*Wednesday* game notes – NL (corrected date) |

[Originally posted as “Tuesday” game notes, doink. I was home sick for 2 days and my head got kinda fuzzy.]

@Brewers 3, Reds 2: You’re never as good as you look when you’re winning 15 of 16, says the adage, and the Reds suddenly have a 4-game losing streak, their second this year, averaging 2 runs on 5 hits. Milwaukee’s comeback was keyed by Carlos Gomez, who put them on the board with a HR in the 6th (reaching double-digits for the first time), then knocked in the tying run with 2 outs in the 8th and scored on Ryan Braun‘s double.

Jonathan Broxton was the victim of the 8th-inning rally, allowing two straight hits with 2 outs & RISP after yielding just 2 hits in 18 prior chances.
29-year-old rookie Jim Henderson earned his 2nd straight save for the Crew. The Canadian, who shares a birthday with a certain blogger, had pedestrian stats in his first 9 years in the minors, but earned a call-up with excellent work as closer for AAA-Nashville this year.

Braves 12, @Phillies 6: In sight of his 12th win this year and 193rd of his career, Tim Hudson couldn’t hold a 6-1 lead in the 5th. He let 6 men on base in the inning and surrendered a tying 3-run HR to Ryan Howard, the 7th HR in 61 ABs in that matchup. But Atlanta fired back in the 7th with a 2-out, 4-run rally, and they improved to 9-3 against the Phils.

Dan Uggla‘s 3-run double gave him 11 RBI in his last 10 games after none in his previous 12.
Braves have won 12 of 15, but gained just a half-game against Washington.
Raul Valdes held down the fort until Philly’s rally, relieving the ineffective Kyle Kendrick and retiring all 5 men he faced and bumping his SO/BB ratio to 29/4. (What can I say … I’ve liked Raul ever since he debuted with the Mets.)

@Pirates 7, Diamondbacks 6: Big clutch hits by Neil Walker drove in 5 runs, giving him 18 RBI in his last 10 games. Walker reversed a 2-0 score with a 3-run HR in the 1st, then broke a tie in the 5th with a 2-run double that drove out Ian Kennedy. Joel Hanrahan blazed the side for his NL-best 33rd save in 36 tries.

Walker set a career high with his 13th HR, after hitting 12 each of the past 2 years, and tied Robinson Cano for the MLB lead in RBI by a 2B.
Andrew McCutchen is still hitting .370. The 3 Pirates who have hit .370 or better since 1900 are HOFers Honus Wagner (.381, 1900), Paul Waner (3 times) and Arky Vaughan (franchise-best .385 in 1935). The only ones with a higher OPS+ than McCutchen’s 194 are Wagner (205 in 1908) and Barry Bonds (204 in 1992).

Giants 15, @Cardinals 0 (9th): A 5-run 6th broke the game open, and Ryan Vogelsong shook off the end of his 16-game QS streak by starting a new one, silencing St. Louis on 3 hits through 7 IP. Melky Cabrera added 2 Runs to his NL-high total; no Giant has led the league in Runs since Will Clark tied for the lead in 1989.

Marco Scutaro hit a grand slam in the 9th and set a career high with 7 RBI.
The Giants have scored 9+ runs 7 times in road games, including 16, 15 and 14, but just once at home (10).
Just getting some work in, Mitchell Boggs met the end of his 20.1-IP scoreless streak, allowing 4 ER — half his previous season total.
St. Louis will fall 3.5 games back of the 2nd wild card.

Nationals 4, @Astros 3: Gio Gonzalez did no harm to his league-best HR/9 rate, avoiding the long-ball for the 19th time in 23 starts. That is, he avoided it on the mound. But in the box, Gio celebrated his first round-tripper, a 2-out, 2-run shot in the 2nd on the first pitch he saw from Armando Galarraga, putting the Nats ahead for good.

The big news came in the 9th: With a tired bullpen and a reasonable pitch count on Gio, Davey Johnson rode him all the way, even after 3 hits put the winning run on 2nd with 2 out. Gonzalez rewarded that faith by fanning Matt Downs for his first CG this year and 2nd of his career.
Washington tied Cincinnati with 3 HRs by pitchers.
Houston fell to 11-23 in one-run games … actually, that’s a hair better than their over-all W%.

@Padres 2, Cubs 0: San Diego got the sweep and a 4-game win streak, while Chicago took their 8th straight loss, their 2nd-longest skid this year, following on the heels of their only winning month.

Clayton Richard used only 98 pitches through 8 innings and was allowed to bat in the home 8th when the score was just 1-0. He faced the tying run for each of the last 2 outs, but Bud Black stuck with him and Richard finished his 2nd career shutout.

Marlins 13, @Mets 0: Giancarlo Stanton, two days off the DL, had a snappy answer for everything Chris Young threw, with a ground-rule double and two flavors of jaw-dropping two-run HR — a moonshot that looked like a routine fly right up until it dropped into the seats and a laser beam that sent Young to an early shower. The bullpen took care of the rest in their accustomed fashion.

