How improbable is a division win for the Mets? September 22, 2015
Posted by tomflesher in Baseball, Sports.Tags: Mets, Nationals, playoffs
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Following a brilliant, but short, start behind Jonathon Niese, the Mets won a 4-0 game against the Braves last night. Terry Collins made some of us hold our breath, lifting Niese after only 88 scoreless pitches, but went straight to the lights-out portion of the bullpen. Addison Reed worked for a few minutes, followed up by Tyler Clippard returning after a five-day layoff. Clippard allowed a single to Pedro Ciriaco and then threw two wild pitches to allow Ciriaco to third, but nonetheless stranded him to hold the 4-0 lead. Since every win counts, Terry brought in Jeurys Familia to close the game.
Last night’s win pushed the Mets’ magic number down into Ed Kranepool territory. It makes sense that Collins is managing this as a must-win series, for two reasons. He obviously lacks some confidence in the Hansel Robles – Bobby Parnell – Eric O’Flaherty portion of the bullpen, but he also wants to have the division clinched before Washington comes to town.
If we sweep Atlanta, then even if Washington doesn’t lose a game, our magic number drops to 5. From there, taking 3 from a four-game series against the Reds and 2 of 3 from a terrible Phillies team clinches the division. Giving up a game to Atlanta means having to sweep the Reds or Phillies instead, or relying on another team to help us, to clinch before the Nationals arrive. Since the end of the Mets series, the Nationals have scored 57 runs and allowed only 28 in 7 games against the Marlins and 3 against the Phillies.
Just one loss to Baltimore gives the Mets significant breathing room, because the Nationals play Philadelphia 3 times, the Reds once, and Atlanta three times before they meet the Mets. A team with some momentum could easily take those 7 games. A number of different possibilities exist to get a loss there:
- The Sunday (the 27th) 1:35 PM game against the Phillies, following a 4:05 Saturday start
- The one-day visit to Cincinnati (Monday the 28th) in between Philadelphia and Atlanta
- The Atlanta series, where a few solid players combined with no remaining off-days might push Washington over the edge
Again, it’s incumbent on the Mets to win their remaining series. One more from Atlanta, 3 from the Reds, and 2 from the Phillies mean Washington only needs to drop one game some time between now and the end of the season for the Mets to win the divsion. This is looking promising.
Two ends of the relief continuum September 21, 2015
Posted by tomflesher in Baseball, Sports.Tags: bullpen usage, saves, weird lines
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The Royals’ Danny Duffy nailed a three-inning save against the Tigers on the 20th. Now, it’s called a three-inning save, but Duffy did something about two to three pitchers do each year – he actually pitched four innings in relief. Recently moved to the pen, Duffy was still in shape to pitch four innings, allowing two hits and no runs while striking out six in relief of starter Kris Medlen. This year, only the Rays’ Matt Andriese has joined Duffy in the four-inning save club.
Four seems to be a soft limit under normal circumstances. There’s a handful of exceptions – Dick Hall recorded an eight-inning save in 1961, and 1920 was weird – but in recent memory, the longest save was a seven-inning effort by Joaquin Benoit in relief of Aaron Myette (who was ejected after four pitches and started the following day as well) and winning pitcher Todd Van Poppel. Ignoring Benoit, and Madison Bumgarner‘s brilliant five-inning save in the last game of the 2014 World Series, the last time a pitcher went 5 innings in a save was Blas Minor saving a game for the Pirates against the Mets in 1993.
On the other end of the spectrum, Huston Street recorded his 38th save for the Angels against the Twins on the 19th. He was called in to pitch only the last third of an inning – why would Mike Scioscia do that? Well, because Street had recorded his 37th save in a full inning pitched earlier that day in a 12-inning win. The Angels had used four other relievers to get to Street, and Los Angeles pitcher Garrett Anderson was crumbling in the ninth inning of game 2, so Scioscia waved for his closer. That doesn’t happen often; Jason Motte, Josh Collmenter, and Mark Lowe have all recorded saves on “negative” rest this year, but never two saves in one day. Jenrry Mejia came close on May 25 of last year, but as always, he was a disappointment; he saved game 2 after winning game 1. Joe Smith is the most recent one: he recorded saves 8 and 9 on July 1 of 2014, also for the Angels.
Mets Game 150 Quick Preview September 21, 2015
Posted by tomflesher in Baseball, Sports.Tags: Braves, Jonathon Niese, Mets, preview, Shelby Miller
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Jonathon Niese has started three games against Atlanta this year, and in two of the three, he’s allowed unearned runs. His ERA in three games against Atlanta this year is 2.03, but his runs per 9 is 3.57. With last night’s defensive struggles in mind, and Niese’s difficulties, Terry Collins needs to be especially mindful of having a strong defense behind Jonathon tonight.
