I’m going to deviate for a moment from my series on the Pitch Count Warriors, to go on a semi-related rant.

When I began the series, there were three pitchers that fit my criteria (throwing more than 130 pitches in a game.)  I began with Ian Snell and moved to Edwin Jackson.  All that was left was to profile a Roy Halladay start on June 2 and my work would be complete.

Then Royals manager Trey Hillman decided to leave Gil Meche in a game in mid June to throw 132 pitches in an attempt to notch a shutout against the Arizona Diamondbacks.

I’m saving the gory details for the fourth entry in my series, but suffice it to say that Meche struggled in his next two starts immediately following his long outing.  He lasted just 3.1 innings on June 21 and went 5 innings on June 26, allowing 14 hits, 13 runs and four home runs.

Although Meche and team officials insisted the extended outing had nothing to do with his struggles, the Royals began to worry.  His velocity was down in the June 26 start (his average fastball at that point was 93 mph and he was having trouble breaking 90 mph) and as I stated in the previous graph - the opposition was having no trouble putting the bat on the ball.

Word began to filter out of the Royals camp that Meche was suffering from a “dead arm.”  On Sunday, his Wednesday start was uncertain.  He was skipping his usual throwing session that would have come on Sunday (two days following his previous start) and instead would have a bullpen session on Monday.  The purpose of the session wasn’t to get some regular work.  It was to test his arm to see if he was fit enough to make his next start.

On Monday, Meche gave his session a “thumbs up!” and declared himself ready for Wednesday.

In his start against the Twins, Meche struggled with his control (or the home plate umpire struggled with his strike zone.)  Either way, Meche was racking up pitches in a day game in Kansas City.  By the fifth inning, he had walked four and struck out four while throwing 99 pitches.  (Of course, the Royals atrocious defense figures into this story.  A ground ball went hit directly at second baseman Alberto Callaspo went right between his legs.  And right fielder Willie Bloomquist dropped a fly ball in the fifth.  That will elevate a pitch count.)

So the Royals received 99 pitches from a starter who’s start was in jeopardy just two days ago because of a “dead arm.”  Of course, you’d like your starter to go deeper into the game, but 99 pitches is 99 pitches - especially when there are concerns about your health.  Everyone figured Meche’s day was over.

Everyone except Trey Hillman.

For some reason, SABR Trey (so named for his bizarre proclivity to play the percentages, and play them incorrectly) allowed Meche to return to the mound for the start of the sixth inning.  Why?  Meche had already thrown a bunch of pitches and hadn’t been all that effective to begin with.  The game was at a perfect point where Hillman could go to his bullpen.  Instead, he stuck with his starter and two pitches in, Meche served up a double.

Then, with the runner on second, Meche went on a fastball binge.  The next 19 pitches of the inning were fastballs.  When was the last time a starter, with a four pitch repertoire, threw 19 fastballs in a row?  If that’s not a red flag, I don’t know what is.

Oh, did I mention that after the double to start the inning, the Twins did Meche a huge favor by hacking away?  The next two hitters saw a total of four pitches and both made outs.  It looked like Meche (and Hillman) could dodge a bullet but then Meche faltered, walking the fourth hitter of the inning to bring Joe Mauer to the plate.  Maybe now this would be a good time to go to the bullpen.  Meche was at 113 pitches, there were two runners on and the best hitter in the AL was standing at the plate.  (And he was probably thinking fastball!)  The manager emerges from the dugout… and returns without making the move to the bullpen.

Mauer punishes a predictable fastball and lines a single to center, pushing the score to 3-0.

Meche retires Justin Morneau on a deep fly ball to end the inning and finally left the game after throwing 121 pitches.

So the Royals second-best starter, coming off a “dead arm” was left in the game to post his second highest pitch count total of the season.  Meche says he “felt great,” but we’ll see how great he feels later this week and when he makes his next start.  Meche is exactly halfway through a five-year, $55 million deal and is actually a huge reason the Royals have improved their win total over the previous two seasons.  He’s a key guy on this team.  I can’t get over Hillman and his case of managerial malpractice.

It’s a trend that is slowly unfolding in Kansas City.  Royals starters have thrown more than 115 pitches in a start on 11 occasions, the second highest total among teams.  Certainly, part of the reason for this is SABR Trey doesn’t trust his bullpen.  Last year, with Leo Nunez, Ramon Ramirez and Joakim Soria, Hillman found himself with a quality pen.  This year with Nunez and Ramirez gone, the Royals bullpen ERA is 4.35, which is the third worst total in the league.

The Royals are a long, long way from being relevant.  Boneheaded moves from their manager like this will only serve to push them even further away.

Where were we?  Ah, yes… The Pitch Count Kings.  I set out to look at all starters this year who threw 130 or more pitches in a start.  In my first installment, Ian Snell was placed under the microscope.  Today, we turn our attention to the second pitcher to toss more than 130 pitches in a start:  The Detroit Tigers Edwin Jackson.

