Gary Sanchez – So Good, So Soon

35 Replies

Yankee catcher Gary Sanchez has been a sensation since his call-up at the beginning of August. So much so that, on Saturday’s Yankees-Red Sox telecast, Fox broadcaster John Smoltz (whom I much admire for his easy-to-listen-to voice and his thoughtful and often insightful commentary) uncharacteristically gushed something to the effect that Sanchez’s month-and-a-half of stellar play leading the Yankees back into the pennant chase was pretty much unheard of for a rookie. That seemed like quite a bold claim and one that would be worth looking into.

After the jump, more on Sanchez and other rookies who started their careers with a short season but a memorable one.

To check out Smoltz’s assertion, I looked for the best OPS+ in short rookie seasons, which I defined as at least 150 PA but less than 300. The twelve best seasons meeting that bill, all with at least 160 OPS+, are shown below (there’s a bit of a drop-off after that with the next best season at 155 OPS+).

Rk Player OPS+ PA WAR Year Age Tm G AB R H 2B 3B HR RBI BB SO BA OBP SLG OPS Pos
1 Bob Hazle (RoY-4th) 209 155 1.9 1957 26 MLN 41 134 26 54 12 0 7 27 18 15 .403 .477 .649 1.126 *9/H7
2 Willie McCovey (RoY-1st) 188 219 3.1 1959 21 SFG 52 192 32 68 9 5 13 38 22 35 .354 .429 .656 1.085 *3/H
3 Nig Clarke 180 195 3.2 1906 23 CLE 57 179 22 64 12 4 1 21 13 18 .358 .404 .486 .890 *2
4 Phil Plantier (RoY-8th) 178 175 2.2 1991 22 BOS 53 148 27 49 7 1 11 35 23 38 .331 .420 .615 1.034 97H/D
5 Frank Thomas 177 240 2.3 1990 22 CHW 60 191 39 63 11 3 7 31 44 54 .330 .454 .529 .983 *3/DH
6 Gary Sanchez 175 169 2.3 2016 23 NYY 39 150 25 48 11 0 14 27 16 40 .320 .391 .673 1.064 *2D
7 Bret Barberie (RoY-5th) 168 162 1.9 1991 23 MON 57 136 16 48 12 2 2 18 20 22 .353 .435 .515 .949 H645/3
8 Bill Skowron 167 237 2.0 1954 23 NYY 87 215 37 73 12 9 7 41 19 18 .340 .392 .577 .969 *3H/54
9 Luke Scott 165 249 2.5 2006 28 HOU 65 214 31 72 19 6 10 37 30 43 .336 .426 .621 1.047 *79/H8
10 Fred Nicholson 163 271 2.7 1920 25 PIT 99 247 33 89 16 7 4 30 18 31 .360 .404 .530 .934 H789
11 Johnny Schulte 160 209 2.3 1927 30 STL 64 156 35 45 8 2 9 32 47 19 .288 .456 .538 .994 *2/H
12 Ben Paschal 160 276 2.4 1925 29 NYY 89 247 49 89 16 5 12 55 22 29 .360 .417 .611 1.028 9H78
Provided by Baseball-Reference.com: View Play Index Tool Used
Generated 9/17/2016.

So Sanchez fits right in the middle of this group of the best similar career starts. To take it a step further and identify which of these players may have impacted a pennant race as Sanchez has, there are a few examples:

