Ken Singleton is among the most underrated players of his era. The former Expo and Oriole finished in the top 10 in OBP nine times from 1973 to 1983 — topping the .400 mark four times, and seven seasons receiving MVP votes. In the words of Bill James, “He drew so many walks and hit so many homers he would produce runs if he hit .220, but he didn’t hit .220; he hit .300.”

The switch-hitting outfielder finished his 15-year big-league career with an OPS-plus of 132 and a slash line of .282/.388/.436. In 17 postseason games — Singleton has a World Series ring with the 1983 Orioles — his line was .333/.391/.421. Despite his career numbers, he didn’t get one vote in 1990 when he became eligible for the Hall of Fame.

More than two decades since his playing days ended, Singleton now is as an analyst for the Yankees on the YES Network.

——

David Laurila: Why were you such a good hitter?

Ken Singleton: I was disciplined. My first year of pro ball was in the Florida State League and I led the league in bases on balls. I walked 87 times. I maintained that — the ability to recognize balls and strikes — throughout my career. It’s hard enough to hit strikes, so why would you want to swing at something that’s a little tougher to hit? My thing was that if the ball was somewhere I couldn’t reach, it probably wasn’t a strike and I wasn’t going to swing at it.

You’re normally going to get something to hit in an at bat. I can remember walking back to the bench after being called out on three straight pitches. The pitcher was a left-handed reliever named Bob Lacey — his nickname was Spacey Lacey — and all three were perfect, knee high on the outside corner. That’s the only time I can recall that happening, and I probably had 8,000 to 9,000 plate appearances. Usually you get at least one pitch that you should be able to hit. Whether you hit it or not is another story. You might swing and miss, or foul it off and not get another one. But 999 times out of 1,000, you’re going to get at least one.

DL: I have to believe that you were pitched around more than once? Read the rest of this entry »

Tonight, Stephen Strasburg returned from Tommy John surgery to make his season debut for the Nationals. Here is a look at his Pitch FX speeds from tonight compared to one of his starts from last season. Read the rest of this entry »

And the crowd goes less indifferent.

Hello, America, and welcome to another heart-pounding installment of Leaderboards of Pleasure.

In this edition of the L to the O to the P, prepare to learn that:

• Torontonian Brett Lawrie is, scientifically speaking, the most entertaining player in all of baseball.

• Atlantan Jose Constanza is, scientifically speaking, pretty close to the most entertaining player in all of baseball.

• The term scientifically speaking is easy to abuse.

1. Team NERD Leaderboard
2. Underrated Player Leaderboard
3. Player NERD Leaderboard
4. Pitcher NERD Leaderboard

Read the rest of this entry »

To borrow a phrase from an inferior sport, I think it’s a slam dunk to do a follow-up on offseason overpay candidates with a column of those I feel might fly under the radar this winter. The same rules apply from last week’s column, but still feel free to nominate your own or openly question my sanity. I work for Carson Cistulli, so you can’t hurt my feelings. After all, coming up with under the radar candidates for free agency is harder than writing a Penny pitch f/x article, man.

Rich Harden – Oakland Athletics SP

Read the rest of this entry »

We’d like to meet you. In person. You know, get to know more about you and what makes you tick. What makes you smile, what numbers to dial.

So we’ve put together a low-key meetup for our friends in the Bay Area.

On Tuesday September 6th, around five pacific time, we’ll gather at the Gordon Biersch Brewery near the ballpark in San Francisco. Our friends at GB will be providing free appetizers, drink specials, and a private space for our nerdly conversations about baseball. We’ll have Stephen Strasburg’s debut on a television or two, at least until the Giants start their game against the Rockies. (In fact, if you want to come early, I’ll be at the bar for the beginning of that Nationals game.)

Attending the meetup will be the following studly dorks:

Grant Brisbee, proprietor of McCovey Chronicles and SBNation writer extraordinaire
Carson Cistulli, NotGraphs destroyer and FanGraphs poet-laureate
Patrick Newman, FanGraphs cameo provider and proprietor of NPBTracker.com
Eric Freeman, Ball Don’t Lie writer, founding member of The Classical and Giants fan
Eno Sarris, tender lover of beers, sandwiches and FanGraphs
Howard Bender, RotoGraphs writer and founder or SF Giants Report

Oh, and a message from Monsieur Cistulli: if someone is willing to house him for any period of time starting Sunday and ending Wednesday, he’s got a nice bottle of prosecco with your name on it. Get all the Cistulli you could want!

For a prospect who has spent the past four seasons steadily ranked between numbers 29 and 46 on Baseball America’s top-100, the discussion surrounding Arizona Diamondbacks pitching prospect Jarrod Parker has varied wildly. From Tommy John surgery, to questions surrounding his recovery, the past couple of years has brought more questions than answers about the young right-hander.

In mid-July, I had the opportunity to scout Jarrod Parker in Chattanooga against recent Dodgers call-up Nathan Eovaldi in a battle of mid-90s hurlers. And while Eovaldi burst back onto the prospect scene this season as one of the best starters in the Southern League, Parker was better. Using predominantly fastballs and changeups, Parker dominated the Lookouts allowing only one earned run and two hits over five innings pitched. The outing was impressive enough for me to rank him in the top-15 amongst players I’ve ever had the opportunity to scout.

Video after the jump.

Read the rest of this entry »

Going into this season, ZiPS projected Madison Bumgarner to have a 3.93 ERA and a 1.32 WHIP built on the back of a 5.84 K/9 and a 2.78 BB/9. It’s safe to say that he outdid those conservative numbers this year. Was this more about improvement or consolidation of talent? In other words, did Bumgarner say the same in the face of regression, or did he take fundamental steps forward this season?

Read the rest of this entry »

When a pitcher strikes out a lot of batters while keeping his home runs and walks allowed to a minimum, good things generally happen. Prior to this season, there were 31 occurrences of a season in which a starting pitcher threw at least 140 innings with a K/9 greater than 10.0 with a BB/9 less than 3.5 and a HR/9 below 1.0. The list includes some of the game’s greatest pitchers: Roger Clemens, Curt Schilling (3x), Sandy Koufax (2x), Nolan Ryan (4x), Pedro Martinez (4x), and Randy Johnson, who had nine (9!) such seasons. The list also includes some surprises like Jason Schmidt, Mike Scott, and Erik Bedard. Recently, we’ve seen Scott Kazmir, Justin Verlander, and Tim Lincecum (2x) put up these kind of seasons.

Zack Grienke (10.67 K/9, 2.16 BB/9, 1.02 HR/9) is close to joining the list; however, as of right now Brandon Morrow is the only pitcher in baseball on pace for membership to my arbitrary statistical club. After his start this weekend, Morrow has a K/9 of 10.41, a BB/9 of 3.45, and a HR/9 of 0.97.

There is one huge difference between the Toronto righty and the rest of the list.

Read the rest of this entry »