Orel Hershiser's Scoreless Inning's Streak

With Jacob Degrom seemingly flirting with history this year (0.54 ERA through 11 starts), I was reminded of Orel Hershiser's scoreless innings streak in 1988.

Granted it was a different era of baseball, but I saw this on baseball reference and it just blew my mind.

Yup, that is a big fat zero earned runs given up over the entire month of September.  With 5 shutouts in a row and it would have been 6 if the Dodgers had bothered to score a run in his last start.

 

Update:

I decided to check out Bob Gibson's game log in his famed 1968 year (1.12 ERA, Cy Young & MVP) and saw this:

 

Again, it was a different era of baseball, but damn.  That's 19 (effectively) complete games in a row with 12 shutouts in the mix.  His ERA fell below 1.00 twice during that span.

Baseball Musings One Month In

A few interesting little statistical nuggets I've noticed after 1 month into the year.

1) Miguel Cabrera

Through the month of April, Cabrera has one home run (which he hit on April 26th, pretty late) and .359 slugging percentage.  Eek!  Not looking good for someone owed $124 million after this season.

2) Chris Davis second half of April

Chris Davis had a horrible start to the year, leading to a record breaking streak of hitless at bats.  However, since he broke that streak, he's actually been good.

First 12 games: .000/.132/.000
Next 11 games: .343/.378/.686

He hasn't played everyday, so it's possible they're only putting him in for good matchups.  But maybe he can turn this around.

3) Mike Trout's Strikeout Rate

The rest of baseball should be scared.  Strikeouts are perhaps Trout's one  weakness, and it appears he's learning to deal with it better.  Trout's struck out about 21.5% of his plate appearances before 2019.  His best year was 2017 when he struck out about 17.7% of his plate appearances.  This year, it's down to 11.8% of his plate appearances.  Oh and his walk rate?   Up to 24.4%.

The Decline of Chris Davis

Early in this baseball season I've been following two players very closely: Mike Trout and Chris Davis.

Following Mike Trout is for obvious reasons.  He's the best player in baseball and has a chance of being the GOAT in baseball.

Chris Davis is an interesting story.

From 2013 to 2015 he lead the AL in home runs twice, hitting 126 home runs over those three years.  That lead him to get a 7 year contract extension for $161 million.

Since then, he has produced WARs of 3.3, 0.0, and -2.8 from 2016-2018.  In 2018, he hit .168 with a .539 OPS.  The .168 is the worst batting average for a position player who qualified for the batting title in about 100 years.

What happened?  It's sort of interesting to look at the deeper statistics.

From 2013-2015 Davis struck out about 31% of his plate appearances.  That stayed relatively consistent and was 32.9% in 2016.  But it jumped to about 37% in 2017 and 2018.

His strikeout rate was about the same in both 2017 and 2018, but his batting average fell from .215 to .168.  That fall of 47 points is pretty large considering his strikeout rate didn't change.

Was it due to bad luck and/or better positioning of fielders?  That can explain some of it, as his batting average balls in play (BAbip) fell from .301 to .237.

But there were some additional issues.

In 2017 37.3% of his batted balls were grounders.
In 2018, it was 40.0%.

In 2017, 29.1% of his batted balls were line drives.
In 2018, it was 25.2%.

In 2017, 28.4% of his fly balls turned into home runs.
In 2018, it was 15.6%

So while there may have been some bad luck in 2018, he was hitting more ground balls (which are more likely to be outs), hitting fewer line drives (which are more likely to be hits), and he had less power in his fly balls (which turns into more outs).

That and some bad luck, and suddenly you cross the mendoza line and hit .168.

Unfortunately, 2019 is not starting off too well for Davis.  He started the season going 0-28 and he recently broke the record for most consecutive at bats without a hit.  On top of that, he's striking out at a 46.8% clip.  Yikes!

Update 8/21/19:

A somewhat interesting aside.  I had a conversation with some friends about "sunk cost fallacy" and mentioned Chris Davis.  I was reminded of this article: How a Hitless Chris Davis Is Like a $15 Dessert.

In it Nobel Prize winning economist Richard Thaler states that the refusal to cut Chris Davis is the Orioles playing to the sunk cost fallacy.

However, I disagree with him in this case.  (Edit: Ok, technically Orioles could be playing sunk cost fallacy, BUT what I'm really saying is there are actually reasons they may not be.) B/c the situation isn't quite the same.  The classic example of sunk cost fallacy brought up in the article is:

One of his favorite illustrations of sunk cost, he said, is deciding whether or not to attend a basketball game you had purchased tickets for even though attending would mean traveling through a blizzard.

I don't believe this analogy applies to the Chris Davis case.

In the MLB, you have to field a team on the field.  That's an active roster of 25 / expanded roster of 40.  If you were to cut Chris Davis, you'd presumably have to put someone else on the roster.

So cutting Chris Davis isn't free, compared to the basketball ticket example above.  You do have to increase your team salary as a result.

Now, adding a minimum salary MLB player to your roster probably is in the noise to a MLB team.  So why cut him?  The article states:

The team should cut Davis and replace him with a minor leaguer, as even a so-called replacement (or near average) player would represent a significant improvement.

This is true.  However, what's the point of it?  The Orioles only won 47 games in 2018 and are pace to win about 51 this year.  Cutting Chris Davis will hardly matter in the standings and the capability for this team to make the playoffs.

Another way to think about it?  If you're the worst team in baseball, why does it matter being a slightly better worst team in baseball?  Or if you miss the playoffs by 40 games, what difference does it make to miss the playoffs by 37 or 38 games.

On top of that, winning a few extra games might actually be dis-advantageous.  This year, the Orioles are actually "challenging" for the worst record in baseball.  The Tigers (as of this writing) have lost a few extra games.  That can affect the Orioles in their attempt to get a better draft pick.

Given how bad the Orioles are, it may be advantageous to just keep on playing Chris Davis in order to lose a few extra games and get that better draft pick.

Now, there are a few reasons I thought of why the Orioles might want to cut Chris Davis and use the roster spot on someone else.  They all center around giving someone else a shot / experience, and using that to help the team become better long term.

1) Give some bench player / minor leaguer some more playing time.

2) Take a flyer in free agency.

3) Give a rule 5 draftee a roster spot.

Given how terrible the Orioles are, they may be reluctant to start the service clock on a number of minor leaguers earlier than necessary.  #2 and #3 are effectively the same, use the roster spot as a means to acquire some talent either by giving someone a chance to turn things around (the Orioles could keep the player or and trade them for prospects) or use the rule 5 draft to acquire a prospect.

