Three Counterpoints to Trevor Story’s First Three Games

Trevor Story did something that has never happened in major-league history before: he homered in first three games of his career. People are generally pretty excited about that, and rightly so. Jeff detailed that excitement the other day, and backed it up with a couple of very good points about Story’s plate coverage and adaptability. It may very well be that we are watching the genesis of the next great Rockies shortstop. (Or, if you prefer, the second great Rockies shortstop.) But before we get carried away, I wanted to offer a few counterpoints.

First, while what Story did was unprecedented, what Arizona’s trio of starting pitchers also just did was nearly as rare. Namely, the club’s first three starting pitchers — Zack Greinke, Shelby Miller and Patrick Corbin — all allowed three home runs. For a trio of starting pitchers to allow three (or more) home runs on three consecutive days isn’t a particularly common occurrence. In fact, since 1974, this was only the ninth time it’s happened. Let’s take a look:

SPs Who Allowed 3+ HR on 3 Consec. Days, 1974-Present

Team	Dates	Pitcher 1	Pitcher 2	Pitcher 3
Nationals	Aug. 13-15, 1999	Javier Vazquez	Jeremy Powell	Shayne Bennett
White Sox	May 10-12, 2001	Rocky Biddle	David Wells*	Jon Garland
Rangers	July 31-Aug. 2, 2002	Rob Bell	Chan Ho Park	Ismael Valdez
Royals	July 29-31, 2003	Darrell May*	Runelvys Hernandez	Kyle Snyder
Indians	Aug. 1-3, 2003	Billy Traber	Jason Davis	Brian Anderson
Royals	July 20-22, 2004	Zack Greinke*	Darrell May	Jimmy Gobble
Nationals	July 13-15, 2007	Jason Bergmann	Matt Chico	Jason Simontacchi
Diamondbacks	Aug. 18-20, 2007	Micah Owings	Yusmeiro Petit	Doug Davis
Orioles	Aug. 17-19, 2009	David Hernandez	Jason Berken	Chris Tillman
Diamondbacks	April 4-6, 2016	Zack Greinke	Shelby Miller	Patrick Corbin

* = Four homers allowed

A quick couple caveats regarding this table, the data for which was graciously pulled by Jonah Pemstein. One: it accounts for consecutive days, not necessarily consecutive games, and is limited merely to starting pitchers, not relief pitchers. Also: the data goes back only to 1974. If we broadened the criteria, we’d find more instances. That’s how things work. But still: nine times. That’s not a lot. About once every three years, in other words.

Interestingly, this was the second time that Greinke has been a part of one of these unholy triumvirates. The first occurred all the way back in his rookie year, which seems like a lifetime ago. But it did happen. That’s not really central to the point here, of course, but it is interesting.

So while we can celebrate Story’s achievement of knocking homers for his first four big-league hits, we can also say that this was a rarity on both sides of the equation. After all, it wasn’t just Story who homered. In the season’s first game, Carlos Gonzalez and Nolan Arenado also homered, which is typical. DJ LeMahieu also homered twice, which is not. If you’re unfamiliar with DJ LeMahieu, he has 17 career home runs in his career, and has never tallied more than six in any one season — even though he plays half his games in Coors Field. When I see things like that it gives me pause.

Let’s move on to a second counterpoint, again, in table form:

Javier Baez vs. Trevor Story Plate Discipline Comp, 2015

Name	Team	Age	PA	BB%	K%	BB/K
Trevor Story	Rockies (AAA)	22	275	5.80%	24.70%	0.24
Javier Baez	Cubs (AAA)	22	313	6.70%	24.30%	0.28

So, I think reasonable people can agree that Javier Baez’s star has dimmed considerably. When the Cubs signed Ben Zobrist this winter, it was a clear signal that the plan with Baez was for him to occupy a bench role. One of the reasons for this is Baez’s incredibly poor plate discipline. And yet, last season in Triple-A, Baez had better plate discipline than did Story. Baez, who is the same age as Story, walked more and struck out less. The walk rate is what’s concerning. At Double-A and lower levels, Story had similar strikeout rates, but a much better walk rate — double his Triple-A mark, in some cases. And while we’re not going to make sweeping judgments about his plate discipline after three major-league games, the zero walks and four strikeouts isn’t making me feel any better.

Finally, hot starts are a bit of a Rockies shortstop specialty. Clint Barmes, in his first taste of regular big-league action, put up a 183 wRC+ in April 2005. It started with what was probably the best moment of his career — a two-run walk-off homer off of Trevor Hoffman on Opening Day. The homer capped a big ninth-inning comeback, and made the whole Rocky Mountain region sit up and take note of this Clint Barmes fellow whom they’d never heard of before. After slumping through May, he was starting to heat up in June again, and then he got hurt. That 183 wRC+ from April 2005 and 192 wRC+ from June 2005 are still the two best months of his career, a decade later. Barmes’ career wRC+ is 71. The interesting thing here, to me, is that Barmes has recorded just 89 homers across more than 10 big-league seasons. He actually hit for power in the minors. He knocked 15 homers in Double-A, and 16 in Triple-A in the years prior to his permanent call-up.

The same is also true of Josh Rutledge. He produced a 139 and 132 wRC+, respectively, in High-A and Double-A prior to his fateful call-up to the majors. When he came up in July 2012, he ratcheted up the expectations with a 171 wRC+ in his first month in the league. It wouldn’t last, as his wRC+ dropped down to 133 in August, and then 29 in September. It was all a bit confusing at the time, especially since, when he went back down for what was then his first taste of Triple-A ball in 2013, he brutalized the Pacific Coast League to the tune of a 171 wRC+. With the space of time, we now know that he just isn’t that good of a hitter. He hasn’t gotten anywhere near that 171 wRC+ since, and his career mark is 79.

I bring these up because both of these guys hit better than Story did at Triple-A last season. They’re not directly comparable given that run environments have shifted, and the Rockies Triple-A club is now Albuquerque. And it’s but two players, at that. Nevertheless, I’m wary. Rutledge was the same age as Story is this season. His rise seemed too good to be true, and it was.

Trevor Story may be on his way to a banner rookie season, one of the few wire-to-wire rookie seasons. (There have only been 19 players to play 140 or more games in their rookie season the past five years.) Perhaps I am protesting too much, or you think these arguments flimsy. I won’t begrudge you either viewpoint. At this point, most arguments are flimsy. But we should consider both sides of a rare streak, especially when the player in question doesn’t have the most airtight track record, and when we have had our hopes raised by some of his predecessors. Does that mean Story will suffer the same fate? Not necessarily, but let’s give it a couple of months — or at least a couple of weeks — before we get too excited.