Most important stats

For Bill James, the sabermetrics guru, offense was on base % and slugging % which now are combined in the OPS statistic. Slugging is important because it measures extra base hits and their frequency. Bill James suggested in his early writings that there was no such thing as "clutch hitting" and when the statistics were closely examined most alll hitters had the same success with runners in scoring position as they did in the non clutch situations OVER THR LONG HAUL. I am not sure I agree with that but I don't have the stats to disprove it.

I think, on the other hand, that your analysis on pitching is right on. The only one I would add would be number of runners advancing to scoring position without an out per inning.

TW344

I will talk High School because that is what I coach and that is where my experience comes from.

Pitching
K's per innings pitched - No plays have to be made. In hs many more hitters reach on plays they should reach on. Even when no errors are made. Slow rollers , shallow fly balls , ground balls in the hole's etc. HS hitters can take .100 pts off their batting averages if college level players were on defense.

BB per innings pitched - We all know what happens when guys walk. Their is no defense for a BB.

Hits per innings pitched - If your giving up base hits your not missing barrells. The more hits you give up the more runs the other team is going to score.

If your not striking anyone out. Your walking people. And you are giving up hits. You are not the guy we want on the hill.

Offense
On Base % - Do you get on base? I dont care how you do it as long as you find ways to reach.

K's- Do you strike out alot? If you do you are killing us. Put the ball in play. We have a chance if you do that.

Slugging % - Extra base hits score runs and they move runners into scoring posistion.

Batting Average Against Quality Pitching - Come playoff time we are going to face the better pitching because the better teams have the better arms. I could careless if your hitting .450 but your hitting .125 against the quality pitchers. But if your hitting .333 for a good average against the quality pitchers your going to be in the line up when it matters.

We always chart what we do with risp and what we do against the quality arms. Stats can be very misleading at the HS level if not recorded properly.

These are the stats that I am concerned with. We do a very good job with our stats. No padding anything anytime for any reason. We need the data to be as accurate as possible.

HS stats can be funny. Here's one, my kid pitching against previous years state champs. 0-0 in 4th champs have 2 on, one out. Coach goes to mound, "I want you to throw the ball as hard as you can down the middle" Next pitch goes 380 feet, It's on the pitcher but is it really. Also HS coaches that make kids take the first pitch, just stupid and skews the stats.

Smalltown - can't agree more with your posit.

Was envolved in program that advocating first pitch on batter kockshot down the middle. Usually had negative results, and immediately put the pitcher in the stretch and it went downhill from there.

When I played we were taught to tease the corners and pitch inside to save your job...just a different time and place.
JMO

Thats not poor stat keeping thats just poor coaching. The stats are only as good as the people keeping them and how they are used.

Its "one" reason college coaches really dont put much stock in hs stats.

Another reason is the difference in the caliber of competition from game to game and from area to area.

Im still waiting to play that team that starts everyone out with a cockshot on every first pitch. That would be nice.

I find the typical daily MLB pitching stats in the USA Today (for example) to be quite boring. Yes, it still tells us which pitchers have the best ERA, have the most wins, strike out the most batters, pitch the most innings (cumulative season long), etc. But they don't give us 'efficiency' stats.

These stats probably exist somewhere and I'd like to see them rather that some of the other c-r-a-p. First, how about 'outs per start'? Tell me how deep the starters go into the game (on average). Is my guy a 5 inning starter or a 7 inning starter? I like "quality starts' as well and that would be a good one to include in a new stat tracker for USA Today. How about 'number of pitches per inning' or 'pitches per out', to tell us how efficient they are. Are they strike out pitchers or like Maddux, do they pitch to contact? To take into account a bad bullpen, similar to quality starts, perhaps they could track how often pitchers turn the lead over to the bullpen (may or may not have received the win)?

Those are just some things off the top of my head I'd be interested in seeing.

Coach May has a great list there for HS.

We always keep two groups of stats: overall and vs. quality pitching. I highly lean on vs. quality pitching when it is crunch time and a playoff lineup has to be made.

I also like to chart swings vs. swings put into play. Our pitchers that give up a high ratio of swings put into play are not who we want to go to in crunch time. He may have more wins or some other good stats; but let's face it, if they are swinging and putting it into play that's when it gets interesting.

