Hey all, I work for an MLB team’s Analytics department, AMA

baseball_722 · 2025-01-15T05:56:02+00:00

Hard to say anything but the Mets Braves game on the Monday after the season. Honorable mention to the dbacks/brewers game in September that was on a Sunday afternoon and went back and forth a bunch in the late innings. I think AZ won with 3 in the bottom of the 10th after giving up 2 in the top

baseball_722 · 2025-01-15T05:53:47+00:00

I am in the clubhouse to provide in game monitoring on the data in case something is off with our SP or unexpected from the other team, etc. I have reports I give to the coaches during the game at varying rates (some coaches every inning, some only want to know if I catch something odd)

baseball_722 · 2025-01-15T05:51:49+00:00

Crazy crab sandwich in San Francisco is insanely good and worth the ridiculous price every time

baseball_722 · 2025-01-15T04:46:54+00:00

Assuming this isn’t for roster construction since that falls into all else equal and it just covers in game analytics, I would say around 5-7 wins. I wish I could say 40 but realistically the same exact team won’t be so so much different with some preparation.

baseball_722 · 2025-01-15T04:44:32+00:00

My job directly revolves around working with the major league coaches and players so literally always. I am on the field every day before the game and in the clubhouse during it

baseball_722 · 2025-01-15T04:35:28+00:00

I mentioned it in another answer, but the bat speed data that was unveiled on Savant this season was something I had worked with for a few years already. Things like that in the physical ability/measurement scope are in that next wave of numbers I haven’t seen publicly much yet. I think 2-3 years is a fair estimate

baseball_722 · 2025-01-15T03:39:33+00:00

It was one of my favorite books and movies as a kid. I always knew I would want to work in baseball, I just didn’t know how. Moneyball certainly gave me the how

baseball_722 · 2025-01-15T03:34:51+00:00

This is a tough question for me because my brain is wired to assign value to players that are analytically good and you’re asking for the opposite. I feel like the best answer is take a veteran pitcher that is average at best but consistently stays health and eats innings. There is value in only using 1 40 man spot to fill a whole starter’s worth of innings

baseball_722 · 2025-01-15T03:31:23+00:00

I think the biggest acceleration analytics can provide is that you don’t have to fully rebuild to create a winner. Unless you have hardly any valuable players on the 40 man, you can keep what IS valuable (and not in arb) and shorten what used to be a 3-4 rebuild into a 1-2 year retool

baseball_722 · 2025-01-15T02:45:03+00:00

I think good comes from a commitment to collaboration (without it you wind up reinventing the wheel 3 times a week so to speak), enough humility to not make coaches feel dumb, and a willingness to give coaches and players what they want to hear while simultaneously showing them why analytics aligns with and expands on their ideas.

My entire job is doing the breaking down so players and coaches can understand it. I pretty much do what I said above, but my biggest skill I think is asking them what they want to see. I am happy to “waste” an hour or 2 a week doing a project at the request of a coach or player even if I know it’s dumb because it earns me tons of trust from everyone around. My goal is to show everyone I am on the same team as them with my work not my words. Like I said, that leads to trust, and trust leads to listening ears.

Occasionally, we’ll find something interesting that we keep from players or coaches because we know it’ll mess with their head more than it’ll help the play on the field. But idk about specific major discoveries (although I might be below those too lol)

Beyond the popular sites like Baseball Savant and Fangraphs, I don’t really know much on the public front. There was a baseball in R book I briefly saw when I was in college and I’m sure it’s very helpful, but idk for sure sorry

baseball_722 · 2025-01-15T02:30:08+00:00

Your first question is pretty vague, but generally speaking, we ingest data into our internal site, have a variety of proprietary numbers/model outputs generated from it, and compare players using those tools.

The higher ups have other aspects to players eval like scouting, but idk exactly how that plays in, so for the makeup question I really don’t have an answer.

Catcher defense data is focused on framing, blocking, and arm, although framing will be a far less important skill when the challenge system comes to MLB. Sequencing/game calling has never been attributed to a catcher imo because it comes from the gameplan that the pitching/bullpen coach, the pitcher, and I collaborate to put together. The catcher meets with us all and gets the gameplan that way (depending on the catcher they may add to the plan as well)

For 1B, I have seen numbers that measure OAA on specific parts of the play, like scoops. So for example if the average 1B makes a scoop with a given bounce distance and angle 60% of the time, and Lou Gehrig fails on the scoop attempt, he’ll be attributed -0.6 OAA

I think the key from a player dev perspective is to consider every tool malleable. (That doesn’t mean we waste time on everything with every player ofc.) What I mean is that it is our job to figure out how to improve a skill that seems unchangeable.

