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October 01, 2009

Mr. LaRussa, meet Mr. McGraw

Earlier today the Cards inflicted a considerable butt-whipping on the Cubs, 13-0. The big story was Chris Carpenter's 6-RBI performance. Not bad for a pitcher.

Still, it wasn't the most impressive achievement on the day. That honor went to his manager, Tony LaRussa, who filled out the lineup card for the 4,769th time, tying him with John McGraw on the all-time leaderboard. Only Connie Mack has done more.

Sure, games managed is a far from glamorous stat - but as many games managed as John McGraw?!? He (and Connie Mack) have been atop the career leaderboards for managers for so long I never imagined it was possible for anyone to catch either one.

In three more years, LaRussa should pass him up in victories, too.
Posted by: Chris Jaffe

September 30, 2009

Most recent mid-season managerial change for all 30 teams

Word is, the perpetually underachieving Indians just canned their manager, Eric Wedge.

Question: When was the most recent managerial change for all 30 teams.

Before checking the list can you guess which team has gone the longest without doing it? Longest in the other league? Well, here they are, bunched by fives for convenience sake. I look at games managed for tiebreakers when multiple teams appear in the same season:

2009 CLE
2009 HOU
2009 DCN
2009 COL
2009 ARI

2008 MIL
2008 TOR
2008 SEA
2008 NYM
2007 CIN

2007 BAL
2005 KCR
2005 PIT
2004 PHI
2003 FLA

2002 CHC
2002 DET
2001 BOX
2001 TEX
2001 TBD

1999 ANA
1998 LAD
1995 STL
1995 CWS
1992 SDP

1990 ATL
1990 NYY*
1986 MIN
1986 OAK
1985 SFG

I would've bet anything Minnesota would come out on top, but no.

I put an asterick by the Yanks because while B-ref lists it as the same guy for every season, I think Zim officially manged them for a month when Joe Torre had a health problem. It's not an official managerial change, but it was a midseason change nonetheless. (Heck, B-ref notes Pete Rose's month-long ump-bump suspension in its managerial record).





Posted by: Chris Jaffe

September 21, 2009

What do hockey pucks from 1996 have to do with baseball in 2009?

While doing some background reading for my 2010 Hardball Times Annual article, I ran across an interesting article about the development of the FoxTrax hockey puck in 1995 and 1996. The system was developed by Fox Sports to allow their TV broadcast to superimpose a blue glow around the hockey puck and add a comet trail to slap shots to help new American hockey viewers follow the action.

What does this have to do with baseball, you ask? [Dora the Explorer-like pause for you to ask.] I'm glad you asked. Let me tell you.

The development of the FoxTrax puck is part of the history that gave us PITCHf/x. The people involved in the FoxTrax development were expert engineers in fields like navigation electronics from Etak, radar systems from defense think-tank SRI International, and video effects from Silicon Graphics. Many of these people went on to found Sportvision, including current Chief Technical Officer Marv White, Sr. VP of Engineering Ken Milnes, and Chief Scientist Rick Cavallaro.

One of the chief treats associated with my attendance at the 2008 PITCHf/x Summit was an hour sitting in Ken Milnes' office with Alan Nathan talking sports engineering. Among other things, Ken showed us a FoxTrax hockey puck and talked about its development. So I had some idea of the technical ancestry of PITCHf/x and the engineering challenges that Sportvision and its FoxTrax predecessor had tackled. But the interesting thing about this article by Rick Cavallaro was the detail with which he described the engineering challenges involved and how the FoxTrax team took on and solved each one. If you're interested in engineering and how it applies to sports, I highly recommend you read the whole article.

I'll give just a few highlights here as they relate to PITCHf/x, HITf/x, and the upcoming FIELDf/x. The FoxTrax team had to learn about cameras--tracking the pan, tilt, and zoom of broadcast cameras and correcting for lens distortion. These lessons have direct applicability to tracking the orientation of the PITCHf/x cameras and reversing the effects of their lens distortion.

They developed an x-y-z coordinate system for the ice rink and method for registering the location of objects detected by the cameras in this coordinate system. This registration system has been adapted for the calibration of PITCHf/x cameras to an x-y-z coordinate system for the baseball diamond. They also learned about the on-the-ground tricks required for wiring up systems at hockey arenas and connecting them up to their broadcast truck, lessons later applied during the PITCHf/x installations during 2007 and the ongoing maintenance of those systems.

If this topic interests you, check out another telling of the same story and of Sportvision's history.
Posted by: Mike Fast

September 07, 2009

Ichiro’s 2000th hit

Ichiro Suzuki recently gained his 2000th hit. According to this story, (hat tip, BTF he achieved that distinction in the second fastest time ever, 1,402 games - whereas Al Simmons did it in 1,390 games.

