Atlanta Braves: extra running might be in store, but should that happen?

Among other things, the Atlanta Braves certainly have the wheels to make opponents pay attention when they’re on base. But should they press that advantage?

It doesn’t matter whether we’re talking specifically about the Atlanta Braves or anybody else in major league baseball:  the running game has been out of vogue for quite a while now… and there are reasons behind this.

Before 1920, it seemed that teams practically ran at will, stealing an average of 1 to 2 bases per team and per game… and that’s not even counting the (relatively few) unsuccessful attempts.

After 1920, things calmed down on the base paths, bottoming out in the early 1950’s when steals were happening only about once every four games.

That rebounded to .85 steals per team/per game by 1987 – the highest since the dead ball era ended.

Over the last decade, the numbers have been trending down again, and 2019 saw a sizeable drop to 0.47 steals per team/game… nearly half of the 1987 high point.

The relationship to base-stealing and run-scoring is not strong… in fact, as you graph the rates over the years, you might be able to argue that – if anything – there’s a slightly negative correlation:  that base-stealing might slightly suppress run-scoring.

That isn’t entirely intuitive, but could point toward runners attempting steals when they shouldn’t… with the result being that they are caught, picked off, or create an open base for the slugger behind them that changes how the pitcher confronts that batter.

There are people who study this who have determined that there is a ‘required success rate’ that runners must achieve before the advantages of a steal outweigh the disadvantages.

That rate has been around 73-74%.  So as a rule of thumb, you need to be successful with a steal attempt 3/4ths of the time for your team to realize a payoff.

This rate actually increases the more your team scores runs, which stands to reason:  if your team scores runs well without your help in running… say they hit a lot of home runs… then maybe running is unnecessary.

Gee… we’ve seen a few homers lately, eh?

From that review cited above:

"This [the percentage of runs scored by homer] affects stealing because it changes the risk profile of stealing. The point of stealing a base is so that you can get a run from a hit instead of two hits or a single instead of a double but if your team is set up to hit home runs why would you take the risk of stealing when you would be driven in by home run if you were on 1st, 2nd or 3rd.  You wouldn’t, and they don’t."