The path of least resistance
is the dead end of the road
I hate to say I told you so
But hey, I told you so
This was a game that the Blue Jays needed to win.
Wandy Rodriguez came into tonight's game with exactly one major league victory and an ERA of 10.67. That's the sort of thing I like to see from opposing pitchers. Especially when, on Saturday you have to beat the NL's reigning Cy Young champion, the man with the best ERA in the entire National League. And on Sunday, you go up against the man who won more games than any other pitcher in the National League in 2004.
So the Blue Jays rather badly needed Ted Lilly to out-pitch Wandy Rodriguez. Granted the Toronto offense has been sputtering lately. But the Houston Astros are the worst offensive team in baseball. Ted Lilly needs to be able to shut this bunch down, because if he can't, what the hell is he good for?.
Sigh.
My esteemed colleague from the west coast of the U.S.A., Mr John ("Gitz") Gizzi, has been watching Ted Lilly for a long time. His most recent comments came about a month ago, in a comment on one of my own Game Reports, the one in which I lamented that the 2005 Ted Lilly had been worse than the 2004 Pat Hentgen. Which, you know, is about as bad as it gets. To which the Gitz posted:
Uncoachable. Stubborn. Million-dollar-arm, ten-cent head. Etc. None of this is news to A's fans. Reading all the Lilly comments the last few weeks has been like re-living his days on the A's. We feel your pain.
This seems like an appropriate time to review some of the Gitz's Greatest Hits when it comes to the Strange Case of Ted Lilly. We can go all the way back to his Oakland days, from July 2003
... why are you so high on Lilly? Have you seen him? I will offer the least scientific explanation I can give about him, even worse than my anti-Jeremy-Giambi stance: Lilly is a wuss. Plain and simple, he's a wuss. He won't listen to his coaches, either, which I realize is somewhat paraodoxical to his wussiness, but he's vastly overrated.
John expanded these views the very next day
Lilly is exactly the kind of pitcher the Jays don't need. He would fall into the "If things go well, he could be adequate" category, and the Jays are rife with those kinds of arms. He won't eat innings, he's got a (relatively) poor health record, and, apparently, he's something of a head case.... I have not been impressed with Lilly since the A's acquired him, and I hope the Blue Jays don't go after him. The allusion to Lilly being hard-headed re: Rick Peterson may be an indication why Lilly has played on five teams despite being left-handed, talented, and only 26-years-old. That he is talented is not in doubt, as his maddening stretches where he strikes out seven hitters in a row show, but it seems he's another one of those pitchers with a nice K/BB ratio whose success doesn't quite add up. He nibbles too much, he's too deliberate on the mound, he's got no reliable fourth pitch.
Lilly pitched very well down the stretch for Oakland in 2003, after the A's had instituted some fairly extraordinary measures, as John noted in September 2003
Apparently the A's have forbidden him to use his curve ball and to shake off the catcher. This seems an absurd thing to do to a major-league pitcher. Has anybody else heard of something like this?
That off-season, as trade talk between Oakland and Toronto heated up, Gitz had this to say in November 2003
As for Lilly ... the Jays can have him. He will not be missed in Oakland, certainly not by this hack analyst. Mike Moffatt has provided Lilly's career numbers somewhere on this page, but I will not even present that as evidence. In fact, I present zero evidence, though I could dig up some numbers if I wanted. My dislike/distrust of Lilly is based quite a bit on non-measurable assertions, which I repeated so many times in my column that I won't repeat them here.
And finally, after the trade was official, in December 2003
Ted Lilly will be 28-years-old at the start of the 2004 season, and he now is 22-24 in his career -- which has spanned five (six?) teams now -- with an ERA+ of 94. Putting the capricious nature of wins/losses and whatever potential Lilly has aside for the moment, is it fair to say that someone of Lilly's career path is even a worthy fifth starter? Putting aside my personal dislike of Lilly, I think it's a fair assessment. I am truly baffled at how much praise Lilly receives, because, to this point, he hasn't shown much in the majors. At what point does "potential" become "unrealized"? I'll certainly give the Jays a shot to capture Lilly's talent, but I wouldn't expect much.
