Friday, January 22, 2010
What Happened to Wang?
It’s looking more and more likely that Chien-Ming Wang’s time with the Yankees is over, with the St. Louis Cardinals currently rumored as the most likely landing place for the potentially former Yankee. Over at the Lohud Yankee blog last week, a guest post by Greg Mathews looked at Wang and laid out a theory that batters started to lay off Wang’s low sinker and that it was indicative of a trend that may mean his effectiveness will suffer unless he makes an adjustment. Trying to see if letting Wang go is a mistake and being on Pitch F/X kick lately I figured I’d look at the data to see if there was any truth to this theory.
Since Pitch F/X has only been around since 2007 and was not completely rolled out until 2008, we don’t have data from Wang’s best season of 2006, and 2007 data is incomplete, which kind of limits how much we can infer from the data we do have given his missed time in 2008 and his very abbreviated 2009, so keep that in mind when looking at the numbers that follow.
Wang's sinker causes classification issues in Pitch F/X, so I'm looking at any pitch classified as either a four-seam fastball, two-seam fastball or sinker for the years 2007-2009. I'm only looking at pitches I'd classify as low, which means they crossed the plate somewhere below the lower third of the strike zone as identified for the specific batter.And here are the numbers.
| Year | # | max | min | avg | ball % | stkS% | foul% | stkC% | In play, out(s)% | In play, no out % | HBP % | break_y | break_angle | break_length |
| 2007 | 180 | 96.6 | 82.9 | 92.6 | 55.0% | 3.3% | 12.2% | 8.9% | 15.0% | 0.6% | 0.6% | 24.4 | 30.7 | 6.0 |
| 2008 | 347 | 97.2 | 84.0 | 90.9 | 48.4% | 7.2% | 15.6% | 9.8% | 10.1% | 3.2% | 0.3% | 23.8 | 37.4 | 6.9 |
| 2009 | 191 | 95.4 | 87.9 | 91.7 | 51.3% | 11.0% | 14.1% | 8.4% | 4.7% | 1.6% | 0.0% | 23.8 | 33.3 | 6.2 |
#: number of times pitch was thrown as recorded in Pitch F/X
max: highest recorded starting velocity
min: lowest recorded starting velocity
avg: average recorded starting velocity
ball %: percentage of time pitch was taken for a ball
stkS%: percentage of time pitch was swung on and missed
foul%: percentage of time pitch was fouled off
stkC%: percentage of time pitch was taken for a called strike
In play, out(s)%: percentage of time pitch was hit into play for an out(s)
In play, no out%: percentage of time pitch was hit into play and not converted into an out
HBP%: percentage of time batter was hit by pitch
break_y: the y-distance from home plate where the maximum deviation occurs(definition taken from this site
break_angle: the direction of the deviation, with the convention that a pitch that breaks away from or toward a RHH has a negative or positive angle, respectively;
break_length: the largest deviation, in inches, of the actual from the straight-line trajectory.
The incompleteness of the data limits whatever conclusions we may want to draw from this, but it doesn't really look like hitters were laying off Wang's low fastballs with any greater frequency. If anything, they were swinging at more of them if you look at the skS%. The big thing I see is they just hit fewer of them into outs, which could just be a BABIP issue or could be indicative of Wang's pitches being more hittable, although the velocity and break data is generally similar across all three years.
I'm kind of bummed that Wang's likely gone, but at the same time I don't think I'd expect him to pitch any better than any of the current members of the Yankee rotation in 2010, including either Joba Chamberlain or Phil Hughes. I'd guess if the Yankees disagreed with me, he wouldn't be on his way to becoming a former Yankee. Either way, I wish him well, as long as he doesn't wind up on Boston or Tampa Bay. Or Anaheim. Or Seattle maybe.
Comments
Yeah I’d say the data is incomplete. W/o going back and rereading the posting, I think part of his conclusion was that hitters started laying off the pitch so Wang had to elevate it. And, after elevating it the batters hit it better.
