It's the top of the 8^th and the Rockies are down by 1 with a runner on 3B with 1 out. Ian Stewart is at the plate. The pitcher takes the sign, and burns a 94 mph fastball right down the middle.

THAT'S A PITCH TO HIT, STEWART

What on earth is he waiting for?

I do not spilly him taking that pitch

We've seen it so many times. The Rockies wait on pitches early in the AB and find themselves suddenly at a 2-2 count when all they need is to make good contact with the ball. Instead of getting the hit on the 1-0 count when a 24 year old pitcher desperately trying to make up for the leadoff walk throws anything that will cross the plate, we're sitting around waiting for...something even better, I suppose.

These problems drive us insane in the game threads. They destroy situational hitting, and spark massive debates between baseball fundamentalists and the Sabrmetrics crowd, arguing the merits of a season-long body of work and the "what-have-you-done-for-me-lately" analyses.

Join after the jump as we look at the hard data.

The ugly facts are as such:

The Rockies (as of late evening 9/6/09) lead the majors in Pitches per Plate Appearance (P/PA) with 4.00.

The Rockies are 4^th in the majors in strikeouts (the bad way).

The Rockies are 25^th in the majors in terms of making contact (Contact%).

However, on the flip side of the coin, we need to also look at these facts:

The Rockies are 4^th in the majors in walks.

The Rockies are 22^nd in the majors in terms of swinging at pitches outside of the zone (the good way).

The Rockies are 24^th in the majors in GIDPs (the good way).

Finally, the most important facts we need to look at:

The Rockies are 6^th in the majors in Runs per Game (R/G).

The Rockies are 1^st in the NL Wild Card standings, 2^nd in the NL West.

Now the tough part about this is trying to draw a straight line between the above listed facts. Are the Rockies a top-rated offensive team (2^nd in the NL behind Philly) because we lead the majors in P/PA? (For the record, Philly is 11^th in P/PA.)

Well, the answer is that there is no answer.

Statistically, there isn't a strong correlation between Pitches per Plate Appearance and Runs or Runs Created. I plotted the P/PA for each of the 30 teams against Runs per Game, and found out that there was a decent positive correlation between the data.

To build on that, I plotted the P/PA with a form of Runs Created for every player in MLB with 100+ PA. Again, there's a positive, but weak, correlation.

So what these graphs are telling us is that P/PA is a good thing. They trend toward the correlation we like to see: that more P/PA results in more runs, which will hopefully result in more wins.

What's also interesting to look at in this study is how the Rockies perform on various counts:

The bolded numbers are the highs. We obviously walk the most on a 3-0 count, but it's interesting to note that we strike out the most on a 1-2 count rather than a 0-2 - we don't bite as much on that first waste pitch. However, it's also interesting to note that we hit the most home runs split between the first pitch swinging and a 1-1 count, while we also ground into the most DPs on that first pitch as well. 1-2 counts and 2-2 counts are right out. We punch out the most on the 1-2 count, but we hit the worst on an 0-2 count - again, which makes sense. After the 0-2 count, the Rockies have a combined .485 OPS. We also walk a lot more than strike out on a full count.

That said, we're still a team that walks a lot and strikes out a lot. But tell you something you didn't know, right?

Only the Yankees have more Three-Ball PA than do the Rockies. However, nobody has more Two-Strike PA than do the Rockies. Again, hard to infer that working these counts is really doing much for us in terms of direct offensive results (that is, high P/PA does not mean high wOBA).

The one thing we CAN infer, however, is that higher P/PA leads to shorter outings by starters, eventually, and hopefully can result in something to capitalize on. Looking at the inning-by-inning batting production, the 4-6 is the hottest 3-inning chunk for the Rockies, which lends credence to the concept of wearing down pitchers. Observe:

We don't really walk any extra in any inning group, but we clearly hit better in the middle innings - lining up nicely when a starting pitcher starts to wear out.

Based on the correlations above and the counts that the Rockies seem to be most productive on, it's hard to really draw a line between everything. We clearly are a patient team, taking the most P/PA and walking the 4th most, however, we also strike out more than just about anyone. We wear down pitchers well, and capitalize in the middle innings. I don't want to put TOOOO much credence on the high discipline numbers, as we can't necessarily say one causes the other, we can't say that our high P/PA makes us a top offensive club.

But that 5th in the majors in runs scored and 6th in R/G? We can hang our hat on those jussssst fine.

Oh and thanks to PF for the idea to write this thing.