The snowbirds are off to Arizona, the fantasy freaks are deep into their spreadsheets, and yes, another summer of baseball stretches in the on deck circle. But before the Mariners’ opening pitch bounces in the dirt, let us take a few moments to consider that despite how it felt, the most miserable performances of last year didn’t all belong to the Mariners. There were plenty of baseball-related disorders spread through the national lineup.
Thus, without further ado, we award the first annual ‘ouchies’ to those players who did the most in 2008 to cause fans to squirm in their seats and fire adult beverages at their flat panels.
MOST OUTS
Is there anything more depression-inducing than watching your guy make an out? And yet, as a raw total, this futility is seldom counted. Certainly, in order to slouch back to the dugout repeatedly, you have to be good enough to keep your spot in the lineup—and preferably, at the top of the lineup. So it’s no surprise that Jose Reyes of the Mets and Ichiro were two of only nine major leaguers to make more than 470 outs last year. In fact, Reyes was the only one to top 500.
But a special tip of the stat sheet goes to the Mariners, the only team to land two of those nine spots in the all-out lineup—come on down, Jose Lopez!
GROUDING INTO DOUBLE PLAYS
Well, actually there is something worse than making an out—it’s making two outs at the same time. Twenty-one different batters grounded into at least 20 DPs, and we should not fail to recognize the catching Molina brothers, Yadier of the Cardinals and Bengie of the Blue Jays, who doubled up, so to speak.
It may seem improbable that a shortstop, say like our Yuniesky Betancourt, could hit into as many double plays as a funky slow Molina, but in fact he did. Nevertheless, take heart—Derek Jeter of the dreaded Yankees actually hit into one more. And yes, there is worse—the leaden standard for shortstops goes to the clay footed Miguel Tejada of Houston, who forced out 32 teammates ahead of him before unsuccessfully reaching first base.
THROWING ERRORS—INFIELD
OK, let’s move to what seems like a simple task for a major league ballplayer—throwing the baseball where you want it to go. I know that it seemed like Yuniesky was flinging at least one over the 11 foot reach of Richie Sexson every other game last year, but he really only recorded nine for the season. Two other shortstops in California alone, Bobby Crosby of Oakland (13) and Erick Aybar of the Angels (11) actually were among the eight infielders to reach double misthrowing figures.
And those numbers seem nearly acceptable compared to Edwin Encarnacion of Cincinnati, who somehow missed his fellow fielders 16 times when he let fly. Still, all hail Mark Reynolds of the Astros, whose 18 throwing errors take on a nearly mythical significance when coupled with the fact that he also led baseball by striking out 204 times.
See…doesn’t that make you feel better about Yuni?
THROWING ERRORS—CATCHER
Catchers have special challenges. They’re often called on to try to throw out or pick off baserunners thoughtlessly allowed to reach base by their numbskull battery mates. When the runner is off, there’s no time to set your feet in advance, because you don’t know where the pitch is going to finish. Then, although you’re supposed to just ‘throw to the bag’, you know that the intended infield recipient inevitably is a moving target. And inexplicably, there is no reward for just hitting the runner himself. Shouldn’t he therefore ‘thrown out’? This is the true failure of the Bud Selig era.
Eleven catchers were charged with at least seven throwing errors last season. Does this stat matter? Apparently not. Two on the list, our Kenji Johjima and Pittsburgh’s Ryan Doumit were awarded fat contracts during, and after the season, respectively. And it didn’t hurt the Dodgers’ Russell Martin, either. (Although Martin’s inaccuracy probably deserves to be forgiven somewhat, since part of his would-be formative baseball years were spent growing up in Paris).
THROWING ERRORS—OUTFIELDERS
It’s really hard to make a throwing error as an outfielder, even though there are thousands of horrible outfield tosses every year. For example: is someone as slow as Ryan Howard just touching third when you let fly from short right? And your toss still sails 25 feet up the first base line? Even before big Ryan is halfway home? Nope, not an error. In the eyes of the official scorer, you can never assume anyone should have been thrown out from the outfield.
