The 122nd season of the modern era is underway. This post takes a look at opening day games of the past, and some of the more memorable accomplishments in those games.
Continue readingOpening Day Superlatives
35 Replies
Category Archives: Records and Milestones
2021 Major League Debuts
Over 200 players made their major league debuts this season. A few will go on to enjoy success over long careers, but most will have careers memorable only for their friends and family members. Following are some notable career debuts, some never before seen in the major leagues.
Continue readingMiggy Joins 500 HR Club
Tiger great Miguel Cabrera launched his 500th HR on Sunday, connecting off Blue Jay left-hander Steven Matz, the 346th pitcher to allow a Cabrera regular season blast. Miggy becomes just the 9th player in the 500 HR club to maintain a career .300 batting average. More after the jump.
Continue readingAlmost Perfect: John Means no-hits the Mariners UPDATED AGAIN
Oriole left-hander John Means no-hit the Mariners, facing the minimum 27 batters, with the only baserunner reaching on a strikeout on a wild pitch (he was erased attempting to steal). An “imperfect” complete game, with 9 IP, exactly 27 batters faced, and no hits, walks or hit batsmen, had been achieved only once previously, by Terry Mulholland for the Phillies against the Giants on August 15th, 1990, with the only batter reaching on an error and erased by a double play. More after the jump.
Continue reading200 Game Batteries UPDATED
With Baseball-Reference.com gamelogs now mostly complete back to 1901, I’ve gone back to look at posts published previously, when there were no game level data prior to 1914. This post was originally published in 2016, but in its reprised version, nine new batteries with 200 starts together are identified (there was a lot more matching of catchers to elite pitchers in the early years of the modern era). More on long-term batteries is after the jump.
Continue reading“There’s a Long Drive…”: the Biggest Regular Season Play for Every Franchise
Last September, Baseball Reference added the Championship Win Probability Added (cWPA) statistic to their website. The stat, developed by Dan Hirsch, assesses the impact of each play in improving a team’s chances of winning a championship. It’s an intuitive concept: a go-ahead home run in a World Series is more impactful than one in mid-August. Consequently almost all of the biggest single plays by cWPA have come in October.
But what of the humble regular season? Less consequential than the playoffs, for sure, but still full of dramatic moments that can pave the way for postseason success. Here, then, are the plays that have had the biggest positive effect on each team’s chances of winning the World Series, going in order from the least to the most pivotal.
Continue readingExceeding Expectations: RE24 Leaders
One of the lesser known and seldom discussed offensive metrics is RE24, a measure for batters (or pitchers) of how much better or worse they were in improving their team’s run expectancy in their plate appearances. Last year’s league leading batters were Mike Trout and Anthony Rendon, and most often (but not always) the RE24 leaders are the same leading players as evaluated by other metrics. But, what RE24 provides that other metrics don’t is that each player is evaluated on how well he did in his own individual context. More after the jump.
Verlander twirls third no-hitter
Justin Verlander no-hit the Blue Jays on Sunday, allowing just one walk and retiring the final 26 batters in order. He becomes just the fifth pitcher since 1893 with three no-hit games, joining Nolan Ryan (7), Sandy Koufax (4), Bob Feller (3) and Cy Young (3). More on Verlander’s gem is after the jump.
Mystery Milestone Games
Most player milestone games are well documented, at least for the past 75 years or more. That, of course, is because the milestone is anticipated, often making the game when the milestone is reached somewhat anti-climatic. But, I’ll be looking at a different type of milestone game in this post, milestones that are not anticipated, not even by the players involved. More on these mystery milestones are after the jump.
CAWS Career Gauge – Part 1
HHS contributor Michael Hoban has written a comprehensive paper on assessing career value for players of the past century (since 1920), commonly known as the live ball era. This series presents a condensed version of Michael’s work for your assessment and discussion.