On May 21, Jackson took the mound in a home start against the Texas Rangers.

8 IP, 7 H, 3 ER, 5 BB, 7 SO

It wasn’t the tidiest of performances, but in many ways it was typical Jackson.  Too many base runners and a few hits strung together with some strikeouts sprinkled in between.  In the end, he threw 132 pitches in a 4-3 Tiger win.

I don’t think Tigers manager Jim Leyland set out thinking Jackson would top 130 pitches for the afternoon.  When Jackson took the mound in the top of the eighth protecting a 3-1 lead, he had thrown 105 pitches and was looking strong.  However, Jackson found himself in hot water early.  A walk to David Murphy, followed by a fly out and a double by Hank Blalock put runners at second and third with one down.  At this point, he had thrown 12 pitches in the inning.

Then came a key at bat against Marlon Byrd.  If Jackson failed to retire Byrd, Leyland probably would have come with the hook.  Maybe.  But Byrd not only hit a soft liner for the second out… He did it in the first pitch of his at bat.

Now it seems Jackson is “this close” to escaping.  Yet trouble comes calling once again.  Nelson Cruz clears the bases with a double to close out a four pitch at bat.  Then Chris Davis walks on six pitches before Jackson gets the final out of the inning.  So after he got the second out, Jackson needed an additional 14 pitches to finish the frame.  That brought his total to a career high 132 pitches, breaking his career high of 117 pitches in a start he set just a month earlier.

Jackson has always had a “live” fastball.  According to FanGraphs, his average heater clocks in at 94.4 mph, which makes him the fourth hardest thrower (behind Ubaldo Jimenez, Justin Verlander and Josh Johnson) in the game.  Like many others who feature a plus-plus fastball, Jackson has battled control issues throughout his career.  Last season, he walked 3.8 batters per nine.  It was the second consecutive season he cut his walk rate (from 6.2 BB/9 in 2006) but he was still allowing far too many base runners.  His 4.88 FIP helps illustrate the fact

The amazing thing about Jackson’s 132 pitch start was he got stronger as the game progressed, and as he blew past the 100 pitch barrier, kept going.  From Brooks Baseball’s excellent PITCHf/x archives.

He was throwing hard all afternoon against the Rangers, but really took a step forward around his 90th pitch.

While I called his 132 pitch start “typical” as far as quality, that’s a bit unfair.  That would be accurate if he were having a “typical” Edwin Jackson type of year.  However, through his first eight starts, Jackson was having a heckuva season.

52 IP, 43 H, 14 ER, 11 BB, 41 SO, 2.42 ERA

The 4:1 K:BB ratio is obviously outstanding.  So was his .222 opponent’s batting average.  The only quibble anyone can have about Jackson’s early season performance is his lack of economy of pitches.  In these appearances he averaged 101 pitches, yet lasted only about six innings per start.

The good news is, in the five starts since his extended outing, Jackson has been just as unhittable.  It’s a good thing, because his walk rate has increased.

34.1 IP, 25 H, 8 ER, 9 BB, 24 SO, 2.10 ERA

The jump in walks from 1.9 BB/9 before his 132 pitch start to 2.4 BB/9 after certainly isn’t a deal breaker.  Not if he’s holding opponents to a .205 batting average.  Besides, he allowed just a single walk in each of his three starts following May 21.  His rate bumped up after a five inning, four walk start on June 11.  It should be noted that in the five starts since May 21, Jackson is again averaging 100 pitches, but is now going deeper into games. (He threw the second complete game of his career back on June 6.)

Also, it should be noted that his velocity has been rock steady since his long outing.  In that game, his average fastball was clocked at 94.9 mph.  In his next start on May 26, his average fastball was 94.6 mph and in his most recent start on June 17, he was again throwing 94.6 mph.

Jackson is having an excellent season… One that has helped the Tigers to an early lead in the AL Central.  Fans can breath a sigh of relief that his long outing at the end of May hasn’t seemed to have a negative effect.  Now they can shift their attention to hoping he can maintain his current level.

Since the turn of the century, 199 starting pitchers have thrown more than 130 pitches in a start. Three of those starts have come this year. In the first of a three part series, we’ll look at each start and how the pitchers have fared in the starts following.

We’ll begin on April 29 in Milwaukee when Pirates starter Ian Snell was engaged in a pitchers duel with Yovani Gallardo. By the time Snell exited the game after seven innings, he had thrown a career high 131 pitches. His line for the game:

7 IP, 5 H, 1 ER, 4 BB, 5 SO

According to the PITCHf/x data collected at brooksbaseball.net, Snell struggled to maintain his velocity in the middle innings, but finished strong.

His average FB in this start was 91.03 mph, which is right in line with his current seasonal average of 91.6 mph. The dip in velocity is interesting because it’s the converse of how many pitchers develop through the game. Most start with some of their lowest velocities, loosen up in the middle innings and tire later in the game. Snell did the opposite here.

