Leave The New Yankee Stadium Alone

by LouieTheLip on May 26, 2009 10:13 PM EDT Comment 14 comments

I live outside of Boston and I'm taking a beaten over the jet stream at Yankee stadium. Which is why I LOVE THE NEW STADIUM AND THE JET STREAM. Red Sox fans have enjoyed the luxury of inflated numbers for a century now. When Peter Gammons (President of red Sox nation) calls the stadium the "Biggest Joke In Baseball" It infuriates me. All of Red Sox nation is hating it because they are hypocrited through and through. Here are some splits that support my argument.

Player         Fenway         Away
Pedroia        342                290
Ortiz              313                264      scrub and Minnesota knew it
Lugo             300               264       scrub
Ellsbury        313               276       eeeeh
Youkilis        303               285
Lowell          306               273        remember he was a contract dump for Florida

Drew is about the same and Bay doesn't have enough at bats to judge.
Everyone of these guys is a tremendous hitter at Fenway and some of them are Scrubs elsewhere. NOT ONE 300 hitter outside of the shoe box they call Fenway. Fenway makes Lugo look like a great hitter.

Let's look at some present and former Yankees

Jeter             322                    309
ARod             310                    300
Bernie          295                     299
Great hitter regardless.

A few more to chew on

Varitek          278                      247    basically a scrub
Rice               320                     277    HOF????
Boggs           369                     302
Ted Williams 355                   320

It seems to me that Fenway can turn scrubs in to great players and great players in to legends and Hall of Famers. There is nothoing to fix at Yankee Stadium and if they do they are playing right in to the Red Sox hands. Leave it alone

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Ted Williams

Would have been a legend no matter what park he called home.

by HappyLuckyGoldenDragonNumber1! on May 27, 2009 4:03 AM EDT reply actions 0 recs

I concur.

There is something to be said about a park that turns Julio Lugo into a .300 hitter, though.

by dzawaki on May 27, 2009 4:56 AM EDT up reply actions 0 recs

Yeah He would

and the splits agree.

Pedroia however????

I see things you don't see.

by LouieTheLip on May 28, 2009 12:31 AM EDT up reply actions 0 recs

The park is the park

If it were easy to figure out how a park will play, this one would be different.

There are things they can fix, like getting the outfield fans a little farther from the field. The problem with the wind currents is a tough one. It is not clear how to change the wind pattern without just rebuilding the thing. Every New Yorker knows that wind out of the west is the dominate wind pattern. That wind goes right over home and atraight at the right field seats.

I have an idea! How about a roof!

If I's known I was going to live so long, I'd have taken better care of myself. Casey

by Cbeck3 on May 27, 2009 10:05 AM EDT reply actions 0 recs

Oh, please!

Can we stop with the roof stuff? Even if you are kidding, that’s getting old.

by Ed Valentine on May 27, 2009 10:39 AM EDT up reply actions 0 recs

The only problem with your analysis (actually, it's just one of the problems

but I’m being polite) is that the orientation of the new Yankee stadium relative to the “dominate” (sic) wind pattern is identical to the old one.

by cph on May 27, 2009 7:40 PM EDT up reply actions 0 recs

The old stadium was much more vertical inside

The wind went over the top and came back (swirled). It seems the new one is flatter. You can see the way the Upper decks are not over the lower ones, but above and behind. So while the wind direction is the same, the effect inside is very different.

I was looking at the two buildings next to each other. I do not think getting the old one down will help. You could change the wind pattern by putting something tall, like big billboards on top around the home plate end or around the top around the outfield. You might be able to do other things but it’s hard to visualize a “spoiler” that would deflect the wind that would not be ugly as sin. The Yanks will probably end up with billboards ans sell more ads. (MORE?)

Realistically, I think the park is the park. The comment that we really won’t know until they’ve played a couple of full season is probably right.

If I's known I was going to live so long, I'd have taken better care of myself. Casey

by Cbeck3 on May 27, 2009 9:13 PM EDT up reply actions 0 recs

Let's be fair

If you saw Jim Rice play, you knew the sense of dread he inspired every time he came to the plate. Hall of Fame… absolutely. He was a terrifying presence in the lineup, and in his prime the only hitter more scary in the AL was Eddie Murray.
Ted Williams is an all time great. Boggs could hit anywhere, and his BA suffered by playing his late in career home games away from Fenway. (He did not drive the ball well or hit for high average as D Ray or at the end of his Yankee days) Ortiz is a legit power guy, and Varitek and Pedroia arfe the sorst whose contributions can not be measured by numbers. Lowell had some terrific years in Florida but had his career derailed by cancer for a while, so cut him some slack.

by Iggy Poptart on May 27, 2009 11:39 PM EDT reply actions 0 recs

Correct

The numbers say Williams and Boggs were great regardless. No dispute their

I see things you don't see.

by LouieTheLip on May 28, 2009 12:33 AM EDT reply actions 0 recs

Not sure what your point is

Fenway is a known offensive inflator of batting averages. In particular, there is almost no foul ground. There are of course also hits off the LF wall that are outs elsewhere. However, Fenway is not really a home run park. It should play as a HR neutral park to RHB and a home run negative park to LHB. To see if this is true, lets look at some RHB and LHB of recent Sox memory.
Lowell HRs Road: 33 Home:33 (same is true if you look at Youkilis, Pedroia or Manny-all basically same home/road)
and LHB
Ortiz HRs Road: 127 Home:105
Drew HRs Road: 20 Home:16

Fenway is not a HR park, especially to LHB. Imagine how many home runs “scrubby” David Ortiz would have it in Yankee stadium (even the old one)? A ton more. So what you say is partally true: Fenway inflates offense. But it does not inflate HRs. What people are talking about the the new Yankee stadium is the HRs.

by Buzzy on May 28, 2009 1:21 PM EDT up reply actions 0 recs

I Understand

It’s not all about HR’s . Fenway turns pop up in to doubles off the wall.

It’s not my opinion that Fenway is one of the best hitters parks it’s a fact.

No lead is safe at Fenway. i didn’t make that up.

I see things you don't see.

by LouieTheLip on May 28, 2009 9:08 PM EDT up reply actions 0 recs

I agree

it is one of the best hitter’s parks (because of the lack of foul ground more than the popups <—> doubles) but that misses the point. People are picking on the new stadium as a bandbox that is producing HRs at a rate greater than Coors before the humidor. I am sure it is also inflating overall offense too, but that’s not what people are shaking their head’s at. I mean, have you looked at Tex’s home/road OPS splits? I think even the old stadium was a better HR park then Fenway (not sure, would have to check).

by Buzzy on May 28, 2009 9:16 PM EDT up reply actions 0 recs