Juiced ball ??

[NievesNoNO]

I haven't really heard any more regarding this. Anybody have any relevant new info or did I miss a report somewhere?

 

Do people buy into MLB, not knowing why there was such an increase in HRs in 2019? Is that same ball here to stay in 2020? I hadn't really looked at final HR totals per player until just recently, but there were some crazy numbers put up by guys that previously showed only marginal power.

 

If the "juiced ball" is here to stay does it create a benefit for the smaller market clubs? My line of thinking is this: Guys that already have 40 HR power are hitting balls 450 feet instead of 435, both still a HR. Guys like Ketel Marte, LeMahieu, Gurriel, Kepler, Calhoun have closed the power gap. Heck even Sogard hit more HRs in 2019 than the previous decade of his career. My point is, do the average players with a decent contact rate stand to benefit the most from a continued juiced ball? I mean stars are still stars but if Sogard could put up 15-20 HRs in a full season's worth of ABs it sure marginalizes the value of a guy like a Mike Moustakas. Maybe not the best example but I think you get the point.

 

Thoughts?

[3and2Fastball]

It was juiced. For sure

 

I have a 2019 MLB foul ball. It’s a way harder Baseball, with slightly lower seams, than I’ve ever seen on a Baseball.

[Ennder]

The ball changed late in 2015. Last year's spike was more about changes in hitting and pitching philosophy imo. Pitchers are focusing on pitching high in the zone and on spin rate and the low pitch is going completely out of favor. This is going to lead to more HRs naturally as well as lower BABIPs and higher K rates. Hitters are focusing more on elevating their swing planes which again increases HR but lowers BABIP and increases K rates.

[Lathund]

The ball changed late in 2015. Last year's spike was more about changes in hitting and pitching philosophy imo. Pitchers are focusing on pitching high in the zone and on spin rate and the low pitch is going completely out of favor. This is going to lead to more HRs naturally as well as lower BABIPs and higher K rates. Hitters are focusing more on elevating their swing planes which again increases HR but lowers BABIP and increases K rates.

 

Ball has changed multiple times. It has overall been flying further since 2015, but within that time 2017 and 2019 saw an even livelier ball. 2019 was indeed partially about players taking more advantage of the juiced ball and the changes in approach, which made the increase in HRs bigger than it would've been if the same ball had been used 10 years ago. But the ball still had much lower drag than in 2018. There's both the analysis of individual baseballs (Lower seams, smoother leather etc) and the pitch tracking data.

[3and2Fastball]

From everyone I’ve had an opportunity to talk to that would be knowledgeable about the topic, the 2019 Baseball was harder than anything previous...

[JohnBriggs12]

I'm no physicist, but isn't the lower seams and smoother cover at least partially also responsible for the upticks in fastball velocity too? Seems to me if a ball has less drag, it doesn't just apply off a bat.

[Lathund]

I'm no physicist, but isn't the lower seams and smoother cover at least partially also responsible for the upticks in fastball velocity too? Seems to me if a ball has less drag, it doesn't just apply off a bat.

 

Well it has an impact, that the pitches lost less velocity from release point to the plate than in the past is how it could be shown pretty conclusively just a week into the season that drag was lower. But we're talking miniscule differences here, only accounting for a fraction of the upticks in fastball velocity. And then only if velocity is measured as the pitch reaches the plate; if it's measured close to the mound, it won't have any impact at all.

[sveumrules]

2014, with league averages of 0.86 HR/9 & 3.74 ERA, was the lowest run scoring year in MLB since 1992, which came in at 0.72 HR/9 & 3.75 ERA.

 

Here are how some league average stats have looked from 2014 through 2019, starting with fly ball percentage...

 

34.4%, 33.8%, 34.6%, 35.5%, 35.4%, 35.7%

 

Here is home run to fly ball percentage...

 

9.5%, 11.4%, 12.8%, 13.7%, 12.7%, 15.3%

 

Or, if you prefer HR/9...

 

0.86, 1.02, 1.17, 1.27, 1.16, 1.40

 

Doubles are also extra base hits...

 

8137, 8242, 8255, 8397, 8264, 8531

[Ennder]

 

Ball has changed multiple times. It has overall been flying further since 2015, but within that time 2017 and 2019 saw an even livelier ball. 2019 was indeed partially about players taking more advantage of the juiced ball and the changes in approach, which made the increase in HRs bigger than it would've been if the same ball had been used 10 years ago. But the ball still had much lower drag than in 2018. There's both the analysis of individual baseballs (Lower seams, smoother leather etc) and the pitch tracking data.

 

I disagree. Year to year variation is completely normal in baseball. When they make balls they make more than a full seasons worth at a time and I don't think they change every other year like this, even if they did you wouldn't see smooth transitions because they don't start new seasons with new runs of balls, they finish the previous seasons balls. I see no reason to believe anything has changed since the new run of balls started late in 2015. Everything else just looks like normal variations and changes in pitch mixes and hitting styles.

