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The Rangers’ Worst Swings Against Marco Estrada

October 6, 2016

When I used to come in to pitch, I’d take my eight warm-ups from the mound, and almost without fail I’d hear loud shouts from the other dugout that “this guy’s got nothing!” For the most part this was because they were right, I had nothing, I should’ve been terrible, but what I think kept me from being truly terrible was their own overconfidence. I was never the best pitcher on my team, and opponents would swing like I was the worst pitcher on my team, but thanks to that overeager aggressiveness, there were surprising numbers of clean whiffs and pop-ups. I was as surprised as they were, but at some point it stops being a fluke.

Marco Estrada is better than he’s ever been. When he was younger, he threw about a league-average fastball. Now he’s four ticks below the league mark. Marco Estrada is a finesse pitcher, and as a general rule, finesse pitchers are worse than non-finesse pitchers. But the best ones — they succeed in part because of their own abilities to locate, but they succeed also by turning hitters against their own selves. Power pitchers force a hitter to shorten up. Finesse pitchers tempt a hitter to lengthen. They tempt hitters to come out of their shoes, as if a 500-foot homer means more than its 400-foot equivalent. Facing a Marco Estrada is a test in self-discipline. As we’ve all experienced for ourselves, when pressure starts to mount, self-discipline can unravel.

Estrada dominated the Rangers on Thursday, Texas hitters frequently swinging out of their shoes. Even knocking Estrada around might not have done much: The Blue Jays won by nine runs. But Estrada came close to a complete-game road shutout, and his finesse-y repertoire worked out just peaches. Too often, the Rangers couldn’t help themselves but overswing. Here now are their five worst swings, along with one honorable mention.

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Rating All of the (Remaining) Playoff Teams

by Jeff Sullivan

October 6, 2016

Come playoff time, you tend to see a lot of team-to-team comparisons. And when you see team-to-team comparisons, the people doing the comparing frequently lean on regular-season statistics. And, you know, in theory that makes plenty of sense. Those numbers are readily available all over the place, and, isn’t the regular season a hell of a sample? Doesn’t the regular season pretty adequately reflect the level of talent on a given roster?

I’m not going to argue that regular-season numbers are or aren’t more important than, say, postseason numbers. The regular season obviously has the biggest and therefore the most meaningful sample. But as should go without saying, things change come October. Rosters are optimized, and usage patterns shift. For example, during the year, Rangers hitters had a 98 wRC+. Rangers hitters on the roster today averaged a weighted 106 wRC+. During the year, Rangers relievers had a 100 ERA-. Rangers relievers expected to relieve in the playoffs averaged a weighted 75 ERA-. The Rangers aren’t what they were for six months. No team is, entirely. So what do we have now? What does the actual, weighted playoff landscape look like?

Time for some tables of numbers. That’s almost as fun as actual baseball!

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Madison Bumgarner and the Crazy Path to Cooperstown

by Dave Cameron

October 6, 2016

Last night, during Madison Bumgarner’s latest playoff masterpiece, someone asked me in our live blog whether Bumgarner’s postseason heroics have already been great enough to get him into the conversation about potential Hall of Fame pitchers, even though he’s obviously far short on regular season totals. And there’s no question that Bumgarner’s playoff numbers are staggering; he’s now thrown 97 1/3 innings with a 1.94 ERA, good for a 53 ERA-. He’s already thrown three complete game shutouts in his postseason career; the all-time Major League record is four. Bumgarner has already cemented himself as one of the best playoff pitchers in history, and he’s still just 27.

But while we’re all rightfully marveling at Bumgarner’s dominance today, it’s worth remembering that, for whatever reason, the current crop of Hall of Fame voters have shown no interest in enshrining quality starting pitchers, even ones with similarly unbelievable postseason numbers. For comparison, here’s Bumgarner’s career postseason numbers compared with those of Curt Schilling.

Bumgarner and Schilling

Pitcher	Innings	H/9	HR/9	BB%	K%	ERA-
Bumgarner	97.3	6.2	0.65	5%	22%	53
Schilling	133.3	7.0	0.81	5%	23%	50

If Bumgarner throws another 40 innings at his current postseason pace, he’ll essentially match what Schilling did during his postseason career. Except Schilling also threw 3,261 excellent regular season innings, worth +80 WAR by FIP (#20 all-time) and +81 WAR (#32 all-time) by runs allowed. And the BBWAA members with Hall of Fame ballots haven’t cared at all.

In 2013, Schililng’s first year on the ballot, he got 39% of the vote. As the ballot got more crowded, he dropped to 29% in 2014, then bounced back to 39% in 2015. Last year, encouragingly, he got up to 52% of the vote, which puts him within striking distance of the 75% needed. Most guys who get over 50% within their first few years eventually get in, so Schilling has a shot at getting inducted.

But think about what we’d require from Bumgarner to get to Schilling’s career numbers. Not only does he have to throw 40 more amazing innings in the postseason, he’s almost 2,000 regular season innings behind; we’d basically need him to keep throwing 200 innings per year for the next ten years. And it’s not like Bumgarner got a late start on his career; he debuted at 19, and would still need to be throwing 200 innings per year at age 36 in order to get up to Schilling’s career innings total, without any injuries between now and then.

And if Bumgarner does that, his closest statistical comparison would be the kind of guy that voters kind of shrug their shoulders at, not sure whether he was worthy of the Hall of Fame or not. That’s just nuts.

Bumgarner, at this point, has more work to do to put himself in Hall of Fame consideration. He just hasn’t pitched enough at this point to be a strong candidate. But there’s no question that he’s put together one of the best postseason resumes we’ve ever seen, and if he remains a quality pitcher for most of the next decade, how could we possibly deny him entry?

But that’s what we’re doing to Schilling. If you’re awed by Bumgarner’s October dominance — and you should be — then you should support Curt Schilling for the Hall of Fame. I know he’s not the most likable guy in the world, but the Hall of Fame is for honoring the greatest players of all time, and Schilling was one of those. When you watch Bumgarner pitch, remember that Schilling was just as good for even longer, and then lobby your favorite Hall of Fame voter to recognize the guy who was doing this before Bumgarner came along.

Madison Bumgarner, Yoenis Cespedes, and Two Extremes

by August Fagerstrom

October 6, 2016

Johnny Cueto may have had the better 2016 regular season, but when the calendar flips to October, Madison Bumgarner becomes the unquestioned ace of the San Francisco Giants — their most important player. The postseason legend of Bumgarner grew last night, thanks to a complete game shutout in a 3-0 victory against the New York Mets at Citi Field in the National League’s Wild Card play-in game.

No Met hit better than Yoenis Cespedes this season, and Neil Walker, the only position player who accrued more value according to WAR, has been out since the end of August with a back injury that required surgery. Cespedes was the Mets’ most important position player last night, and he also had a team-worst -.101 Win Probability Added, going 0-for-4 with two strikeouts, helping to strand two of the only six batters Bumgarner allowed to reach base.

In a showdown between the Giants’ best pitcher and the Mets’ best position player, the most important showdown, Bumgarner won by KO in four rounds. And he did it by putting his hand on the “approach” lever and pushing it all the way toward the extreme.

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Eno Sarris Baseball Chat — 10/6/16

by Eno Sarris

October 6, 2016

1:40	Eno Sarris: not beautiful like Thor vs Bum, but this has it’s own kind of beauty