Couple the high pitch count with the fact that Snell’s previous high in his career was 120 pitches back in 2007, and this seems even more extreme. In fact, covering Snell’s entire career (113 starts) he’s thrown more than 110 pitches just 10 times. And he hadn’t thrown that many pitches since a start in May of 2008. As we would expect, Snell was nowhere near as sharp in his next outing. His average FB dropped to 90.43 mph, which tells only part of the story. The real issue in this start was his movement, or lack of. Compare his velocity from April 29 to his following start.

His velocity in this start followed a more conventional trend. What wasn’t so conventional according to the PITCHf/x data, was a fastball and change that were flatter than usual. Conversely, he wasn’t locating his slider and was missing badly. Hitters were quick to adjust, feasting on his fastball and laying off the slider. The result:

5 IP, 4 H, 5 ER, 5 BB, 2 SO

His ineffectiveness was underscored by the fact that of his 94 pitches in this game, only three were swung on and missed.

Despite the high pitch count of his April 29 start, I don’t think it has had any negative long-term effects. Here’s Snell before and through his 131 pitch start:
29 IP, 3.72 ERA, 9.0 H/9, 5.6 BB/9, 6.2 K/9

Sure, that’s a decent ERA, but it’s not like he was on fire to start the season. His walk rate was astronomical and his WHIP was a gaudy 1.62.

Snell since his 131 pitch start:
36 IP, 7.00 ERA, 9.8 H/9, 4.5 BB/9, 6.25 K/9

The ERA has exploded, but that’s because his walk and hit rates again yielded a too-high 1.58 WHIP. A pitcher that allows this many base runners can dodge a few bullets, but over the course of the season, this is going to catch up to him.

Snell has been horrible since that start back on the 29th of April. But he was horrible before that start as well. His moderate ERA to that point masked some deeper issues that have since come to the surface.

Everyone knows about David Ortiz and the Great Power Outage of 2009. But a quick look at the home run tallies from this season shows he’s not the only one who can’t buy a home run. A similar power outage is underway in Cleveland where shortstop Jhonny Peralta has, like Ortiz, hit just a single home run this year. This is coming after a 2008 season where he hit 23 home runs - one off his career high - and 42 doubles.

Peralta has always trended more to the ground ball side of the batted ball equation. His career GB/FB ratio stands at 1.4. Aside from his first 300 plate appearances between 2003 and 2004 where his ratio was 1.8, he’s been fairly consistent in the 1.3 to 1.4 range. This year, however, he’s slipped back to the extreme ground ball tendencies he exhibited early in his career with a GB/FB ratio of 1.9.

The increase in ground balls is coming at the expense of both fly balls and line drives. In other words, he’s not making good contact. Compare his batted ball rates from last year when he hit 42 doubles and 23 home runs, to this season:

2008
20.2% LD, 43.6% GB, 36.2% FB

2009
16.5% LD, 54.3% GB, 29.1% FB

More ground balls don’t necessarily mean fewer base hits. But they most certainly mean less power. The result of Peralta’s worm-killing tendencies has been a steep decrease in ISO, from .197 last year, to his current rate of .070 this season. That’s quite a slide.

Peralta’s contact rates themselves haven’t changed all that much. At least not enough to raise a red flag. He’s making contact (either a foul or ball in play) on 76% of his swings, which is right in line with his career percentage. So it’s not the quantity of contact, it’s the quality of contact.

My new colleague at BDD, Zach Sanders, looked at Peralta’s teammate Kelly Shoppach and found a similar decrease in fly ball rate. My first thought was perhaps there’s a common organizational thread where for some bizarre reason the Indians are emphasizing basic contact at the expense of power. (Hey, crazier things have happened. I’m in Kansas City where a few years ago the organization decided that strikeouts were bad… For their pitchers.) Indians hitting coach, Derek Shelton is in his fifth season, so he’s been Peralta’s coach for most of his big league career. That also leads me to believe that there wasn’t some kind of crazy tinkering going on that sapped Peralta of his power.

The good news is, if anyone should know Peralta’s swing, it’s Shelton. The bad news is, this power outage has gone on for two full months. Peralta’s last extra base hit was a double against the Kansas City Royals back on May 21. That was 40 plate appearances ago. His only home run came on May 1, 110 plate appearances ago.

This isn’t a minor power outage… It’s a full scale blackout.

Mike Lynch over at Seamheads has run a couple of baseball simulations using the excellent Out Of The Park software. In his last sim, he had owners from around the blogosphere build their ideal franchise using a collection all-time greats from different eras and having them duke it out on the computer. That league was won by Joe Posnanski, who managed his all-time Cleveland Indian team to a title.

