20 Responses to “Cleveland Indians’ weird combo of strikeouts and earned runs allowed”

1. oneblankspace Says:
   April 4th, 2011 at 12:18 pm

   On the K/ER front, this may lead to some astronomical BABIPs.

   On the attendance front, I wonder if the Indianapolis Indians will be able to draw more fans when their AAA season opens later this week.

2. Xander Says:
   April 4th, 2011 at 12:34 pm

   This post made me wonder about Matt Garza's interesting debut with the Cubs yesterday. He struck out 12 Pirates while also giving up 12 hits. I ran a game finder on pitchers who had 12+ strikeouts and 12+hits and it's pretty rare...only occurred 23 times since 1919 and not since Curt Schilling in 2001. All of the hits off Garza were singles too, bizarre.

3. dukeofflatbush Says:
   April 4th, 2011 at 1:44 pm

   169/120 pitch to strike ratio. The fewest pitches and the best ratio of the bunch. I guess its not always smart to pound the strike zone.

4. Nate Says:
   April 4th, 2011 at 1:44 pm

   Just seeing the subject I immediately thought of that Padres-Nationals game. There had been a long rain delay, so there it was, a 12-run game in the late innings... there were probably fewer than fans in the stands than you'd find at a typical Marlins game. You could hear individual voices on the TV broadcast.

5. Andy Says:
   April 4th, 2011 at 1:48 pm

   I have heard my own voice on TV broadcasts a few times, actually. When the Mariners opened Safeco field I went to the first Yankees game there and later on videotape heard myself shouting certain things in support of certain players. It was then that I realized how loud I am.

6. Cody Says:
   April 4th, 2011 at 1:58 pm

   Another oddity of this statistic. The K to BB ration of the Indians game is easily the best out of any of the games.

7. Jesse Says:
   April 4th, 2011 at 2:56 pm

   just looking at some the CHC/ATL game from 2006 kinda stood out to me.

   Cubs faced 56 batters, struck out 18, Walked 4, and gave up 8 homers

   thats a 53.6% three true outcomes

   also 4 of the 17 on the first and 3 of the 17 on the 2nd list happened all happened in Wrigley field

8. Ed Says:
   April 4th, 2011 at 5:09 pm

   Thanks for following up on this Andy! Much appreciated.

   Like Cody, I found it interesting that that K/BB ratio was so good. And they also only gave up 2 HRs.

   And two days later, against the same team, they gave up only one run, while striking out only two. Weird, weird, weird! Guess that's why I'll always be fascinated by baseball....

9. Sam Says:
   April 4th, 2011 at 5:13 pm

   Random lurker. Just wanted to say I still have nightmares about that Twins/Yankees game that's #6 on the top chart.

10. John Autin Says:
    April 5th, 2011 at 12:02 am

    Random early-season observations (with apologies for being a big-mouth who can't stay on topic):
    -- In 2010, the Pirates went 17-64 on the road and had just one stretch in which they won 3 out of 4 games on the road. They've begun this year 3-1 on the road.
    -- Charlie Morton made 17 starts last year without once allowing 1 run or less. He allowed 1 run in 6 IP in winning today.
    -- Craig Kimbrel last year struck out over 45% of the batters he faced, the highest percentage ever with at least 20 IP. He's now fanned 5 of 6 this year, raising his career rate to 48% (45 of 94).
    -- Takashi Saito allowed 2 HRs in a game for the first time in his 294-game career. He began the day with the 7th-lowest HR rate among active pitchers with at least 300 IP (0.57 HR/9).
    -- What's more remarkable: Nelson Cruz setting a new record by homering in each of the first 4 games, or Elvis Andrus breaking his own 178-game, 804-PA homerless streak?
    -- The Orioles are 4-0 even though their new #3-4 hitters Derrek Lee and Vlad Guerrero have neither driven nor scored a run. Brian Roberts has yet to draw a walk or attempt a steal, but he has 8 of the team's 16 RBI and all 3 of the team's "long hits" (triples & HRs).
    -- Mariano Rivera has been saving games for 14 years, but this is the first time he has 3 saves in the first 4 games. He's slipping, though; tonight he allowed a 2-out infield single, and threw 2 balls among his 14 pitches.

11. Johnny Twisto Says:
    April 5th, 2011 at 12:06 am

    [Mariano Rivera}'s slipping, though

    Bite your tongue.

12. Gerry Says:
    April 5th, 2011 at 12:38 am

    Take out all the extra-inning games in the first table and you'll see how rare a high strikeout, high earned run 9-inning game is.

13. Doug Says:
    April 5th, 2011 at 1:41 am

    @12.

    Bang on Gerry, about omitting the extra-inning games.

    And, notice how this is strictly a present era phenomenon. The earliest game on either list is 1966. Leave out the extra-inning contests and the earliest game is 1990.

    Until recently, teams that were striking out a lot in a game were also not scoring a lot. But now, with guys routinely striking out just about every game (12 players struck out 150+ times in 2010, the same number, for example, as the entire decade of the 1970s), you're going to see the 2 HR + 3 K types of games that produce results like this.

