or you might say luck - involved that explains the Ortiz grounder. (This also cracks open the door to the idea that sometimes a very average pitcher gets very lucky - remember Dallas Braden?) In general, you have to be good, but on top of that, you also have to have the baseball gods on your side which is why there is nothing in sports quite like the progressive tension as one of these feats nears its completion or on a larger scale, the season and playoffs run their course. This dark space from which the randomness oozes is also where the fans take refuge with their loyalty and faith, rally caps and superstitions, petitioning the gods for mercy in their favor. This is why there is nothing like being a baseball fan.One last thought - I'm not sure what Yu Darvish did to piss off the gods, but just in the past year, he's lost both a no-no and a perfect game with two outs in the ninth. What are the odds of that? I'll get back to you on it... Click HERE to see the full SABR report.
Jim Tosches is an amateur umpire and blogger in Encinitas, Ca and author of the book, "The Rules Abide: The Thinking Fan's Guide to Baseball Rules (With History, Humor and a Few Big Words)"
Being a Rangers fan, I certainly feel the pain of those "almost" games, especially the almost perfect game last season. Yu's day will come, though. He has consistently been one of the best pitchers in MLB, so I expect we'll continue to see great things from him for many years.
ReplyDeleteOr course, if Elvis Andrus had laid out for that last grounder, we might be singing a different tune. Great pitchers don't get no-nos entirely by themselves...