Fantasy Baseball Insiders

A Dinger Dilemma: Will David Ortiz’s Home Run Derby Success Lead To a Second-Half Slump?

Most baseball fans believe success in the Home Run Derby translates to a power outage in the second half of the season. Josh Hamilton in 2008 comes to mind, but it would be foolish to make assumptions based on that one particular instance. To answer this presumption, I tallied the first and second half home run totals of each Home Run Derby winner since 2000. The results may surprise you. The following table shows the pre and post All-Star Break at-bat per home run rate (AB/HR) of each player in the season they won the Home Run Derby. (Note: an AB/HR rate of 14.0 simply means the player hit a home run once every 14 at-bats.)...