Tuesdays with More E’s (Wrap-up of Tuesday’s games)
Posted by Andy on May 25, 2011
(Bear with us as John Autin comes online as a blogger. This is his wrap of yesterday's games.)
Sorry about the headline. I foolishly watched the Mets try to make a statement after being tweaked by their owner. The statement came out as: “You are too kind, good sir! We are not worthy!” Let’s get to the games involving teams with a pulse.
-- Oakland 6, LAA 1: Two multi-HR games by an A’s hitter this year, both by David DeJesus. Those are the only HRs he has this year, and the only multi-HR games of his 8-year career. DeJesus hit 5 HRs all of last year, and has averaged 8 HRs per 162 games in his career.
-- Detroit 7, Tampa Bay 6: Doesn’t it seem like Miguel Cabrera (3-run HR) has been awfully quiet for a month or so? Then you look up and see he’s got a .990 OPS and 176 OPS+ and is in the top 10 of virtually every hitting stat. Meanwhile, Detroit catcher Alex Avila hit 2 HRs, including a trailing-to-leading 2-run shot in the 8th off alleged LOOGY Cesar Ramos, who was called in specifically to face him. Avila leads all catchers with 27 RBI; he’s 2nd with 8 HRs and a .920 OPS; and he’s thrown out 37% of opposing base thieves.
-- St. Louis 3, San Diego 2 (11): The Padres went ahead on Brad Hawpe’s 2-run HR in the 1st, then added just 1 other hit over the next 10 innings. It was the 27th game this year in which a team got 2 hits or less. Cardinals catcher Tony Cruz went 3 for 5 with a double in his MLB debut. Each team used 4 relievers in the game; all 8 finished the game with an ERA between 2.00 and 2.86. San Diego had just 5 baserunners, the fewest in more than 160 games that went 11+ innings since last July 22, when Cole Hamels & friends held the Cards to 1 hit and 2 walks in an 11-inning shutout.
-- White Sox 8, Texas 6: Carlos Quentin hit 3 HRs -- in the 1st for the first run of the game; a 3-run shot in the 3rd for a 4-1 lead; and an insurance tally in the 9th for the game’s final run. After a 9-1 start to the season, the Rangers are now just 1 game over .500, but that’s good enough for 1st place in the egalitarian AL West, where just 2 games separates first from last. Neither SP returned after a 3-hour weather delay in the middle of the 4th inning. For Texas, 35-year-old Japanese reliever Yoshinori Tateyama made his MLB debut; he faced 3 batters, allowing 1 hit with 1 strikeout, and was charged with a run when Arthur Rhodes allowed his first inherited runner of the year (after stranding the previous 9.)
-- Yankees 5, Blue Jays 4: How often do you see the SP get the win when the bottom of the 9th begins with his team behind? C.C. Sabathia pulled it off, retiring the last 16 batters after a 3-run 4th, while his mates scored twice each in the 8th and 9th. Sabathia used just 103 pitches against 36 batters. The game may have turned in the 4th when Sabathia, after 3 runs were in, shockingly walked Corey Patterson with 2 out to load the bases for Jose Bautista, but got him to ground out. Meanwhile ... folks say the Yankee offense is too HR-dependent, but what about Toronto? They’re now 2-13 when they fail to HR, 22-11 when they hit at least one dinger. The Yankees are 5-6 when they don’t homer, 21-15 when they do.
-- Marlins 5, Giants 1: Ricky Nolasco took a shutout into the 9th and improved to 4-0. Nolasco has a K/BB ratio of 4.15 this year; it would be his 4th straight year over 4. Florida moved within a game of the Phillies, with a stealth attack led by Gaby Sanchez (a .915 OPS and 30 RBI? -- who knew?!?) and Mike Stanton, who homered for the 6th time in 10 games and suddenly has 11 HRs, 3rd in the NL. Stanton has played 143 games in the majors, 506 AB. He has 33 HRs, 30 doubles, a .522 slugging average and a 123 OPS+. Not bad for a guy who bought his first legal beer last November. (I presume....)