 

The 2017 and 2019 HR rates were very close to each other, there is almost no way that 2018 was using different balls. That is just normal year to year variance that you have seen over the entire history of baseball.

[nate82]

Has the ball changed? It probably has changed but I don't believe it is impacting the game at all. I believe this is just the hitters making an adjustment on how they swing. There will be and already is an adjustment on how pitchers attack batters now.

[Lathund]

 

Ball has changed multiple times. It has overall been flying further since 2015, but within that time 2017 and 2019 saw an even livelier ball. 2019 was indeed partially about players taking more advantage of the juiced ball and the changes in approach, which made the increase in HRs bigger than it would've been if the same ball had been used 10 years ago. But the ball still had much lower drag than in 2018. There's both the analysis of individual baseballs (Lower seams, smoother leather etc) and the pitch tracking data.

 

I disagree. Year to year variation is completely normal in baseball. When they make balls they make more than a full seasons worth at a time and I don't think they change every other year like this, even if they did you wouldn't see smooth transitions because they don't start new seasons with new runs of balls, they finish the previous seasons balls. I see no reason to believe anything has changed since the new run of balls started late in 2015. Everything else just looks like normal variations and changes in pitch mixes and hitting styles.

 

The 2017 and 2019 HR rates were very close to each other, there is almost no way that 2018 was using different balls. That is just normal year to year variance that you have seen over the entire history of baseball.

 

I would argue that the 1% drop in HR/FB rate in from 2017 to 2018, when pull % and hard hit % went up and more and more teams were actively trying to hit more HRs at the expense of contact (The same trend which has been going on for a long time) is a rather strong argument that the ball was different. 1% is a lot, and other data would suggest that if anything it should have gone up.

 

But there's not really the need to speculate based on numbers, because we know that the ball *is* different. It shouldn't be, but it is. The 2019 ball is smoother, rounder and has lower seams than the 2018 ball. The ball being "bouncier" also explains a part of (But not all of) the increased average exit velocity. Even MLB admits that the ball is different, with the lower seams having a big impact on drag.

 

So there's the article analysing individual baseballs above. But then you have, for instance, Rob Arthur who looked at drag and could see a difference already very early in the season. Can't find the chart now, but drag remained lower throughout the season. (Until it spiked heavily in the playoffs, which is another interesting subject).

 

The ball has changed since 2015. I haven't suggested the changes are intentional, or planned from year to year, but clearly there is a lot of variance. Is it a case of a slight change in all balls (Due to, for example, different materials being used) with there still being the batch-to-batch and ball-to-ball variation you'd expect, but where there is a general trend in all balls that they fly further? Or is it a case of some individual batches of baseballs in 2019 (And I'd argue 2017, but the articles I've linked don't specifically look at it so I've focused on the 2018-2019 difference) being massively different, which skews the overall numbers? Again, I don't know. But it's clear that regardless of what batters or pitchers are doing differently, drag is lower. Meaning that balls hit with the same exit velocity (And balls account for part of EV changes too) and launch angle under the same conditions fly further in 2019 than they did in 2018. That's separate from the fact that players hit it harder and hit more fly balls to take advantage of the lower drag.

 

Some other articles on the topic;

https://www.baseballprospectus.com/news/article/55869/moonshot-mlb-admits-lower-seam-height-caused-the-home-run-surge/

https://www.baseballprospectus.com/news/article/52655/moonshot-the-rocket-ball-is-powering-most-of-the-2019-home-run-spike/

https://www.baseballprospectus.com/news/article/52840/moonshot-the-ball-might-have-caused-increased-exit-velocity-too/

 

(I don't know if the Athletic and Baseball Prospectus articles are unlocked for non-subscribers, I really hope they are because it's interesting reading)

[wntrtxn21]

 

Ball has changed multiple times. It has overall been flying further since 2015, but within that time 2017 and 2019 saw an even livelier ball. 2019 was indeed partially about players taking more advantage of the juiced ball and the changes in approach, which made the increase in HRs bigger than it would've been if the same ball had been used 10 years ago. But the ball still had much lower drag than in 2018. There's both the analysis of individual baseballs (Lower seams, smoother leather etc) and the pitch tracking data.

 

I disagree. Year to year variation is completely normal in baseball. When they make balls they make more than a full seasons worth at a time and I don't think they change every other year like this, even if they did you wouldn't see smooth transitions because they don't start new seasons with new runs of balls, they finish the previous seasons balls. I see no reason to believe anything has changed since the new run of balls started late in 2015. Everything else just looks like normal variations and changes in pitch mixes and hitting styles.

 

The 2017 and 2019 HR rates were very close to each other, there is almost no way that 2018 was using different balls. That is just normal year to year variance that you have seen over the entire history of baseball.

