The Domination Index and Japanese Baseball
Checking out the Central League
The Domination Index and Japanese Baseball
When I first read Baseball Dynasties years ago, I wondered if Neyer and Epstein’s methodology could be easily applied to any baseball league in history.
I figure that this is a pretty good time to test the idea out.
If you don’t know yet, I’ve calculated Domination Index ratings for every team in the history of Nippon Professional Baseball (日本野球機構, but better known as プロ野球). I’m actually not very knowledgable about the history of the NPB (if you want to find somebody who actually knows what he’s talking about, check out Jim Albright’s website). As such, I’ll use this as an opportunity to learn a few things about the best teams in NPB history.
I’ll go through the top 5 Domination Index scores in both of Japan’s leagues to give you a taste of things. Due to its length, I’ll have to split this one up into two parts. We’ll do the Central League today, since it’s easier.
If you want to follow along (or fight with my statistics), you can find the spreadsheet I use in the member’s area.
Central League
If you know anything about Japanese baseball, this leaderboard really shouldn’t surprise you.
1951 Yomiuri Giants (3.647 DI)
1990 Yomiuri Giants (3.446 DI)
1955 Yomiuri Giants (3.196 DI)
2012 Yomiuri Giants (3.193 DI)
2005 Hanshin Tigers (3.153 DI)
This feels about as exciting as discovering that the top American League teams of all time are all New York Yankees teams.
The Giants of the 50s
The Yomiuri Giants from 1950 through 1958 were simply awesome. I mean, just look at their Domination Index scores and won-lost totals:
1950: 1.632 DI; 82-54-4 (.603); 3rd place
1951: 3.647 DI; 79-29-6 (.731); 1st place; won Japan Series
1952: 2.791 DI; 83-37 (.692); 1st place; won Japan Series
1953: 3.118 DI; 87-37-1 (.702); 1st place; won Japan Series
1954: 2.512 DI; 82-47-1 (.636); 2nd place
1955: 3.196 DI; 92-37-1 (.713); 1st place; won Japan Series
1956: 2.643 DI; 82-44-4 (.651); 1st place; lost Japan Series
1957: 1.693 DI; 74-53-3 (.583); 1st place; lost Japan Series
To top that off, all the Giants did in 1958 was sign a youngster named Shigeo Nagashima, topping that one off by signing Sadaharu Oh in 1959.
It’s interesting to note that the Giants of the Nagashima / Oh era didn’t crack the all-time top 5 list. Their highest Domination Index score was a 3.076 rating in 1966, when the Giants finished with a 89-41-4 (.685) record, finished in first place, and (as usual) won the Japan Series.
As impressive as that season was, though, it was nothing like the franchise’s 1951 season, which is arguably one of the most dominant seasons by any team in any league in baseball history.
The 1990 Giants
The 1990 Yomiuri Giants don’t look all that imposing at first glance. Their 88-42 record and .677 winning percentage is good, but it doesn’t strike you as absolutely overpowering.
Dig just a little bit, though, and you’ll see why this team was so great.
The Giants scored 589 runs in a league that was unusually packed in terms of runs scored. A glance at the team runs scored totals will show you what I mean:
Yomiuri - 589
Chunichi - 573
Hiroshima Toyo - 570
Hanshin - 550
Yokohama Taiyo - 546
Yakult - 529
That gives us a standard deviation of only 19.856. The Giants wound up almost 1 1/2 standard deviations from the average in terms of runs scored, though it was by an extremely slim margin.
It would be nice if we had game-by-game accounts, since they were only 40 runs away from average. A blowout win or two might have won them quite a few Domination Index points.
The pitching, though, was unquestionably amazing. The Giants gave up only 399 runs in a league that averaged 560. In fact, the Giants allowed only 976 hits and 94 home runs, completing a whopping 70 starts (out of 130 games started; the next closest team, Yakult, had only 37 complete games). One wonders if the ghost of Billy Martin was running the team. Masaki Saito, Masumi Kuwata, and Masao Kida showed that young pitchers could still finish their games without blowing their arms out, even in the 1990s.
This was the last season in Japan for Warren Cromartie, who had a good year for a 36-year-old, hitting .293 / .356 / .442 with a little bit of power. Cromartie returned to the Unitd States on the back of this season, hitting .313 for the Kansas City Royals in 1991 in 69 games. I know that it’s not going to spoil anybody’s major league equivalency stats, but that does say something about the relative level of play.
By the way, the Giants were swept by the Seibu Lions in the Japan Series that year. You can watch the 4th and final game here:
The 2012 Giants
The 2012 Giants went 86-43-15 during the regular season, good for first place with a .667 winning percentage (those tie games make things complicated). The Giants were the only team to score over 500 runs in the league, finishing with 534, and were the only team to allow fewer than 400 runs, finishing with 354.
They also almost blew it.
Japanese baseball has gone just as crazy as American baseball in recent years, adding in superfluous playoff rounds to stir up fan interest (aka money). In 2012, the Central League Climax Series climaxed with a 6 game playoff between the Giants and the second place Chunichi Dragons.
After clearly winning the regular season pennant, the Giants were given an automatic one game advantage in the playoff. They proceeded to almost blow it, losing the first 3 games to Chunichi before coming back to win the next 3.
I suppose that means there are some questions about whether this team is actually one of the best teams in NPB history. Yomiuri did defeat the Hokkaido Nippon-Ham Fighters in the Japan Series in the end, winning 4 games to 2.
Curse of the Colonel
That leaves us with the 2005 Hanshin Tigers.
We’ll talk later about the 1985 Japan Series and the famous Curse of the Colonel. Needless to say, the Hanshin Tigers have had nothing but bitter disappointment after winning the 1985 Japan Series - disappointment that was clearly shown in this 2005 team.
The 2005 Tigers were another deceptively dominant team, finishing in first place with a medicore looking 87-54-5 record (.617 winning percentage), yet destroying the league in the process. The team scored 731 runs, easily best in the league, and gave up only 553 in the process.
This was an aging team, with numerous stars who were 30 years or older — including Shane Spencer, whose famous 1998 season we’ll talk about in a future post. Spencer’s platooning magic was long gone by this point, but he was good enough to make a positive contribution on an extremely good team.
The Tigers couldn’t duplicate the curse-breaking feat of the 2004 Boston Red Sox, losing the Japan Series to the Chiba Lotte Marines, 4 games to 0.
It’s not complete, sadly, but you can relive some of the happier days of this team by watching this 2 hour clip from late September:
We’ll take a look at the Pacific League in a few days!