-- Just 2 shutouts in MLB over the past 2 days. Did they outlaw the cutter already? Was Mariano grandfathered in?
May 25th, 2011 at 10:18 pm
"but what about Toronto? They’re now 2-13 when they fail to HR, 22-11 when they hit at least one dinger."
JA, decent "nugget" about the Jays. You have psychic baseball intuition. 🙂
Their problem is a lack of consistent offensive quality up and down the lineup. Not unlike the 2011 Padres.
For tonight's recap, Jo Jo Reyes just tied Matt Keough for most consecutive starts without a win, 28! Unique in all of baseball history.
Will his team move him to the pen or send him down to prevent Jo Jo from being embarrassed by setting an terrible record?
May 25th, 2011 at 10:40 pm
Hi, Neil -- Just FYI, the NY Times ran a story on Jo-Jo's streak today. So he's finally getting a little East Coast attention. 🙂
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/05/25/sports/baseball/hapless-but-not-hopeless-blue-jays-jo-jo-reyes-carries-on.html
May 25th, 2011 at 10:48 pm
@2
Damn, JA, (I never "swear"), Jo Jo made headlines for all the wrong reasons. Still an interesting baseball story.
How does a pitcher remain in the starting rotation for so long without picking up the ultimate goal of a starting pitcher, a win?
A difficult question to research .... and answer.
May 25th, 2011 at 11:55 pm
Nolasco is the current K/BB poster boy -- or perhaps the exception to saber orthodoxy. Every season his DIPS stats are great (giving him a great WAR per Fangraphs calculations), but he either underachieves, or gets unlucky, or just proves there's more to pitching than those stats. Career BABIP of .305 (thought it would be higher), career ERA of 4.33. Maybe he has put it together this season. Time will tell.
May 25th, 2011 at 11:57 pm
Neil -- Interesting question as to why Jo-Jo (in particular) has gotten this many chances. I was misled by the Times story that mentioned his ERA this year (4.09 before today), which sounds like he's pitched OK; actually, when you look at his full stat line (including 9 unearned runs), he has been about as bad this year as in 2007-08. And he wasn't good in the minors last year, either.
I hope they're not running him out there just to justify last year's Escobar-Gonzalez trade.
May 26th, 2011 at 1:18 am
Because a friend of mine had him in a Strat league, I was thinking a couple years ago Reyes oughta be made a reliever. As bad as he's been overall in the majors, he's gotten lefties out, and he was a pretty good minor league prospect. He has some talent. Get some use from him out of the pen.
May 26th, 2011 at 3:59 am
You'd think Jo-Jo would have had more luck in his career, given his Major League debut occurred on 07-07-07...
Then again, his last win as a starter came on....... Friday June 13, 2008!
Strange.....
May 26th, 2011 at 11:01 am
JA and others, I'm interested to hear your thoughts on the outstanding start to the season by the Braves' Jair Jurjjens. Could be the most overlooked pitching performance of the year so far.
JJ has gone at least 6 IP with 2 ER or less in all 8 starts this season, and leads the NL with a 1.56 ERA. Also of note is that his walk rate compared to his career has been cut in half this season (from more than 3 BB/9 to less than 1.5 BB/9), even though his K rate is down.
May 26th, 2011 at 1:07 pm
@8, Jacob -- I would have to say that Jurrjens is far and away the best Curacaoan pitcher in MLB history. 🙂
http://www.baseball-reference.com/bio/Curacao_born.shtml
But seriously ... If Jurrjens has been somewhat overlooked, it's probably just because he missed the first 2 weeks, by which time there were already a number of pitchers off to smoking-hot starts, led by Jered Weaver, Dan Haren, etc., etc.
One interesting angle on Jurrjens so far: His K rate is down a little, from a steady mid-6 in 2008-10 to 5.2 K/9 thus far. But the bigger difference is that his walks are WAY down so far -- from a clockwork-consistent 3.2 BB/9 in his prior seasons to just 1.4 BB/9 this year.
