Something Dennis Eckersley Said Is Relevant to Gio Gonzalez

This post is about Gio Gonzalez. It says so right in the title. But to get there, we first have to talk to Dennis Eckersley, because he said something the other day that’s pertinent to what the lefty in Washington is doing right now.

Eckersley, in Oakland because the team named a gate after him, was relaxing before a game. We were talking about changes in the sport, and I asked him why his strikeout rate peaked in 1992, at a point when he was 38 years old and had been a reliever for five years. Was it a new pitch? Grip? Approach?

Nope.

“Everyone started chasing, just like now,” the legendary reliever said that day. “You punch out 200 guys now, it’s not a big deal. Everyone is striking out a guy an inning. You tell me why. First of all, they’re throwing harder. I get that. But no one puts down their hack. These 2-2 swings… they’re, like, crazy.”

A greater willingness to forgo a specific two-strike approach is something we’ve not only seen players discussing in these pages but a trend that’s illustrated by the numbers. Batters are going after the fastball in every count and are happy to take the strikeout in exchange for the power that more aggression brings.

But the focus here is mostly that, in times of great change, we aren’t always great at realizing what’s changing. Eckersley, talking about now and then, said, “They were trying to go deep back then, but more contact,” with a wistful tone. “I don’t want to sound like a geezer, but the game has changed.”

Take a look at strikeout rate since free agency began in 1974, with 1992 and 2017 highlighted. Times of great change, indeed.

The early 90s and right now represent the only times in recent history in which the league’s strikeout rate has changed more than 1.2 percentage points over two years. League average just two years ago was 20.4%; this year, it’s 21.6%.

It’s a quick, radical change that hasn’t often been equaled in baseball history. So it’s a big deal. But it’s small enough that, after years of increasing strikeout rates, we may not notice it.

But take the pitchers who’ve changed the least since 2014, and you’ll notice that they look different if you index their strikeout rates to the league average. Here are five pitchers whose strikeout rate changes since 2015 would round to zero. Check out their indexed strikeout rate changes over the same time frame.

These pitchers have changed by remaining the same. In the case of Jon Lester, he set a sufficiently high bar in 2015 that staying the same has meant that he’s now just above average instead of plus. In the case of Matt Garza, things went from bad to worse despite adding a little bit of whiff.

But look at Gio Gonzalez. Two years ago, his strikeout rate was 9% better than league average; this year, just 3% better. But he’s actually improved his personal K rate in the interim. Just not enough to keep pace with the league.

It’s interesting how this relates to actual performance, too. Gonzalez, by ERA, is having a great, league-leading type season. By strikeouts and walks and homers, though — the fielding-independent numbers, in other words — he’s been much closer to league average.

He could certainly be earning some of his good results on ball in play — he’s using his fastball less often than ever before, and fastballs have higher hit rates than breaking and offspeed pitches — but as the game whiffs more and more often around him, his strikeout rate has become less impressive. In context. Context provided by Dennis Eckersley. Of course.