One year we tried to use a system I got from former University of Indiana coach - Bob Morgan. He called them quality at bats. The problem Coach May was talking about of getting a good stat keeper is what forced me to drop it. We are lucky to find a person to keep scorebook let alone another stat sheet. I hate having parents keep the book because of obvious reasons.

Anyway, the quality at bat is pretty obvious but it factors on hard line drives as being productive. It breaks down each at bat and how you get on.

It uses a +1, 0, -1 system for an at bat. If you hit the ball hard or advance a runner or get a solid basehit then you get a +1. Anything routine like a groundball or flyball then you get a 0. Anything hit weakly or if you fail to advance a runner then you get a -1. At the end of the game you take your + and - and add them all up and divide by number of at bats.

What's great about it is you benefit if you crush a one hopper to the shortstop who makes a great play and gets you at first. That is considered a +1 for the stat because you did what you were supposed to do - hit it hard. If you get a Texas Leaguer which finds the Bermuda Triangle that falls in that gets you a -1 for the stat because you didn't hit it hard.

I like the stat because it rewards the guys for hitting a ball hard and makes them focus on line drives instead of lazy fly balls. You know how it is when a guy hits four screamers in a game but the defense makes a play on all of them that sometimes leads to a slump because the guy to start pressing and trying too hard. This stat (if the guy buys into it) should help the guy stay in a positive frame of mind.

I have probably forgotten a few things about it trying to describe it. It's buried in some boxes somewhere but if anyone wants to know more about it let me know or PM me your address and I will mail you a copy of it.

It really is a good stat.

Now we are talking baseball , I love this stuff. After going through a stretch of the season a few years back where we were not having enough qab's quality ab's we started playing a QAB scrimmage once a week. This is how it worked.

We put a defense on the field and we pitched from the L screen. Four hitters on a team. You got +1 for the following. A hard ground ball anywhere. A line drive. A base hit. A home run. A BB. If you hit a weak ground ball but you moved a runner you got a +1 and a sac bunt was a +1. You got a -1 for K's, Pop ups , fly balls that didnt leave the yard , fly balls that fell but should have been caught , weak ground balls , weakly hit balls even if you reached on an error etc. So each team would get 3 innings to make as many points as they could make. The point was to get them to focus on having QAB's. Hit the ball hard on the ground , line drive , move runners etc.

It amazed me how much better our ab's were when we really got the guys to realize how many more runs we scored in games when we did this. And the boys love it its alot of fun.

coach2709,

the oakland A's also use that system. i mentioned it before on one of these sites. regular batting avg.then a quality at bat or hard hit avg. because your right you can hit four hard line drives and be out and hit a little bloop hit for a basehit. this approach really helped my son mentally when hitting. we always talk about the quality at bats.as long as they are driving the ball , and swing is compact .this does help frame of mind.

You can have a QAB and strike out. Do you agree with me on that? I have seen some tremendous AB's that have ended in K's. I have the scorekeeper "who just happens to be a math teacher at the school who just loves keeping stats" place a star in the top left corner of the box. This means QAB.

My goal is for each kid to have 2 QAB's a game. When we get this we win everytime. Because someone is going to have 3 and sometimes someone is going to have 4. If you get QAB's throughout your line up you are a very hard team to beat.

quote:

Originally posted by Coach May:
You can have a QAB and strike out. Do you agree with me on that? I have seen some tremendous AB's that have ended in K's. I have the scorekeeper "who just happens to be a math teacher at the school who just loves keeping stats" place a star in the top left corner of the box. This means QAB.

My goal is for each kid to have 2 QAB's a game. When we get this we win everytime. Because someone is going to have 3 and sometimes someone is going to have 4. If you get QAB's throughout your line up you are a very hard team to beat.

Amen to your last two posts. That is a great idea about the quality at bat game.

I figured that you guys have heard of the quality at bat stat but you really don't see it down as a stat. We all teach it but we all don't really show it to the guys as a stat.

I agree that a strikeout can be a quality at bat. What I teach offensively is to attack from first pitch. We really stress and teach the strike zone. We look for fastballs in most of the zone early on and want to attack them to hit them hard. We lay off curves and changes early in the count because most time they won't be in the zone. By doing this we can get a pitcher's pitch total up pretty quickly.

