Before I Take Too Long...
 

researching something that someone else on the site has already researched,

On BBR, who are the two most SIMILAR BATTERS of all-time?

I got interested in this when getting tired of Nick Markakis being touted as possible HOF material based on a hot first half to 2018.

His most similar was Cesar Cedeno @ (905.1)

Cedeno's is Amos Otis @ (938.3)


I assume that there have been comparison numbers higher than 938.3


SIMILAR BATTERS is calculated via an involved Bill James formula. I have posed the 'MOST SIMILAR' question to BBR...we will see if they respond.


Anyone on this site know the answer?


Thanks in advance for your assistance,
Raymond

p.s.- I also got tired of the Braves' announcers, slip carey specifically, going on and on about Markakis being such a good player for so long without ever having been an all-star until this year. They overlook that he plays a position, RF, which frequently is manned by team's best or certainly one of their best offensive players...and Markakis is only slightly above average over ALL positions.
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I can only find a list on BBR of players who are most unique -- that is, have the lowest similarity scores to anyone else. Pete Rose was first.

https://www.baseball-reference.com/l...milarity.shtml

It should be the group of players who got one at bat and did almost nothing. Or even something, if there's a few that got one hit in one try.

"Similarity score" comparisons aren't provided at BBR for most guys who had extremely short MLB careers,
although Steve would be right, theoretically, a guy whose entire career consisted of, say, 0-for-1, would be
1000.0 identical to another guy with those identical stats.

Ray, you might want to set a minimum number of plate appearances or innings pitched to find what you're
really looking for. Here's a starter pair, found just at random, that involves two guys probably too obscure
and with careers too short to satisfy your search:
Tim Mauser (119 career IP) and Travis Phelps (106 career IP), 993.8 "similar."
Someone else on board can surely find a "similarity score" to top that, but we can't figure out
how to do a search for it at BBR...

I just heard back from BBR:


Sorry, but a query like that would be fairly complicated and therefore fall under our custom dataset policy.

- included in the policy explanation is this statement:

We will not fulfill any requests for data for custom downloads, unless you are prepared to pay a minimum of $1,000 for any such request.


So, I guess I know what I'll be working on for the next few months....

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Interesting - to me anyway -

the most similar batter to Robin Yount is Paul Molitor @ (845.7)



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The most similar that I recall was a funny one. Alex Gonzalez (Marlins shortstop) was most similar to Alex Gonzalez (Blue Jays/Cubs shortstop) for many years. Since Marlins Alex played a little longer, he messed it up and now Blue Jays Alex is his #4 match. But, when you have a similarity score that is over 90%, both play shortstop, both play in the same era, played against each other in the classic 2003 NLCS between the Cubs and Marlins, and both have the same name... well, that's hard to beat!

By the way, although Alex Gonzalez hit only .228 in 2003, and Alex Gonzalez hit much higher at .256, in that 2003 NL Championship series Alex Gonzalez significantly outperformed Alex Gonzalez with 8 hits to 3.

well played Sam


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