Opposite field power
With pitchers and catchers reporting soon, I've been gearing up to get back into blogging shape for the 2013 season. In doing so, I came across the following two graphics on ESPN's Home Run Tracker:
These two images are the home run charts of Andrew McCutchen and Pedro Alvarez, respectively, from 2012. As a writer I love all of baseball's little literary nuancesl and as a scientist I love the way that baseball's hidden truths can be teased out of its reams of statistics, but as a baseball fan I love the way an opposite field home run can just absolutely suck the life out of an opposing pitcher.
Baseball's almost here. Life is good.
Pat ~ In NO other endeavor in Western Civilization is there greater opportunity for analysis by the lay person to grade and compare an individual's performance. Medicine? Architecture? Other professional fields? NO. They lie hidden in the academia of their field
Other sports, say football or hockey? NO.
Only in baseball, the Grand American Past-time, may an observer wax ad infinitum over their most beloved performer, through truly an endless array of criteria, in order to see more fully the player's value. Or, most likely, to prove superiority over a challenger.
Even in my youth, far before all of the meta-metrix, foreign letter combinations (such as UZL), I would compare the season of Roberto Clemente to Willie Mays and RIco Carty and Henry Aaron and.... However, then and now I rely on the same metrix.......
To this day, I still rely on the simple three figure synopsis of AVG, HRs, RBIs to denote value. All of these other measures I truly appreciate, most often do not understand, andtherfore find confusing, or unnecessary.
So I salute you and all others younger than the "salt n' pepper" generation for the endless array of new methodologies to compare and analyze the so simple, yet all-so-alluring, sport of baseball.