Naturally, #2 can cost a non-trivial amount of money (as an example, Matt Harvey was paid $11 million for his trial with the Angels this year), so that can only be considered when looking at the potential options in free agency.

#3 is atleast a low cost option.  It costs $100K for the draftee in addition to the salary for the roster spot.  So it's not free, and has to be weighed with the fact that the rule 5 draft prospects are typically not the greatest caliber prospects.

All of this has to be weighed against the fact that winning 3 or 4 more games a year may be disadvantageous towards getting a better draft pick.

So while there may be opportunities for the Orioles by cutting Chris Davis, I don't think it's entirely obvious that they should do so.

Twins signing Lance Lynn

The 2017 free agent off season has been one of the most surprising in recent memory.  When spring training broke, over half of most people's top ten free agents hadn't signed with a team.  That included J.D. Martinez, Yu Darvish, Jake Arrieta, Lance Lynn, Alex Cobb, and Mike Moustakas.  As of this writing Alex Cobb and Jake Arrieta are both unsigned.  Moustakas and Lynn signed 1 year deals within the last few days.

I was surprised that Lynn had such much trouble reaching a reasonable mid-level deal.  Like, lets say 3 years for about $35 million.  For a pitcher that has a career record of 72-47 and a 3.38 ERA, I thought he would have a nice collection of suitors.  He's not an elite pitcher, but he's topped 200 innings pitched twice, made an All Star team, and has a healthy 14.9 WAR in his career.

He had Tommy John surgery in 2016 and is just over 30, but with a 3.43 ERA and 3.1 WAR in 2017, surely he could more interest than what he got?

Then I noticed the following in baseball reference.

From 2012-2015 Lynn had an ERA of 3.38 and a FIP of 3.39.  So nearly identical to each other.

In 2017, his ERA of 3.43 went with a FIP of 4.82.

From 2012-2015 Lynn had a strikeout / 9 innings rate of 8.6.

In 2017, it was 7.4.

From 2012-2015 Lynn had a strikeouts to walk ratio of 2.59.

In 2017, it was 1.96.

From 2012-2015 Lynn had a BABIP of .315.

In 2017, his BABIP was .248.

So in other words, all of Lynn's peripherals looked bad / trending down and he appeared to benefit from a lot of luck.

For Lynn, signing a 1 year deal was probably a great idea.  He can hopefully show more value another year removed from Tommy John surgery.

Update (10/24/18):

Here's Lance Lynn's stats line from 2018

10-10, 4.77 ERA, over 156 innings and had a collect 0.9 WAR. 

But look at these peripherals

FIP - 3.84 ERA, nearly a run better and better than 4.82 in 2017.

strikeouts per 9 innings - 9.2, matches his career best as a starter

strikeouts to walk ratio - 2.12, better than 2017 but still below career average

perhaps he'll do better on the free agent market because of his peripherals this year

Don't Mess With the Hoot - Warranted Reputation?

I recently saw the documentary Fastball.  In the film, Bob Gibson mentions that his reputation as someone who would plunk players to intimidate them wasn't quite as warranted as it was.  He then mentions that if you look at the numbers, he never hit as many players as people thought he did.

So I looked at his plunking numbers compared to some other random Hall of Famers, and this one blew me away.

Bob Gibson - 102 HBP, 0.02626 HBP per inning.

Greg Maddux - 137 HBP, 0.02736 HBP per inning.

Greg Maddux, who was well regarded as one of the best control pitchers in baseball history, hit more players per inning than Bob Gibson in his career.

Of course baseball was different when Maddux played and some believe that players  crowd the plate more in modern times.  Here's some random Hall of Fame contemporaries to compare Bob Gibson to, sorted by HBP per inning:

Sandy Koufax - 18 HBP, 0.00775 HBP per inning

Jim Palmer - 38 HBP, 0.00963 HBP per inning

Steve Carlton - 53 HBP, 0.01016 HBP per inning

Juan Marichal - 40 HBP, 0.01141 HBP per inning.

Catfish Hunter - 49 HBP, 0.01421 HBP per inning

Don Sutton - 82 HBP, 0.01552 HBP per inning

Tom Seaver - 75 HBP, 0.01589 HBP per inning

Ferguson Jenkins - 84 HBP, 0.01867 HBP per inning.

Gaylord Perry - 108 HBP, 0.02019 HBP per inning

Phil Niekro - 123 HBP, 0.02276 HBP per inning

Hoyt Wilhelm - 62 HBP, 0.02751 HBP per inning

Nolan Ryan - 158 HBP, 0.02934 HBP per inning

Bert Blyleven - 155 HBP, 0.03119 HBP per inning

Don Drysdale - 154 HBP, 0.04487 HBP per inning

So while Gibson is on the higher end of this mini survey, it does seem his reputation as an intimidating plunker may not be as warranted as it is.

While skimming through Hall of Famers, I did find it interesting how many plunks some recent Hall of Famers had.

Randy Johnson - 190 HBP, 0.04595 HBP per inning

Pedro Martinez - 141 HBP, 0.04988 HBP per inning

These were the highest by far of all the players I looked at.

Play the lotto or have a kid?

A few years back I had a funny thought.  If you put all the money it would take into raising a child into the lotto instead, would your odds of being financially set for life be better?  My last post's thought experiment reminded me of this thought experiment I did years ago and decided to re-crunch the numbers.


Obviously, there's a set of ridiculous assumptions here.  The most ridiculous assumption is that the probability of any child becoming rich is the same across all people.  This is a horrible assumption in reality of course.  Also will a rich child actually take care of you?  Oh well, this is just a silly thought experiment.

Another assumption we need to make is how rich is rich?  Lets look at someone with a net worth of $100 million dollars.  There's never been a billion dollar Lotto payout but there have been multiple hundred million dollar payouts, so lets just go with this number.

The odds of winning the Powerball jackpot are 1 in 292,201,338.

Based on the most recent census, the U.S. population is about 309 million.  According to a recent Forbes article, there are approximately 5000 hectomillionaire households in the U.S.  Now "household" is different than "people", but we'll go with this number as it's the best one I can find.

Based on these numbers, the odds of a person becoming a hectomillionare is about 1 out of every 61,800 people.

Using the default inputs on a cost of raising a child calculator I found online, it'll cost about $191,000 dollars to raise a child and not send them to college.  If you put all that money into Powerball, you have about a 1 in 3059 chance of winning ($2 for a ticket).

So if you wanna be rich, play the lotto instead of having a kid!

How much food do pets eat?

I recently had a conversation about an old article on the topic of carbon emissions of pets.  For example, here's an article on the topic from Salon.  Short story, dogs consume enough resources that their carbon footprint is more than your average SUV, while cats have a carbon footprint bordering on an average compact car.

