Yeah, yeah, I missed a week. Give me a break, I was on vacation. I just slapped the last two weeks together in this one article. I tried to make up for missing by giving some more analysis than I have in the first two editions of my Short Stories.
Tarik, Meet Greg (Story/Analysis)
What can a reigning Triple Crown and Cy Young winner do to outdo himself? Tarik Skubal answered that question on the afternoon of May 25th when he pitched a complete game shutout in under 100 pitches, also known as a Maddux.
It is hard to throw a complete game in under 100 pitches. You have to get 27 outs. That’s only 3.7 pitches per out. Last season, the major league average was 5.49 pitches per out which translates to about 148 pitches for a 9 inning game. Some drastic action has to be taken to get that count 50 pitches lower. The obvious first step is to limit the number of hitters you have to face. Skubal certainly did that, facing only 29 batters. He allowed only two singles and hit one batter, with the infield helping him out with a double play. What’s the next best way to limit your pitch count? A normal person might say by pitching to contact and getting outs in the field. You can get frequent single pitch outs with this approach. Tarik Skubal is not normal. He had 13 K in this game. 41% of his pitches were used to generate those Ks before considering the balls and foul balls in those at bats. Ridiculous.
That is, somehow, not the most impressive part of this outing. Skubal’s average fastball velocity sat at 98 for this appearance. He only threw three pitches 100+ MPH the entire game. Two of these pitches rank as the two fastest he’s ever thrown. Both of these came in the 7th or later. His fastest pitch of the outing generated a swing and miss from Gabriel Arias to end the game. Skubal’s 94th pitch of the outing clocked in at 102.6 MPH. You read that right, 102.6. It is the fastest recorded strikeout pitch from a starter ever and it was thrown in the 9th inning of a game. This guy throws hard, but he didn’t throw nearly that hard all night. His next closest fastball velo was a full mile an hour slower. This dude is not human.
Welcome to Chicago (Story/Analysis)
Pitchers and catchers have a lot to work on together. They have to be on the same page with the pitch selection to work from, what pitch is comfortable in every situation, and with tendencies like spiking curveballs or letting fastballs fly armside. There is so much that goes into the relationship to not only call a good game but avoid disaster. This relationship can be put to the test sometimes, like it was for Adrian Houser and Edgar Quero a couple weeks ago. You see, all of this getting comfortable with each other comes with time. Pitchers and catchers will share countless bullpen sessions and simulated at bats before they go and do the thing for real. Houser and Quero had about 5 hours together before they went out there.
While the White Sox are not historically bad again like I predicted they could be, they’re still awful. Their whole roster is thin. Guys in the pen are regularly asked to start games. On May 20, reliever Bryse Wilson, who has occasionally made spot starts, was slated to pitch for the Sox. They instead turned to Adrian Houser, a vet who has only seen action in AAA this season… for the Rangers. The Rangers released Houser the previous Thursday. The White Sox decided they could use his services and signed him around 3 PM on May 20, asking him to make a start just three hours later. A fortuitous rain delay allowed Houser and catcher Edgar Quero to have a longer discussion about the gameplan and they got right to it.
So how did it go? Surprisingly well. Houser went six scoreless against a pretty hot Mariners squad. That is a fantastic story in itself. Guy signs and is asked to make his first start of the season the same day and cruises. It gets better. Houser proved it wasn’t a fluke by going six scoreless again in his second start. He shut the Mets down with 6 K and only four baserunners allowed. He cracked for the first time against the Orioles, allowing 3 R in 6.1 IP, but again had a respectable 6 K. After his first 3 starts, Houser has already accumulated 1.1 WAR (tied for 4th on the team) and has a 1.47 ERA.
There are a few reasons I think these outings, namely that first outing with minimum preparation, went well. Houser does not throw hard and he does not throw in the dirt. His fastball tops out at 95 and his slider, curveball, and changeup are all regularly thrown in the strike zone. He also has a pretty normal pitch mix for today’s game. He throws fastballs 60% of the time and his offspeed pitches move predictably for their pitch type. Lastly, his offspeed pitches mirror each other. He will throw his slider for strikes around the middle of the zone. If he’s looking for a K gloveside, it’s the changeup. If he’s looking for a K armside, it’s the curveball. While the predictability may hurt Houser in the long-run, it helped to put him and his catcher on the same page and get some immediate results.
