Baseball stats for beginners: the importance of home/road splits

What do you think of these two players:

Player A: 9014 plate appearances, 414 doubles, 416 homers, 1604 RBI, .320 BA, .920 OPS

Player B: 9102 plate appearances, 332 doubles, 348 homers, 1298 RBI, .277 BA, .789 OPS

Look at that difference in OPS–huge, right? Player A drove in a lot more runs with a much higher batting average.

Among players with 9300 to 9700 career plate appearances, the player with the closest OPS to Player A is Al Simmons. The player with the closest OPS to Player B is Ted Simmons. That’s a pretty good representation of those numbers–Player A is a Hall of Famer while Player B is merely “really good”.

So who are these two players really?

Player A is a hypothetical player with Jim Rice‘s home totals doubled.

Player B is a hypothetical player with Jim Rice’s road totals doubled.

Rice did a lot of damage at Fenway Park and a lot less damage on the road.

For most of Rice’s career, Fenway was an extreme hitter’s park, and Rice’s totals show that he took full advantage of that. But imagine if he played somewhere else…one thing’s for sure: he wouldn’t have made the Hall of Fame.

 

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Ed
Ed
12 years ago

Time for some random comments: 1) Just curious Andy but what prompted this post? 2) If I remember my Bill James correctly, most players perform about 5-10% better at home than on the road. So simply doubling his road totals isn’t quite fair.. 3) I wonder what other Hall of Famers have that range of home/road OPS split. 4) Looking at Rice’s splits by ballpark, his best performance was at Yankee Stadium. His splits were .336/.386/.661 (1.047 OPS). And that’s not counting the 5 games against the Yankees at Shea Stadium where he had a 1.145 OPS. Kind of surprising… Read more »

John Autin
Editor
12 years ago
Reply to  Ed

Interesting numbers for Rice and Yankee Stadium, especially his HR rate. Rice hit 22 HRs in 308 PAs at Yankee, a rate of 50 HR per 700 PAs, easily his best for any park. That’s 55% above his Fenway rate (32.3 HR/700), and 74% above his rate for all other parks combined. This is initially puzzling, since the former Yankee Stadium was of course tough on righty power. But, for that reason, the Yankees often have more lefty pitching than average. And 10 of Rice’s 22 HRs in YS came off lefties. He especially feasted on Ron Guidry — overall… Read more »

Tmckelv
Tmckelv
12 years ago
Reply to  John Autin

Yankee Stadium was only tough for HR if you hit to the left-center power alley. I don’t know if there is a spray chart for his HR, but I can see Rice easily hitting some opposite field HRs there.

Mike L
Mike L
12 years ago
Reply to  John Autin

Yankee Stadium was much tougher on right handed hitters before the first renovation (early-mid seventies) and Rice played only in the renovated stadium. Right down the left field line it was 301 ft, but it got deeper very fast, 415 to Left, then 457 to left center and 461 to dead center-plus the monuments. After the first renovation (the bulk of Rice’s career)it was still tough, but more manageable. And the Yankees did look for left-handed pitching.

MikeD
MikeD
12 years ago
Reply to  Ed

I’m not sure what it means, beyond my belief it doesn’t mean much. How Rice (or any player) performs in one park on the road probably has little meaning. The overall home-road splits against all competition will tell a better story than 300 PAs spread over 16 seasons. The Yankees was Rice’s favorite team to face, putting up better numbers against them than any other team. If he was facing a pitcher with an interlocking NY at Yankee Stadium, Fenway or Shea Stadium, it didn’t matter, he was extra dangerous. I’m sure this contributed greatly to his perception as a… Read more »

Dr. Doom
Dr. Doom
12 years ago
Reply to  Andy

Actually, I think I read the post first – I just didn’t comment. 🙂

You picked a good example, though, Andy. Rice would have been one player who came to mind. Obviously, a 90s or 00s Coors guy (Helton, probably, though Walker’s MVP year is an interesting one; or Ellis Burks, 1996) would have worked just as well.

Dr. Doom
Dr. Doom
12 years ago
Reply to  Dr. Doom

Okay, so I talked about all those other things that “would have been” good to try, and I thought I could resist doing them and just do my homework. Alas, I give my self too much credit, and the draw of baseball stats not enough. Same categories Andy gave below. Todd Helton, career, doubled: Home: 8886 PA, 5922B, HR, RBI, . BA, . OPS Road: PA, 2B, HR, RBI, . BA, . OPS Larry Walker, 1997, doubled: Home: PA, 2B, HR, RBI, . BA, . OPS Road: PA, 2B, HR, RBI, . BA, . OPS Ellis Burks, 1996, doubled: Home:… Read more »