So this led to an interesting thought.  If we didn't have pets, how much more food could we produce?  The thinking was that more food means lower prices and more abundant supply of food for more people and subsequently more people wouldn't go hungry.  Of course, increased supply of food wouldn't be a guarantee that the same supply would be produced.

Other assumptions are that all pet food is human edible (almost certainly false, as some dog food contains bone meal).  But I thought it was an interesting thought experiment to just look at how much food dogs & cats eat and the basically the cost our society may put on food production for non-humans.

Since it's hard to look at all pets, I'll look at just dogs & cats.  I'm going to stick to stats in the United States since it's just easier for this thought experiment.

According to ASCPA there are 70-80 million pet dogs in the US and 74-96 million pet cats.  Lets take the low end of those numbers, 70 million dogs and 74 million cats.

The average number of calories a moderately active adult male needs according to the USDA is about 2600 and for women its about 2000.  We'll take the average of these and say the average adult needs 2300 calories of food a day.

Based on this OSU veterinary chart dogs should get the calorie count according this an advanced formula based on weight.  Unfortunately I cannot find an estimate on the average weight of a dog in the United States.  So I'm just going to go with 25 pounds as the average and hope that's a good guess (I'm likely underestimating given that the most popular dogs are labradors, german shepards, golden retrievers, and bulldogs, which all exceed 25 pounds on average).

1.6 * 70 * (25 pounds / 2.2 (pounds / kg) )^0.75 = 693 calories needed by dog per day

For cats I found this random page saying cats need 20 calories per pound, with Google saying the average cat is 7.9 to 9.9 pounds.  We'll just assume 8 as the average.

20 * 8 = 160 calories needed by cat per day

So under the (likely bad) assumption that all food production for cats & dogs could be converted to human food and assuming all cats and dogs are fed properly, cats & dogs in the US eat enough to feed:

70 million dogs * 693 (calories / dog) / 2300 (calories / person) ~ 21 million people

74 million cats * 160 (calories / cat) / 2300 (calories / person) ~ 5.1 million people

Total ~ 26 million people that could be fed everyday if we didn't have pet dogs & cats

That's a lot of people!  Way more than I thought.  Many of the assumptions above are probably not good ones.  But even general "off by" factors, we could perhaps safely assume it's still enough to feed atleast 10 million people.  Any rounding errors could probably be handled via statistics on other pets not discussed here, the likely larger average weight of dogs, or the low bar I selected on many of the estimates.

Shelby Miller trade vs. Chris Sale trade

Last year the Atlanta Braves traded Shelby Miller to the Arizona Diamondbacks for Dansby Swanson, Aaron Blair, and Ender Inciarte.  The trade was widely panned that the Diamondbacks overpaid for Miller.  Miller was considered a very good pitcher, perhaps at peak a #2 starter, but nothing near an elite pitcher.  Miller had just come off an All-Star season for the Braves in 2016 and had 4 years of team control left.  If Miller could improve, he'd be an incredible asset under budgeted team control for quite some time.

The haul the Braves got for Miller was Blair, the MLB.com pre-2016 #56 prospect in baseball, Swanson the pre-2016 #8 overall prospect, and a MLB starter Ender Inciarte.  Inciarte was a relatively light hitting outfielder, but with elite defense.  He posted an incredible 5.3 WAR in 2015 with a 2.6 defensive WAR.

The 2016 results was about as horrific for the Diamondbacks as one could have ever imagined.  Miller struggled with his mechanics and was even demoted to the minor leagues at one point.  He finished the year 3-12, with a 6.15 ERA, and -0.7 WAR.

On the other hand Swanson continued to impress in the minors and got a small callup, Blair made it to the majors in 2016 (although struggled), and Inciarte produced a solid 3.8 WAR and ended up winning a Gold Glove.

Some rumors point to the Diamondbacks looking to move Miller, as a change of scenery might be the best thing for him.  In other words, the trade is just looking absolutely horrific for them.

Just a few weeks ago, the Boston Red Sox pulled off a blockbuster deal, trading for the White Sox's Chris Sale.  Sale is a five time All-Star and has placed in the top 6 of Cy Young voting 5 years in a row.  His past five years he's posted WARs of 5.9, 6.9, 6.6, 3.3, 4.9.  He's a completely different beast compared to Miller.   In addition, Chris Sale is under control for three more years at a very team friendly salary.

So while Chris Sale is a far superior pitcher, has 3 years of team control at a good (although more costly than Miller) price, one probably would have thought the Red Sox would have had to give up a much bigger haul for Sale.

But as I thought about it, I felt like the Red Sox got Chris Sale for about the same price the Diamondbacks paid for Shelby Miller.  Lets take a look.

For Sale, the White Sox got Yoan Moncada the MLB.com pre-2016 #3 prospect in baseball and pre-2017 #1 prospect in baseball, Michael Kopech the pre-2016 #98 prospect and pre-2017 #30 prospect, Luis Alexander Basabe, and Victor Diaz.  The latter two prospects aren't on any top 100 rankings but were considered top 20 prospects in the Red Sox organization.

While the pre-2017 #1 prospect in baseball is better than the pre-2016 #8 prospect in baseball, and the pre-2017 #30 prospect is better than the pre-2016 #56 prospect, it's not that different.  Both of the top two prospects traded were high value middle infield prospects and RHP prospects.

The difference of course is the two other minor leaguers vs Ender Inciarte.  Inciarte was an established major league starter with 5 years of control.  By most people's estimation, that's better than the two lower end prospects the White Sox received.  One can make an argument that the Braves haul was better than the White Sox one solely based on the fact that Inciarte was already a solid major league starter.

So the Diamondbacks appeared to pay an elite #1 starter price for Shelby Miller.  Making the trade look even worse than it already did.

Not Striking Out - Is it why Albert Pujols Will Age Decently?

A long time ago I remember reading a statistical analysis on the aging of baseball players.  One sign of a player that would age well was the player's inability to strike out.  The theory was relatively simple.  If a player strikes out a lot when they are younger, they will only do worse as they age and their bat speed gets worse.

The paper (which I'm struggling to find) used George Brett as an example.  He struck out a paltry 7.8% of his at bats over his career.  As a modern day comparison, from 2011-2013 when Miguel Cabrera won three batting titles, Cabrera struck out 13.7% of the time. George Brett was able to last in the big leagues until he was 40.  Although not the elite hitter he once was he was productive and even won a batting title in 1990 at the age of 37.

Other players in this same mold can be found.  Hank Aaron and Tony Gwynn both come to mind.

