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Power is always in the hands of the masses of men. What oppresses the masses is their own ignorance, their own short-sighted selfishness.
- Henry George

Well, they do in certain situations.

Runner on third and 1 out, no

Bases empty, no one out, yes.

Then we agree. A single is ALWAYS greater than or equal to a walk. In which case, a single has more value in the long term.

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Hawaii (fuck) You

the walk is your friend

Yes, most often its equal. But your original statement seemed to indicate that a Walk could never hold the value of a hit. It said nothing about long term.

And long term is debateable because now you're delving into player's psyches. Although if you mean a guy who hits is better than a guy who can draw a walk, then I agree.

Has anyone ever said a WALK is "greater" than a hit? I've never heard that.

when is a walk better than a single? When it took 8 pitches to earn a walk and two to earn a single.

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Ба́бушка гада́ла, да на́двое сказа́ла—то ли до́ждик, то ли снег, то ли бу́дет, то ли нет.

You did now. See post after yours.

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Hawaii (fuck) You

Ok, but that is not saying a walk on its own is better than a hit. Thats more about a long at bat. Im sure CoF would agree that an 8 pitch at bat that ends with a hit is just as good.


Walks are fine. Some people overlove them. I get it.

The bullpen is not fresh if the starters are not making it to the seventh inning. Look at last week when two pitchers where throwing no hitters and where pulled because of pitch count. Both teams lost the game. Most of these bullpen guys have one maybe two good pitches they can throw to a hitter. It is a lot easier to hit someone when you know what is coming then to hit someone that may be tired, but have three or four good pitches in his arsenal.

correct. When you're going up against a 1 2 or 3 starter, what really counts is pitches. Now, if baseball wasn't comprised of series where you can tear through starters to see the same inferior (to the starters) bullpen guys for three nights in a row, then it really pays to see large numbers of pitches.

The Cubs home opener is a prime example. Their strategy of striking early in the count almost got them no hit. Patience got them back in the game until they got to the right bullpen guy who served up a 95 mph centercut fastball.

Does it matter if you end up at first as a result of a single or walk if it's a large number of pitches seen? Of course not. But if you don't think a team mentally has an edge waiting on pitches, you're crazy. It's not easy to throw pitches to pinpoint locations. Pitchers miss all the time. Batters do too. The crucial difference is the pitcher has to pitch. The batter does not need to offer.

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Ба́бушка гада́ла, да на́двое сказа́ла—то ли до́ждик, то ли снег, то ли бу́дет, то ли нет.

KDStivic and I had this discussion last year or two years ago. League bullpen ERA is better than starters now. Every situation is different but the whole "just get to the bullpen" thing is not as automatic as it used to be

See the current WS Champs


Would you rather face Yordano Ventura's 90th pitch or Wade Davis' first?

Wade Davis would mostly come in the 9th for the save. Ventura's 90th pitch would be earlier if he was pitching bad enough that you needed to go to the bullpen. If he had 90 pitches in the 9th then I would rather face Davis because my team didn't do shit against Ventura all night.

The only reason I would ever try to take a walk is because the pitcher is not bringing it in the zone. The whole idea that you just take pitches to wear down an opponent is not something I am interested in (i.e. letting strikes go by time after time). If the ball is in the zone, you should be swinging except for limited situations like a straight steal or 3-0 count.

When you don't swing, you have no chance of a multi-base hit. As lovers of slugging percentage and OPS can attest, the HR is the most valuable commodity. You won't get that taking walks. Balls in play also put pressure on the defense that good base running teams can exploit.

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Hawaii (fuck) You

(It's a joke, kids ....)

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Power is always in the hands of the masses of men. What oppresses the masses is their own ignorance, their own short-sighted selfishness.
- Henry George

said Billy Beane, relievers are like volatile stocks...you're always looking to trade them for big profits before they blow up on you.

I love KC, but if they were building a team based on making it a six inning game every night, that will only work for so long.

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Ба́бушка гада́ла, да на́двое сказа́ла—то ли до́ждик, то ли снег, то ли бу́дет, то ли нет.

"try to take a walk" is a strawman.

Being patient is the key. Not going up intending to not swing the bat.

I'll go as far as to say taking strikes you cannot do anything with.

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Ба́бушка гада́ла, да на́двое сказа́ла—то ли до́ждик, то ли снег, то ли бу́дет, то ли нет.

Do better.

You know what I mean. 2-2 game going to the 8th, you want KC's bullpen coming in or Chris Davis to go one more innning?

if you make an out that's bad ...ain't it?

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I'm going to bounce from the spot for awhile but I will be back at some point to argue with you about this hoops stuff again. Playoffs have been great this season. See ya up the road.

I'm out.

OPS includes OBP. The guy with the highest OPS ever set Walk records.

I see your point, I just think you're going a little extreme.

and absolutely killed them in the NYM series last year

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O judgment! Thou art fled to brutish beasts,
And men have lost their reason.

Yes, that would be the Sabermetric approach. The goal is to "not make an out"

http://www.fangraphs.com/community/the-leadoff-walk/

Any inning

Single 325455 Scored 122662 37.69%
Walk 150570 Scored 57189 37.98%
HBP 11865 Scored 4600 38.77%
Error 19260 Scored 7270 37.74%
Strikeout 1007 Scored 375 37.24%
Catcher's Int. 155 Scored 54 34.84%
Totals 508312 Scored 192150 37.80%

Interesting enough, lead-off walks score at a slightly high % than lead off singles. This is all data from 1952.

It's fine once it's occurred. The problem is that taking pitches often gets a hitter into bad counts where he eventually ends up striking out. The numbers (high Ks, low BBs) bear that out.

_________________
Anybody here seen my old friend Bobby?
Can you tell me where he's gone?
I thought I saw him walkin' up to The Hill
With Matthew, Tulsi, and Don

No, it didnt. Getting beaten by great pitching is not an argument against plate discipline.

We all know that isn't really the goal though. I dislike sacrifice bunts as much as anyone in most cases, but I believe that since the rise of what we now refer to as "SABRmetrics" happened to occur during an era of unparalleled offense, many people continue to look at the numbers through that prism. Teams aren't scoring 5+ runs per game all over the place now. There's far less downside to "wasting" an out than there was in that high offense environment.

_________________
Anybody here seen my old friend Bobby?
Can you tell me where he's gone?
I thought I saw him walkin' up to The Hill
With Matthew, Tulsi, and Don

The dreaded leadoff walk. To me, that's simply evidence of a pitcher in trouble.

_________________
Anybody here seen my old friend Bobby?
Can you tell me where he's gone?
I thought I saw him walkin' up to The Hill
With Matthew, Tulsi, and Don

How often is 'often' exactly?

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Power is always in the hands of the masses of men. What oppresses the masses is their own ignorance, their own short-sighted selfishness.
- Henry George

Look at the K/BB ratio across baseball. It's higher than ever. A batter can't strikeout on anything but a two-strike count. I'm sure some of the two-strike counts have to do with there being more foul balls as there is less foul territory than ever.

_________________
Anybody here seen my old friend Bobby?
Can you tell me where he's gone?
I thought I saw him walkin' up to The Hill
With Matthew, Tulsi, and Don

I don't know about far less. I'd like to see an analysis of 2015 vs 200...6 though.

Assuming the highest ever guy is Bonds, I don't think this really adds much. Unless you want to try to justify the "plate disciplined" titles of the juicing BoSox again.

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There are only two examples of infinity: The universe and human stupidity and I'm not sure about the universe.