This time around, Lynch decided to assemble a league based on great teams that never won a championship to form a Near Miss League. He approached BDD poo-bah Joe Hamrahi and myself about picking a Kansas City Royals team that qualified. Since I love the Royals and have followed them since the mid-70’s, this opportunity thrilled me to say the least. Besides, I’m always on a crusade… Attempting to right some wrongs that were brought upon me by the New York Yankees of the 1970’s. The Yankees crushed my hopes for three straight years - 1976 through 1978 - before the Royals finally triumphed in 1980 only to lose to the Phillies in the World Series. Those four teams averaged over 97 wins and all of them could be considered solid choices for this league.

After drawing on my memory bank (some of which is just too painful to clearly recollect) and consulting the team pages at Baseball Reference to confirm our initial thoughts, we went with the 1977 Royals. This team was - championships aside - the most successful team in franchise history.

Other representatives in the league include Aaron Gleeman managing the 1965 Twins, Jonah Keri at the helm of the 1994 Expos and Bill Simmons in charge of the 2008 Red Sox.

Back to the Royals… The ’77 team won a club record 102 games and fell to the Yankees in five games in the ALCS. What’s notable about this team is beginning in mid August of that year, they posted a 10 game winning streak, lost three of their next four and then embarked on a 16 game winning streak. When that streak was snapped, they won the following night and proceeded to win their next seven games. Add it all up, it was a stretch where they went 35-4 - an amazing .897 winning percentage.

Offensively, the ’77 Royals were led by Hall of Famer George Brett, who hit .312/.373/.532. He was backed up by right fielder Al Cowens who hit .312/.361/.525 and designated hitter Hal McRae at .298/.366/.515.

Dennis Leonard, with 20 wins, 244 strikeouts and a 3.04 ERA in 292 innings fronted a four man rotation that also included lefty Paul Splittorff (3.69 ERA in 229 innings) and Jim Colborn (3.62 ERA in 239 innings).

I was a little nervous when league play finally started. Four AL teams are from this decade, so I just assumed they could pound my light-hitting wonders into oblivion. Then you have the ‘69 Orioles, the ‘82 Brewers and the ‘61 Tigers to contend with. All these teams are really, really good - as you would expect. Joe and I could only hope our boys could hang with some of the greats. Opening day was a week ago and our Royals took on the 1954 New York Yankees, and their owner, King Kauffman. In the opener, Leonard outpitched Whitey Ford as we posted a 5-2 victory. Splittorff pitched eight scoreless innings as we took the second game 7-3. We lost the third, 10-1 (so we won’t discuss that one) but after taking two of three from the mighty Yankees, we were feeling pretty good.

Through 12 games, our record stands at 8-4, which leading the AL West. Amos Otis is setting the pace with a .341 batting average and four regulars are hitting over .300. Because this is a Royals team that played on artificial turf in double knit polyesters, we’re a running team. So far we’ve stolen a league-high 20 bases and hit just three home runs. I’m not sure the small ball approach is paying off as we’re scoring just 3.1 runs per game. Three runs! It helps that our pitching is only allowing 2.8 runs per contest and has allowed just 78 base hits in 105 innings of work.

In fact, our pitching is so good right now, our team WHIP is 1.00 - by far the best rate in the league. (Seattle is second at 1.12 and no one else is lower than 1.23.)

Things are going great, but Joe and I will be forced into a decision soon about what to do with first baseman, John Mayberry. He’s hitting .026. That’s .026! One freakin’ hit in 38 at bats! With 15 strikeouts! It’s making me so crazy, I’m abusing my ! key! Here’s the great thing… Somehow, he’s walked twice. His .096 OBP means he’s been on base three times in 11 games, yet he’s scored three runs. Arrrrrrgh!

Mayberry aside, we’re off to a great start. Joe and I will keep you posted. Kauffman and his Yankees are paying us a return visit and then it’s three against Simmons and his big time Red Sox to close out the month. We’ll keep you posted.

I’m admittedly slow to adapt to some of this Web 2.0 stuff. Facebook? I entered my info reluctantly and soon found myself surrounded by “friends.” OK, that was kind of cool. But since this is the 21st century, web popularity has the shelf life of a loaf of bread. So long, Facebook. Nowdays I’m kinda, sorta addicted to Twitter.

The fun thing about Twitter is there are a few baseball players who have pages. Certainly, there’s a number of fake or imposter pages, but there are a handful of pages that are legit.

Here are a few of the more notable MLB players on Twitter:

David Ortiz is on Twitter. I clicked his link, thinking there would be some explanation for his .319 slugging percentage. Or maybe some deep thoughts on Manny. Nope. His last entry is from April 27:

big weekend for us. up next Cleveland

Cliches in 140 characters or less. Maybe he’ll get the hang of it considering that’s only his second update. At least the Sox took two of three in that big weekend and Ortiz was 4-13 with a double and two runs. Big weekend, indeed.

The White Sox Chris Getz has the same number of home runs as Ortiz (0) but has him beat in updates (8). His last one was May 3:

Wonder what the record is for rain delays in a game?

