Rox Talk

Hot Stove News

Not much from the Rox front. Nice to see Baylor back in the purple pinstripes. Hurdle will have two former managers ready to take over when the Rox struggle out of the gate next year. At least it will keep him honest.

It's the Weather, Stupid!

To further my cause in esoteric baseball research I decided to look at the effects on homeruns and weather at Coors Field. Weather data comes from baseball reference. Data includes 2007 and 2008 numbers (grey boxes and line) and includes Rox and opponents homers. Circles are the 2007 and 2008 data points. The rate is determined by taking the total number of homers for the point and dividing this by the number of times that point occurred (i.e., it has been 80 degrees 5 times during the last two years and a total of 9 homers have occurred so the rate is 1.80). So below is temperature and generally the trend is that has it gets warmer the rate of homers increases. The weighted mean temperature at Coors Field over the last two years has been 74 degrees. The average homers hit at Coors over the last two year has been 2.2 a game. Eighty-three degrees has had the most home runs hit (27)

The next graph shows wind speed and home run rate. Generally as the wind increases homers decrease. This graph is independent of the whether the wind is blowing in or out. The weighted average of wind is about 7.5 mph.

The final graph gives the wind direction. Generally we don't have a Wrigley effect. When the wind is blowing in (147 homers, 67 times) a rate of 2.2 and when blowing out (106 homers, 48 times) for a rate of 2.2. Also it seems when that when the wind blows out the wind speed averages about 6.5 mph while when the wind blows in it is about 8 mph. The most homers occur when the wind is blowing in from centerfield (85) although the highest rate is when the wind blows from left to right (which also has on average the higher wind speed).

This Month in Comics...?

Yup I am on some wacky comic schedule with all my books coming in on the same day!

Buffy #19

Last issue in the Fray crossover. Have to admit this wasn't all that interesting to me as I never read the Fray comic books so have no real buy in with the character and really not for sure why Buffy was there in the first place other than we get so sort of time traveling Willow redemption or something. All story lines can't be that great...

Flash #3

I have been totally impressed by the story and art on this book. Although obviously the character isn't new the viewpoint is and it shows that decent comics can be made even if they aren't from the Big Two (of course it is probably debatable if the Big Two are producing any quality comics. Secret Invasion had potential but got mired and really thudded to the ground by the last issue. Final Crisis and no one seems to care so again it is refreshing to read and see something new for a change.

Batman #681

OK so why does every big storyline in comics lead to the death of a main character. I am sick of this being the plot point to try and expand or start a comic in a new direction. Morrison's storyline was brilliant in some ways and just a carbon copy of former big event storytelling. Have all the good storylines been taken? I mean Batman having a broken back, great...the leveling of Gotham, good...killing him off, I just don't know. One complaint was even after reading the books, then getting online to get a Cliff Notes version of the RIP storyline, I still had to shake my head. The most shocking aspect was a complete revisionist history on who his parents were...that was good. Anyway, I like involved stories but with Morrison things just seem to get lost. Like the whole New X-men run, how did Zorn and Magneto become one? Perhaps 600 issues of continuity just bogs a writer down...

Daredevil #113

The Lady Bullseye saga continues. I think this story will need to gestate beyond this short introduction run. Not for sure if you can really add a new villain and get the bang that you are looking forward. Hopefully they can develop the character and not make it seem cheap. We shall see. 

Haiku Wednesday

Jingle

Merry chime of bells
Catchy tunes spread like snowflakes
Ban the Ba Humbugs

Larry Niven - The Flight of the Horse

A collection of Niven's more sci-fi fantasy related short stories.  Couple of stories about his time traveling character and I guess his one and only all fantasy short story.  Nice work if not quite in the sci-fi vain you come to expect although the underlying humor and quirkiness is there.  What a great imagination!

Rox Talk

This is an update to a post that I did back in July. The Rox at the time had played 108 games. This post updates through 162 games with both our offensive and pitching...

A couple of weeks ago (June or July 2008) I was listening to the Rockies radio broadcast team, Jeff and Jack, and Jack Corigan made the statement that basically said that as your (i.e. the pitcher) pitch count increases in the inning the more likely a run is going to be scored. From the sound of this it made me go hmmm. Two questions immediately popped up...1) is this true (logically you would think yes) and 2) what is on average the amount of pitches thrown in an inning that would allow a single run?

Well off to baseball reference where on their box score page they show the amount of pitches thrown in an inning along with the number of runs. By taking this data and plotting the number of pitches per inning, the runs scored for that number of pitches, and annotating in a running log how often this number of pitches occur in an inning, I was able to come up with the number of pitches thrown in 2008 by Rockies pitchers and what is the average number of pitches thrown to allow for one run in an inning (i.e., a 12 pitch inning occurred 127 times and a total of 18 runs were scored for a rate of 0.14 runs). Conversely the Rox offensive saw 12 pitches only 90 times and scored 10 runs over the season for a rate of 0.11 runs.

Graphically all this data looks like this:

This first plot shows the number of pitches versus the total runs. The size of the circle indicates how often this number of pitches were thrown. The next plot shows the distribution which indicates that 12 and 13 pitches were thrown in an inning approximately 249 times or accounting for about 17.2% of the total innings pitched. Conversely the Rox offensive saw 12 and 13 pitchers approximately 172 times for only about 11.9% of the total innings pitched to them.

The final plot shows the rate at which runs are scored. So for instance 26 pitches in an inning occurred 26 times and a total of 45 runs were scored. Thus giving a rate of 1.73 runs scored when 26 pitches are thrown. If you plot this rate you get this...

