Aberdeen must stink for hitters

[DocJJ]

I've never seen anyone hit successfully at this league....   Even our top prospects struggle there.   I have to wonder if its the ballpark?  Does the wind blow in?  Are the fences too deep?  Are there shadows or things that make it hard to track the pitch?  

 

I know it's Ripken's home town, but we got to move out of there!!!

[CharmCityHokie]

4 hours ago, DocJJ said:

I've never seen anyone hit successfully at this league....   Even our top prospects struggle there.   I have to wonder if its the ballpark?  Does the wind blow in?  Are the fences too deep?  Are there shadows or things that make it hard to track the pitch?  

 

I know it's Ripken's home town, but we got to move out of there!!!

This fascinates me, because I grew up in Frederick, and for years people talked about how Harry Grove Stadium (former home to the Keys and now home to a college development league team and an as-of-yet unnamed Atlantic League team) was a band box, with homers just flying out; and that's not just anecdotal as there have been several guys who posted big HR totals for a single season there just to never do it again in another league. Harry Groves dimension's are 325-Right/400-Center/325-Left.   Ripken Stadium is 310-RF/400-CF/310-LF and the walls are far shorter in height than Harry Groves. I don't know if it's the angle of the parks, something about the wind coming out of the mountains to the west of Frederick, or the winds pushing back off the water in Aberdeen, but it really is interesting how different they play.

[Frobby]

So it’s a pitcher’s park.  Who cares?  The better hitters are going to have the better numbers, and you adjust your standards of what’s a good performance according to the difficulty of the park.  Frankly, I don’t think it’s a bad thing for players to learn to play in a difficult environment.  

Honestly, a lot of our prospects did okay there.   Stowers had a .900 OPS there, Westburg .858, Ortiz .816 in a small sample before he got hurt.  
 

[CharmCityHokie]

13 minutes ago, Frobby said:

So it’s a pitcher’s park.  Who cares?  The better hitters are going to have the better numbers, and you adjust your standards of what’s a good performance according to the difficulty of the park.  Frankly, I don’t think it’s a bad thing for players to learn to play in a difficult environment.  

Honestly, a lot of our prospects did okay there.   Stowers had a .900 OPS there, Westburg .858, Ortiz .816 in a small sample before he got hurt.  
 

I care, from a scientific/statistical level, why its a pitcher's park given it's dimensions.

[Frobby]

3 minutes ago, CharmCityHokie said:

I care, from a scientific/statistical level, why its a pitcher's park given it's dimensions.

Sorry, I was reacting to the “we got to move out of there” remark in the OP.  The inquiry about why it’s hard to hit there is a good one.   

I have heard that (1) the air there is very damp and the ball simply doesn’t carry well, and (2) there is some problem with the batter’s eye that makes it tough to follow the ball at certain times of day.  The second reason was mentioned by one of our good prospects who played there part of last year (maybe Norby?) in an interview I heard.  

[Tony-OH]

48 minutes ago, CharmCityHokie said:

This fascinates me, because I grew up in Frederick, and for years people talked about how Harry Grove Stadium (former home to the Keys and now home to a college development league team and an as-of-yet unnamed Atlantic League team) was a band box, with homers just flying out; and that's not just anecdotal as there have been several guys who posted big HR totals for a single season there just to never do it again in another league. Harry Groves dimension's are 325-Right/400-Center/325-Left.   Ripken Stadium is 310-RF/400-CF/310-LF and the walls are far shorter in height than Harry Groves. I don't know if it's the angle of the parks, something about the wind coming out of the mountains to the west of Frederick, or the winds pushing back off the water in Aberdeen, but it really is interesting how different they play.

The power alleys at Ripken Stadium are pretty deep at 378 feet and the ball just does not carry very well there. 

[Gurgi]

Is Ripken park meant to be a clone of Memorial Stadium?  Memorial was 309 down the lines then really fell back to deep powerallies.  Memorial was a pitchers park

[sevastras]

I would think if the batters eye was an issue, it is fairly easy to fix. 

[glenn__davis]

1 hour ago, sevastras said:

I would think if the batters eye was an issue, it is fairly easy to fix. 

Yeah, agree.  That's the first I've seen of the batter's eye being a problem and I agree, that should be a very easy fix if they care to fix it.

That said, Aberdeen seems to be least well run of our affiliates, and I'm sure the SigBot 3000 has a great way to account for park factors, so maybe they just aren't that concerend about it.

[sevastras]

3 hours ago, glenn__davis said:

Yeah, agree.  That's the first I've seen of the batter's eye being a problem and I agree, that should be a very easy fix if they care to fix it.

That said, Aberdeen seems to be least well run of our affiliates, and I'm sure the SigBot 3000 has a great way to account for park factors, so maybe they just aren't that concerend about it.

Was the lawsuit the Ripken’s filed over the city not upholding maintenance settled?  Maybe it is part of the maintenance or an on going issue. If the batters eye is really the problem, that would be top priority for me as an owner. 
That said, they don’t really hit well on the road either. 

[Frobby]

On 4/25/2023 at 8:30 PM, Frobby said:

Sorry, I was reacting to the “we got to move out of there” remark in the OP.  The inquiry about why it’s hard to hit there is a good one.   

I have heard that (1) the air there is very damp and the ball simply doesn’t carry well, and (2) there is some problem with the batter’s eye that makes it tough to follow the ball at certain times of day.  The second reason was mentioned by one of our good prospects who played there part of last year (maybe Norby?) in an interview I heard.  

I’m reminded that it was Hernaiz who mentioned the batter’s eye.  Apparently it’s made of some see-through material rather than a solid green wall, so light comes through it before sunset.  Also, the lights there aren’t very good.  

[CHIP]

Remember that the stadium was a grass field with the Ironbirds were the short season team in 2019.  NO TEAM in 2020.  They rebuilt the lights and went from Grass to Turf so they could play full season ball and the O's would keep them vs. Frederick.

The lights are horrible.  I think they set them up not for baseball but so they could host other events there and not disturb the 'neighborhood' with the new lighting.

so far we only have the 2021 and 2022 seasons to track how players did Home vs. Away while there and how they did at the next level of AA.  

I think Ripken is the reason this location was chosen and the O's have to live with that and we get to judge them on it...