Some things that happened Friday 8/26
Posted by John Autin on August 27, 2011
-- Chris Capuano made the last pre-Irene game in this area memorable with a 2-hit, no-walk, 13-K shutout. His 96 Game Score was the highest by a Met since David Cone's 19-K masterpiece in 1991. Capuano faced the minimum through 7 IP (the lone hit erased on a DP), and let just one runner reach 2nd base, on an 8th-inning double. He threw 122 pitches, 3 short of his career high; it was the first time in 4 years that he topped 106 pitches.
- Capuano's previous career bests: 83 Game Score; 12 Ks; 5 hits in a CG.
- Lucas Duda went 4-2-3-2 with a 2-run double off lefty Jonny Venters, snapping a 23-IP scoreless streak; it was the 2nd XBH Venters allowed to a LHB this year. Since the Break, Duda has an OPS over 1.000, with 7 HRs and 26 RBI in 116 ABs. He has only recently started playing both ways and has yet to HR off a lefty, but is batting .316 against them.
- All sporting events scheduled for this weekend in the greater NY/NJ area have been postponed due to the oncoming Hurricane Irene.
- The Mets' 10 prior Game Scores of 96+ included 5 by Tom Seaver and 1 each by 5 other pitchers, but none by Dwight Gooden (high of 93). The only ones to reach 96 in 9 IP or less were Cone and Seaver (3 times). The 2 highest Game Scores in Mets history resulted in a tie and a loss.
-- After winning 14 of 16 on their previous 2 homestands, the Brewers returned to Miller Park and raised their home record to 48-16 with a 5-2 win led by Ryan Braun (on base all 4 times) and Randy Wolf (5th win in 6 starts). Their lead remained 9.5 games.
- The best home record in the live-ball era is 65-16, by the 1961 Yankees.
- Braun had 2 doubles, swiped his 30th bag in 34 tries, upped his NL-best Runs and SLG marks, and raised his BA to .333, just 3 points off the lead.
- Braun had a season 165 OPS+ before tonight; he would the 6th player in modern history to post at least a 130 OPS+ with 300+ PAs in each of his first 5 seasons. The others: Albert Pujols, Jeff Bagwell, Ted Williams, Charlie Keller and Johnny Mize.
-- Revenge of the A's: After getting pummeled by the Yankees Thursday, Oakland went into Fenway and put up 15 runs on 16 hits. They tied the live-ball club record with 8 doubles, and had 10 extra-base hits for the first time since 2009 (one shy of their live-ball record).
- Tim Wakefield came up short in his 6th try for win #200, but he's actually bettered his season ERA during that span.
-- With his 10th CG, James Shields joined CC Sabathia (2008) as only pitchers to reach that mark this century.
- In his 12 wins, Shields has a 0.71 ERA and an average of 8.44 IP. He also has an 0.71 ERA against the Jays this year in 3 starts, all wins.
- Desmond Jennings hit a go-ahead 2-run HR, his 6th of the year, raising his OPS to 1.027 in 142 PAs. Just for laughs, some stats projected to 162 games: 30 HRs, 40 2Bs, 15 3Bs, 65 SB.
- Toronto only run was a HR from their phenom, Brett Lawrie, his 5th in 20 career games, lifting his OPS to 1.074.
-- All 9 Detroit starters got a hit, and the infield turned 3 early DPs behind Rick Porcello in an 8-1 win. The Tigers have won 7 of 8 and lead by 6.5 games.
- Porcello (36-29 career) is just the 3rd pitcher since 1987 with 36 wins through age 22 ... despite a 91 ERA+.
-- Cleveland welcomed the prodigal son and stayed in theoretical contention with a late rally for a 2-1 win against the visiting Royals, behind a 10-K outing from Ubaldo Jimenez.
- The last 10-K game by a Cleveland pitcher was in 2009, by Justin Masterson ... a 4-hit, 12-K, 1-0 loss in which Paul Konerko drove in the only run.
-- Carlos Gonzalez's 8th HR in 13 games gave the Rox an early lead, but Matt Kemp and the Dodgers blew that away with a 6-run 7th. Gonzalez has 19 RBI and 11 runs in the 10 games of the current homestand.
- Kemp reached 30 HRs for the 1st time and joined Raul Mondesi as the only 30/30 hitters in Dodgers history.
- The road HR still left CarGo with a 15/9 edge at home, where he's hitting .332 with a 1.006 OPS, compared with .232/.733 on the road. Sound familiar? His OPS split last year was 1.161/.775, and his career split is .992/.733.
- Did someone unplug the humidor? Coors Field's multi-year park factor is back up to 118, not far from the wild old days. Rockies games at Coors this year have averaged 10.78 total runs; their road games averaged 7.57.
-- Dontrelle at the Bat! His 6-game hitting streak was snapped 2 starts ago, but tonight Dontrelle Willis went 3 for 3 with a double, joining Carlos Zambrano and Chris Young as the only pitchers with a 3-hit game this year.
