I'll never forget that fucking game for as long as I live. A few years later I think it was 94 McDonald's came up with a set of MLB cards each team had a player. The Yankee was Roberto Kelly. No one wanted that fucking card, but you needed it to complete your set.
what size?
Everything is bigger in Canada
I did shot put what about you
Who are the other catchers? The back-ups? Late game subs? Catchers from crappy teams the pitchers got traded for? This is a weird statistical manipulation to get at a positive result.He was the best hitting catcher of all time and underrated behind the plate controlling games
So, about Mike Piazza's defense ...
Mike Piazza's not going into the Hall of Fame this summer for a bunch of reasons, and his defense is just one of them. But does he deserve the bad rap for his glove work?www.google.com
The most important part of a catcher’s job is handling his pitchers and in this area Piazza was superb. Here is one of the most telling statistics. In his career behind the plate, pitchers had a 3.80 ERA when Piazza was catching. If you look at all the other catchers who caught the same pitchers in the same year that Piazza did, they allowed a 4.34 ERA. That’s a major difference, much more important than a few extra bases stolen. (In fact, Piazza’s catcher ERA of 3.81 includes the run value of any extra stolen bases he allowed.)
Craig Wright wrote an excellent article in The Hardball Times Baseball Annual 2009 called "Piazza, Hall of Fame Catcher". He did a detailed sabermetric study that showed that hitters had a .723 OPS with Piazza behind the plate and a .748 OPS with other catchers. This 25-point differential is highly significant. In further studies that we did in The Fielding Bible—Volume II, we found that Piazza saved at least 20 to 70 runs more than an average catcher defensively, depending on the technique that we used.
I highly recommend checking out the Piazza article by Craig Wright ... My conclusion is the same as his from that article:
"Mike Piazza was not a defensive liability who made up for it with his bat. The greatest offensive catcher in the history of Major League Baseball was a good defensive catcher as well."
For the dodgers it was mainly Carlos Hernandez a very good defensive catcher who went to the padres and started for their 98 World Series team. Most backup catchers have a job because they are good defensively and can’t hit.
Yeah, but how much playing time does a backup catcher realistically see? What are the situations where they get called in? I'm just saying, to suggest those numbers are statistically significant is a bit of a stretch. I watched Piazza in New York for his whole career there plus my girlfriend would bang him right in front of me she's such a Mets Stan. The consensus here in the East is he was defensively okay at best.
I don’t disagree with him possibly just being okay. I just think he’s better than people generally give him credit for.
Wrong thread?
LOL. This dude had to look pretty damn hard to find a positive defensive stat for Piazza. And it's largely meaningless. "If you look at all the other catchers who caught the same pitchers in the same year that Piazza did..."
Rugby guys are tough. I can watch that sport even if I don't always know what's going on.
God dammit
