steve161
Is it new? I seem to remember Keith Hernandez doing pretty much the same thing, except that he moved rather more gracefully than Pearce.
8:01 PM Oct 16th

MarisFan61
.....and, except for my having no illusion about knowing better than Ned Yost (not to mention Dyson scoring the winning run, which sort of matters) :-) I still don't get it!

I'm lovin' it.​
12:59 AM Oct 15th

DaveFleming
They also have a surprisingly low number of players having good individual seasons. Alex Gordon leads the team in WAR and Win Shares....he has 26 Win Shares, followed by:

Escobar - 20
Cain - 19
Perez and Aoki- 17
Davis, Shields, Holland - 15
Hosmer - 14
Ventura - 13
Duffy & Butler -12
Vargas & Herrera - 10

That doesn't scream World Series to me.

Looked at slightly differently, who on the team has a shot at making the Hall of Fame? Maybe Gordon...but probably not. Maybe Holland or Perez, but probably not. They might be the first championship team that doesn't have significant contributions from a Hall-of-Fame caliber player.

The 1984 Tigers, somewhat famously, don't have a Hall-of-Famer, but they had Whitaker and Trammell (and Jack Morris), whom a lot of people consider Hall-of-Fame level players.
12:33 AM Oct 14th

MarisFan61
I didn't think any Yost decision (except maybe pinch running Dyson for Aoki) :-) was as odd as Showalter (who I consider brilliant) leaving O'Day in to pitch to a good lefty hitter.

That's not a second guess; I was screaming it at the TV when it happened, not so much because I was upset (I loved it) but because I couldn't believe the announcers weren't saying anything about it and I wanted to hear what they might have thought of it. I think it was from something Bill wrote, years ago, that I learned that you can't let most of those kind of pitchers pitch to a lefty. And especially when the count got to.....whatever it was (I think 2-0 or 3-1), I was getting giddy. Actually, after the fact I looked up O'Day's record this year vs. righties, and it is superb, although with too many HR's (4 in 106 PA's; only 2 in 165 vs. righties).

I assume Showalter wasn't eager to leave him in against Gordon (even though righties were up next) but figured he needed to stretch his pitchers in an extra-inning game.
9:25 AM Oct 11th

MarisFan61
WOW -- was this an unusual move or what.....
Showing how much they're emphasizing speed, Dyson comes in to pinch-run for AOKI!
Unless Aoki is hurt or something, it's odd because Aoki is (from anything I can tell) very fast too. But Yost must think the difference is worth going for.
P.S. Dyson out stealing! (overslid the bag, so they said; wasn't clear to me)
10:03 PM Oct 10th

MarisFan61
Dave: This is great. I love it. I love how you take this current fascinating question and take us through the step-by-step process of looking at it, with each finding leading to the next -- and with some nice little surprises along the way, and eventual confirmation of what we might have suspected.

As an aside: I've been glad to sort of 'adopt' this Royals team for the playoffs, for so many reasons.....They're small-market, their wins have been so exciting, and the way they play the game is so interesting and so much fun to watch, including these aspects that you studied here. I've been glad to hear how many other people (on call-in radio and elsewhere) have said likewise, including how their kids have been interested to watch games more than ever before. I've always felt that this kind of baseball -- contact, and running -- is simply more interesting to see, and so, even realizing it wasn't necessarily intelligent, I've been in favor of it on that basis, almost regardless of whether it is also of value for winning. I've been thrilled to be seeing these games where those things have seemed of such value, and thrilled to see the results of your study. But even besides the results, the process you take us through is great.
9:50 PM Oct 10th

shinsplint
Dave, good job, and fun post to read. I was intrigued by the postseason success of the low-strikeout teams, as well as the overall success of the low-strikeout/high SB teams. As a result of the strikeout post-season results, I'm thinking of expanding on my Playoff Hitting thread, and showing BA/AVG/SLG for different levels of SO relative to league. If what you infer is right, then I would expect the low-strikeout teams to have a lower decline in the post-season relative to the more whiff-prone teams.
9:28 AM Oct 10th

DaveFleming
And although it's a small sample size, it's worth noting that the Royals are 13-6 since they moved Escobar to the top of the batting order.
12:13 AM Oct 10th

shthar
Forget the bunts and the steals.

What the heck is Escobar doing leading off?

Are we going back to 1952 to make up our lineups now?
8:57 PM Oct 9th

steve161
Interesting stuff, as usual.

Another curious fact about the Royals, as the TBS crew never tires of pointing out, is that they were last in the AL in drawing walks. So they are even more contact-prone than the strikeout rate suggests. Not sure if this means anything, but it reinforces your argument, at least.

Hawthorn are the Australian Football League champion, having annihilated Sydney in the Grand Final. As a Swans fan, I am devastated.
6:23 PM Oct 9th

chuck
Dave, in the event you didn't read the thread I started here:
boards.billjamesonline.com/showthread.php?3863-What-Won-in-the-Postseason-1995-2013&highlight=​postseason

it's a study I did of the postseason series matchups since 1995. A number of interesting things come out of it- that winning teams in those series were the ones who had a profile of:
1. limiting opponents' hits, via strikeouts and good defense,
2. being more contact-oriented on offense, with more singles.
Those were the big things- there are many others. Among them:

A higher rate of walks and for the pitchers (higher than their opposing staff),
More hit batters by the staff,
A lot more stolen base attempts,
Fewer misplays (E+WP+PB),
Slightly older main pitchers (starters and closer); 1-3 years older.
or, much younger main pitchers (5 years younger, on average),
Older regular position players.
Better performance in batting average with men in scoring position (both on offense and/or by the staff), and
Better performance in slugging average with men on base (by offense and/or by staff).
Winning percentage,
Road winning percentage,
Run differential,
ERA+,
Shutouts thrown,
and a somewhat lower HR rate differential. That is, the offense's rate compared to what their staff allowed. This seems counterintuitive, but the teams that were much more powerful- or had the much bigger HR rate differential- did not fare well in these series.

One can look at the above and see those things reflected in the 4 remaining teams this year- especially KC, St Louis, and the Giants.

4:12 PM Oct 9th

mrbryan
So, of the 13 teams with the highest relative difference in strikeouts and stolen bases, one team won the World Series. Not the strongest predictor, from my point of view. I think the traditional strength of power over speed will see the Royals ending their run very soon.
10:29 AM Oct 9th