    Play Index says there are 36 seasons of 175+ batting strikeouts, the earliest in 1963. Of these 36 seasons, 24 have occurred since 2000. There's just not the slighest stigma anymore about striking out a lot, as long as you're also putting up decent (or half-way decent) power numbers.

14. Doug Says:
    April 5th, 2011 at 2:01 am

    Further to the 175+ strikeout club, I looked up the first member back in 1963. It was Dave Nicholson who tallied 573 Ks in 538 games over 7 years, ending in 1967.

    Im wondered how many others have careers of 500 games and more strikeouts than games. Answer: 12 others. But, here's the kicker - 9 of the 13 players in this club (500 games, more Ks than games) are active in 2011.

    So, there you have it - Dave Nicholson, truly a man (way) before his time.

15. Doug Says:
    April 5th, 2011 at 2:25 am

    One name I was surprised to see missing from the 500 game, more Ks than games club was Dave Kingman. But, he definitely qualifies as a very honorable mention, and a worthy successor to Dave Nicholson.

    Through 1982 (hist first 12 seasons), Kingman had 1400 Ks in 1392 games, with more Ks than games in 8 of those seasons (including 6 straight from '72 to '77). Dave's last four years each saw less than one K per game, including 3 years in Oakland to finish his career, his only back-to-back-to-back 30+ HR seasons (compared to only one 30+ HR season in 3 full seasons in Wrigley - go figure). Evidently, DHing agreed with Kingman.

16. John Autin Says:
    April 5th, 2011 at 10:18 am

    @13, Doug -- Do you think there should be a stigma attached to striking out a lot, even if the overall numbers are good?

17. Doug Says:
    April 5th, 2011 at 12:04 pm

    @16, John -- yes, I think there should be stigma (as their certainly once was) associated with high K rates for most guys. To me, it speaks to lack of discipline - doesn't matter how the pitcher's throwing, just swing for the fences. No sense of adapting your approach to the pitcher or to the game/out/count situation.

    I don't buy the convenient arguments that striking out is better than a GIDP, or that it will make guys less agressive when they do get a pitch they can handle. Bottom line for me is every K consumes an out and gains no ground for men on base. Consuming outs other ways does no worse than a K (except GIDP, of course) and at least provides the potential to advance runners or induce errors in the field.

    And, of course, you WILL end up getting getting more hits and walks when you take a more disciplined approach. If you do get your pitch, then by all means, go for the fences, but just don't do it on every swing against every pitcher in every game/out/count situation.

18. John Autin Says:
    April 5th, 2011 at 11:55 pm

    @17, Doug -- A couple of counterpoints:

    1. The cost of GIDPs is too big to be glossed over in parentheses. GIDPs are very costly to a team's offense, and GIDP rates go up as K rates and flyball rates go down.

    2. A high K rate does not necessarily indicate an undisciplined approach. Guys who work the count end up in more 2-strike counts. Guys who don't chase end up taking more called 3rd strikes. Many batters who strike out a lot also walk a lot. Take Jim Thome. Over his long career, Thome has averaged 162 Ks per 162 games, but also 114 walks, just 11 of those intentional. And despite being slow and hitting with lots of runners on, Thome has averaged just 10 GIDP per 162 games. (And that figure has been driven up by his later years; he averaged only 7 GIDP per 162 G through age 35.) When I look at his overall results -- runs, ribbies, OBP, the success of his teams -- I have a hard time thinking that he's been going at it the wrong way all these years.

    3. The number and impact of bases advanced on outs is usually much overestimated. In the live-ball era, if you try to make "productive outs" an important part of your offensive attack, you are fighting a losing battle.

    No one can say exactly how much home-run hitting would suffer if most of today's batters changed their approach to maximize contact and minimize strikeouts. But I think it would suffer a lot, and I think scoring would go down.

19. Neil L. Says:
    April 6th, 2011 at 12:08 am

    John and Doug

    What's easy to lose sight of in this discussion is that home runs are a glamour stat. Home runs are rewarded in a contract year despite how many strikeouts go with them. In this era of baseball as a business there is no incentive to sacrifice home runs in favour of situational hitting.

    Case in point, Carlos Pena.

20. Johnny Twisto Says:
    April 6th, 2011 at 12:09 am

    I think Doug has a point in that hitters of Thome's type are not the best in certain situations. And maybe it would be nice if Thome-type hitters were better able to adjust their approach in spots where simply making contact has more importance. But if Thome (or Giambi, or McGwire, or whoever) were able to do that, they wouldn't be Thome, they'd be Mays or Gehrig or something. A nice thing to wish for, and one will come around every 30 years or so. There are hitters who can make contact and who can probably adjust their approach to the situation, but overall those hitters are not as valuable as the Thome types. I don't think it's a lost art so much as a less valuable one, and baseball in general has recognized this. There are ways in which MLB could better reward players who have the ability to simply make contact, if you think that's a more interesting game to watch -- change the bats, the balls, the gloves, the field dimensions. Under current circumstances, however, Jim Thome is a much more valuable batter than Placido Polanco, even if there are certain times you'd rather have Polanco at the plate.