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Kauffman Stadium KCComment -
On this Day...
1987 - Eddie Murray homers from each side of the plate for the second consecutive game, a major league first. Murray's four home runs in two days help the Orioles to 7-6 and 15-6 wins over the White Sox.
1988 - Oakland beats Detroit 3-1 to extend its club-record winning streak to 14 consecutive games, the longest in the majors since 1977. The A's will finally lose tomorrow 8-2 to the Tigers.
1989 - Mets shortstop Kevin Elster and Red Sox catcher Rick Cerone end their major league-record errorless game streaks at their positions. Elster had played 88 consecutive games without an error while Cerone had played 159.
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Pujols was so good, and absolutely fleeced the Angels too.Comment -
Good luck to everyone today gentlemens.Comment -
Happy birthday Tony Gwynn. RIP Mr. PadresComment -
In a recent bout of strike zone curiosity, I started looking into umpire accuracy metrics to try to visualize the baseball world at our doorstep: a world in which balls and strikes are called by robot umpires. While referring to an electronic strike zone as “robot umpires” no doubt adds an unnecessary measure of Asimovian flourish, the reality of baseball’s future is bearing down on us. Electronic strike zones are coming to baseball.
Then again, COVID-19 threw a wrench into all pockets of predicting baseball’s future, and there’s no longer any certainty in, well, just about anything. So there will be no more crystal ball voyeurism from me today, no more speculation, only a cold, hard look at the past.
Of course, the issue of umpire accuracy is hardly reserved for the future. Until electronic strike zones are implemented, the human models making the calls behind the plate remain incapable of ridding themselves entirely of human error – try as they might. Sometimes a ball misses the plate, and they call it a strike. Sometimes it crosses the dish, and the arm stays at the umpire’s side. The question for today is this: which pitcher got the most extra strikes in 2019?
With my previous look into Statcast pitch data, I looked for clusters of pitchers that would illuminate certain things about how umpires called balls and strikes. Today is about passing along some of the trivia. Statcast data, after all, holds a ton of information, including whether or not each ball or strike was correctly called. Using machine learning, we can pretty cleanly find those pitchers who benefited the most from gifted strikes, as well as those who were hurt the most by stolen strikes.
And that brings us to Adam Warren of the San Diego Padres (frequently and presently a member of the New York Yankees). Of the pitchers who threw as many as 200 pitches in the majors in 2019, it wasn’t close: Warren benefited more than any other pitcher in 2019 from umpires gifting extra strikes.
To be perfectly clear, a gifted strike here is a pitch that lands outside the strike zone that the umpire calls a strike. This alone does not make Warren the luckiest pitcher in baseball. Nor does it make him the umpires’ favorite (though it probably gets him a look). In a vacuum, that Warren led the lead in percentage of called strikes that were gifted means only this: no pitcher had a higher percentage of their called strikes come from pitches that missed the zone.
This was important for Warren because, even with the added help, only 31.4% of his pitches landed in the zone (league average was 39.4%). And while batters swung and missed at a relatively average rate when Warren was throwing strikes, batter O-Contract% – the percentage of times a batter makes contact when swinging at a ball outside the zone – was just 61.9%, much lower than the 67.3% average. So the more Warren got batters to chase, the more effective he became (surprise, surprise). Still, he only registered 7.85 K/9 versus 3.77 BB/9.
For context, MLB pitchers – on average – had ~16% of their called strikes come on pitches outside the zone. Warren, by contrast, received a gifted strike on almost 42% of his strike calls. This was an extreme outlier. The second-place finisher for highest percentage of gifted strikes was Michel Baez at ~30% – interestingly, also of the Padres (and the conspiracy is on!). Not for nothing, but Warren also fits the profile of the type of pitcher more prone to getting extra calls. He averaged just 86.4 mph this season (fastball clocking at 91.4 mph), he’s right-handed, and both his fastball and curve register in the bottom quartile for spin rate.
