#sharp decline

[muddypolitics]

Viewership drops 20 percent for Trump State of the Union address

Overall viewership for President Trump's State of the Union address on Tuesday night fell 20 percent

a sharp 20-percent decline

[mystlnewsonline]

NEW YORK | US stocks fall on sharp decline in energy stocks; S&P 500 closes 10 percent below record set on Sept. 20

NEW YORK | US stocks fall on sharp decline in energy stocks; S&P 500 closes 10 percent below record set on Sept. 20

NEW YORK— US stocks fall on sharp decline in energy stocks; S&P 500 closes 10 percent below record set on Sept. 20.

By Associated Press

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[lastestcryptonews-blog]

Ethereum Price Analysis: ETH/USD Could Correct Towards $240

Ethereum Price Analysis: ETH/USD Could Correct Towards $240

Key Highlights

ETH price found support near the $209 level and later corrected higher against the US Dollar.

There was a break above a short-term bearish trend line with resistance at $226 on the hourly chart of ETH/USD (data feed via Kraken).

The pair is likely to extend the current correction towards the $238 and $240 resistances.

Ethereum price is slowly correcting higher against the US Dollar…

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[lastestcryptonews-blog]

Ripple Price Analysis: XRP/USD Eyeing Upside Break above $0.4650

Ripple Price Analysis: XRP/USD Eyeing Upside Break above $0.4650

Key Highlights

Ripple price found support near the $0.4300 level and recovered a few points against the US dollar.

There was a break above major connecting bearish trend line with resistance at $0.4500 on the hourly chart of the XRP/USD pair (data source from Kraken).

The pair is currently attempting an upside break above $0.4620 the 100 hourly simple moving average.

Ripple price is trading with…

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[baseballthing]

Billy Butler Isn't Feasting on Hitters Counts

The A's signed Billy Butler to hit. He hasn't done that.

It's not just this year, either. His recent downward trends in your favorite offensive metric are troublesome:

2012: 138 OPS+, 139 wRC+, .302 TAv

2013: 116, 117, .283

2014: 96, 97, .256

2015: 85, 86, .243

We'll leave the reasons for this to smarter people. What interests me right now is Butler's increased inability to a) get into hitters counts and b) do damage once he gets there.

Here are his numbers from 2012 to 2015 in pitchers, even, and hitters counts. I've included slash lines and OPS for qualitative measures, as well as percentage of total plate appearances to indicate how often he finds himself in each situation.

Pitcher ahead

2012: .268/.276/.376, 652, 30.9

2013: .232/.235/.330, 565, 30.5

2014: .244/.259/.333, 592, 38.5

2015: .257/.260/.329, 589, 34.8

Fairly static over the last three years, no surprise. When pitchers get ahead in the count, they usually have the advantage. This is as true when Butler bats as when most other players bat. He has been behind in the count more often in 2014 and 2015 than he was in 2012 and 2013.

Even count

2012: .309/.320/.498, 818, 33.6

2013: .319/.322/.417, 739, 31.1

2014: .287/.280/.379, 659, 33.2

2015: .220/.240/.390, 630, 33.0

Decent drop from 2012 to 2013, all in the power department (ISO from .189 to .098). More drop from 2013 to 2014, largely driven by batting average. Overall output has mostly held steady this year, but the shape is different. Huge drop in batting average, huge gain in ISO (.092 to .173). Amount of time spent in even counts has remained static.

Batter ahead

2012: .366/.506/.672, 1178, 35.5

2013: .320/.527/.503, 1030, 38.3

2014: .295/.462/.457, 919, 28.4

2015: .238/.423/.362, 784, 32.1

And here is the problem. Butler used to punish pitchers when he got into a favorable count. He doesn't do that anymore. His ISO has dropped from .306, to .183, to .162, to .124. The sharp decline in batting average exacerbates matters, as does the fact that he gets into good counts less often now.

Butler isn't completely ineffective in hitters counts, he just doesn't get the huge boost that he once did. If you subtract his OPS when the pitcher is ahead from when the batter is ahead, it looks like this:

2012: +526

2013: +465

2014: +327

2015: +195

The advantage is severely diminished. What might be causing the problem and whether it is fixable are good questions that someone on the A's staff should be trying to answer. For our purposes it's enough to know that this is happening and is one aspect of Butler's current struggles.