Notes and Essays, Week Ending 3/7

3/3: When I read that Mark DeRosa pronounced himself “devastated” that Cory Bellinger won’t be suiting up for the USA, I found myself concerned that quite a few players might actually not want to be participating in this thing, and are just playing because their alleged patriotism seems to be at stake. But in truth, maybe I only claim this concern because I frankly wouldn’t lose a wink of sleep if the WBC went away. When people are pressured into activities that give me enjoyment, or when they are pressured into the pro-social, like diverted from taking steroids, I have no qualms. I am a bit of a globalist iconclast, so that is one reason country-versus-country competitions make me uncomfortable, but I also reflexively resist short series and the strong unjustified conclusions they often lead to. In both ways, the WBC is a competition that taps our emotional side, not our rational side.

3/5 N1: When it comes to Jon L pitchers in Cubs history, Jon Lieber will take a backseat to Jon Lester, but I’ve been looking at Lieber’s record, and he was a neat pitcher. He was the unlikely recipient/producer of 251 innings for the 2000 Cubs, going 12-11 with an E.R.A. just 0.22 better than the league average. That is one of 83 seasons of 250+ IP over the last 40 years, but only one of four with 12 or fewer wins, the other cases being 11 wins seasons of Mike Moore (1986), David Cone (1993) and Livan Hernandez (2004).

The 2000 Cubs lost 97 games under Don Baylor, and I don’t know how people remember his management of starters, but you can actually really see the imprint of modern thought here: while Lieber threw 110+ pitches 14 times, he topped out at 125, and only threw 120 three times. The limits were just a little higher than they are now.

For Lieber to get to 251 innings, then, you’d think he must have been a super finesse guy, but actually he had four double-digit strikeout games. The year before, he’d struck out 186 and had the third best ks/inning rate in the NL. For the year as a whole, Lieber threw 3.50 pitches per inning. Maddux (153 ERA+, 3rd Cy Young) led the NL at 3.19. 11th of 74 qualifiers, Lieber must be acknowledged to have been in the good but not great category.

He was an outstanding control pitcher, though. Wih his stuff probably down a notch after Tommy John surgery and little margin for error, he led the AL in BB/9 in 2004 with the Yankees, then did the same with the Phillies in 2006. He won 131 games in all, and the 54 walks he had in 2000 were the most he ever had.

The Cubs stole Lieber from the Pirates before the 1999 season after he had compiled five mediocre seasons with Pittsburgh (100 ERA+, 104 starts). All they gave up to get him was bench bat Brant Brown, who would accumulate -2.4 bWAR and 225 games in his remaining big league time. Brown, in fact, ended his MLB career again with the Cubs, the team giving up future Nationals manager Dave Martinez in the process.

Martinez’s career with the Cubs is better remembered for its 1986-1988 time, his 2000 contributions limited to about three weeks of service. He came up with them, but would have have his franchise change nine times.

3/5 N2: Another pitcher who is interesting for his high innings total while not having clear ace credentials was Oil Can Boyd, who worked 272.1 innings in 1985. That made me think of Dwight Gooden’s 276.2 that same year, a total which has seemed increasingly crazy over time, as he was just 20 years old. Boyd was 25. The average length of Gooden’s outings, however, was certainly in line with his effectiveness, while the same can’t be said for Boyd, whose E.R.A.+ was 116. And having to work more for his innings, Boyd faced 1132 batters, compared to Gooden’s 1065.

Boyd’s manager was John McNamara. He managed five other franchises, so we can get a good idea of whether Boyd was just one more pitcher he pushed to be the brink, or an exception.

If you managed a bunch of teams, you also managed for a while, with the norms for pitcher outings changing. And McNamara managed in both leagues, adding a variable. So it would take a person with a fine-tuned sense of the norms, or a full study, to say where he fit in the spectrum of pushing starters.. But I checked the innings totals of starters for all his teams, and my take is that he did not have one philosophy.