Sold! I've had enough. Kelvim Escobar was nowhere near as maddening, and there was much more in the way of extenuating circumstances in Kelvim's case. Escobar went from a starter (in the minors) to being a closer, a set-up guy, a starter, a closer, and then a starter again. All this in seven years, in the same organization, although five different managers were involved. It's no wonder Escobar had a little trouble getting his feet on the ground. I don't know what Lilly's excuse is.
Now I'm pretty sure that Rob kind of expects me to crank out a 5000 word Game Report. And while I don't have nearly that much to say about tonight's game, a while back I prepared a little piece called When Pitchers Wield the Lumber as the Jays headed off to play some games by National League rules. And Jobu, that faithful Bauxite, noted conspiracy theorist, and all-around troublemaker posed the following innocent question:
Out of curiosity, does anyone know the total win-loss records for NL vs AL during interleagee?
Guess who decided to find out?
Curiously enough, I couldn't find a convenient one-stop source for my data-gathering needs. I ended up using the extremely useful season logs at Retrosheet. I began with the 1997 Anaheim Angels. I saw that they played 3 NL opponents at home, and that their record added up to 1-7. They played 3 NL opponents on the road, and the records added up to 3-5. I repeated this for all eight seasons from 1997-2004. For 30 teams.
As you can probably imagine, this took a fair bit of time, in the same way that sacking a city takes a fair bit of time. Perhaps unsurprisingly, it is apparent that a couple of data entry errors crept into my work. (I couldn't copy and paste, because there were no inter-league totals - I had to visually identify the opponents from the other league, add up the figures myself, and then enter them into the spreadsheet.)
The records of each league, playing opponents only within that league, should balance perfectly. They don't. I have American League teams going 8089-8090 against themselves. The NL error is a little larger: I have the NL at 9234-9228 against themselves. These figures are derived by subtracting their numbers against the other league from their overall numbers (which were also entered manually.) At any rate, there were lots of opportunities for data entry errors to creep into the process. But unless I check all 238 season logs again (and don't hold your breath on that one!), I'm afraid it's the best I have to offer. The errors, I am quite confident, are very small.
So which league wins more often? The National League, but it's very close. I have the NL with a .505 percentage, the AL with a .495 percentage in games against each other. It's a spread of about 10 games, out of almost 2000.
Which team has been most successful playing the other league?
The Oakland A's and the Florida Marlins, ladies and gentlemen. The A's are the best on the level of raw performance - they went 85-55 against the NL during these 8 seasons, a .607 winning percentage. That's the the best overall record against the other league, but they are not the team that raised their overall winning percentage by the greatest amnount. Oakland played at a .540 clip within the American League during these seasons; they improved that performance by .067, which is significant. The Marlins went 77-58 (.570) against the AL, which is the fourth best winning percentage in inter-league play, behind Oakland, the Yankees, and the Atlanta Braves, who were the NL team with the best overall record against the AL. However, in their own league, the Marlins played at a .466 clip. Their increase of .104 is much the largest by any team. By contrast, while the Braves winning percentage of .581 in inter-league play is the best by any NL team, it actually represents a significant decline in performance; the Braves were a .615 team when they were playing other National League teams.
The home team wins more often in baseball. All but one major league team had a better home record than road record during this period (the exception? Cincinnati.) Home field is a slightly bigger deal in the National League. During these 8 seasons, in games involving only NL teams, the home team's percentage was .537; in the American League, the home team's winning percentage was .530.
In inter-league play, we see a similar pattern raised up a little bit. In games played in NL parks, the home team's winning percentage was .557; in the AL parks, the home team's winning percentage was .543.
American League teams
Oakland kicked the crap out of the NL when they were the home team. They played .500 ball when they visited NL parks; but in their own house, they were dynamite, going 51-19, a .729 clip. They played .585 ball when they were at home to other AL teams, which was the second best figure in the AL during these years. The Yankees played .634 ball when they were at home to AL teams, and .671 ball when they were at home to NL teams.
A number of AL teams did not enjoy themselves when guys from the other league came to town. Four teams - Kansas City, Tampa Bay, Detrot, and Baltimore - actually played below .500 in their home games against the other league. Now as it happens, these teams had the four worst records in the American League during this period - they also played below .500 in their home games against their own league. The three other AL teams who were below .500 overall for these seasons all managed to play .500 ball at home, against both leagues.
