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In case you missed it, the Padres traded left-hander Randy Wolf to Houston for right-hander Chad “I’m Not Going to Pay a Lot for This Pitcher” Reineke. Pretty exciting stuff, eh? Paul DePodesta gives us the scoop…
Baseball revolves around control of the strike zone.
On pages 179-181 of the Ducksnorts 2007 Baseball Annual, we examined how the Oakland A’s and Minnesota Twins parlayed their dominance of the strike zone into wins. The A’s excelled at getting on base, while Minnesota specialized in keeping runners off base. Both achieved a fair measure of success with this approach — perhaps not directly because of it, but certainly during the same time frame.
Acknowledging that many other factors dictate a team’s fate, it’s worth noting that the Padres have done an excellent job of controlling the strike zone since moving to Petco Park. This has coincided with the fact that — the first half of 2008 notwithstanding — they’ve done an excellent job of winning baseball games since then:
| Walks | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Year | Drawn | Allowed | Diff | W-L Pct |
| Statistics are courtesy of Baseball-Reference and are through games of July 15, 2008. | ||||
| 2000 | 602 | 649 | -47 | .469 |
| 2001 | 678 | 476 | +202 | .488 |
| 2002 | 547 | 582 | -35 | .407 |
| 2003 | 565 | 611 | -46 | .395 |
| 2004 | 566 | 422 | +144 | .537 |
| 2005 | 600 | 503 | +97 | .506 |
| 2006 | 564 | 468 | +96 | .543 |
| 2007 | 557 | 474 | +83 | .546 |
| 2008 | 301 | 302 | -1 | .389 |
The numbers from 2001 are freakish, which means they probably deserve further attention. On looking a little more closely, we find that Padres hurlers surrendered 219 home runs that year. Only the Houston Astros, Texas Rangers, and Colorado Rockies allowed more in all of MLB, so there may not have been much incentive to take walks. Such is the legacy of a rotation featuring Kevin Jarvis, Bobby Jones, Woody Williams, Brian Tollberg, and Adam Eaton. In every other year this decade, there has been a correlation between controlling the strike zone and winning games.
Notice that since moving downtown, the Padres have outwalked the opposition in every full season. Perhaps not coincidentally, they’ve played winning baseball in each of those seasons. Whether the walk totals lead to winning or are a result of it, we cannot say. We would need to study the issue more rigorously to reach any meaningful conclusions. Right now we’re just looking at some data that I find interesting. (This seems obvious, but people screw it up all the time, so I have to make it explicit.)
Let’s look at the walks again, this time expressed as the number drawn and allowed per game. It’s always helpful to consider league context, so we’ll throw that in as well:
| Walks | |||
|---|---|---|---|
| Year | Drawn | Allowed | MLB Avg |
| Statistics are courtesy of Baseball-Reference and are through games of July 15, 2008. | |||
| 2000 | 3.72 | 4.01 | 3.75 |
| 2001 | 4.19 | 2.94 | 3.25 |
| 2002 | 3.38 | 3.59 | 3.35 |
| 2003 | 3.49 | 3.77 | 3.27 |
| 2004 | 3.49 | 2.60 | 3.34 |
| 2005 | 3.70 | 3.10 | 3.13 |
| 2006 | 3.48 | 2.89 | 3.26 |
| 2007 | 3.42 | 2.91 | 3.31 |
| 2008 | 3.17 | 3.18 | 3.41 |
The pitching numbers this year seem reasonable, but check out the hitters: 3.17 walks per game. That’s easily the lowest number of the decade. In fact, you have to go back to 1995 to find something lower (3.10). In other words, this is the worst the Padres have been at drawing walks during Kevin Towers’ tenure as general manager.
