Give this to Jeff Keppinger: he’s a long way from history. Keppinger, to date, has started 29 games for the White Sox, and he’s still searching for his first base on balls. That’s a long streak to start a season, but it’s far from the longest streak. Two years ago, Brent Morel of the same White Sox didn’t draw his first walk until start 33. In 2009, John McDonald went 35 consecutive starts without a walk. In 2003, it was 39 consecutive starts for Jose Molina. In 1995, Mariano Duncan didn’t walk until start 46. And blowing everybody else out of the water, there’s Rob Picciolo circa 1980. That year, Picciolo walked on October 2 and October 5. Through October 1, Picciolo had zero walks, 77 starts, 92 games, and 267 plate appearances. Picciolo’s streak isn’t out of Keppinger’s reach, since Keppinger’s streak is still active, but it’s not unlike thinking about a perfect game in the top of the fifth.

Give this to Jeff Keppinger: he isn’t the only player in baseball this year without a walk drawn. There’s also Jarrod Dyson, and Joe Mahoney, and Brent Lillibridge, and dozens and dozens of others. All the players without a walk have totaled 1,275 plate appearances. But 125 of those belong to Keppinger, and no one else without a walk has more than 31. Among the walkless, Jeff Keppinger has more than four times as many plate appearances as the runner-up.

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Hello friends, and welcome to the second part of the fifth edition of The Worst Of The Best. Apparently this is how I start these things now. The last edition of this was posted on April 26, and here’s a link to that, in case you want to know what you’re in for, before you’re actually in for it. The idea is to do these on a weekly basis, but there were no posts that went up last Friday. Why was that? None of your business! But to make up for the hiatus, this post will cover the last two weeks of baseball action, as was the case with the earlier post chronicling the wildest pitches.

So we’re looking at the top five wildest swings from April 26 through May 9, and by “wildest swings” I mean the swings at pitches furthest from the center of the strike zone. This always takes a lot more time to research than the wildest pitches post, because I have to exclude checked swings for this, and checked swings go in the PITCHf/x e-books as regular swings. Dear PITCHf/x: you might consider taking note of checked swings, versus full swings? Partial checked swings, versus checked swings that were still ruled strikes? It wouldn’t help many people, but it wouldn’t help no one. Anyway, here’s a post, with .gifs. I hope you like it, because that’s the whole point.

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Hello everybody, and, after a one-week hiatus, welcome to the first part of the fifth edition of The Worst Of The Best. Here is the first part of the fourth edition, from April 26. When we left off, I noted that I’d be out of town on the following Friday, and that I hadn’t yet decided whether the next edition of this would cover one week or two weeks. I decided this morning to go with two weeks, so that we don’t miss anything extraordinary from the time I was away. While that means we don’t get to fully explore the one week that just was, this way we’re sure to cover the most extreme pitches and, later, swings, and I care more about chronicling the most extreme than the not-quite-most extreme. That is a horribly-written sentence, but maybe 10% of this post’s audience are reading these introductory words.

So, the window considered: April 26 through May 9. We’re looking at the top five wildest pitches, as determined by distance from the center of the strike zone (at the front of the plate). It’s all based on the spectacular and imperfect PITCHf/x system, and if this is your first visit, prepare for .gifs, for so many .gifs. Personally I’m of the opinion that the Internet is presently experiencing .gif over-saturation, and there’s going to need to be an adjustment, but I don’t know any other way to present this material. If you’re wondering about pitches that just missed the cutoff, Zach McAllister came in sixth with a pitch thrown to Josh Donaldson on May 7. Phillippe Aumont came in seventh with a pitch thrown to Hunter Pence on May 8. But fret not: this isn’t the last you’ve heard of Phillippe Aumont, today. Onward and…upward? Downward? Onward.

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Truth be told, I don’t know all that much about Chris Cornell. Were I in charge of a massive Chris Cornell museum, I’d constantly be thinking to myself, “I don’t know how this happened.” But I know a few years ago, Cornell went solo and released an album that was a complete departure from his previous music. It sold, but people didn’t really like it that much, and before long Cornell was back to being Cornell again. Soundgarden released “King Animal” in 2012 and the solo album is just this weird thing that people remember. Maybe Cornell had to try it, just to see.

A little under a month ago, Dave Cameron wrote an article here titled “Adam Dunn’s Failed Experiment.” Dunn, of course, is one of the first guys you think of when you’re playing three-true-outcome free association, as he built a solid career upon dingers, walks, and strikeouts. Dunn was always a patient sort, but he got off to a miserable start in 2013, and that was accompanied by a curious uptick in aggressiveness. Cameron highlighted a quote showing that Dunn was going to be more aggressive on purpose. Dunn was pretty good in 2012, all things considered, and no one would’ve predicted him to try to change things up at 33, but he made a change and the early results were deplorable.

