Bonds

[chickenhead]

Anyone know what the Vegas odds are for Bonds to hit .400 this year?

Is it minimum 400 AB to qualify?

[BillW]

Originally posted by chickenhead
Anyone know what the Vegas odds are for Bonds to hit .400 this year?

Is it minimum 400 AB to qualify?

CH,

It used to be 502 plate appearances. A plate appearance includes walks.

Not sure about the odds.

Bill

[chickenhead]

thanks Bill, PA makes more sense than AB.

[sq764]

Are you on crack? .400 for Bonds??

I will give you odds right now on that.. Name your price..

[sq764]

Sorry, trying to make the adjustment to a kindler, gentler poster...

What I really meant to ask was:

Are you sure that this would be such a wise wager? Considering he is 35 points from .400 now and it's harder to gain points the longer the year goes on..

He would have to hit in the .450 range for the rest of the year, which is simply not possible (IMO). He is a good hitter, but not a .400 hitter..

I don't think anyone will ever hit .400 again.

[SAL]

Since Bonds rarely gets pitches to hit, .400 seems unlikely.

If he were challenged more it would be a possibility.....

[chickenhead]

didn't say I thought he would, said I wondered what the odds were.

His average jumped 20 points in the last 4 games, he has so few at bats it's not even funny.

[sq764]

Last 30 days, he is hitting .358.. If he were to hit .400, a month like this would mean he would have to hit .500 the next month and close to that every month thereafter...

There is a reason why no one hits .400.. There are no hitters like Ted W anywhere in sight anymore

[chickenhead]

but you have to admit ( well, you don't have to) that if it occurs again it will be someone like Bonds, very few AB's. Brett was the same deal I think. But I basically agree with you, for it to be at all likely, you'd have to be above .400 at this point in the season.

[sq764]

I don't think it would be someone like Bonds. He is not a pure hitter.. It would be someone like Olerud (in his prime) or Tony Gwynn or Wade Boggs or some other pure hitters that allude my memory.

Power hitters hit too many flyballs, which is why they would never hit .400. You have more of a shot of getting a hit on the ground than in the air, obviously.. Try to remember how many balls Tony Gwynn hit in the air.. Not many..

[chickenhead]

uh, I assume you mean pop fly's, not balls in the air. When I (try) to remember Gwynn, I remember him ripping hard shots into the gap or dropping them in front of the outfielders...not hitting ground balls. Same for Boggs and Olerud. Maybe my memory isn't firing right anymore.
Not important anyway, when I said someone like Bonds, I meant someone who draws a lot or walks, or for some other reason has an abbreviated amount of AB's.

[sq764]

shots in the gap are called line drives, not fly balls... And hitting the ball on the ground the majority of the time is the only shot they have at hitting .400

The year Gwynn hit .394 (1994), he had 165 hits, of those 165 hits, 117 were singles..

(And he struck out 19 times all year, which is just sick)

[kenwoodallpromos]

I was an official scorer in high school. Unless things have changed, line drives that were caughty were labeled FO, Fly out. GO was Ground out. Generally balls that hit the ground prior to being fielded were grounders in the infield, and flys if they landed in the outfield.
IMO any ball hit over the infielders is preferred, especially if at a low trajectory. So I say line drives to the outfield are the best % chance of hitting safely.
I always thoiught batters who stay closest to .400 had the best chance of hitting .400 for the season.
I think Bonds has odds of 250-1 of hitting .400 because he gets less pitches in the strike zone than most, so he cannot get as familiar with the pitcjhers. But his bat speed is in his favor.

[sq764]

Um, I am not sure why you are trying to disagree with me. I said that line drives and hard ground balls are the best chance to get hits..

[Valuist]

I agree that a Gwynn type hitter is the type who has the best shot at .400. Rod Carew also came very close. Carew was like a magician with the bat. There's nobody like Gwynn or Carew now. Everyone wants to be on ESPN's highlights so they all swing from their heels; ironically the only guy I ever see choke up with 2 strikes is Barry Bonds.

[cj]

Don't forget George Brett's 390. Of all the players today, I think the only one with even a small shot is Todd Helton, and only in Colorado.

[sq764]

Valuist, if the only person you see choke up is Bonds, you should watch Bobby Abreu hit.. He is unreal with 2 strikes..

At one point, he had 16 homeruns and 10 of them were hit with 2 strikes..

I am biased because I love the Phillies, but as far as a guy who has the 5 tools, Abreu is one of the top complete players around right now..

[Bubbles]

A guy I think has a shot at .400 in the next few years: Ichiro. Guy hits a ton of slow rollers to the opposite fields, and with his speed, he'll beat a lot of them out. Surprised he hasn't been mentioned in this thread up to this point.

[sq764]

Probably not mentioned for 2 reasons.. 1) He has never hit over .350 and 2) His average has declined every year in the major leagues..

This tells me they have him figured out much better than they did in his first year..