Baltimore and Boston are noteworthy for having the biggest drop-off in home field percentage when the other league came to call. The Red Sox played .581 ball in Fenway against the AL, but just .521 against the NL. And the Orioles played .493 at Camden Yards against the AL, and just .437 at home against the NL.
The Yankees were the only AL team with a winning record in NL parks - I have them at 33-32 (.508) while Anaheim was at an even .500 (35-35). Anaheim played .477 ball on the road when they visited AL parks - they were one of three AL teams with a better winning percentage on the road in NL parks than on the road in AL parks. The others were Tampa Bay and Detroit, two terrible teams who played roughly .370 on the road in the AL, and about .410 on the road in the NL.
The largest home-road split in the AL over this period has been posted by the Texas Rangers. Texas played .550 ball in Arlington, just .431 ball on the road during these seasons, a split of .119. That split is larger in their own league - they were .123 better at home against AL opponents, .086 better at home against NL opponents. Oakland has the second largest home-field advantage during these seasons, being .106 better at home overall, and .089 better at home against the AL. Oakland has by the biggest home-field advantage in the AL during inter-league play, however, playing .243 better at home than in NL parks. The other teams that enjoyed a significant home-field advantage against the other league were the Yankees (.164 better at home) and the Blue Jays (.152 better at home).
Anaheim and Kansas City essentially had no home-field advantage in inter-league play, posting roughly the same record both home and away. The AL teams with the smallest home-field advantages - i.e. the teams whose records showed the smallest improvement at home during these seasons - were Kansas City, Baltimore, and Boston. While KC's home advantage against the NL basically shrunk out of existence, both Baltimore and, especially Boston, increased their home-field advantage when the NL came to town. Boston, for example was a .554 team during these years - that's .574 at Fenway and .533 on the road, a very small split. Against the NL, they didn't play nearly as well overall - they were a losing team, playing .468 ball. But that broke down as .521 at home, and just .412 on the road.
National League teams
While the St Louis Cardinals posted the best home record against AL teams, going a pretty nifty 39-20 (.661), they were a pretty good home team all along. They played .585 ball at home against the National League. But the late, lamented Montreal Expos were happy to see the AL come to town. Les Expos lost more games than they won (.489) with the last at bat when another NL team came to call. But they whipped AL visitors at a .632 clip, the biggest performance increase of any NL team.
The Atlanta Braves were by far the NL's best team during these years: they had both the best overall home and road records. They played .646 ball at home when other NL teams came to call. On the road, they played .583 ball, which is better than almost every NL team's home record, with the sole exception of San Francisco. But when the AL came to town... something went wrong. The Braves managed just a 33-32 (.508) mark, by far the biggest drop off of any major league team.
The Braves made up for it when they visited the AL parks, however. The Braves went 46-25 when they visited AL parks, a fairly phenomenal .648 clip. That was by far the best performance by any road team in inter-league play - only a handful of teams were able to rise above .500, never mind .600. Nevertheless, the Braves performance increase visiting AL teams as opposed to visiting NL teams was not the largest in the league. As noted, the Braves have been a great road team all along - it's hard to improve a whole lot on .585, although the Braves did about as well as one could ask. The Braves performance paralells that of the Arizona Diamondbacks, albeit at a much higher level. The D'Backs improved their road performance by a similar amount, going from .461 against the NL, to playing .525 ball against AL teams. And both Atlanta and Arizona fall short of the mark posted by the Marlins. Florida was pretty bad visiting NL teams, playing .405 ball - but when they went to play in AL parks, they were suddenly a decent (.507) team.
The Colorado Rockies have the biggest home-field advantage in baseball, although it's quite possible that what really happens is that playing their home games at high altitude has given them a larger road disadvantage than a true home advantage. It remains a difficult situation to get a handle on. At any rate, the Rockies played .542 ball at Coors during these seasons, and just .387 when forced to compete at sea level. This enormous (.165) spread actually doubled during inter-league play. The Rockies played .589 at home against AL teams; but when visiting AL parks, they were an utterly pathetic .250 team (14-42), by far the worst mark of any team in any split, anyway, anyhow, anywhere. Florida was the only NL team whose normal home-road split remotely compares to Colorado, and it doesn't matter which league the Marlins are playing against. The Marlins were .124 better at home against the NL and .125 better at home against the AL. They just play a whole lot better against the AL, both home and away. But several other NL teams significantly increased their home-field advantages during inter-league play, most notably the Expos.