  • Catcher Johnny Schulte played his first games for the defending world champion Cardinals at the end of May, going 5 for 8 against the Reds. Schulte didn’t play much in June, but still contributed three home runs, added three more in July, again in limited playing time, and another 3 dingers after returning from an injury in September. Schulte started most of the Cardinal games from September 7th to season’s end as St. Louis closed 20-8 to almost wrest the NL title from the Pirates, falling just 1½ games short.
  • Bob “Hurricane” Hazle played his first game for the world champion-to-be Braves on July 29 with Milwaukee tied for the NL lead. The Braves won that game and 14 of the next 15 to take an 8 game lead (which is how the race ended, though Milwaukee briefly made it interesting, allowing their lead to shrink to 2½ games on Sep 15 before a 10-2 finish salted the title away). Milwaukee’s torrid pace over the first half of August coincided with Hazle’s .545/.583/.879 clip over his first 11 games, all of which the Braves won. Hazle’s rookie season BA, OBP and OPS are all the top marks in a short season of 150-300 PA, whether by a rookie or any other player, while his 209 OPS+ is second only to Gavvy Cravath‘s 213 mark at age 38 in 1919.
  • Two years later, Willie McCovey got called up at the end of July and started with a 4 hit game that included two triples, still the only such career debut game. San Francisco won that game to take over the league lead, and won 7 of the next 8 to solidify their hold on top spot, a lead they would maintain in a three team race for 52 straight days. Alas, a 1-7 finish handed the title to the Dodgers, a swoon that came despite a .364/.391/.682 slash by McCovey over that stretch (no pun intended).
  • Frank Thomas came up to the Sox at the beginning of August 1990 and played pretty much full time until the end of the season. Chicago wasn’t going to catch the defending world championship A’s but a 94-68 finish was easily their best since going to the ALCS seven years before. The White Sox finished strong with a 14-6 mark to close out the season, led by Thomas’s .364/.494/.561 clip over that stretch.

Is a rookie season like Sanchez’s a predictor of good things to come? To find out I’ve expanded our group of twelve to a more substantial sample size of the top 50 (and ties) for OPS+ scores in short rookie seasons. That group of 51 has a minimum OPS+ of 138 that will almost certainly accommodate Sanchez even if he were to slump badly the rest of the way.

So, how did this larger group do after that impressive rookie season? Here are the top 10 WAR totals of that group over their first 5 seasons, excluding seasons with rookie status, which, as it turns out, are also the only players to compile 10 WAR over that period.

Rk Player WAR WAR/ 502 PA Seasons Age G PA AB R H 2B 3B HR RBI BB SO BA OBP SLG OPS Pos Tm
1 Frank Thomas 26.4 5.1 1991-94 23-26 584 2605 2080 424 678 147 5 135 453 481 315 .326 .449 .596 1.045 *3D/H CHW
2 Chuck Klein 23.0 4.2 1929-32 24-27 607 2769 2508 557 895 188 39 152 573 227 209 .357 .412 .645 1.056 *9/78 PHI
3 Carlos Santana 15.0 2.9 2011-14 25-28 604 2569 2141 299 530 126 5 92 314 394 468 .248 .364 .440 .804 23/D5H7 CLE
4 Kal Daniels 14.7 4.2 1987-90 23-26 433 1763 1484 282 442 89 3 75 239 258 293 .298 .403 .513 .916 *7/H CIN-LAD
5 Tommy Henrich 13.2 3.4 1938-41 25-28 464 1959 1649 336 462 97 21 72 286 272 125 .280 .385 .495 .881 *9/8H37 NYY
6 Willie McCovey  12.7 4.1 1960-63 22-25 450 1570 1381 240 376 52 12 95 257 161 267 .272 .353 .534 .886 37/H9 SFG
7 Wally Schang 12.3 3.9 1914-17 24-27 451 1574 1320 190 357 49 36 14 163 165 148 .270 .369 .394 .763 *2/75H89 PHA
8 John Romano 11.5 3.9 1960-62 25-27 386 1489 1284 187 358 60 6 62 213 171 174 .279 .365 .480 .844 *2/H CLE
9 Bill Skowron 10.9 3.0 1955-58 24-27 490 1840 1674 239 501 75 17 66 312 130 221 .299 .353 .483 .835 *3/H5 NYY
10 Brett Lawrie 10.4 2.8 2012-15 22-25 451 1862 1716 205 447 82 9 50 192 107 347 .260 .310 .406 .717 *5/4DH6 TOR-OAK
Provided by Baseball-Reference.com: View Play Index Tool Used
Generated 9/17/2016.