This question makes sense because the Sox game against the Rangers the night before was delayed for almost two and a half hours by rain. What would have been better about this Tweet was if Getz had posted it during the delay. If Charlie Villanueva can tweet during halftime of an NBA game, can’t a ballplayer at least tweet from the on deck circle? Or in the bullpen between warm-up pitches?

I would love for some ballplayers to Tweet during the game. How great would that be if they questioned strategy or a call. Or even better… pointed out a nice looking lady in the stands.

None of that is happening, but the Royals Coco Crisp has one of the more entertaining Twitter habits. He’s updated about rough plane flights (it was moving like a Wakefield knuckleball - excellent description), his new dog (a chihuahua - really?) and his haircut. Crisp last updated three days ago following a 1-4 evening at the plate:

OK i officially have a new (baseball) disease called PPA (Piss Poor Aim). Everytime i hit a ball hard PPA kicks in. There has to be a cure.

Piss Poor Aim… Since the Royals have dropped four in a row, that’s apparently more contagous than the Swine Flu. Here’s more from that rough flight into KC for the home opener:

Got n 2 KC last night. That plane ride was by far the worst i’ve ever been on. i thought fasho i was a goner.

I’m following Crisp. Fasho.

And since I’m a Royals fan, I also follow Joakim Soria. Soria (or the Mexicutioner as he’s known around these parts) is currently on the DL with shoulder stiffness. He’s keeping us updated on his condition in true Mexicutioner fashion:

i be back

Whew. I’m glad that’s settled.

Like myself, the Twins Joe Mauer expressed some trepidation about Twitter. His first post:

My buddies convinced me to use this. Not sure. I’m excited to see Twins fans at Twins Fest this weekend.

He’s still not hooked, updating just twice since the start of the season:

Opening Day! Go get ‘em boys!

And on the day of his return from the DL:

Back to Twitter, but more importantly back to baseball tonight. See you all at the dome!

There’s not much interesting here. He’s probably using Big Papi’s ghost Twitterer.

By far the most popular ballplayer on Twitter is the Yankees Nick Swisher with just under 100,000 followers. With good reason… He updates regularly and is pretty entertaining. Another plus is he’ll update from his phone, usually when he’s on his way to the park or when he just arrived in the clubhouse. He broke down Tuesday’s Yankee-Blue Jay tilt this way:

The teacher vs. The student. This is going to be fun!

I guess that’s a reference to the Roy Halladay/AJ Burnett match-up. The teacher won that battle with a five-hit complete game. Swisher was 0-2 with a pair of strikeouts.

Finally, of all the ballplayers who tweet, none can match Barry Zito. Zito updates constantly.

On Tuesday, the Giants came back from run down in the ninth on a three-run Pedro Sandoval home run. Zito’s reaction?

F@#K YEAH BABY!!!!

The funny thing was, Zito wasn’t even at the game. He was sitting at home watching it on TV. We know, because he tweeted about it:

Just got home from game, they let starters go home to rest up when starting day game. Watching the boys battle on tv…

When Zito isn’t tweeting baseball, he’s usually tweeting music or movies. He’s been on a huge Beatles kick lately and namechecks Radiohead and Stan Getz among others. If you dig pop culture, you’ll probably enjoy following Zito. Besides, when you follow someone as popular as Zito, you never know when a random celebrity will show up.

@Alyssa_Milano: Me vs Billingsley Friday. You going?

Alyssa, if you’re reading, you can find me at RoyalsAuthority.

The descent of Lastings Milledge continues…

On Monday, Milledge broke his right ring finger squaring to bunt in a game for Triple-A Syracuse. He’s due to be examined by a hand specialist, but the best case scenario has him missing several weeks.

The injury comes weeks after opening the year as Washington’s starting center fielder. However, when the Nats stumbled out of the gate, losing their first seven games, management looked to make an early change. Milledge was an easy target as was swinging his way into oblivion… Collecting just four hits in his first 26 plate appearances and striking out 10 times. It took just seven games for Milledge to play his way out of a starting role in Washington.

Optioned to Syracuse to work on his plate discipline and defense, Milledge wasn’t getting the message. In 83 plate appearances for the Sky Chiefs, Milledge had 16 strikeouts against just three walks and was hitting .253/.277/.316 at the time of his injury. The power, the average, the promise… It’s all unfulfilled.

Milledge turned 24 just before Opening Day, so it’s crazy to completely write him off, but he’s certainly running out of time to make a positive impression and provide the production that would lead his employer to believe he can be a contributing major league player.

Milledge has now made appearances in the major league (for the Mets and Nats) over the last four seasons, appearing in a total of 260 games. Over that time, he’s accumulated 1,004 plate appearances and has a line of .261/.326/.400. In other words, he’s fallen well short of the promise that led Baseball America to tout his “lightening quick bat speed,” “strength to hit for average and power,” and “above average speed he uses to his advantage on the bases and in the field.” As the Mets top prospect prior to the 2006 season, Baseball America summed him up in a way that got fans in New York excited: “With his package of five tools, Milledge has few peers in the minors, and he has produced throughout his minor league career.”

