Baseball By The Numbers By Michael Salfino

July 7, 2006
Why the A.L. is Better

The All-Star Game is the last interleague contest before the World Series. This year, the American League holds a 128-75 advantage in these matchups. The National League hasn’t won the midseason classic since 1996 and also has lost eight straight World Series games. Is all this ample proof of AL superiority?

Over 200 games is a nice sample size. But let’s combine this year’s interleague record with 2005’s, giving the AL a 264-181 advantage. That’s four standard deviations above the .500 record you’d expect if talent was evenly distributed between the leagues. This  means there’s about a one in 27,000 chance that the leagues are equal despite these recent head-to-head results. Mathematics says the AL is better, and very likely a lot better.

Boston Red Sox General Manager Theo Esptein recently said that an 85-win team in the AL would win 95 in the NL, and vice versa.

One thing Theo didn’t mention is the payroll gap between the leagues. The total AL payroll for 2006 is $1.167 billion. In the NL, it’s $1.095 billion. If that doesn’t sound like a lot, remember that that the NL has two more teams than the AL. So, while the average AL team has about $83 million invested in players, the average NL team has just $68 million. If payroll correlated perfectly with wins, the average AL team would be expected to be about five wins better.

But how do we explain the other five, if we accept Epstein’s view coupled with the evidence of the recent interleague record?

The best guess is pitching. We’ll stipulate that the AL has better hitters plus the designated hitter. But AL teams only are scoring about as many runs per game as NL teams once you back out the interleague stats. Logically, then, AL pitchers have to be much better to balance the effect of their superior hitters. When facing weaker NL hitters, this AL pitching superiority more fully reveals itself.

There’s plenty of attention this week on the players who made the squad. But let’s look at those surprising players who failed to make the cut but who are paying huge dividends relative to cost. Is there evidence of a fundamental shift in broad skills that makes the first-half surge sustainable deep into summer?

Buy

Dave Ross (C, Reds): About 30 percent of his flyballs are homers, over twice the league average and more than three times Ross’s historic rate. But Ross only recently received regular playing time, so there’s a better chance he’s a late bloomer than the market is granting.

Hold

Freddie Sanchez (3B, Pirates): Batting average the last three years on balls in play: .188, .308, .382. Is he getting better or luckier? Lean toward the former. Unlike Eric Byrnes (below), Sanchez hasn’t yet valleyed from a comparable peak.

Marcus Thames (OF, Tigers): This guy has always had plus power. Now, it’s A-plus, with 17 bombs in his first 221 ABs. The batting average is fluke however, given his high strikeout rate (over 20 percent of plate appearances).

Brandon Phillips (2B, Reds): We telescoped too much risk into Phillips earlier in the year. Never bail on a surprising player in the midst of his first slump. Phillips is showing why he was once so highly regarded.

Alexis Rios (OF, Blue Jays): He was projected to get the short-end of rightfield platoon. He’s doubled his power (13.8 percent of flyballs are homers), but the bigger shocker is that he’s no longer an extreme groundball hitter.

Sell

Mark DeRosa (2B/OF, Rangers): DeRosa is entrenched as a regular. We like the 50-doubles pace. But too much of his current value is tied up in batting average. He’s currently at .397 on balls in play, which is not sustainable.

Eric Byrnes (OF, Diamondbacks): Still strikes out and doesn’t walk enough. Guys like Byrnes have one year out of three when they get really lucky on balls in play (.325 this year). Will the luck run out in August or next April?