Skepticism

by ubelmann on Jan 4, 2007 12:47 AM EST in News

Poking around the internet, I found this:

A company that uses computer imaging claims baseballs had a larger rubberized core and a synthetic rubber ring in 1998, including the ball Mark McGwire hit for his 70th homer.

...

"Examining the CT images of Mark McGwire's 70th home run ball one can clearly see the synthetic ring around the core -- or 'pill' -- of the baseball," UMS president David Zavagno said. "While Mark McGwire may or may not have used illegal steroids, the evidence shows his ball -- under the governing body of the league -- was juiced."

I submit for your consideration:

(click image for larger size)

ISO is isolated slugging (SLG minus AVG) and HR/10AB is the number of home runs per ten at-bats. Each data series is listed for the AL and the NL. Isolated power and home run rate both measure how much power

Now, look at that graph and tell me when the ball was juiced. Doesn't look like 1997, huh?

I see two likely possibilities:

There was nothing special about the ball in 1997.
The ball actually was changed in 1997, but it didn't make any real difference on how players were able to hit home runs.

The only way to get around these possibilities is to start inventing conspiracy theories about the league using different balls for games with McGwire and/or Sosa.

It's clear that there's a shift in offensive levels, but that shift happened from about 1992 to 1994. It's unclear exactly why this shift occurred, though it's probably some combination of stronger players, different ballparks, and possible equipment changes. Amongst all of those, I'd say that the players made the biggest difference, but I can't really back that up.

If I was to point to one year in this set and say "something weird was happening this year," it would maybe be the spike from '86 to '87 or the dip from '87 to '88. But I'm guessing even those were probably just fluke years.

Anyway, whether or not these guys did all of their fancy imaging to determine that the ball was different in '97, there was no league-wide trend of hitting for more power, so any claim that juiced baseballs helped McGwire hit more HR in '97 has little or no basis in reality. Before they went through all of that effort, they would have been wise to see if there was actually an offensive spike to explain in the first place.

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ohter possibilities

I can see other possibilities besides the two you mention.

The AP story just says the ball was juiced in 1998 without saying what years' balls they are comparing it to.

Which leaves open the possibility that they began juicing the ball in 1993, or even tinkered with it more than once. Anyway there's nothing in the article saying the ball juicing couldn't have coincided with the upsurge in power in the early '90s. So for instance maybe they juiced the ball in 1993, and power numbers gradually grew as hitters changed their approach and training regimens to take advantage of it.

Basically it's just a poorly written story which remains open to many interpretations. If anyone sees a better article describing which years were used as a control please post a link.

by by jiminy on Jan 4, 2007 10:12 AM EST reply actions

Why I don't think that matters a whole lot

I agree that the article is very poorly written. They could have cleared a lot up by mentioning if these folks published a scientific report somewhere about their findings.

If the ball was being "juiced" for a long period of time, what's to make that any different from other changes in the rules of baseball like changes in the height of the mound. If we're going to start discounting McGwire's HR record on account of a ball that players played with over the course of many years, we have to discount every pitching record set before they lowered the mound again circa 1969.

This also doesn't seem like something that players can train to take extra advantage of it. It's physics. If the ball really is "juiced" the way they claim, it should just fly farther given exactly the same contact that hitters were always making. If specific hitters were able to hit more HR off the juiced ball by changing their training, then they should have been able to hit more HR off a non-juiced ball relative to other players hitting with a non-juiced ball.

Juiced ball or not, there are only three players ever to hit over 61 HR in a single season. Considering the number of players who have had a crack at the single season record since around '94, that's still pretty darned impressive.

by ubelmann on Jan 4, 2007 1:33 PM EST up reply actions

training for HRs

what I meant by training to take advantage of juiced balls or juiced bodies is the shift toward making every position a potential power position. When the ball is juiced, which I think it was, and steroids are tolerated, which they obviously were, and perhaps most important of all, when home runs are valorized, marketed around, and rewarded awith millions of dollars, then you will suddenly see everyone down to second basemen and shortstops bulking up and swinging for the fences, which is exactly what happened in the past 15 years.

I don't think you need to isolate a single year where this transition occurred to say th game has changed to emphasize power. When what used to be the defining characteristic of the game becomes a marginal strategy ("small ball") used only by small-market teams who can't afford sluggers, and that transition is aided and abetted by the league, whether by juicing the ball, tolerating steroids, or hyping home runs, my skepticism toward accusations like this one is greatly reduced. Considering the home run binge came when the league desperately needed to wind back fans after the strike, my skepticism is almost nil.