There is, of course, quite a range of PAs so I’ve added the WAR rate stat for this part of these players’ careers. Nobody in this group should have been in any danger of being unable to find work, as their WAR rates over a minimum qualifying season are all comfortably above replacement level, with all but the two active players (Santana and Lawrie) at 3 WAR or better, a very creditable contribution on almost any team.

Of note is that only three of these ten players made the first list of twelve who posted a 160 OPS+ in their rookie season. Two of the other nine (Clarke and Barberie) from that first list were in the top half of the 46 in the group of 51 who are not active rookies (the remaining five being Sanchez, Trea Turner, Ryan Schimpf, Ryon Healy plus Sanchez’s Yankee teammate Greg Bird, who is no longer a rookie but has had no playing time since his rookie season). The rest of our group of twelve from the first list finished in the bottom half of the larger group, which includes everybody with 4.4 WAR or less over this part of their careers.

Looking now at the 39 retired players in our larger group, their median 6.6 career WAR total may appear underwhelming, but the top 10 (half of the top half) all show a very respectable 20+ career WAR. Reducing that group of 39 to the 29 who compiled 1000 career PA moves that top quartile up to 27 WAR, significantly better than the 19 WAR top quartile for all retired position players with 1000 career PA.

Rk Player WAR From To Age G PA AB R H 2B 3B HR RBI BB SO BA OBP SLG OPS Pos Tm
1 Frank Thomas 73.7 1990 2008 22-40 2322 10075 8199 1494 2468 495 12 521 1704 1667 1397 .301 .419 .555 .974 *D3/H CHW-OAK-TOR
2 Willie McCovey 64.4 1959 1980 21-42 2588 9692 8197 1229 2211 353 46 521 1555 1345 1550 .270 .374 .515 .889 *3H7/9D SFG-SDP-OAK
3 Wally Schang 45.0 1913 1931 23-41 1840 6432 5307 769 1506 264 90 59 705 849 573 .284 .393 .401 .794 *2H7/8596 PHA-BOS-NYY-SLB-DET
4 Chuck Klein 43.6 1928 1944 23-39 1753 7171 6486 1168 2076 398 74 300 1201 601 521 .320 .379 .543 .922 *97H/83 PHI-CHC-PIT
5 Tommy Henrich 35.7 1937 1950 24-37 1284 5410 4603 901 1297 269 73 183 795 712 383 .282 .382 .491 .873 *93H/87 NYY
6 Pedro Guerrero 34.3 1978 1992 22-36 1536 6115 5392 730 1618 267 29 215 898 609 862 .300 .370 .480 .850 35978/H4 LAD-STL
7 Buck Herzog 27.4 1908 1920 22-34 1493 6047 5284 705 1370 191 75 20 449 427 331 .259 .329 .335 .664 456/73H9 CIN-NYG-BSN-CHC
8 Bill Skowron 26.9 1954 1967 23-36 1658 6046 5547 682 1566 243 53 211 888 383 870 .282 .332 .459 .792 *3H/54 NYY-LAD-WSA-CHW-CAL
9 Doug Rader 24.4 1967 1977 22-32 1465 5832 5186 631 1302 245 39 155 722 528 1055 .251 .322 .403 .725 *5/3HD69 HOU-SDP-TOR
10 John Romano 20.9 1958 1967 23-32 906 3256 2767 355 706 112 10 129 417 414 485 .255 .354 .443 .797 *2H/73 CHW-CLE-STL
Provided by Baseball-Reference.com: View Play Index Tool Used
Generated 9/17/2016.