Gary Carter and Quackerjack
Meanwhile, Shelby Miller is on a skid – the Braves have lost both of his starts against the Mets this year, and Miller has put up a 4.38 ERA in his two starts against New York. Miller has an 8.36 ERA in three September starts, all losses, with a horrific .408 batting average on balls in play. Besides the defense, though, he’s putting up a .414 OBP-against and a 1.71 K/BB control ratio (2.00 if you remove a single intentional walk). Those numbers are a bit inflated because Miller faced a blistering Mets squad on September 10 and the Blue Jays on the 16th; though he may have a bad time, this is not a pitcher who the Mets should look past, particularly with Yoenis Cespedes still recovering from the slump he broke out of last year.
With the magic number stuck at Gary Carter‘s 8, this is a crucial series for the Mets. The Braves have been vile this year, and even if the Nationals go 2-1 against the Orioles, the Mets can push the magic number down to 5 by the end of this series with just 2 wins against the Braves. That means splitting a series with the Reds puts it at 3, even if the Nationals sweep the Phillies, giving the Mets a chance to either put it away by sweeping the Phillies themselves (clinching by October 1) or, if they win 2, coming into the season-ending series against Washington needing only to avoid a sweep. Again, that’s assuming the Nationals don’t help us out at all, taking 2 against the Orioles, sweeping the Phillies, winning their single game against the Reds, and sweeping the Braves.
I’m Still With 47 September 21, 2015
Posted by tomflesher in Baseball, Sports.Tags: #imwith47, gratuitous Hansel Robles, Mets, Subway Series, Yankees
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Photo: slgckgc on Flickr
Hansel Robles took the loss last night on an ugly line – 2/3 of an inning pitched, 5 runs on 3 hits, a walk, and a wild pitch. It was a tough way to lose – the story of the game was Matt Harvey leaving after five shutout innings of one-hit baseball and, so the narrative goes, Robles coming in to crap it up. I’d like to suggest that it’s not entirely fair to throw this all on Robles.
Robles’ first batter was Jacoby Ellsbury, who reached on a throwing error by second baseman Daniel Murphy. His second batter was Brett Gardner, who reached on a fielder’s choice. Ellsbury was safe on the fielder’s choice due to a catching error by David Wright. Let’s keep track of that – although the official scorer considers Gardner to be Robles’ only earned run, Gardner should have grounded out.
At that point, Carlos Beltran hit a double, which should have been a completely innocuous hit with no one on. Brian McCann struck out – inning over, in a parallel universe where Juan Uribe hadn’t suffered an injury coming out of the game (or where Wilmer Flores or Kelly Johnson comes in to play second, rather than Murphy). Even allowing for Gardner to reach safely and Beltran to bat him home, that gets followed up by a wild pitch with Greg Bird at the plate, followed by walking Bird, and a swinging strikeout of Chase Headley. Worst case scenario, Robles gives up the tying run.
From there, it’s a totally different ballgame – Sean Gilmartin or Addison Reed comes in to at worst a tied game in the 7th, followed up by a chance for Tyler Clippard or Reed to take the eighth and Jeurys Familia closing to the strains of “Danza Kuduro” in the ninth. Don’t get me wrong – Collins has made a lot of excellent moves this season. Last night’s sixth was a comedy of (literally) errors, but a few other moves made it look like Collins had decided the game was already out of hand by the seventh.
Sometimes the bullpen just needs some work (Game 145 recap) September 16, 2015
Posted by tomflesher in Baseball, Sports.Tags: bullpen usage, Marlins, Mets
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Photo: Keith Allison from Hanover, MD
Last night’s loss to Tom Koehler of the Marlins was tough for Jacob deGrom – not in the sense of tough losses, but because two big innings hurt deGrom so much.
Jacob twice allowed 3 runs in an inning. Using the Baseball Reference play index, I dug up a couple of other times that’s happened – once earlier this year against the Marlins, once in April against Nationals, and once in June of last year against the Cardinals. Jacob just usually has a better handle on the offense than that.
Mike Dunn‘s lights-out seventh inning – Koehler allowed two walks, but Dunn struck out Curtis Granderson, Yoenis Cespedes, and Daniel Murphy in order – took away some momentum. An unfortunate wild pitch by Eric Goeddel to put Miguel Rojas in position to score off a Christian Yelich groundout with Eric O’Flaherty at the plate seemed to put the game out of reach for the Mets, despite a nice showing by Michael Conforto against Koehler and Bryan Morris (2 for 3 with a walk, one strikeout). Dee Gordon is unfortunately unstoppable.
