It’s amazing to consider, but some major league regulars are yet to take ball four and their free base. Okay, I lied, it’s not “some” as much as “a pair”. Mariners shortstop Yuniesky Betancourt and Giants backstop Bengie Molina have appeared at the plate a collective 100 times entering Wednesday’s games, and combined had zero walks. Zero intentional walks, zero hit by pitches, etc.

Neither of them are all too fond of OBP boosting. Molina’s career BB% is 4.1% and Betancourt’s is 3%.

In fact, Betancourt’s career high in walks in a single season is 17, the same number that current walk champion Adam Dunn had entering Wednesday’s games. Yeah, he really is that impatient.

Given Betancourt’s distaste for the walk, it’s no surprise that he’s only seen four counts go to three balls, with only one of those being a non-full count. Heck, this isn’t even Betancourt’s longest dry spell in the past calendar year. Last season, from April 29th until May 28th Betancourt went 103 plate appearances in between walks.
Remember, this is a hitter with a career batting average of .283, slugging percentage of .401, and .301 batting average on balls in play. This is not Ichiro Suzuki or Vladimir Guerrero, this is a below average hitter refusing to take a free base. When combined with poor defense, it’s easy to see why most Mariner fans would enjoy seeing Ronny Cedeno starting at shortstop.

Players can be offensive contributors without walking like Dunn or Pat Burrell, but not walking at all makes it nearly impossible. Of the 33 players with 5% or less walks this season, 24 have negative wrAA. Here’s a look at how the two are correlating thus far:

And there you see our pals Molina and Betancourt, both spared too much ridicule, thanks to decent slugging percentages thus far.

One of the talking points buried in last weekend’s Rays/White Sox series is the difference in organizational philosophies. More specifically, pitching philosophies.

Over the years, the White Sox have established the cut-fastball as their “add-on” pitch of choice. John Danks , Mark Buerhle, and D.J. Carrasco amongst others throw the cutter thanks to the help of pitching coach Don Cooper. The Rays on the other hand are an organizational that preaches the way of the change-up. James Shields is notorious for helping teammates like Scott Kazmir, David Price, and even Troy Percival refine their grips on perhaps baseball’s most practical pitch.

Going beyond that “add-on” pitch, the two teams have a similar outlook on what makes for a good relief staff.

Dave covered the Rays bullpen a few days ago. Describing them as a unit that “throws feathers” due to the lack of hard throwers. The White Sox are perhaps the antithesis of that philosophy. This year, the Rays’ bullpen throws an average fastball of 87 miles per hour, easily the lowest group total in the league. The White Sox’ pen is closer to 92 miles per hour. Last year the Rays finished second to last in combined fastball velocity while the Sox lead the league.

With the exception of Grant Balfour, the rest of the Rays pen throws sub-90 heaters. On the flip side, the White Sox have three relievers who routinely hit 92-94, three who sit 89-91, and one who sits around 87-89. If Brian Shouse and Matt Thornton ever get into a paper ball throwing match, I know who I want on my side.

It’s pretty fascinating that two teams can entirely different approaches to assembling and teaching pitchers while experiencing success in such techniques.

Zack Greinke last allowed an earned run on September 13th. Since then he’s made five starts, 34 innings, and allowed zip. During that time Greinke has posted some impressive lines:

9/18 Mariners 7 IP 7 K 1 BB 2 LD
9/23 Tigers 7 IP 4 K 2 BB 5 LD
4/8 White Sox 6 IP 7 K 3 BB 2 LD
4/13 Indians 5 IP 9 K 2 BB 5 LD
4/18 Rangers 9 IP 10 K 0 BB 6 LD

Quite a few things have been different for Greinke. Greinke is hardly walking anyone, yet only 42% of his pitches are being registered as in the strike zone. Part of the reason he is avoiding the free pass is thanks to an impressive 64% first pitch strike rate. Throw in a decreased contact rate, and it’s pretty clear that Greinke has good stuff.

The most notable change in pitch usage has been the increased presence of Greinke’s curveball. Since 2007, his curve has went from 8% usage to 14% to 18%. Along with a slider and change-up, Greinke has scaled down his fastball usage. Intriguingly, his fastball has seen an improvement in horizontal movement since doing so, gaining almost an entire inch of movement inwards to righties. Greinke’s curve has a violent break and his ability to control the speed of it is quite impressive. It’s been measured as low as 60 MPH and as high as 85.

Give Dayton Moore some points for getting Greinke signed to an extension last off-season.

