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

1. Featured Pitch: Luis Avilan’s Curve
2. Today’s Notable Games (Including MLB.TV Free Game)
3. Today’s Complete Schedule

Featured Pitch: Luis Avilan’s Curve
What Happened Yesterday
Yesterday, left-hander Luis Avilan pitched two perfect innings of relief for Atlanta in the 6-2 victory over the New York Nationals (box).

What Has Happened More Generally
More generally, Avilan, who pitched almost exclusively as a starter at Double-A Mississippi, has been an entirely proficient member of the Braves bullpen for two-plus months. To wit: 35.0 IP, 23.2% K, 7.3% BB, 45.7% GB, 3.15 SIERA, 90 xFIP-, 0.6 WAR, 5 SD, 1 MD.

How Avilan Has Done That
Avilan’s success is based largely on his curveball, on which pitch he has posted a 19.0% swinging-strike rate (relative to a league average of ca. 11%, according to work by Harry Pavlidis). Avilan’s curve has been worth close to four runs above average for every 100 he’s thrown.

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Something ridiculous happened. When ridiculous things happen, you’re often left wondering how much to worry about it, since, of course, it was ridiculous. It might be even more ridiculous to continue thinking about it.

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Craig Kimbrel is putting the finishing touches on one of the best reliever seasons in history. He has struck out 113 of his 226 batters faced this season, producing a 50% strikeout rate that nobody with 30+ innings in a season has matched or exceeded.

In fact, nobody has ever thrown 30+ innings with a 45% strikeout rate either. Kimbrel isn’t merely en route to establishing a new record. He is about to blow right by the existing record, which was set in 2003 by Eric Gagne. Gagne struck out 44.7% of the opposition in his Cy Young campaign. Only two other relievers have even topped 44% throughout history: Aroldis Chapman‘s 44.4% rate this season, and Kenley Jansen’s 44.0% rate last year. While relievers face such a small sample of batters, and another strikeout or two could materially affect the strikeout rates in question, Kimbrel still has a commanding lead. He has simply been unhittable this season and may have established the new benchmark for evaluating relief pitching performance in this era.

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Ben and Sam discuss whether the second wild card has made the stretch run more exciting, then talk about why papers publish columns that criticize advanced stats without making an effort to understand them.

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