Bobby Parnell acquitted himself well, and I appreciated Terry’s opportunity for Dario Alvarez. Although the game wasn’t out of hand as early as Terry went to the second string bullpen guys, I’m glad to see Parnell getting opportunities, and Dario Alvarez being used in this situation. O’Flaherty had been on ice since September 4, but pitched well, despite allowing a single (to Gordon) and an intentional walk.
Hopefully, that’s out of our system now.
World’s Worst Mets Preview, Game 145 vs Miami September 15, 2015
Posted by tomflesher in Baseball, Sports.Tags: #imwith47, gratuitous Hansel Robles, Marlins, Mets, preview, Tom Koehler
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Jacob deGrom at bat. Photo: Arturo Pardavila III
Last night’s win against the Marlins of Miami had several positives:
- The triumphant return of Hansel Robles
- A baserunning error by Juan Lagares that in the end was still not that big a deal
- Kyle Barraclough allowing his second earned run of the season, causing his ERA to grow to 0.96. You heard what I said. ERAs can grow to .96.
Several indicators tonight point toward the positives continuing. With a magic number of 10, the Mets are starting Jacob deGrom against Stony Brook alum Tom Koehler. Since August 1, Koehler has a 5.48 ERA; over his last five games, that drops to 5.34 with a 1-3 record. That is, however, working with a pretty nasty .345 batting average on balls in play. His season BAbip is .276, which indicates that the defense behind him may be lacking.
Mets have hit Koehler reasonably well:
| Name | PA | AB | H | HR | SO | |||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Kirk Nieuwenhuis | 8 | 5 | 2 | 1 | 0 | .400 | .625 | 1.200 |
| Travis d’Arnaud | 16 | 12 | 5 | 0 | 1 | .417 | .563 | .583 |
| Yoenis Cespedes | 6 | 6 | 3 | 0 | 0 | .500 | .500 | 1.167 |
| Kevin Plawecki | 2 | 2 | 1 | 0 | 1 | .500 | .500 | .500 |
| Ruben Tejada | 27 | 22 | 7 | 0 | 1 | .318 | .423 | .500 |
| Curtis Granderson | 23 | 19 | 4 | 0 | 5 | .211 | .348 | .211 |
| David Wright | 27 | 24 | 6 | 0 | 6 | .250 | .333 | .375 |
| Lucas Duda | 30 | 24 | 3 | 0 | 6 | .125 | .300 | .208 |
| Daniel Murphy | 30 | 27 | 6 | 1 | 2 | .222 | .300 | .333 |
| Wilmer Flores | 11 | 11 | 3 | 0 | 2 | .273 | .273 | .455 |
| Juan Lagares | 23 | 23 | 6 | 0 | 2 | .261 | .261 | .348 |
| Michael Cuddyer | 8 | 8 | 2 | 0 | 1 | .250 | .250 | .375 |
| Jacob deGrom | 8 | 7 | 1 | 0 | 4 | .143 | .250 | .143 |
| Eric Young | 14 | 12 | 1 | 0 | 1 | .083 | .214 | .167 |
| Kelly Johnson | 10 | 10 | 2 | 0 | 3 | .200 | .200 | .200 |
| Michael Conforto | 5 | 5 | 1 | 1 | 2 | .200 | .200 | .800 |
| Anthony Recker | 9 | 8 | 0 | 0 | 1 | .000 | .000 | .000 |
| Dilson Herrera | 3 | 3 | 0 | 0 | 3 | .000 | .000 | .000 |
| Juan Uribe | 3 | 3 | 0 | 0 | 1 | .000 | .000 | .000 |
| Eric Campbell | 2 | 2 | 0 | 0 | 1 | .000 | .000 | .000 |
| Total | 275 | 242 | 53 | 3 | 47 | .219 | .308 | .347 |
If Terry wanted to start a lineup based on those stats, we’d have an outfield made up of Kirk Nieuwenhuis, Yoenis Cespedes, and Curtis Granderson; Lucas Duda at first, Ruben Tejada at short, Daniel Murphy at second, David Wright at third, and Travis d’Arnaud catching. (Aside from starting Kirk rather than Michael Conforto, that’s pretty much our standard lineup anyway.) Since Kirk got the start on Sunday, starting him again so soon, and leaving Conforto on the bench, might be a suspect move, but there’s quite a bit to be said for the strong bench that gives Terry a left-handed option (in Conforto) and a right-handed option (Juan Uribe) who both have some pop.