As for his streak of 8 starts with 6+ IP and no more than 2 ER, it sounds more remarkable than it really is. It is the longest streak so far this year, but in the past 10 seasons there were 28 other streaks of at least 8 games meeting those criteria. Last year, Ubaldo Jimenez started the season with a streak of 12 such starts, while the rookie Jaime Garcia opened with 7.
Best thing for Atlanta fans, though, is simply that Jurrjens seems healthy again.
May 26th, 2011 at 1:16 pm
P.S. to Jacob -- As a Tigers fan, every time I see Jurrjens toss another gem, I feel a little tremor in my heart that penetrates all the way back to 1987. At least Doyle Alexander pitched us into the playoffs that year, and Smoltz was getting clobbered at AA. But Jurrjens for Edgar Renteria?!? Aaaaaaaarrrrrrgggghhhhhhh!!!
May 26th, 2011 at 4:54 pm
JA, how can you bring up 1987 in the AL East? 🙂
The pain of fans of the second place-finishing team that year never went away! You remember the final series of the regular season? The second place-finishing team without its regular shortstop.
The final game that Detroit won, 1-0. I can't bring myself to link the box.
It should have been the second place-finishing team that went forward to face the Twins! 🙂
May 27th, 2011 at 1:00 am
@11, Neil -- Sorry, but nothing was stopping Doyle Alexander that year!
If it's any consolation to you, take a look at the Tigers game-by-game results for the next season: Through August 21, they were 73-50, 4 games up in the division and 2nd-best record in MLB. Then they went into Minnesota (brrrrr...) and dropped 3 straight. (They went 1-11 against the Twins in '88.) They still had a 2-game lead as September dawned; but they hit a teensy rough spot, dropping 12 of 14 (4 of 6 to that "second-place-finishing team," grrrr...) When the dust had settled, they'd played every day for 20 straight days, and lost 16; they fell 7.5 games in the standings in exactly 2 weeks. Then, after it was too late, they won 9 of their last 14, just to taunt me.
As Karl Malden said in On the Waterfront:
"Ballgames?!? Don't break my heart!"
May 27th, 2011 at 1:03 am
@4, JT -- (Tried to post this last night, but the site went dark....)
What you said about Nolasco reminds me of my persistent faith in Glendon Rusch when he was with the Mets. "There's no way," I said to anyone who would listen, "that a guy with 7.6 K/9 rate and a 3.6 K/BB ratio [his stats for 2000-01 combined] won't be a successful pitcher in the long run!"
Rusch had gone 19-23 with a 101 ERA+ those 2 years. But instead of his record and ERA eventually falling into line with the lovely K/BB data, the K/BB data fell apart, and he had an 86 ERA+ for the rest of his career.
Looking at Nolasco's career, his HR rate is a bit high, but I can't see anything else in his splits that explains why he's allowed more than a hit per inning and has a 4.33 ERA.
What do you think?
May 27th, 2011 at 11:57 am
I was thinking of Rusch as well. I remember when DIPS first came along and people were sure that any BABIP above .300 was just "bad luck," I read plenty of other people who were also high on Rusch. He certainly is an outlier. Without checking, I don't think most pitchers with a .330 BABIP manage to last as long as he did. Pitchers who don't have a talent in suppressing BABIP get filtered out in the minors, which is why most major leaguers cluster together and its their other talents which separate them.
My impression (though I barely remember watching Rusch, and I haven't seen Nolasco much) is that Nolasco has much more impressive stuff. So if one could quantify that scouting aspect of it, he would project to do better than Rusch did (or than Nolasco himself has).
Anyway, perhaps I'll try studying the numbers later and see if I have any ideas why he's been a relative underachiever in his career.
May 27th, 2011 at 12:02 pm
OK, I looked. 196 pitchers have thrown at least 1000 IP since 1993. The median BABIP is .297. Rusch easily has the worst BABIP at .331, 11 points higher than anyone else. Three standard deviations from the mean.