Crucial Situations

Using Win Expectancy to determine high-leverage situations

By Tangotiger

This is going to be one of those articles that starts off slow (boring definitions), has no real meat (why clutter up your reading time with one thousand words when...), but will end up with a bang (... a picture is worth as much). Bear with me, and we'll get there.

What is a clutch (read: pressure, crucial, high-leverage) situation? It is that specific situation where the impact of an event will be much greater than in a typical situation. Man on base, tie game, bottom of the ninth qualifies. Bases empty, down by 8, two outs does not.

A little while ago, I introduced a Win Expectancy chart. This chart showed the chances of a team winning in various score/inning/base/out situations. This is nothing new, as the Mills Brothers generated something similar in the 70s, and many authors have followed suit. It all boils down to the same thing. Winning.

In a continuing look at using Win Expectancy, I will identify the crucial game situations. These situations are for 1 plate appearance only. This is a similar concept as to when to walk Barry Bonds, at home and on the road. They are useful to determine when to bring in a good pinch-hitter. They are not useful to determine when to bring in a good reliever, unless you are planning to only bring in a reliever for one or two batters. I'm currently working on identifying the optimal point in the game (given inning/score/base/out situation) to bring in your best reliever to the end of the inning, or to the end of the following inning.

As you bring up the chart, you will see that many crucial situations occur early in the game. This does not mean that you need to start switching pitchers or batters at that point. But it does mean that the strategies you do make will have much greater impact than in other game situations.

Enjoy the Crucial Game Situations Chart.