Let's Talk About Cal (Analysis)
While Shohei and Judge were trading homers back and forth in their World Series rematch, Cal Raleigh quietly took sole possession of the MLB home run lead. His 8 homers over this two week span give him 23 on the year. Finding his power stroke this season is far from the only impressive thing about his game. It’s time to discuss his season a little.
The most homers ever hit by a catcher in a season is Salvador Perez’s 48 in 2021. I hate this record because Big Sal played a lot of first and DH this season. Don’t worry, Cal is here to correct that. His 23 homers through 58 games put him on pace to beat this record. His 23 homers through 58 games actually puts him on pace to beat Aaron Judge’s non-steroid record for homers in a season. It would be Cal’s most homer– wait WHAT?! More than a third of the way through a season, a catcher is on pace for the home run record (by players who didn’t have any extra help). How on Earth is that possible? Cal is also on pace to have the highest single-season OPS+ by any catcher ever. He’s on pace for the total bases record by a catcher.
You may think it’s unfair that I’m comparing Cal to catchers for the most part. For most positions, like comparing second to third or left to right, positional records are arbitrary because the positions are nearly defensively interchangeable in terms of value. But catcher is the most valuable defensive position on the diamond. Catchers can hit worse than league average and still be considered elite because of the massive value they can provide on defense. Cal is on pace to set the all time home run record and hit 87% better than league average at a position that wears on your body much more than the other positions and is generally very difficult even before considering wear and tear. That is why catchers get to be treated special in the record books.
Ok, so the dude is raking so he must be an average catcher at best, right? Wrong. He won the platinum glove last year, you know, the award for the best overall defender? While he is being outclassed by some of his colleagues this season, he’s still in the 85th percentile in fielding run value and has positive or neutral run value in all catcher fielding subcategories.
Let’s put the icing on the cake here. Catchers are slow. They just are. No, I am not going to tell you that Cal has 90th percentile sprint speed, he is slow like every other catcher. I will tell you, however, that his baserunning is efficient. He has attempted seven steals this season and has successfully committed catcher on catcher crime six times. That’s an 85% success rate, 10% higher than the generally accepted break-even rate with steals. Not only is he not doing anything poorly this season, he’s passing all subjects with flying colors. If he continues in the neighborhood of this pace for the remainder of the season, this will rank as one of if not the best catcher season ever.
Superstars Back At It (Stories)
Most of baseball is guys that are doing their best to prove themselves and retain their spot on the 26-man roster. While those dudes are the backbone of the league, no one is buying a ticket to watch Addison Barger play right for the Blue Jays (no offense to the Addison Barger fan club). Superstars like Ronald Acuna Jr. and Shohei Ohtani are the guys that put asses in seats. One of these guys recently came back and another one of these guys is getting closer by the day.
Acuna returned from his second ACL tear on May 23. Let me ask you: what do you think he did with the first pitch he saw? He did what any superhuman would do and crushed the ball 467 feet. With an outfield assist and another hit to top things off, Acuna had one heck of a return. It’s the kind of spark that the Braves need right now. They have a great roster but are certainly not playing like it. We’ll see if Acuna’s 1.063 OPS can provide the jolt that their lineup needs.
Yes, Ohtani is playing and has been the whole season. But he hasn’t been doing the other thing that makes him the unicorn he is. We now have an official timeline of his return. The Dodgers are eyeing the beginning of August. While it does seem like he’d be able to return sooner as he’s already thrown to live batters, it makes sense that the Dodgers would give him his time. The Dodgers are going to make the playoffs no matter if Ohtani pitches in two weeks or two months. Let the guy who has eight and a half seasons left on his contract take his time. Still, as a baseball fan you just want to see him on the mound as soon as possible.
Elly Honors His Sister (Story)
Athletes are humans, too. It’s easy to forget sometimes because of the incredible things we see them do night in and night out. Moments like Marquise Goodwin breaking down when scoring a touchdown after losing his son are reminders that real things happen in their lives too and it’s not all just a game for us to watch, ogle over, or analyze. What athletes do on the field means something to them.
Elly De La Cruz lost his older sister Genelis on Saturday. He still decided to play on Sunday in her honor. For Sunday’s game, he wrote messages to Genelis on his hat and on his cleats. In the sixth inning Elly hit a homer and looked up to the sky and made a heart with his hands while crossing home. He held his chain that holds a family picture almost the entire way around the bases. In what was an incredibly emotional game for Elly, he was able to homer in honor of his older sister. The homer did give Elly 2 RBI, 4 TB, and 1 HR for the statsheet, but looking at Elly makes it obvious that it meant a lot more than that.
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