The expectations quickly turned sour and after appearing in parts of two seasons in the Mets outfield, they shipped him to Washington in the Ryan Church deal. Last year for Washington, Milledge started for the majority of the season but again failed to capitalize on his promise, hitting just .268/.330/.402.

He’s always been a bit of a free swinger, chasing balls out of the strike zone 31.8% of the time. Some players can thrive swinging at a bunch of pitches (think Vlad Guerrero) but it’s not working more Milledge. His lack of discipline has led to a depressed contact rate of 65%. Pitchers know this, so he’s seen a steady diet of sliders over the last two seasons. Last year, Milledge hit .210 when his at bat was resolved with a slider.

When he makes contact, good things usually happen. Last year his .305 BABIP was right in line with his career mark, but a strikeout rate north of 20% and a lack of walks, ensures his overall numbers will remain around league average.

The Nationals don’t want to give up on Milledge and they shouldn’t. At 24, there’s still plenty of time for him to regain his footing and become a productive major leaguer. But for him to do that, he’ll need to recognize his weaknesses (bad plate discipline, the slider, etc.) and work to correct them. While he will almost certainly never fulfill the promise he flashed as a young minor leaguer, but if he can get back on track, there’s no reason he can’t have a productive career. Or he could go the other way where he doesn’t work to make the necessary improvements and he becomes a journeyman who bounces from organization to organization, looking for playing time. The injury comes at a time that finds Milledge at a crossroads.

The broken finger isn’t the end of the line, but it’s certainly a big step back. Time is running short.

Currently hitting .200/.266/.300 in the young season, Cubs first baseman Derrek Lee is struggling. Struggling may be understating his current condition - in 79 plate appearances, he’s managed just five extra base hits. What in Wrigleyville is going on?

For starters, Lee’s line drive rate is obscenely low. At 8.3%, Lee is hitting fewer line drives (as a percentage of all balls put in play) than any other big league regular. And it’s not even close. Only Florida’s Cameron Maybin and Lee’s teammate Mike Fontenot have line drive rates lower than 10%.

Historically, Lee rakes the liners. For his career, he’s hitting a line drive 21.3% of the time and last season his rate was at 21.5%. As we all know, line drives are the gold standard for batters. Since roughly three-fourths of all line drives fall for hits, the more line drives, the better the offensive production. Lee’s abysmal line drive rate is reflected in his batting average on balls in play. Currently, he’s carrying a .228 BABIP, well below his career mark of .325.

Meanwhile, Lee is putting more balls in play than at any other time in his career. He’s walking just 9.1% of the time (versus a career rate of 11.2%) and striking out just 17.1% of the time (verses a career rate of 23.2%.) If he continues making this kind of contact, Lee will set a career best for his strikeout rate.

So Lee is making more contact than ever, yet his line drive rate is at an all time low. Why? Since it’s not a lack of contact issue, it must be a type of contact issue.

Lee has slowly been expanding his strike zone ever since joining the Cubs prior to the 2004 season. According to FanGraphs, Lee’s O-Swing% (the percent of pitches he sees outside of his strike zone which he swings at) has been steadily increasing.

2004: 14.7%
2005: 16.9%
2006: 17.7%
2007: 18.7%
2008: 20.8%
2009: 22.2%

While Lee’s has been slowly expanding his zone, that in and of itself shouldn’t be cause for concern. When a batter goes fishing out of his strike zone, he’s really swinging at a pitcher’s pitch - it’s a pitch where if the hitter actually manages to get his bat on the ball, he’s usually not going to make quality contact. Again from FanGraphs, check out Lee’s contact percentages for when he swings at a pitch outside of the strike zone:

2004: 53.1%
2005: 43.6%
2006: 50.7%
2007: 52.5%
2008: 57.4%
2009: 68.8%

Making contact on pitches out of the zone doesn’t necessarily mean a bad thing. Players like Vladimir Guerrero and Albert Pujols routinely go out of the strike zone and make solid contact. However, for a player like Lee to see such an extreme jump in his percentage from one year to the next… that will set off a few alarm bells. Making such a high rate of contact on balls out of the zone is not his game and his batting average, on base percentage and power are all suffering because of that.

So if Lee is going out of the zone more often and isn’t hitting line drives anymore, what type of contact is he making? For his career, Lee usually hits a similar number of balls on the ground and in the air. His career FB rate is 38%, but this season, 55% of all of his batted balls are going in the air.

Lee is still taking that power swing but now instead of driving the ball, he’s just getting under the ball. And when he goes fishing outside of the zone, the result is a harmless fly ball. This season, many of those fly balls aren’t even leaving the infield. His infield fly ball rate is a whopping 21.2%. Almost a quarter of all his fly balls are barely traveling 120 feet.

