Monday, April 29, 2013

Internet Baseball Scorecard 2013 Minima II v 3.6 Architecture


In the last post on Internet Baseball Scorecard 2013 Architecture I had the batting totals boxes grouped in eighteen, seven column boxes, four rows high. My text editor, blogger and all the Browsers I tested the coding in (Chrome, Firefox and IE7), didn't like it.

So I threw out all that coding and instead created seven narrow, long columns that run the entire length of both scorecards - in each column are seventy five elements that are individually the totals boxes for each batter in the line-up - times 3 for substitutes.

The bench tables and the pitching tables were also formed in the manner I discovered browsers hate - so I tried something that I didn't really think would work - but it did.

The bench tables and the pitching tables are coded in six different columns - yet on render they look like they are placed on top, as one thing - in fact, each line and even the main title text are in separate columns.

That this works amazes me, because I thought that separating the coding like that, separating 1 pixel wide lines, and text like that, would lead to instability issues; but on zoom the elements grow in size exactly together - even the 'Bench Table' and 'Pitching Totals' header titles - which are both in two separate columns, align perfectly at any zoom setting.

Now the only coding not in one of the base-level columns, is the per-inning-totals Totals box - which is (will be) a positioned element, coded at the very bottom of the mark-up.

Columns are amazing.

Columns good.

Here's another schematic I drew to illustrate the architecture.



Internet Baseball Scorecard 2013 - "Test: Minima II v 3.6.01 - bench, pitching tables in the columns" - http://internetbaseballscorecard2013.blogspot.ca/2013/04/test-minima-ii-v-3601-bench-table-in.html



mh

What's wrong with the Blue Jays' Line-up?


Game Notes from Sunday afternoon's scorecard - Game 4 between the visiting Toronto Blue Jays, and the New York Yankees --- the complete scorecard of which, is here: "Blue Jays at Yankees - Game 4" - http://internetbaseballscorecard2013.blogspot.ca/2013/04/28-blue-jays-at-yankees-game-4.html




Game Notes

Final in 9
Toronto Blue Jays: 2
New York Yankees: 3

What's wrong with the Blue Jays' Line-up?

(Written after I filled in the line-ups for today's game)

Yesterday I ranted here in Game Notes about how John Gibbons doesn't seem to know his players. Specifically I wondered why he didn't bat Cabrera in the 3 spot - as he is the team's best batter (average, situational, power); and move the heavy hitters into the 4 and 5 spots. I may have come off a little harsh, and without backing up my opinion with some details.

Here's what I meant:

Optimal Blue Jays' Line-up

1. C Rasmus CF, or R Davis RF
2. E Bonifacio 2B, or R Davis RF, or M Izturis 2B, or M Kawasaki SS
3. M Cabrera LF
4. J Bautista RF
5. E Encarnacion DH
6. A Lind 1B
7. B Lawrie 3B, or Mark DeRosa 3B
8. J.P. Arencibia C, or Henry Blanco C
9. M Kawasaki SS

The idea is to position 2 of the Jays' speedy, slap-hitting, inside-game-capable players in the 1, 2 spots; and bat Cabrera in the 3 hole.

This is not set in stone - for example, Lind, Lawrie and Arencibia can move up and down in the 6, 7, 8 spots - depending how they're hitting ... Lawrie and Rasmus as well show speed,average and power, so they can move in and out of the top of the order and down into the clean-up spots - giving the manager lots of flexibility in defensive planning.

Kawasaki is also top of the order style hitter - but Kawasaki is a ten year veteran of the Japanese leagues, he has the experience that may make him valuable batting ninth and in turning the line-up over --- so let him excel in the 9 spot through that added responsibility. Allow him to lead from the bottom through his sacrificing a number of at-bats batting low in the order, in order to help the team. Kawasaki may be better suited to this role because in the baseball culture he comes from, putting the team before the individual is highly accented - much more than it is here.

The use of the 9 spot in this way is based on the way many great managers have used a very good hitter in the 9 spot --- like the New York Yankees managers have done through the last period.



mh

Saturday, April 27, 2013

Every wrong move - is Coach Gibbons in over his head?


