Image credit: Michael J.
It takes a lot of individual contributions to win 89 games, as the Brewers did in 2019. Some players, however, played a larger role in those wins than others.
Win percentage added (WPA) is a statistic designed to determine the impact a single event or sequence of events had on a baseball team’s chance of winning a game. It’s typically not predictive of future events and it is largely context driven (Ryan Braun’s ninth inning, go ahead grand slam on September 15 swung the Brewers’ chances of winning by 73%, for example, while Christian Yelich’s slam while leading 7-1 in the seventh on July 16 moved the scale just 1%), but it can tell a story of individual performances that most impacted a game outcome.
On episode 1452 of the Effectively Wild podcast, longtime baseball writer Sam Miller introduced the concept of the “Game Ball” statistic, an imaginary award handed out to the top performer in each team victory by WPA. As part of that conversation, he acknowledged Brewers closer Josh Hader as one of the sport’s leaders in such performances.
All told, 26 different Brewers would have taken home at least one Game Ball in 2019, including eight players that did it once each: Jesus Aguilar, Tyler Saladino, Cory Spangenberg, Jhoulys Chacin, Alex Claudio, Junior Guerra, Jeremy Jeffress and Brent Suter were each the most impactful Brewer in a single victory this season. On the other end of the spectrum, five Brewers combined to collect the game ball in 37 of the Brewers’ 89 victories in 2019.
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They were led, unsurprisingly, by Christian Yelich with eight. Yelich played his way into contention for a National League Most Valuable Player Award for the second consecutive season with a year that combined strong all-around performances with a flair for the dramatic. His first Game Ball came on March 31 against the Cardinals when he reached base five times, including a first inning home run, and his last came on September 7 when he hit a walk-off double against Brandon Kintzler and the Cubs. Yelich started 66 Brewers wins in 2019 and was the team’s top offensive performer by WPA in 14 of them.
Yelich only shared the team lead in 2019 Game Balls, however, as Ryan Braun also finished the season with eight. Braun trailed Yelich by 250 points in on-base plus slugging overall but was at his best with the game on the line, batting .367 with a .430 on-base and .667 slugging in tie games and .321/.385/.538 in the same categories when the score was within one run. Braun had his best WPA game of the season on May 4, going 6-for-8 while the rest of his teammates went 5-for-54 in an 18-inning win over the Mets.
The only Brewer with a better WPA game than Braun this season was Mike Moustakas, who finished tied for third on the team with seven Game Balls. His top performance came on September 11, when his ninth inning homer, his second of the game, powered the Crew to a 7-5 win over Miami. Moustakas came to the plate 73 times with runners in scoring position and two outs in 2019 and had a .438 on-base percentage with .509 slugging in those opportunities.
The Brewers’ tendency to use Josh Hader for multiple innings late in close games also gave him the opportunity to rack up some high-WPA outings, and he took advantage en route to seven Game Balls. He was the team’s most valuable pitcher by WPA in three of their first five wins and 14 overall, including an April 27 game against the Mets where he recorded the final six outs to protect a two-run lead.
Brandon Woodruff was the starting pitcher and didn’t get the Game Ball in that game, but he also picked it up seven times in 2019. A Brewers starting pitcher only recorded outs in the eighth inning six times this season, but Woodruff was responsible for three of those outings, including an eight inning one-hitter on May 26. Woodruff received the Game Ball in just less than one third of the games he pitched in 2019. He also had a positive WPA as a hitter in eight games in 2019.
The rest of the leaderboard is as follows:
- Eric Thames, Chase Anderson and Zach Davies finished tied for sixth with five Game Balls each.
- Freddy Peralta had four, headlined by a +.662 WPA performance on April 3 that was the best by a Brewers pitcher in 2019.
- Orlando Arcia, Keston Hiura and Gio Gonzalez each had three.
- Yasmani Grandal, Trent Grisham, Matt Albers, Jordan Lyles and Drew Pomeranz all had two.
- As noted above, eight players rounded out the list with one.
