True dat, Chris Perez. True dat.
Although, I might suggest that a good measurement of “heart and balls,” as Chris Perez so aptly put it would be to look at the percentage of fastballs a pitcher throws and then look at how often he challenges hitters inside the strike zone, to which I’d see that Mr. Perez throws four seam fastballs a whopping 65% of the time, while leading the league with 60% of his pitches going through the strike zone.
This might lead you to believe that Perez likes to challenge hitters, and therefore we can safely put him on the leader board when it comes to “heart and balls.”
His knack for challenging, of course, reminds me of this:
Things I hope I never have to quantify:
1. The testicles of a baseball pitcher.
Feel free to continue the list.
How many useless rejects will view these comments.
There’s a Jon Lester joke out here somewhere, but I’ll leave it to someone else.
Jon is heart and ball.
+1
Alert the marketing department! New Jays ad slogan! HEART & BALLS 2.0!
I’m sure scouts are quantifying players balls right now. We just heard Alex Anthopolous talking about it this past week. Hard for us to do though. Not going to show up in Fangraphs soon.
Hard to say we will never be able to quantify it though.
eg. maybe fMRI images show some region of the brain in high use for people that have supreme confidence?
Who knows..
I think challenging hitters isn’t a bad of testing it out without the bother of neuroscans.
Wouldn’t surprise me either :)
Oh good, the Testicular Fortitude Index. Thanks Mick Foley!
Is that a thing? If not, I like the term.
Testicular Fortitude was termed by Mick Foley during WWF Attitude era (hardcore wrrestling angle).
I’m sure we craft some sort of score for Testicular Fortitude for:
When you call out the fans, other players, the umpires, ownership and the League in general.
When you just throw straight fastballs down the pipe like a boss.
When you get hit by come backers and remain in the game.
Eschew athletic supporters in general
The ability to put Robin Ventura in a headlock and him noogies.
Metric time.
Cardiologists and urologists disagree with your assertion, Mr. Perez.
Sounds like baseball’s version of the joke about which body part is the boss.
Mr. Perez often demonstrates which of his body parts is the boss of him.
Balls: Definitely one stat steroids can’t help with.