So no, I'm not as impressed by 60-plus homers in the steroid era (or 50, or 40, or 30, if they're from Ken Camaniti). To me they just devalued the home run for a while, and if drug tests bring things back to normal, good.

by by jiminy on Jan 5, 2007 11:01 AM EST up reply actions

Sure...

...if you want to devalue HR for the whole era, then go ahead and do so (anyone seriously comparing players between eras does this anyway), but there's no evidence that players as a whole progressively got better at hitting HR since '94. Just look at the graph--almost all of the change happens from '92 to '94. From '94 to '06, especially in the AL, HR rate and ISO have remained practically constant.

The way the article was written, it sounded as if they were trying to implicate the balls in one particular season as being juiced, in order to take down McGwire specifically because he achieved the (then) single-season HR record that year. It remains, though, that all of his contemporaries, save Barry Bonds, weren't able to hit that many HR.

The main thing is just that we don't need fancy imaging of the baseballs to tell us that offensive levels in the game increased--we can see that with data that has been available to us for a long time now.

To me they just devalued the home run for a while, and if drug tests bring things back to normal, good.

Again, you can take a look at the graph. Steroid testing hasn't changed power production in baseball at all so far. There's not really much, if any, evidecne that performance enhancing drugs, while certainly part of the story, are a big cause in the rise of offensive levels. Sure, it might help hitters hit farther, but as we saw with Juan Rincon, hitters aren't the only players looking for an edge with PEDs. And even without PEDs, athletes are bigger and stronger than they used to be.

It's really pretty complicated to try to sit down and explain exactly which things caused how much of the rise in offense in baseball. (For instance, we haven't even mentioned the disappearing strike zone.) What is easy, though, is looking at how offensive levels have changed over the years, and we can see that there was absolutely nothing special about '97 compared with the rest of the last 12 years.

by ubelmann on Jan 5, 2007 1:33 PM EST up reply actions

okay

so you're saying even if it was in an inflated era, what MacGwire did in relation to his peers was exceptional -- okay, that makes sense.

I still love the idea of exposing that they juiced the ball though, if indeed they did, just to get out the truth. Especially if they blatantly lied about it. And to get it on record that they twisted the game to market around HRs. I hope they do more imaging studies and prove it.

I'm surprised it's that hard though. Can't they just get a ball from each year and cut it open? They're not so hard to come by; there are dozens of foul balls every day.

Which suddenly makes me question this whole story. Surely someone HAS cut open balls and checked them out. And if they'd found out anything we would have heard about it, wouldn't we?

A minute ago I would have put the odds of them doctoring the ball at over 50-50. Now I don't see how they could ever get away with it. There are so many ways to test it, and such easy access to the evidence.

Or could it be that this is really the first study?

If they have tested balls, and this story was just examining MacGwire's HR balls, then that's weird. Are they implying some conspiracy to feed MacGwire special balls to help him break the record? If so why don't they say that? Because it sounds so dumb?

I guess I'll go back to my old assumption -- he was juicing (duh) and the league let him because they needed a distraction from the strike. (And of course the collective bargaining agreement didn't help any.)

by by jiminy on Jan 5, 2007 4:12 PM EST reply actions

McGwire...

w/r/t McGwire, I think it's possible that he was only taking PEDs that were completely legal at the time. To the best of my knowledge, andro was completely legal at the time, and as such, I don't think it would've violated either the letter or the spirit of the MLB rules at the time. It's possible that he was taking worse stuff, but we really don't have evidence, so that becomes a big quagmire of speculation.

I still love the idea of exposing that they juiced the ball though, if indeed they did, just to get out the truth.

I surely think it's interesting to know more about the baseballs over the years, my beef is mainly with the spin on the reports. I don't necessarily have a problem with them making equipment tweaks here and there (after all, a long time ago, they made an even bigger change from a dead ball to a livelier ball and that turned out to be a great move), but it's nice to know when and where they are making the equipment changes.

Which suddenly makes me question this whole story. Surely someone HAS cut open balls and checked them out. And if they'd found out anything we would have heard about it, wouldn't we?

As I recall, there was lots of talk about the balls being "juiced" when people started chasing 60+ HR, and nothing came of it at the time, even though, as you mention, it would've been easy to test a ball at the time.

MLB claims that since 2000, they've had UMass-Lowell testing their balls, so they've probably been pretty consistent over that time frame. Before then, though, it's certainly hazier. These guys apparently imaged around 35-40 balls. There certainly have to be balls from every year in baseball lying around in various places. It'd be interesting to see a year-by-year comparison. (And by that, I mean to actually see the comparison, rather than to see a tiny report that a comparison had been made.)

by ubelmann on Jan 5, 2007 4:26 PM EST up reply actions