That is the percentage of times a runner advances more than one base on a single and more than two on a double. This chart shows how much it fell off for Mantle when he turned 33. Maybe he feared getting hurt running the bases and slowed down to avoid sliding.
Here is how he compares to similar players: Willie Mays, Hank Aaron, Frank Robinson, Al Kaline and Carl Yastrzemski.
Age
|
Mantle
|
Mays
|
Aaron
|
Robinson
|
Kaline
|
Yaz
|
18
|
38%
|
|||||
19
|
64%
|
50%
|
||||
20
|
65%
|
53%
|
51%
|
56%
|
65%
|
|
21
|
58%
|
70%
|
47%
|
62%
|
52%
|
62%
|
22
|
61%
|
53%
|
63%
|
71%
|
54%
|
|
23
|
64%
|
73%
|
51%
|
67%
|
73%
|
36%
|
24
|
60%
|
67%
|
57%
|
53%
|
65%
|
48%
|
25
|
55%
|
67%
|
60%
|
57%
|
67%
|
52%
|
26
|
53%
|
69%
|
72%
|
63%
|
64%
|
43%
|
27
|
56%
|
64%
|
54%
|
57%
|
54%
|
44%
|
28
|
54%
|
67%
|
51%
|
66%
|
66%
|
41%
|
29
|
56%
|
72%
|
60%
|
60%
|
51%
|
46%
|
30
|
57%
|
67%
|
64%
|
51%
|
51%
|
39%
|
31
|
65%
|
59%
|
59%
|
44%
|
48%
|
56%
|
32
|
56%
|
74%
|
50%
|
62%
|
70%
|
47%
|
33
|
31%
|
63%
|
55%
|
58%
|
58%
|
45%
|
34
|
22%
|
57%
|
54%
|
50%
|
66%
|
45%
|
35
|
36%
|
65%
|
59%
|
52%
|
49%
|
53%
|
36
|
28%
|
67%
|
39%
|
41%
|
40%
|
38%
|
37
|
54%
|
34%
|
43%
|
43%
|
54%
|
|
38
|
48%
|
33%
|
49%
|
55%
|
40%
|
|
39
|
74%
|
37%
|
43%
|
42%
|
36%
|
|
40
|
49%
|
29%
|
17%
|
49%
|
||
41
|
43%
|
36%
|
33%
|
|||
42
|
48%
|
23%
|
40%
|
|||
43
|
17%
|
This chart shows the trend over time for all these players. It seems that none of them had as early and dramatic a decline as Mantle.
Mantle's GIDP% started an upward trend at age 30 in 1962. That chart is next. Following that is the trend for strikeout% (I removed sacrifice hits and IBBs from PAs). At age 32 his SO% started coming back up, so we would expect him to have a lower GIDP%, everything else being equal. Now it (GIDP%) did come back down his last three seasons after peaking but it was still high compared to earlier in his career.
10 comments:
Nice work, Cy, as always. Not to be *that guy* but do you have the numbers for Mays and Aaron? I am interested in how good they were at their peak, and also their declines. Thanks. Great work either way!
Thanks, Mark. The XBT% numbers are in the table above for Mays and Aaron. Is that table not showing up? Or do you want to see their GIDP%?
Ugh, sorry. For some reason on my phone I only saw the names Robinson, Yaz, Kaline. Reading error on my part. Great job!
Great. Glad you can see all of it. It makes me wonder that the typical aging pattern is for this stat. Maybe if I get time I will do more players
A couple of questions. Is the denominator only include those times when a player *could* take an extra base, excluding (for example) singles hit while they are on third?
Also, do we know anything about times they were thrown out trying to take an extra base? It would be interesting (to me) to understand how much "value" is represented here? How much was Mays's obvious advantage here worth? How much was Mantle's drop-off from .6 to .3 worth?
Fascinating to contemplate.
On the first question, I think you might have to ask Sean Forman. But my guess is that would not be included in the denominator.
The Advanced Stats page does show how many times a runner gets thrown out in total and in various situations. If you look at Mantle using the link I have, it seems like in those last 4 years he did not get thrown out much.
In the year with 22% XBT, he was thrown out zero times. Maybe he was super conservative that year.
The value question is pretty important. My guess is that it is not much. If you look at a run expectancy matrix, you can see how much it goes up if you advance a base. I think that Baseball Prospectus might still have data on base running runs. They did a few years ago
This link is Mantle's page. His BRR was just slightly negative in those later years
https://legacy.baseballprospectus.com/card/25475/mickey-mantle
Glossary
Baserunning Runs measures a player's contributions on the basepaths based on activity during the run of play, on stolen base attempts, from tag-up situations, and other advancement opportunities.
Baserunning Runs. Measures the number of runs contributed by a player's advancement on the bases, above what would be expected based on the number and quality of the baserunning opportunities with which the player is presented, park-adjusted and based on a multi-year run expectancy table. BRR is calculated as the sum of various baserunning components: Ground Advancement Runs (GAR), Stolen Base Runs (SBR), Air Advancement Runs (AAR), Hit Advancement Runs (HAR) and Other Advancement Runs (OAR).
https://legacy.baseballprospectus.com/glossary/
Thanks Cy.
One of the reasons his DP rate dropped off was those were years where basically pitchers overwhelmed the batters. No one was getting on in front of him.
This is the same reason he didn't have more 100 RBI seasons. The players batting ahead of him for the most part had below average OB %.
It might have been fun to see how many added runs he'd have driven in with say Eddie Yost hitting in front of him?
Thanks for reading and commenting. But the DP rate takes into account how often base runners were on base in DP situations
Post a Comment