MLB Rankings: Baseball’s Greatest Hits of Week-25
By Bill Felber
In week-25 of “MLB Rankings: Greatest Hits,” we rank the top 10 base hits in MLB based on their impact on Weighted Win Probability Added.
In this week’s “MLB Rankings: Baseball’s Greatest Hits,”, the Milwaukee Brewers have looked to their depth to keep the team afloat in the National League wild-card race. Last Sunday veteran Ryan Braun, a key part of that depth, showed that he certainly can be counted upon.
Trailing the division-leading St. Louis Cardinals 4-3 and down to his last strike, Braun delivered a grand slam home run that provided just enough margin for a 7-6 Brewers victory.
The hit also gave Milwaukee a series win, and most importantly fueled what has developed into a stretch of 11 victories in 13 games down the stretch since Yelich’s injury.
Not surprisingly, it turned out to be the most pivotal base hit of the season’s penultimate week, swinging the odds on that day from 83 percent in favor of St. Louis to 96 percent in favor of Milwaukee.
Braun’s slam was actually one of two dramatic bags-loaded homers this week. Toronto’s Randal Grichuk also hit one in the ninth inning that turned around the Jays’ Wednesday game with Baltimore. That was the week’s second most statistically influential hit.
This countdown recognizes the 10 most game-critical base hits of the past week. Our measuring stick is Weighted Win Probability Added, which is the percentage improvement in a team’s chances of victory brought about by the hit in question. Where ties exist, they are broken by Weighted Win Expectancy, which is the probability of a team’s winning the game at the conclusion of the play.
Weighted Win Probability Added is one of those so-called New Stats, but it’s based on data that’s been around a while. Simply put, every at-bat improves or harms a team’s chances of winning, depending on the game situation and the at bat’s outcome. A home run hit in the late stages of a tight game is far more susceptible to move the Weighted Win Probability needle than the same home run hit in the early stages of a blowout.
Here are this week’s “MLB Rankings: Baseball’s Greatest Hits”.