{"id":1802,"date":"2012-02-15T08:15:19","date_gmt":"2012-02-15T13:15:19","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.ceetar.com\/optimisticmetsfan\/?p=1802"},"modified":"2012-02-14T23:03:33","modified_gmt":"2012-02-15T04:03:33","slug":"baseball-is-a-collection-of-sprints-not-a-marathon","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.ceetar.com\/optimisticmetsfan\/2012\/02\/15\/baseball-is-a-collection-of-sprints-not-a-marathon\/","title":{"rendered":"Baseball Is A Collection of Sprints, Not a Marathon"},"content":{"rendered":"
\n

Baseball statistics have come a long way. \u00a0We have a ton of information at our fingertips and are able to perform some pretty awesome analysis of baseball players. \u00a0This includes things like projections, trying to figure out which pitchers were victims of bad luck and fielding, and which hitters are having some\u00a0unsustainable\u00a0success. \u00a0 However, baseball is an elaborate game. \u00a0You can do all this work, analyze all these players, and have a pretty good idea of what should happen over a large sample of data and still have completely no idea what’s going to happen in any given moment. \u00a0The cliche is that baseball is a marathon and not a sprint, but truthfully it’s probably like a whole bunch of sprints crammed together. \u00a0You can make some pretty good educated guesses about who’s going to win the marathon, but each individual sprint is pretty much a crap shoot.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Ultimately everyone wants to see their team win the marathon, but most of the enjoyment comes from watching them win some of those individual sprints. \u00a0A thrilling pitching matchup or a walk-off home run can be as exciting in 2012 as it was in 2006, or 1986. \u00a0This is sort of the baseball opposite of missing the forest for the trees. \u00a0We can get so focused on which teams are the best in a division or which individual players are the best that we miss that sometimes things happen in the individual games and matchups that are awesome and fun to watch. \u00a0It doesn’t matter that Andres Torres may not be a very good major leaguer; he can still go 3-4 in one game with two home runs. \u00a0Mike Pelfrey’s barely an above average pitcher, but he’s capable of pitching a complete game with 3 hits. \u00a0This is especially true in April and May when you’ve just gotten into the forest and trying to figure out what the whole place looks like is just silly; relax and look at the trees!<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Even the 1962 Mets played some thrilling games. \u00a0That’s the beauty of baseball. \u00a0Maybe Santana comes back\u00a0rejuvenated\u00a0and strikes out every batter he faces on the way to a Mets playoff berth. \u00a0Maybe adjusting the walls make no difference and the Mets struggle to hit for power. \u00a0Either way I promise you there will be fun Mets baseball this summer. \u00a0At least 162 magical opportunities to see something you haven’t seen before. \u00a0 Who knows, maybe this is the year the Mets finally pitch that illusive no-hitter. \u00a0Would you want to miss it because you have the Mets penciled in for last place and decided to spend your Saturday afternoon in June at the zoo?<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

 <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Baseball statistics have come a long way. \u00a0We have a ton of information at our fingertips and are able to perform some pretty awesome analysis of baseball players. \u00a0This includes things like projections, trying to figure out which pitchers were victims of bad luck and fielding, and which hitters are having some\u00a0unsustainable\u00a0success. \u00a0 However, baseball … <\/p>\n

Continue reading “Baseball Is A Collection of Sprints, Not a Marathon”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[1248,19,3],"tags":[1400,969,2480,2479,2478,2964,14,2145],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.ceetar.com\/optimisticmetsfan\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1802"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.ceetar.com\/optimisticmetsfan\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.ceetar.com\/optimisticmetsfan\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.ceetar.com\/optimisticmetsfan\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.ceetar.com\/optimisticmetsfan\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1802"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"http:\/\/www.ceetar.com\/optimisticmetsfan\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1802\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1818,"href":"http:\/\/www.ceetar.com\/optimisticmetsfan\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1802\/revisions\/1818"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.ceetar.com\/optimisticmetsfan\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1802"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.ceetar.com\/optimisticmetsfan\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1802"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.ceetar.com\/optimisticmetsfan\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1802"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}