Pitchers Swinging The Lumber
Chris Carpenter had himself some kind of afternoon. In his final tune-up for the postseason, he threw five shutout innings at the Reds, allowing just four base runners and striking out six batters in the process. But that’s not all that unusual for Carpenter, whose dominance is one of the main reasons the Cardinals are going to the playoffs.
It is Carpenter’s bat that got him noticed today. In the first inning, he came up with the bases loaded and deposited a Kip Wells pitch into the seats for a grand slam home run that put his team up 5-0. Then, in the fifth inning, he came up with runners at first and second and doubled them both in, giving himself six RBI on the day.
Carp became the seventh pitcher since 1954 to drive in six runners in a game. The other notable big hitting pitcher games?
Tony Cloninger, July 3rd, 1966. 3-5, 2 HR, 9 RBI.
Robert Person, June 2nd, 2002. 2-3, 2 HR, 7 RBI.
Micah Owings, August 18th, 2007. 4-5, 2 HR, 6 RBI.
Blue Moon Odom, May 4th, 1969. 3-3, 2B, HR, 6 RBI.
Dave Giusti, August 21st, 1966. 2-4, 2 2B, 6 RBI.
Babe Birrer, July 19th, 1955. 2-2, 2 HR, 6 RBI.
Cloninger’s game is easily the most impressive, as both of his home runs were grand slams, and he threw a complete game to boot. Talk about winning a game by yourself.
Perhaps the most amazing performance belongs to Birrer, however. He came into the game as a relief pitcher, and worked four innings. When he went to the ballpark, he was not scheduled to play. He went home having pitched four shutout innings and launching a pair of home runs. He only recorded one other hit in his major league career.
Dave is the Managing Editor of FanGraphs.
Hitting a HR off of Kip Wells is not impressive.
discrediting a pitcher hitting a home run is not impressive.
Yes it is. Even if you’re Albert Pujols.
When you hit a home run you do something that only (on avg) happens a couple of times per game. Which is an impressive feat.
Let’s see you do it!
I was at the Robert Person game. The man took the axiom “swing hard in case you hit it” very seriously.
I was stranded in a small airport in NJ watching that game. Back in the good ol’ days when Robert Person was our ace…
In a 7-inning high school game, I was 4-4 with 3 HR and a single with 9 RBI. I also threw a complete game on the mound. We won 9-8. I wasn’t a great pitcher, the opposing pitchers were even worse, and the field was very small (though the HR were fairly legit). I should have retired after that game.
Are you sure you’re not talking about that one time when you imagined you were a real baseball player?
The reliever’s performance is most impressive. Could you see David Wells doing something like that on a day where he wasn’t scheduled to pitch? Ok David Wells is a bad example for anything involving human motion, but still doing something cold turkey is always harder.
Micah Owings is an animal with the bat in his hands. I wasn’t surprised to see him make the list at all. He has a .325 wOBA this year…man, he’d bat middle of the order for the Giants. I wouldn’t be surprsied to see Zambrano make it at some point, either.
He needs to Ankiel it up and head back to the minors, become an outfielder. If he learns how to take a walk, he could be a productive hitter; he hits it hard when he makes contact.
FYI, he generated more value in 2009 as a hitter then as a pitcher. A reverse Tony Pena Jr. of sorts.
He’s looked bad this year, but if he can get his walks down, he probably can add a good win or so with his bat above the average pitcher. All he has to do is be a mediocre pitcher with his hitting talent. If he can do that, he can then get his pitcher PA’s and get 25 or so pinch-hit appearances a year and be pretty good.
He’s been a AAA pitcher posing as an MLB’r in 2009, though. To be useful at all, he needs to be at least #5 starter quality.
Owings’ FIP/WAR:
2007: 4.81/1.6
2008: 4.73/1.0
2009: 5.66/-0.3
Two out of three years he posted decent strikeout rates and decent walk rates. He gives up more homers than you’d like, but it wasn’t like he was horrific the last two seasons, and that was around 1100 BF/PA.
This year he’s been horrible, I’ll give you that. But there’s definitely room for him to become slightly below average (something like 18% K’s, 9% BB, and 10% HR/FB with an even batted ball dist.) and be +1 WAR with the bat above a pitcher. If he’s even 1 WAR as a pitcher and 1 WAR above pitcher as a hitter, he’s worth something.
Not saying it’ll be easy, but it’s definitely doable.
Looks like Birrer recorded only one other hit that year… he had 7 hits total according to his fangraphs page, 4 of which came in 1958.
Interesting note about Person. He was a converted outfielder.
Good topic.
I did a study on pitchers who can hit using the lineup calcuator that Baseball Musing has. A pitcher who can hit about replacement level (I used Vizquel’s last season with the Giants as replacement level) vs. one who hit as well as a Giants pitcher that season, would add roughly a third of a run per game, or roughly 10 runs over a 30 start season, or gaining an additional win per season.
Assuming the pitcher is average, a 16-16 pitcher would become 17-15. Over 10 years, a 160-160 pitcher would become a 170-150 pitcher.
For a .500 team, 81-81, having a rotation of pitchers who can hit replacement level would boost them to an 86-76 team.
Seems to make a good case for teams to teach their pitchers how to hit better. It should also get teams to value pitchers who can hit as more valuable than similarly talented pitchers.
I recall seeing a game at DC Stadium in which Mel Stottlemyre 2-hit the senators. And he went 5-5 along the way. No HR, just a double.
My favorite part about yesterday’s game was that Carpenter hit his 2-run double off of none other than Micah Owings, who had doubled off Carp two innings before!
Oh, and also that Carpenter’s grand slam was his first-ever HR in the majors. It’s still not as cool as Felix’s salami off of Johan Santana, though.
I saw the Giants beat the Expos, 18-0. Shawn Estes threw a complete game shutout and hit a grand slam. Jt snow was raking and bonds hit one in the water. Not the most competitive but one of the funnest games i’ve seen. Has any other pitcher thrown a shutout and hit a grand slam in the same game?
Person just missed another grand slam, which would have meant 11 RBI! He also walked…From Retrosheet :
Person
struck out; Person hits long foul that would have been a
second slam; 4 R, 3 H, 0 E, 3 LOB. Expos 1, Phillies 14.