Clutch hitter? Don't be an idiot.

There is an ongoing and persistent insistence among many baseball writers and fans that some baseball players are clutch hitters, or clutch players.

They are wrong. Don’t be like those people.

In a quote attributed to Hall of Fame infielder and manager Frank Frisch, he once said, "Have one great year and you can fool them for another 5 seasons during which everyone will be waiting for you to repeat that one great year."

In other words, perception is often much more important than reality.

These folks that that insist a guy is clutch will often mention a game or series during which a player was phenomenal – maybe cite a play or two that we all recall, that they feel clinches their argument?

But what defines "clutch" anyway? If a guy hits a grand slam in the second inning of a World Series game to give his team a 6-1 lead in a game they ultimately win 6-5, isn’t that clutch? Does it have to be a homer in the bottom of the ninth to win the game?

We are all guilty of faulty recall and we all have bias for or against one player or another, but until we actually begin to look at numbers, we can’t really begin to figure anything out – then, we look at the numbers, and we may know even less?

"Definitely 2 for 5...a .400 hitter."

The reality is that unless a person is a savant like Rainman (who could keep running statistical totals in his head), none of us is able to determine by mere observation whether a player is great, or just had a great at bat, a great game, or a great series.

If during the course of a 162 game MLB season, a hitter has 600 at bats, and gets 180 hits, he will have batted .300. If he manages only 150 hits, he’s a .250 hitter. The difference of 30 hits spread out over six months becomes five hits per month, which is about one per week. My point in telling you this is that none of us are capable of being able to tell by observation alone, whether a hitter is good (.300) or mediocre (.250) by simply watching every at bat a hitter has. In a short series with a batter getting 20 at bats, the difference between .300 and .250 is 1 hit. One.

Can you track 25-27 games in a month, and keep a mental tabulation of how well a player is performing over those 100 to 130 bats?

Let me answer that question for you. No, you can’t.  I bet you can't do it for a week.



You are Big Papi

 Not too long after the Red Sox magical 2004 season, Sports Illustrated interviewed dozens of MLB players, coaches, managers and front office people and asked them if they thought David Ortiz was the best clutch hitter in all of baseball?

An over-whelming majority thought that Ortiz was the greatest clutch hitter they’d ever seen, with some quoted as saying "He’s (Ortiz) like an .800 hitter in clutch spots." The actual number was more like .350, which was great, but the reality was that Ortiz had a fantastic 2004 season, and a better post-season, but in his career he is actually slightly worse in post season than he is during the regular season.

"Skeets" Jeter

The same is basically true of Derek Jeter, who is another guy we are always hearing about when the word "clutch" comes up in baseball. Fact is that Jeter’s numbers go down in the post-season. He is still excellent, but he’s not quite as excellent as he’s been throughout his career during the regular season.

A part of the Jeter mythology is whether anyone in baseball history has gotten more mileage than Jeter has over two plays? That one backhand flip to Posada to nail Jeremy Giambi at the plate in the 2001 ALCS, and the face-plant in the stands versus the Red Sox in 2003 are the proof, aren’t they?

Sorry, but no. Jeter is good in the post-season, but he’s been just as good and generally better during the regular season.

Ortiz has been a great player at times in his career, but he is not a Hall of Fame player, and Derek Jeter is a certain first ballot Hall of Fame player. But neither is clutch, they are just either great or generally good. They have also been not so good, or lousy, depending on the parts of their respective careers we wish to examine.

Take my main man Harry Schlomo (not his real name) as an example:

Harry hits 3 homers in a league championship series, and then makes a fantastic running and diving catch of a line drive in deep right-center field, and the media and the public is ready to anoint him as one of the ultimate clutch players of all time. His team wins the pennant and Schlomo is the MVP after batting .381. He then hits a game-winning homer in the World Series (which his team wins), and Harry’s legacy is made, even though he only hits .207 in the World Series, with that one homer.

I can almost guarantee you that if Harry Schlomo finds himself in another post-season after that one, he’ll be regaled as a "great clutch hitter and player," and we’ll be treated to highlights of his game saving catch, and game winning homer from that prior post-season. The announcers and commentators on FOX and ESPN won’t dwell on the fact that Harry only hit .249 during the most recent season, and spent most of it at DH, because he’s such a crappy outfielder.



Reggie, Reggie, Reggie...

 Historically, there is no denying how great Reggie Jackson was in the 5 World Series in which he played – he hit .357 with ten homers in 98 at bats. But did you know that he hit only .227 with only 6 homers in 163 at bats in the 11 League Championships Series he played in?

Pete Rose was the flip side of those numbers, hitting a robust .381 in 118 at bats in the LCS, but only .269 in 130 World Series at bats.

Babe Ruth hit .326 in the World Series.
Babe Ruth hit .341 lifetime in the regular season.

I have to admit that I am guilty of the same mistake in judgment on occasion. In the Red Sox 2004 run I couldn’t stop marveling on how "clutch" Boston shortstop, Orlando Cabrera was. It seemed as though every time Boston needed a hit, he got it, and maybe that was more true than not? I don’t know about that, but I do know that Cabrera hit .294 for Boston during the regular season in 2004, and a bit less (.288) in the post-season.

Best ever season in '67

I will state for the record that Carl Yastrzemski had the greatest "clutch" season I was ever able to follow, back in 1967. He won the Triple Crown that year, and carried Boston to a World Series that Boston ultimately lost to the St. Louis Cardinals.


Alas, Yaz made the final out in a losing World Series against Cincinnati in 1975, and popped out to third with the tying and winning runs on base against the Yankees in the Bucky Fucking Dent playoff game in 1978.

Lastly, for you Mets fans, I give you Carlos Beltran, and how fantastic was he in that post-season with Houston in 2004, hitting 8 home runs? Of course Mets fans can only remember that strike three yakker he took from Adam Wainwright for the final out in the 2006 NLCS. They forget that he hit .296 with 3 homers.



Carlos...you suck!

So, the next time you hear someone tell you what a great clutch hitter some guy is, tell them to get over themselves, or turn off the volume on the TV, because they are just plain wrong.  Don't be like them.