We’re a month into the season, and with Lee hitting .190/.227/.238 over his last six games, it’s time to be concerned. He missed a couple of games after experiencing back spasms over the weekend and returned to the lineup on Wednesday where he went 0-3, with three fly ball outs. Apparently, he didn’t use his time off to reevaluate his methods.

As it stands, Lee needs to overhaul everything about his approach at the plate. For starters, he needs to lay off all pitches outside the strike zone and focus only on those pitches that are over the plate - the pitches where he can actually accomplish something productive. Then, he needs to concentrate on making solid contact. The extra base hits will take care of themselves, but for now Lee just needs simply to connect on a few line drives. It’s the first step in his recovery.

A long-time subscriber of the Extra Innings package, after test driving MLB.tv for a month at the end of the season last year, I decided that I would cut the cord with my cable company (take that Time Warner!) and throw my cash directly at MLBAM this summer. Part of my reasoning for the move was the lack of my cable company to provide multiple high definition broadcasts. Last year, I was lucky if I received one HD game a day. Another reason had to do with the quality of the standard definition signal. Some games looked OK, other’s were downright horrible. Red Sox games on NESN in particular were incredibly compressed. Also, I’m just kind of tired of handing over a ton of cash to my cable company. So for $60 less on the year, I could get the same baseball experience with full archives on my computer. It seemed like a perfect time to jump.

In the meantime, MLBAM decided to abandon Microsoft’s Silverlight platform which was the driving force behind MLB Mosaic which gave subscribers the ability to view six games at a time. In my brief test drive last September, Silverlight seemed to work well enough. The games streamed just fine, but I ran into some playback issues on my Mac when it wouldn’t play nice with the Windows Media files that were processed through Silverlight. Overall though, I was happy, but it seems like my experience wasn’t representative of those who signed on for a full season as many customers were unhappy with the product and baseball listened. Although they MLBAM never detailed the reasons for dropping Silverlight, tech website CNET reports that sources close to negotiations between baseball and Microsoft said that MLBAM was unhappy with “glitches and a series of conflicts between the two companies.”

To replace Silverlight, MLBAM chose to go with Adobe’s Flash platform. They reportedly went with Flash because of it’s ubiquitousness on computers and it’s cross platform friendliness. According to Bob Bowman, the CEO of MLBAM, the player is extremely flexible and “can be put on any screen you want, there’s no degradation at all. It has all the bells and whistles, picture-to-picture, DVR-quality pause, rewind, fast-forward, real-time highlights. The meat-and-potatoes of it of course is the picture quality itself and it is eye popping.”

I’ll second what he said about the quality. The high definition picture on MLB.tv is incredible. Crystal clear and then some. I can’t believe I’m streaming video that looks this good. And when I hook my computer up to my TV, I can’t tell I’m basically watching a game on my computer. It’s outstanding.

Despite a killer picture, there have been glitches. At times the video has been choppy. Personally, this was an issue for me on opening day, but hasn’t been a real problem since. Others are having a problem with games not loading properly. For a while on Opening Day, the audio was horribly out of sync - although that was soon corrected.

Early on, the archived game section was incomplete where only a handful of each day’s games were available for viewing once they were finished. That seemed to be corrected by Thursday morning when all games but the season opener of the Indians and the Rangers available for repeat viewing. The condensed games (where only the pitch that resolves the at bat and the occasional instant replay are shown) still haven’t appeared. And while I haven’t seen it reported as a known issue, yesterday I couldn’t get a list of games to load under the “Today’s Games” tab.

Slowly but surely, the service is evolving into what was promised. The DVR capability is sweet, allowing the viewer to slide back in time to review a play or to pause the game to step away from the computer for a moment. Or if you know exactly where you want to go, like say the seventh inning of Wednesday’s Phillies-Braves game, you simply click on the “jump to inning” tab and select the bottom of the seventh.

Did I mention the awesome hi-def picture? One thing I really like is the ability to chose your broadcast feed. In the past, I subscribed to Gameday Audio and had my favorite announcing teams. For example, if I wanted to listen to a Dodger-Padre game, I would choose the LA feed - no brainer. Now with two broadcast feeds, I can do the same thing. But this time around, I find myself selecting the broadcast that is delivering the game in high definition. I’m sure MLBAM keeps track of who’s watching what, so it would be interesting to see the percentage of those who choose a HD feed over a SD feed. I’d bet it’s close to 9-1 in favor of HD. Any lower than that and my faith in humanity would be shaken.

MLB.tv isn’t all the way there just yet, but it’s on it’s way. I don’t miss my cable at all.

Since Curt Schilling announced his retirement today, the debate can begin in earnest. Is Schilling worthy of enshrinement into the Hall of Fame?

Schilling was clearly a great pitcher and no doubt deserves serious consideration. I’ll put a little more time and effort into his candidacy later this week, but for now I’d like to focus on one aspect: October.

