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Since the inception of the DH rule, the American League has averaged more runs per game than the National League every year. And in most seasons, the gap has been considerable.
David Pinto of Baseball Musings occasionally writes for the Sporting News and informed me of a trend I thought I'd been noticing: The National League is scoring all kinds of runs early this year. He's got a pretty graph, too.
My first reaction was 'Well, of course they are. Barry Zito has been allowed to pitch.' But the astute Pinto delves into all kinds of OPS comparisons between the leagues, analyzing position to position and age to age.
Not only do most NL positions outproduce their AL counterparts, but I found most interesting was the age comparison.
At just about every age under 30, the NL's young talent is dominating. When you think about all the young talented bats in Major League Baseball it becomes a little more obvious, but the disparity is striking.
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You can point directly to teams like the Yankees investing in aged talent, while many NL teams aren't afraid to build a team around a 25-year-old star, or even younger.
I don't know if this increase in runs will translate into more World Series titles for the NL, but guys like Jose Reyes, David Wright, Justin Upton, Chase Utley, Hanley Ramirez and on and on sure give the league an exciting future.
However, all of this analysis could be largely affected by an outlier named Barry Zito.
UPDATE: Chicago Cubs pitching has decided to fully embrace this trend. Thanks Jon Lieber, now GFY.
How the heck is the NL outscoring the AL? [Sporting News]
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