Mack On Baseball – Chapter 1 - “Inches”

David Rubin and I were talking last night about what makes a good player great. We both are basically old school pundits, though it seems that he is making the conversion to a saber-dude much easier than I have.

I’ve seen so many people play this game at so many levels. I’ve had the advantage of covering games in neighborhood grassless fields to the perfectly manicured Field 1 in the Mets complex in Port St. Lucie. I’ve watched six year olds hit off a tee while their father/coach goes nuts because his son didn’t hit the ball 400 feet into the gap. And, I’ve sat behind home field with a radar gun and watched professionals throw the same pitch three times in a row, but each winding up in three different corners of the strike zone.

I believe every person that reports sports for a living eventually learns enough about the game to recognize talent. The newbies almost become groupies while the old salts eventually fall victim to the “who-what-where-how-when” approach taught in Journalism 101.

Don’t let anyone tell you that journalism courses in college aren’t subjective. I took my first at Florida State University when I was in the Air Force. The teacher asked us to write a 500 word description of something that meant something special to me. I wrote about the room I lived in and finished the piece with a last sentence of “and the three most important things to me were my books that taught me everything I know today, my writings which are the best ever written, and my bottle, in case everything else fails me. The teacher game me a B+.

Three years later, I had to take the same course when I attended St. John’s University, a catholic school in Queens, New York. I turned the same paper in to a teacher named Father John Divine, and all I did was change one word. “Bottle” became “Bible” and I received an A.

Sports are equally subjective, but at so many other levels. One drive to a basket could be a charge handed out from one referee while another would grant the ball handler free throws for his effort. A 35-yard field goal attempt by a professional could be made blindfolded in practice, but everything is different when an opposing coach freezes the kicker with a last second time out and a gust of cross-wind kicks up just when the foot hits the leather.

Baseball is no different. David and I were talking about Mets pitcher Bobby Parnell. Here’s a guy that spent his entire youth as a starting pitcher, only to be converted to the pen after he hit a wall at the AA-level. Parnell possessed plus-heat, but he also gave up 224 walks in 521 minor league innings.

There’s only so much a scout can do to recognize potential talent. Young ballplayers only possess raw tools like being able to throw hard, run fast, and hit a ball a long way the few times they luckily square up with a bat. Clay Carroll, an ex-Atlanta Braves relief pitcher told me that “everything else can be taught or refined”.

Well, the Mets put the time in to teach Bobby control and, sure enough, he learned to consistently throw strikes while retaining his velocity. He learned so well that he routinely now throws 97-101 fastballs right down the pipe.

The problem is there is too much control. The fastball is straight as an arrow. A fast arrow, which would intimidate players in his old school division, but not seven figure paid superstars that make their living hitting fast pitching.  Parnell’s heat never moves and eventually, as the Mets learned in 2011, velocity without movement isn’t the answer.

There also is a head problem here, which we will talk about in a future chapter, but suffice to say that the same pitch with an inch or two of redirection near the end, is basically the difference between a pitcher like Parnell and, let’s say, Mario Rivera. Rivera basically throws one pitch, but you never know where the hell it’s going to end up. Parnell’s is like on a conveyor belt.

Baseball, like all sports, is a game of inches. A ground ball is hit between third base and shortstop. One of three things can happen here. Either infielder can field the ball and throw it to first, or the ball can go through to the outfield. Well, really five things could happen here. You have to add the fact that either infielder could make an error trying to field the ball. No, that’s seven things when you add that either infielder could field the ball but throw it wildly to first base. Err, make that nine things if the first baseman drops… you get the picture.

Can this be represented correctly through Sabermetrics? Why would you give a batter credit for something an infielder doesn’t do correctly?

I remember a conversation I had once with a Mets pitching prospect named Matt Durkin. Matt was a 2^nd round draft pick whose career was cut short after TJS surgery. We were talking about his outing the previous night and how frustrating it was for him. His third inning started by getting the first two hitters to an 0-2 count, only to lose both of them to infield errors. The next thing he knew was there were runners on first and third with no outs, and the team’s top hitter was up at the plate. At this point in the conversation, I reminded him that both those runners wouldn’t be held against him (ERA), and he reminded me that the fact that he should have two outs rather than two runners took him completely off the game mentally. Durkin went on to give up three runs, two walks, and never got out of the inning.

What’s the Sabermetrics formula for the ability to block out all the shit going on around you and getting your job done without developing a headline on ESPN?