Recap for Tuesday, May 1

Orioles 7, Yankees 1 — “How soon can we get Pettitte out of the courtroom and into the Bronx?” Of the 10 SPs with at least 4 starts who have yet to top a 50 Game Score, two are Yankees.

Freddy Garcia will skip a start, at least. Phil Hughes had some positives tonight — 6 Ks and 1 walk in 5.2 IP — but he was hurt by a pair of Oriole HRs and by his inability to finish off Matt Wieters with 2 strikes to close out the 6th. He clipped Wieters with his 100th pitch and was lifted; that runner and two more would come in before the inning ended.

  • Hughes has allowed 7 HRs in 21.2 IP, at least 1 in each of his 5 starts.
  • Long time comin’: Baltimore beat New York for the first time in five tries this year. And Brian Matusz won for the first time since last D-Day, ending a 12-decision losing streak. Matusz allowed only Curtis Granderson‘s 9th HR — a bomb that gave the Yanks a brief lead — in notching his second straight quality start; he had none in his previous 15 starts.

Blue Jays 8, Rangers 7: Francisco Cordero blew a save in the top of the 9th, on a trio of 2-out hits. But Brett Lawrie led off the bottom half with a screamer that skipped off and over the wall for the second game-winning HR of his young career.

  • Texas has split their last 10 games. ‘Course, they won 8 straight before that.
  • Keep ’em in the yard: The Rangers are 1-4 when they fail to homer, but 9-1 when they hit exactly one.
  • Toronto is 14-8 against Texas since 2010.

A’s 5, Red Sox 3 — Rookie of the night: Jarrod Parker (1 run in 6.2 IP against baseball’s top offense) has allowed 2 runs over 13 IP in 2 starts since being called up from AAA, where he had a 2.18 ERA in 4 starts. The 23-year-old Parker was part of the offseason package for Trevor Cahill, who also won tonight.

  • Oakland closer Grant Balfour retired just one of the four men he faced, allowing 2 runs and departing with the tying runs on base. Balfour has gotten just 1 out in his last 2 games, allowing 5 hits. He does not have good numbers against Boston.

Tigers 9, Royals 3 — There are over 100 active SPs with at least 500 career IP, and Luke Hochevar began tonight with the worst ERA+, 81. Then he surrendered 9 runs on 12 hits and 3 walks in 4 IP, his second “disaster start” this year (more runs than IP). If there’s any positive in his season line so far, it’s that none of the 32 hits off him in 25.2 IP has left the yard.

KC’s long-term failure to develop or sign quality starters has been well documented, but to recap: In the 12 years from 2000-11, the Royals had:

  • just 22 qualifying pitcher-seasons; the other AL teams averaged 34.
  • just 10 qualifying seasons with an ERA+ over 100; the other AL teams averaged 24.
  • just 5 seasons of 4+ WAR; the other AL teams averaged 12.
  • only 1 season of 5+ WAR; the other AL teams averaged 5.

Rays 3, Mariners 1 — Seventh time this year that a team won while getting 3 hits or less. Matt Joyce did most of Tampa’s damage with his 6th HR and 3rd triple. Seattle had 9 hits, but only 1 walk, and they scored only on a solo HR.

  • ย The year’s first “4-0-4-0” was also the first 4-hit game in the career of Jesus Montero, lifting his BA to .294. On the down side, he’s drawn just 2 walk against 18 Ks.

Dodgers-RockiesDee Gordon improved his OBP and his SLG, leading off the game with his first career HR. Two hits later, Andre Ethier crookified that number with a 3-run shot. Did I mention they’re in Coors Field?

  • Ted Lilly is 3-0, 1.38, and has allowed 13 hits in 26 IP. He did finally allow his first HR, after averaging 30 for the past 2 years.
  • There are two active players with the last name Ellis, and they’re both regulars for the Dodgers who had big games tonight.

White Sox 7, Indians 2 — Converted reliever Chris Sale is now 3-1, 2.81 in five starts.

  • Running totals for Ubaldo Jimenez at this writing: 20 walks, 14 Ks. No pitcher since 1995 has had a qualifying ERA+ over 100 with more walks than whiffs.
  • Cleveland’s #1-5 hitters went 0-20.

Cardinals 10, Pirates 7 –STL (15-8) is the only team over .500 in the NL Central. Pittsburgh’s 4 errors contributed to 3 unearned runs.

  • Jon Jay has 24 hits in 15 starts.

Angels 4, Twins 0 — Who had Jerome Williams tossing the Angels’ first shutout? His last scoreless game of 7+ IP was in 2005.