Does performance in the playoffs and World Series impact a player’s Hall of Fame resume? Although post season performance often elevates a player in the eyes of fans, it’s rare that, given the opportunity, a great player doesn’t perform at a high level in the playoffs. It’s part of what makes them great. Sure, Alex Rodriguez has been vilified for October chokes, but would something like that keep him out of Cooperstown? Of course not. (Apparently, there are a few other issues he’ll have to overcome. It is worth noting that he’s hitting .315/.413/.611 in three League Championship appearances.) Take away the outside issues for just a moment and A Rod is a no doubt Hall of Famer.

Then what to do with players who didn’t play at all in the post season? Ernie Banks is perhaps the best known Hall of Famer who played his entire career without logging a playoff or World Series at bat. Banks was obviously great enough to overcome the misfortune of never appearing in the playoffs or the World Series. And the fact the league championship series came into existence the last three years of his career kept his opportunity at a minimum.

Post season play isn’t a huge factor in determining someone’s candidacy and bad play or lack of appearances have never eliminated a worthy Hall of Famer. But does quality post season play help? It certainly can’t hurt because these are the appearances that become the stuff of legend. Do you think Schilling would allow Red Sox doctors to suture his ankle together for a May start against the Baltimore Orioles?

It’s for that reason the post season absolutely matters and Schilling was among the best post season pitchers of his generation.

He appeared in 12 post season series throughout his career, starting 19 games. His overall record stands at 11-2 with a 2.23 ERA with a strikeout rate of 8.1 K/9 and a walk rate of 1.7 BB/9. He helped his teams wins in 10 of those 12 series including three World Series titles.

From Schilling’s page at Baseball Reference, here’s how everything breaks down by series:

What’s most impressive was the fact that in four of his post seasons starts, his team was facing elimination and Schilling helped his team to victory in all four. Let’s look at those starts.

October 14, 2001

It was the fifth and final game of the NLDS and Schilling took the mound against Matt Morris of the St. Louis Cardinals. Schilling threw 121 pitches, 86 of them for strikes as the Diamondbacks won 2-1 on a Tony Batista single in the bottom of the ninth inning. Schilling went the distance, allowing a JD Drew home run in the eighth for the Cardinals only run of the game.

His final line:
9 IP, 6 H, 1 ER, 1 BB, 9 SO

November 4, 2001

Schilling helped bring the only World Series title to the Valley of the Sun with a 3-2 victory against a Yankee team that famously wouldn’t quit. It was his third appearance in that World Series, but his final performance (along with that of co-MVP Randy Johnson) is the one that sticks in the mind. He had allowed only one hit through the first six innings and had faced the minimum thanks to Paul O’Neil getting thrown out at third trying to stretch his double into a triple.

However in the seventh and part of the eighth, Schilling faltered, allowing four hits and two runs. Tino Martinez tied the game at one in the top of the seventh and Alfonso Soriano put the Yankees ahead with a home run leading off the eighth. By the time manager Bob Brenley came out for the ball, Schilling was gassed.

His final line:
7.1 IP, 6 H, 2 ER, 0 BB, 9 SO

October 19, 2004

The Bloody Sock.

Schilling had opened the ALDS against the Anaheim Angels and aggravated an ankle injury fielding a chopper. With the injury, Red Sox fans were fearing the worst. And in his first start of the ALDS against the Yankees those fears became reality as he lasted just three innings and allowed six runs.

But thanks to some nifty suturing, Schilling’s tendons in his ankle were basically stapled into place, which allowed him to pitch seven innings of one run ball as the Red Sox pushed the Yankees to a game seven. The injury limited his power and deception, but he maintained his pinpoint control, throwing only 32 balls among his 99 pitches. The Yankees could only touch him for a Bernie Williams home run in the seventh.

His final line:
7 IP, 4 H, 1 ER, 0 BB, 4 SO

October 20, 2007
Just like in ’04, Schilling was hammered in his first start of the ALCS going just 4.2 innings and surrendering five runs on nine hits. And just like in ’04, he rebounded to hold the opposition at bay to force a game seven.

This time, the opponents were the Cleveland Indians. Schilling allowed a home run to Victor Martinez leading off the second, but that wasn’t a huge deal considering JD Drew opened the Red Sox scoring with a grand slam in the bottom of the first. Schilling wasn’t as dominant as he had been in his past elimination games, but he was able to stay out of trouble. It certainly helped that the Sox followed Drew’s grand slam in the first with a six-run third to effectively put the game out of reach.

His final line:
7 IP, 6 H, 2 ER, 0 BB, 5 SO

That gives Schilling an impressive 30.1 innings pitched when his team was facing elimination with an ERA of 1.78 in those games with 27 strikeouts and just one walk. Money.

Schilling’s final post season performance was a game two start in the 2007 World Series against the Colorado Rockies. His body was breaking down at that point (he spent time on the shelf with tendonitis in his shoulder) but he still managed to go 5.1 innings allowing only one run as the Sox won the game 2-1.

Fitting that his final post season start was also the final start in his career.