THE BEST OF EPIC CARNIVAL SERIES: THE GRAND NATIONAL CHAMPIONSHIPS

by DCScrap, Our Book of Scrap

Every Wednesday Friday time we remember to do it, we thought we'd give you a little taste of what goes on at the home sites of our many fine writers. Amazingly enough, when they're not here entertaining you at Epic Carnival, they all have Web sites of their own in which they secretly pine for more airtime for Pam Ward on their NCAA football telecasts express their opinions and display their deranged senses of humor. This way you can get a small glimpse into why they were chosen to be a part of this conglomerate of crazy.

This week's entry comes to us from The Grand National Championships ... enjoy!

I have an internet friend that wanted to brag on something.
Note: This was before Jay Gibbons was busted for HGH.

He’s dating a girl that dated Brian Roberts. And seeing as some of you know whom Brian Roberts is and my friend is kind of anonymous, this isn’t exactly the greatest brag. However, there was an interesting little tidbit.

It seems as if young Mister Roberts was juicing. And he was not alone either. The other names named in this conversation were one Jay Gibbons, and one Melvin Mora.

And when the news of Jason Grimsley, who was an Oriole in 2005, and his various misdeeds broke on June 6, 2006. These Orioles Three were sufficiently scared for their livelihoods that they kicked themselves off the juice ever since.

Now Gibbons and Roberts were among the names named by Grimsley in the Los Angeles Times, and to be fair Roberts did hit all of his 2006 Home Runs after June. But the Washington Post effectively put a major amount of doubt on the names named.

And in doing statistical research, I’m inclined to believe that there is something to this case.

Let’s take a look at Melvin Mora first. Stats in AVG/HR/RBI (OPS)

2004: .340/27/104 (.981)
2005: .283/27/88 (.821)
2006: .274/16/83 (.733)
2007: .242/6/25 (.729)

Now for 2006, the year in question, the numbers are a little muddy, some may have been on an off cycle. Some may have quit in the middle. In fairs, and for the benefit of the doubt. We will separate April and May from the rest of the year, considering the arrest was reported on June 6th, 2006.

Pre-Grimsley: .306/8/28 (.856) .377 OBP/.479 SLG
Post-Grimsley: .257/8/55 (.736) .352 OBP/.384 SLG

For Mora, the case is strong. He lost a lot of power after Grimsley came to fruition, and he seems to have lost some bat speed at this rate.

Let’s move on to Brian Roberts and see the a weaker case before us.

2005: (Power Spike) .314/18/73 (.903)
2006: .286/10/55 (.757)
2007: .310/2/18 (.828)–Mostly walks (OBP of .409)

Here’s were you have to look deeper. Slugging percentage is a good measure of isolated power. Here’s Roberts (with a 2004 Outlier.)

2004: .376
2005: .515
2006: .410
2007: .419

Interesting. Very interesting. Let’s split the numbers out and see if the Roberts was just off to a slow start on the juice, considering his dinger totals.

Pre-Grimsley: .325/0/15 (.833) .400 OBP/.433 SLG
Post-Grimsley: .275/10/40 (.712) .335 OBP/.377 SLG

That right there is your M. Night twist. Less power generated with all those taters. And if you want to look deeper into the conjecture, you could conceivably tie in his OBP drop to outside pressures. And the sad thing is, he was valuable with the skill set God gave him.

So Brian Roberts has a definite statistical case against him as well. Now, there’s one name left. Jay Gibbons. Outfielder. And we will write off 2004 due to injury.

2005: .277/26/79 (.833)
2006: .277/13/46 (.799)
2007: .216/3/12 (.597)

Now Gibbons has been injury prone in recent years. And in 2006, he did miss most of June and July. However, like the other two, there is a definite case here.

Pre-Grimsley: .268/10/29 (.903) .313 OBP .580 SLG
Post-Grimsley: .288/3/17 (.831) .377 OBP .454 SLG

Very large drop in slugging percentage, masked only by a sudden visits to the church of bases on balls. Gibbons also had a fishy power drop in the post Grimsley months.

So, what have we learned?

At the very least, the math lends credence to Grimsley’s claim on Gibbons and Roberts. And considering the rapid degeneration of Melvin Mora, going off the juice seems as if it would be a strong probability.

Sure, the source is a piece of gossip. However, the numbers show that there’s a lot more to the story.