Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1906-08-21
CHANCES OF THINGS
HAPPENING IN BASE BALL
GAMES.
BY HUGH 8. FULLERTON.

| BY HUGH s. FULLERTON.
Every time you go to ball game you
hear some one say: There's still
chance" Maybe he tells you how much
Of a chance. But does he know? You can
figure that a certain man at bat has hit
.342 for the season, and Immediately you
think he has better than one chance in
three to make hit.
But what the chances are Of certain
play being pulled OF successfully few know.
wanted to find out-so took four old
score books Of four different years. They
contained scores Of four different Chicago
National League teams and four other
teams, one Cincinnati and three Chicago
White Stockings,as the home teams against
all the other clubs in their league. Practi-
cally. therefore. they represented the work
| OF practically sixty-four different ball clubs.
| covering period of eight years. embracing
| all kinds of teams and players, and, of
| course, the pennant winners and the tail
| enders. BY studying the 1853 games record
| ed In these books 1 got some clues to
the chances of certain plays being pulled
or The results were rather startling.
AS to the chances of making base hit.
|
ed with times at bat, and. of these 1852
made base hits The batting average of the
teams. therefore, was 200, which shows
that even the despsed .24O hitter is going
| some compared with the grand average
| In these 15S games 929 men drew passes
| to first base, or one man was permitted to
walk out of every IA -3 approximately
who faced the pitcher. The figures showed
| that 4-1S0 men walked to first on bases on
| balls in every game, or that the odds
against batter getting base balls
| should be approximately Is 20 to 1.
| There were GO men hit by pitched balls,
which seems exceedingly low, although,
come to think of it, there are many games
In which no one is hit, so the average OF
one every three games (the figures show
/ slightly under this or one every 61-62)
does not seem SO far wrong after all.
| The chances of a man being placed /
position to sacrifice are pretty large. for
| approximately one in every twenty-four
men who went to bat, or. rather, faced the
pitcher, tried to sacrifice. There were $50
| sacrifice hits made in the games counted,
| which is an average of 1t per game This
| average approximately is right, 1 should
judge, as 1t includes the games of the old
Chicago National League team under An
| son, that seldom used the sacrifice, and
many White Stocking games in which the
Chicago team under Comiskey carries the
sacrifice hit game to its Nth power.
| ~
discovered some figures that rather tend
| to discourage the art of sacrifice hitting.
In those games OIL men were sent to bat to
| sacrifice, according to my scores How
many disobeyed orders and hit it out only
| can guess, and likewise there is a chance
that lot of them decided to hit after they
| had two strikes called. But, at any rate,
| Oil Of them went through with the attempt
| to sacrifice, and $50 of them succeeded in
| their efforts, showing that Yearly sixty-four
per cent Of them succeed, or that the odds
! ought to be to on a man sacrificing
| successfully OF these $50 there were III
| who beat out their hunts and got base hits
instead Of sacrifices In thirty cases
| the f1elders made wild throws that let the
| runner go on to second, and the notes in
| dictate that sacrifices were the direct causes
| OF winning eighty-one games of ball; that
| is, one sacrifice or attempted sacrifice turn
| ed the tide and won the game. Fifty-eight
batters struck out trying to sacrifice, and
| 100 popped up flies. '" -s
The figures indicating how many attempt
| ed hunts resulted in forcing runners at
| Gated, but I find in the scores ninety-two
such cases.
| Perhaps the most striking and startling
| figures resulting from the investigation are
/
| In the 1876 games 1,O67 men tried to steal
bases, an average of about six to the game
| or a little under that. OF those 800 tried
| to steal second base and 273 tried to steal
third. while twelve tried to steal home. The
| figures indicate that the nearer home q
| runner gets the easier 1t is to steal, as eight
| Of the II who tried to steal home succeeded.
| These figures, however. are fallacious. as
| the steal Of home usually Is by some bril-
liant, daring runner and achieved by a
sudden dash when the pitcher is asleep.
|
| However, the figures plainly reveal the
| fact that 1t is easier to steal third base
| than 1t is to steal second. OF the 800 men
who tried to steal second 455 were sue
| cessful while 367 were caught, or IS 1-3
per cent reached the base in safety. or the
| 273 who tried to steal third 1859 reached
| the base, or over 62 per cent. Yet nearly
| four times as many tried to steal second
| as attempted to steal third.
| The figures further show that of the 273
| who tried to steal third 96 scored. and Of
| these 81 scored wild throws from the
catcher resulting from their steals. OF the
| wild throws from the catcher. showing that
| the catcher is far more likely to make a
| wild throw to catch a runner at third than
| he is to throw, wild to second.
'A~ ;
| I can find in the books only sixteen in
| stances Of attempts to make the squeeze
play" and Of these eleven were successful
and five failures. In four Of these five fail,
ures the batter missed the ball. and in the
other the bunt went straight to the pitch
| err who threw out the runner at the plate
| and the appended note says that the pitch
er's feat was marvellous one
| X X
Among other things. looked up the
chances Of man scoring when he reaches
! different bases In these games 1913 men
reached first base by hits errors, being HIT
| or bases on balls, or fielders' choices, or an
| average of about 211z to the game OF these