When Seattle and Tampa Bay open their three-game series on Tuesday night, it will mark a match-up of the two best defensive teams in the majors. At least when measured by team UZR. Some would say the Mariners are following a similar path to the Rays of 2007 and 2008; going from a poor team defensive to one of the best in the league within one off-season.

Seattle’s surge has been lead by your current UZR king, Franklin Gutierrez, Endy Chavez, and Adrian Beltre. Meanwhile another newcomer, Ronny Cedeno, has taken kindly to an all encompassing utility role, producing positive UZR in left and at second base in about 30 innings of work.

Meanwhile, defense is apparently unwelcome in the general Washington D.C. area. The nationals and Orioles make up the two worst defenses to date. That seems a bit surprising in Baltimore’s case, given an extremely athletic outfield and shortstop Cesar Izturis. Bizarrely all four register as negatives thus far, but we’ll see how long that lasts.

Speaking of improved defenses, let’s hear it for the Texas Rangers and Jon Daniels. Nelson Cruz, Chris Davis, Ian Kinsler, Josh Hamilton, Omar Vizquel, and Hank Blalock are all rated as average or slightly above, with Cruz tying Gutierrez for the overall UZR lead. The Rangers worst defender has been Michael Young, who isn’t taking to third base as quickly as the Rangers would’ve hoped.

The Padres haven’t showcased much range (-4 RngR) yet when they have fielded balls, they’ve converted them into outs, as showcased by a positive ErrR.

Minnesota’s outfield boasts one Delmon Young, who has gunned down plenty a baserunner in his day, but still they have the lowest combined ARM rating in the league. Atlanta leads the league in ARM.

Not much has went right for the Yankees thus far, but their infield has been silky smooth at flipping double plays, a far cry from the Phillies, who, along with the Cardinals and Royals, have fewer than -1 run earned through DPs.

The new Yankee Stadium will likely witness many a great moment over its lifeline, but yesterday was hardly how the boys in pinstripes hoped to christen the field. The Yankees trailed by one until the fifth when Jorge Posada homered, marking the first homerun in the new park and the first Yankee run, run batted in, and Yankee to touch all four bases in a game that counts.

Insane went the crowd.

Then the bullpen happened. Or, more specifically, this happened:

The crowd went insane.

Of course, this is a non-story that will be blown out of proportion until the Yankees win tomorrow or the next day, or whenever they finally win in the new park. The only reason I’m even contributing to the coverage is to highlight one specific incident; the chant of “We want Swisher!” by the Yankees faithful.

Yesterday a commenter asked about Tim Lincecum’s delivery since it appeared different. Well, after random sampling two of Lincecum’s starts last year and comparing them to this year’s starts, it’s safe to say his release point has indeed changed. Take a look for yourself:

Not by as much as I originally thought, but there still appears to be a conscious (or perhaps unconscious?) effort to lower his release point. There are also that set of dots way out there from the pack in which I have no idea what was going on with Lincecum, but it likely was nothing good.

Since I already had the Pitchfx hat on, I figured a glance at how Lincecum’s pitches were moving was worth the effort. They seem to be riding in to righties more and as mentioned yesterday the velocity is down a few ticks. Not sure if this should be cause for concern or not, perhaps it’s entirely intentional for Lincecum to have more break on his pitches and less velocity. Or maybe it’s just an anomaly that will soon be forgotten.

That added movement could explain his control issues though. If Lincecum’s grown accused tom topping out three to five inches of movement inward to right-handed hitters, and suddenly the ball is dancing five-to-seven inches it’s easy to understand why he’s missing the zone a bit more often.

Let’s see how Lincecum fares in his next few starts.

The defending NL Cy Young winner, Tim Lincecum, is going through a rough stretch to start this season. Only eight and a third innings through two starts for Lincecum – who averaged closer to seven innings per appearance last season – and his ability stats are off. Sure, he’s struck 10 batters out, yet he’s also walked six with only one of those being of the intentional kind.

Lincecum’s batted ball data suggests not much of a change, he’s getting more infield flyballs than ever, and also allowing more homeruns with only a slight bump in the amount of flyballs given up. The most worrisome aspects for Lincecum are his downed velocity. His fastball is averaging 92.8 MPH, a mild drop from this 94.1 career average. Lincecum’s slider has also dropped about MPH, his curve has dropped by closer to three, and his change has remained static. It is worth noting that during Lincecum’s last start he did top out in the 96 MPH range.