- Willis is 9 for 20 this year with a HR, 3B, two 2Bs and just 2 Ks.
- He also had his 7th quality start in 9 games, with a 3-run HR doing all the damage in his 7 IP. He did walk 5, a season high.
-- A.J. Burnett had another tough night, and the O's won their 5th straight. A.J. allowed 6 straight extra-base hits in a 6-run 2nd inning (HR, 2B, 2B, 2B, 2B, HR), then made an error on the next batter. He threw 3 wild pitches, including one on a 3rd strike, who came around on a walk, another WP and a groundout. He threw 116 pitches in 5 IP. "Nothing to see here, folks -- just keep moving."
August 27th, 2011 at 3:13 am
this is why the Braves, for all the talk of their lights out bullpen, will be lucky to make the NLCS, imo; every few days, almost like clockwork, they make whatever pitcher happens to be facing them that day look like Cy Young.
August 27th, 2011 at 3:31 am
I thought only Phillies fans thought that way, Tommy. Lose to a Cy Pelfrey or a Clay Big Train Hensley. Even 100 game winning teams have to lose 62. And some of those losses are against the Cubs or Pirates or Mariners. No need to overreact.
August 27th, 2011 at 3:31 am
Maybe Dontrelle Willis should've come back as a position player, ala Rick Ankiel.
August 27th, 2011 at 3:48 am
i'm not really a Braves fan, but i follow them because my dad is. it's not that they lose to bad teams, it's that they collectively forget how to hit on a pretty regular basis (or maybe it just seems that way to me, i dunno.)
August 27th, 2011 at 4:29 am
Tonight's Rockies-Dodgers game was in Los Angeles.
August 27th, 2011 at 9:17 am
David Cone threw that 19 K shutout knowing that he would be publicly accused of rape the next day. The charge proved to be false but still, that is pitching under some serious pressure.
August 27th, 2011 at 9:19 am
JA, great post, as always. About the humidor comment, I had been wondering if the other parks had been getting more pitcher friendly - perhaps as part of the backlash against 'steroids offenses'. In the 90's it seemed all the new parks and park changes were designed towards more offense, but now it seems to be going the other way. I wonder how much of the offensive boom of the last 15-20 years was long-term park effects vs. just steroids.
August 27th, 2011 at 9:24 am
Re: David Cone: Has any other pitcher thrown a 10+ K perfect game yet have another game in which his Game Score was higher. Maybe Koufax but I'm too lazy to check.
August 27th, 2011 at 10:28 am
Assuming I've used the PI correctly, there have only been 9 perfect games with 10+ K's:
- Roy Halladay - his perfect game was his highest game score
- Randy Johnson - perfect game was highest GS
- David Cone - as noted, his 19K game was higher
- David Wells - perfect game was highest
- Mike Witt - perfect game was highest
- Len Barker - perfect game was highest
- Catfish Hunter - perfect game was highest
- Koufax - perfect game was highest
- Jim Bunning - had one other game (7/20/58, GS 97) that matched his perfect game (6/21/64, GS 97) however it was a no-no itself - 0H, 2BB, 1HBP, 12K
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August 27th, 2011 at 11:33 am
I was at the Capuano game. Right was we started to "not talk about" what was happening in the 5th, it stopped happening. I hope we didn't jinx it by thinking about it.
August 27th, 2011 at 11:38 am
Okay, last time I'll mention it...
AJ for Zambrano.
Cubs new GM puts his stamp of idiocy on his new tenure with a great PR move.
Yankees send Zambrano to AA Trenton to 'tune up'... and then leave him there. When he realizes he's staying in the minors, he'll quit (not retire), Yanx get out of both contracts.
Zambrano tours the world for a year (he is 30 after all, and I'm not gonna get too esoteric on this site, but there is something called the Saturn Returns that happens to all of us between 28-31, and some people just need a time-out - it is an initiatory phase of our development in which an aspect of our egos literally dies and has to be reborn, and there are some sensitive people who don't need to go through that in front of millions of people with a-hole vulture reporters sticking microphones in their face.
So, Zambrano returns from his journeys, gets a minor league deal with the Royals, makes it back and does well.
AJ goes 18-6 next year with only 4 wild pitches.
Yankees spend .001% of the 18-35 million they saved giving me a commission for coming up with the idea.
August 27th, 2011 at 12:00 pm
John:
"•Braun had a season 165 OPS+ before tonight; he would the 6th player in modern history to post at least a 130 OPS+ with 300+ PAs in each of his first 5 seasons. The others: Albert Pujols, Jeff Bagwell, Ted Williams, Charlie Keller and Johnny Mize."
