Swinging at the First Pitch

by christonabike on Mar 16, 2007 5:57 PM EDT Comment 3 comments

Jimmy Rollins is frequently maligned for hacking at the first pitch of his at bats. In fact, his Baseball Reference page even states that "[he] is often criticized for swinging at the first pitch, which normally leads to him flying out or grounding out."

However, recently, in the post "A Stroll Through Spring Stats", dajafi decided to look up the numbers. In the last 3 years, Rollins has put the first pitch into play 299 times with a line of:

.338/.341/.535

At first glance, these numbers seem pretty impressive. He certainly does significantly better than he has hit cumulatively over the last 3 years:

.285/.340/.455

So, should Rollins be swinging at more first pitches? Already, hitting the first pitch 299 seems like an awfully high percentage of times to put the ball into play on the first pitch. It doesn't even count swings and misses! To answer this question, let's compare Rollins to the rest of the league and the Phillies.

Unfortunately, I was unable to find the league average numbers for swinging at the first pitch. Fortunately, I am capable enough at hacking together some Perl code and like a good challenge. I parsed the three year splits on ESPN.com and tallied the stats of every player with 20 ABs or more on a 0-0 count*. The results:

Players analyzed: 507
Total ABs: 55218
AVG: 0.343
OBP: 0.349
SLG: 0.557

These numbers are far better than the league average line of .260/.330/.420. I believe the reason batters have such high averages when hitting the first pitch are twofold:

It is impossible to strike out on the first pitch, so swings and misses are excluded from these stats.

Batters are likely to only swing at the first pitch if it's a pitch they are expecting or "sitting on."

Despite being an above average hitter, Rollins is below the league average for swinging at the first pitch. While this analysis is somewhat rudimentary, it leads me to believe that the critics are right - Rollins should be swinging at fewer first pitches, not more. Fortunately, he has been. Here are Rollins' percentages at swinging at the first pitch over the last 3 years:

2004 - 18.5%
2005 - 15.8%
2006 - 10.1%

So far, in spring training, Rollins has shown some pretty impressive patience at the plate. Let's hope that trend continues. For reference, here are the rest of the Phillies lines with 75+ ABs swinging at the first pitch over 2004-2006:

Wes Helms 90 ABs .356/.378/.544
Rod Barajas 109 ABs .367/.364/.688
Pat Burrell 186 ABs .403/.401/.737
Jimmy Rollins 299 ABs .338/.341/.535
Aaron Rowand 214 ABs .397/.414/.715
Chase Utley 141 ABs .390/.424/.702
Ryan Howard 124 ABs .427/.430/1.000

Finally, if anyone is interested, I'll gladly send the code for parsing ESPN's splits. If a lot of people are interested, I'll even do a post on it.

*ESPN.com stats pages are of the form http://sports.espn.go.com/mlb/players/splits?statsId=XXXX&type=batting3 where XXXX is a four digit number. I parsed the numbers 5000-8000. I don't believe there are active players outside of this range. Note that the player IDs shift from page to page and a player ID on a player's main page is not his number on his 3 year splits page. However, 507 players seems like it would be an accurate number of players to have accrued 20+ ABs with a 0-0 count (e.g. even Coste didn't have this many last year).

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Re: Swinging at the First Pitch

I think the traditional hitting advice is good on this one. Look for a pitch you can hit, if you don't get it, don't swing, even if the pitch is strike. Never swing at a bad pitch, including a pitcher's paint the corner's strike on the first pitch. I think ok to be even more selective with no strikes and look for a specific pitch in a specific area. Whatever Rollins is doing is working, so I wouldn't ask him to change it.

by allentown on Mar 17, 2007 3:15 PM EDT reply actions 0 recs

Re: Swinging at the First Pitch

"Whatever Rollins is doing is working, so I wouldn't ask him to change it."

I agree. Rollins does get a lot criticism but he is still a great hitter. With his improved plate discipline we are seeing this spring (leads the grapefruit league in walks), he will become just more dangerous at the plate. I am very excited to see what Rollins will do this season.

Driven To Deep Center

by Skeeter on Mar 17, 2007 9:10 PM EDT up reply actions 0 recs

Re: Swinging at the First Pitch

This is where looking into something, but not looking at all possible variables can lead to faulty data.

Sure, .338/.341/.535 looks like a great line when you say he is swinging at the first pitch. But that is a misnomer. This is when he puts the first pitch into play. Show me his ENTIRE line when he swings at the first pitch (including when he misses it or fouls it off). That is a much better example of his success at swinging at the first pitch. And I am sure the line will look much different.

by jonk on Mar 26, 2007 4:38 AM EDT reply actions 0 recs