One of the oldest truisms in baseball is that, to be successful, pitchers need to pitch inside. Establishing the inside of the plate allows pitchers to more effectively use the outer-half of the plate — and get batters to swing and miss or make weak contact more often on pitches thrown to the outer part of the zone. But it isn’t easy to pitch inside. Pitchers who lack the ability to get away with throwing inside tend to stay away from that part of the plate for fear that hitters will drive those pitches for extra-base hits. This can lead to hitters cheating on outside pitches and can force pitchers to throw fatter pitches as a result of throwing behind in the count.

So who were this year’s best pitchers when it came to throwing inside? I dove into our PITCHf/x data and found out.

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The Detroit Tigers won 88 games in the regular season, tied for the least of all the playoff teams, and good for seventh in the American League. They advanced despite winning fewer games than both the Angels and the Rays. Based only on that, you’d assume that the Tigers are a team with vulnerabilities, and indeed, vulnerabilities they’ve got. Infield defense is a known weakness, although so far in the playoffs Jhonny Peralta has decided to just play all positions at the same time. And then there’s the bullpen. There’s a lot of chatter these days about the Detroit Tigers’ bullpen.

And there’s chatter for a reason. In Game 2 of the ALDS against the A’s, the Tigers’ bullpen gave away a late lead. In Game 4 of the ALDS, the bullpen did the same thing. In Game 1 of the ALCS, a 4-0 lead in the ninth turned into a 4-4 tie in the tenth. The Tigers, clearly, have survived, winning their first series and winning the first two games of their second, but now there’s a lot of distrust. There’s a lot of pressure on the Tigers’ starters, because people are wary of the relievers behind them.

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Episode 259
Are this season’s playoffs too dramatic? Managing editor Dave Cameron’s answer might shock you — although, probably only if you’re easily shocked. Also asked: Why does everyone hate A-Rod so hard? And: Are the Cardinals magic?

Don’t hesitate to direct pod-related correspondence to @cistulli on Twitter.

You can subscribe to the podcast via iTunes or other feeder things.

Audio after the jump. (Approximately 31 min. play time.)

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Chris Carpenter is going to take the hill for St. Louis tonight in Game Two of the NLCS. During the game, you’re going to hear about Carpenter’s postseason track record — it’s very good — and about how he’s come back for the playoffs after missing most of the season. Carpenter is both often excellent and often injured, so those are the two things he is understandably most famous for.

But, perhaps there’s one other thing that Chris Carpenter should be well known for, because he’s probably better at this than he is at just about anything else – shutting down the running game.

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For a team that won 89 games, the Angels have a decent number of holes to fill this offseason. There is a good core there, but questions about the rotation and the kerfuffle about Vernon Wells could make this a particular trying situation for Angels’ fans.

Let’s start with Wells. Here’s what Alden Gonzalez had to say about it in his season wrap:

“[Torii Hunter] really wants to come back, and may do so for about half his 2012 salary ($18 million) on a one- or two-year deal. But his return will hinge on whether [Angels general manager Jerry] Dipoto is able to shed Vernon Wells, who’s owed $21 million over the next two seasons, and what he decides with regard to the young, high-upside Peter Bourjos.”

The Angels’ reluctance to kick Wells to the curb is maddening. That it could also cost them a chance to get back Hunter is downright infuriating. Not only is Hunter the type of team leader and universally regarded good guy that every team will want this winter, but he is also coming off a good season as well. And while he may want to come back, he isn’t going to need to wait by the phone all winter waiting for Dipoto to call.

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As the Red Sox get ready to begin contract negotiations with David Ortiz, they can relax comfortable in the knowledge that money will not be an issue in the negotiations. All Ortiz really wants is respect. That should make things pretty simple, right?

Jokes aside, “respect” probably translates to money plus multiple years, say, two. Ortiz is going to turn 37 next month, so he probably is not planning on playing too much longer. Ortiz was not very happy about not being offered multiple years last off-season, so he probably is not going to readily settle for just one this time around.

After a down year in 2009, Ortiz began to bounce back in 2010, and was even better in 2011 and the first part of 2012 (in the 90 games in which he appeared prior to his season ending due to injury). It is the 2011 and 2012 seasons that are of particular interest here, not only because these excellent performances are the most recent and relevant data with respect to his true talent, but because of the unusual way Ortiz went about doing it. This adds to the already complicated matter of figuring out how good a hitter Ortiz can be expected to be over the next couple of seasons given his age, and thus, how much the Red Sox (or other potential suitors) should be willing to invest in him.

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Ben and Sam catch up on the Yankees-Tigers ALCS and Ben’s beat-writing adventures, then talk about why players and stats disagree about the difficulty of pitching on short rest, and Jim Leyland’s comments about closers.

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The St. Louis Cardinals have a ferocious offense, capable of putting up runs in bunches against any pitcher in baseball. So, on one hand, the fact that they torched Madison Bumgarner for six runs and chased him from the game in the fourth inning can simply be chalked up to a good opponent. On the other hand, the lousy performance was the continuation of a six week trend, and there are reasons to think that perhaps Bumgarner has worn down over the course of the season.

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Table of Contents
Here’s the table of contents for today’s edition of Daily Notes.

1. Contract Crowdsourcing: An Introduction
2. Contract Crowdsourcing: Catchers
3. Today’s One Playoff Game

Contract Crowdsourcing: An Introduction
A Thing That’s a Fact
A totally true fact is that free agency this year begins a mere five days after the end of the World Series — at which point, major- and minor-league free agents may sign contracts with teams other than their former clubs.

Another Thing That’s a Fact
Another thing that’s a fact is how, despite clearly lacking all taste so far as books and films are concerned, is how the Crowds possess a certain Wisdom wherein estimating figures is concerned — like the weight of a slaughtered and dressed ox, for example.

The Only Obvious Conclusion
The only obvious conclusion one is permitted to draw from the true facts above is that the Crowds might be particularly well-suited to estimating the contract year and dollar-value amounts this offseason’s notable free agents are likely to receive.

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If there’s good news for the New York Yankees, it’s that, while they’re behind two games to zero to the Detroit Tigers in the ALCS, they haven’t yet started CC Sabathia. The flip side of that, though, is that the Tigers haven’t yet started Justin Verlander, and they’re about to, in Tuesday’s Game 3. The series is by no means over, as the Giants demonstrated in the Division Series round against the Reds, but it’s a little Verlander dominance away from feeling over, and Verlander is frequently dominant. Given the losses and the struggles and the Derek Jeter injury, these are challenging times for the Empire.

In Sunday’s Game 2, the Yankees were shut out 3-0 by Anibal Sanchez and the Tigers’ bullpen. This was a game in which Hiroki Kuroda was perfect through five innings, and still he never pitched with a lead. The Yankees, during the regular season, had the best team offense in baseball. It’s largely gone missing in the playoffs, and though they say pitching and defense wins championships, you also need at least a little hitting too. Sunday, the Yankees had none of it.

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