Now, strikeout rates have been increasing in baseball, especially in the last two decades, so "good strikeout rate" is now somewhat relative.  David Ortiz's strikeout rate of 13.7% of his plate appearances in 2016 may seem high, but it's relatively low compared to many of his other power hitting peers.   As an example, Mike Trout struck out 20.1% of his at bats in 2016, and that was a decline from prior years.

However, one of the anomalies in baseball in the 2000s was Albert Pujols.  Despite strikeout rates going up, Pujols continued to strike out at very low rates.  From 2001-2011 in St. Louis, Pujols struck out only 9.5% of plate appearances.  A paltry number for a power hitter in this century.  His worst year was his rookie year when he struck out 13.7% of the time.

It's one of the reasons some people felt a long term contract for Albert Pujols may not be that bad compared to others that received big long term contracts.  The belief was that Albert Pujols would age better than many of his peers.

Albert Pujols' strikeout rate as an Angel has stayed somewhat consistent.  It's been 11.2% over his 5 years as an Angel.  However, as many of us know, Albert Pujols is not the same today.  In 2016, his WAR of 1.4 was a career low, even below his injury plagued season of 2013.  So is Albert Pujols not aging well?

It's at this time I realized, that "aging well" is a relative term.  Very few players can play baseball into their 30s.  So "aging well" may in fact simply be a statement that a player is capable of just holding a job in baseball into their late 30s.  Not that they can hold a job at an All Star level of play.   George Brett had a WAR of 1.7 in his age 36 season before a fluke-ish 4.1 WAR in his age 37 season.  He never had a WAR above 1 again.

While there are the occasional Hank Aarons or David Ortizes of the world that can produce All Star performance into their late 30s, it's very rare.  A player simply being able to hold a starting position into their late 30s is by itself testament to a player aging well.

I'm reminded of this fact because today Ryan Howard, one of Albert Pujols' first basemen peers was bought out of his 2017 option year by the Phillies.  With negative WAR values in 2014-2016, it's likely that Howard's career is over.  If he hadn't signed his contract extension so early, he likely would have been out of baseball at the age of 34 or 35.

Earlier this year, another of Pujols' peers Prince Fielder had to retire.  While his retirement was due to injury, his numbers were already beginning to look bad with a 1.9 WAR in 2013 during his age 29 season and 1.5 WAR in 2015 in his age 31 season.

Is Adrian Beltre a Hall of Famer? An Inner Circle Hall of Famer?

I recently read an article, and one of the things in the article that struck me was the following:

Adrian Beltre at 37 is still a phenomenon; this guy is a first-ballot, no-doubter, inner-circle Hall of Famer.

Inner circle? Really? Having never really looked into it, I had a feeling that Adrian Beltre deserved some strong Hall of Fame consideration.

But never would I consider him an inner circle player.

First, lets see if he's got Hall of Fame credentials.  As of this writing:

.285/.337/.815
436 HR
4 Gold Gloves
4 All Star appearances
Two top 3 MVP finishes
Career WAR of 88.2
1 time lead league in HRs
2902 hits, so 3000 hit club will likely be reached

Generally speaking, this looks pretty good.  I could definitely see him as a Hall of Famer.  I was surprised that he had so many hits despite having a career average of .285.  But when you start your career at 19 and play everyday, those things will start adding up.

Now how does he compare to the greats?  Looking at a post about the "Baseball Inner Circle" from a survey of writers about their top 50 players of all time, I found 4 third basemen on the list and 1 that was just off of the top 50.  The post is a little old (Ken Griffey Jr should definitely be on this list), but I don't think there's been any third basemen added to the HOF in the last few years.  So here's their top 5 third basemen of all time.

#20 Mike Schmidt

.267/.380/.527
548 HRs
10 Gold Gloves
12 All Star appearances
3 MVP, two other top 3 MVP finishes
8 times lead league in HRs
Career WAR 106.5

#24 George Brett

.305/.369/.487
317 HRs
1 Gold Glove
13 All Star appearances
1 MVP, three other top 3 MVP finishes
Career WAR 88.4
3 batting titles
3000 hit club

#39 Eddie Matthews

.271/.376/.509
512 HRs
9 All Star appearances
Runner up MVP twice
2 times lead league in homers
Career WAR 96.4

#46 Brooks Robinson

.267/.322/.401
268 HRs
16 Gold Gloves
15 All Star appearances
1 MVP, three other top 3 MVP finishes
Career WAR 78.4

#51 Wade Boggs

.328/.415/.443
118 HRs,
12 All Star appearances
1 time 4th in MVP voting
Career WAR 91.1
5 batting titles
3000 hit club

So assuming Adrian Beltre plays 1-2 more years, crosses the 3000 hit barrier, and adds a few more WAR points to his career total, he'll probably finish 3rd in career WAR amongst these third baseman.  While he's still playing well, it's hard to imagine him getting another 8 WAR to surpass Eddie Matthews, but it's certainly possible (Edit: After amassing 6.4 WAR in 2016, I think surpassing Eddie Matthews may be very doable now).

However, I can't imagine many writers ever putting Adrian Beltre on a pedestal as high as Schmidt, Brett, and Robinson.  Maybe some will put him above Matthews and Boggs.

The thing that appears to separate Adrian Beltre from these well accepted Inner Circle players appears to be something more subtle.  It's all the things that aren't related to the Career WAR.  It's the MVPs, Gold Gloves, All Star appearances, and what not.  Adrian Beltre will finish his career with a very low amount of them compared to these legends.  So while he had a very long and productive career, he was never considered really amongst the most elite players for a decent length of time.

As a potential HOF contemporary of Beltre's, lets look at Chipper Jones

.303/.401/.529
468 HRs
8 All Star appearances
1 MVP, 1 other top 4 MVP finish
1 batting title
Career WAR 85.0

I wouldn't consider Chipper Jones an "Inner Circle" Hall of Famer, but he does have the MVP, batting title, and all those All Star appearances.

I found it interesting that Adrian Beltre didn't make an All Star team until his age 32 season.  He certainly should have made the team in 2004 when he was runner up to MVP.  However, what blocked him from being an All Star for so long?

In the NL, he wasn't really that great until 2004 (three 3 WAR seasons from 1999-2003).  Scott Rolen and Mike Lowell blocked his way to the All Star game in 2004.  In a weaker generation of third basemen, he probably could have snuck on in 2004.  As an illustration of how deep third baseman were in this generation of players, Chipper Jones didn't make an All Star team from 2002-2007. 