All right, I might as well append the tables with all the raw (albeit flawed!) data. I fully expect someone to post and point me to a convenient one-stop spot where I could have copied and pasted this much more conveniently. Until then, make of this what you can. The flies in the ointment: Milwaukee played in the AL in 1997, in the NL ever since 1998, which was also when Arizona and Tampa Bay joined the party.
INTER-LEAGUE PLAY
HOME GAMES ROAD GAMES ALL GAMES
W L Pct. W L Pct. W L Pct.
Oakland 51 19 0.729 34 36 0.486 85 55 0.607
NY Yankees 47 23 0.671 33 32 0.508 80 55 0.593
Milwaukee 5 1 0.833 3 6 0.333 8 7 0.533
White Sox 42 26 0.618 32 39 0.451 74 65 0.532
Seattle 40 30 0.571 34 36 0.486 74 66 0.529
Minnesota 39 29 0.574 32 38 0.457 71 67 0.514
Anaheim 36 34 0.514 35 35 0.500 71 69 0.507
Cleveland 35 33 0.515 35 36 0.493 70 69 0.504
Toronto 39 32 0.549 27 41 0.397 66 73 0.475
Texas 36 34 0.514 30 40 0.429 66 74 0.471
Boston 37 34 0.521 28 40 0.412 65 74 0.468
Detroit 34 37 0.479 28 40 0.412 62 77 0.446
Tampa Bay 28 32 0.467 24 38 0.387 52 70 0.426
Kansas City 28 40 0.412 29 42 0.408 57 82 0.410
Baltimore 31 40 0.437 25 43 0.368 56 83 0.403
W L Pct. W L Pct. W L Pct.
St. Louis 39 20 0.661 24 32 0.429 63 52 0.548
San Francisco 38 20 0.655 31 33 0.484 69 53 0.566
NY Mets 42 23 0.646 30 41 0.423 72 64 0.529
Florida 43 25 0.632 34 33 0.507 77 58 0.570
Montreal 43 25 0.632 26 45 0.366 69 70 0.496
Los Angeles 39 25 0.609 28 33 0.459 67 58 0.536
Chicago Cubs 35 24 0.593 26 31 0.456 61 55 0.526
Colorado 33 23 0.589 14 42 0.250 47 65 0.420
Houston 34 25 0.576 30 27 0.526 64 52 0.552
San Diego 33 31 0.516 27 37 0.422 60 68 0.469
Atlanta 33 32 0.508 46 25 0.648 79 57 0.581
Philadelphia 33 35 0.485 33 35 0.485 66 70 0.485
Pittsburgh 27 29 0.482 17 36 0.321 44 65 0.404
Cincinnati 25 31 0.446 23 30 0.434 48 61 0.440
Arizona 23 30 0.434 30 27 0.526 53 57 0.482
Milwaukee NL 19 31 0.380 23 24 0.489 42 55 0.433
PLAY WITHIN THEIR OWN LEAGUE
HOME GAMES ROAD GAMES ALL GAMES
W L Pct. W L Pct. W L Pct.
Oakland 338 240 0.585 286 291 0.496 624 531 0.540
NY Yankees 364 210 0.634 351 232 0.602 715 442 0.618
Milwaukee 42 32 0.568 28 44 0.389 70 76 0.479
White Sox 321 258 0.554 268 308 0.465 589 566 0.510
Seattle 330 249 0.570 297 279 0.516 627 528 0.543
Minnesota 296 284 0.510 264 311 0.459 560 595 0.485
Anaheim 318 263 0.547 275 301 0.477 593 564 0.513
Cleveland 315 264 0.544 290 286 0.503 605 550 0.524
Toronto 302 276 0.522 274 305 0.473 576 581 0.498
Texas 321 258 0.554 249 328 0.432 570 586 0.493
Boston 335 242 0.581 317 262 0.547 652 504 0.564
Detroit 252 324 0.438 214 365 0.370 466 689 0.403
Tampa Bay 218 287 0.432 181 323 0.359 399 610 0.395
Kansas City 254 321 0.442 237 342 0.409 491 663 0.425
Baltimore 284 292 0.493 268 313 0.461 552 605 0.477
W L Pct. W L Pct. W L Pct.
