"Because it’s just about always a terrible strategy — the run expectancy after an intentional walk ALWAYS goes up."
You play to win the game. Baseball teams have such detailed analytics in place that if the intentional walk were always suboptimal strategy, in every given situation, then it would be gone from the game. The fact that it is still employed as a tactic is confirmation that the actual run expectancy in that situation goes down instead of up (or that the multiple-run expectancy goes down significantly, which matters...). As you know, Joe, actual run expectancy in a given situation is based on the specific batter's tendencies as compared to the actual pitcher's tendencies weighted by the probability that they can actually execute (where all players are not created equally.)
Even the best hitters only come up once every 9 at bats for their team It amazes me that any fan would want to give up even 1 of those especially if you paid the big bucks to go to the game
I reject the premise of this article. I don't think "why do they keep pitching to Judge" is functionally equivalent to "they should intentionally walk Judge every time." Rather they should stop doing things like throwing him fastballs down the middle.
Anyway, now that we'll have the pitch clock next year, bring back making pitchers actually throw the four intentional balls.
You could have a rule that says you can't intentionally walk the #3 or #4 hitter in the batting order. I'm sure that could be fine-tuned, but a rule like that should get you most of the way there. I just saw that rule implemented at Mets Old Timers Day. Al Leiter had to keep throwing pitches to Mike Piazza until Mike finally hit something. I think it was Strike 6. A lot of fun.
This might be a terrible idea, but I've always thought a reasonable way to get rid of the IBB is for any 4 pitch walk (I'm looking at you unintentional intentional walk) to count for 2 bases.
Seems unlikely. Aaron Judge gets on base at a roughly 41% clip. You’re making that 100%. You save less than 10% going to Rizzo instead of Judge, so the question is does the increased likelihood of an extra base hit with Judge offset a 200% increase in on base chances? I think the answer is almost certainly going to be no.
Trying to think of an actual equivalent in other sports:
Football: If the defense was allowed to grant the offense a free 20 yards of field position to start their drive, but the offense had to take their top receiver off the field for the rest of the possession.
Basketball: Whenever Steph Curry has the ball, the defense can signal to stop play and allow a different player an uncontested 3 pointer. Gives them a better chance to score overall, but prevents Steph from beating them.
Imperfect. But the point is these would be similar strategies to avoid letting the best players do their thing.
I just posted something similar to your basketball example (and I used Steph too :)), but I think yours is a little bit too mild. An intentional walk is 25% of the typical plate appearances a batter gets so need something more limiting to the fans seeing a player than him just missing one possession.
It's hard to find an equivalent that matches both the real impact on the game and on the fan experience.
I think it's true in the football example that the better the top WR is relative to the rest of the team, the more often the defense would choose this option. Which is similar to the IBB. But nothing is quite the same as taking the bat out of the best hitter's hands, given the rarity of the fans getting to see that guy hit.
Maybe it's giving them 40 yards free but they have to play with the backup QB. Although I would say for many teams they'd make that tradeoff every time.
Here's my wacky idea, which I'm sure someone else has come up with—maybe even in the 123 comments so far on this post. (What, read all those comments before posting? Have you been to the Internet before?): You can intentionally walk a batter, but the batter gets their average bases per hit, rounded to the nearest base. Most players would still get one base. But Aaron Judge—who, if my calculations are right, is averaging 2.22 bases per hit this season (79 singles, 23 doubles, 0 triples, 57 HRs) would get two bases. I don't know how many players would get two bases instead of one, and I'm kind of disappointed my method wouldn't give Judge a triple on an IBB. But if walking a player didn't create a double-play opportunity, you'd really have to be scared of HRs to do it.
There are lots of flaws with this approach. If you have special rules for IBBs, managers would probably just do "unintentional" IBBs. And you could still set up double plays if whoever is behind the slugger averages down to a single-base walk. So it's a wacky idea that probably wouldn't work. But maybe we could get Banana Ball to try it out or something.
Since there are so many comments, I'll post what I believe is the best solution, by "Joe Pancake" below. I think this idea has been floating around for a while:
After ANY walk (or HBP), the batter can refuse the walk. Then, the number of balls resets to 0, BUT the number strikes does not reset. If there is a second walk or HBP, the batter walks to SECOND base. Again, the batter can refuse, and then a third walk/HBP is a three-base walk, and a fourth walk/HBP is a four-base walk.