So, where does that leave Sanchez? Well, being in a group of twelve (our first list) that includes two HOFers can’t be bad. Also encouraging is that our second list of ten includes a third HOFer, with the other six retired players all having name recognition. And, as noted above, the third list shows a top quartile career WAR over 40% higher than the overall major league average for 1000 PA careers.

For the glass-half-empty crowd, one can’t overlook that one third of the players in the first list (Nicholson, Paschal, Schulte and Hazle) failed to reach 1000 PA for their careers, as did one-quarter of the retired players in the larger group of 51. There’s probably no better example of a career fizzling after a hot start than the top name (Bob Hazle) on our first list of 10; after setting short season records that still stand, Hazle played just one more season of only 129 PA and a .211/.302/.281 slash.

Time will tell how Sanchez’s career turns out, but his fast start shouldn’t be dismissed as being meaningless. Based on players with comparable career starts,  their career totals are clearly superior to the major league average. Thus, Yankee fans have reason for optimism and anticipation of what the future may hold for Sanchez.

35 thoughts on “Gary Sanchez – So Good, So Soon”

  1. David P

    I feel like the “Gary Sanchez story” has played out so many times throughout the history of baseball. Rookie goes on a hot streak but eventually his weaknesses are found out and he comes back down to earth.

    Just this year, we’ve seen it with Trevor Story and Tyler Naquin. Let’s just look at Naquin. He got off to a decent start, shuttling between the majors and minors, putting up a .751OPS over 65 PAs. He was recalled from the minors on June 2nd and went on an absolute tear, putting up a 1.141 OPS over 166 PAs. That included 13 home runs , which is 3 more than he ever hit in a full minor league season. But since then? 102 PAs and a .651 OPS.

    Another guy that I was thinking of is Wally Joyner. Joyner hit 15 home runs in his first 36 games, along with a 1.006 OPS. The rest of the season? 118 more games, a .736 OPS and only 7 more home runs. (Joyner did hit 34 homeruns his second season but dropped off significantly after that).

    Or Carlos Santana (mentioned above). Put up a 1.165 OPS in his first 72 MLB PAs but only .682 in the subsequent 120 PAs. And in 6 full major league seasons, his best OPS is .832.

    As for Sanchez himself? In his last 79 PAs, he’s put up a triple slash line of .214/.291/.429, while striking out in 31.6% of his PAs. (previously he was only striking out in 18.1% of PAs).

    No doubt Sanchez has talent and could be an All-star for years to come. But one hot streak does not a career make. The hot streak has come and gone and now we’ll see what kind of career he has.

    Reply ↓
  2. David P

    BTW, with all the attention focused on Sanchez, I haven’t seen it mentioned that Rockies rookie David Dahl tied a record by beginning his career with a 17 game hit streak.

    The record was set in 1941 by Chuck Aleno. The rest of Aleno’s career didn’t go so well. He ended his career with only 358 PAs and a .209 BA.

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    1. Voomo Zanzibar

      On the subject of 17 game hit streaks in 1941…
      DiMaggio cracked off one of those after his 56 gamer got Keltnered.
      So, hits in 73 out of 74 games.
      Best hitter in the league, obviously.
      Or was he?

      Stats from May 15 – August 2, 1941:

      Joe D:
      .408 / .471 / .738 / 1.209

      Ted Williams:
      .430 / .559 / .744 / 1.303

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  3. no statistician but

    Hurricane Hazle. Those of us old enough to have followed that 1957 season through remember the weirdness of the Braves’ year. They’d finished second three times and third once in the four years since the move to Milwaukee, and had lost out to the aging Dodgers by just one game in 1956. Everyone picked them to win in ’57, which they did, but not exactly the way expected. Joe Adcock suffered an injury early on, Bill Bruton missed the second half of the season with a torn ligament, and to inject more offense into the offense, the Braves traded for Red Schoendienst in June. In spite of that, the Cards, picked for a distant fifth, were red hot mid-season and took the lead, led by Stan the Man in his last great season.