Game Notes from Saturday afternoon's scorecard - a match between the visiting Toronto Blue Jays, and the New York Yankees --- the complete scorecard of which, is here: "Blue Jays at Yankees - Game 3" - http://internetbaseballscorecard2013.blogspot.ca/2013/04/27-blue-jays-at-yankees-game-3.html



Game Notes


Final in 9
Toronto Blue Jays: 3
New York Yankees: 4


This coach doesn't see baseball the way I see baseball. I don't agree with his approach with regards to defensive substitutions late - the way he's utilizing the parts he has; how he has the line-up configured, and how he uses the pitching staff; how he seems to determines everything that happens on the field from the foundation stone of the lefty / right-y pitcher batter match-ups meme.

Rasmus out of the line-up because of a lefty right-y match-up thing??? How about putting your best defence on the field against one of the stingiest pitchers in the league in what appears to be a closely matched series?

Of coarse it doesn't matter if the whole world doesn't like the way Gibbons' manages, the question is, do the players on this team respond to how he's doing it? As far as I can see no one is being put in a position to succeed, it's like he hasn't a clue who he has on the team - it's all about a calculator struck in average vs pitcher over time.

For example why not move Bautista down to the four spot and bat Cabrera three - he's the best batter and a idea three hitter; move Bautista and Encarnacion down to four and five spots and then you show the team who they are - a contender. Instead Gibbons sticks with the line-up architecture that the Jays' have used the past three seasons - because they didn't have the parts to configure the line-up in this, the ideal fashion.



mh

Jays' shaky defense obscures positives in tight tilt with Yanks


Game Notes from Friday evening's scorecard - a match between the visiting Toronto Blue Jays, and the New York Yankees --- the complete scorecard of which ... is here: "Blue Jays at Yankees - Game 2" - http://internetbaseballscorecard2013.blogspot.ca/2013/04/26-blue-jays-at-yankees-game-2.html



Game Notes

Final in 9
Toronto Blue Jays: 4
New York Yankees: 6

Yankees win by 2 with a wild pitch and a pass ball by the Jays' battery - both of which plate runs That and base on balls all over the place; plus a double play not made in the second - and that's all she wrote. Shaky defense loses this one.

Interesting - this beat up Yankee team, and this still-finding-their-way Jays team - seemed to struggle together today - the game had a battle of cosmic forces kind of feel to it. These teams are well matched.

We'll have an indication whether or not my feeling is correct if the Jays win the next two. Quite an unlikely feat at this point.


mh

Wednesday, April 24, 2013

Internet Baseball Scorecard 2013 Architecture


Starting in the fall of 2010 I started to teach myself how to write html; and to build a way of scoring baseball games on line and publish them for free via Blogger. It took me a long time to learn how to code a web page correctly - but this spring I finally gleaned how it is done properly. To internalize the knowledge, I produced a schematic of the 2013 version (see the image below, and check out the real thing at the link).

Websites are configured in 'columns'. Every element of a web page is held in Horizontal position within a column. Vertically they are held in place by either stacking elements one on top of the other; or via the html 'position:' tag.

In this production, the vast majority of the page is held in place by 'div' elements stacked into one of 13 columns.

The Game Notes area (default top left); the per-inning totals table; and the bench and pitching tables for each team are coded at the bottom of the html - and positioned over top of the columns.

Here's a schematic of the 'Internet Baseball Scorecard 2013' - that I produced with my computer's 'Microsoft Paint' program:

Internet Baseball Scorecard 2013 - http://internetbaseballscorecard2013.blogspot.ca/



mh

Saturday, April 20, 2013

Hats off to Yankee starting pitcher, Hiroki Kuroda ...

Game Notes from Saturday afternoon's scorecard - a match between the visiting Yankees and the Toronto Blue Jays --- the complete scorecard of which, is here: http://internetbaseballscorecard2013.blogspot.ca/2013/04/20-yankees-at-blue-jays-game-2.html


Game Notes

46,095 paid tickets

Final in 11
New York Yankees: 5
Toronto Blue Jays: 3

As the TV sportcasting crew was saying all game long, the Jays were hitting the ball right at positioned Yankees ... And that tells you (me) that the Yankees' starting pitcher had full command and control of his pitches today - pitching to spots against the Jay's offense, that resulted in the batted ball going where the Yankee brain trust predicted they would most likely go.

