Friday, April 18, 2008 |
Hunter Better Than Sexson: Angels 5, Mariners 4
If he pitches 200 innings this year, he's on target for 25 Ks (if you round him up), which I suspect might be an all-time low (does anyone know how to check this?).I did check it, and it turns out that in the Retrosheet era (currently, 1956+), there really hasn't been anybody who's pitched 200+ innings and had only 25 strikeouts. Missing bats is a good indicator of basic ability, and Garland so far hasn't shown that.
Of course, Garland didn't pitch in today's game, but I use it to bring up another, equally scary point: the pitching staff isn't whiffing anybody. The team's K/9 rate is second worst in the league, with a collective 4.98 K/9 that ranks ahead of only the Rangers. This isn't historic by any stretch; again, in the Retrosheet era, the worst-case K/9 "leaders" look like
*ML4 = AL Milwaukee+--------+--------+------+ | teamID | yearID | k/9 | +--------+--------+------+ | BOS | 1978 | 2.97 | | SEA | 1981 | 3.11 | | ML4* | 1981 | 3.19 | | CIN | 1970 | 3.51 | | CHA | 1978 | 3.52 | | BAL | 1973 | 3.53 | | ML4 | 1978 | 3.54 | | ML4 | 1979 | 3.56 | | CAL | 1981 | 3.57 | | KCA | 1983 | 3.58 | +--------+--------+------+
Joe Saunders did absolutely nothing to help with the team's overall strikeout rate, whiffing only two batters, and allowing a pair of big flies to Richie Sexson. (Sexson, in case you were wondering, already had two games with three homers, both with Milwaukee.)
In fact, if it wasn't for Torii Hunter's heroic grab of Sexson's long fly to end the ninth, the Angels might very well have lost this game. Part of the reason for that is that "K"-Rod isn't whiffing as many as he used to (he owns a 7.56 K/9, nearly half his usual rate, which is well into double digits and usually between 12-14), and he's walking as many as he strikes out (seven in each case). Part of that may be velocity issues (itself fallout of a sprained ankle), part of that may just be he's got early season jitters, or maybe it's still overwork from winter ball. Frankie has had slow starts before and come out of it fine, but he has been making it interesting a lot lately.
Back to Torii, in addition to the game-saving catch, the Angels got three doubles out of him, the first of which drove in the game's first three runs, and might have been scored a triple had he slammed on the brakes at third. The Angels also got some nice production out of Maicer Izturis, playing because Howie Kendrick was yet again not in the starting lineup, a fact accounted for by the fact — which I didn't hear in the game call or the pregame show — that he was placed on the DL retroactive to April 14. Sean Rodriguez got the callup from Salt Lake, and wow.
Labels: angels, mariners, recaps
That is a big reason for the increase in bullpen ERA for sure and w/o Lackey and Escobar and their 350 K's from last year we aren't getting guys out the same way - that impacts the defense and the RA per game.
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