Twins Moneyball. Take first Pitch. Analytics.

[hankchifan]

Read Yahoo Sports article on Twins finding a new Moneyball style trick/analytics that is working for them.  It’s taking the first pitch whenever possible. Analytics data is that hitters starting 0-1 are slashing.211/.255/.325 with ..580 OPS while those starting 1-0 are slashing .251/.317/.417 with .789 OPS. Twins have taken the first pitch 701 times while the White Sox last in this category have taken the first pitch 577 times.  They said pitchers have been avoiding first pitch fastballs to avoid getting ambushed.  First pitch strikes to Twinshitters have been averaging 56 % this season and the MLB average is around 60%. Food for thought.  At any rate, the message should be that White Sox hitters should be taking more first pitches.  Sox need to adjust. What they are doing now is not working.

 

 

[caulfield12]

Already posted...

[hankchifan]

34 minutes ago, caulfield12 said:

Already posted...

Sorry.  Didn’t see it.  My post is a synopsis of the article.

[reiks12]

One day the Sox will pay attention to analytics, but we arent there yet. Maybe when Jerry dies. Dave Duncan's son is head of the analytics department and he has 0 experience in math or statistics.

[Harold's Leg Lift]

[Dominikk85]

20-30 years ago players were always taking the first pitch, many coached in high school or little league have been saying don't swing at strike 1, i. E take until a called strike. 

 

However in the last years teams have increasingly gone away from auto takes, i. E you swing at every "fat" pitch in every count because you don't want to give the pitcher free strikes. 

Pitchers are so good these days that you just can't afford to take strike one down the pipe. 

Yeah, it is bad if you chase ball one but just auto taking is bad in today's game. 

Problem is the sox have quite a few hitters with very high chase rates. Robert, tim, burger, pollock, leury and Harrison all chase a lot, vaughn, engel and abreu (he actually improved quite a bit in that regard) are about average and really only grandal has plus plate discipline. 

However newer studies suggest that plate discipline isn't really about approach and patience (few players want to swing at everything) but about the physical ability to project the second half of the ball flight based on how the first half looks and modern pitchers make that harder with tunneling which means trying to make the first half of the pitch flight look the same on all pitch types.

Don't forget decision point of swinging when the ball is like 20 ft away so you don't have that info for your decision. 

 

20 years ago those players were simply told to work the count a little and take a few pitches and that works for some time but then pitchers realize that quickly and just attack the zone early and then make that guy still chase later in the count.

So the only way to improve that is improving the physical ability to predict ball flight in player development. 

Some teams have used VR programs for pitch recognition and also some gadgets (like there is a hoop with some triangles in it and you throw a pitch through it and then the hitter tries to memorize where in the hoop the pitch passes through but I don't know if sox player dev uses those tools. Modern pitching makes that quite tough. 

[FoxForce2]

4 hours ago, Dominikk85 said:

So the only way to improve that is improving the physical ability to predict ball flight in player development. 

Some teams have used VR programs for pitch recognition and also some gadgets (like there is a hoop with some triangles in it and you throw a pitch through it and then the hitter tries to memorize where in the hoop the pitch passes through but I don't know if sox player dev uses those tools. Modern pitching makes that quite tough. 

The term 'anticipate' would probably work better here than 'predict'.
We're getting into fast twitch response-reaction integrated with eye-brain cognition (among other dynamics) on this, and sure, the right kind of training will improve even the most naturally talented batters. But then there is the question of what the right kind of training is. One approach may be suited better to this guy while other method(s) may work with someone else.
Most of us have heard the story of Ted Williams who never mastered the art of managing or coaching. With regard to coaching, he had difficulty comprehending that his players and students didn't have the natural ability to perform at something like his level at the plate. He only connected with a few players who he was able to communicate ideas to, Tony Gwynn most notably. Even there, Gwynn was already established as a premier hitter who took on a few of Williams' ideas to good effect. 

Edited May 30, 2022 by FoxForce2

[Dominikk85]

There are VR systems which end the video after the first half of ball flight and then you have to click on a field with pitch type. 

 

Some think that can help but others think that VR is not advanced enough and the impression will be slightly different so it could actually do harm to do it. 

 

I have worked with some players using the gamesense app and I think it helped but those were mostly high school level players 

[Balta1701]

Twinshitters.