Dr. Doom
Dr. Doom
12 years ago
Reply to  Dr. Doom

Whoops – posted before I was ready. Ignore it. Here’s the whole thing. Todd Helton, career, doubled: Home: 8886 PA, 592 2B, 414 HR, 1576 RBI, .354 BA, 1.071 OPS Road: 8570 PA, 516 2B, 270 HR, 1040 RBI, .291 BA, .869 OPS Larry Walker, 1997, doubled: Okay, actually, I gave up on this one, because they were shockingly similar. Check it out if you don’t believe me. Home OPS, 1.169; road OPS, 1.176. Better on the road. Who knew? Ellis Burks, 1996, doubled: Home: 734 PA, 62 2B, 46 HR, 158 RBI, .390 BA, 1.171 OPS Road: 636 PA,… Read more »

MikeD
MikeD
12 years ago
Reply to  Dr. Doom

Dr., were you attempting to show Walker’s home/road splits for his career, like Helton, or just one year? Curious, because it’s not a clear cut calculation. While he has 4700+ PAs as a member of the Rockies, he also has over 3000 PAs as a player on the Expos and Cardinals. In fairness to Rox hitters, there appears to be some type of Coors effect that also works against hitters when they are on the road. I’ve seen a couple of studies on this, but can’t remember when the last one was done. Part of it may be based on… Read more »

bstar
12 years ago
Reply to  Dr. Doom

It looks like Burks is the clear winner as far as getting the most benefit from his home park, but I think Todd Helton is going to be the more historically significant one because the wild discrepancies in his splits will affect his Hall of Fame chances.

Mike, I too have heard of those reports about the away-from-Coors effect being a tough one to deal with. I think there may be something there.

Ed
Ed
12 years ago
Reply to  Dr. Doom

Mike D – Actually there’s plenty of evidence that the Coors Field “hangover” is a myth. I don’t have time to look up the studies but briefly:

1) The Rockies do better offensively at the beginning of a road trip than they do at the end. This is the opposite of what you would except from a “hangover”. Other teams don’t show a similar pattern.

2) Almost all Rockies hitters do the same on the road before, during and after their time with the Rockies.

Rockies fans love to push the “hangover” effect but there’s little evidence that it’s real.

Dr. Doom
Dr. Doom
12 years ago
Reply to  Dr. Doom

@21 MikeD, I was going to show his splits in 1997, simply because of his years in Montreal. I didn’t think it would be fair to call a big home-road split a Coors-effect, when roughly 40% of his career was elsewhere. So I was going to pick on his MVP season, when I was shocked to learn that he was actually a pretty equal hitter at home and on the road. His career home-road split is bigger, though. bstar, he may be the person to have gotten the most benefit for a season. However, Dante Bichette’s near-triple-crown season (1995) is… Read more »

Ed
Ed
12 years ago
Reply to  Andy

Dr. Doom and I have to keep our streak going of being the first to comment on your posts! (course maybe we’re the same person…no one’s ever seen us together).

I also noticed that Doug passed me in total comments so I need to get my comments back up!!! 🙂

Gary Bateman
Gary Bateman
12 years ago

Player B numbers looked, at first glance, like Ron Santo’s career stats to me. The numbers are certainly similiar. Santo also had interesting home/road splits, in my opinion.

Dr. Doom
Dr. Doom
12 years ago
Reply to  Gary Bateman

When we had the Santo for the Hall debate on the ol’ B-R blog, one of the things that Santo detractors repeatedly pointed out was his home-road splits.

kds
kds
12 years ago

What I would like to see done is to separately figure his WAR with the different park factors. Of course, I think that the park factors should be for each component, (HR, singles, not just one generic for runs.) and further that the park factors should be platoon adjusted. (All the following numbers are made up for illustration only.) (If Fenway increases scoring by 25% and increases 2B and HR by RHB by 50% I think it correct, in rating Rice, to use the 50%, not just the 25%, which is how I think WAR does it.)

Doug
Doug
12 years ago

I just posted splits for Yaz and Splinter, but the post seem to have gone astray. Anyway, Yaz looks a lot like Rice in terms of taking advantage of his surroundings. His rate stats are around 15% to 20% better in Fenway. Some of his counting stats are much better: 45% more doubles, 36% more RBI. For Splinter, not so big a difference. His bump on rate stats are more in the 5% to 10% range. For counting stats, his doubles differential was also huge: 55% more doubles at Fenway. Surprisingly, Williams hit 10% more homers on the road than… Read more »

Doug
Doug
12 years ago
Reply to  Doug

Might be hard to visualize those percentage bumps in rate stats. So, here they are (top line Home, bottom line Away). Hope this one gets posted.

