Plate discipline - part 2

Last week, I presented a new statistic which I call Plate Discipline Ratio(PDR) and applied it to the 2008 Tigers. Now, I'll apply the statistic to all of Major League baseball. Remember that Plate Discipline Ratio is derived from two statistics provided by Fangraphs.com: ZSWING and OSWING. ZSWING is the percentage of pitches in the strike zone at which a batter swung and OSWING is the percentage of pitches outside of the strike zone at which a batter swung. PDR = ZSWING/OSWING.

For example, Todd Helton had a ZSWING=66.5% and an OSWING=16.5%. His PDR=66.5/16.5=4.02. Thus, he was about 4 times as likely to swing at a pitch in the strike zone as he was to swing at one outside the strike zone. That is a very good ratio. Juan Pierre on the other hand, had a PDR of 1.75 meaning that he was less than twice as likely to swing at a pitch in the strike zone as he was to swing at one outside the strike zone.

There were no Tigers among the leaders and trailers. To see where the Tigers rank, see the first link above for the previous article. Tables 1 and 2 below contain the leaders and trailers for Major League Baseball in 2008.


Table 1: MLB Plate Discipline Leaders in 2008

MLB Rank	NAME	TEAM	ZSWING	OSWING	plate discipline ratio
1	Chris Iannetta	Rockies	72.3%	16.2%	4.47
2	Chipper Jones	Braves	67.2%	15.2%	4.42
3	B.J. Upton	Rays	64.8%	15.0%	4.33
4	Troy Glaus	Cardinals	63.3%	15.0%	4.21
5	Marco Scutaro	Blue Jays	63.4%	15.4%	4.13
6	Jack Cust	Athletics	62.8%	15.3%	4.11
7	Todd Helton	Rockies	66.5%	16.5%	4.02
8	Austin Kearns	Nationals	61.7%	15.6%	3.95
9	Daric Barton	Athletics	63.6%	16.4%	3.88
10	Carlos Ruiz	Phillies	57.1%	14.8%	3.85
11	Adam Dunn	Reds/DBacks	65.0%	17.2%	3.78
12	Brian Giles	Padres	65.1%	17.4%	3.74
13	Luis Castillo	Mets	46.8%	12.6%	3.70
14	Doug Mientkiewicz	Pirates	63.2%	17.1%	3.69
15	Denard Span	Twins	60.9%	16.7%	3.65

Table 2: MLB Plate Discipline Trailers in 2008

MLB Rank	NAME	TEAM	ZSWING	OSWING	plate discipline ratio
273	Darin Erstad	Astros	59.7%	35.8%	1.67
272	Juan Pierre	Dodgers	55.7%	31.8%	1.75
271	Alexei Ramirez	White Sox	76.2%	42.7%	1.78
270	Vladimir Guerrero	Angels	81.7%	45.5%	1.80
269	Clint Barmes	Rockies	65.0%	35.7%	1.82
268	Bengie Molina	Giants	74.7%	40.8%	1.83
267	A.J. Pierzynski	White Sox	74.4%	40.6%	1.83
266	Carlos Gomez	Twins	67.5%	36.8%	1.83
265	Alfonso Soriano	Cubs	71.6%	38.7%	1.85
264	Erick Aybar	Angels	64.6%	34.6%	1.87
263	Miguel Olivo	Royals	81.2%	43.2%	1.88
262	Jesus Flores	Nationals	69.4%	36.9%	1.88
261	Howie Kendrick	Angels	69.1%	36.6%	1.89
260	Mike Aviles	Royals	67.0%	35.5%	1.89
259	Adam Lind	Blue Jays	64.3%	34.0%	1.89