Randy Wells Shuts Down Atlanta
Randy Wells did something that Cubs’ pitchers had previously found difficult last night. He locked down the Atlanta Braves in rather generic fashion.
Wells’ line is anything but spectacular. He struck out one batter and walked two, but he didn’t allow a home run (or a run of any kind) in large part because very few balls were hit into the air. Of the 21 balls put into play against him, 13 – or over 60% — were hit on the ground. Combine that with 60% strikes and it’s pretty clear that Wells’ game plan was simply to pound the zone with his sinker and let his infielders do the rest.
Pitchfx has 35 of Wells’ 97 pitches classified as sinkers, an additional 20 as four-seam fastballs, 23 more as change-ups, and the final 19 as sliders. Roughly three-fourths of his sinkers went for strikes of the called variety, since only one was swung at and missed. In fact, the only pitch that Braves’ batters had a hard time connecting with was his change-up, which generated an impressive five empty swings.
The Braves only managed six hits, with a Martin Prado double being the only of extra base variety. They definitely had some chances though. In the second, with runners on first and third, the Braves had the unfortunate coincidence of pitcher Tommy Hanson going to the plate. He would fly out, but the Bravos would threaten again the very next inning, as the bases would be loaded for Troy Glaus. On a 1-1 pitch, Glaus rolled to third and became the victim of a double play.
The Braves’ run expectancy at the time was a game high 1.5, they wouldn’t top 1.0 for the remainder of the game, as Sean Marshall, Esmailin Caridad, John Grabow, and Carlos Marmol would combine to shut the door and Wells earned the first victory of the year for the Cubbies.
There are going to be some nights where Wells doesn’t have passable command or movement on his pitches, and that’s fine, because there are also going to be nights like this, when the opposing team pounds the ball into the dirt, only to become one easy out after the next.
“Randy Wells did something that Cubs’ pitchers had previously found difficult last night. He locked down the Atlanta Braves in rather generic fashion. ”
You must have missed Wednesday’s game in which Ryan Dempster had a 6 3 1 1 2 9 line. The bullpen blew it, but it was a far better game than Wells pitched.
Yeah pretty much.
During the series it looked like this:
Cubs pitchers with a letter Z in their name: 1.2 IP 64.80 ERA
Cubs pitchers without the letter Z in their name: 23.1 IP 1.93 ERA
The Braves really struggled to hit the ball off everyone but Zambrano and Samardzija. That and 83 MPH changeups belt high from Grabow.
How was it “much better”? More strikeouts != better.
I was at the game, the Braves could not get it going. Heyward especially seemed to swing for the fences every pitch, Escobar and McCann similar. Chipper was pulled in the third or fourth. And yet the Braves were two or three more feet on an Eric Hinske flyball that looked like a homer with two on in the bottom of the ninth. The Cubs really deserved to be swept. And a manager that doesn’t start a Sean Marshall deserves to be shipped off.
Esmailin Caridad has only thrown 18 pitches, most of which have been breaking balls, but his average fastball has jumped to 96.0 mph, up from 92.7 in 2009.
For those Cubs fans who followed the team in March, was he throwing this hard at ST as well? I know Caridad has never been a strikeout machine, but his K/9 has increased at every stop without any statistical change in control . . . and now he’s throwing 96+? He becomes infinitely more interesting if he can maintain a fastball average around 96 mph.
R.J., I like you a lot, but this is just not a “spectacular” game. Hanson had a better game by xFIP.
kampfer: I think that “spectacular” comes in to play when, regardless of the advanced stats that have brought all of us here, the performance itself clearly shows that the pitcher was a master of Pitching on a giving day. I try to make Randy Wells appointment TV (or radio, occasionally) because he pitches, and I can never get enough guile. He never “throws.” His fastball generally sits around 88-90, with anything over 91 a bit of a surprise. He hits spots, changes speeds, and appears to have a better handle on the psychology of the at bat (which is more difficult to quantify) than most other pitchers as inexperienced as he is (remember: converted catcher).
xFIP doesn’t say a thing about who had a better game. It says which pitcher had a better Strat-O-Matic game if his player had loaded dice. xFIP is meaningless for a single start for the same reason that we shouldn’t read much into the -162.3 UZR/150 Milton Bradley accrued in LF in 2008 during his 1 game (8 innings) played there. These statistics are only meaningful when calculated from a statistically meaningful sample size. Personal opinion: with most of the non-elite starting pitches, the eye test still tells us more than the saber stats for the first 4-6 weeks of the season. You need a good 7-10 starts to build a sample with multiple variables: home/road, game conditions, quality of opponent, situational leverage (spotted 5 by his offense in the first vs. opponent gem).
Hanson also failed to pitch 6 innings. If you can’t keep your pitch count low enough to make it through 6 (17-18 pitches per inning to be around 100 isn’t ridiculous), then you didn’t help your team out enough. Wells was able to do that. And that’s the sort of raw number that, early on, lacking the sample sizes necessary for deep analysis, is meaningful. Shut down the opponent, finish your last inning, and protect any lead.