That's nice to know, but it leaves me with a question. As I'm sure everyone out there in reader-land knows, Ichiro came to MLB a fully formed player in his prime. Usually, guys have to spend a couple years growing into the game and for the best players that's usually in their early 20s. Thus Ichiro should have an advantage in reaching 2000 hits if one measures it purely by games.

Let's look at age instead. Ichiro was 27 in his rookie season and is age 35 now. Using, Baseball-Reference's Play Index let's see where Ichiro stacks up. I should note in advance doing it right now is actually a tad unfair to Ichiro, as his age 35 season isn't completed, but we can account for that after seeing the results. My own hunch is that if he's 2nd fastest to 2,000 hits in terms of games, he'll do worse when comparing him to others from ages 27-35.

So you can imagine my surprise when I saw the results. Ichiro, even though he hasn't even finished his age 35 season is in first place, and not by a small amount. Not only is he the only guy to tally 2,000 hits in that time, he's the only one over 1,900 hits as well. Assuming he stays healthy and doesn't trail off too badly (both fair assumptions), only Pete Rose will achieve 90% of Ichiro's hits in these ages.

I suppose that makes sense. The man is averaging over 220 hits a season and will probably end up averaging 225 when 2009 is all said and done. There's only been 62 times in all baseball history someone got that many hits in a single season, let alone averaged it for almost a decade. While I was right to note Ichiro missed the early warm up period, I forgot to account for the decline most players experience by age 35. Ichiro keeps on a-chooglin'.

What I also find interesting in that list is that only 5 of the top 19 currently have 3,000 hits in their careers - I have to say currently because both Ichiro and Derek Jeter are legitimate shots to reach that plateau.

All this leads to a new question: is this the most hits anyone has ever had in any 9-year period? Well, let's see:

Most hits by the following ages:

Ages 20 to 28: Ty Cobb 1,786 hits
Ages 21 to 29: Joe Medwick 1,801 hits
Ages 22 to 30: Willie Keeler 1,905 hits
Ages 23 to 31: Paul Waner 1,860 hits
Ages 24 to 32: Jesse Burkett 1,891 hits
Ages 25 to 33: Jesse Burkett 1,882 hits
Ages 26 to 34: Jesse Burkett 1,846 hits
Ages 27 to 35: Ichiro Suzuki 2,000 hits
Ages 28 to 36: Bill Terry 1,861 hits
Ages 29 to 37: Pete Rose 1,837 hits
Ages 30 to 38: Pete Rose 1,840 hits
Ages 31 to 39: Pete Rose 1,833 hits
Ages 32 to 40: Sam Rice 1,821 hits
Ages 33 to 41: Sam Rice 1,762

I guess I could go further, but the point is clear: no one has ever had such a hit-terific 9-year stretch as Ichiro. No one has even come close.

Well, one last question then: what may the future hold? He was Japan's annual hit-king and has lashed out base hits like no one else in the history of MLB since his arrival year. As an added bonus: he does a great job staying in shape. Barring an unexpected injury (which is always a possibility regardless of conditioning, especially as one ages), Ichiro has a good bet to get more hits from age 36 onward as anyone in history.

With that in mind, here is the list of most hits by anyone from their age 36 season onward. Seven guys topped 1,000 hits, so I really like Ichiro's odds to crack 3,000. If two guys approached 1,500 hits, then I think Ichiro is a serious contender for 3,500 hits - provided again that he doesn't suffer from an injury (which is far from a given). After all, he should end this season over 2,030 hits.

Posted by: Chris Jaffe

July 15, 2009

Warren’s Wizard

This week I received in the mail a pre-publication, uncorrected page proof version of a new book: The Wizard of Waxahachie: Paul Richards and the End of Baseball as We Knew It, by Warren Corbett.

Ordinarily, I would write a review of such a tome for THT. However, in this instance in all good conscience I can't review it, because I have no objectivity toward it. I've been closely watching and anticipating this ambitious project for several years. Warren even allowed me to edit one of the versions of his manuscript, for which he graciously credits me in his Acknowledgments.

So, take this recommendation for whatever it's subjectively worth: the book is terrific. Paul Richards is one of the most significant figures in major league baseball history, yet no serious, comprehensive Richards biography had ever been produced. Until now: Corbett presents an impeccably researched, sharply observed, fluidly written account of this brilliant, flawed, and perplexing character. This is a must-read for any serious student of baseball history.

The book's publication date is October, but you can pre-order a copy here. You will not regret it.
Posted by: Steve Treder


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