I always give a quality at bat to a guy who sees about 8 pitches from a pitcher and strikes out. If we can get 2 out of 3 hitters to do that this pitcher will be gone in about the 4th inning.

Some very good discussion going on here.

QUALITY AT BATS: I agree with Coach May that a strikeout can be a "quality at bat" but the hitter needs to make the pitcher throw a few pitches [more than 5] to get that designation. One thing that has not been talked about here is the importance of the right kind of foul balls. Pitches that are close to the outside corner or inside corner must be swung at with two strikes. Does anyone work on what the hitter does with those pitches? I don't mean in theory but do you take time in batting practice or cage work to finetune hitters in that area. I have used a cage drill where the hitter swings at every pitch regardless of location with the idea of fouling them all off with either ground balls or line drives [no fly balls or popups allowed]. How do you know they are foul balls? because you have white strips placed on the netting on the foul side of third base and the foul side of first base.

AT BATS AGAINST BETTER COMPETITION: I think this is an extremely important statistic to isolate and study. Here in West Virginia the baseball talent can vary greatly from school to school. Some high schools put a competitive team on the field year after year. Others seem to never have any talented baseball players though they may have an excellent track team and football team. Still others go through cycles where they are competitive for a couple of years and then they begin rebuilding and are not that good for a couple of years. We are lucky enough that a local paper in Parkersburg keeps detailed statistics of hitters and pitchers for our entire conference and they are updated each week during the season. It makes it a great game when your team is facing the pitcher that leads the conference in ERA. Then you find out who can hit the good pitching and who cnosistently goes 2 for 4 against bad pitching and 0 for 4 with 4 strikeouts against any good competition he has to face. But remember the 2 most effective strategies against good competition, is getting on base and forcing the starter to throw a lot of pitches. At least that is my opinion, for what it is worth.

TW344

quote:

Originally posted by coach2709:
One year we tried to use a system I got from former University of Indiana coach - Bob Morgan. He called them quality at bats. The problem Coach May was talking about of getting a good stat keeper is what forced me to drop it. We are lucky to find a person to keep scorebook let alone another stat sheet. I hate having parents keep the book because of obvious reasons.

Anyway, the quality at bat is pretty obvious but it factors on hard line drives as being productive. It breaks down each at bat and how you get on.

It uses a +1, 0, -1 system for an at bat. If you hit the ball hard or advance a runner or get a solid basehit then you get a +1. Anything routine like a groundball or flyball then you get a 0. Anything hit weakly or if you fail to advance a runner then you get a -1. At the end of the game you take your + and - and add them all up and divide by number of at bats.

What's great about it is you benefit if you crush a one hopper to the shortstop who makes a great play and gets you at first. That is considered a +1 for the stat because you did what you were supposed to do - hit it hard. If you get a Texas Leaguer which finds the Bermuda Triangle that falls in that gets you a -1 for the stat because you didn't hit it hard.

I like the stat because it rewards the guys for hitting a ball hard and makes them focus on line drives instead of lazy fly balls. You know how it is when a guy hits four screamers in a game but the defense makes a play on all of them that sometimes leads to a slump because the guy to start pressing and trying too hard. This stat (if the guy buys into it) should help the guy stay in a positive frame of mind.

I have probably forgotten a few things about it trying to describe it. It's buried in some boxes somewhere but if anyone wants to know more about it let me know or PM me your address and I will mail you a copy of it.

It really is a good stat.

I like this. So, how do I score a texas leaguer that scores or moves a runner? Just use my best judgement...or make it a 0?

Also, how is a walk scored? +1 or 0?

We score a walk as +1 and moving a runner +1.

my son has always felt the go/fo ratio was an personal stat that he paid attention to because it indicated if he was keeping the ball down. But #1 was the black dot in the ab box aka a first pitch strike that dictated who was going to own who..

Estone28 I think you can play this one by ear. Myself personally I would probably count it as a +1 if I had a younger team. I would do that to help bolster confidence and aggresiveness which is what we want.

A more vetern team probably give them a 0 because they should be mature enough and knowledgeable enough to know they helped the team but wasn't exactly the best type of hit - more luck than skill.

That's what I would do but regardless be consistent in how you grade it all year because the kids will know. If you waffle any then the stat loses credibility.