    The Braves outfield without Bruton consisted of Hank Aaron, who moved to center field after Bruton went down, and a cast of irregulars—Wes Covington, Andy Pafko, the fast fading Bobby Thomson—who were platooned left and right, so to speak, by the platoon crazy manager, Fred Haney, until Hazle came up and got hot. Haney, incidentally, also platooned slugger Adcock and Joe Torre’s older brother Frank, once Adcock got back from the DL.

    Hazle was the man of the quarter hour in baseball that year, despite Williams’ .388 BA, Mantle’s remarkable season overall, and the great performances of Aaron and Musial. Once his 15 minutes were up, though, Hazle fizzled and ended his career in the Southern Association at age 29, so the nickname Hurricane was doubly apt, since such storms don’t last long and they fade to nothingness.

    Reply ↓
    1. Dr. Doom

      Bushville Wins! is a lovely little book about the ’57 Braves. I grew up hearing stories about that team, since my dad was 7 when they won, and it was the team of his childhood. Actually, I think he preferred the ’58 variety, but that didn’t end as well for Milwaukee.

      Also, Aaron’s ’57 MVP always seems so odd to me, and it seems like it really came down to the Braves actually winning that year. He was basically the same player for the next ten years, and yet he never even finished 2nd after 1957 (though he did have five more 3rd-place finishes thereafter). It seems like there was always a better story somewhere else.

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      1. no statistician but

        Hank led the league in runs, HRs, RBIs, and total bases, and was among the leaders in several other categories. On a pennant winner, such stats in those times would make for an MVP trophy automatically unless there was an extraordinary season by someone else, probably a pitcher.

        Incidentally, the WAR leader that year was Mays, playing for the sixth-place Giants.

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    2. Doug

      Was reading Hazle’s SABR bio and it seems the sudden decline in his fortunes in 1958 may have been related to two beanings he suffered, one in spring training and a second in early May that hospitalized him for 5 days because his “equilibrium was thrown off a little” (guess that’s how concussions were described back then).

      Reply ↓
      1. no statistician but

        If so, the 1958 decline was only temporary, I’d guess. His stats in 1959 and 1960 in the high minors aren’t much different from what he put up in ’55 and ’56—or maybe it’s just that you can’t re-inflate a soufflé.

        It’s interesting that the 1958 Braves had some equally tough luck with personnel—Schoendienst and Buhl come to mind, Mathews had an off year—but they again won the pennant by 8 games, this time without a tropical storm.

        Reply ↓
  4. Hartvig

    The first name that popped into my mind was Freddy Lynn.

    In his late season call-up he mostly rode the pine at first, getting a pinch hitting appearance in games on Sept 5th & 6th and then sitting until getting another PH shot on the 14th before finally getting his first start on Sept 15th when the Red Sox were 2 & 1/2 games out. He got 2 plate appearances which he turned into a double and a home run before being pinch-hit for by the immortal Juan Beniquez. He started again 2 games later, going 1 for 3 as well as recording 6 put outs in CF before again being replaced by the redoubtable Beniquez. In his 3rd start, he only managed to go 4 for 5 with a double & triple with 3-rbi’s coming with 2-outs. For whatever reason he would only appear in 9 of Boston’s 14 remaining games but ended the season with a slash line of .419/.490/.698 in 15 total games with 10 RBI’s, 6 extra base hits, an OPS+ of 229 and 0.7 WAR.

    Where it doesn’t fit your narrative is that when Lynn started playing the Sox were only 2 & 1/2 games back & they finished the season behind by 7.

    I’m pretty sure that wasn’t his fault however.

    And in his first full qualifying season he did manage to win both ROY and MVP while leading the Sox to a first place finish in the AL east and eventually to the World Series.

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  5. Dave

    Sanchez unfortunately is in a pitch-to-pitch defensive position. He is the worst at blocking pitches. Two strike -put-away breaking balls cannot hit the ground. Pitchers will like his offense but he will take them out of double play setups.