How about the minor leagues? Is this concept of controlling the strike zone being taught (and learned) at lower levels? Let’s take a look:
| Walks | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Team | League | Drawn | Allowed | Lg Avg |
| Statistics are courtesy of Baseball-Reference and MiLB, and are through games of July 15, 2008. | ||||
| SD | MLB | 3.17 | 3.18 | 3.41 |
| Por | PCL | 4.43 | 3.71 | 3.52 |
| SA | Tex | 4.16 | 3.21 | 3.43 |
| LkE | Cal | 4.37 | 2.95 | 3.35 |
| FtW | MWL | 4.36 | 2.44 | 3.15 |
| Eug | NWL | 4.86 | 3.93 | 3.97 |
| AZL | AZL | 5.83 | 2.83 | 3.66 |
| DSL | DSL | 5.05 | 3.76 | 4.36 |
With the exception of the Dominican Summer League (and of course, the big club), every team in the Padres organization leads its league in walks drawn per game. This hardly strikes me as an accident. One or two, maybe, but six out of eight? (Most of these teams — with the exception of Portland — do a pretty good job of keeping opponents off base as well.)
Granted, not everyone in the minors is a prospect. In fact, the vast majority of players aren’t. That said, an organizational philosophy seems to have taken hold here. How well it ends up translating into big-league success remains an open question.
Tags: adam eaton, bobby jones, colorado rockies, houston astros, kevin jarvis, minnesota twins, padres, petco park, strike zone, texas rangers, woody williams
Ever since I added the commenting feature to Ducksnorts several years ago, I’ve enjoyed hearing what other folks have to say. I’ve learned a lot from debating topics of mutual interest in a constructive and respectful manner.
Lately, though, we’ve lost our focus thanks in large part to my laxity in enforcing the Ducksnorts Comments Policy. It’s in my nature to err on the side of permissiveness, which I’m sorry to say hasn’t served the community well.
That changes now.
Henceforth I will be reviewing all comments to ensure that they adhere to the Ducksnorts Comments Policy. Anything that doesn’t is subject to removal without prior notice. If I have time and I’m feeling magnanimous, I may email you with an explanation, but I’m a writer, not an administrator, so don’t count on it. Assume that if your comments have been removed, they are in violation of the policy. It is your responsibility, as a participant in this community, to figure out why and make the necessary adjustments. Drop me a line if you are uncertain.
If you repeatedly violate the Ducksnorts Comments Policy (which I’m sure you won’t), I reserve the right to hold your comments for moderation so that they don’t appear unless and until I approve them. You may or may not receive prior notification that this will happen, again depending on my availability and mood.
If you wish to participate in the discussion here, please take a moment to review the Ducksnorts Comments Policy so that you have a clear understanding of what is and is not acceptable behavior here. Compliance is mandatory.
Comments that are excellent candidates for deletion include (but are not limited to) a few pet peeves of mine:
I also very much appreciate comments that attempt to engage my articles. This is the reason comments were enabled in the first place, and although I enjoy many of the twists and turns our conversations take, it sucks to have my stuff ignored. It kills my incentive to create new content, which in turn kills my incentive to maintain Ducksnorts.
Yeah, I know; I should have a thicker skin. But I don’t.
This is my web site. I’ve invested a lot of time and energy in it, and I’m prepared to ensure that it maintains a certain standard. As such, I am the sole arbiter of what constitutes acceptable behavior. All decisions are final, unless they aren’t.
Please make an honest effort to stay within the guidelines, as every minute I spend policing the comments is a minute I spend not creating new content, which puts me in a very nasty mood and gets me fantasizing about a world without Ducksnorts (this fantasy also involves Diana Rigg in her prime and an endless supply of Macallan 18 at my disposal, but I digress).
We’ll give this a shot for a while and see how it works. So long as my moderating duties don’t infringe too much on my writing time, we’ll keep the comments open. Otherwise, I’ll be forced to re-evaluate the situation and consider other options.
If you have questions, feel free to leave ‘em in the comments or drop me a line. Agree or disagree with my policy? Either way is fine with me. All I require is that you abide by it.
Thanks for your attention. Go Padres!
Tags: acceptable behavior, comments policy, compliance, ducksnorts, message board, moderation, pet peeves
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