You’re discounting quantum physics? Because (as I understand most of it) there is a huge element of randomness and pure probability in the universe. I’m not criticizing, my degree is in biochem and I can’t help but believe that the clockwork theory wasn’t invalidated by Heisenberg…he just stated that we aren’t ever going to be able to read the clock without blindly feeling the hands. I personally subscribe to the modified clockwork theory many above have described.

I find it strange that people can’t understand randomness. Almost everyone has played a sport, or a game, or a video game, or tossed rocks at a stump. I know you want to justify running three racks in pool, or winning five times in a row when you had 60/40 hand odds, or whatever. But when you accept random it really does help once you come back down.

….“random” things like this that players have almost zero control over. Which of course in turn gives rise to us calling it “random” for all practical purposes.

Which you already said. I’m an idiot for writing that last post.

However, in the context of baseball performance and what baseball players can reasonably control, I think we can call certain variances random.

When you put randomness (or the lack thereof) in those mathematical terms you are taking them out of human context (as we are not god-like creatures who are going to understand all the universal forces that lead to “non random” events). Language that occurs between humans carries lots of implications. So, for sake of argument with other humans, let’s just imply that events are perceivably random when we use the word “random”.

In my limited observation, I’ve seen Branyan lose several hits to the short right fielder but I’ve only seen him go the other way once. To his credit, Griffey did poke a ground ball through the vacant shortstop hole the other night against the shift for an RBI.

Given the relative skillsets of Branyan and Griffey at this point in their respective careers, it might make more sense for Griffey to adjust to the shift that way while Branyan should keep doing what he is doing, even if he loses some singles.

If the batter adjusts to it by going the other way some of the time, he should be able to increase his BABIP at the expense of his power. Which would seem to be one of the purposes of the shift — to invite the batter to make an adjustment that will decrease his likelihood of hitting a home run.

It would be interesting to look at Branyan’s hit distribution over the course of the season to see if he’s going the other way any more than he was earlier in the season. That would be an indication that he’s adjusting to the shift.

In my limited observation, I’ve seen Branyan lose several hits to the short right fielder but I’ve only seen him go the other way once. To his credit, Griffey did poke a ground ball through the vacant shortstop hole the other night against the shift for an RBI.

A case in point in something we use every day, a computer. Pretty much all languages have a “random” number generator (and most programs use a “random” number somewhere). However, in every single case this “random” number generator is completley deterministic. It’s impossible on anything but a quantum computer (which for now is impossible to make) to actually generate a random number. However, the mathematical functions developed to produce these “random” numbers are such that they make a nice scatter plot on a chart given various inputs (usually the time). So the results appear very random, but in fact are deterministic, same input = same output. But, good luck trying to find the “why” (the function that governs the input/output pairs). If it’s a good mathematical model, it will be impossible with current technology to figure out. (note: not all are good; many in fact are not. The C language, for instance, is crap and it’s very easy to determine their “random” number generator function).

This was just a simple example with computers, but this type of thing is reflected in nature all over the place. Almost nothing is random (and I only say “almost” instead of just “nothing” because of various things in quantum mechanics that we don’t yet fully understand). But these types of things don’t show up in baseball, so nothing in baseball is random. There is always a reason. It’s just that the reasons are often much to complicated for us to be able to tell. Most baseball “experts” then will say “it was because he changed his stance”, even though that has nothing to do with the actual reason. Often the actual reason might be that he happened to hit the ball 1/8th of an inch higher on the barrel and it allowed the ball to hang up just enough for the outfielder to catch it or “random” things like this that players have almost zero control over. Which of course in turn gives rise to us calling it “random” for all practical purposes. But in the end there is a always a reason, even if it’s not within our grasp to see in every case.

We then may be talking about an entirely different kind of regression. But still out of Branyan’s control (or is it?) and eliminating the “he’s tired” argument.

As for the bullpen’s eventual regression, I still see that as an argument for having a strong rotation to give the bullpen fewer innings with which to regress and lose games with its true talent level.

Have you seen any examination of the skillset that might result in a more consistent (lower SD) result? It seems that would be a desirable item to examine, although I’d guess we simply do not have the data to come to a reasonable conclusion.