Ironically - I think the most important stat is one that cant be measured.

You cant measure heart.

quote:

Originally posted by Coach May:
You can have a QAB and strike out.

I preach QAB's every time at bat, as a goal. (and have done so for forty years!)

Should a kid K looking, it's not a QAB.

Should a kid go down hacking, and itls an 11 pitch AB, then it's a borderline QAB.

I also preach, one out of three AB, take a sh^thouse or castle swing!

cheers

quote:

Originally posted by Bear:
Should a kid go down hacking, and itls an 11 pitch AB, then it's a borderline QAB.

11 pitch at bat is borderline QAB is pretty harsh but to each their own I guess.

our hitting coach actually does his stats with a point system to basically determine "productivity." he never shows kids offensive stats, just their productivity score. its similar to what COACH MAY has in his game, yet we do it game to game, +1 for this, +2 for this, etc. he values them on what he feels helps us win. neat system imho!

I hate looking K's but sometimes I can't complain either. There are times a kid battles his butt off and fights off some borderline pitches really works the count and then takes a pitch obviously out of the zone and gets rung up. Im not going to say a word to that kid other than "Good at bat!"

If all your guys have a QAB approach your going to have a good game offensively.

Given that approximately 70% of lines drives drop in for hits and about 30% of ground balls end up as hits why would you rate them the same? I'll agree that a higher percentage of hard hit grounders probably end up as hits but it still doesn't compare to hitting a line drive. There are also a lot fewer DPs turned on line drives than on hard hit grounders.

The purpose of our "ground ball scrimmage" is to focus on hitting the ball hard on the ground or a line drive. What you do not want to do is hit pop ups or lazy fly balls. In hs especially, a hard ground ball is one of the best ways for your team to be successfull. #1 it has to be hit in a location the fielder can reach it. #2 he has to be able to field it #3 he has to make an accurate throw #4 they have to catch that throw before you reach the bag. Alot can go right for the team that puts alot of hard ground balls in play and very few pop ups or routine fly balls. Pop ups and routine fly balls take only one play to make. All they have to do is catch it. In games where you hit alot of pop ups and lazy fly balls you struggle to score especially when you have some K's.


Of course we want to hit alot of hard line drives. But even a hard line drive only requires one play to get you out. So we score them the same. Hit a hard line drive or a hard ground ball. What happens when your whole team is trying to launch bombs , maybe a bomb maybe two but alot of pop ups , routine fly balls and K's. This doesnt get it done.

It is an attempt to get kids to focus on the fact that a hard ground ball is a QAB. Too many times kids get fly ball happy. When you hit alot of hard ground balls some find holes. And you put alot of pressure on teams to constantly make plays. And you hit some line drives. You end up scoring more runs.

So the bottom line is square it up and make something happen. Force the other team to make plays to beat you.

On hit & run or run & hit situations, I would prefer a ground ball to a line drive. The liklehood of a ground ball hit at a fielder resulting in a double play in those situations is far less than that of a line drive hit right at a fielder which, when caught, will almost certainly be a double or even a triple play. Also usually at least one fielder [and often two or more] are moving away from their defensive position and towards a base before the ball is struck creating more "holes" where a ground ball can skitter through the infield. And if when you practice hitting ground balls you teach your hitters to anticipate such actions on the part of the defense and adjust their approach accordingly, you make your chances of success in those situations even better.

There are probably other situations where you want a ground ball instead of a line drive. Anyone out there want to add to the list?

TW344

quote:

Originally posted by TW344:
On hit & run or run & hit situations, I would prefer a ground ball to a line drive. The liklehood of a ground ball hit at a fielder resulting in a double play in those situations is far less than that of a line drive hit right at a fielder which, when caught, will almost certainly be a double or even a triple play. Also usually at least one fielder [and often two or more] are moving away from their defensive position and towards a base before the ball is struck creating more "holes" where a ground ball can skitter through the infield. And if when you practice hitting ground balls you teach your hitters to anticipate such actions on the part of the defense and adjust their approach accordingly, you make your chances of success in those situations even better.

There are probably other situations where you want a ground ball instead of a line drive. Anyone out there want to add to the list?

TW344

Runner on 2B and ground ball hit to the right side to advance him over.