 

Look no further than the International League and the Pacfic Coast League to know the ball was juiced last year. Each league used the major lg. ball for the first time in 2019. The I.L. saw a monsterous 57% increase in HRs and the Pacfic Coast Lg. saw an even bigger increase of 58%.... FOUR teams broke the previous team HR record....Teams hit 5 or more HRs in a game 114 times in 2019, a 90% increase over the previous record....24 teams hit 200 or more HRs last year, far surpassing the previous record. None of these are normal variations.

[Ennder]

 

Look no further than the International League and the Pacfic Coast League to know the ball was juiced last year. Each league used the major lg. ball for the first time in 2019. The I.L. saw a monsterous 57% increase in HRs and the Pacfic Coast Lg. saw an even bigger increase of 58%.... FOUR teams broke the previous team HR record....Teams hit 5 or more HRs in a game 114 times in 2019, a 90% increase over the previous record....24 teams hit 200 or more HRs last year, far surpassing the previous record. None of these are normal variations.

 

That is completely meaningless. I didn't say the ball wasn't different than the minor league ball. I said it wasn't different than the major league balls being used in 2017. The balls definitely changed late in 2015, we have pretty definitive proof of that. We don't have anything concrete from that point on though, just a bunch of conjecture and poorly run experiments that are trying to prove a change instead of being subjective.

[jerichoholicninja]

I guess I don't understand why some people are losing their minds over this. Whether there were changes made to the ball, intentionally or not, the game has been trending to homerun or bust for a few seasons. Unless people believe any changes intentionally made were intended to favor a certain team or teams I just don't see the big deal. The game changes constantly. Every 15-20 years it naturally swings from pitching to hitting for whatever reason. Wasn't the big complaint just a couple years ago that pitchers were too dominant and we needed to lower the mound?

[wntrtxn21]

I guess I don't understand why some people are losing their minds over this. Whether there were changes made to the ball, intentionally or not, the game has been trending to homerun or bust for a few seasons. Unless people believe any changes intentionally made were intended to favor a certain team or teams I just don't see the big deal. The game changes constantly. Every 15-20 years it naturally swings from pitching to hitting for whatever reason. Wasn't the big complaint just a couple years ago that pitchers were too dominant and we needed to lower the mound?

 

I think the biggest worry is that the game will become a heavy strikeout version of slow-pitch softball. Homerun or whiff.

[jerichoholicninja]

I guess I don't understand why some people are losing their minds over this. Whether there were changes made to the ball, intentionally or not, the game has been trending to homerun or bust for a few seasons. Unless people believe any changes intentionally made were intended to favor a certain team or teams I just don't see the big deal. The game changes constantly. Every 15-20 years it naturally swings from pitching to hitting for whatever reason. Wasn't the big complaint just a couple years ago that pitchers were too dominant and we needed to lower the mound?

 

I think the biggest worry is that the game will become a heavy strikeout version of slow-pitch softball. Homerun or whiff.

 

It already is. But history has shown it's not going to stay that way. It may already be shifting. Some of last year's playoff teams struck out the least in baseball. This offseason Stearn's has ditched a lot of high strikeout players for guys with similar slash lines but lower K rates. Maybe it's a coincidence but I doubt it.

[homer]

I guess I'd like to see samples of guys who didn't appreciably change their swing plane yet still had a significant spike in home runs. Obviously there are other variables at play (park factors, wall scrapers, etc etc.) but this would be a decent starting point.

[bill hAll Star]

I guess I'd like to see samples of guys who didn't appreciably change their swing plane yet still had a significant spike in home runs. Obviously there are other variables at play (park factors, wall scrapers, etc etc.) but this would be a decent starting point.

 

Somebody might be better at the actual statcast swing planes than me, but using Fangraphs:

 

Tommy La Stella's career FB% is 31% (including 2019). In 2019 he hit the ball 33% of the time as a fly ball and was on pace for 30 HR (16 in half a season) after hitting 10 in his entire career.

 

DJ LeMahieu hit 26 bombs after only 49 in his career before that. In 2018, he had a 29% FB% and only hit 26% FBs in 2019...yet he hit 15 HR in 2018 and 26 in 2019. Some of this may be park related. He hit a bunch at Yankee Stadium to the short porch. Coors is not a bad HR park but it more lends to base hits/extra base hits along with being a pretty good HR park.

 

Sogard did step his FB% up even more than he has the past 2-3 years, but here's another comparison.

In 2013 Sogard hit 39% fly balls and had 2 HR in 410 plate appearances.

In 2019 Sogard hit 42% fly balls and had 13 HR in 442 plate apperances.

 

Again, some park factor in there for Sogard but he hit 13 HR this year after hitting 9 in his career. He seems to have increased his launch angle but that's still something.

 

Those are some that jumped off the page to me watching last year. I'm sure I can dig up some others.

[3and2Fastball]

I guess I'd like to see samples of guys who didn't appreciably change their swing plane yet still had a significant spike in home runs. Obviously there are other variables at play (park factors, wall scrapers, etc etc.) but this would be a decent starting point.

 

Yelich might be a good example. He has at least said he wasn’t trying to swing up more, wasn’t trying to hit more HR’s...