To Succeed, Keep Your Eye in FRONT of the Ball

I always heard that the way karate fighters break through all those boards is that they focus on a point below/past all the boards. (Not sure if that's true, but at least it correlates with this post!) This recent study in PLoSONE fits with that for baseball. The best baseball hitters don't keep their eye on the ball, but in front of it. Their gaze automatically anticipates the location of the ball where it will hit the bat. This may be too fast for them to even know what they are doing, but they are not so much reacting as predicting. They are literally seeing -- or at least anticipating -- the future.

This is what learning can do, make prediction automatic. I propose that if learning anticipation is the trick to baseball and to karate, then it's also the trick to science and biochemistry and all sorts of other things.

And no number of Google searches will compensate for this trick when it comes to abstract knowledge. This is what I will try to teach -- keep your mind in front of the ball.

Why It Can Be Hard to Hit a Baseball

Check out this animated .gif of the movement of Yu Darvish's pitches. They all start at the same place but they end up in completely different locations. How is someone supposed to hit that?:

Is the fact that the Mariners beat this pitcher once this season (out of the two times they've seen him) evidence that the high point of the season is already past?

Source link here.

Beautiful, Breaking Bat

(Here I go making a pun reference to a  TV show I haven't seen but really want to start, some day ...)

I didn't see this happen but heard about it second-hand: the hit that broke open Game 7 of the NLCS last night shattered the hitter's bat and actually hit the bat two or three times. Just look at this:

Something about that is just beautiful, the way the bat bends and the ball just rolls along the line of the wavering wood of the bat, more scooped than struck. It's like one of those slo-mo water droplet pictures, and it basically meant the Giants return to the World Series and the Cardinals don't. So, more Angel Pagan!

Nice analysis of whether this was a legal hit or not, and why it faked out the shortstop, here at Fangraphs.

How to Pitch a Perfect Game

Baseball is the best sport for after the fact analysis. Yesterday, after more than 5000 games for the Mariners franchise, a Mariners pitcher threw a perfect game. (If you know the Mariners at all, you don't even have to ask who it was.) But how did Felix do that? The game is broken down in this incredible piece of analysis, which shows very clearly just how the game changes as it wears on and players change their approach. Almost like an immunological arms race of pathogen vs. immune system. You can even see where the opposing manager argued a called strike, got thrown out of the game ... but then the umpire changed his strike zone as a result. So there IS a point to managers getting thrown out of games. I think I could teach a whole math and strategy class on this one game. 

Does the Unbalanced Schedule Make Baseball More Boring?

As of today there are only 1, maybe 2 of the 6 divisions in baseball in which the winner of the division is not already settled, with almost a month of baseball to play. I honestly do not remember a close race in September -- ever. Now, part of that is the fact that I'm a Mariners fan and they haven't been exactly competitive the past decade or so, since I've become a fan (remember, kids, correlation is not causation!).

The thing is, I remember in about the year 2000 that a new "unbalanced" schedule was introduced, in which teams would play the other teams in their divison more often. This was specifically introduced to make September more exciting. It's clearly had the opposite effect. At least I don't have to worry about important baseball games interfering with preparation for the upcoming school year.

That's why I'm skeptical about schemes like adding a second wild-card team or realigning the divisions. I remember the claims made with past innovations (Exhibit A: "This time it counts!"), and I cannot remember one that really worked. Of course, I wasn't around when they introduced the DH, but I always must support that innovation because it gave us St. Edgar of the ALDS Double. I'm not diametrically opposed to so-called innovation, just skeptical.

On the other hand, advanced statistical metrics for understanding baseball? More please.

And Now Aidan the Sports Reporter Talks About the Mariners Game

I told Aidan he could "report" on the M's game today for the blog, so here goes:

"The Mariners won 6 to 1 today against the San Diego Pay-dres. They got a winning five streak today. There was one intentional walk before Felix Hernandez got to go up to bat. Carlos Peguero got a 2-RBI double today. It was amazing how he hit it and how fast the Mariners player on first ran to get to home. There were like about 13 strikeouts from Felix. He pitched really well. Only a couple hits for the Pay-dres."

