Bandits Batting - The Bash Brothers and Our Japanese Brethren

This weekend was another disappointing series for the Bandits - and it was beginning to show in the dugout... thrown helmets, broken chairs, three ball strikeouts. As touched on in my last blog, another challenge also awaits - our adopted Japanese Bandits will soon be jetting back to Japan to prepare for the NPB season. This not only includes the dominant Yohei Yanagawa, but also a large chunk of our batting roster - Yamashita, Nakahara, Imamiya, and Makihara. With this in mind, I thought I would look at the importance of the Japanese contingent to the Bandits lineup. I'm also aware I've written a lot about pitching and not much about batting on this blog (personal bias), so it seems fair to even things up.

These days there are a lot of advanced statistics in baseball, and more being created everyday. What you still find though, is that batters can be pretty fairly summed up based on three core numbers - forming the 'slash line'. The slash line gives a pretty good indication of a batters hitting ability (average), patience (on base percentage) and power (slugging percentage). These give a good indication of a batters ability on an individual level. Of these, it's often said that on base percentage (OBP) is the most important - followed by slugging percentage (SLG) - leading to the use of the statistic OPS (on base plus slugging). If you're interested in where all these numbers come from, please search the web - there are innumerable baseball statistics resources available - my aim here is to investigate the Bandits batting performances.

With that said, here is the current Bandits slash line. I've also included the number of at-bats as it's important to take into account the number of plate appearances a player has had when evaluating the validity of the stats.

Player	AB	AVG	OBP	SLG
Ayatsugu Yamashita	53	0.340	0.397	0.472
Kevin Hoef	9	0.111	0.385	0.111
Brad Dutton	98	0.306	0.343	0.378
Wade Dutton	81	0.235	0.333	0.346
David Sutherland	97	0.299	0.327	0.443
Joshua Roberts	103	0.301	0.324	0.495
Rory Rhodes	49	0.184	0.310	0.286
Kenta Imamiya	42	0.238	0.304	0.310
Mitch Nilsson	19	0.158	0.273	0.368
Matthew Roxburgh	67	0.239	0.261	0.299
Keiji Nakahara	87	0.207	0.258	0.402
Joel Naughton	40	0.175	0.250	0.275
Andrew Campbell	17	0.118	0.250	0.176
Taisei Makihara	62	0.194	0.219	0.194
Daniel Lamb-Hunt	7	0.143	0.143	0.143
Jay Nilsson	14	0.000	0.125	0.000
Ryan Battaglia	1	0.000	0.000	0.000

The list is ordered by on-base percentage. As you an see, the catcher Yamashita tops the list, leading in both batting average and on-base percentage, and placing second in slugging percentage. The rest of the Bandits Softbank Hawks guests fair less well - the main standout being Nakahara's slugging percentage, courtesy of his team leading four home runs.

The key fact - and this is something most Bandits fans know very well - is that the true heart of the lineup lies in the local boys: Brad Dutton & Wade Dutton (aka The Bash Brothers, or B1 & B2), David "Goofy" Sutherland, and Josh Roberts. This quartet is amazingly consistent and make the Bandits who they are. With Yamashita returning to Japan, the youthful and talented Mitch Nilsson also has a chance to establish himself within the core.

Herein lies the problem, though - the Bandits batting core is Brisbane based, with support in the first half of the season from Japanese players. Which makes it tough to see the team lose a series 3-1 largely thanks to the Adelaide Bites import players - Almote, Anderson, Jones (all from the USA) and Hu (from Taiwan). Import players are great for the standard of the league, but it is very rough for fans when the performance of their team hinges less on the ability of the players their state produces than the international appearances they can secure.

At the end of the day, the ABL needs to strike a balance between encouraging international players to attend and providing opportunities to local talent. On a local level, I feel the Bandits need to ramp up their efforts to attract quality international players (quality over quantity in this regard). The inaugural ABL all-star game (Aussies vs Imports) should be a fantastic event and a good measure of how the balance currently stands.

Struggling Start - Can Morriss Rebound?

Following a strong home series against the Blue Sox, the Bandits fortunes reversed this weekend in Melbourne - going 1-3 for the weekend. While still in second place, thanks to the Perth Heat killing everyone in sight, it brings there overall record to a level 6-6. Simon Morriss was pinned with two of the recent losses, and four overall, putting him in the unenviable position of having two thirds of the teams losses against his name. I've noticed Simon has been copping heat in reaction to this, and thought I would take a closer look - and see if Mr Morriss can turn his season around.

First, let's have a look at his appearances so far this year:

Opp.	Role	IP	H	R	ER	BB	SO
@Canberra	Starter	5.0	5	6	6	4	4
Sydney	Starter	4.0	7	4	2	2	4
@Melbourne	Closer	0.2	4	3	3	0	1
@Melbourne	Starter	4.0	7	5	5	0	5

Yep, rough start. After a closer look of the numbers, a few things stand out. Firstly, he's given up the most home runs of any Bandit (4). This equates to 2.63 home runs per 9 innings pitched, up from 1.58 last year. Secondly, he's leaking both hits and walks. This season, his WHIP (walks + hits per innings pitched) is up to 2.12 from 1.38 (as well as two hit batters). And finally - on a different note - his strikeout-to-walk ratio has improved from 1.61 to 2.33. So what to make of all this?

Those home runs hurt. In fact, extra-base hits hurt. The runs given up against Canberra came from two home runs and a double. Two against Sydney were from a double. He gave up a solo homer to blow the save against Melbourne, and added a pair of doubles to it in his next appearance. He's getting hit and getting hit hard - and it seems his style of pitching is poorly suited for the batter friendly stadiums highlighted in my last blog post.

One important factor is his Groundout to Flyout (or airout)  ratio (GO/AO). In a tiny ballpark like Melbourne, if you allow the batters to hit flyballs consistantly - eventually some of them are gonna clear the fence, or at least go for  extra base hits. When Chambers got blasted from the third game against Melbourne (after just two innings), he didn't induce a single groundout. Melbourne know how to take advantage of their ballparks dimensions (and so do Canberra, to a certain degree). So Morriss is getting hit, and getting hit in the wrong way. So are the other pitchers, but for Simon it is more pronounced.

Pitcher	Home GO/AO	Away GO/AO
Morriss	3.00	0.67
Maestri	7.00	2.86
Yanagawa	0.40	1.00
Chambers	3.33	0.29

Three of the starting pitchers have a very high proportion of groundouts at home, so far. For Yanagawa, the flyballs being him off him at home haven't mattered due to it's pitcher friendly nature (there is nothing at all wrong with a flyball pitcher - it only becomes a problem when the fences come a lot closer). The other numbers speak for themselves - those who can control the flyballs when away fair best - ala Maestri.

Morriss has a similar problem last year, at home his ERA was 2.65 - yet, overall it was 5.63. Whether he can adjust his approach on the road - with the ultimate aim to prevent home batters playing to the advantages the stadiums provide - remains to be seen. Simon is by no means a bad pitcher - he is a true battler and a local boy to boot - but he (like many pitchers in the league) needs to find a solution to the ballpark problem.