Rob Rains Inside Baseball: Where Have All The Home Runs Gone At Busch?

By Rob Rains

The basic facts are that in the last 13 games played at Busch Stadium, the Cardinals and their opponents have combined to hit six home runs.

The question that nobody seems to be able to answer is why.

If this was merely an anomaly covering a brief portion of the season, that might be all of an explanation that was necessary. Teams get hot, teams get cold. A team runs into a stretch of good pitching and doesn’t hit as many home runs or allow as many as normal. 
A key player gets hurt and is out of the lineup for a time and the home runs drop. Those things happen to every team over the course of a 162-game season.

In this case, however, the last 13 games is only a fraction of a much larger sample size, covering the 56 games played at Busch Stadium this season, and the facts show there has been a dramatic drop-off in the number of homers hit through the same number of games last season.

Through the first 56 home games, there have 71 homers hit at Busch Stadium this season, 41 by the Cardinals and 30 by the visitors. At the same point a year ago, the Cardinals and their opponents had combined to hit 102 homers, 57 by the Cardinals and 45 by the visitors.

The rate of homers at Busch so far this season compared to last year at the same point has declined from an average of 2 per game to an average of 1.27. 

League-wide, the rate of home runs has also declined, but by a much smaller percentage, from an average of 1.90 home runs per game last year to 1.76 per game this year.

“This park has always played very fair in my opinion,” said manager Mike Matheny. “You’ve got to get it to get it out of here, but if you get it, most of the time it will go. But there’s a number of times this season I’ve seen balls hit that I was certain would be multiple rows up, but they ended up being caught on the warning track. 

“What the reason is, I’m not sure, but it is playing a little different this season.”

In the 13 home games since July 19, the Cardinals have hit four home runs – two by Matt Holliday and one each by Carlos Beltran and Matt Adams. Opponents have hit just two, one by A.J. Ellis and one by Wellington Castillo.

In the corresponding number of games, over roughly the same dates a year ago, between July 8 (the final game of a homestand) and August 8, the Cardinals and their opponents combined to hit 16 home runs.

Looking at a greater sample size, a 25-game stretch between June 17 and August 11 this year, there were 24 home runs hit at Busch Stadium. Over the same number of games, between June 16 and August 8 last year, there were a total of 41 home runs.

The biggest difference, and one possible theory for the decline in the number of home runs, has been the weather.

In the 25 home-game stretch this year between June 17 and August 11, the average game-time temperature at Busch Stadium was 82.7 degrees. There were only four games which began with a temperature of 90 degrees or higher, topping out at 93 degrees on July 19.

In the 25 home-game stretch last year, between June 16 and Aug. 8, the average game-time temperature was 97.5 degrees. There were seven games which began with a game-time temperature of 101 degrees or hotter and 19 which began with a temperature of 91 degrees or higher.

Looking specifically at the two comparable 13-game stretches, the game-time temperature this year dropped from an average of 95.1 degrees last year to an average of 83.5 degrees this year.

“The few years I’ve been here guys talk about ‘wait until June or July,’ (meaning the hotter weather),” said David Freese, who has one home run at home so far this season after hitting eight last year. “(Jose) Oquendo said he’s never seen a summer like this for the lack of heat and the carry on the ball. I just think it’s the weather.

“Where the ads are to the left and right of dead center, you see a lot more home runs there usually as you go along in the summer. Lately the summer has been different. It seems like all the home runs here have been pulled. Even in BP (batting practice) you can tell there’s a difference.”

Hitting coach John Mabry did not know the specific numbers, but he does know this season the ballpark has played differently than in the past.

“You could point to a number of different things,” Mabry said. “What I do know is the average (distance) is down, from 402 last year to 388 this year. From a hitting standpoint it is playing bigger. It’s playing bigger in BP and it’s playing bigger in the game. I don’t know what the cause is. The ones that have gone out have only gone out by a little bit.”

The possible explanation that the decline in homers has been mostly weather-related is based on past studies which have shown that warm air is less dense than cold air, and baseballs will travel farther on warm days than cold days. Theoretically, it should be easier to hit home runs on warmer days than on cooler nights.

“I’ve heard some guys complaining about it, but honestly I don’t know,” said Carlos Beltran, who has hit 10 of the Cardinals’ home runs this season at home. At the same point last year, he had hit a team-high 14. “Honestly I don’t approach home plate thinking I am going to hit a homer. If I get it thank God.”

Pitcher Adam Wainwright knows this has been a cooler summer than the record-setting heat of 2012 in St. Louis, but he doesn’t know if that is the proper explanation for the home run drop-off.

“Last year the big story was we were too home-run driven, and we don’t ever get two out hits and all of our runs come via the home run,” Wainwright said. “We had five guys with 20-plus home runs. We’re the same team but this year we have the opposite. It’s the same way as a couple of years ago our team won almost every game it seemed like we played at home and had a terrible road record. This year we started off great on the road. 

“Those things vary from year to year. There is no meaning. Weird crazy things happen in this game.”

Another potential theory behind the decline in home runs which has been discussed is that somehow the Ballpark Village construction behind left-center field has affected the wind currents in the stadium. A survey of scouts, players and others produced a consensus that the construction will have a greater effect on how the stadium plays once it is completed – and should lead to more home runs rather than fewer.

If there is any wind coming into the stadium, it comes from that area. Once the buildings in Ballpark Village have been completed, it likely will serve as a barrier and reduce the wind flow into the stadium.

“I think it will help the hitters once it gets up there,” Wainwright said. “It will be more like the old Busch. It was closed in, and the ball flew out of the yard. I think it will create more home runs, which is bad for me.”

The only park in the National League which has yielded fewer home runs than Busch this season is in Miami, where 62 total home runs have been hit. There also have been 71 homers hit at PNC Park in Pittsburgh.

While hitting a combined 71 home runs in 56 games at Busch, the Cardinals and their opponents have hit a combined 97 home runs in 61 away games this season. At their present rate the Cardinals would finish the season with 128 home runs, which would be their lowest total for a season since hitting 107 in 1995. 

If the present rate of home runs at Busch continues for the rest of the season, the season total of home runs combined for the Cardinals and opponents will be 102. Since the current stadium opened in 2006, the fewest homers hit there in one season was 120 in 2009. A total of 140 homers were hit at Busch last season.

“We can’t worry about that, we just have to worry about the process of doing it,” Mabry said. “If it goes out it goes out. If it doesn’t then we have to find other ways to get it done.”

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