shohei ohtani alert

I kinda don't know what to say

Except that it's insanely on brand for Ohtani to skip a 50/50 day and go straight to 51/51

Final batting line today: 6-for-6 with 3 HRs, 2 SB, 2 doubles, 10 RBI.

Forgetting 51/51 for a moment (lol), I actually can't remember a game I've seen with a better batting line. Clemenza, you got a recent comparison for me?

Is he going to pitch in the postseason? I would not put it past him at this point.

Since RBI became official in 1920, only one MLB player has had, over the course of his entire career (same game or not),

a game with 10+ RBI
a game with 6+ hits
a game with 5+ XBH
a game with 3+ HR
a game with 2+ SB

That one player is Shohei Ohtani. He did all of it today. pic.twitter.com/njXOmwHKnm

— OptaSTATS (@OptaSTATS) September 20, 2024

uhh

every single hit today was an absolute rope

Just saw the whole thing in sequence. To (possibly) make it all even more amazing, he was 3-3 with 2 SB..then hit the 3 HR. And if he hadn't been thrown out at third (on the third hit, I think), he would have had a cycle, too.

Funny comment on the tweet above: "If he had had this game for the Angels, they would have still lost somehow."

A year ago to the day he had Tommy John's* surgery.

So what record is he breaking next? I believe in the 5hr game.

only 2 HR shy of Judge for the MLB lead now

He's got 9 games left to play around with still. I believe

he needs to stop running imo, unless they're in deep danger of losing the bye

Boooooooo

priorities, man

I don't see the dodgers reigning him in. Not sure they even could if they tried

Funny misspell

I don’t really have anything to add but wanna post in this thread anyway

Dude is living in a different reality than the rest of us. As for future records, I can definitely see him hitting 5HR in a game. In this game he was about two feet from another HR on that first double of the game. If that one had gone out, there'd be no question about whether this was the "greatest game ever".

MLB Network is going overboard, saying stuff like the greatest baseball player of all time.

Slow down a moment...

is he going to reach bonds/mays/ruth levels of WAR for a career? probably not. but he is clearly doing entire levels of stuff that no other baseball player has ever done or likely will do. i mean jfc

He’s amazing

i know i'm a little late to the party here but holy moly what ohtani did

I think James once devised a kind of provisional Game Score for hitters, but googled and found nothing. Probably on his website, and all that stuff's gone now.

Shohei surely locked up that MVP award with that game

One thing about the SB thing that bothers me is that Ohtani is stealing in the "new era":

pitch clock
limited pick off attempts
increased base size so there's 4.5" less distance to cover between bases
etc.

It doesn't overshadow what he's done, but it's definitely not the same when people start trotting out the historical comparisons.

Is there a SABR way of devaluing the >2022 stolen base or revaluing the <2022 stolen base?

51/55, though? To me, that more than negates the things you point out.

lol

https://sports.yahoo.com/verdict-shohei-ohtanis-bat-not-good-023611674.html

The only tiny, tiny asterisk I'd add to last night--I'm really not trying to being a gadfly here; it's a really tiny one--is that the third HR was off a position player. When I watched the highlights last night, I did think "That guy's a pitcher?" when the last one floated up to the plate--just had that confirmed now.

well that’s what happens when you comprehensively murtalize the other team - if anything it’s further proof that shohei can’t be stopped

put another way, if shohei wasn’t so good, it’s unlikely that position player would have been in the game at that point

tough to give shohei an asterisk for that

my asterisk is that home runs/stolen bases seems like an arbitrary pairing

is there a sabrmetric deep dive that explains the significance?

I dont see the connection either except players who hit a lot of HRs tend to be a bit slower. so maybe the ability to consistently do both is particularly impressive.

fwiw I find Scooter Gennett's 4-HR, 10-RBI game to be a bit more impressive, because, you know, it was Scooter Gennett. a guy who only socked 35 of them in his roughly 1600 plate apperances with the Brewers. how crazy is it though that Shohei is still making history for being the first guy to do x, y, and z over the course of a game/season in categories that don't even include pitching

re shasta’s post, i’d be interest in reading about why sb numbers have declined in general. will rickey’s single season 130 ever get broken in our lifetime?

I'd wondered that briefly because I thought Elly De La Cruz might be able to do it turns out he'd have to steal twice as many bases as he is now to get there

is 130 sb in a season the new maris 61? what about oven mitts - how do you put a sabrmetric value on a piece of plastic that artificially extends reach? could a player use a giant foam finger instead - what does the rulebook say?

Obviously, I should have added two or three more "tiny"s there.

龜: Posnanski traced the history of this the other day--like frogs said, historically they didn't naturally go together.

Shohei Ohtani hit his 48th home run on Tuesday night to go along with his 48 stolen bases...so we’re getting awfully close to that 50-50 miracle.

I’ve been asked a few times to try and put that accomplishment in some sort of context—like how does it rank against, I don’t know, 60 home runs in a season or a Triple Crown or something like that.

I have two thoughts on it.

The first thought is that 50-50 is a totally made-up statistical compound. Obviously. But a huge part of the fun of baseball is counting things, and part of the fun of counting is using and mixing those numbers to tell amazing stories. Henry Aaron hit 755 home runs in his career! That’s amazing! And he never hit 50 in a single season! Somehow that makes it even more amazing!

