Monday, September 08, 2014
Park Factors
I've had a long-running, on-and-off discussion with MGL regarding park factors about as long as I've known him, which must be about 13 or 14 years, though whoever was around in the old Fanhome days can give us a better estimate.
I wrote this about 10 or 12 years ago, and nothing really has changed.
I am having a Twitter discussion with him, but since Twitter is blocked at my day job, I'll just post here. The single key point to consider is one of the points that MGL brought up, and that is wind conditions. A park that is susceptible to the wind will be tougher to establish the park factor, especially if you are truly trying to answer the question: "how would an average player have performed THAT DAY?"
While with a full-time player in the lineup, you can get by by using "average" conditions for the year, reasoning that he got a nice blend, you can't do that with a starting pitcher, and to a lesser extent reliever. That's because the "average" will have a greater uncertainty level.
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Then we have the question itsef. Sometimes, we don't want to know what the average player would have done in these conditions, but rather, how did these conditions actually affect said player? For example, 3Com Park kills LHH for power. So, if you a LHH at 3Com, and you compare yourself to an "average" player (and that means a player that is 60% RHH, 40% LHH), you'll really be behind the 8-ball. The odds have been stacked against you. Then you have Barry Bonds (LHH), who managed to hit as many HR at 3Com as he did away from 3Com. Now, you can argue that it's random variation, or you can argue that Barry's skillset is such that he's not affected by 3Com the way other LHH are affected. We have, in effect, Personalized Park Factors.
You can see this with let's say a GB pitcher like Felix, who may not be affected by Safeco the way other pitchers are. And given his long history there, and how his splits are nothing like other pitchers who pitch at Safeco, we would also strongly think that his Personalized Park Factor is different at Safeco.
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Both are legitimate questions, both have individualized answers. And you can't argue against one, by focusing on the other.
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