Ideal Batting Order

[RedbirdRay]

Some interesting discussions going on lately about proper construction of a batting order.

 

Constructing Lineups from the Hardball Times.

 

Cyril Morong's regression analysis

 

This cool tool found linked on the THT article from Dave Pinto's blog will construct lineups for you if you just enter the OBP and SLG of prospective batters. It came up with a Brewer lineup (general without splits for R/L) of Clark Jenkins Weeks Lee Fielder Hall Hardy Sheets Miller.

 

I bet batting a pitcher 8th who doesn't bat like Dontrelle Willis would stir a lot of controversy.

[rluzinski]

There's been alot of talk about this, lately.

 

Primary Numbers I

 

Primary Numbers 2

 

I think that lineup constructer script is bologna. It's based on Morong's regression analysis work, which tried to find the value of OBP and SLG for lineups currently employed. I don't think he can help you gain insight on completely different lineups and it certainly can't tell you the "runs scored" implication of that lineup.

 

Tangotiger, MGL and Dolphin just came out with a book and one of those chapters involves batting order optimization. I tried to use their general rules to construct the "correct" lineup for the Brewers:

 BA OBP SLG OPS 1 Fielder 0.268 0.349 0.489 0.838 2 Weeks 0.267 0.361 0.462 0.823 3 Jenkins 0.272 0.347 0.479 0.826 4 Lee 0.282 0.347 0.506 0.853 5 Koskie 0.251 0.351 0.431 0.782 6 Hardy 0.264 0.342 0.418 0.760 7 Clark 0.281 0.349 0.402 0.751 8 Pitcher 0.150 0.150 0.100 0.250 9 Miller 0.250 0.320 0.390 0.710

It could certainly be argued that Koskie and Jenkins should switch spots in that order, since the #3 hitter comes up most often with 2 outs and no one on. Koskie's high walk total would be best utilized there in that situation (a walk has the same value of a single with no one on). Personally, I'd rather have the stronger hitter at #3.

 

This is all interesting discussion, but an optimized lineup is worth maybe 1 win over the course of a season. Considering that a team never really knows how well their batters are going to do anyway (this is all based on projections), it's almost not worth the trouble.