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I’ve often wondered what would happen if a group of umpires came together to make a call that was so obviously wrong, so over-the-top blatantly inaccurate as to be completely nonsensical. Like, what if a pitcher threw a pitch, and the batter grounded out, and the umpires signaled for an automatic double? Obviously, the defensive team’s manager would get ejected, and a bunch of other guys would probably get ejected too, but, then what? If the umpires all agree that the batter doubled, who steps in to prevent the double? Does the defensive team leave the field in protest? Are they then given a forfeit? Does the commissioner get involved? The commissioner would have to get involved. But this is a thought experiment — of course, something like this would never happen.

But, you know. There are bad calls every day. Some of them are dreadful. Inexplicably dreadful. And now we have one that even followed a video review. You already know all this by now, but Wednesday night in Cleveland, in a high-leverage spot, the umpiring team did something nonsensical, and shortly thereafter the A’s were handed another loss. At least, Oakland should’ve played a bottom of the ninth. They didn’t, and won’t.

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J.A. Happ got hit in the head by a line-drive comebacker. When the same thing happened to Doug Fister, he got lucky; when the same thing happened to Brandon McCarthy, he also got lucky, if you understand that “luck” can go both ways, like “accelerate.” Happ is fortunate in that he seems to be doing well, but the scene at the time was terrifying, with Happ on the ground and blood on his face. It was the kind of incident that makes you wonder if we’re going to see a player die, and it’s sparked back up the familiar debate regarding pitcher protection. This post isn’t about that, because there’s nothing new to be said. (It would be nice.) (Reality hasn’t yet matched up with the theory, in that no one’s yet invented anything worthwhile.)

This post is about the result of the play. Desmond Jennings was the player who drilled the line drive, and he wound up standing on third base with a two-run triple. A screenshot taken moments after ball-head impact:

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I know it’s not like me to use such a provocative, declarative headline. Truth be told, I’d be more comfortable with “Yuniesky Betancourt Hasn’t Changed a Bit, Probably”, just so I can cover all my bases. But here we are, and I think it needs to be said, on the heels of Betancourt slamming his eighth dinger of the still very young regular season. This is a time for sanity, in the midst of something very much insane.

The Blue Jays are 13-21, and John Buck has ten home runs. The Dodgers are 13-19, and Dexter Fowler has eight home runs. The Angels are 11-21, and Yuniesky Betancourt also has eight home runs. When something early in the season takes you by complete surprise, it’s worth re-evaluating your expectations, rather than sticking to your guns. But just because you re-evaluate doesn’t mean you have to change your position, and if Betancourt’s changed at 31 years old, it’s showing up in only one place.

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A year ago, one of baseball’s best individual player stories was Kris Medlen, of the Braves. Previously something of a forgotten man, Medlen threw 138 innings as a reliever and then as a starter, allowing just 26 runs and six dingers. The year before, Pirates sinkerballer Charlie Morton made a name for himself by starting 29 times and allowing just six dingers. The year before that, Brett Anderson was outstanding for the A’s when healthy, making 19 starts and riding his sinker while allowing just six dingers. This year, the Royals are looking like an early American League surprise, and one of their best arms out of the bullpen is Kelvin Herrera. But over just 14 games, Herrera has already allowed six dingers, his latest coming on Monday.

Maybe we don’t need to compare Herrera to other pitchers, who don’t have anything to do with him. As fun as it is to compare opposite extremes, if we want to make a point we need only compare Herrera to himself. Already in 2013, Herrera has seen six batted balls fly over the fence. Last season — over a full season — Herrera saw four batted balls do the same thing. Against 17% as many opposing hitters, Herrera has allowed 150% as many home runs, and that’s a thing for us to talk about.

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Monday night and Tuesday morning, the A’s and Angels played a game for the ages, a 19-inning affair that saw the hosts rally in the ninth and the 15th before walking off in the game’s seventh hour. The game featured 18 runs and nearly 600 pitches, and in the end, the A’s improved to 15-12, while the Angels fell to something much worse than that. Generally, such games are immediately thought of as turning points, and generally, such games don’t go on to work that way. But this was a game that few will forget, regardless, simply because the duration grew to be so extreme.

FanGraphs isn’t in the business of issuing game recaps, particularly several hours after the fact. But still, some attention to the game should be paid, and I’m electing to focus on a particular intentional ball. With two out in the top of the 11th inning, Grant Balfour intentionally walked Albert Pujols. We consider the 3-and-0 pitch.

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