Beltre then played on a pretty terrible Seattle team from 2005-2009 that surely didn't help his case.  The cavernous fields of Seattle probably didn't help either.  Alex Rodriguez, Mike Lowell, Troy Glaus, and Evan Longoria blocked him during this time.  Again, a weaker generation of third basemen could have helped him sneak on at some point.  He did have two 5 WAR seasons in 2006 & 2008.

All his All Star appearances were after he went to much better Boston & Texas teams from 2010-2014 (and perhaps also helping, better hitters parks).  He finally got the All Star nod in 2010 and even started in 2011-2012.

So I think that Beltre is an unquestionable Hall of Famer, but I wouldn't put him into the Inner Circle category.  I think it takes a little something extra to be put into that upper echelon of the Hall of Fame.

2016 Cubs - Things are averaging out

About a month ago I wrote about how everything was going perfectly for the Cubs as humanly possible.

I noted that the performance seemed to defy reason and some regression back to the mean seemed likely.

It seems that it happened just in the last month.

Here's the pitching roster's stats on June 6th

Jake Arrieta - 9-1, 1.80 ERA
Jon Lester - 6-3, 2.29 ERA
John Lackey - 6-2, 2.88 ERA
Kyle Hendricks - 4-4, 2.84 ERA
Jason Hammel - 7-1, 2.14 ERA

here it is today on July 16th

Jake Arrieta - 12-4, 2.68 ERA
Jon Lester - 9-4, 3.01 ERA
John Lackey - 7-5, 3.70 ERA
Kyle Hendricks - 8-6, 2.41 ERA
Jason Hammel - 7-5, 3.46 ERA 

By all means the staff is still doing really well, but 5 starters with a sub-3.00 ERA seemed beyond their capabilities.  Only Hendrick's ERA has gone down, while everyone else's went up by atleast 0.72.  Hendrick's FIP sits at 3.48, over a full run above his current ERA of 2.41.  So that may average out for him over the rest of the year too.

Trade Analysis: Willie McGee for Bob Sykes - Why did this trade even happen?

There have been some bad trades in baseball history.  Obviously they are bad in hindsight, but looking back they made some sense at the time.

While the famed Ernie Broglio for Lou Brock trade was terrible for the Cubs and great for the Cardinals, you can understanding the reasoning of the trade at the time.  Broglio was an established successful starting pitcher and Brock was a young player who hadn't quite figured things out.  Did the Cubs know Broglio's best days were behind him?  No.  Did the Cardinals know Brock would turn into a Hall of Famer?  Doubtful as well.

Likewise with the Jeff Bagwell for Larry Andersen trade.  Did the Boston Red Sox think Jeff Bagwell, a player who hit 4 home runs in AA in 1990, would become a borderline Hall of Fame slugging first baseman?  Nope.  But they did trade Bagwell for a veteran reliever who had a 1.95 ERA in 1990 to help their playoff chances.  He pitched well for them, with a 1.23 ERA over 22 innings at the end of the year.  The reasoning for the trade made some sense at the time.

However, I was recently looking at the 1981 trade of Willie McGee for Bob Sykes, and can't help but wonder how this trade even went down.  It just doesn't make any sense.

In 1981 McGee was a relatively high value prospect.   He was the 15th pick overall in the 1977 draft.  In 1981 in AA he hit .322/.360/.454.  Pretty darn good.  He went on to be one of the best centerfielders in baseball in the 1980s.  He reached the World Series four times, was a three time Gold Glover, four time All Star, won the NL batting title in 1985 & 1990, and also won the NL MVP in 1985.

Bob Sykes was a 19th round draft pick of the Tigers in 1977.  He couldn't quite turn the corner in the majors.  He had a 4.65 ERA in his career and was eventually demoted to the bullpen of the Cardinals in 1981.  He didn't perform that great in the bullpen with a 4.58 ERA in 1981.  After being traded, he never pitched an inning in baseball again.  AFAICT, he was never a high level prospect.  He had a respectable career ERA of 3.01 in AA, but that balloons up to 4.83 in AAA.

So in hindsight, this trade was terrible for the Yankees and great for the Cardinals.  However, why did this trade even happen?

We have a first round draft pick who is performing quite well in the minors.

And we have a middle reliever who doesn't seem to be doing that well in the majors and doesn't have an elite prospect status from the past.

They seem like perfect trade targets for each other??

This trade is hard to make sense in any way.  Even if the Yankees had reasons to trade McGee, surely they could have gotten something better in value?

Obviously some context can be lost over the last 35 years to understand why.  But it's one of the worst trades in baseball I can recall and just can't make any sense of.

Update 6/19/2017:

I was thinking about this and found this old Nytimes article: Cardinals' Willie McGee is Not 'E.T.'.


In it it states:

''When we signed Winfield, somebody had to come off our 40-man roster to make room for him,'' Bill Bergesch explained. ... "We decided to outright McGee to our Columbus farm team, which meant he was a 'frozen' player - he couldn't be reacquired by us without going through major-league waivers.''

... ''But we knew that if we tried to get him back through waivers, we'd probably lose him for $20,000 so we decided to try to trade him. That way at least we would get a player for him ..."

So that's some of the back story.  Dave Winfield was signed before the 1981 season and McGee's breakout year was in 1981 (he hit .283/.343/.359 in 1980 in AA).  So the Yankees perhaps did not expect a breakout in 1981 and were suddenly stuck with trying to trade him after 1981.

But I found this nugget fascinating:

Willie McGee was mentioned to at least one other National League club, the San Diego Padres, who spurned him.

McGee was clearly not someone that was viewed very highly amongst the rest of baseball, which still confounds me.  Surely a speedy 21 year old center fielder, former first round draft pick, hitting .322 in AA, would elicit more than a passing glance from most teams?


Some context is still lost.

2016 Cubs - Everything Is Going Right For Them

Today the Cubs stand at an amazing 39-16, on pace for 114 wins on the year, just below the record of 116 wins.

I couldn't help but look at the stats for the Cubs and think that everything is going better than anyone could have humanly expected for them.  It's not surprising given their 39-16 record.

Currently, their 5 starting pitchers all have an ERA under 3.00 and none have missed a start.

Jake Arrieta - 9-1, 1.80 ERA
Jon Lester - 6-3, 2.29 ERA
John Lackey - 6-2, 2.88 ERA
Kyle Hendricks - 4-4, 2.84 ERA
Jason Hammel - 7-1, 2.14 ERA

Jake Arrieta had a season for the ages in 2015 culminating in the 2015 NL Cy Young award.  While expected to perform well, was another 8.7 WAR season expected?  I would have doubted it.  But so far he's just under pace for it (on pace for about a 8.5 WAR).

