2005 TBL pitching performance

Here's the 2005 data on pitching performance by grade. Righties are a little better. Don't know what was going on with grade 9 lefties in 2005, but they stunk. In 2005, righty 8s were better than lefty 9s and 10s.



And in graphical form:

TBL Pitcher grade performance

At the draft, I got into a discussion about the relative value of left-handed and right-handed pitchers in TBL. Bob is of the firm opinion that lefties get skunked, and I suspect that many in the league share his view. But I took a quick look at TBL pitchers in 2006, and it looks like the effect might not be as large as some expect. Here are the numbers - I haven't studied them long enough for me to hear them speaking:



These are quick and dirty numbers. I ignored split-grade pitchers. I lumped starters and relievers together. I have ignored control and homerun ratings - I have that data, and it's all over the place, but it shouldn't affect hits per 9 IP. There’s not a lot of data at the tails. But looking at grades 6-15 or so, there doesn’t seem to be as much difference as I expected. Mostly, the righties are a little bit better, but sometimes the lefties are. Some graphs might be better illustrations:





I'll be doing the 2005 numbers soon.

The Lineup Toy

Creating a batting order has long been an interest of mine. Around this time of year, baseball fans start discussing and thinking about lineups for their teams, and the question is always "what lineup would be best to use". So I made a little toy program I call The Lineup Toy to help answer the question, or at least provide a useful starting point.

In baseball, runs are generally scored by players getting on base and other players knocking them in. So it makes sense to put the best players at getting on base in front of the players who are best at knocking them in.

The players at the top of the batting order get more plate appearances than the players lower in the order. The higher a player's OBP, the fewer outs that player makes. Since the length of your game is limited by 27 outs, putting high OBP guys on top of a lineup gives your team more plate appearances as a whole, and more chances to score runs.

This suggests a fairly simple-minded strategy for constructing a reasonable lineup:
1. Put the best OPS in 3rd
2. Put the best remaining Slg in 4th
3. Put the best remaining OBP's in 1st and 2nd (with the better Slg in 2nd)
4. Arrange the remaining players in order of descending Slg

Now, this might lead to some pretty strange-looking creations. But like I said, it's a simple-minded method. The Lineup Toy doesn't take into account factors like speed and stolen bases. Take the Lineup Toy's suggestion and use some common sense to tweak it.

The 2006 final stats are done

Click the "2006 stats" link on the right.

So how do people feel about how the stats are compiled? Any suggestions?