It seemed like a very high number of starters in the playoffs this season were pulled from games early, having gone less than five innings. Some of them were pitching well enough that the manager might leave them in if it were a regular season game to get the win. I wanted to see if it indeed was high, since managers in the post-season may be more inclined to the quick hook.

You can see the 22 starts here, ordered by innings pitched.

So far, starters were pulled with less than five innings pitched in 10 of 22 starts, 45.5%. That’s the highest percentage in the 15 years the Day by Day Database covers. Of course, those are for full playoffs years. The next highest would be 2007, at 33.9% (19/56), then 2011 at 31.6 (24/76), then 2004 at 30.9% (21/68). Those are the only years over 30%.

I did not notice a trend toward higher percentages in recent years. I wondered if managers had grokked the third time through the lineup danger. It’s something to watch for the rest of the playoffs.