Nevertheless, six different outfielders were charged with four throwing errors last year. Among them was Rick Ankiel, the former Cardinal pitching prodigy banished to greener pastures after he uncannily but constantly missed his target from 60 feet. So, from 250 feet, what would you expect? Which just goes to show…when you can’t aim, you can’t aim.
HOME RUNS ALLOWED
For a fan, this is the ultimate thrill—or cringe inducer, depending. A couple dozen hurlers saw their offerings fly over the wall at least 25 times last year, including some really bad pitchers (Vincente Padilla of Texas) and some really good ones (Cole Hamels, World Series MVP of the Phillies). Special tribute here to the Nationals, who had four guys give up 20 or more, and the Cincinnati trio of Bronson Arroyo, Aaron Harang and Johnny Cueto, who averaged 31 gopher balls apiece.
But let’s devote a moment’s sympathy to the southsiders of Chicago, who saw their Gavin Floyd not only initiate 30 round trippers, but also easily lead the league by allowing 37 stolen bases. The guy should have run a merry-go-round.
HIT BATSMEN
Here’s where the ouchies really begin to sting. Some pitchers hit guys more than others. Nineteen plunked into the double digits last year. Some of those guys are bad (yep, Padilla again), but some are good—both Roy Halladay of Toronto and Brandon Webb of Arizona, each placing second in the Cy Young voting in their respective leagues.
But the standout here was the wildman flamethrower of the Orioles, Daniel Cabrera. After years of waiting for him to ‘find his location’, Baltimore decided to move his location across the metro area to the Washington Nationals. Imagine how excited those National League batters will be to see him!
HIT BY PITCH
Of course, there is always a bruised body at the other end of those HBPs. In fact, 29 batters were felled at least ten times last year. Some of them are big hulks who can’t seem to get out of the way in time (Giambi of the A’s, Fielder of the Brewers, Shoppach of the Indians), and some are annoying little guys just trying to get nicked in order to steal second (Ichiro, Sizemore of the Indians, McLouth of the Pirates).
But perhaps the most surprising leader in any Ouchie category is Chase Utley, the uber-second baseman of the champion Phillies, who easily led the field with 27 airborne wounds. Not surprisingly, he’s spending most of spring training recovering from hip surgery.
NORTHWEST HIGHLIGHTS
Before we move to our national Ouchie of the Year, three separate feats by Mariners should not go unnoticed. Jose Lopez, in some respects, was eerily ‘typical’. The statistical difference in his Gross Production Average (sort of like on base percentage—don’t ask) between left handed and right handed pitchers was a mere .001. In other words, it made absolutely no difference. And the percentage of times he hit fly balls, line drives and ground balls were all exactly the major league average. Scary.
Equally scary--Lopez and Yuniesky combined to record the two lowest percentages for accepting walks in all of baseball. Swing, batter, swing!
But the Mariners’ stat of the year is guaranteed never to be bested. Felix Hernandez had exactly one official at bat…and hit a grand slam home run. The resulting slugging percentage of 4.000 is the statistical max. For fun, imagine anyone averaging four RBIs per at bat for an entire season. For someone with 686 at bats like Ichiro, that would project to over 2,700 RBIs. Sure, that’s stupid—but isn’t it fun to look at?
OUCHIE OF THE YEAR
You may know him as the former Diamondback who came out of nowhere to lead the American League in home runs for most of the year, striding menacingly from the White Sox dugout. But in baseball as in life, with joy there is often pain. As one of only four players with four throwing errors from the outfield, and one of only three who was zapped by opposing pitches at least 20 times, the White Sox’ Carlos Quentin is the first recipient of Ouchie of the Year—well actually, part of the year. His season ended in September, appropriately enough, when he suffered a fractured wrist—by angrily smashing himself with his own bat.
Dude, that’s Hall of Fame ouch.
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