Marlins closer A.J. Ramos last pitched on the 12th; his last blown save was September 4, and he hasn’t allowed a run since. The overall Marlins bullpen has a 3.40 ERA, but performs slightly worse in high-leverage situations than in other situations; the Marlins as a team have a 5.19 ERA against the Mets this year.
This is a game where a few runs early on will make a big difference for the Mets, and as long as they leverage their high OBP against Koehler, they can keep pushing the magic number down.
Quickie – The distance-elasticity of extra point successes September 14, 2015
Posted by tomflesher in Economics, Football, Sports.Tags: elasticity, extra point, point after touchdown
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Baseball content will resume with the next update.
The NFL moved the lineup for the point-after-touchdown from the 2 to the 15; since the ball is snapped back eight yards, and the end zone is ten yards deep, the kick moved from a twenty-yard kick to a 33-yard kick.
There were a couple of oddities this week so far, including a 48-yard extra point kicked by the Browns yesterday. Also, an unusual number of PATs were missed. In 68 extra-point attempts, 64 were successful, for a completion rate of 94.11%. Last year, in week 1’s Sunday games, 60 attempts were made, and 59 were successful (98.33%). If you include all Week 1 games, that percentage rises to 98.61% (71 out of 72). We can roughly estimate the PAT’s sensitivity to distance using an elasticity formula, percentage change in completions over percentage change in distance.
Percentage change in completion rate = 100*(98.61 – 94.11)/94.11 = 4.78
Percentage change in distance = 100*(33-20)/20 = 65
4.78/65 = .07, meaning that a 1% change in the distance would yield about a .07% change in completion rate. Since teams pretty rarely kick field goals from the 15, it’s tough to calibrate that to other data, but it’s likely that this isn’t a constant-elasticity function. A small change close to the goal line probably has a very small effect (as demonstrated), but a small change further away would likely be a much bigger deal.
Mets Game 143 Recap – 2-out RBIs a-go-go! September 14, 2015
Posted by tomflesher in Baseball, Sports.Tags: 2-out RBIs, Braves, Mets, RBIs
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After yesterday afternoon’s roller coaster, the Mets are at magic number 11. That’s after a – frankly – ridiculous outing where the Mets were actually at a prior 0% win probability. Peter Moylan‘s strikeout of Kevin Plawecki in the ninth inning, 3 runs up, actually moved the win probability to 100% for the Braves, meaning (roughly) that from that state there was no expectation that the Mets would win the game. Never one to listen to statistics, Juan Lagares doubled, Curtis Granderson walked, and Daniel Murphy promptly tied the game with a home run. That’s three two-out RBIs. Later on, Kirk Nieuwenhuis scored from 3rd when Plawecki reached on an error with two outs. Lagares walked, and then Granderson walked to force in Ruben Tejada, and Murphy walked to force Plawecki home. Though Kevin didn’t get an RBI for his play Granderson and Murphy each notched a 2-out RBI.
For the Braves’ part, Andrelton Simmons and Adonis Garcia each notched an RBI with two outs as well.
There’s an underlying mythology that Mets fans hold – the Mets are killer in the clutch. They play better with 2 outs than any other team. For the most part, that’s actually true – the Mets lead the league in 2-out RBIs in 2015 with 266. What’s more, they’re fourth-best in the league on defense, with only 174 2-out RBIs allowed this year. They’re in the upper half for go-aheads with 2 outs, as well, with 47 (behind the Yankees’ 58 and nine other teams).
One side note: the Mets have 13 walks with the bases loaded – that is, run-scoring walks. Granderson leads the team with 5. Of those 13, 12 – Twelve! – came with two outs. Other teams have 194 walks with the bases loaded, and 102 of them came with two outs. After Granderson’s five, seven players (Jose Bautista, Yonder Alonso, Michael Brantley, Marcel Ozuna, Francisco Lindor, Josh Donaldson, and Logan Forsythe) are tied with 3. All three of Donaldson and Lindor’s RBI walks came with two outs; take note, there are two Blue Jays in that list. The Blue Jays have five walks with the bases loaded and two outs.
That’s right. The Blue Jays, combined, have as many of those as Curtis Granderson, and Granderson’s have all come since August 8. The Mets’ team OBP had hovered between .290 and .311 for the first few months of the season, but ballooned to .337 in August and .378 in twelve September games. The Mets have been setting the table and when you play the game right, these oportunities present themselves.
