Showing posts with label home run tracker. Show all posts
Showing posts with label home run tracker. Show all posts

02 May 2012

What Effect Moving the Fences at Camden Yards Would Have?

I have been wondering how fence distance affects home runs.  I thought I had read somewhere that a ten foot difference results in a 20% difference in home runs.  However, I can not find that article, so I decided to figure it out myself.  I used Hit Tracker and simply graphed a section of the wall at Camden Yards with ten foot sections marked off.


In this section 138 home runs were hit from 2009-2011.  In the graph above, if the fence was at line 1 (the bottom most line), then 138 home runs would be hit.  If the fence is set ten feet back at line 2, then 108 home runs would have been hit.  That is a reduction of 30 home runs that were hit in that 10 foot space along this section of the wall.

The following graph shows the relationship between moving the fence back and home runs:


You can then use this information to predict the effect of moving a fence.



The graph above is a bit confusing.  Somehow my tired brain could not figure out how to do it.  Anyway, the way the x-axis works is that you go out to the furthest distance the fence could stand with no home runs and move back in.  The stretch of wall I looked at had a distance of 340 to 395 and correlates to the 80 mark.  Knowing that, we then can produce the following table showing how distance affects home runs over the course of three seasons:
Beginning End Projected Home Runs Actual Home Runs Percetage
260 315 469
342
270 325 417
304
280 335 367
268
290 345 321
234
300 355 278
203
310 365 238
174
320 375 201
147
330 385 167
122
340 395 137 138 100
350 405 109 108 80
360 415 85 83 62
370 425 63 62 46
380 435 45 47 33
390 445 30 31 22
400 455 18 17 13
410 465 9 12 7
420 475 4 2 3
430 485 1
1