Scoring question

[Scorekeeper]

I agree w/ batting average, but my point wasn't about the value of batting average. Could've/should've used OPS or runs created. At what do we decide that the difference between a 1.000 OPS and .900 is meaningful? To the point that we'll switch the batting order based on it? Coaches are always making those judgments w/ every lineup.

That’s precisely why more than one metric should always be factored in.

 

[Scorekeeper]

Unfortunately there is much more to making out a lineup than the consideration of stats. Stats are only part of the puzzle. If it could be done with a formula, coaching would be much easier.

The whole point of the conversation about how lineups are made is that it could be done with a formula, and there’s no way to prove it would be better or worse. You can’t play a game using one lineup, then stop, rewind and play the game again with a different one. So all that can be done is to set a lineup using whatever information is available.

 

[CoogansBluff]

That’s precisely why more than one metric should always be factored in.

Even if you have every metric under the sun, you still might conclude, 'that's luck.' ... For example, you're coaching at team of players about which you have no history. You base the initial batting order based on the observations of the staff in practice. Your #7 hitter goes 6-for-15 with 3 doubles in your first tournament. What do you make of that? At what point does his superior stats lead you to believe he's better than the #3 hitter who was 3-for-15 w/ no extra-base hits?

 

[Scorekeeper]

…You can have a lot of fun with a 12U team's batting order by taking advantage of opponents' assumptions about batters based on where they are in the order. Our team back then often batted a prototypical #3 hitter in the lead-off position and teams that weren't familiar with her often treated her like a high-OBP batter without power - big mistake. Also, the team's batting order in friendlies picked up where we left off in the previous game, so that caught opponents by surprise when our hitters performance didn't match what they expected based on the order.

It’s not just lower levels where opponent’s assumptions can cause problems. The 1st page of the attached shows last season’s HSV team. The 2nd page shows the combined numbers from 2007 thru 2014. As you can guess, last year’s team suckered in a heck of a lot of coaches and pitchers.

View attachment runprod5.pdf

 

[SoCal_Dad]

It’s not just lower levels where opponent’s assumptions can cause problems. The 1st page of the attached shows last season’s HSV team. The 2nd page shows the combined numbers from 2007 thru 2014. As you can guess, last year’s team suckered in a heck of a lot of coaches and pitchers.

Not really - I wouldn't guess that just from those 2 pages of numbers.

How does #4 have more PAs in 2014 than #2 and #3?

 

[Scorekeeper]

Not really - I wouldn't guess that just from those 2 pages of numbers.

You can’t see that our #9 hitters in 2014 performed as good or better than most of the other positions? OK. I guess we see different things.

How does #4 have more PAs in 2014 than #2 and #3?

I have the ability to run for all players or any combination. I didn’t have it set to include all of the players. Nice catch though.

View attachment runprod.pdf

 

[SoCal_Dad]

You can’t see that our #9 hitters in 2014 performed as good or better than most of the other positions? OK. I guess we see different things.

I saw/see relatively consistent numbers 1 thru 9 without any evidence of suckering teams. I can't tell whether there is a high correlation between those numbers and the hitters (i.e. depth) or there was more variation among the players and the 1-9 consistency was the result of moving them around in the order (i.e. suckering).

It's very difficult to sucker teams in Div-I HS baseball down here between player familiarity and scouting.

I have the ability to run for all players or any combination. I didn’t have it set to include all of the players. Nice catch though.
View attachment 6914

Same 2014 PAs, different date.

I only noticed it because I was looking at the distribution of PAs in regards to another batting order strategy discussion.

 

[Scorekeeper]

I saw/see relatively consistent numbers 1 thru 9 without any evidence of suckering teams. I can't tell whether there is a high correlation between those numbers and the hitters (i.e. depth) or there was more variation among the players and the 1-9 consistency was the result of moving them around in the order (i.e. suckering).

It's very difficult to sucker teams in Div-I HS baseball down here between player familiarity and scouting.

Perhaps “sucker” wasn’t the best word. What happened over and over again was coaches seemed to ASSUME the # 9 hitters were the worst hitters in the lineup, played them defensively with no respect, pitched to them the same way, and ended up paying for it.

If you really want, I can print off all 16 pages of the individual breakdowns for each BPOS, and you can find your own correlations, if any. Since you SoCal folks do everything so much better than anyone else, what does your team’s breakdown by BPos look like? I’ve never seen anyone else do that in amateur ball of any kind, but I’d be interested in seeing if we’re an aberration.

Same 2014 PAs, different date.

I only noticed it because I was looking at the distribution of PAs in regards to another batting order strategy discussion.

Found it. I didn’t catch a pinch runner being credited with a PA in a 15-1 mercy shortened game. Thanx. It gave me the opportunity to correct it.

 

[SoCal_Dad]

If you really want, I can print off all 16 pages of the individual breakdowns for each BPOS, and you can find your own correlations, if any.

That would be a bad approach. If the player stats for the regulars were in similar ranges like the stats by position (e.g. OBP .433-.495), you had depth from top to bottom.

Since you SoCal folks do everything so much better than anyone else, what does your team’s breakdown by BPos look like? I’ve never seen anyone else do that in amateur ball of any kind, but I’d be interested in seeing if we’re an aberration.

I haven't seen it and am not aware of anyone using it (e.g if iScore and/or GameChanger produces it). Data can be crunched and presented in an endless array of reports, but it's only information if it is useful beyond satisfying a curiosity.

"SoCal folks" prefer using a crystal ball that tells how each player will do in the game. That is much more useful in constructing the line-up.

 

[Scorekeeper]

That would be a bad approach. If the player stats for the regulars were in similar ranges like the stats by position (e.g. OBP .433-.495), you had depth from top to bottom.

Since you have no idea what any teams look like if presented the same way, how can you categorize our team as having depth? For all you know, we stunk compared to many other teams.

I haven't seen it and am not aware of anyone using it (e.g if iScore and/or GameChanger produces it). Data can be crunched and presented in an endless array of reports, but it's only information if it is useful beyond satisfying a curiosity.

Since you’ve never seen it, you have no idea as to its usefulness, do you. I can produce several way to look at batting positions. No one looks at them every single day, but periodically the coaches get together and analyze them all to see if they can tweak the lineup a bit to maximize its potential. I suppose if you’ve never seen anyone doing that, you could take the position that it isn’t useful beyond “satisfying a curiosity”, but others would categorize it more as “ignorance is bliss”.

http://www.infosports.com/scorekeeper/images/babip1.pdf

"SoCal folks" prefer using a crystal ball that tells how each player will do in the game. That is much more useful in constructing the line-up.

Sure they do. That’s why they’re the largest purchasers and users of scoring software per capita in the world.