Rather than belabor the finale of the Yankees-Red Sox series — let’s just say that Jose Contreras should never, ever be let near that lineup — I wanted to take a quick look at what’s separating the two teams. Over at Bronx Banter, my old sparring partner Sully, who runs a blog called The House That Dewey Built noted the following, which I’ve reformatted to fit here (the extra O is for opponent’s):
OPB SLG OOBP OSLG
Sox .358 .470 .326 .407
Yanks .352 .456 .321 .431
Accompanying this, Sully asked, “Is there a better strategy for winning baseball games than hitting for more power and getting on base more often than your opponent?” Elsewhere he asked:
What do you all make of BP’s adjusted standings, pythag and the like? As a Sox fan, it’s little consolation to me that the Sox are better than the Yanks in this respect but it does provide conviction in my belief that the Sox are at the very least the Yanks’ equal. I am interested in sober thoughts here. Not “all that matters are wins and losses baby”.
I offered Sully some quick answers, which I may as well expand upon here because I’m not going back to dwell on that ugly mess of a game (though I’m ready for somebody to carve up Felix Heredia for organ donation). First, let’s look at a portion of the Baseball Prospectus Adjusted Standings (through Sunday) to which he referred:
Team W L RS RA W1 L1 EQR EQRA W2 L2 D1 D2
Red_Sox 54 44 548 479 55.5 42.5 577 444 61.4 36.6 -1.5 -7.4
Yankees 61 36 541 478 54.4 42.6 531 456 55.7 41.3 6.6 5.3
The first four columns are the two teams’ actual wins, losses, runs scored, and runs allowed. Using BP’s Pythagenport formula, a modification of Bill James’ Pythagorean formula which takes into account the run environment (the total number of runs per game), the Sox, based on their runs scored and allowed, could be expected to have a record that’s 1.5 games better than their current one. The Yankees, on the other hand, could be expected to have a record that’s 6.6 games worse than their current record — an eight game swing, the same gap as that in the loss column.
Looking at the next set of numbers, we find the Equivalent Runs produced by the team — a team’s total offensive production, adjusted for park and league environment – and the number of Equivalent Runs allowed as well. These numbers measure how the components of runs — the hits, the walks, the steals, the outs — should add up on both sides of the ball. The Red Sox could be expected to outscore their opponents by 133 runs, though they’ve actually outscored them by only 69 — a huge swing of 7.4 games to the negative. The Yankees, on the other hand, could have been expected to outscore opponents by 75 runs, and in fact, they’ve only done so by 63. They’ve outdone that projection by 5.3 games, another huge gap.
I said it after the Yankee sweep at the beginning of the month and I’ll say it again — despite the large gap in the standings, the run differentials show that these two teams are pretty close, and that kind of stuff has a way of evening out over the course of a season. The larger the sample size, the more closely a team’s record will resemble its Pythagorean record, and the more closely its projected runs will resemble its actual runs. The things that often cause over- and underperformance relative to the Pythagorean are things like records in one-run games, a large number of blowouts, and particularly clutch (or unclutch) performances. Timing is everything.
Just taking a quick glance at the two teams’ records in one-run games, the Yanks were 17-11 through Sunday, while the Sox were 7-10. How about that for an easy answer? Flipping through the two teams’ batting stats, check out their performance in the “Close and Late” split, situations when the game is in the 7th inning or later and the hitter’s team is ahead by one run, tied, or with the potential tying run on base, at bat or on deck.
AVG OBP SLG OPS SL*OB
Yanks .292 .381 .481 .862 .183
Opp .232 .290 .361 .650 .105
Sox .281 .355 .449 .804 .159
Opp .236 .312 .395 .707 .123
How do you like them apples? While close and late is not the be-all and end-all of clutch stats — hitting with runners in scoring position or with two outs and runners in scoring position are just as important, if not moreso, and just as elusive to trend-tracking — this performance nonetheless does explain a bit of the spread between those two teams. The Yankees have a higher OPS than their opponents in those situations by over 200 points, while the Sox are about 100 points better than their opponents. That last column is SLG times OBP, which is a pretty good thumbnail measure for runs created per at-bat, not to mention old, old favorite of mine. The Yankees are 75 percent more productive per at-bat than their opponents in those situations, while the Sox are about 29 percent more productive than their opponents. Yankee hitters are about 10 percent more productive than Sox hitters in those situations, and Yankee pitchers are about 15 percent more productive (or their opponents’ hitters less productive) than Sox pitchers in those situations.
Check out some of those Yankee OPS numbers in that situation:
OPS PA
Giambi 1.098 39
Posada 1.095 51
Matsui 1.059 56
Cairo 1.026 29
Jeter .982 53
Sierra .955 36
Lofton .900 25
Sheffield .813 59
Rodriguez .736 58
Williams .576 58
Clark .557 32
With small sample sizes duly noted, that’s still a whole lot of clutch goodness on one end, not to mention Mariano Rivera — two consecutive blown saves after Monday night notwithstanding — on the other. Some Sox numbers for comparison:
OPS PA
Garciaparra 1.115 18
Kapler 1.060 20
Damon 1.012 50
McCarty .995 29
Youklis .911 23
Ramirez, .897 55
Ortiz .890 54
Bellhorn .749 52
Mueller .734 35
Nixon .627 17
Varitek .617 52
Millar .576 43
Some good ones, but more clunkers than the Yanks. Add it all up and you can say that at least in this situation, the Yanks have been more clutch than the Sox this year. But be forewarned: clutch hitting is a statistical Sasquach, a mythical beast ofted hunted but never subdued, only found in retrospect. Clutch hits exist, consistent clutch hitters simply do not, no matter how many times your drunk-assed buddy on the barstool high-fives you as he talks about what a money player Ol’ Googly-Eye Jackson is. Just because certain Yanks have hit well in 40 or 50 trips to the plate in certain situations doesn’t mean they’ll continue to do so; in fact it’s more likely that those numbers will come to more closely resemble the rest of their stats. And whether or not the team in Boston is actually gunning for the AL East flag or merely trying to assure itself of the Wild Card, don’t be surprised when the race tightens.
That is, unless the Yankees throw Felix Heredia’s intestines to the wolves after finding another competent reliever, in which case the Bombers ought to run away with it all.