Watch out ESPN!

Animated Baseball Standings as 2010 Played Itself Out

In the series of "useless but interesting baseball graphs," check out this large picture file, which animates each AL division race from last year from April through October, which each division side by side with the others. When the ball gets a little trail to it there's a trend up or down in the winning or losing (in the case of the Mariners last year, mostly losing). Also, when two teams switch places in the standings a little line forms between the symbols. Sitting through the losing was painful, but now that it's over watching that little Mariners ball plummet throughout the season is kind of soothing in a fishtank at-least-2010-is-over kind of way.

No Team is an Island ... Except the 2010 Mariners

At least on this graph the Mariners are similar to Houston, but if you break it down by league, the Mariners are, as the author of part one of this series put it, "an island." It can only get better!

Baseball: The Game of Inches

So close, yet so far from being a home run.

The reaction of the batter is also classic.

And the Giants win again!

Charlie Brown's Baseball Team Actually Exists ...

... it's just called the Kansas City Royals (currently in 4th place in the AL Central). See the reasons why in this excellent blog post by a Royals fan blog, "Royals and Peanuts Baseball Eerily Similar."

Glad to Have that Johjima Shirt (Again)

We bought the boys two Mariners shirts a few years ago: one was #51 Ichiro and the other was Johjima. Since then Ichiro's been as consistent as always but Johjima's lost a bit of power, been injured, and been in a sort-of-spat with one of the starting pitchers blaming him for some bad starts (in my assessment not really Joh's fault, more the other player-who-will-not-be-named-later). He was already showing signs of decline when suddenly he was signed to a big three-year contract that has the fingerprints of "forced by the ownership" all over it. I was still a fan, but it didn't seem to be working out, and I was hoping for a turnaround.

The turnaround happened in an altogether suprising way. Johjima walked away from the guaranteed two years' salary to return to Japan, be with his family and play every day. Worries of an albatross contract turned into that all-too-rare feat in baseball: a graceful exit.

When you look at the numbers you see we got more than our money's worth out of Johjima. And now that I see his own sense of honor in the face of imperfect circumstances, I'm happy to have my kids wear his shirt again, just like I still wear John Olerud's All-Star shirt from 2001. Nice job.

Now, if we can start talking to Carlos Silva about just pay ... (Don't tell the player's union!)

Call of the Year

This is too funny. Usually I find Mariners' announcer Mike Blowers annoying but apparently on Sunday he turned clairvoyant. You need to listen to both audio clips in order to understand what's going on. Oh ... and make sure your volume's turned down for the second clip ...

http://mynorthwest.com/?nid=374&sid=218287

The Monstah at the End of this Post

This is where I was tonight. The seats date back to 1912 and are much narrower than the seats I'm used to. A big iron post (seen on the left of the picture) blocked my view of third base. And the place was packed of course, so I got to hear about 35,000 people singing "Sweet Caroline" at the tops of their lungs. I abstained because I don't know the words and prefer to keep it that way. By the time time the first inning was over I already got to see the canonical sight: a small white ball going over that 4-story green wall for a home run.

Don't worry, I'm still a Seattle Mariners fan first and foremost. Red Sox Nation does have its annoying parts. But for the baseball historian in me, this was a unique and very much worth it experience.

Must Be Seen to Be Believed

You know, I know the Mariners have lost, like, 15 of their last 10 games (yes you read that right), but there's got to be a better way to get people to come to the ballpark than this:

http://seattle.mariners.mlb.com/sea/ticketing/special_group.jsp?group=cheezburger

On the other hand, I will never get tired of watching that "cat in the Kingdome" video.

This Must Be Rock Bottom

How bad is this season for the Mariners? So bad we're a punch-line in The Onion:

http://www.theonion.com/content/news_briefs/mariners_improve_to_eight

This literally made me LOL... the sad part is it's true.

