• Crash Davis Jason LaRue plated the first two of the Cardinals’ dozen runs with a two-out hit in the bottom of the first. Batting sixth, he had baserunners on every time up, including the bases loaded in his first three PAs. That’ll happen when the five batters ahead of you all have a .350 or better OBP (Barton, .353, Lopez, .400, Pujols, .458, Ludwick, .371, and Glaus, .372). On the day, LaRue had a total of 12 runners on for an OBI% (Others batted in) of 16.7%. Is that good, you may wonder? For reference, the Cardinals have only two players with a better OBI% on the season: Pujols, 18.0%, and Ludwick, 17.4%. (LaRue’s is 13.4% for 2008.) LaRue might’ve had more than two OBI if in that third inning he had been more patient. After Glaus had walked on four pitches to load the bases, LaRue broke the rule that we learned when we were young, which is to take a strike. He jumped at the one weapon Doug Davis has, a changeup outside the zone, and hit into a DP (and yes, we checked it on MLB Gameday and it was outside).
• A big reason that LaRue had so many opportunities was number-five batter Troy Glaus’s four walks. That effort puts Glaus solidly in contention to have the second-best OBP of his career (he had a .404 in 2000).
• Speaking of LaRue, when he batted in the fifth inning with the bases loaded, none out and the game tied 3-3, he struck out. Someone mentioned that, in that situation, a strikeout was preferable to a double play. Is that true? According to the Win Expectancy Finder, the Cardinals’ WE when LaRue came to the dish was 78.0%. After the strikeout, it was 70.3%. If LaRue had hit into a run-scoring double play (leaving a runner on third), it would have been 70.8%. And with Adam Kennedy (his Wrigley Field heroics notwithstanding) and Joel Pineiro to follow, the scoring DP might’ve been even higher in practice.
• As for that fifth inning: After LaRue struck out, TLR subbed Kennedy for Brendan Ryan, who had drawn a walk in his previous at-bat. Versus RHP this season, the Flyin’ Irishman has a .197 GPA; Kennedy has a .237 GPA. Not exactly Aaron Miles’s .256, but, fine, it’s an upgrade. But after Kennedy fouled out, TLR let Joel Pineiro (.092 career GPA) bat for himself. Granted, Pineiro pitched another two fine innings after that, but at the time, that was far from a fait accompli, and the Cardinals had no fewer than seven relief pitchers available. Either you’re trying to win the game there or you’re going to save your bullets for a later strike (and possibly extra innings). The pinch-hit for a position player and non-pinch hit for the pitcher seemed an inconsistent strategy.
• Pineiro’s style and approach reminds us of erstwhile Cardinal pitcher Jeff Suppan. Indeed, this season, Suppan earned 47 Pitching Runs Created for the Brewers, while Pineiro has 43. But Suppan’s expected FIP is worse at 4.95 than Pineiro’s 4.43. Worse yet is Pineiro’s #1 comp Jason Marquis’s 5.03. Yet Suppan is making $8 million (and due to make $25 million over the next years), and Marquis is making $6.375 million in 2008 ($9.875 million in ‘09). Pineiro made "only" $5 million this year (and is only under contract for next season, at $7.5 million).
• With a seven-run lead in the eighth inning, TLR brought in Josh Kinney, who promptly walked the leadoff man. Then in the ninth inning — with a nine-run lead, Chris Perez relieved and walked the second batter he faced. We wondered if the Cardinals tend to lose focus with big leads and walk people. But they’re actually better than the rest of the league: With a margin of greater than four runs, Cardinal pitchers walk batters at a rate of 7.5%. The rest of the league does it at 8.4%.
• Diamondbacks manager Bob Melvin is not related to Doug Melvin. Just so you know.
• Mr. Three True Outcomes himself, Adam Dunn, didn’t put the ball into play until his fourth plate appearance, homering, walking and striking out previously. While Dunn was doing his thing, Scott Kazmir pitched for the Rays yesterday. Not to be outdunn (bad, we know), Kazmir had an uncanny eight strikeouts, two walks and four home runs allowed in a mere 22 batters. That’s right: 64% of the batters he faced did not put the ball in play. We defy anyone to come up with a higher single-game percentage than that (for reference, MLB average is 29.1%).
• Speaking of Diamondbacks who strike out a lot, several people are talking about Mark Reynolds setting a new K mark and his chance to lead the league in both strikeouts and errors. But in this day and age, we know that both stats are less important than once believed. True, they don’t make for very good baseball from an aesthetic standpoint, but some of the league’s best players are strikeout-prone and stone-gloved: Dunn, Dan Uggla, Matt Holliday, Hanley Ramirez and Manny Ramirez, for example. Besides, errors aren’t exactly the best measure of fielding ability: For instance, Jorge Cantu, Aramis Ramirez and Edwin Encarnacion all have a worse Revised Zone Rating than Reynolds.
• Bob Melvin sent an incredible four consecutive Diamondback pinch-hitters to bat in the ninth (welcome to September!), giving those of us keeping score a real workout. Then starting second baseman Augie Ojeda approached the batter’s box. Official Scorer Gary Mueller quipped over the pressbox microphone, "This is Ojeda. Batting for himself." Honest people may disagree on who should win the NL MVP this season, but as far as we’re concerned Mueller should win NL Most-Entertaining Official Scorer in a landslide.

This entry was posted by Pip on Friday, September 26th, 2008 at 12:27 pm and is filed under by the numbers. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.