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May 21, 2003

Lies, Damned Lies

Holes

by Nate Silver

Holes isn't just the movie you see begrudgingly upon discovering that The Matrix Reloaded is sold out on all 17 screens at the Springfield GooglePlex. No, "holes" are also one of the big concepts in Michael Lewis' Moneyball, and not just as a part of Billy Beane's vernacular. Rather, Lewis contends that every hitter (excepting Scott Hatteberg, Pickin' Machine) has a hole in his swing, and that the hole will inevitably be discovered and exploited in repeated trials. Unless the hitter is able to make adaptations of his own--retooling his swing, standing in a different place in the batter's box, taking more pitches--the hitter will not be able to survive in the big leagues for long, and will join Kevin Maas and Joe Charboneau in baseball purgatory.

It's a nice concept. Game theory hasn't been this sexy since Russell Crowe played the genius/lunatic somewhat resembling Princeton scholar John Nash in A Beautiful Mind. But is it real? Can it be tested? Does it hold its sabermetric water?

Let's use Reds slugger Adam Dunn as a test case. Apart from the fact that he looks just a tiny bit like a gerbil, Dunn makes a good guinea pig for a number of reasons:

• He hasn't been in the big leagues too long, and we have play-by-play data available for all of his career plate appearances;

• He has some very obvious strengths and weaknesses as a hitter;

• His performance dropped off precipitously in the second half last year, leading to some claims that Dunn has a fundamentally flawed approach at the plate.