Home Run Derby

As a purveyor of a Home Run Derby contest … I have to admit I love Cincinnati Reds slugger Adam Dunn. 

Every time he steps to the dish, he’s a serious threat to put the ball in the seats. 

• He’s a lock for 40 Home Runs every season
• He has the longest current 40-Home Run streak (4 seasons) of any active player in baseball
• He’s on pace again in 2008 with 23 Home Runs already.
• Since 2004, only Alex Rodriguez (191) and David Ortiz (190) have more Home Runs than Dunn (189) – and I think he’ll surpass them by the end of the season.

What makes him even more fun is that he’s an certifiable adventure in left field – and not in a good way. 

He might be the worst left fielder I’ve ever seen – and I know something about bad fielding (ask Nick the Greek about my legendary anti-prowess in the field back in intramural softball).

Every time a ball is hit to left, he’s a serious threat to put the ball on the ground. 

• He has a .968 Fielding Percentage in LF since 2002 – which is the worst of any LF who qualified for at least two seasons in that span. 
• Since 2002 – he has 53 errors in LF – 17 more than any other player in that timeframe. 
• He’s already got five errors in LF this season. 

Here’s one of them right now …

So imagine my surprise to find out that Adam Dunn has a signature glove. 

Louisville Slugger makes that error-assisting machine.  What the Hell are they thinking?

(more…)

So Mitt Romney bowed out of the Presidential race yesterday.

The Wall Street Journal had its own analysis as to why Romney couldn’t win the votes of Republicans …

He looked the part … He sounded the part … And he acted the part … But in the end, Mr. Romney didn’t fit the part.

He looked presidential, but ran a beginner’s campaign and never managed to ignite passion among voters.

That’s pretty spot on from the point of view of a credible news source. 

But this is a baseball blog … who cares about that?  The real reason (in my overly-baseball-tainted mind) that Mitt Romney lost is that he couldn’t tell the difference between a Baseball Mitt and a Baseball Glove.

Here’s a sample of some of Romney’s campaign merchandise …

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So I was having a catch with my son the other day and he tried to jump up and catch one a la Torii Hunter.  He thinks Hunter is awesome – but probably only because of his “Spider-Man” nickname.

He missed: “Dad – what kind of glove does Hunter use? I need one of those.” Already he wants an upgrade from the Derek Jeter special I got him (there weren’t any Clint Barmes models.)

“I think he uses a Rawlings. You’ve already got a Rawlings.”

“Is that the best glove? Do they make more catches?”

I was about to say something poignant about great skills being more the player and not the leather … but I said, “Yep. That glove will help you catch anything.”

That got me to thinking. What are the fielding percentages by glove this season in MLB?  Then I got beaned since I wasn’t paying attention.

When I came to … I remembered that baseballgloves.com had a list of players and their  gloves.  It’s not a complete list and there were some glitches (Sosa and Dunn were listed twice and there were a bunch of retired players) but after auditing the list and adding some players, I came up with a sample list of 199 players.  And then I mined ESPN for some fielding stats.  One pivot table later …

I’m not surprised to see that Rawlings holds a 50% Market Share in the Major Leagues.  But I was surprised to see that Wilson didn’t have a higher percentage of users. 

By the way, I was right … Hunter uses a Rawlings.  And my son caught the next 6 balls thrown at him.  If you think you have a magic glove … you have a magic glove.

Stats through Monday 5/28.