Dave Cameron finds that blue-eyed players hit just fine in the day time.
That being said, I doubt that all blue eyed people have the same genetic causes. I remember in my genetics course in college being shown a picture of an albino couple who produced normally pigmented children. The albinism was caused by different genes in the couple, so when they reproduced, each child received one normal gene. In other words, there are different causes of albinism.
So there may be different recessive causes of blue eyes. Some of those may hurt day vision more than others. Phenotypes do not always reflect the underlying genotype.
Update: In the comments, a reader points out there is a single gene that controls blue eyes. In the words of Emily Latella, “Never mind.”
I looked at any possible “Arlington” effect (and more) with regard to Hamilton’s statement …. no apparent validity …. the Rangers (and their opponents) have been all over the map in terms of OPS difference in day/night games in Texas.
I discussed this here:
http://valueoverreplacementgrit.com/2011/06/25/eye-color-inside-the-baselines/
It’s still overwhelmingly unlikely that eye color impacts daytime hitting.
This is off-topic, but the discussion of genetic types reminded me: has anyone ever explored whether lefties are, in fact, low-ball hitters? Announcers still treat this claim as established fact, but I can’t recall it ever being researched.
With the work going on at places like Baseball Analytics, maybe we could find an answer now. Perhaps this is something I could look up myself, but I wouldn’t know where to begin. So I just thought I’d throw this out in case you find it interesting.
Scooter » Thanks.
Just so you know, being blue-eyed is one of the few things that actually has just one genetic cause. It’s a fairly recent discovery:
http://www.livescience.com/9578-common-ancestor-blue-eyes.html
dtb » Cool.