One of the metrics for evaluating situational hitting is RE24. For those of who aren’t familiar, that stands for Run Expectancy in the 24 base-out states.

RE24 is calculated as the difference in run expectancy before and after a PA, plus any runs that score as a result of the PA. The run expectancies in that calculation are based on empirical results for each base-out state, from nobody on, nobody out to bases loaded, two out. Run expectancy means how many future runs would expect to score in an inning starting from each base-out state, assuming a team of identical average hitters facing identical average pitchers. The run expectancies are pretty intuitive: the more runners on and the fewer the outs, the higher the run expectancy, and vice-versa.

RE24 for a PA can be positive or negative and thus can be summed over a game, a season, or a career. The results apply to both pitchers and hitters. Thus, a positive RE24 for a batter in a given PA is a negative RE24 for the pitcher, and vice-versa. One caveat is that RE24 scores are not adjusted for inning, game score, batting order position, platoon advantage, park effects, or anything else. Thus, RE24 is often most useful when comparing players on the same team.

More on 2013 situational hitting results after the jump. 

To give you a couple of simple examples of RE24, these are the players in 2013 having the most of a few different events.

All of the above events are worth one RE24 because one run scores and the base-out state remains unchanged (which leaves the future run expectancy unchanged).

First, let’s look at the overall leaders. The players below all qualified for the batting title and accumulated over 7 RE24 per 100 PA.

No real surprise to see three Cardinals on this list, given their incredible success hitting with runners in scoring position (that observation shouldn’t be taken to mean that the RE24 scores are necessarily the cause or the effect of the RISP results, only that there is a logical affinity between the two). What is somewhat surprising is that a player (Holliday) would make this list while leading his league in GIDP, a notable RE24 killer (Holliday minimized the RE24 damage by having the good sense to ground into only one double play with the bases loaded, and into 20 of the other 30 with just a runner on 1st).

Those 3 Cardinals are among a majors-leading 5 on one team with 20 or more RE24.

These are the team RE24 leaders having the largest proportion of their team’s total RE24.

These are the top RE24 games of the year, with players who improved their teams’ run expectancy by more than 5 runs.

Lest you think that high RE24 games are commonplace, here are the leaders with the most games with an RE24 score of 2 or more.

For consistent RE24 scores, these are the players with the most games with a positive or zero RE24 score.

I mentioned that RE24 is most useful when comparing players on the same team, as that provides some measure of context control. Here are a few examples of teammates with similar OPS+, but dissimilar RE24 scores.

Let’s start with the world champions.

With one-third more PA, Pedroia surprisingly compiled 10 fewer RE24. Despite making the list above for most games with zero or better RE24, Pedroia appears to have been hurt by his 24 GIDP, more especially since he had 3 games with two GIDP. More than half of Victorino’s season RE24 came from 3 monster games (including the season’s top RE24 game) where he was a combined 10 for 13 with 4 HR and 15 RBI.

A couple of interesting pairs on the Royals.

As with Pedroia, Billy Butler was hurt by a high GIDP total. Hosmer benefited from bunching his hits effectively. His 60 multi-hit games were tied for second most with Andrew McCutchen, trailing only 63 games by Matt Carpenter.

Perez had the edge on Alex Gordon despite 25% fewer PAs, more GIDP, and fewer home runs. Like Hosmer, Perez benefited from bunching his hits. Of 82 players with 10 or more 3-hit games (Perez had 11), Perez ranked 14th in fewest season PAs, and 21st in fewest overall hits. Gordon was very consistent over the season with no games above 3 RE24, and also no games below -3 RE24.

And, a pair of Dodgers.

Gonzalez did have 16% more PA and more power, and it shows in both his RE24 and RBI. Gonzalez made both of the above lists (for positive RE24 games, and 2+ RE24 games), showing an 81-76 game split in favor of positive or zero RE24 scores. For Ethier, it was a quite different 58-84 split. Ethier didn’t have a lot of really bad RE24 games, just too many games where he did a little worse than average with the opportunities he had.

For some historical context, here are some RE24 superlatives (all since 1950, unless otherwise noted):

• Most times leading league: Barry Bonds (10), Mickey Mantle (8), Duke Snider (4), Mike Schmidt (4), Frank Thomas (4), Willie Mays (4)
• Most times leading league, active players: Miguel Cabrera (3), Albert Pujols (3), Jason Giambi (2), Alex Rodriguez (2)
• Highest season RE24: 128.83, Barry Bonds (2004)
• Lowest season RE24, leading league: 44.53, Duke Snider (1956)
• Most seasons, 50+ RE24: Barry Bonds (14), Willie Mays (12), Hank Aaron (10), Mickey Mantle (9), Albert Pujols (9), Ted Williams (9, incl. pre-1950 seasons with partial data)
• Highest RE24, one game: 9.506, Mark Whiten 1993-09-07
• Highest RE24, one game, fewer than 2 HR: 7.910, Orlando Cepeda 1961-07-04
• Highest RE24, one game, no HR: 6.422, Jim Russell 1947-08-20

Finally, the career RE24 leaders. Have to believe that Splinter and maybe Stan would be up near Bonds with complete data for their careers.