I Kill Baseball Part 2: The Great Clayton Kershaw Experiment

Four and a half months ago, I wrote basically the best thing I ever have or ever will write. It is the logical conclusion of every stupid thing I’ve ever written—no less of a source than a man with whom I recorded a one hour and fifty-two minute World Cup preview in which we declared that Brazil's national sport is basketball has declared it the peak of me putting forth objectively stupid hypothetical questions.

You see, I’m not particularly interested in boring baseball hypotheticals like “how would the Cardinals do if they had Mike Trout in center field instead of a platoon of Peter Bourjos and Jon Jay” because I more or less already know the answer—better, because Mike Trout is super good and Peter Bourjos and Jon Jay aren’t as super good as Mike Trout. I’m interested in peculiarity. In the case of my first edition of hacking Baseball Mogul, I dipped somewhat into science fiction (note: as of the time this was written, human cloning is not known to have happened), but this time, I’m dipping merely into the realm of unlikelihood.

CLAYTON KERSHAW THE BASED BALL GOD:

It can be argued that on Wednesday night, Clayton Kershaw had the greatest pitching performance in the history of Major League Baseball. I think I would still defer to Kerry Wood, who was a questionable official scorer’s decision away from, like Kershaw, having a no-walk, no-hit pitching performance not converted into a perfect game due to an error, while striking out 20 batters to Kershaw’s 15. And hell, Sandy Koufax and Matt Cain both pitched actual perfect games with 14 strikeouts. But this is really just splitting hairs because no matter what way you slice it, Clayton Kershaw was super duper awesome. It is difficult to imagine a situation in which his awesomeness wouldn’t have carried the Dodgers to victory against any team in baseball. And that’s where I come in.

The thing is, as easy as it would be to dwell on Hanley Ramirez for his error, it’s not like factors outside of Clayton Kershaw, whether they his defense or luck, let him down on the whole. Kershaw struck out 15, which means 12 outs were recorded by fielders, which means that, since there was an error, there were 13 balls in play. The Rockies’ team BABIP in the loosest sense of the term (one in which the Ramirez error, which was very much an error, was ruled an infield hit) was .077, which is, um, bad. Now, there were a lot of weakly hit balls and all that but regardless, Kershaw wasn’t exactly alone out there, as awesome as he was.

But now, Mr. Kershaw, you will face karmic revenge that you do not especially deserve via your defense. They will let you down. They will make you hurt.

But don’t worry: I’m not a total masochist. I will give ClayClay (this is a nickname people use for Kershaw, right?) some offensive help. In fact, I will give him some of the best damn run support I can. In fact, some of these guys will be really good fielders. They will merely be used, um, unconventionally.

Mike Trout, catcher: For all of Trout’s strengths, as I previously explored, he doesn’t have a great arm. It’s not a terrible arm but it’s really nothing to write home about. WHICH MEANS HE ISN’T A FIVE TOOL PLAYER BECAUSE THAT IS A STUPID TERM. But since his offensive value is too great to ignore, it was important to place him somewhere where his world-class range wouldn’t make him anything resembling an asset in the field. So welcome to catcher, Mike Trout. Hey, Mike Piazza was a great hitter who couldn’t throw out runners to save his life at catcher (granted, he was a passable fielder in other facets, but I think in spite of previous history with Mike Trout, he might survive here).

Giancarlo Stanton, first base: Of the eight best hitters in baseball, Stanton has the best arm and the best range. So I’m putting him in the position sometimes played by David Ortiz.

Jose Bautista, second base: Since Joey Bats (brother of the late, great Billy Bats) has played third base, it’s slightly risky to give him a position that he couldn’t handle to a degree. So we might as well limit a pretty good arm and exploit a relative lack of range.

Miguel Cabrera, shortstop: So you thought Miguel Cabrera playing third base was a shitshow?

Andrew McCutchen, third base: Cutch is an interesting defensive player. He makes occasionally spectacular defensive plays but can’t particularly throw and mostly makes up for bad defensive instincts by being fast (which partially contributes to the spectacular plays). Third base is a perfect terrible position for him. This was the first position I decided. But Baseball Mogul remains optimistic about Cutch, though I question their judgment after reading the final sentence in his scouting report.

Troy Tulowitzki, left field: Tulo has been the best hitter in baseball this year so he HAD to be on the team. But he’s a really good fielder at shortstop. I’m optimistic that at left field, Tulowitzki will not be a good fielder because that’s just how Baseball Mogul works, but on the off-chance that he is good, he’s in left field so the “damage” is limited.

Paul Goldschmidt, center field: There are two guys on this team who have never played the outfield in their careers. One is in left field. The one I’m positive would be a bad fielder is in center field. And the guy who has barely played in the outfield (in left) is in right.

Edwin Encarnacion, right field: You get the idea by now.