Jon Lester has been an elite pitcher (> 6.0 WAR in 2008 and 2009, 5.2 WAR in 2010), but the last three years his WAR has been 3.0, 4.6, and 3.1.  Were the Cubs expecting another 5.0 WAR from him this year?  I doubt it, but he's on pace for it so far.  The 2.29 ERA would be the best of his career and his ERA+ of 175 would be the best for his career.  It's worth noting his current FIP is at 3.22, so nearly a full run above his ERA.  Perhaps that'll level out as the year goes on.

In 2015 at the age of 36, John Lackey probably had the second greatest year of his career (5.7 WAR vs 6.3 WAR in 2007).   While a really good pitcher for the middle of the rotation, did the Cubs think he'd repeat his performance in 2015 at the age of 37?  He's got better peripheral stats (FIP of 3.19 vs. 3.57 and SO/W ratio of 4 vs 3.3) so far and on pace for a 4.4 WAR.  Excluding 2015, that would be his best WAR since 2007.

Never considered an elite prospect Kyle Hendricks had a good year in 2015 at the age of 2015 with a 1.7 WAR over 180 innings.  He had a 3.95 ERA and 3.36 FIP.  Some improvement may have been expected and hoped for, but a 3+ WAR for your number four starter along with a 3.92 SO/W ratio?  Probably unexpected.

Jason Hammel had a career best 3.1 WAR in 2014 (and a 3.0 WAR in 2012 for Baltimore).  He had a 1.8 WAR in 2015 and so far has a WAR of 1.9.  So was a 5 WAR player expected in 2016?  Doubtful. His FIP of 3.41 is over a full run higher than his ERA, so this will likely level out over the rest of the year.

But everything hasn't been just good on the pitching side, it's been great on the hitting side too.  Anthony Rizzo and Kris Bryant are doing about the same they did in 2015.  There's been no regression here.

Anthony Rizzo 2015 - .278/.387/.512
Anthony Rizzo 2016 - .251/.390/.524

Kris Bryant 2015 - .275/.369/.488
Kris Bryant 2016 - .274/.358/.507

If anything Rizzo should do better, as he has a likely unlucky .232 BAbip right now.  Bryant's strikeout rate has gone done as well so his numbers could rise as well.

But at the top of the order we have Dexter Fowler and Ben Zobrist.

Dexter Fowler - .303/.421/.515
Ben Zobrist - .326/.438/.500

How in the world was this expected.

Fowler has a career high WAR of 2.8 in 2012 and a WAR of 2.2 in 2015.  He already has a 2.7 WAR in 2016.  His current OPS of .936 would annihilate his career high of of .863, which was gained in Colorado.

Zobrist is a multiple time All Star from his days in Tampa, but is this the kind of resurgence that was expected from a 35 year old?  I would say not.   He hasn't had a OBP over .400 since 2009 and has never hit above .300.  His current OPS of .938 would be his highest since 2009 and first above .900 since 2009.  In fact, this is for a player who's OPS was .816 in 2015 and below .800 in 2013 and 2014.

About the only sore spot so far has been the performance of Jason Heyward.  He's struggled so far and is sitting with a .615 OPS, well below his career average of .774.   But everything else seems to be going way better than expected.

The NBA Turning Into A 3-Point League

Stephen Curry and the Golden State Warriors are off to an amazing 38-4 start to the 2015-2016 season.  Stephen Curry is undoubtedly been the NBA's MVP during the first half of the season. 

The statistic I find most fascinating about Stephen Curry's run this year is the number of three pointers he's shooting.  As of this writing, he's got 193 three pointers on the year.  That's good for a pace of 376 over 82 games.  Keep in mind, he missed a couple of games due to an injury earlier in the year.  For a good part of the year prior to that injury he was on pace for over 400.

Regardless, any of these numbers will completely shatter the NBA record for three pointers in a season, which Curry already owns.  He had 286 three pointers last year to set the record.  That beat his prior record of 272 which he accomplished in 2012-2013.  With 261 in 2013-2014, he owns three of the top five three point shooting seasons in NBA history.

While Curry is going to annihilate this record, it's really an indication of how much the NBA has changed in terms of the three pointer being used as a weapon.  The NBA changed three point line distances several times starting in 1994 before settling into what it is today in the 1996-1997 season.  Ever since then three point shooting has gone up and up.  From 1997-2001 teams averaged 4.6 three pointers per game.  Then from 2001 to 2005, NBA teams averaged over 5 per game.  Then from 2006 to 2012 it grew to over 6 per game.  From 2012 to 2015 it jumped to over 7 per game.  And now in the 2015-2016 season, teams are currently averaging 8.3 three pointers per game.

The change in the game can be perhaps be illustrated best by looking at Michael Jordan's early career.  Debated as the best basketball player of all time, but minimally the best shooting guard of all time, some of Jordan's pre-1994 three point statistics can look comical by modern day measurements.

For example, Jordan lead the league in scoring each year from 1986 to 1989.  However, he made an phenomenally unimpressive 46 three pointers in those three seasons.  Yes, that's 46 three pointers in THREE SEASONS.  As a comparison, Stephen Curry has made 47 in his last eight games.  In the 1987-1988 season, Jordan made a comical 7 three pointers total and had a horrible 13.2% shooting percentage on three pointers.  Even during a championship year in the 1991-1992 season, Jordan made only 27 three pointers on 27% shooting (the league average was 33.1%).

Later, Jordan's three point shooting grew just as it did for the rest of the NBA, but it's comical looking at some of those early numbers.

The NFL growing into a pass heavy league

Looking through the final NFL 2015 stats, I found something stunning.

An amazing 11 players threw for atleast 30 touchdowns this year.  That's phenomenal.  I remember a time when through 30 touchdowns a year was a benchmark of elite play.  Even more amazing, 21 players threw for atleast 20 touchdowns.

As a comparison, in 2001, only 3 players threw for 30 touchdowns.  Throwing for 20 touchdowns ranked you as 10th best in the league.

Here are the number of 30 TD passers the league has had each year since 2000.

2000 - 3
2001 - 3
2002 - 0
2003 - 1
2004 - 4
2005 - 1
2006 - 1
2007 - 4
2008 - 3
2009 - 4
2010 - 5
2011 - 5 (including three players with atleast 40 TDs thrown)
2012 - 5
2013 - 5
2014 - 9
2015 - 11

As you can see, it's been ratcheting up this decade and especially the past few years.  It's hard to believe that in 2002 there wasn't even 1 quarterback that threw for 30 TDs.

Here's the total number of touchdowns thrown in the NFL during that same timeframe.