    Reply ↓
  6. Voomo Zanzibar

    The guy just hit his 17th home run.
    He has a chance to lead the Yankees in HR in just over 50 games played.

    22 … Beltran (gone)
    21 … Castro (DL)
    19 … McCann (part time now)
    18 … Didi
    17 … Sanchez

    Reply ↓
  7. Voomo Zanzibar

    Wow. He just did it again.
    He has 185 PA.
    He will end this season with no more than 225-230ish.

    He ALREADY holds the record for most HR in a season with fewer than 230 PA:

    18 … Gary!
    16 … Eddie Robinson
    16 … Bob Thurman
    16 … Karim Garcia
    16 … Mike Simms
    16 … Russell Branyan
    _______________________

    Here are the low PA benchmarks for HR:

    20 / 262 … Willie McCovey
    21 / 271 … Art Shamsky
    25 / 305 … Johnny Mize (he beats 22,23,24)
    27 / 318 … Giancarlo Stanton
    32 / 321 … Mark McGwire

    35 / 417 … Rudy York
    39 / 422 … McGwire
    40 / 465 … Henry Aaron
    43 / 483 … Matt Williams
    52 / 548 … McGwire

    54 / 616 … George Ruth
    58 / 657 … McGwire
    65 / 661 … McGwire
    73 / 664 … B.L. Bonds

    Yep, Big Mac has 5 spots on the list.

    Reply ↓
        1. Voomo Zanzibar

          …………………………….aaack. Don’t jinx it, Doug. There’s a few Yankees fans here who are still clinging to hope (2.5 back).

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        2. Mike L

          Doug, do you have some animosity for the HHS Yankees fan? Haven’t we been loyal?
          Toronto is not a bandbox, it is cavernous, with the wind swirling ways uniquely disadvantageous to someone with Sanchez’s swing.
          Boy, you try to teach….but do they listen? No.

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          1. Doug

            One more HR for Sanchez and one more for Ryan Schimpf would make 6 rookies with 20 home runs, tying 2006, 1987 and, surprisingly, 1964 for the most in one season. One of the 1964 rookies was a player I’d never heard of before, Sam Bowens. He hit 22 that season but only 22 more the rest of his career, one of 10 players (out of 169 with a 20 HR rookie season) with as few home runs after their rookie season. The lowest career HR total after a 20 home run rookie season is only 5, by Orestes Destrade, a 31 year-old rookie with the Marlins in their maiden 1993 season.

            Ryan Schimpf has already set the rookie record for home runs by a player 5’9″ or shorter. His current mark of 70% of hits going for extra bases is also a record for any season with 50+ hits, rookie or otherwise (the only other player with 2/3 of hits for extra bases is Barry Bonds in 2001, his 73 home run season). On the flip side, Schimpf’s strikeout rate of 31.8% of PAs is the 8th highest mark in a 300 PA rookie season, and the highest among this year’s rookies.

          2. Doug Post author

            To complete the thought, Sanchez and Schimpf did indeed both reach 20 home runs, to make it 6 rookies doing so this season. Schimpf finished the season with an even 70% of his hits (42 of 60) going for extra bases, a new record for any player in a 300 PA season.

          1. David P

            So to straight shutouts means two straight games without a Sanchez home run. Clearly, it’s time for the Yankees to release the bum. Doubt anyone else will pick him up…. 🙂 🙂 🙂

          2. Voomo Zanzibar

            St. Peterburg and Toronto.
            Two countries.
            Two days.
            Two shutouts.
            Sanchez in the two games:
            .333 / .500 / .500 / 1.000
            Not Doug’s fault.

            Need to win nine in a row.

          3. Doug

            That’s twice in three weeks with consecutive goose eggs for the Yankees, most proximate such back-to-backs since Yankee bats started the ’84 season ice cold.