This isn’t a Daniel Cabrera or Scott Olsen situation, but still, for a pitcher coming off a huge workload, people are going to start wondering and rumoring. Remember all of those whispers about Lincecum’s durability around draft day? If he has a few more rough starts, expect those to creep up again, albeit perhaps unfairly.

At this point, it looks like a command issue more than anything; only ~45% of Lincecum’s pitches are in the zone and he’s only registering 39% first-pitch strikes, copare that to career averages of 50% and 58% and there’s a world of difference. Whether it continues or not is something worth watching, but don’t be surprised if Lincecum fails to match his 2008 season this year, or any year in the future.

Not having a long reliever sometimes comes back to bite you on the behind. Last night, the Yankees found this out, but were not the only ones red in the face.

The starting first baseman, Nick Swisher, took over pitching duties in the bottom of the 8th and did the unthinkable, he struck a major league hitter out…via swinging strike. The unlucky victim was Gabe Kapler. Needless to say, Kapler probably won’t be living this down anytime soon. Take a look at Swisher’s pitches and their movement:

Sure, he topped out in the low-80’s (80.2 MPH exactly), but he’s got better stuff than some pitchers. Daniel Cabrera, for instance.

Of course I’m joking, but only a by a bit.

Juan Morillo is 25-years-old with an average fastball velocity near 97 miles per hour. As far as baseball chances go, the only thing that Morillo could do to make himself more endearing to a long-term career – minus becoming a good pitcher – is to throw left-handed. With that said, Morillo has been designated for assignment by the Colorado Rockies, meaning some team can claim the power arm, throw him into their pen, and attempt to spark the potential for essentially no cost.

So is Morillo worth some burn this season?

In 2008 Morillo threw about 60 innings for the Rockies Triple-A team, striking out an impressive 55 and walking 56. That’s not a typo, he actually walked more than he struck out. In 2007 and Double-A, with about the same workload, Morillo struck 59 batters out and walked 27. As a starter in 2006 (again in Double-A) Morillo fanned 132 and walked 80. Control? Not much here, but velocity! And strikeouts!

Morillo certainly has a live arm, let’s look at some of his stuff through the lens of Pitchfx.

That’s from Morillo’s lone appearance last year so there’s some small sample bias, but this is actually his only outing available. The most noticeable issue here is the lack of movement on his fastball. Vertically the pitch resembles a sinker – in fact Gameday classified a few pitches as sinkers – but horizontally it barely moves. Having little movement vertically and horizontally is not a good mixture, even when you throw extremely hard.

Add in an inconsistent release point and questionable control and Morillo’s only asset is his ability to make radar guns flicker like streetlights.

Let’s take a look at some of the notable pitching performances from yesterday. Take the numbers presented with a grain of salt – it is only one game after all – but it was a grand day for pitching storylines.

It might be safe to say Chris Carpenter is healthy, for now at least. Yesterday, Carpenter made his 2009 debut, throwing seven innings of one-hit ball against the Pittsburgh Pirates. Carpenter threw 92 pitches, inducing swinging strikes on 14 of those, about 15% while using his all of his pitches pretty well. Encouraging processes and results here.

Rick Porcello made his shortly-awaited major league debut. Five innings, 89 pitches, a walk, four strikeouts, and two homeruns allowed. Outside of the homeruns, Porcello did manage to get quite a bit of groundballs. Used his change and curve along with a ton of fastballs. Three swinging strikes, one on a curve.

A.J. Burnett’s first win as a Yankee as they avoid a sweep. Five and a third innings, six strikeouts, a walk, and a homerun. Tons of fastballs (averaged about 96 miles per hour, topped out near 98) and curveballs. A long third inning prevented Burnett from going deeper, although it did allow the Yankees to get Mariano Rivera some work.

Jarrod Washburn(!) went eight, as did Glenn Perkins, both striking out four and allowing five hits. The difference: Washburn gave up no runs, while Perkins gave up one. I guess Franklin Gutierrez and Endy Chavez are paying off already for Seattle.

Matt Garza gained notoriety for his performance in the ALCS against the Red Sox and faced off with them again yesterday. Seven innings, five Ks, and three walks were good enough for the win, as Daisuke Matsuzaka lasted five and a third, yielding three walks and three homeruns.

Kyle Davies and John Danks played dueling banjos through seven and six respectively, giving up three hits each and a few walks. Davies struck eight out, but found himself in the no decision barn right alongside Danks as the Royals edged the Southsiders.