GaryMrMets
06-04-2004, 02:31 AM
http://www.courierpostonline.com/news/sports/s060304d.htm
Clutch hits are hard to come by for team
Thursday, June 3, 2004
PHILADELPHIA
Jim Thome wanted to be up in the ninth inning. The Phillies felt pretty good about it, and the Mets didn't like it so much. Even with a late-inning implosion by a weary and depleted bullpen, when the Phillies got Thome to the plate with the winning run on base, a buzz ran through the park because Thome is a great clutch hitter.
Except for this season. Thome, one of the most dangerous hitters in the game, is batting .190 with runners in scoring position this year. With nobody on, Thome is hitting .447. With the bases loaded in the ninth Wednesday, Thome grounded to short to end it.
That made the Phillies 1-for-6 with runners in scoring position Wednesday, continuing a season-long bout of futility. In this recent 4-7 skid, the Phillies are hitting .137 with runners in scoring position. The Phillies entered the night hitting .214 with runners in scoring position. That's 42 points lower than the .256 team batting average - by far the biggest dropoff in the National League.
Of all the people who should rise above that, one should be Thome. He really is a great clutch hitter. So why has he been so bad this year?
Statisticians go to great lengths to prove the Moneyball theory that clutch hitting is a myth. It's luck. Elite athletes square off, and someone is going to win and someone is going to lose. A great clutch performance is largely random chance.
Mike Lieberthal, for example, is hitting just .096 in the clutch this year. Last season, Lieberthal hit .319 with runners in scoring position. The year before, he hit .200.
Conversely, David Bell is hitting .324 with runners in scoring position, and in his career he's batted 16 points higher with runners in scoring position than with nobody on.
And, surely, the wheel will come around for Thome. He's too good a hitter.
Thome is a career .282 hitter with runners in scoring position. He brings the one thing everyone seems to agree makes for a good hitter in those situations - he wants to be at the plate with the game on the line.
"You watch him - he gets to the plate a little quicker than he does with nobody on," Phillies hitting coach Greg Gross said. "He wants to be up there."
"I'm thinking to myself: `Man, this is what it's all about,' " Thome said. "You go through the whole day to get to this moment. Some days you walk away proud, some days you walk away distressed.
"But you've got to talk yourself into wanting to be in that situation all the time. That's when it's fun."
Cardinals manager Tony LaRussa sure wasn't worried about Thome's average May 4, when he walked Thome intentionally to load the bases in the ninth inning of a 6-5 game, voluntarily putting the winning run in scoring position.
That's where it matters - even if clutch hitting is a myth, when people believe the myth it becomes reality. LaRussa was terrified of Thome, and that shows in the way hitters in front of him and behind him get pitched.
Most baseball people believe in the idea of clutch hitting. They've seen it. There are players who rise to the occasion with the game on the line.
It's like so many things in baseball that everyone accept as true, even if they can't prove it, even if the statistics don't bear it out. It exists today, and it existed 50 years ago.
Robin Roberts said he never worried about whether the guy at the plate was a clutch hitter; which is probably true when you're one of the greatest pitchers of all time. But he believes that certain players were clutch hitters.
"Granny Hamner had the damnedest knack of hitting a ball hard in the clutch," Roberts said. "He could be the worst looking hitter the first two times up, but in the eighth, with a man on second, he'd hit a rope. Maybe that's what it is, you have the knack of lulling people to sleep and not doing anything, and then you come through at the end and everyone thinks you're a clutch hitter.
"There just seemed to be guys who, at the end when the situation was tough, would come through. When the chips were down, if you were on the mound against Frank Robinson, say, or Jackie Robinson was another, you knew you had a hard job at hand. There are guys who seem to rise up in clutch situations."
The Phillies are hoping they have some of those guys. At the moment, they're banking heavily on the bad luck theory, and hoping somehow it comes around.
Clutch hits are hard to come by for team
Thursday, June 3, 2004
PHILADELPHIA
Jim Thome wanted to be up in the ninth inning. The Phillies felt pretty good about it, and the Mets didn't like it so much. Even with a late-inning implosion by a weary and depleted bullpen, when the Phillies got Thome to the plate with the winning run on base, a buzz ran through the park because Thome is a great clutch hitter.
Except for this season. Thome, one of the most dangerous hitters in the game, is batting .190 with runners in scoring position this year. With nobody on, Thome is hitting .447. With the bases loaded in the ninth Wednesday, Thome grounded to short to end it.
That made the Phillies 1-for-6 with runners in scoring position Wednesday, continuing a season-long bout of futility. In this recent 4-7 skid, the Phillies are hitting .137 with runners in scoring position. The Phillies entered the night hitting .214 with runners in scoring position. That's 42 points lower than the .256 team batting average - by far the biggest dropoff in the National League.
Of all the people who should rise above that, one should be Thome. He really is a great clutch hitter. So why has he been so bad this year?
Statisticians go to great lengths to prove the Moneyball theory that clutch hitting is a myth. It's luck. Elite athletes square off, and someone is going to win and someone is going to lose. A great clutch performance is largely random chance.
Mike Lieberthal, for example, is hitting just .096 in the clutch this year. Last season, Lieberthal hit .319 with runners in scoring position. The year before, he hit .200.
Conversely, David Bell is hitting .324 with runners in scoring position, and in his career he's batted 16 points higher with runners in scoring position than with nobody on.
And, surely, the wheel will come around for Thome. He's too good a hitter.
Thome is a career .282 hitter with runners in scoring position. He brings the one thing everyone seems to agree makes for a good hitter in those situations - he wants to be at the plate with the game on the line.
"You watch him - he gets to the plate a little quicker than he does with nobody on," Phillies hitting coach Greg Gross said. "He wants to be up there."
"I'm thinking to myself: `Man, this is what it's all about,' " Thome said. "You go through the whole day to get to this moment. Some days you walk away proud, some days you walk away distressed.
"But you've got to talk yourself into wanting to be in that situation all the time. That's when it's fun."
Cardinals manager Tony LaRussa sure wasn't worried about Thome's average May 4, when he walked Thome intentionally to load the bases in the ninth inning of a 6-5 game, voluntarily putting the winning run in scoring position.
That's where it matters - even if clutch hitting is a myth, when people believe the myth it becomes reality. LaRussa was terrified of Thome, and that shows in the way hitters in front of him and behind him get pitched.
Most baseball people believe in the idea of clutch hitting. They've seen it. There are players who rise to the occasion with the game on the line.
It's like so many things in baseball that everyone accept as true, even if they can't prove it, even if the statistics don't bear it out. It exists today, and it existed 50 years ago.
Robin Roberts said he never worried about whether the guy at the plate was a clutch hitter; which is probably true when you're one of the greatest pitchers of all time. But he believes that certain players were clutch hitters.
"Granny Hamner had the damnedest knack of hitting a ball hard in the clutch," Roberts said. "He could be the worst looking hitter the first two times up, but in the eighth, with a man on second, he'd hit a rope. Maybe that's what it is, you have the knack of lulling people to sleep and not doing anything, and then you come through at the end and everyone thinks you're a clutch hitter.
"There just seemed to be guys who, at the end when the situation was tough, would come through. When the chips were down, if you were on the mound against Frank Robinson, say, or Jackie Robinson was another, you knew you had a hard job at hand. There are guys who seem to rise up in clutch situations."
The Phillies are hoping they have some of those guys. At the moment, they're banking heavily on the bad luck theory, and hoping somehow it comes around.