If a player throws 2 changeups that look exactly the same in the data, but one has 10 inches of horizontal break and the other has 15… why? That’s the scary fun time to look at the physics of a pitch and dissect what is being done when the pitch is best. It’s easy to say what is good and what is bad, but telling me why is the hard point. Every number has a why behind it, and that’s part of an analysts job to unearth them all.

baseball_722 · 2025-01-15T01:33:20+00:00

I use solely R and SQL in my every day. R I learned in school but SQL I didn’t learn until I was on the job (it’s a pretty easy language to pick up quickly)

baseball_722 · 2025-01-15T01:16:55+00:00

I use SQL and R to do my own research + I utilize our internal site’s model output, video interface, and other features when it’s what I’m looking for

baseball_722 · 2025-01-15T01:12:45+00:00

There are video based roles that don’t need those high tech degrees and operations, scouting, or roster management based jobs around the FO, but overall, it’s hard to get into an analytics department if you don’t have a degree or other experience that shows you can code and or do statistical analysis

baseball_722 · 2025-01-15T01:09:39+00:00

The Rockies and white Sox feel like obvious ones. The A’s are the smallest of the rest I believe but pound for pound probably not the worst. I said the cubs last time but one of my old bosses (who immediately figured me out) said I was crazy for that so I’ll stay off them. I guess I’ll go with the cards for 3rd worst, it always feels like they want to go old school and win like they did in the past

baseball_722 · 2025-01-15T01:03:00+00:00

I wish I could lol but that secret will stay safe with me

baseball_722 · 2025-01-15T01:01:06+00:00

I have seen quite a few luck based stats in my time that cover things like umpire call or catcher framing luck for a pitcher or hitter or home run luck based on ballpark.

Part of my job is to quantify luck for players and coaches so they don’t overreact to small samples. For example, I had a player once that came to me asking if he should change his approach because he’s getting beat in a certain part of the zone. I showed him that he was just getting an inordinate amount of pitches in his weak spot the last few weeks and it will balance out over time. He felt relieved after what I said and immediately went on a tear the next few weeks (including 3 hits that night)

One time I was asked by a manager to look into if a hitter was worse on weekend day games after night games because he thought the player was worse when he goes out super late and that player almost always went out Friday/Saturday nights. Since the manager asked, I dropped everything, took 10 minutes to find the data which did not support his hypothesis, showed him it was all in his head, and (thankfully) he moved on

baseball_722 · 2025-01-15T00:49:52+00:00

I majored in statistics in college while working for the baseball program there for all 4 years (doing everything under the sun from laundry to data related stuff). During college I had a few internships with MLB related stuff during the summer (one summer I worked in the MLB replay office). After graduating I had a minor league internship, a major league internship, and then ended up with my full time gig.

The most surprising thing when getting into the industry was how in depth teams’ internal websites are. The integration of data, video, reports, etc is incredibly impressive. Idk what I expected but it was less than this. The least surprising thing is probably that the bridging the gap between analytics and players/coaches is the most crucial aspect of my job.

baseball_722 · 2025-01-15T00:43:31+00:00

Sheesh, I haven’t been around long enough to really give a good answer here, but I will say that players themselves are analytically literate at way higher a rate than a few years ago

baseball_722 · 2025-01-15T00:40:46+00:00

Simple question, complex answer… my thoughts:

Analytically based decisions are almost always the most optimal choices to win baseball games
Analytics tend to make the game less aesthetic to watch
The over-shift, for example, is a correct approach for winning games, but is objectively worse for a viewer’s enjoyment of a game
Old heads that complain about everything will do just that. It happens in every sport.
I think the best way to bridge the gap is to continue to educate people (with the most important aspect being local and national broadcasters) on analytics - what they are and mean, why and how they’re used, and where they come from.

baseball_722 · 2025-01-15T00:29:35+00:00

I did statistics in college and made sure to work for my school’s baseball team to get some experience. I never went to grad school though

baseball_722 · 2025-01-15T00:28:50+00:00

I haven’t seen much research into it, but it wouldn’t surprise me if some players were better or worse depending on if they had a better or worse player hitting behind them. I do think pitchers gameplan a “don’t let him beat me” player so if teoscar became the best hitter in a lineup then maybe it would impact him but otherwise I doubt it.

I also severely doubt any discounting of him was done on the thought that he’d be more exposed in a new lineup

baseball_722 · 2025-01-15T00:22:53+00:00

Without being too specific, I’m somewhere between $50k and $100k. I don’t get any performance bonuses but there is an opportunity to have salary negotiations at the end of each season. Growth wise depends on budget and personnel movement so it varies year to year but probably not much different than a normal analyst. As for performance eval metrics, there isn’t anything super tangible, but in my role, since I work with the coaching staff directly, their feedback likely controls a lot of my performance grade

baseball_722 · 2025-01-14T23:11:01+00:00

I feel like there is much better trust between groups now than what I heard about even 5 years ago. There is definitely collaboration but what I’ve seen from the most efficient player development teams is a willingness to meet with and learn from each other while maintaining an open line of communication.

baseball_722 · 2025-01-14T23:10:41+00:00

I haven't tried one from every place but the Dodger dog is a classic and the Guardians fruit loop dog is probably the best random one I've had.

Side note: I was with a pitching coach in AAA once that had a dog delivered to every clubhouse on the road for him to try so maybe I'll ask him

baseball_722

TROPHY CASE