Okay, so you know how I said that this wasn’t about cloning? Well, I lied. Everything is about cloning. So Clayton Kershaw is getting thirteen clones. Since I will be inputting his stats solely from Wednesday into the game, he will have super good endurance, but since the computer will inevitably go to the bullpen (BBM allows you to manage games but I kind of enjoy my will to live, so I ain’t sitting through 162+ games of this), he gets Clayton Kloneshaws ™. As for the bench, I want to minimize it. So the Dodgers will have three bench players. Every starter will get a perfect health rating and for the bench, I’m going to go with default created players, who are terrible at everything. They will be at least as bad at fielding as these guys and much, much worse hitting. And I will scale down manager substitution and double switches. Each of these guys would get 100 games if Mike Matheny could double switch them into games.

IMPORTANT EDITING NOTE: If you are a Baseball Mogul player, remember to uncheck the box about “sanity checking” stats. Usually the sanity checks only come into play in small sample sizes, like if a guy plays one inning and records three putouts and then it looks like he’s literally a vacuum which encompasses an entire baseball field. Three Cardinals in my experiences have broken the sanity check: 1985 Vince Coleman for steals, 1998 Mark McGwire for home runs, and 2013 Matt Carpenter for doubles. The more you know!

So an interesting thing happened when editing Kershaws. Turns out he was so damn good on Wednesday that Baseball Mogul literally cannot rationalize what he did. His predicted stats show his Wednesday line but…apparently the system is overwhelmed and spit out some pretty, um, erratic, scouting numbers (don't worry, I changed the health after this point). Hurray!

Also, the Kershaws have been differentiated with new first names. The original Kershaw is now Alpha Kershaw, and then Beta, Gamma, etc. Hey guys, I know the Greek alphabet! I am so worldly! That or I was mandated to learn it in college. One of these theories is true. Anyway, because YOLO, I decided to let the computer sort the Kershaws by optimizing the bullpen and rotation and…turns out the actual Clayton Kershaw, Alpha Kershaw, is the team’s fifth starter. The cloning process has bred four better starters—Beta, Gamma, Delta, and Epsilon. You may recognize these as the next four letters of the Greek alphabet. Thankfully, generations Zeta on were not nearly as strong or I’d have thrown my computer off my balcony and set fire to it. I’ve seen The Terminator. I know what’s going on here.

THE RESULTS

So basically, I figured this would go one of two ways. I honestly didn’t have much of an idea between the two as to how it would inevitably go, but I was pretty sure there was no middle ground here. Either this team would be a wretched mess, an offensive juggernaut with an incredible pitcher being totally let down by a hot mess of a defense. Or my general belief that sabermetrics revisionism has led to defense being overrated in a strikeout era would be validated when offensive and pitching superstars carry the new-look Dodgers to glory.

Well, I was right. One of either the win or loss column included the total of 149. So either this is the best or worst team in baseball history. But first, let’s look at a game which symbolizes just how much I have ruined baseball.

JUNE 4, 2014—Chicago White Sox at Los Angeles Dodgers

The pitching matchup for this game is Beta Kershaw, the nominal ace of the staff, against Jose Quintana, who has bucked the trend I set forth by being an actual person and not a clone.

Anyway, Jordan Danks led off the game with a bunt single to first base. It dawns on me all of a sudden that…how bad could Giancarlo Stanton be at this? Or Andrew McCutchen down the left field line at that? Is this what teams are going to do, lay down bunts and exploit outfielder unfamiliarity with fielding ground balls? If this is a continuing problem, I will have to go back through previous game logs and hopefully discover that the AI didn’t figure this out immediately. Or we are all screwed. The Baseball Mogul managers will slowly learn more and slowly exploit our apathy before we work for them.

Luckily, ol computer Robin Ventura didn’t keep doing this in the first. #2 hitter Gordon Beckham popped up to the shortstop, Miguel Cabrera, who recorded the out. Which isn’t a huge surprise—Miggy isn’t THAT bad of a fielder.

And then, things got real weird.

“Dayan Viciedo grounded to third for a double play (5-4-3).”

A double play? Kershaw didn’t record one measly strikeout? How exactly did Andrew McCutchen cleanly field contact off Beta Kershaw’s 81 MPH hard curve, fire it to Jose Bautista, who then made a proper turn to Giancarlo Stanton for the third out of the inning? Perhaps players are this good. Maybe social pressures dictated that these phenomenal hitters went to the outfield and didn’t develop into the next Mike Schmidt or something. Perhaps positions are not real—we have merely invented them for the sake of order. Or maybe this is a fluke.

Well, anyway, the Dodgers scored a run in the bottom of the first, but we don’t care about this, right? It should have actually been more damage—Paul Goldschmidt grounded out with the bases loaded. Paul Goldschmidt is this team’s seventh hitter. Jesus Christ.

After three innings, the score was 3-0 Dodgers. This part was fine. But Beta Kershaw struck out one batter and allowed no baserunners since the leadoff bunt. The defense was holding their end of the bargain. A slight reprieve would come in the top of the fourth, when Beta struck out Jordan Danks, Gordon Beckham, and Dayan Viciedo. Maybe all he needed was to figure out the order the second time through. OH DEAR GOD THE CLONES ARE LEARNING!

