Bellhorn04
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Everything posted by Bellhorn04
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What exactly does this mean? How would the other factors 'show up'?
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'Mostly' due to randomness. This is the problem. It's a fuzzy statement. You're allowing for the possibility of other factors and yet by categorically denying the existence of the hot hand, you're dismissing the other factors. That's the way it reads to me, anyway.
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The conflict starts from this black-and-white statement: There really is no such thing as a 'hot hand' or a 'cold hand'.
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Definition time again - how are you defining 'very small range'?
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That's just a 'general rule' though, with tons of exceptions. Many players have rather large fluctuations in their numbers between years. Hanley Ramirez for example.
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To me the term randomness should be confined to pure luck and eliminate all the human factors. My whole contention is that the human factors are also there. Guys feel better and perform better at different times, as a result of physiological factors and mechanical factors. I don't see how that can be denied.
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Right. It's physiological.
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I'd also like to know how the pro-randomness people define randomness.
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With pitchers the game-to-game differences in their performances are much easier to identify. You can see differences in the average speed of their pitches, differences in how often they use a particular pitch, whether they're able to get their breaking pitches over for strikes etc. It illustrates that they have different capabilities on different days.
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Let me bring in that great quote from Mike Mussina. Out of 32 starts you're going to have 8 starts where everything is working, 8 starts where nothing is working and 16 starts where something is working. Mussina had his own randomness down to a precise mathematical distribution. And isn't he clearly attributing the randomness to the ups and downs of himself?
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But you've also conceded that streaks aren't necessarily a function of randomness alone.
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I don't understand - how can intangible reasons be identified by the data?
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But you did say that the hot hand doesn't exist.
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Trading Lackey straight up for Kelly wouldn't have been so bad.
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There is no one explanation that's satisfactory. There's external randomness, there's the ups and downs of the human body and mind, there's the differences between Detroit pitchers and St. Louis pitchers and game plans etc. The correct answer would probably be 'no one knows'.
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That 2013 World Series for Papi really was something. He came to the plate 25 times. They got him out 6 times.
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I certainly agree that luck plays a big part in hitting. The game of baseball is designed to be quirky. Balls can be smoked 400 feet and caught. Balls can be nubbed and blooped for hits. The luck part is beyond question.
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As notin said in another thread, we need to sign some scrap heap guys.
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I'm not really meaning to move the goal posts. The discussion has been about what causes sharp variances in player performance. I think this question is pertinent to that topic.
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That may be so, but I don't think Dombrowski is the guy who should get most of the blame for our lack of pitching depth. It wasn't exactly Ben's strong suit either.
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Let's talk about pitchers for a moment. Was the difference in Josh Beckett's numbers in 2006 and 2007 randomness? Clay Buchholz 2012 vs. 2013 - randomness? Rick Porcello 2015 vs. 2016 - randomness?
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And I'm willing to bet that MLB overall offensive numbers for the postseason are significantly lower than MLB overall offensive numbers for the regular season.
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Yes, and it applies perfectly to flipping coins and games of chance where odds can be computed mathematically. But it's not entirely satisfactory for explaining human performance variances.
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But what also needs to be considered is the strength of opposition factor in the postseason. Generally speaking you're facing the best pitching staffs, and with all the off days you're not going to see much of their back end guys.
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That's a description of the results, but it's not an explanation.