Clippard’s Vulture Win and the Braves’ Double Plays September 13, 2015
Posted by tomflesher in Baseball, Sports.Tags: Braves, double plays, Mets, vulture wins
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During last night’s 6-4 win over the Braves, Mets setup man Tyler Clippard allowed three runs in the eighth, when Adonis Garcia hit a game-tying home run. Tyler finished the inning gamely, and then (through no fault of Clippard’s) the Mets scored two runs – Kelly Johnson batted Eric Young, Jr., home off of closer Arodys Vizcaino, and Yoenis Cespedes batted Johnson home off of reliever Peter Moylan.
Clippard’s sixth blown save of the year was a special kind of decision called a vulture win, which exists when a pitcher blows a save but gets the win anyway. It was Tyler’s first this year. Jeurys Familia relieved him immediately in the ninth for the save. Of the 492 blown saves thus far in 2015, 185 were in games the pitcher’s team won. Vulture wins are a very tiny proportion of those blown saves. Brad Boxberger has two; so do David Robertson, Greg Holland, J.J. Hoover, John Axford, Justin Wilson, and Luke Gregerson. No one has three this year.
In addition, the Braves (led by Andrelton Simmons) turned four inning-ending double plays with a runner on third. Of the 2228 inning-ending double plays this year, 429 came with third base occupied. Atlanta, including last night’s 4, has turned 27, or over 6% of them – almost double what would be expected. The Cubs have turned the fewest, with 6. 7, including all four of last night’s, were turned behind Braves starter Williams Perez.
Behind all of this, Noah Syndergaard shined, facing 223 batters in 7 innings of one-run baseball. Despite his hopeless inability to bunt (which set up a double play with Wilmer Flores on third), he managed to pitch to a 76 game score and hold the game in check so that even Clippard’s buzzarding didn’t cause any major issues.
Give Noah a fair shake. September 12, 2015
Posted by tomflesher in Baseball, Sports.Tags: Noah Syndergaard
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Noah Syndergaard is set to start tonight’s game in Atlanta. Syndergaard has had a tough year on the road: he’s 7-1 with a 2.15 ERA in 10 starts at Citi Field but 1-5 with a 4.91 ERA in 10 road starts. However, the offense hasn’t been good on the road, and there’s an argument that the defense hasn’t been supportive on the road.
In Noah’s road starts, the team (not Noah, necessarily) has beaten the Dodgers and Phillies, and lost to the Cubs, Pirates, Padres, Braves, Cardinals, Nationals, Rays, and Orioles. In his home starts, the Mets have won against the Brewers, Phillies, Blue Jays, Reds, Diamondbacks, Padres, Nationals, Rockies, and Red Sox; his only home loss is to the Giants. The road teams Noah has beaten have a combined record of 134-148; the teams he’s lost to on the road combine to 585-539. Meanwhile, his loss to the Giants at home was Chris Heston‘s no-hitter, and his wins came against the bottom-dwelling Red Sox, Reds, Rockies, and Phillies, and the fourth-place Padres, Brewers, and Braves, the balance coming against the Nationals (who he lost to on the road) and 3rd-place Diamondbacks (still below .500). It’s true that Noah isn’t as good at home as we’d like to pretend.
He isn’t as bad on the road as we think, either, though. Three of those road losses are to the ridiculous NL Central, including the Cubs, Pirates, and Cardinals. (The Cubs are in third place and still have more wins than the NL East-leading Mets.) He’s overall faced a tough schedule on the road and not received much help – 29 runs of support (that’s 1.2 below the league average) on the road, compared with 48 at home (over 2/3 of a run above the league average).
Credit Flickr user slgckgc
That corresponds to his 1-2 road record in August, bolstered by Yoenis Cespedes, Juan Uribe, and Kelly Johnson and receiving 4.67 runs per game of support . (He’s 3-0 at home in August.)
In addition, Noah’s batting average on balls in play (BAbip) at home is .240. The league average hovers around .290, meaning that more balls in play are hoovered up by the defense at home than would be expected. On the road, not so good – a Farnsworthian .364. Without a doubt, Noah has some issues – he more than doubles his home walk numbers on the road from 9 to 20 – but he’s gotten some very unlucky hits as well.
Finally, a piece of advice: Let Noah face no more than 18 batters. When facing batters for the first time, he holds them to a .288 on-base percentage, and pushes that down to .246 in the second appearance. That balloons to .333 when a batter sees him for the third time. With a strong and rested Mets bullpen, don’t be afraid to hook Syndergaard for long man Sean Gilmartin or lefty specialist Dario Alvarez. Make sure that if you leave him in, you have a strong defense behind him, and for heaven’s sake, help him out by producing some runs for him.
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