Since we don’t know what 2006 looked like, it is tough to tell if there is a trend. For example, stkS% could have been higher in 2006, then dropped precipitously in 2007 as batters laid off the low pitch. As Wang elevated the pitch to get more of the strike-zone, batters started swinging more often. And they hit it better, so it fell in for a hit more often. I think his theory is still sound, and we have incomplete data to confirm or refute it.
I agree to wishing Wang well…
The Wang we know and love is almost certainly gone, never to return. A guy named Chien-Ming Wang could put on pinstripes next season, but I just don’t believe he’d be the same guy.
I hate that injury with a passion. It’s #2 on my injury hate list (#1 being Bernie’s knee injury in 2003). We had a good, home-grown pitcher. What’s more, he was good despite the fact that he didn’t do the thing that typically leads to success: miss bats. And we’ve lost him, because he couldn’t run the bases in a friggin’ 10-1 blowout.
The Wang we know and love is almost certainly gone, never to return.
Based on what? I don’t understand why people are so sure of this. I haven’t seen anything that would give me confidence in either direction.
Just saw there was a new thread, but anyway, regarding HGH discussion from previous thread:
not sure how you can read that abstract and come to the definitive conclusion that HGH does “NOT” improve athletic performance… I see a lot of “may” this and “might” that.
I wasn’t basing my opinion on that abstract. I have read a lot about it. I was just linking to that for the sake of convenience. There are dozens of studies and articles about it, and a friend of mine researched an article about it and has spoken to a dozen scientists about it:
http://www.slate.com/id/2162473/
This mentality has put doping officials and athletes into a feedback loop of addled hysteria. The World Anti-Doping Agency will ban any drug that athletes use, whether or not it has an effect. The WADA code points out that the use of substances “based on the mistaken belief they enhance performance is clearly contradictory to the spirit of sport.” In other words, it doesn’t matter if HGH gives athletes an unfair advantage. If Jerry Hairston believes he’s cheating, then he really is cheating.
HGH doesn’t do jack for a an adult athlete.
“Based on what? I don’t understand why people are so sure of this. I haven’t seen anything that would give me confidence in either direction. “
I don’t know the specifics of Wang’s shoulder surgery, but isn’t the prognosis of a successful return from most shoulder surgery a lot more uncertain than from elbow surgery?
I also agree with the well wishes.
Nothing would make me happier than to see Wang turn it around in pinstripes, but if he is ever going to get back to his old self he probably needs to pitch for a patient non-contender for a couple of months and knock 2 years of rust off his body before he is ready to pitch meaningful games. I can’t see how the Yankees could possibly show the patience he will likely need.
The Angels are picking up $21 million of the remaining $23 million left on Gary Matthews’ contract in their trade of Matthews to the Mets.
Hilarious.
[7] I agree. Everything about that situation is greatly amusing.
The whole thing is so delightful in the way we get to sneer at two teams at once. I can tell 2010 is going to be my year.
I don’t know the specifics of Wang’s shoulder surgery, but isn’t the prognosis of a successful return from most shoulder surgery a lot more uncertain than from elbow surgery?
That’s my understanding, and isn’t this Wang’s second major shoulder surgery?
The Angels are picking up $21 million of the remaining $23 million left on Gary Matthews’ contract in their trade of Matthews to the Mets.
Ahahahahahahaha! In total the Anaheim Angels of Scoscangles will have wasted $8M more on GMJ than the Yankees did on Pavano. Let that soak in.
[10] Yes, he had shoulder surgery in 2001.
[3] The surgery was his second of the kind, by most accounts removing him from the realm of major league success. It’s not so much fan pessimism as it is medical prognosis. One surgery is bad enough, but two is unheard of in terms of recovering to full capacity.
[12] I don’t know… when you are young, Wang recovery is only a few minutes.
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