Some years ago, people started putting home runs and stolen bases together into one stat. I think the original idea was that power and speed are naturally opposing skills. Those big power guys--the Harmon Killebrews and Hank Greenbergs and Willie McCoveys--were obviously slow. And those big speed guys--the Lou Brocks and Maury Wills and Vince Colemans--were obviously not powerful hitters.

But what about the players who could hit home runs AND steal bases?

The number we settled on was 30-30. Willie Mays had two 30-30 seasons, Henry Aaron had one and Bobby Bonds did 30-30 five times between 1969 and 1978, but honestly I don’t recall it being an actual thing until Dale Murphy’s 30-30 season in 1983. Murph was on television every night because of the Superstation WTBS, and he became something of an icon, and 30-30 seemed to perfectly describe his all-around talents.

Then, in 1987, Darryl Strawberry, Howard Johnson, Eric Davis and Joe Carter all went 30-30. Now, this was very much a thing, so much so that Jose Canseco made it his mission to go 40-40 to push the boundaries of awesomeness. He pulled that off in 1988. Barry Bonds had his 40-40 season in 1996. Alex Rodriguez had his 40-40 season in 1998. And all the while, a whole bunch of players went 30-30, from Abreu to Yelich, and the homers-stolen base combo did come to represent something larger than it probably is. But that’s OK. I mean, a 30-30 season is cool. A 40-40 season is even cooler. And a 50-50 season...well, I mean, come on.

The second thought is that 50-50 is fundamentally different from 30-30 or even 40-40, because 50 home runs in a season is such a rare feat...and 50 stolen bases in a season is such a rare feat.

In baseball history, only 31 players have hit 50 home runs in a season. That number pretty well shocked me.

In this century, only 26 players have stolen 50 bases in a season. That number was not as shocking, because we know that before the rule changes, the stolen base had more or less died.

But the point is that 50 home runs is elite, all-time great stuff. As mentioned, Henry Aaron never hit 50 home runs in a season. Albert Pujols never hit 50 home runs in a season. Harmon Killebrew, Mike Schmidt, Reggie Jackson, Frank Robinson, Willie McCovey, none of them hit 50 home runs in a season.

AND 50 stolen bases is elite, too. It’s not quite as elite as the home run total, but only 11 Hall of Famers since 1922 have stolen 50 in a season.

Putting the two thoughts together--ranking Shohei’s 50-50 season against other great accomplishments is really tough because it’s a very specific made-up statistic, one slavishly devoted to round numbers (I mean, isn’t 48-48 good enough?).

And, at the same time, it’s absolutely mind-blowing, because both sides of the statistic are remarkable and historic. Home runs and stolen bases are two of the most exciting plays in baseball. Shohei is combining them in a way that’s unprecedented in the long history of this game. I think it might just be the single most thrilling achievement in baseball history.

again, what makes this even more insane is knowing Ohtani had 5.6 WAR as a pitcher two years ago

Ohtani Cashes In 50-Home-Run Futures Bet Ticket https://t.co/QAsypoPukJ

— The Onion (@TheOnion) September 20, 2024

Shohei accumulated 0.7 fWAR in one game today.

That would put him second on the 2024 Chicago White Sox. https://t.co/ZvSeeNKm9J

— Josh (@Sharpie630) September 20, 2024

Shohei just uppercut a pitch at his neck for 52. One more to tie judge.

I know this is ridiculous, but I almost believe he could make 60/60 with how ridiculous he has been the past 24hrs lol. What silly, silly human-being

https://blogs.fangraphs.com/of-course-this-is-how-shohei-ohtani-makes-history/

This game was so impressive that I wanted more. I decided to ask my Ohtani 50/50 prediction model whether he could get to 60/60. I tweaked a few variables, added to his home run rate, and eliminated rest days. It said, essentially, “lol no.” In one million simulations, he never hit nine homers and stole nine bases in the same nine-game stretch. Even Ohtani might not be up for that one.

On the other hand, his chances of getting to 55/55 are surprisingly reasonable. Without any adjustments to my pre-existing model, I give him an 8% chance of hitting quadruple nickels – 55 twice. If I use his second-half pace as a guide instead of our projections, it’s more like 11%. It’s unlikely but doable, which is more than I can say for the game we just witnessed.

Yeah okay Fangraphs, but did you consider he's facing the Rockies pitching (worst in the league) for 6/9 of his last games?

Whatever. I'm betting the house on 55/55 anyways. 3 of each in his last 8 games? Book it.

https://t.co/1O81kaAAm8 pic.twitter.com/EpA6XC8iuL

— matty (@MVPWood_) September 21, 2024

He’s actually at 53/55 wtf lol. 6hr in his last 6 games.

Ties the game in the bottom of the 9th with 53, mookie walks it off with his own the next AB.

SB by month:

March/April 5
May 8
June 3
July 12
August 15
Sep/Oct 12

If he'd made it a goal at the start of the season, he could have stolen 70-80 bases.

(80's baseball fans might want to namedrop Eric Davis)

just in case you thought this couldn't get any more impressive: he was just named the NL's Player of the Week

Well now they're getting carried away.

400 total bases this season. First since 2001. 19th player in mlb history.