If you’re new here and like what you see, you may want to subscribe to my RSS feed. Need more info on what subscribing entails? Here’s a primer. Thanks for visiting!Sure, Ozzie Smith can do back-flips and Cal Ripken had some kind of streak or something, and Ryne Sandberg might have been on [...]

Rob Neyer called for further investigation of the point. Neyer stated:

Two, while I’m intrigued by the notion that Trammell’s solid defensive credentials — he won four Gold Gloves, and Bill James has him as a Grade B-minus shortstop over his entire career — are partly the result of the high grass in the Tiger Stadium infield, I’d sure like to see somebody do some actual work on this one. Yes, sinkerballer Walt Terrell’s home/road splits were massive when he pitched for the Tigers, particularly from 1985 through ‘87. But did other sinkerball pitchers fare particularly well in Tiger Stadium during Trammell’s career? Were Trammell’s fielding stats significantly better at home than on the road? If the grass was long and did lead to more plays for Trammell, did it cost him anything as a hitter?

Inspired by Neyer I decided to at least take a very crude look at what effect the grass had on ground ball hit rates. This isn’t exactly answering Neyer’s question or refuting Sheehan’s claim, but at least it is another data point. My methodology was to look at all groundballs hit, and see at what rate they produced baserunners. I then converted those rates to park factors.