If he were a starter, he’d fit the mold exactly. Of course, sample size is likely a culprit here in Warren’s numbers being so far outside the norm. Warren wasn’t exactly a spotlight pitcher in 2019. He threw 555 pitches for the Padres across 25 games, 28 2/3 innings. He ended the year 4-1 with a 5.34 ERA/6.91 FIP making his season worth -0.2 bWAR/-0.8 fWAR. This is not to say he will be a total disaster if he suits up for the Yankees sometime this season, nor is it to say he’ll receive the same measure of umpire error if he does. Though Warren has been received favorably by umpires in the past, his overall average percentage of gifted strikes over the past 5 seasons is just under 28%. That still puts him two standard deviations above the mean, but nowhere near the outlier of his 2019.Comment -
Umpires are so bad, who needs the human element?Comment -
On this day May 10, in 2012, exactly eight years ago, the Baltimore Orioles became the first American League team to lead of a game with three consecutive home run.
Ryan Flaherty, JJ Hardy, and Nick Markakis all went deep in the bottom of the first inning off of Texas Ranger starter Colby Lewis.
Batting AB R H RBI BB SO PA BA OBP SLG OPS Pit Str Details Ryan Flaherty LF 4 1 1 1 0 3 4 0.167 0.188 0.267 0.454 12 10 HR J.J. Hardy SS 4 1 1 1 0 0 4 0.244 0.29 0.488 0.778 13 8 HR Nick Markakis RF 4 1 1 1 0 1 4 0.246 0.324 0.426 0.75 22 14 HR Adam Jones CF 4 1 1 1 0 1 4 0.288 0.336 0.576 0.912 12 9 HR Matt Wieters C 2 1 0 0 1 2 3 0.294 0.379 0.569 0.948 16 8 Wilson Betemit 3B 3 1 1 2 0 2 3 0.253 0.317 0.507 0.824 10 7 HR Chris Davis DH 2 0 0 0 0 2 3 0.283 0.33 0.491 0.821 18 11 HBP Mark Reynolds 1B 3 0 0 0 0 1 3 0.186 0.317 0.337 0.655 13 9 GDP Robert Andino 2B 3 0 0 0 0 1 3 0.305 0.348 0.438 0.786 14 9 Comment -
Bet on all 5 dogs in Korea Baseball Yesterday. 0-5Comment -
“Gone, and I mean gone! That’s Bo Jackson territory”!
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Major League Baseball is going to look different in 2020. However, one new element will make the Senior Circuit look particularly different.
MLB has formed a plan for the upcoming campaign, which the coronavirus pandemic has postponed, that it's going to discuss with the players' union on Monday. Implementing the designated hitter in the National League is included in the plan, according to Joel Sherman of the New York Post.
The extra wear on pitchers, who will be asked to ramp up activities on relatively short notice and with an abbreviated second spring training, is in part prompting the league's proposal. The hope, Sherman notes, is that exhibition games will begin sometime in June, with regular-season contests getting underway on July 1.
The plan also includes a proposed season duration of 78 or 82 games with an extra round of playoffs, expanded rosters, and reduced player salaries.
In January, before the pandemic caused the sports world to halt, there was reportedly a growing belief that owners are in favor of adopting the DH in the NL as early as the 2021 campaign. There was some concern the move would need to wait until 2022 after the current collective bargaining agreement expires.Comment -
On this day May 11, in 2016, exactly four years ago, Max Scherzer of the Washington Nationals tied a major league record by striking out twenty Tigers (walking none) in a 3-2 victory.
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Rich Murray.
Year Age Tm G PA AB R H HR RBI BB SO BA OBP SLG OPS OPS+ 1980 22 SFG 53 206 194 19 42 4 24 11 48 0.216 0.259 0.34 0.599 69 1983 25 SFG 4 10 10 0 2 0 1 0 3 0.2 0.2 0.2 0.4 13 2 Yrs 57 216 204 19 44 4 25 11 51 0.216 0.256 0.333 0.589 66 162 Game Avg. 162 614 580 54 125 11 71 31 145 0.216 0.256 0.333 0.589 66 Comment -
Padres Goat, good stuff Peavy!Comment -
Who remembers this guy?
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Owners presenting an offer to players to start season on July 4th weekend without fans.
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