2000 - 634
2001 - 635
2002 - 694
2003 - 654
2004 - 732
2005 - 644
2006 - 648
2007 - 720
2008 - 646
2009 - 710
2010 - 751
2011 - 745
2012 - 757
2013 - 804
2014 - 807
2015 - 842

Wow, it's really ratcheting up.  It's the third straight year of 800 TDs thrown (another record, beating the one set in 2014, which beat the one set in 2013) and there hasn't been fewer than 745 since 2009.

Perplexed over the Giants signing of Jeff Samardzija

After I heard that the Giants had signed Jeff Samardzija to a 6 year $90 million dollar deal, I was perplexed.

Right now, according to FanGraphs, teams are spending about $6 million per WAR on a player.  Although that calculation is a few years old and some say it is closer to $8 million per WAR nowadays, it's a reasonable number to use for judgement.

Jeff Samardzija has had the following WARs in his career since being converted to a starter:

2012 - 1.8
2013 - 1.0
2014 - 3.7
2015 - 0.2

Based on his $18 million a year salary, the Giants are effectively paying for 3.0 WAR a season.  Something he has only accomplished once in his career, and he wasn't particularly close in any other year.  He was ridiculously off in 2015.

In contrast, lets take a look at David Price's contract at 7 years and $217 million.  The Red Sox are paying for what they hope is about 5.1 WAR per year.  Since 2010, when he began a full time starter, David Price has WARs of:

2010 - 4.8
2011 - 2.8
2012 - 6.9
2013 - 2.8
2014 - 4.6
2015 - 5.9

That's not too bad.  He cracked a 5.1 WAR two times and was pretty close another two times.  Minimally he's averaging a WAR of 4.6 (~90% of desired) compared to the average of 1.67 for Samardzija (~55% of desired).

Lets look at Zack Greinke.  His 6 year $206 milllion dollar contract means the Diamondbacks are looking for 5.7 WAR per year.  Since 2008 when he began playing as a starter full time Greinke's WAR has been:

2008 - 5.4
2009 - 10.4
2010 - 3.4
2011 - 1.5
2012 - 2.6
2013 - 3.9
2014 - 4.3
2015 - 9.3

He's cracked 5.7 twice and was pretty close in 2008.  Again, his average is 5.1.  Not that far off (~89% of desired).

Lets look at Jordan Zimmerman to just round things out.  Zimmerman got a 5 year $110 million dollar deal, so that comes to a goal of 3.66 WAR per season.  What's his history?

2011 - 2.8
2012 - 4.7
2013 - 3.7
2014 - 4.9
2015 - 3.5

This deal seems to be a bit more on the mark.  Zimmerman is averaging a WAR of 3.9 over his career.  Based on this, it seems the Tigers got a pretty good deal on Zimmerman.

So while I'm perplexed about the Samardzija signing, a team that has won three World Series in the last 6 years should deserve some credit.  Perhaps they see something that others don't.  At the minimum, because Samardzija converted to a starter later in his career, he doesn't have as much mileage as other starters.

But the Giants are certainly banking on the fact that 2015 was a fluke and 2014 is a better indicator of his performance.  In 2015, Samardzija played for the most defensively poor team in baseball (see Fangraphs chart).  So a change of scenery to a very good defensive team (#2 according to Fangraphs for 2015) may do wonders for Samardzija.

Arizona Diamondbacks Zack Greinke signing & Shelby Miller trade analysis

The Arizona Diamondbacks just made two huge moves by signing Zack Greinke and trading for Shelby Miller in the last week.

The Zack Greinke deal was a bit of a shocker, as most expected the 32 year old to get about a $150 million dollar contract.  Instead, he got a $206 million dollar contract.

The Shelby Miller trade has been widely panned as the Diamondbacks gave up:

Ender Inciarte, a player who posted a WAR of 3.7 & 5.3 in his first two major league seasons.

Aaron Blair, a prospect who was rated the #40 prospect in baseball before 2015.

Dansby Swanson, the #1 pick in the 2015 draft.

That seems like a huge haul for Miller, who was an All Star in 2015 and posted a 3.6 WAR.  He has a career war of 9.1 in a little over a three seasons of work.

However, much like the James Shield for Wil Myers trade a few years back, I think the there is a method to the Diamondbacks madness.  Time will tell if the move was a good move or not, but right now I don't think it's as bad as people make it out to be.

In 2015 the Diamondbacks were 79-83 with a +7 run differential.  So basically, they were about a .500 team.

They had the second best offense in the National League.   They had the best offense in the National League amongst teams that didn't play in Colorado.  Led by All Star & Gold Glovers Paul Goldschmidt and A.J. Pollock, the Arizona offense is really really good.

The pitching was a different story though.  Arizona's pitching was 9th in the National League, so sort of middle of the pack, a bit below National League average.  Rubby De La Rosa, Chase Anderson, and Jeremy Hellickson started 86 games for the Diamondbacks.  They all posted ERAs of atleast 4.30 and only Chase Anderson had a WAR that was above 0.0 and it was barely at that (0.8).

So this had to be improved.

Bringing in Zack Greinke and Shelby Miller for 60-70 starts should immediately make that situation better.  Add in rookie Robbie Ray for more than 23 starts and a hopefully healthy Patrick Corbin for more than 16 starts, and suddenly this pitching staff looks much deeper and much better.

It isn't hard to imagine that Zack Greinke and Shelby Miller single handedly change the run differential by about 50 runs by themselves.  Add in new depth in the pitching staff and a change of 60-70 or so runs in run differential isn't hard to imagine.  And when your run differential goes from +7 to lets say +70, you suddenly have a contender for the National League West Title (Dodgers were +72 last year, Giants were +69).

Of course, this assumes that Ender Inciarte's value can be replaced.  Which may not be a small feat.

Is Kris Bryant too strikeout prone?

I was looking at the season stats for Kris Bryant, the likely ROY winner for the National League this year, when I saw something startling ...  Bryant struck out 199 times this year.  It easily lead the National League and it's tied for eighth all time.  He's tied with such strikeout illuminaries as Chris Davis, Ryan Howard, and Adam Dunn.  If he had started the year in the majors, he would have easily crossed 200 strikeouts, joining strikeouts legends like Mark Reynolds in the 200+ club.

Needless to say, Bryant was a rookie, so perhaps I'm picking on his 199 strikeouts a bit too much.  However, looking up Kris Bryant's minor league record, he struck out an amazing 162 times in the minor leagues in 2014.  And that was against AA and AAA pitchers.

Now strikeouts have been going up across baseball, so they are perhaps nothing to be too concerned about.  Mike Trout had 184 strikeouts in his MVP 2014 season.  But then again, Trout admitted he was also learning to hit for more power in 2014.  That strikeout total came down to 158 in 2015.  He also never had over a 100 strikeouts in any minor league season.