            Strk Start End Games Opp
            NYY 2016-09-22 2016-09-23 2 TBR,TOR
            NYY 2016-09-02 2016-09-03 2 BAL
            NYY 2015-08-08 2015-08-09 2 TOR
            NYY 1999-05-12 1999-05-13 2 ANA
            NYY 1996-05-28 1996-05-29 2 CAL
            NYY 1991-05-16 1991-05-17 2 CAL,SEA
            NYY 1989-05-26 1989-05-27 2 OAK
            NYY 1984-05-19 1984-05-20 2 CAL
            NYY 1984-05-02 1984-05-04 2 CHW,MIL
            NYY 1984-04-27 1984-04-28 2 MIL
            NYY 1984-04-21 1984-04-22 2 TEX
            Provided by Baseball-Reference.com: View Play Index Tool Used
            Generated 9/24/2016.
          4. David P

            And there we go! Yanks have been shut out for 3 straight games for the first time since 1975 (and only the 5th time in the PI era). Last time it happened, all three games were at Yankee Stadium, with the first two games coming against the Red Sox in a doubleheader, followed by a game against the Tigers.

  8. John Nacca

    Most homers in the first 45 games of a career……..

    1. Sanchez, 19
    2. Wally Berger, 17
    3. Wally Joyner, 16
    3. Jose Abreu, 16
    5. Kevin Maas, 15
    5. Zeke Bonura, 15
    7. Albert Pujols, 14
    7. Mike Jacobs, 14
    7. Sam Horn, 14
    7. Ryan Braun, 14

    Reply ↓
  9. Voomo Zanzibar

    Hey, let’s not sleep on Tom Murphy.
    Rockie. Sure, he’s got that thin air to work with, but, he’s 23 games into his career:

    8 HR, 20 RBI

    At the same stage Gary had:
    9 HR, 16 RBI

    (Of course, discount the 2G/2PA cuppa from last year, and the numbers jump to):
    11/21
    _________________________

    And yes, in this hors d’oeuvre sample size, he is showing just a dollop of a Home/Road split:

    .436 / .476 / 1.051 / 1.527
    .040 / .143 / .080 / .223

    Reply ↓
  10. David P

    Teams are currently hitting 1.166 home runs per game, which is just below the record of 1.172 set in 2000.

    Oddly, neither this year, nor 2000 featured any individual player(s) hitting tons and tons of home runs. 2000 was led by Sammy Sosa’s 50 home runs, a rather pedestrian mark for the height of the steroids era. Similarly, it’s unlikely that anyone will reach 50 home runs this season.

    Reply ↓
      1. Doug

        Currently 100 such batters with only 2000 (102) and 1999 (103) with more.

        There are 8 players sitting on 19, and four more with 18, so I’d have to agree with John that a new record is likely.

        Reply ↓
  11. Voomo Zanzibar

    Rookie of the Year?
    Comes down to he and Fulmer… and how the next nine days unfold.

    If Sanchez somehow leads NY to the playoffs he’ll win it, otherwise Fulmer has it in the bag.

    25 starts
    Team Record 18-7
    (Run support 5.24. And only once less than 2.)

    15 QS
    5 disasters
    4 starts with 5+ innings and less than 4 runs.
    And one game where he was taken out in the 5th after hitting two batters to load the bases (only 1 run allowed)

    Reply ↓
  12. David P

    Sanchez in his last 29 games:

    .225/.313/.505 (striking out in 29.7% of PAs).

    Sanchez in list last 7 games:

    .038/.103/.154 (striking out in 37.9% of PAs)

    That rising SO rate is particularly troubling. Even his full season rate (24.9%) is of concern because it’s hard to maintain a decent batting average while striking out at that rate.

    This season 21 players have struck out in 24% or more of PAs. Only 3 have a batting average above .254. Freddie Freeman (.304), Jonathan Villar (.284), and Yasmany Tomas (.270).

    Reply ↓

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