The problem with this search in play index is that it eliminates "cup of coffe" guys who may have had a minimal number of PA's in September and done less than your arbitrary OPS+ figure. Por ejemplo: Dick Allen. 145+ OPS from rookie of the year season (1964) trhough 1974. Pretty consistent, however, not eligible for your group due to a September 1963 call-up of 10 games and 24 AB's. Perhaps, someone could tweek the search engine/software/database...... I dunno
Thanks for your hard work in the pursuit of statistical anomaly!!
August 27th, 2011 at 12:54 pm
*Surprising that John did not mention that the last 10 K game by an Indian starter before Jimenez was a CG by Justin Masterton (12 Ks), on September 30th, 2009, in the second part of a double-header.
*Rick Porcello is blessed by run support from his teammates. In 83 career starts, he got one full run more than the MLB average during the innings he pitched (5.5 vs 4.4)... and he only pitches 5.7 innings per start, compared to a MLB average of 5.9 . B-R has Porcello’s neutralized W-L lifetime record at 20-29 and another well-known online database at 30-35, compared to his actual record of 36-29.
*Finally, a Philly fan tidbit: when Cliff Lee scored last night in the 9th inning, it was the first time a Phillies pinch running pitcher did since Randy Wolf on May 2nd, 2004.
August 27th, 2011 at 1:01 pm
return of Saturn? How about return of D-Train!!!
I guess that Zambrano is not the best pitching hitter in baseball now. Except, Dontrelle is even pitching well, on top of that.....wow.
August 27th, 2011 at 1:30 pm
@5, Jon -- Thanks for the correction re: COL@LAD.
August 27th, 2011 at 1:39 pm
@12, Paul -- That's an entirely valid point, and it's good you mentioned it. Although I dialed down the PA requirement to 300, it does still eliminate 2nd-half call-ups.
It steers the results towards players who were expected to be so good that they deserved to be in the majors early in their rookie year. And there may be something interesting in that aspect. But I do wish the P-I allowed us to find the "first N years" starting from the first year in which they got a certain # of PAs.
Expanding the search to the first 6 seasons, 4 players met the criteria all 6 years -- Pujols, Bagwell, Williams, Mize. Braun is one of 29 others with at least 5 such years; I won't bother to pick out those for whom those were their first 5 seasons. It's still a mighty strong group.
August 27th, 2011 at 2:30 pm
A different angle on Ryan Braun:
Just 44 teams in modern history have had 2 qualifying hitters at OPS+ of 160 or higher -- the Brewers would be the 13th in the expansion era:
-- 2011 Brewers (pending), Braun, Fielder
-- 2006 Red Sox, Ortiz, Manny
-- 2005 Yankees, A-Rod, Giambi
-- 2004 Cards, Pujols, Edmonds
-- 2001 Rockies, Helton, Walker
-- 2000 Giants, Bonds, Kent
-- 1997 Mariners, Junior, Edgar
-- 1992 Padres, McGriff, Sheffield (how many would have named that team?)
-- 1989 Giants, W.Clark, Mitchell
-- 1969 Orioles, Powell, F.Robinson
-- 1969 Pirates, Clemente, Stargell
-- 1963 Giants, Mays, McCovey, Cepeda
-- 1961 Yankees, Mantle, Maris
August 27th, 2011 at 3:16 pm
@13, Imbroglio -- I've amended the post to include Masterson.
August 27th, 2011 at 3:20 pm
Even though Porcello's ERA+ is worse than his first 2 seasons one positive note is his strikeout rate has increased a bit to 5.3 per 9 while his walk rate remained low. Detroit's mediocre defense doesn't do a pitch to contact pitcher like Porcello a whole lot of favors either.
August 27th, 2011 at 7:47 pm
When you mentioned how well "Complete Game" James does in his wins, I went to his game log, and couldn't help but notice that his worst 3 starts (in terms of Game Score) came against the A's, the Mariners, and...the Mariners.
On June 2, the M's erupted for 8 runs in just 4 innings against James, leading to a 8-2 Mariner victory (Game score of 19).
Then the A's scored 10 runs and had 12 hits in 4 innings on July 27 en route to a 13-4 thumping (Game Score of -2!!!)
And then last week on August 21st, the Mariners scored 5 runs in the first 4 runs and added two in the 8th off of James (7 runs in 7 innings-he didn't record an out in the 8th), but the Rays came back and won it 8-7. Talk about not taking advantage of weaker hitting teams!
It is amazing looking at his stats, though. He went from 10.9 H/9 last year to just 7.2 H/9 this year. All of his other rate stats are pretty much what he did last year. Maybe he went from extremely unlucky to lucky?
August 27th, 2011 at 8:10 pm
@20, Genis26 -- I think there's some truth to that "extremely unlucky to lucky" narrative for Shields from 2010-11.
August 27th, 2011 at 9:09 pm
10 Yeah,wasn't at the game just watching on TV.Started to think about the Mets finallly getting a no-no,how a surprise would be the way it happpened and bang,base hit.