June 15, 2008
Pitching Against Type
Ricky Nolasco came into today's game against the Rays with a K per 9 rate of 5.4. That's low, so it was a bit of a surprise to see that he struck out a dozen Tampa Bay batters on the way to a 9-3 Marlins victory. I wondered how unusual it was for a low K pitcher to have a big strikeout game. I looked at all seasons from 1957 to 2007 in which a pitcher had a K/9 rate below six and at least 12 strikeouts in a game that season. There were 128 examples, so it's not that rare. Probably the most interest example of this comes from Ron Villone, who averaged 4.9 K per 9 innings in 2000, but had a 16 strikeout game that season. His 16 K game came at the end of the season, and you have to wonder if the Cardinals, with an eleven game lead really cared.
Posted by David Pinto at
09:16 PM
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