Hats off to Yankee starting pitcher, Hiroki Kuroda for executing the game plan.

On the sloppy play by the Blue Jays' defence (which cost them the game) there is plenty of blame to go around. It seems everyone is trying too hard - especially Lawrie who is a natural leader - and so everyone is trying too hard ...

Not to mention that it is still uncertain who will stick with this team. With lots of major league capable talent just down the road in AAA Buffalo, who knows what will happen if some under performance is detected - anywhere on the field, it seems (if John Gibbons' PH and defensive replacement meme is any indication - which as yet, it is hard to tell  what messages he's trying to send to his players --- from here, a mile away from the stadium, at any rate).

Which reminds me of an idea related to this - do second-time-through coaches get the usual honeymoon ... Or are we allowed to call for their heads in April?  :)


mh

Tuesday, April 16, 2013

Dammit Jim, I'm a Health Insurance Adjustor, not a Baseball Writer!

Game Notes from Tuesday night's scorecard - a match between the visiting White Sox and the Toronto Blue Jays --- the complete scorecard of which, is here:
http://internetbaseballscorecard2013.blogspot.ca/2013/04/16-white-sox-at-blue-jays-game-2.html


Game Notes

Gibbons PH for Rasmus in the 7th.

Injury?

Usually you try to put your best defensive team on the field with a lead late. As the score was tied...

I like the way Joe Madden manages - everyone moves to the same position at a certain point in the game when the coach decides it's the best inning. That team is your defensive juggernaut.

Anyway...

It has to be a physical problem, because Rasmus was 2 for 2 with a home run when Gibbons pulled him, late, in a low scoring, tie game.


Dammit Jim, I'm a Health Insurance Adjustor, not a Baseball Writer!



mh

Sunday, April 14, 2013

drawing illusions with code



This is a bit of code I wrote that creates the outfield icon perimeter in the Internet Baseball Scorecard 2013.




To show you how it's made, below I add 'border: 1px solid;' to two 'containers'.





The border reveals the two containers which each have a white background. The inner shape is a 'border-radius:' - code that lets you put rounded corners on a box.

Here I show the two containers pulled apart. I moved the right-hand container 'left: 30px;'.







If I put a box with a white background around the half circle you can see the five shapes create an illusion:






A floating semi-circle. The top of a parachute. Perhaps the ice-cream end of the cone.




'radius-simple' - that will go into the scorecard



mh



Saturday, April 13, 2013

Baseball Art - "Izturis slides, Perez blocks, Jerry Meals gets into position"


An instant of a game caught on high definition camaras, broadcast on line at MLB and paused by me at this instant. The shot reminds me of the action in the Ty Cobb photo (see below) of him sliding into third, into the camera.

Everything's in motion in this frame. The tension before resolution is at it's zenith. I love the way the umpire is 'flowing' with the play.


"Izturis slides, Perez blocks, Jerry Meals gets into position"
"Izturis slides, Perez blocks, Jerry Meals gets into position"
by Michael Holloway
(open image in a new tab to see full size)

So what happened?!

--> Izturis looked to be blocked off the plate, but the ump had the only good look at it - he ruled the runner's cleat touched the plate (otherwise he was out).



Charles M. Conlon's photograph of Ty Cobb (1910), via Graham Womack's Twitter background image - https://twitter.com/grahamdude


Updated version - with cropped section restored (from Baseball's Golden Age: The Photographs of Charles M. Conlon 1993)

Screen Print via Time Magazine http://lightbox.time.com/2011/10/19/the-golden-age-of-baseball-photographs-by-charles-m-conlon/#11

---------------------


Top image created from a screenshot from MLB, Gameday, "Kawasaki's sac fly"

MLB | "Kawasaki's sac fly" | TOR@KC: Kawasaki drives in Izturis with a sac fly (01:16)
http://mlb.mlb.com/mlb/gameday/index.jsp?gid=2013_04_13_tormlb_kcamlb_1&mode=box

(Can't link directly to it - the link above gets you to the MLB Box Score for this game. Click on the Video Tab at the top and check the list of videos for this game - your looking for, "Kawasaki's sac fly".)

[This is a bad user experience, MLB Advanced Media.]



mh