  • Francisco Liriano (5.1 IP, 4 R, 10 baserunners, 2 HRs) somehow managed to avoid a fifth straight start of 5+ ER. But that doesn’t make 0-4, 9.97 look a whole lot better.
  • After 14 games, Albert Pujols finally ended his RBI drought … with a groundout.
  • Last July 29, the Twins’ record was 50-56. They finished in a 13-43 swoon, which has grown to 19-60 counting this season.
  • On the bright side, this was their first shutout loss.

Marlins 2, Giants 1: Matt Cain (8 IP, 2 R) fell to 1-2 with a 2.35 ERA; his only win was the 1-hit shutout. SF got the tying run to 3rd with no outs in the 8th and loaded the bases with 1 out, but Buster Posey‘s double play ended that.

  • Posey is 4-19 with RISP this year, with 2 RBI and 2 GIDP.
  • Ricky Nolasco allowed a run on 7 hits in 7.1 IP, with a walk and just one strikeout. In 105 prior starts of 6+ IP, he never had less than 2 Ks. Nolasco’s K rate peaked at 9.5 SO/9 in 2009, but has fallen to 8.4, 6.5 and now 5.0 through 5 starts.

Padres 2, Brewers 0: Mark Kotsay‘s pinch-hit 2-run HR off Francisco Rodriguez broke up a scoreless game in the 8th. Milwaukee managed just 3 singles off Edinson Volquez and two relievers.

  • In 14 games this year, K-Rod has had just 2 clean innings. His WHIP sits at 1.62.
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MikeD
MikeD
12 years ago

Returning now to 21st Century baseball, was tonight We-Were-Once-Bright-Prospects-But-Now-We’re Failed-Young-Starter Night with Matusz, Hughes and Hochevar all taking the mound? Out of the three of them, I don’t have much hope for Hochevar. I still the lefty Matusz has the best chance of getting it together. As for Hughes, I think he’ll become the latest example of failed starters sometimes make good relievers. Velocity is fine, but really only has two pitches, and his command isn’t sharp. He’s great for an inning or two. Smells like a reliever.

Hartvig
Hartvig
12 years ago

John- on a day when the only baseball I got to watch was some highlights or something from about 50 years ago (it was in a bar & there was no sound) your little wrap ups are just the ticket. If they put you in charge of baseball highlights on SportsCenter it would improve it about a thousand times over.

Neil L.
Neil L.
12 years ago
Reply to  Hartvig

Hartvig, but then SportsCenter would actually have to have some intelligence instead of mass fan appeal. They could never withstand the spotlight that is JA.
๐Ÿ™‚

nightfly
12 years ago

Free Matt Cain! (Also, free Johan Santana.)

I’m glad you didn’t recap the Mets game, John. I was only watching the gamecast on ESPN and I was still horrified. Did the Astros bother with actual bats once the relievers came in, or did they just carry badminton rackets to the plate?

Paul E
Paul E
12 years ago
Reply to  nightfly

Well, at least Cain got his money – and, he’s certainly earning it.

Abbott
Abbott
12 years ago

I just heard that the Astros used 7 relief pitchers to face 7 batters. There should be a law against that.

brp
brp
12 years ago
Reply to  Abbott

If only we could go back in time and prevent Tony LaRussa from being born…

Hartvig
Hartvig
12 years ago
Reply to  Abbott

****pop****

(sound of head exploding at distant computer terminal)

The sad part is that there are probably some baseball writers who watched that and thought: “Wow! This guys is really doing a great job managing.”

no statistician but
no statistician but
12 years ago
Reply to  Abbott

My long view is that Al Lopez, more with the White Sox than with the Indians, was the manager who actually started the trend, and everyone thought he was a genius, too. Casey out-managed him head to head time after time, though. It wasn’t just that the Yankees had the horses.

Tmckelv
Tmckelv
12 years ago

I noticed Jeter has exactly 40 hits in his first 100 ABs. Does anyone know how to search in the Play Index for players that have had 40+ hits in their first 100 AB’s and the final numbers for the year for those players?

Lawrence Azrin
Lawrence Azrin
12 years ago
Reply to  Tmckelv

Sorry, I don’t know how to search on the B-R P-I, but I manually checked Rod Carew. In 1974 he started 41-for-100, and ended up with a .364 BA.

Neil L.
Neil L.
12 years ago

“Jon Jay has 24 hits in 15 starts.”

You mean the Cardinals don’r miss Colby Rasmus? ๐Ÿ™‚