Speaking to the point most clearly in light of Boyd’s workload, with the Reds, McNamara succeeded Sparky Anderson, “captain hook,” and it seems he took pains to do what Sparky had done. That probably says something, that a new manager’s instinct would be not to veer from his predecessor, but not to make waves. Maybe that’s why McNamara was seen as rather vanilla. The 1979 Reds had three pitchers make 30 starts (Tom Seaver, Mike LaCoss and Fred Norman), and Seaver led them with just 215 innings. That placed him just 17th in a 12-team National League.

McNamara’s first team was the 1970 A’s, who finished 2nd in the West to the Twins. It was 1970, so these pitchers didn’t have the benfit of the DH to stay in games, but 15 years before, I still would have thought somebody worked more innings than Boyd, at least if McNamara was aggressive with his starters. But the A’s were led by Chuck Dobson’s 267 innings and by Catfish Hunter’s 262.1 — totals slightly lower than Boyd’s.

Piloting the Padres, McNamara had the great Randy Jones in 1975 and 1976, and Jones rates as his starter who threw the most innings: 285 in 1975, 315.1 in 1976. Other than Jones, however, McNamara didn’t go over 226 innings (Bill Grief, 1974) with any of his Padres starters.

Prior to getting the Red Sox job, McNamara managed the Angels in 1983 and 1984. He had some “name” pitchers, and it seems he managed them by the book. Tommy John threw 234.2 innings in 1983, Mike Witt 246.2 innings in 1984, Ron Romanick 229.2 innings in 1984. Witt was just 23, so I suppose that kind of workload was a lot, considering. On the other hand, the 6’7” hurler would top it in his next four seasons, with McNamara gone.

One thing that interested me was that Mario Soto led McNamara’s 1980 Reds with 190.1 innings despite just 12 starts. Soto also threw 41 games in relief that year. That Soto managed to do this didn’t mean that the staff was ravaged with injuries, as you would suspect; the Reds had four pitchers in the 25-30 start range. Anyway, although Witt had started and pitched well in 1981 and 1982 under Jim Fregosi and Gene Mauch, I saw a certain parallel to Soto in Witt’s throwing 43 games for McNamara in 1983, just 19 as a starter, then taking on a big role in 1984.

Boyd slipped to 30 starts in 1986 from 35 in 1985, and his innings went down as well, to 214.1. Clemens had that unforgettable year (a 14-0 start en route to 24-4; the record 20 strikeouts on April 29), but still threw just 254 innings, less than Boyd had in 1986. Boyd was still second on the staff in innings, Bruce Hurst taking on more of a workhorse role in later years.

As Boyd could strike you out, I don’t think we can place him with Jones, but I think, despite his slight frame, that McNamara identified Can as someone he wanted to ride. I’m just guessing, but maybe that came from Boyd. If McNamara took the path of least resistance with the Reds, maybe he was doing the same with Boyd, and didn’t want to risk his wrath by taking him out. In general, it doesn’t seem that McNamara was at all in the Billy Martin mold when he came to working his starters.

Clemens time to be a workhorse was only delayed, not denied. In 1987, with his August 1985 shoulder surgery well behind him, Clemens had fewer signature moments than in 1986 but won another Cy Young and pitched 281.2 innings. McNamara was still at the controls, although he would be fired in 1988. Although Charlie Hough beat Clemens in 1987, throwing 3.2 more innings, Clemens’ 18 complete games that year hasn’t been approached since, with six pitchers having thrown 15 (the last to do it — Curt Schilling in 1998).

McNamara’s last managerial jobs were with the Indians in 1990-1991 and with the Angels in 1996. He went 112-155 across the years. In his one full season, 1990, his most worked pitcher was Greg Swindell, who threw 214.2 innings.

3/5 N3: After looking into Larry Doby, Minnie Minoso, Al Smith, Chico Carrasquel, etc., I have a new interest in the Indians of this era. For all I know about Ralph Kiner, it had never really registered that he finished up with the 1955 Indians. There is so much there that seems surreal to me, like fantasy baseball: Kiner with a good team; Kiner playing against the Yankees; Kiner not bestowing praise on Ewell Blackwell from the opposing dugout, but with rookie Herb Score (Kiner was in left field and batting five for his first game).

My memory is that Kiner thought it was as if it wasn’t he who was out there, his back injury so stopped him from being able to play his best. It left a bad taste. He did hit only .243, the worst he ever did. But he walked 16.7% of the time in his 390 plate appearances, and a 5.6% HR/AB would have been great for just about anyone else. He had a .411 secondary average.

