[Timofmars]

Does anyone have any idea if there are any matchups between batters and pitchers that can give better results on average, depending on the specific distribution of skills of the 2 players, or other attributes, besides the more obvious left vs right stuff.

For example, I suppose if a hitter has no power at all, then much of the pitcher's movement ability would end up making less difference, since the batter wasn't going to hit any home runs anyway. Likewise, a terrible eye on the batter might make a pitcher's exceptional control go to waste.

But what about more average situations? Would a batter with 100/100 power look like a 50/100 power hitter when facing a 100/100 movement pitcher?

From my research in the editor, it seems that above average power adds more HRs per ability point than each ability point below average. But for pitchers, movement reduces HRs in a more linear fashion. So if the interaction between the batter and pitcher is sort of 2 separate calculations added together, then a 100/100 power batter facing a 100/100 movement pitcher should result in more HRs than a 50/50 batter meeting a 50/50 pitcher. And if this is correct, then I would think there isn't really an opportunity to consider this kind of matchup when selecting your lineup against a particular pitcher, since only overall ability matters.

But if the batter/pitcher interaction is not so separate, then matchups become a possible factor to consider. For example, a high movement pitcher would have a larger effect in reducing total HRs against a high power hitter compared to an average power hitter. Or an average power hitter should hit like a high power hitter against a weak movement pitcher.

However, I suspect this is not the case, since the editor seems to show that a pitcher's movement affects the expected number of HRs given up linearly.