By the top of the sixth, I’m getting worried. The Dodgers are up 4-0 and Beta Kershaw has “only” five strikeouts. Now, I realize that nine K/9, even when a player is projected for 15 per nine, is perfectly good, but what concerns me is this defense. They—aren’t bad. Please, for the love of Based Ball God, give me some reason to believe that clones will blow it.

The leadoff batter of the top of the sixth, Denis Phipps, got to a full count before grounding the ball to third baseman Andrew McCutchen, who committed a fielding error. On the next pitch, catcher Mike Trout had a passed ball and Phipps got to second. Next, after a weak Hector Gimenez dribbler in front of the mound, Trout committed a throwing error. It was now first and third with nobody out. Eric Patterson came to the plate and…he reached first on an error by second baseman Jose Bautista. A run scored and there were runners on first and second. Presumably rattled by his supporting “defense”, Beta Kershaw then allowed a home run to Jordan Danks, who it bears repeating led the game off with a bunt. Beckham, Viciedo, and Jose Abreu then proceeded to get three consecutive outs, but damage had been done. On one hit and zero walks allowed, Beta Kershaw had allowed four runs and the game was tied.

Welp.

Mike Trout hit a solo home run to lead off the bottom of the sixth, saving some face after his defensive miscues in the top half of the frame, to give the Dodgers a one run lead before the seventh inning began. Apropos of nothing, I wonder what inning the Dodgers have to cut off alcohol sales.

The computer manager did a really weird, stupid thing, replacing Paul Goldschmidt with a guy whose CF defensive rating is inexplicably WORSE than Goldschmidt’s and who cannot hit at all. TRIM THOSE SIDEBURNS, MATTINGLY. But luckily that didn’t affect this inning.

First, Alexei Ramirez reached on another Trout error. I’m starting to think that my Clone Trout experiment gave the impression that cloning an outfielder and putting him at other positions wouldn’t work but that in reality it was a Trout problem. But anyway, after a Conor Gillaspie strikeout, Denis Phipps drove a “double” into the left field gap. According to the play-by-play, he went for an extra base and reached third but I have my suspicions that Tulo blew it. SEE HE CAN’T BE MVP NOW THE MVP SHOULD ALWAYS BE YADIER MOLINA. But next, a Hector Gimenez single to center and the White Sox took the lead. Beta Kershaw overcame another Trout error (Jesus, dude) and going into the seventh inning stretch, the Sox led 6-5.

In the bottom of the eighth, the Dodgers scored six runs and ended up winning the game 11-6. I tell you this for one reason and one reason only—the pitcher who allowed all six runs for the White Sox? Mitchell Boggs. Those of you who are not Cardinals fans are probably confused as to why this detail matters but trust me, I know how to pander to a base.

Beta Kershaw pitched a complete game. His final line reads: 9 IP, 6 H, 0 BB, 1 HR, 6 R, 1 ER, 10 K, 140 pitches. His season ERA increased to 0.60.

This season went well for the Dodgers.

The starting rotation of the Dodgers accumulated WAR seasons of 19.5, 19.6, 20.3, 19.8, and 11.7 (he only had 23 starts. He also got 21, making him the only Dodgers starter who did not reach 30 on the season). Beta pitched three perfect games and an additional no-hitter. Gamma had one perfecto and one no-hitter. Epsilon got a no-no, Delta got four no-hitters, and Alpha (i.e., the actual Clayton Kershaw character pre-cloning) got none. And since he got a no-hitter in real life this year already, the game may have underestimated this team’s force.

The entire pitching staff had these combined statistics on the season: 2128 strikeouts, zero walks, 63 earned runs, 134 total runs. Theta Kershaw was the worst pitcher on the entire team by a sizable margin: He had a season ERA of 1.04 and a season FIP of 1.73. #DFATheta

Amazingly, Mike Trout was not the worst defender on this team. He was merely third worst, with a mere -5.1 lost defensive wins, catching a solid 10% of baserunners while committing 38 errors. Hell, he was even a moderately minus defender in 24 games where Don Mattingly ruined everything and Trout wound up in right or center field.

Miguel Cabrera committed 43 errors at shortstop. He put up -6.5 defensive wins and had a .914 fielding percentage. Jose Bautista was worse. Bautista, at second, was -6.7 wins and rocked 27 errors. I’m still not sure how he was worse but I don’t even really understand these stats in real life—I’m not trying to understand them in this hellish landscape of “baseball” of which I am responsible.

But anyway, now I’m going to simulate the playoffs. I’ve written this entire thing up to this point without having done that! You guys can learn what happens with me.

The Dodgers won the World Series in four games, ironically over the White Sox. Beta Kershaw pitched a no-hitter in the playoffs and won World Series MVP. Baseball is ruined

Human cloning may not be a good thing, folks.