Okay, here’s my blog post about comparing Jordan Hicks and Shohei Ohtani, written from my personal experience and in a casual, conversational tone:
So, I was messing around with some baseball data today, and I got into this whole Jordan Hicks versus Shohei Ohtani thing. It started pretty simple. I wanted to see who threw harder, plain and simple. You know, just pure velocity.
First, I dug up some data. I’m not gonna lie, I mostly just googled around. I found some websites that track pitch speeds and all that good stuff. It wasn’t super scientific, but it gave me enough to play with.
Then I started comparing their fastest pitches. I saw that Hicks is known for hitting, like, 105 mph. Dude’s a flamethrower! Ohtani, obviously, is insane because he hits and pitches, but his fastball is closer to, say, 101 mph. Still crazy fast, but not quite Hicks level.
Digging Deeper
But then, I thought, “Wait a minute, there’s more to it than just speed.” Ohtani is a two-way player, a total unicorn. So, I started looking at other stuff, like strikeout rates, ERA, and all those fancy stats. And, yeah, Ohtani is just on another level overall. His hitting stats alone are ridiculous, and then he’s also a top-tier pitcher? Come on!
It become very intersting that I found Ohtani not just fast but more comprehensive.
My (Very Unscientific) Conclusion
So, what did I actually do? Mostly, I just looked at a bunch of numbers and made some comparisons in my head. I didn’t build any fancy models or anything. I just, you know, explored the data.
Here’s what I figured out:
- Hicks probably throws a bit harder, on average.
- Ohtani is a way, way better overall baseball player. It’s not even close.
It was a fun little exercise. It reminded me that while raw power is cool, there’s so much more to the game. And it definitely made me appreciate Ohtani even more. I mean, the guy is just unreal.
I spent about 2 hours to get the data and summarize it.
It is not a deep dive but I really enjoyed the process.