Splits show Kiner with just a .208/.300/.340 slash against the Yankees. His two home runs came against Eddie Lopat and Tommy Byrne. Guys we know today, yes, but both left-handers, and both older than Kiner.

What Kiner did against the Yankees was not immaterial, as the teams were part of a real pennant race. Coming off their 111-win pennant season, the Indians didn’t collapse, and had a share of the lead as late as September 16. But the Yankees went 17-6 in September and ended up three games to the good. Kiner mostly sat on the bench in the latter stages, with his last start coming in the first game of a 9/11 doubleheader versus the Yankees.

3/5 N4: In a footnote of a piece I am either editing or finishing up (take your pick), I claimed that there are probably not two duplicate pitching lines in major league history of any number of innings. This thought came not so much from instinct as from reading in a cognitive psychology class that that was true about sentences, and from the NFL Scorigami phenomenon.

We were running a little low on notes this week, so I decided to play around with this. I guess I think of pitching lines getting farther and farther apart with more innings. I am sure there are identical pitching games, games being 9 innings. But somewhere past that, the separation occurs, I assumed.

Working within the parameters of Stathead’s game search, I wondered, after a team’s first 22 games, if a pitcher had ever had this line:

IP 30, 27 H, 14 R, 10 BB, 18 SO

I was obviously trying to pick something rather capturing average performance, to give some chance of a hit. If you asked if anyone had ever had allowed 6 hits, 2 walks, and 50 strikeouts, of course the answer woukd be no.

After 22 games, going back to 1901, there have only been 211 pitchers who had exactly 30 innings, seemingly not enough that there could be a perfect combination. But anyway, of those 211 pitchers, 14 (7%) gave up 27 hits, 19 (9%) gave up 14 runs, 15 (7%) gave up 10 walks, and 10 (5%) struck out 18 batters. That’s pretty close to a 1 in 50,000 conjunctive probability, granted that the middling runs total at least would probably correlate with the average-ish other totals, raising the probability a bit.

No one hit more than two of the sub-categories. It’s fun to see the names, years, and teams, so:

Joey Jay, 1965 Reds, 17 H 14 R 19 BB 18 SO

Richard Dotson, 1982 White Sox, 32 H 14 R 11 BB 18 SO

Dave Righetti, 1983 Yankees, 27 H 14 R 7 BB 25 SO

Russ Ortiz, 2005 Diamondbacks, 27 H 13 R 10 BB 12 SO

Masahiro Tanaka, 2017 Yankees, 28 H 14 R 10 BB 22 SO

Righetti threw the no-hitter that year.

Of this perhaps random group (although it would seem to favor more quality in later years, as 30 innings through 22 games is more than it used to be), I also thought it would be fun to note highest and lowest in all of the categories.

Hits:

Best: Hideo Nomo, 11, 2001 Boston.

Worst: Stan Williams, 44, 1961 Dodgers.

Williams’ legacy is that he was nasty in more than one way (and indeed, the big guy was pitching coach of the Nasty Boys), so to see him here as a guy who took a beating was a surprise. He would rebound to post perhaps his career year, which included just 213 hits in 235.1 innings.

Runs:

Best: Atlee Hammaker, 4, 1983 Giants; Jeff Ballard, 4, 1989 Orioles; Joe Saunders, 4, 2012 Diamondbacks.

Worst: Dave Mlicki, 26, 2000 Tigers

Hammaker 1983 is remembered for being on the other side of Fred Lynn’s All-Star grand slam. It’s kind of a shame, but I guess if he’d done more, he’d be remembered for more. He did have 2.2 bWAR for the division-winning 1987 Giants, but continuing to be “wrong place, wrong time,” started and lost game 7 of the NLCS against the Cardinals.

At 25 runs are seasons by Kevin Gausman (2017), Barry Zito (2005), Elmer Riddle (1942) and Beany Jacobson (1904). I can’t speak for the last two, but same names there.