This is a great idea for several reasons:
1) It doesn't require any judgement calls for intent. I always think a good rule is one where the incentives push teams towards the desired approach, rather than mandating a certain approach and trying to close all the loopholes. This idea makes an intentional walk foolish since the hitting team can choose what's best for them i.e. what's worst for the pitching team. Therefore, teams won't do it.
2) We probably won't see too many declined walks in practice. A walk is almost always a GOOD thing for a hitter. Especially if there are 1 or 2 strikes, the run expectancy would likely be higher to just take the walk. So there isn't actually a large change to the game.
3) There are a lot of fun, dramatic scenarios possible with this rule. The first 4-base walk is going to be big news. A hitter declines a walk and then hits a home run. Maybe a hitter declines the walk and then strikes out on three pitches.
4) This is a vital point. The result of this rule is that more time will be spent watching the best hitters hit. There will be fewer intentional and quasi-intentional walks. And furthermore, the rare cases where a walk is declined will almost always be when a good hitter is at the plate. So instead of a 4-pitch walk to Judge deflating the tension, it pushes it through the roof.
Add a balk to this and it becomes even more effective. Every runner on base advances just as if the batter walked (or as if the pitcher balked) but the batter has the option to stay at bat.
My thought for the Intentional Walk -- probably too radical for many people -- but it would eliminate it.
When a player walks, he can choose to take 1st base ... OR a pinch runner takes 1st base and the batter gets a brand new count at 0-0. Intentional walks would disappear instantly, imo, if you are penalized with a runner but you don't actually get to avoid the batter.
Joe, you are on a roll this week. Ticked off people about Marino. Ticked off people about dumping the Browns and looking for a new team and now ticked off people who apparently enjoy watching an umpire point to first base more than watching a pitcher try to get a batter out.
1 million% true. Thanks Joe!
The intentional walk has to go!
For a sport trying to create more interest and excitement this seems like among the lowest of the low hanging fruit
The Blue Jays have entered the chat.
"Because it’s just about always a terrible strategy — the run expectancy after an intentional walk ALWAYS goes up."
You play to win the game. Baseball teams have such detailed analytics in place that if the intentional walk were always suboptimal strategy, in every given situation, then it would be gone from the game. The fact that it is still employed as a tactic is confirmation that the actual run expectancy in that situation goes down instead of up (or that the multiple-run expectancy goes down significantly, which matters...). As you know, Joe, actual run expectancy in a given situation is based on the specific batter's tendencies as compared to the actual pitcher's tendencies weighted by the probability that they can actually execute (where all players are not created equally.)
Even the best hitters only come up once every 9 at bats for their team It amazes me that any fan would want to give up even 1 of those especially if you paid the big bucks to go to the game
I reject the premise of this article. I don't think "why do they keep pitching to Judge" is functionally equivalent to "they should intentionally walk Judge every time." Rather they should stop doing things like throwing him fastballs down the middle.
Anyway, now that we'll have the pitch clock next year, bring back making pitchers actually throw the four intentional balls.
The intentional walk is like being able to give the Golden State Warriors 10 points to force them to take Steph Curry out for a quarter.
"We lost, but it was still the right move." Lasorda after spotting Golden State 80 points to keep the splash brothers on the bench all game.
That’s very good, Rob.
Ooh. I *like* that simile.
You could have a rule that says you can't intentionally walk the #3 or #4 hitter in the batting order. I'm sure that could be fine-tuned, but a rule like that should get you most of the way there. I just saw that rule implemented at Mets Old Timers Day. Al Leiter had to keep throwing pitches to Mike Piazza until Mike finally hit something. I think it was Strike 6. A lot of fun.
Yes! The last paragraph sums it up!
Don’t be a coward, challenge the hitter.
This might be a terrible idea, but I've always thought a reasonable way to get rid of the IBB is for any 4 pitch walk (I'm looking at you unintentional intentional walk) to count for 2 bases.
The run matrix is based on the average batter.
But Judge's OPS+ is 208 while Rizzo's is 135 and Stanton's is 115.
https://www.baseball-reference.com/teams/NYY/2022.shtml
Seems to me like there could be an analytic case for the IBB
Seems unlikely. Aaron Judge gets on base at a roughly 41% clip. You’re making that 100%. You save less than 10% going to Rizzo instead of Judge, so the question is does the increased likelihood of an extra base hit with Judge offset a 200% increase in on base chances? I think the answer is almost certainly going to be no.
