Wild and still slinging – A.J. makes his mark

15 Replies

One of the less well-noted happenings prior to the 2012 season was a change in one of the career pitching leaderboards. With the retirement of Tim Wakefield, there was a new active leader in career wild pitches, one Allan James Burnett.

A.J.’s ascension to the top rung was well-deserved, coming on the heels of 3 seasons with the spectacular aggregate total of 58 wild pitches. To put that number in perspective, at least five pitchers, at the time they became active leaders in this category, had compiled career wild pitch totals not exceeding A.J.’s three-year mark. For the curious, those players were Freddie Fitzsimmons (1935, 1942), Bill Hallahan (1935), Bump Hadley (1939), Johnny Allen (1942), and Warren Spahn (1959).

After the jump, a look at where A.J. fits into the pantheon of the game’s wildest hurlers.

Continue reading →

Quiz – Heavy Hitters

63 Replies

Below are a list of similar hitters. Except for maybe one, that first guy. All but Pepi have had seasons of 40 HRs, over 100 RBI, or over 100 Ks.

So what is it that only this group of hitters has accomplished in a full season (502 PA) since 1901?

Player
Joe Pepitone
Dave Kingman
Juan Gonzalez
Frank Howard
Harmon Killebrew
Ryan Howard
Sammy Sosa
Mark McGwire
Barry Bonds
Provided by Baseball-Reference.com: View Play Index Tool Used
Generated 11/17/2012.

Congratulations to Paul E. He correctly identified these players as the only hitters since 1901 having a season (502 PA) with home runs comprising more than 55% of runs scored. Here’s the list.

The Heusser Club (“Who?”)

25 Replies

Out of all the retired pitchers in MLB history, there are 2,191 who logged at least 400 innings through age 34.

Of that group, 317 fared so poorly that they had a career WAR value of less than 1.0 WAR through age 34.

With such a poor performance in a reasonably long trial, it’s no surprise that just 21 of them pitched in the majors from age 35 onward. Most of them were finished before they turned 30.

And of those 21 who did pitch at age 35 or older, only one ever had a season worth at least 3.0 WAR.

Continue reading →

Sign of the times – the decline of the 4×100 season

13 Replies

What is the 4×100 season? I’m talking about seasons with triple-digit totals for runs, RBI, walks and strikeouts. There were no such seasons in 2012, and only four seasons by three players in the past 5 years, which is quite a departure from the recent past.

  • 2008-2012: 4 seasons by 3 players
  • 2003-2007: 16 seasons by 10 players
  • 1998-2002: 22 seasons by 11 players

After the jump, a bit more on another sign of the changing face of the game.

Continue reading →

Will Transparency Destroy Us?

114 Replies

The Baseball Writers Association of America, whose contract with Major League Baseball references as many third-party transactions with Satan as Fox’s World Series contract and the liner notes to a Robert Johnson collection combined, has declared its intentions to make future baseball award votes more transparent than in the past.

Sure enough, the BBWAA released all individual ballots for last night’s Rookie of the Year voting.  While it seems like transparency can only help to legitimize a process that has been under scrutiny longer than Strom Thurmond’s voting record, a glance at the RoY voting suggests that we may be in for some trouble.  See why after the jump.

Continue reading →

Quiz – Tom Glavine

43 Replies

Tom Glavine was among the finest pitchers of his time, compiling a distinguished 20-year, 300-win career likely to be recognized with his enshrinement in the HOF. Among Glavine’s many accomplishments was a season performance which, at the time, had not been achieved in either league in almost 60 seasons. What was this accomplishment?

Clues:

      • When Glavine became the ninth pitcher since 1901 to achieve this feat, he was (like most who had done it before him) past age 30
      • The eight pitchers preceding Glavine accomplished this feat within a span of just 23 seasons. None of them are in the HOF.
      • A tenth pitcher achieved this feat  before Glavine retired, becoming the oldest pitcher to do so. Like Glavine, he is probably destined for the HOF.
          • Besides Glavine, there is only one other lefthander among these ten pitchers

Congratulations (and welcome back) to Raphy, with an assist from Richard Chester. Raphy identified search criteria satisfying the above clues. The season I had in mind was Glavine’s 2004 campaign with 200+ IP, ERA+ >= 100, zero wild pitches and zero hit batsmen. The list of pitchers to do this since 1901 satisfies the above clues.

Is Barry Zito among the most or least reliable starters?

15 Replies

We are now in the tenth decade of the live-ball era, generally acknowledged to have begun in 1920. Offensive and defensive periods have come and gone within this era, even to extremes like the 1960s, sometimes referred to as the second dead-ball era, and the homer-happy 1990s and 2000s.

With those changes, the use of starting pitchers has also changed. This post will explore those changes and look at the pitchers who have most frequently exceeded and most frequently fallen short of the changing performance standards expected of starting pitchers.

Continue reading →

Pitchers Who Help Themselves

31 Replies

The highest WPA-rated hitting performance by a pitcher in 2012 was this game by Anthony Bass, the only pitcher with a game WPA score above 0.3.

Rk Player Age Date Tm Opp Rslt PA AB R H 2B 3B HR RBI BB SO WPA RE24 aLI
1 Anthony Bass 24.185 2012-05-04 SDP MIA L  8-9 3 3 1 2 0 1 0 3 0 0 0.345 2.634 1.463

After allowing 5 runs on 4 hits (incl. 2 HR)  in the opening frame, Bass redeemed himself with a two-out bases-loaded triple in the 3rd inning to put the Padres ahead 6-5 and chase opposing starter Josh Johnson. Bass left after 6 innings with a lead that the bullpen promptly surrendered en route to San Diego’s loss in 12 innings.

The last pitcher with a WPA score above 0.4 was in this game.

Rk Player Age Date Tm Opp Rslt PA AB R H 2B 3B HR RBI BB SO WPA RE24 aLI
1 Mike Stanton 26.342 1994-05-10 ATL PHI W  9-8 2 2 0 2 0 0 0 1 0 0 0.433 1.326 3.635

Stanton was the Braves’ seventh pitcher of the game, entering in the 12th inning and pitching four scoreless frames. He singled leading off the 14th but was stranded. In the 15th, Stanton came up with two out and runners at 1st and 2nd. After Deion Sanders stole 3rd, Stanton delivered a walk-off bunt single on the next pitch.

Neither of these games, though, makes the top 10 of pitchers’ WPA games for the available data, which are mostly complete since 1950 with some games as early as 1948. After the jump, I’ll take a closer look at those top 10 games, and also at changes in how pitchers have batted in past 60 years or so.

Continue reading →