BB:

Best: Tim Hudson, 0, 2014 Giants

Worst: Herb Score, 24, 1958 Indians

Hudson didn’t make it through inning 31, but you are going to lose a walk streak, it might as well to Carlos Santana with his career 1330. Santana also led the AL in walks that year with 113. Hudson, of course, went all the way with the Giants.

1958 was the year after Score got hit in the eye by McDougald’s line drive. He had always walked people, though: 154 in 1955, 129 in 1956.

What a strikeout legacy in Cleveland, from Feller to Score to McDowell. I’d like to read a book about Score. I don’t think we hear enough about him.

SO

Best: Max Meyer, 41, 2025 Marlins

Worst: Neal Heaton, 4, 1985 Indians

Despite his 4 ks in 30 innings, Heaton was pitching very well at the time. Both he and Meyer had allowed 7 earned runs, and had 2.10 E.R.A.s.

The seasons of both would devolve. Heaton was part of a horrible Indians’ season, going 9-17 with a 4.90 E.R.A. I was surprised to find the worst strikeout rate didn’t come from an earlier pitcher, given general rates. This doesn’t exactly flatter Heaton, but he struck out 4.2-per-9 over a career of 202 starts and 1507 innings, so it appears to have been a fluke. His 1985 strikeouts did continue really low through the All-Star break though; he was striking out just 2.6-per-9.

Meyer finished with a 4.73 E.R.A. in just 64.2 innings. He tour his hip labrum before he could get deeper in the season but has pitched this spring. In game 22 last year, he struck out 14 and walked none against the Reds. He had other flashy game logs, although he has always given up too many home runs at the major league level. It’s easy to reflexively dismiss the significance of any current pitcher topping a historical strikeout list, but right behind Meyer with his 41 strikeouts were seasons of Pablo Lopez (not good luck actually!), Max Scherzer, Justin Verlander, and Logan Webb. Great company.

3/7 N1: Three of the Cardinals’ Baseball America top-10 prospects are catchers: Rainel Rodriguez (#3), Jimmy Crooks (#9) and Leonardo Bernal (#10). Bernal hit 5th for Team Panama on Friday as their designated hitter, and MLB .com evidently likes him more than Baseball America does, rating him the 98th-best prospect overall (you’d have to have a hell of a farm system to have 10 top-100 overall — not saying that the Cardinals don’t). Despite his undeveloped defense, Baseball America still projects only Rodriguez in the Cardinals 2029 lineup, and has him still at catcher. He and Bernal actually have the same fielding/arm/running profile (45/60/30), but Rodriguez hits at 60/65 (average/power), while Bernal is 50/50 — a big difference.

3/7 N2: Scoring six times in the 8th and twelve times overall, the DR had their way with Nicaragua, but the nights of Cristopher Sanchez and his relievers could not have been more different. Sanchez could boast of striking out four in the first, including three straight with the bases loaded, but obviously was having his trouble otherwise. Nicaragua then racked up four hits in five batters to start the second. Huascar Brazoban came in and struck out his Mets teammate Mark Vientos before retiring Omar Mendoza to keep the damage to two runs in the inning.

Going on to change pitchers every inning between the third and ninth, once Brazoban started a clean frame in the third, the DR would retire 12 straight Nicaragua batters. But as it happened, none came by strikeout

So what was a 1.1 inning, 6-hit, 4-strikeout start for Sanchez morphed into a 9-hit, 6-strikeout line for the whole staff, lending a very different impression. No one for Nicaragua struck out twice, and four of their starters (Benjamin Alegria, Ismael Munguia, Cristhian Sandoval and Freddy Zamora) did not strike out at. However, all of those guys were pinch hit for in the 9th inning, seemingly in an effort to get everyone into a blowout.

My notion of Sanchez is that he’ll overmatch you without striking you out, so my first reaction was that this outing was highly ironic. Pitching BAbip is mostly luck in any event, but actually all of those ground balls he throws can find a hole. He’s given up a composite .307 BAbip over 2024-2025, some 15 points over average, and stood out in 2024 for as many hits as innings, despite pitching well. Then, on the strikeout front, while Sanchez hasn’t broken out as one of the game’s best, he did punch out 212 people last year. And in not allowing Nicaragua any home runs, he was on brand there, too.