51–60 of 92 posts
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Does it suggest that leadoff guys will be cheaper in the future? The next moneyball trend will be fast guys who can accurately place hits?
There's been a trend recently to put high OBP bats at leadoff regardless of their speed (see Kyle Schwarber)
Earlier quoted context omitted.
There's been a trend recently to put high OBP bats at leadoff regardless of their speed (see Kyle Schwarber)
And Schwarber as leadoff was a horrendous failure. See his .162 avg and .289 obp this year.
Other examples are Carlos Santana, George Springer, etc
http://www.espn.com/blog/sweetspot/post/_/id/79308/leadoff-h...
As many have said this is a tactical reaction to changes in pitching and defense. It always amazes me how balanced the game of baseball is compared to other sports. It's been around for more than a century and people have become so much stronger and faster on both sides of the ball. Still, offense and defense remain so perfectly matched. The bases remain 90 feet apart and the pitcher still throws from 60 feet away. A…
Rugby has remained Rugby, pretty much. There's been various changes over the years, juggling points for tries and penalties, introducing sin bins, and so on, but it isn't really anything fundamental. Where you do see changes has been in the physique of players, and to some extent it's cyclical. Teams adapt to circumstances, player sizes and types change, and then some outlier will come along and with a visionary coac…
Even 20 years ago at a club level, many things were allowed that aren't now: Quicker scrums, high tackles, raking the ruck with cleats, and general hooliganism seem to have been more par for the course than today.
I saw a match from 1977, and there was no Croutch/Bind/Set. The scrum just walked up toward each other and engaged immediately. More dangerous, but a lot different than today. The line-outs didn't lift; the hooker threw the ball in like a football lob.
>"The increase in frequency and efficiency of defensive shifts. According to FanGraphs, teams are shifting at a rate nearly 10 times greater than six years ago" This should be more prominent and is likely the root cause of guys swinging for homeruns more often. Every hitter will eventually fall into a pattern where they're hitting certain pitches to only a certain part of the field. With the increase in data it's muc…
Earlier quoted context omitted.
The offside rule's been there since long before WW1. They did alter the number of defending players needed to put a player on-side down from 3 to 2 in the mid 1920's. I'd argue that was altering an existing rule rather than a fundamental rule change though.
Then the other massive change was "no one can be offside when the ball is played" to "no one in an offside position can attempt to play the ball". Totally changed the way the offside trap was practiced, I believe. EDIT: This is what I was thinking of: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Offside_(association_football)... Doesn't say when the change in interpretation was made.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
There's been a trend recently to put high OBP bats at leadoff regardless of their speed (see Kyle Schwarber)
And Schwarber as leadoff was a horrendous failure. See his .162 avg and .289 obp this year.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Does it suggest that leadoff guys will be cheaper in the future? The next moneyball trend will be fast guys who can accurately place hits?
There's been a trend recently to put high OBP bats at leadoff regardless of their speed (see Kyle Schwarber)
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Yet he's still in the top 5 for the All Star pick; meh.
All Star voting doesn't mean anything other than popularity
Earlier quoted context omitted.
There's been a trend recently to put high OBP bats at leadoff regardless of their speed (see Kyle Schwarber)
I mean, it's not a terrible idea to put someone like Votto or Belt even at the top spot. These guys have very high OBPs who can work the count and coax out tons of walks. If they can get on base, that's really all that matters so the next guy in line can try to get them in.