The Giants’ Shot at Noah Syndergaard’s Vulnerability

I’ll begin with a statement you’re going to grow sick of: No, there’s no predicting any of this. We wouldn’t even really like it if there were, but there’s not, and there never will be. Baseball games are played by people, and the best analysis in the world could be rendered useless by Noah Syndergaard or Madison Bumgarner waking up with the sniffles. Last year’s Blue Jays weren’t eliminated after Russell Martin accidentally bounced a return throw off Shin-Soo Choo because a few minutes later Elvis Andrus made seven consecutive errors. Just last night, the Orioles were eliminated because Zach Britton did all of his pitching off the bullpen mound. I mean, no, that wasn’t everything, but, you get the point. The smaller the sample of baseball, the more insane it seems to get. The thing about insanity is it’s unpredictable.

I feel bad having to include all that, but I’d feel worse if I didn’t. I’d feel like I was lying. The best we can do is to discuss little details, small factors that might slightly shift the win expectancies. On the plus side, that is fun, and it contributes to the conversation. So why don’t we contribute to the conversation about Syndergaard facing the Giants?

This has the appearance of a dream match-up. Two of the very best starting pitchers in baseball are going to go head-to-head with the very season on the line. There’s no one the Giants trust more than Bumgarner, and there’s no one the Mets trust more than Syndergaard, and if this doesn’t turn out to be a pitcher’s duel, well, that’s baseball for you, but we’ve got the whole setting. Odds are, the game won’t end 1-0, but if it did, not a soul would be shocked. The game could last two hours, or five.

Let’s talk about Syndergaard. More specifically, let’s talk about the Giants against Syndergaard. There has been one vulnerability, that being the running game. For much of the year, Syndergaard allowed opponents to run free. It’s something he’s worked to address, and the results have been better lately. Adding on to that, the Giants aren’t the speediest team in the league, and they’re not going to have Eduardo Nunez. The math says the running game probably won’t be much of a factor. Maybe the Giants will steal a base. Maybe it’ll matter.

I’d like to highlight another thing. Leaving Bumgarner aside, here’s the projected Giants starting lineup of position players:

Nothing too weird in there, once you substitute Gillaspie for the ailing Nunez. Right away you see all the lefties. I’m not going to claim this is the most dominant lineup in the world, but just three of its batters will bat right-handed against Syndergaard, including the pitcher. Six guys will take swings from the left side, and Syndergaard does have a platoon split. Since he debuted, lefties have touched him for a .703 OPS. Righties come in at .589. Righties have struck out a lot more, and walked a lot less. The platoon game is a little thing.

Yet you see I also included strikeout rates. The Giants have a low-strikeout lineup. They were just the best contact-hitting team in baseball, and five of these starters are what you might consider skilled contact bats. There’s not an easy strikeout in the group, Bumgarner potentially aside, and last year’s Royals got my brain gears whirring. So out of curiosity, I went through Syndergaard’s history, and I split his results by opposing hitter type.

I looked at how Syndergaard has done against everyone he’s ever faced, and I arranged those same opponents in order of overall strikeout rate. Then I split them into four groups: high-strikeout hitters, modest strikeout hitters, modest contact hitters, and great contact hitters. I calculated Syndergaard’s OPS against by each group, and I also calculated each group’s overall OPS. Here you go:

I’m not going to act like the samples are bigger than they are, but the smallest sample is still a couple hundred plate appearances. And you can see something of a trend here. Syndergaard has completely annihilated the highest-strikeout hitters. These are also the worst hitters as a group, since it includes a lot of pitchers, but Syndergaard has mowed these opponents down. Relatively speaking, he’s been less successful against modest strikeout hitters, and modest contact hitters. And then you look at the lowest-strikeout group. Five starting Giants would go in this group, and those hitters have actually been more successful against Syndergaard than they have been overall. That’s…odd, and it has to be at least somewhat noisy, but there could still be a general truth, here. The Giants like contact. Syndergaard likes non-contact. Contact hitters don’t allow him to take such charge, and then the Mets’ mediocre team defense stands a greater chance of being exposed.

We talked about this with regard to the Royals a lot. The Royals liked to put the ball in play, and that seemed to give them a slight advantage against postseason pitchers, who tend to be higher-strikeout types. Higher-strikeout pitchers might be better able to exploit higher-strikeout hitters. Aside from Bumgarner, the Giants aren’t going to start a high-strikeout hitter, and they’re going to feature a lot of bat-to-ball skill. It doesn’t mean Syndergaard won’t still dominate, and he is pitching at home, but this is something to pay attention to. The Giants lineup makes contact like the Royals, and it can also draw walks, for good measure.

Anything could conceivably swing this game. Maybe the Giants bullpen implodes. Maybe the Giants bullpen doesn’t implode. Maybe the Giants bullpen doesn’t even ever pitch. Everything we could discuss now only barely nudges the needle. But the Giants’ ability to make contact? It seems like that could sure nudge the needle. It could be a factor tonight, and it could be a factor for as long as the Giants stay alive.