Diamond Mining: NLCS Statistical View on Dodgers and Cardinals

The National League Championship Series is finally upon us and fighting for a shot to play in the 2013 World Series are the Los Angeles Dodgers and St. Louis Cardinals. Here’s the tale of the tape between the two squads–from a numbers’ standpoint.

OFFENSE

From an efficiency standpoint, the Cards are one of the better teams in all of baseball at scoring runs. Judging by their Strikeout Percentage (K%), they get a slight edge in plate discipline. The Cardinals are also a better base running team based on the Ultimate Base Running (UBR) metric alone (a stat that measures the value of base running events, i.e. advancing base on extra base-hit).

Batted ball stats are as follows:

• Both teams are among the top three clubs in the National League in Line Drive Percentage (LD%)
• The Dodgers have the higher Fly Ball Percentage (FB%) and Home Runs/Fly Ball Percentage (HR/FB%), but also pop up more than the Cardinals.

Interesting to point out that the Dodgers balanced out a more powerful, Atlanta Braves‘ hitting lineup by having a higher LD% and better discipline. Now it’s the Dodgers that have the advantage in driving balls in the air, but their LD% and discipline are matched by a more efficient offense in St. Louis. Just how disciplined are the Cardinals? They led the NL in lowest Swinging Strike Percentage (SwStr%) this past season. They also have the advantage in Contact Percentage. And let’s not forget that based on Clutch Rating, the Cards finished the season as the most clutch team in the NL.

ADVANTAGE: ST. LOUIS CARDINALS

FIELDING

Interestingly enough, the Dodgers’ battery does a better job in keeping runners in check than the Cardinals. However, the Cardinals are not a running team so it’s highly doubtful that this advantage for the Dodgers will come into play this series. On the other hand, with Yadier Molina behind the plate, the Cardinals have arguably the best defensive catcher in all of baseball.

A concern in the Pittsburgh Pirates’ series for the Cards was their lack of defensive range and weak arms in the outfield. Once again, their opponent is a better fielding team in terms of range. In terms of Ultimate Zone Rating (UZR–A defensive stat that attempts to quantify the value of defense using “runs” as units of measurement), the Dodgers have a 70+ run advantage over the Cardinals. Still, the Cardinals are still one of the better teams at turning the double play and are a lot less error-prone than their opponents.

ADVANTAGE: ST. LOUIS CARDINALS

STARTING PITCHING

Anchored by NL Cy Young Candidate, Clayton Kershaw, the Dodgers seem to have the slight advantage in this category. Not shown are the batted ball stats that show the Cards sporting a lower LD% and a higher GB%. Meanwhile, the Dodgers have trouble keeping some of their fly balls in the park as they have the dubiously higher HR/FB%.

To their credit, L.A.’s rotation has the lowest Contact Rate and highest SwgStr% in the National League, undoubtedly thanks in large part to Kershaw’s efforts.

ADVANTAGE: LOS ANGELES DODGERS

BULLPEN

Based on the data table shown, it would appear that a slight edge goes the Cardinals’ bullpen. Walk Percentage alone (BB%) should be good enough to put the Cards over the top.

Batted ball stats show both teams ranking among the NL’s best at inducing grounders. However, despite possessing one of the lowest FB% in the NL, just like their brethren in the starting rotation, the Dodgers have trouble keeping the ball in the park. At the same time, they force a lot more pop-ups than the Cards.

Conversely, the Cardinals have the lowest LD% in the National League, but also have the lowest pop-up rate in the NL as well.

ADVANTAGE: ST. LOUIS CARDINALS

Based on our findings, it would appear as if the Cardinals will be representing the National League in the 2013 World Series. Of course there are intangibles like the impact that rookie Yasiel Puig has made with the Dodgers, the reemergence of Hanley Ramirez as an elite player, the fact that the Cardinals’ bullpen is full of young players, and other factors that cannot be readily quantified that may or may not affect this series. However, the Cardinals have arguably been the best hitting team in the NL and along with timely pitching, it might be enough to get them to the World Series again.

Check out fangraphs.com for a glossary of terms.

Felipe Melecio

Felipe Melecio was the managing editor for the blog Pathological Hate. He believes that math is your friend and numbers can be fun, especially when it comes to baseball. Keep tabs on all his knee-jerk reactions on Twitter: Follow @pathological_h8 !function(d,s,id){var js,fjs=d.getElementsByTagName(s)[0],p=/^http:/.test(d.location)?'http':'https';if(!d.getElementById(id)){js=d.createElement(s);js.id=id;js.src=p+'://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js';fjs.parentNode.insertBefore(js,fjs);}}(document, 'script', 'twitter-wjs');

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