SB Nation User Blog: ncgostl

A History of Goats

ncgostl — Fri, 09 Oct 2009 22:19:39 -0000

A History of Goats

This article helps provide perspective. Even the Babe::

"Holliday, however unfortunate to have missed the ball due to glare or the white hankies being waved by the fans at Dodger Stadium, is on both sides now. He joins a fraternity that includes the likes of Smith, Bill Buckner, Mickey Owen, Fred Merkle, Willie Davis, Justin Verlander, Fred Snodgrass, Herb Washington and Babe Ruth.

Yes, even The Bambino was a goat once. You have to have goats if you have heroes. The decisive Game 7 of the 1926 World Series ended with Ruth trying unsuccessfully to steal second, leaving the capable Bob Meusel in the batter's box unable to swing away with the score 3-2, St. Louis."

Clinched: Team of the Aughts

ncgostl — Sun, 06 Sep 2009 02:37:39 -0000

Clinched: Team of the Aughts

With tonight's win and the Braves' loss, the Cardinals have clinched the most NL wins of the 2000s. It's been a great decade. Competitive nearly every year and averaging over 90 wins a season.

Tonight's win is #900 for the decade of the 2000s

ncgostl — Wed, 02 Sep 2009 03:05:16 -0000

Tonight's win is #900 for the decade of the 2000s

Halladay vs Pujols

ncgostl — Mon, 13 Jul 2009 17:35:37 -0000

Halladay vs Pujols

In anticipation of seeing this match-up in the first inning tomorrow night, check out this link (originally posted by CGSing 20 days ago).

Silver Sluggers

ncgostl — Fri, 14 Nov 2008 03:14:12 -0000

Silver Sluggers

Pujols and Ludwick win. Cardinals are the only team with two winners.

http://mlb.mlb.com/news/article.jsp?ymd=20081113&content_id=3678086&vkey=news_mlb&fext=.jsp&c_id=mlb

Experience at THT

ncgostl — Wed, 12 Nov 2008 20:30:55 -0000

Experience at THT

When the Cardinals won the WS in 2006 after barely squeaking into the playoffs, I speculated to a friend that maybe their playoff experience in the previous years had been helpful. As we all saw, the Cardinals seemed much more poised than the Tigers (see "pitcher fielding"). The Cardinals had been in the playoffs in 5 of the 6 previous years and had gone to the NLCS 4 of those years. This was much more experience than the Padres, Mets, or Tigers. Of course, it's the kind of anecdotal, "soft," non-sabermetric thought that I usually do not allow myself to entertain. But it seemed plausible.

My statistically-minded friend pointed out that "it's testable."

Well, David Gassko at THT has done the test. He doesn't report a lot of detail, but does run a logistic regression that includes both pythagorean wins and average team experience to predict playoff outcomes over . Here's the link (or click on the title above):

http://www.hardballtimes.com/main/article/does-experience-matter-in-the-postseason/

My guess is that there was enough roster stability for the Cardinals in the mid 2000s (Pujols, Edmonds, Suppan, plus imports like Eckstein) that it would score pretty high on the average experience score that Gassko calculates.

posts at beyond the boxscore

ncgostl — Thu, 23 Oct 2008 13:30:52 -0000

posts at beyond the boxscore

Sky Kalkman has a nice post on Pujols at Beyond the Boxscore--no surprises to those who follow Albert and are sabermetrically minded, but nice summaries. He's also posting similar analyses for other positions.

Also, see
http://www.beyondtheboxscore.com/2008/9/24/620979/the-eight-most-underrated

John Patterson released by Nationals

ncgostl — Thu, 20 Mar 2008 21:36:20 -0000

This is a surprising cut. Should the Cardinals be interested?

Washington Post article here.

Low Nielsen Ratings

ncgostl — Mon, 30 Oct 2006 18:36:08 -0000

I'm tired of hearing about this being the lowest rated world series. So was last year's. And the 2000s have been lower than the 1990s. That's not news. But, to show this, I did a quick analysis using data from ESPN (see data below for years 1996-2006). I did a multiple regression regressing either Rating or Share on year (coded 1 = 1995 to 11 = 2005) and on # of games played. I deliberately excluded 2006 to pick up the trend by year to see where you'd expect 2006 to fall. The outcome is very simple:

Year is a highly significant predictor in both regressions despite the small sample. # of games makes no difference.

Ratings are dropping 1/2 a point per year.

Share is dropping 1 point per year.

The upshot: Thhe 2006 viewing results are right at what you'd expect given larger patterns in TV viewing (i.e., more shows, more use of the internet, etc.).

The aberrant World Series was 2004, which was well above the trend (technically, it's "residual error" is 1.6 standard deviations above what would be expected). Thus, our Cardinals were in the most unexpectedly popular World Series in recent years; of course, credit for the level of interest is shared with a large Red Sox fan base and the mystique of an 80 year old curse. (It wasn't due to an exciting series.)

I'll go out on a limb and predict that next year's share will be about a point lower than this year's.

The ESPN data are included below.

Year Rating Share #Games
2006 (Fox)    10.1    17    5
2005 (Fox)    11.1    19    4
2004 (Fox)    15.8    25    4
2003 (Fox)    12.8    22    6
2002 (Fox)    11.9    20    7
2001 (Fox)    15.7    25    7
2000 (Fox)    12.4    21    5
1999 (NBC)    16    26    4
1998 (Fox)    14.1    24    4
1997 (NBC)    16.8    29    7
1996 (Fox)    17.4    29    6
1995 (Fox-ABC)    19.3    33    6

Albert at Baseball - Reference

ncgostl — Thu, 05 Oct 2006 00:41:41 -0000

If you're not familiar with baseball-reference.com, you should check it out. It has an amazing collection of historical statistics. The 2006 season has been added. And it is now time to admire the greatness that is Albert.

One of the breakdowns the website offers is the top 10 players for various offensive statistics at different ages (21, 22, 23, etc.). Here's the link to leaders at age 26:

http://www.baseball-reference.com/leaders/leaders_26_bat.shtml

Albert is all over the place, including many counting stats (e.g., doubles, home runs, total bases, extra base hits). His presence on the counting stats list is striking because Albert has far fewer plate appearances than most others since he started "late" (at 21), compared to guys like A-Rod. (It would be nice to have a different type of leader page: Leader based on number of years played (not age). Albert would be even more insanely great by that cut.)

The leader page also gives you a sense of his "comparables" at this age, and it's an impressive group. There are very few lucky, flash in the pan types in the lists--they're almost all hall of famers. The blindingly obvious implication is that, at this sample size, Albert is in an undeniably elite group and the group as a whole has amazing overall careers. Now it's about staying healthy.

Also check out his player page and his "comparables" through age 26 (bottom of the player page).