Baseball Musings
Baseball Musings
May 21, 2007
The Strikeout Defense

The Yankees open up a do or die series with the Red Sox tonight at Yankee Stadium. Over the next week and a half, the Yankees and Red Sox complete two-thirds of their scheduled games against each other. The Yankees need to gain ground on the Red Sox now. Likewise, the Red Sox have the opportunity to bury the Yankees for good.

Right now, the offenses are close. Boston is a little better, with a higher OBA and slugging percentage. The real difference in the teams resides in the pitching staffs. And a big part of that difference comes from the ability to strike out batters. The Red Sox staff sent about 100 more batters down swinging than the Yankees staff. What does that mean? Consider this: opponents batting average when not striking out against the Yankees is .301. Against the Red Sox the opposition hits .305 when not striking out. In other words, the two teams defend batted balls equally well. So if the Red Sox pitchers take away 100 balls in play with strikeouts, they're saving 30 hits. This shows up in the team hits allowed per nine, 8.3 for the Red Sox, 8.8 for the Yankees.

Now, the Red Sox are also walking fewer batters and giving up fewer home runs, but if the Yankees up their Ks, they'd have fewer opportunities to walk batters and allow home runs. For many years during the Torre era, the Yankees were near the top in pitcher strikeouts. They need to return to that level if their staff is going to compete with Boston.


Posted by David Pinto at 10:50 AM | Series | TrackBack (0)
Comments

Thoughs stats are great and all, but please let's state the obvious- The Yankees suck. And as the pressure grows the only guys that can handle it are Jeter and Posada. If Clemens starts out slow this thing is over.

Posted by: Jay at May 21, 2007 03:30 PM

Uh, sample size anyone?

It seems like every team goes through a stretch like 19-23. Luckily they also play 120 other games. We're going to see some serious regression to the mean real soon, methinks.

The Yanks'll still win 90 games; it'll be up to the Red Sox to play .500 ball the rest of the way.

Posted by: Kevin at May 21, 2007 06:32 PM
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