In contrast, Paul Goldschmidt had 151 strikeouts this year and 145 strikeouts in his breakout 2013 season.  He also had 161 strikeouts during his full year of playing in A ball in 2010.

Still, strikeouts in the 150s range is still much lower than the 200ish that Bryant approached.  Looking at other great hitters from the past few years, the high strikeout rate for Bryant is a tad concerning.

The great Joey Votto struck out a career high of only 138 times in 2013 but has usually hovered in the low 100 range.

Miguel Cabrera struck out a career high 148 times in his rookie year but usually has hovered in the low 100s.  In his elite run from 2010-2013, he never had over 100 strikeouts.

Prince Fielder never struck out more than 138 times.  He struck out a very low 88 times in 2015.

Robinson Cano had a career high 107 strikeouts in 2015, but never crossed the 100 mark in any other year.

Jose Bautista has also hovered in the low 100 strikout land, with a career high of 116 in 2010.

I can't remember where I read it, but there was a saying that "The greatest way for a hitter to succeed to is to not make outs."  Not everyone is going to be an Albert Pujols (career high of 93 strikeouts in his rookie year, never higher than 76 in any other year) but the 199 strikeouts is a tad concerning.  If he can't get the strikeouts down, Bryant's ceiling may not be as high as everyone hoped.  This isn't to say he won't be a great player, but he may not be the second coming of Frank Thomas (career high 115 strikeouts in 2002 & 2003).

The Game Theory of Online Dating

I just learned this morning that John Nash, the famed economist/mathematician, passed away.  I know of John Nash mostly through the famed "Nash Equilibrium" taught in most beginning economics courses and the theories I learned in a game theory class I took in college.

The game theory course I took in college is one of my favorite courses from college.  Not so much in that I used the class in my career, but I liked the principal that you could try and apply mathematics/game theory to everyday normal life.  And if you view life through these principles, it might help explain life in better (or minimally different) ways.

One of the ways I applied game theory in a conversation sometime ago was online dating.  Myself and many of my friends have done online dating to various degrees of success (... or failure depending on your perspective :-|).  One day I came up with the following conversation/theory.

(To anyone that I don't know reading this, please take this with a grain of salt.  It is just a way to think about things.)

So this conversation/theory only applies to people looking for a relationship.

Assume all people in the world are classified in two groups:

• A person wants to be in a relationship/get married
• A person does not want to be in a relationship/get married

However, nobody knows what group anyone belongs in, including themselves.  A person may believe they want to be in a relationship, but they don't.  A person may believe they don't want to be in a relationship, but really do.

Online dating, while becoming more socially acceptable, is not the traditional first route for dating.  There are gajillions of other ways to meet people: school, church, work, your neighborhood, general social activity, etc.  Online dating, in my opinion, is second or third order.  Something people try when the other ways haven't worked out.  I could be wrong about this, but I get the strong impression it is for most people.

So here in lies the question.  If all people in the world are classified in the two groups I list above, who are the people doing online dating?

As I state above, online dating is second or third order.  So, presumably, all the people that want to be in a relationship are already taken.  Since there are a gajillion ways to meet people before online dating, they've presumably already met someone.

So are the people doing online dating a whole bunch of people who don't want to be in a relationship?

Now the above is just the setup and way to think about it.  Reality is really different.

People aren't in the two classifications I list above.  Instead, everyone's personality and desires falls along a spectrum like the below:

I'll be single forever! <------> I want to get married now!

Everyone in the world is in this spectrum.

People who want to be single forever, they probably are not doing online dating at all.

The people that want to get married now, they are already taken.

The people doing online dating are in between.  There will be those who broke up with someone and really want to be in a relationship again.  They are going to be towards the right side of the spectrum.  There will be those who may have the attitude, "ehhh maybe I'll meet someone".  They may be towards the left side of the spectrum.

But what does the population of people doing online dating look like?

I don't know for sure.  But based on my theory on the two classifications, I speculate there are many people more towards the left side of the spectrum than the right doing online dating.  In other words, there's perhaps a reason why a person is still single.  This isn't meant to imply that a person is single for a terrible reason.  It's for very normal reasons: career, location, commitment, what makes you happy, etc. etc.

So, what kind of questions can be gather and think about from this thought process.

If you're someone that really wants a relationship, is online dating the right avenue?  Perhaps not.  Or perhaps its the best out of a lot of crappy options.

If you're doing online dating and think you really want a relationship?  Do you really?

Social Media: David Letterman vs. Jimmy Fallon vs. Jimmy Kimmel vs. Conan O'Brien vs. John Oliver

I recently came upon an article that said that one of the reasons David Letterman was looking to retire was a realization that he was not keeping up with social media in today's vastly different entertainment market.  The reality is that getting "viral hits" was as important to the success of modern shows than nightly ratings.

I was curious on Letterman's success with social media compared to his contemporaries.  Boy, it is not good.  The following is a chart of David Letterman, Jimmy Fallon, Jimmy Kimmel, Conan O'Brien, and John Oliver videos on YouTube with the indicated number of views. I would also do Jon Stewart, but he lacks a Daily Show specific channel on YouTube.

Views	Letterman	Fallon	Kimmel	O'Brien	Oliver
50M+	0	1	2	0	0
20M-50M	0	23	19	0	0
10M-20M	1	24	16	4	1
5M-10M	0	64	43	22	14
Total Channel Views	155 Million	2.8 Billion	2.0 Billion	1.4 Billion	288 Million

Holy cow! That is awful for Letterman. With the exception of a single video, he doesn't even have any other 5M+ view video on YouTube. It's also worth noting that the video that cracks the 10 million mark is a video released less than two weeks before his last show.

What I find amazing is how Conan O'brien and John Oliver have such better social media audiences on YouTube despite being on basic cable or HBO.  Even their total views blow away Letterman.  Oliver's channel does much better than Letterman's even though he has weekly program while everyone else has nightly programs.  So he is doing more with a much smaller of videos.

Another completely random measurement, number of Twitter Followers for their respective shows and their own personal accounts.  It appears that Letterman only has a twitter for his show and not a personal account.


@letterman: 348K
@jimmyfallon: 25.3 Million
@FallonTonight: 2.63 Million
@jimmykimmel: 5.29 Million
@JimmyKimmelLive: 834K
@ConanObrien: 16.5 Million
@TeamCoco: 588K
@iamjohnoliver: 991K
@LastWeekTonight: 417K


Again, numbers don't look good for Letterman.  He's substantially lower than everyone else.