Trying to think of an actual equivalent in other sports:
Football: If the defense was allowed to grant the offense a free 20 yards of field position to start their drive, but the offense had to take their top receiver off the field for the rest of the possession.
Basketball: Whenever Steph Curry has the ball, the defense can signal to stop play and allow a different player an uncontested 3 pointer. Gives them a better chance to score overall, but prevents Steph from beating them.
Imperfect. But the point is these would be similar strategies to avoid letting the best players do their thing.
I just posted something similar to your basketball example (and I used Steph too :)), but I think yours is a little bit too mild. An intentional walk is 25% of the typical plate appearances a batter gets so need something more limiting to the fans seeing a player than him just missing one possession.
It's hard to find an equivalent that matches both the real impact on the game and on the fan experience.
I think it's true in the football example that the better the top WR is relative to the rest of the team, the more often the defense would choose this option. Which is similar to the IBB. But nothing is quite the same as taking the bat out of the best hitter's hands, given the rarity of the fans getting to see that guy hit.
Maybe it's giving them 40 yards free but they have to play with the backup QB. Although I would say for many teams they'd make that tradeoff every time.
Here's my wacky idea, which I'm sure someone else has come up with—maybe even in the 123 comments so far on this post. (What, read all those comments before posting? Have you been to the Internet before?): You can intentionally walk a batter, but the batter gets their average bases per hit, rounded to the nearest base. Most players would still get one base. But Aaron Judge—who, if my calculations are right, is averaging 2.22 bases per hit this season (79 singles, 23 doubles, 0 triples, 57 HRs) would get two bases. I don't know how many players would get two bases instead of one, and I'm kind of disappointed my method wouldn't give Judge a triple on an IBB. But if walking a player didn't create a double-play opportunity, you'd really have to be scared of HRs to do it.
There are lots of flaws with this approach. If you have special rules for IBBs, managers would probably just do "unintentional" IBBs. And you could still set up double plays if whoever is behind the slugger averages down to a single-base walk. So it's a wacky idea that probably wouldn't work. But maybe we could get Banana Ball to try it out or something.
What if they did walk Judge every time? The Yankees would score a lot more runs
Since there are so many comments, I'll post what I believe is the best solution, by "Joe Pancake" below. I think this idea has been floating around for a while:
After ANY walk (or HBP), the batter can refuse the walk. Then, the number of balls resets to 0, BUT the number strikes does not reset. If there is a second walk or HBP, the batter walks to SECOND base. Again, the batter can refuse, and then a third walk/HBP is a three-base walk, and a fourth walk/HBP is a four-base walk.
This is a great idea for several reasons:
1) It doesn't require any judgement calls for intent. I always think a good rule is one where the incentives push teams towards the desired approach, rather than mandating a certain approach and trying to close all the loopholes. This idea makes an intentional walk foolish since the hitting team can choose what's best for them i.e. what's worst for the pitching team. Therefore, teams won't do it.
2) We probably won't see too many declined walks in practice. A walk is almost always a GOOD thing for a hitter. Especially if there are 1 or 2 strikes, the run expectancy would likely be higher to just take the walk. So there isn't actually a large change to the game.
3) There are a lot of fun, dramatic scenarios possible with this rule. The first 4-base walk is going to be big news. A hitter declines a walk and then hits a home run. Maybe a hitter declines the walk and then strikes out on three pitches.
4) This is a vital point. The result of this rule is that more time will be spent watching the best hitters hit. There will be fewer intentional and quasi-intentional walks. And furthermore, the rare cases where a walk is declined will almost always be when a good hitter is at the plate. So instead of a 4-pitch walk to Judge deflating the tension, it pushes it through the roof.
Add a balk to this and it becomes even more effective. Every runner on base advances just as if the batter walked (or as if the pitcher balked) but the batter has the option to stay at bat.
My thought for the Intentional Walk -- probably too radical for many people -- but it would eliminate it.
When a player walks, he can choose to take 1st base ... OR a pinch runner takes 1st base and the batter gets a brand new count at 0-0. Intentional walks would disappear instantly, imo, if you are penalized with a runner but you don't actually get to avoid the batter.
Joe, you are on a roll this week. Ticked off people about Marino. Ticked off people about dumping the Browns and looking for a new team and now ticked off people who apparently enjoy watching an umpire point to first base more than watching a pitcher try to get a batter out.
Keep it up.