Eric Seidmen wrote an interesting article last Thursday about Atlanta reliever Craig Kimbrel’s historic strikeout pace. So far, Kimbrel is sporting a blistering 42.7% strikeout rate (K%). Even for a relief pitcher in this era, that’s incredibly impressive. But one person who commented on the story noted that there was a non-reliever approaching the same level of whiff greatness (i.e. > 30% strikeout rate).

Nationals phenom Stephen Strasburg has thrown 182 innings in the big leagues and has struck out 32.5% of the batters he’s faced. No starting pitcher who lasted any significant amount of time ever finished his career with a strikeout rate higher than 30%. The closest  is Randy Johnson and his 28.5% strikeout rate. This season, Strasburg has a 33% strikeout rate. If he were to maintain that pace, he’d be the 10th starting pitcher in history to achieve the feat and would have the 23rd such season since 1916. But take a look at that list and you’ll note that the oldest instance came back in 1984.

The problem we run into with strikeouts — like many statistics in baseball — is that the playing environment has changed over time.

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In this, their long-overdue rebuilding year, the Chicago Cubs have redefined terrible on the North Side. They currently sport an Major League Baseball-low 24 wins and have a dreadful duo of punchless offense and impotent pitching.

But they are not without trade chips as they approach a dark second half. Bryan LaHair and Jeff Samardzija — who possess an attractive blend of affordability and upside — and Ryan Dempster, Geovany Soto and David DeJesus will all get a number of inquiries as the deadline approaches. But the team is particularly eager to sell one asset more quickly than the others. His name is Alfonso Soriano.

Signed to a double-albatross contract — awarding the 36-year-old an $18 million salary through 2012, 2013 and 2014 — Soriano has no hopes of playing at a value commensurate with his income. However, he’s not without his strengths, and for certain teams looking for a power-hitting righty, Soriano might be the right fit.
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In Tuesday night’s game against the Tampa Bay Rays, Nationals’ manager Davey Johnson asked home plate umpire Tim Tschida to examine the glove right-hander Joel Peralta for foreign substances.

Peralta was subsequently ejected for having pine tar on his glove.

This is not new. Baseball has a long history of players skirting around the rulebook in hopes of gaining an edge on their opponent. Whether it is spitting on the baseball, taking performance-enhancing drugs, corking bats, cutting the baseball, or even just (allegedly) having a man in white standing in the outfield bleachers, cheating is as much a tradition in baseball as hot dogs and cracker jacks.

As they say, if ya ain’t cheatin’, ya ain’t tryin’.

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Episode 198
David Laurila, curator of FanGraphs’ Q&A Series, talks with Washington Nationals reliever Brad Lidge about playing with a pair of phenoms, great sliders of yore, and the prospect of reading War and Peace.

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 15 min. play time.)

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Many people expected the Nationals to be legitimate contenders this season for the first time since moving to town, but I don’t think many expected them to have the second best record in baseball more than one-third of the way through the campaign. The Nats came into Wednesday’s action with a 37-23 record to go along with their +38 run differential, the fifth best mark in the game. They’ve relied on utterly dominant starting pitching so far, riding a staff that owns baseball’s best ERA (2.94), FIP (3.15), and WAR (8.3).

Great starting pitching only goes so far though, and Washington is really lacking in the run creation department. Their offense owns a .307 wOBA (sixth worst in MLB) and a 90 wRC+ (seventh worst) through their first 60 games, resulting in a 3.90 runs per game average that is the second lowest among teams with a .500+ winning percentage. Bryce Harper has been nothing short of brilliant so far — 153 wRC+ and 1.3 WAR through 172 PA — and Michael Morse’s recent return from the disabled list should provide a boost as well.

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Bryce Harper may have added to his legend with his game-winning hit in the Nationals’ 7-6 extra-innings victory over the Mets yesterday, but Ian Desmond’s night at the plate was more remarkable, according to Win Probability Added (WPA). Not only was Desmond’s game-tying double earlier in the final inning worth more WPA than Harper’s game-winning hit (.380 to .349), but his total WPA for the game was 1.017.

That’s right — Desmond’s contributions were worth more than one “win” according to WPA. Of course, that’s a bit of a deceptive way of saying it. WPA is measuring the shift in “probability” or “certainty” of winning given the relative score, inning, base/out state, and run environment. In a game like yesterday’s, with many ties that were broken, plus extra innings (any one of which could have been the final inning), there are even more opportunities for big WPA events. Thus, Desmond got additional big boosts from his game-tying single in the bottom of the eighth as well as his run-scoring reached on error in the bottom of the tenth.

How often do hitters end up with a single-game WPA over 1? Not often, but according to our database, it has happened 42 times in the regular season since 1974. In fact, Desmond’s big game is only the 35th highest score on the list. Each has a story, but here are three that I have picked out semi-randomly.

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The fact that Bryce Harper got to the Major Leagues at age 19 is pretty remarkable, as not many players are talented enough to earn the call to the bigs before they turn 20. The ones that do stick around usually don’t perform all that well, showing flashes of ability but getting overmatched on a more regular basis. Harper, though, is not only holding his own against big league pitchers, he’s threatening to put up the best offensive season by a 19-year-old in the history of baseball.

In his first 121 plate appearances of his career, Harper is hitting .286/.372/.514, good for a .376 wOBA and a 138 wRC+. Here’s where those numbers rank on the all-time top 10 for 19-year-olds:

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The Peter Bourjos trade rumors have started to circulate again. The primary discussant in the linked article is the Nationals, but the Royals, Diamondbacks, and Blue Jays are also mentioned. With super-prospect Mike Trout in the majors, the Angels already having something of an outfield crunch and Bourjos flat-lining on offense so far this season, there is a surface rationality to the idea of trading him. Let’s briefly look at how Bourjos might fit into the plans of the teams allegedly interested in Bourjos before turning to the question of how this makes sense (or nonsense) for the Angels.

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It wasn’t the way the Nationals envisioned it, but nevertheless, Bryce Harper has graduated to The Show. With Ryan Zimmerman heading to the disabled list for the second straight season, the team was looking to put an impact bat, as well as perhaps shift the focus away from Zimmerman’s injury, and thus Harper gets the call.

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Last night, the Tampa Bay Rays connected for four home runs against Ervin Santana. It was the fifth time this year that a pitcher has allowed 4+ home runs in a single outing – the other notable hurlers to get bombed are Clay Buchholz (5 vs NYY), Josh Beckett (5 vs DET), Tommy Hunter (4 vs TOR), and Yovanni Gallardo (4 vs STL). Even as we head towards the third straight Year of the Pitcher, there are still nights where quality pitchers just don’t locate very well and pay the price for it.

That’s what makes what the Washington Nationals are currently doing so amazing. You’ve probably noticed that their pitching has been very good and has propelled them to a 13-4 record, the best mark in the National League. What you may not have heard is that the Nationals have a chance of establishing a new standard for home run prevention in a given month.

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