St. Louis 345 245 0.585 298 292 0.505 643 537 0.545
San Francisco 366 225 0.619 303 279 0.521 669 504 0.570
NY Mets 313 269 0.538 276 301 0.478 589 570 0.508
Florida 305 272 0.529 236 347 0.405 541 619 0.466
Montreal 283 296 0.489 227 351 0.393 510 647 0.441
Los Angeles 322 262 0.551 301 286 0.513 623 548 0.532
Chicago Cubs 303 288 0.513 258 332 0.437 561 620 0.475
Colorado 318 274 0.537 237 355 0.400 555 629 0.469
Houston 343 247 0.581 304 286 0.515 647 533 0.548
San Diego 300 284 0.514 260 324 0.445 560 608 0.479
Atlanta 376 206 0.646 336 240 0.583 712 446 0.615
Philadelphia 298 281 0.515 259 321 0.447 557 602 0.481
Pittsburgh 292 298 0.495 240 355 0.403 532 653 0.449
Cincinnati 282 311 0.476 293 302 0.492 575 613 0.484
Arizona 287 227 0.558 235 275 0.461 522 502 0.510
Milwaukee NL 227 289 0.440 211 308 0.407 438 597 0.423
OVERALL RECORD
HOME GAMES ROAD GAMES ALL GAMES
W L Pct. W L Pct. W L Pct.
Oakland 389 259 0.600 320 327 0.495 709 586 0.547
NY Yankees 411 233 0.638 384 264 0.593 795 497 0.615
Milwaukee 47 33 0.588 31 50 0.383 78 83 0.484
White Sox 363 284 0.561 300 347 0.464 663 631 0.512
Seattle 370 279 0.570 331 315 0.512 701 594 0.541
Minnesota 335 313 0.517 296 349 0.459 631 662 0.488
Anaheim 354 297 0.544 310 336 0.480 664 633 0.512
Cleveland 350 297 0.541 325 322 0.502 675 619 0.522
Toronto 341 308 0.525 301 346 0.465 642 654 0.495
Texas 357 292 0.550 279 368 0.431 636 660 0.491
Boston 372 276 0.574 345 302 0.533 717 578 0.554
Detroit 286 361 0.442 242 405 0.374 528 766 0.408
Tampa Bay 246 319 0.435 205 361 0.362 451 680 0.399
Kansas City 282 361 0.439 266 384 0.409 548 745 0.424
Baltimore 315 332 0.487 293 356 0.451 608 688 0.469
W L Pct. W L Pct. W L Pct.
St. Louis 384 265 0.592 322 324 0.498 706 589 0.545
San Francisco 404 245 0.622 334 312 0.517 738 557 0.570
NY Mets 355 292 0.549 306 342 0.472 661 634 0.510
Florida 348 297 0.540 270 380 0.415 618 677 0.477
Montreal 326 321 0.504 253 396 0.390 579 717 0.447
Los Angeles 361 287 0.557 329 319 0.508 690 606 0.532
Chicago Cubs 338 312 0.520 284 363 0.439 622 675 0.480
Colorado 351 297 0.542 251 397 0.387 602 694 0.465
Houston 377 272 0.581 334 313 0.516 711 585 0.549
San Diego 333 315 0.514 287 361 0.443 620 676 0.478
Atlanta 409 238 0.632 382 265 0.590 791 503 0.611
Philadelphia 331 316 0.512 292 356 0.451 623 672 0.481
Pittsburgh 319 327 0.494 257 391 0.397 576 718 0.445
Cincinnati 307 342 0.473 316 332 0.488 623 674 0.480
Arizona 310 257 0.547 265 302 0.467 575 559 0.507
Milwaukee NL 246 320 0.435 234 332 0.413 480 652 0.424
How's that, Rob!?
https://www.battersbox.ca/article.php?story=20050610223755414