A 15-Inning All-Star Game

I don't know why, but I was laughing through the All-Star Game. Not that it was a horrible game or anything, it's just that several things struck me as funny. Since the All-Star Game still doesn't really count for much, it's easier to look at the bad/unlucky things that happen and just find them, well, funny:

-- Seeing so much of underrated ex-Mariner George Sherrill
-- Seeing Ichiro's awesome throw to get Albert Pujols at second
-- Poor Dan Uggla with 3 errors in one All-Star Game
-- Every inning from the 9th on ... surely this will be the last ... surely the bases loaded with 1 out will mean a run will score ... nope!

My only disappointment is that I was hoping to see a position player have to get up and pitch. The game definitely had the right entertainment value for me, just not in the way the organizers were hoping.

Hey Batter Batter ... Don't Swing!

Lookout Landing (Mariners blog) posted this picture of last night's final at-bat in the Mariners game, Yuniesky Betancourt vs. Frankie "The-White-Stuff-Under-The-Bill-of-my-Cap-is-just-a-Fashion-Statment" Rodriguez. Amazingly enough, he didn't swing at pitch 1, which was called a ball. Then the next three IDENTICAL pitches were swung at, ending the game with a strikeout in a one-run loss. He would have been better off just standing there.

The scary part? This guy's one of our BETTER hitters this year. How bad is it this year? I cheer when the Mariners DON'T swing. (I actually saw Richie Sexson take a walk in a critical situation once. That was cool.)

The great thing about baseball is that even when your team is historically bad you can still analyze precisely how historically bad they are.

Don't Call Me Bartman

This post's title has a double meaning for those with ears to hear, joining two otherwise disparate topics:

1.) Today during our pastor's sermon he mentioned a quote from a few seasons ago on the Simpsons, the episode "The Father, Son, and Holy Guest Star" (the third is Liam Neeson, who voiced an Irish priest). The episode is about Bart and Homer's attempts to convert to Catholicism and is one of my favorites. The operative line from the clip is "Our God can kick your God's butt!" Note for skeptics: the passage was used with irony.

Anyway, during the afternoon I found the clip, burned it to DVD, and Laurie got it to church where it was used for evening services. I'm sure Scott Becker is watching over all this with a laugh.

2.) I took my unlucky Mariners glasses out of the back of the cabinet and took a drink. I'm full aware this is risky behavior: something bad happens to the Mariners every time I use these glasses. The last time I used them Chris Snelling was injured (OK, he was no longer a Mariner, and he's always getting injured, but STILL!). I think I was using them the night Soriano got a concussion from a line drive to the right ear, and then traded for The Worst Pitcher in Baseball ... I think I was using them that day too. SO, I use the glass today, and the Adam-Jones-for-Eric Bedard trade went through, reported today, WHILE I WAS SIPPING MY DRINK.

I'm still hopeful that Bedard can actually turn out to be a very nifty addition to our team, but I really doubt that the price of Adam Jones' potential (and probably two others who may be very good as well) is worth it in the long run.

The glasses have spoken. I am now even more skeptical of the trade ... let's go M's ... ?

Mariners in the Crosswords

Today's New York Times crossword is usually pretty hard, but I was able to get started fast on this one thanks to the following clue in the upper right hand corner:

"6'5" All-Star relief ace with two identical first initials" (6 letters)

Yes, it's JJPUTZ, Seattle Mariners closer. Finally, he's getting some New York press!

Mr. Spock's Favorite Baseball Website

Fans of the original Star Trek will recall how Mr. Spock has the helpful habit of being able to calculate his odds of survival at odd moments during the episode. Now we have a baseball site that can do the same thing for your team, live. Here it is:

http://www.fangraphs.com/livescoreboard.aspx

These are graphs of "Win Probability Added," updated live for every game in the league. What these do is they take the point where you are in every game (bottom of the fifth, one man on second, two outs, score 7-1 against the home team) and based on the history of recorded baseball it can tell you how many teams in that precise position won their game.

For instance, the Mariners are in that position right now, and they have a 4% chance of winning the game. It's like having Mr. Spock next to you telling you the chances of winning this game are 1 out of 25.

Oops, out of the fifth inning now with no change in score. Odds are now 1 out of 33 and dropping fast.

Therefore, I am currently blogging to the tune of American Idol.