Yaz

BA, OBP, SLG, OPS, BAbip
0.306, 0.402, 0.503, 0.904, 0.309
0.264, 0.357, 0.422, 0.779, 0.270

Williams

BA, OBP, SLG, OPS, BAbip
0.361, 0.496, 0.652, 1.148, 0.347
0.328, 0.467, 0.615, 1.082, 0.309

Lawrence Azrin
Lawrence Azrin
12 years ago
Reply to  Doug

Doug,

The right field bullpens in Fenway were added in 1940, Williams’ second year. I think they were nicknamed “Williamsburg”, or something like that.

Surprisingly, his HR total _went down_ from 31 to 23. Looking at his HR splits, in 1939 it was 14/17 home/road, in 1940 it was 9/14 home/road, in 1941 19/18 home/road. Maybe it was just a more difficult HR park for the type of left-handed pull hitter he was, even with the bullpens added.

Ed
Ed
12 years ago

BTW, I nominate Joe Dimaggio for the “anti Jim Rice”. A .938 OPS in Yankeee Stadium, 1.015 on the road. 59% of his home runs were hit on the road.

Lawrence Azrin
Lawrence Azrin
12 years ago
Reply to  Ed

Dimaggio had “Death Valley”, a 457-foot power alley to left-center to contend with in Yankee Stadium his whole career. I think the monuments in deed center were still on the playing field and in play.

Goose Goslin, Dimaggio, and Joe Adcock were probably the three players whose HR totals were hurt the most by their home park(s).

Richard Chester
Richard Chester
12 years ago
Reply to  Lawrence Azrin

Those monuments were on the field, at the base of the flagpole. DiMaggio once even caught a Hank Greenberg fly ball behind the monuments.

Goslin holds the record for most home runs at Yankee Stadium by a visiting player.

Voomo Zanzibar
Voomo Zanzibar
12 years ago

Dimaggio also had his #5 retired by the Florida Marlins.
Pretty impressive seeing he was 79 when they came into existence.

John Nacca
John Nacca
12 years ago
Reply to  Voomo Zanzibar

#5 was retired by the Marlins, but it was for executive Carl Berger……

Voomo Zanzibar
Voomo Zanzibar
12 years ago
Reply to  Voomo Zanzibar

@24
Yes, but it was because Joe D was Berger’s favorite player.

Paul E
Paul E
12 years ago
Reply to  Lawrence Azrin

Lawrence:
IF I recall correctly, Bill James in his BJHBA, mentioned Eddie Yost as a guy who got slaughtered by his home park – particularly when it came to HR’s….
And since we’re picking on Hall of Famers (Rice, Santo, Yaz), I believe Mel Ott hit the most HR’s in one park (Polo Grounds) and had a relatively significant disparity between home and road (323 vs 188). But, if he retires in 1947 with 376 career HR’s (2 x 188 road homers), he’s still probably top 5 (Ruth, Foxx, Gehrig, ?) at retirement

topper009
topper009
12 years ago
Reply to  Paul E

In 1947 376 HRs would have been 4th all-time.

714 Ruth
534 Foxx
493 Gehrig
376 Ott road x 2
331 Greenberg (1947 was his last year)
307 Al Simmons
301 Rogers Hornsby
300 Chuck Klein

Lawrence Azrin
Lawrence Azrin
12 years ago
Reply to  topper009

I remember at the end of the 1968 season what a big deal it was when Mantle passed Jimmie Foxx (534) to move up to 3rd on the all-time HR list, after Ruth and Mays. Ted Williams was 4th (521), Mel Ott 5th (511).

At the other end of the scale, there are several categories where the career leaders haven’t changed at all at the top since 1947, such as triples and complete games. I went down to #38 in CG (Robin Roberts), to find a pitcher who debuted after WWII.

Lawrence Azrin
Lawrence Azrin
12 years ago
Reply to  Paul E

James also said in the NBJHA that while the Polo Grounds were great for left-handed HR hitters (Ott), overall it didn’t really improve offensive levels as a whole.

So I take this to mean that Ott hit more HR, but his overall offensive stat line wasn’t inflated (unlike the way it would be in Coors Field).

Richard Chester
Richard Chester
12 years ago
Reply to  Paul E

Here are some HR facts for Eddie Yost.

Park………………PA………HR
Griffith Stadium…..3796……..25
Briggs Stadium…….1206……..29
Yankee Stadium……..681……..16
Fenway Park………..656……..19

Similarly for Goose Goslin.

Park………………PA………HR
Griffith Stadium…..3126……..38
Navin Field……….1706……..37
Yankee Stadium……..683……..32
Sportsman’s Park…..1453……..70

topper009
topper009
12 years ago

If you put Jim Rice on the 1986 Expos for his entire career his line becomes:
.280/.332/.470, 359 HR, 1289 RBI, 632 BB, 1465 K

If you put Tim Raines on the 1978 Red Sox for his entire career his line becomes:
.308/.401/.443 2908 H, 1820 R, 923 SB, 1485 BB, 1006 K