A relatively nice curve that has a Rsquare of about 0.8189 (versus 0.6766 for our offensive). If you throw out the outliers you can get a better curve fit. After about 30 pitches in an inning the number of times a team scores runs tends to mess up the rate (i.e. 31 pitches in an inning occurred 14 times with 34 runs scored while 32 pitches happened 6 times with only 11 runs scored). If you take the equation and solve for 1, you get approximately 20.5 pitches for the Rox pitching and 20.6 for the Rox offensive. Pretty consistent.

So there you have it...it does appear as you throw more pitches in an inning, the likely of runs being scored increases.

Follow on questions would be could you establish pitcher effectiveness based on this (i.e., Cook threw 3,068 pitches this year, divided by 20.5 would indicate he should have given up 150 runs (but actually only 102)). Actually a more representative way to look at this would be average pitches per inning that Cook threw (14.5) which would represent approximately 0.53 runs per inning or 113 runs over his 211 innings pitched. And of course you can turn this around and say that Tulowitzki saw 1,536 pitches and if you divide by 20.6 then he should have scored about 75 runs instead of the 48 that he did. But if you look how many pitches he saw per plate appearance (3.6) and multiplying the rate (0.10) by plate appearances then he should have scored only 41 runs. Lowest pitches per inning average was by Buchholz at 13.4 and the most pitches seen was by Podsednik at 4.5 pitches per plate appearance.

College Football

AF final regular season game...where did the season go.  Sitting at 8-3 it would be nice to finish with a W but going into Texas to steal one might be tough.  With a win we might get a better bowl but we shall see.  I think we lose a tight one 21 - 17.

Last week's gun and fun has Notre Dame sinking Navy, Wisconsin scoring 18 unanswered points in the 4th to beat Minnesota...the battle of lakes and freezing temps, New Mexico St losing to Fresno St (which by the way, what state is Fresno?)

Week lucky 13 matchups...battle of 1-6 Indiana teams with Purdue and Hoosiers, battle for Tennessee with Vols and Vanderbilt battling, and what exactly is Citadel doing playing Florida in the Swamp?

Books Change With Time?

As a book lover I obviously keep all the books that I found enjoyable at one time.  In high school I read a lot of Heinlein.  His book The Number of Beast was one of my favorites.  The underlying concept that there are 6 to the 6 to the 6 worlds out there and that every world is created when someone decides to write a story always fascinated me.  And it is funny that the two stories I always go back to is ERB Barsoom books and the Baum's Oz books are featured in this book.  Great serial novels taking a basic ideal and keeping the characters alive.  So having read some ERB lately I decided to revisit the book to see if it held up after all these years.  I figure it has been 20 years since I last read it and while I thought it was ok I sort of got bored with it about halfway through and pretty much skimmed the rest of it.  The whole part with L. Long I just couldn't remember.  Overall it just didn't speak to me like it once did.  Wonder how much that is the case with other books that I hold high esteem for?

Haiku Wednesday

Stuffed

Stomach is guilty

Turkey carcass stares at me

Sure, give me some pie

Magazine Update

The New Yorker

Interesting review of the 2008 election. Always interesting to read everything in hindsight. I mean they plug the whole "change" thing and say that was the essence of the election. Had McCain won what would "change" of meant?  Bottom line was "change" was what the people wanted and from the sound of it the cash that flowed to Obama was a dominating factor in helping him to win.  Good all around articles.  Later in the issue was a fiction piece by Jonathan Lethem called "Lostronaut" Weird ass story about a failing space station and the occupants aboard. Kind of a sad story....

Rox Talk

This week the pitching HOKE are in. See below...note pitching is a bit more complicated in the formula:

Total Bases (1B, 2B, 3B, HR) + RBI (minus HR) * RBI base factor (see last week's post) + Hit By Pitch + Walk + Balk + Stolen Base + Wild Pitch - Pick Off - Caught Stealing - Double Plays - Offensive HOKE = HOKE

Note: that I take the pitcher's offensive HOKE and subtract it from their pitching HOKE because a pitcher's goal is to have fewer bases allowed and since they bat and can add bases to their count (granted very few) this gets subtracted. So for instance Cook had 474 HOKE and faced 886 batter's (he also batted 78 times himself) and so had 3,232 possible HOKE which gave him a percentage of 14.7% or 101 HOKE+ (note the MLB average was 14.9%) . See the chart below for this year's pitching prowess (compared to last year's). HOKE, followed by HOKE (or base) per plate appearance, HOKE divided 4 for runs, HOKE+ (based on MLB average), RC or Runs Created, WPA, and WS or Win Shares (a win is worth 3 win shares).

Obviously the team did a bit better in 2007. Interesting to note that while Cook's HOKE+ wasn't that much greater in 2008 then 2007 he had a much better season in the eyes of many fans. Hopefully Corpas can come back to form and Buchholz continue his bullpen prowess. If Street in facts stays in the mix that makes us have a pretty good pen for next year. Also if Francis can gain back his form from 2007 that makes a pretty potent 1-2-3 (assuming Jimenez continues to improve). De la Rosa is a decent 4th man which leads us to find a fifth between Hirsh, Reynolds, Morales, and Smith.

Now that I have the HOKE complete for both offense and pitching, I have to wonder if it really means anything? Does Holliday's 135 versus Buchholz's 129 mean much? Holliday had 23 win shares to Buchholz's 9 (7.5 wins to 3 wins). Buchholz's average of bases per plate appearance was 11.5% versus Hollidays 20.1% (MLB average 14.9%) but Buchholz only played in 59 games versus Holliday's 139. So although it is interesting that bases are the one thing that can be compared to pitcher's and batters the final number probably still doesn't allow you to compare a player's real value to his team (and versus his teammates). Perhaps next week I will take a look at the MLB in general and find what the top player's HOKE are...