Deadline trades suggested that Miami would mail it in, but so far in this series it’s the Mets who are scrounging for postage. Tuesday, they left 11 men on, 10 in the first 5 innings, including the bases loaded in the 5th on a very curious — OK, silly — decision by Terry Collins to let Jonathon Niese bat with the tying runs in scoring position. (Good morning, good afternoon, good night.) After that symbolic surrender, the Mets got just 1 man on base the rest of the way.
Wednesday, they got 10 men on base in Nathan Eovaldi‘s 5 IP, but went 0-10 with RISP for the evening.
We should not judge defensive ability with the naked eye. But boy, Andres Torres sure looks awful out there in CF.
Some band called Mercy Me is playing in Citi Field this Friday; I will henceforth think of them as Mercy Rule.

@Dodgers 3, Rockies 2: Matt Kemp erased a 2-0 deficit with a 3-run shot in the 1st. The rest happened too late for this edition of Game Notes.

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Larry

12 years ago

There is something delicious about the consistency with which the Astros lose. It must have been what it felt like to follow the hitting streak of the great DiMaggio. They lose on a scale seldom seen in a lifetime. I am hoping for at least 110 losses, but 120 would be ecstacy.

Doug

If McCutchen finishes above .370, he will be the first player to do so aged 25 or younger since Ted Williams hit .406 in 1941 (when Williams did it that year, it was the 27th time in 33 years).

I can’t claim to know how Andres Torres is coping with Citi Field, but his tendency to try to run down absolutely everything in the gaping spaces of AT&T was, at the very least, hugely entertaining. Not sure how his outfield chums felt about this.

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John Autin

Reply to RJ

The troubles I’ve seen for Andres are on balls that are unquestionably in his domain. He just doesn’t look confident in his pursuits, and an astonishing number of balls tip off his glove or fall just out of reach. That could be because he’s getting near balls that others wouldn’t, but it doesn’t seem so to me, especially considering how many bad routes I’ve seen him run. I also may be influenced by the fact that he absolutely cannot hit the ball out of the infield — he’s our new Luis Castillo, right down to the high walk rate. FWIW,… Read more »

Reply to John Autin

It never fails — I savage Andres Torres (“cannot hit the ball out of the infield”), and he immediately reels off a double, HR and triple in consecutive ABs — the first time he’s ever had that combination in a game.

Mike L

John A, feel like savaging a couple of Yankees? The lead is shrinking and the old folks fading.

Reply to Mike L

Mike, as much as I like to help my pals, I’ll have to withhold any reverse-kibosh until your boys move on from Motown. There’s bragging rights at stake!

Even your request jinxed my Bengals! Joaquin Benoit gave up back-to-back HRs to Teix & Chavez, and became the first reliever this year to allow 2+ HRs in consecutive appearances.

(Plus, I kiboshed Cabrera by posting about him.)

Voomo Zanzibar

He should put that band aid back on his face.

brp

Jim Henderson is an interesting case; he was in Single-A still at age 26. Plus he’s not even the first sports-related google hit in some cases; there is some sportscaster with the same name who comes up more frequently.

Can’t judge a guy from two appearances but he’s looked pretty good, so far. Will have to wait and see what happens once hitters have seen him/his film.

Tmckelv

“Deadline trades suggested that Miami would mail it in, but so far in this series it’s the Mets who are scrounging for postage.”

That is one of the best lines I have ever read. Because of the imagery, not the context. I love your ability to breathe life into sports cliches.

Reply to Tmckelv

Thanks, T! Part of the fun for me is finding new ways to say the same ol’ thing, so I’m glad you liked this one.

Hartvig

I’m sure it’s not a record but Scutaro’s 0.014 WPA with a grand slam & 7 RBI’s would seem to be a solid contender for “the least impactful big game in a winning effort” award this year.

Editor

Reply to Hartvig

Not just this year.

Only other game with WPA calculated and with a grand slam, 7 RBI and a lower WPA is Del Ennis of the Phillies, beating the Cubs 13-3 way back on July 27, 1950. WPA was -0.028.

http://www.baseball-reference.com/boxes/PHI/PHI195007270.shtml

Richard Chester

On 8-21-2009 Hideki Matsui hit 2 3-run HRs plus 1 other RBI for a WPA of -.048.

Reply to Richard Chester

In that same game, Robinson Cano had a nearly identical WPA (-.057) even though he went 1-6 with one RBI and a GDP.

@Doug – how in the world do you find that kind if stuff? That is just amazing. I guess there are search engines, but it seems tough to know how to set the parameters. It is also amazing the unique things that happen in baseball, but can bloom unseen unless the eye is trained to look for it. This is quite the group you have here!

Reply to Larry

Just have to practice using the Play Index at baseball-reference.com. Once you’re familiar with the search engine, many of these queries become fairly intuitive.

For the search @12, that was just a Game Finder for any player with 1 or more HR and 7 or more RBI, sorted in ascending WPA order. There were only a few games listed above Scutaro’s game, so I just checked each one for whether the HR was a grand slam.

bstar

JA, that’s the second time in a month Tim Hudson has been unable to close the deal given a 5+ run lead, the first being against the Mets on July 13th when he couldn’t finish 5 innings after being staked to a 5 run lead. Extremely un-Huddy-like behavior. He escaped with a ND both times, but it’s cause for worry if he’s the Braves de facto ace.

R.A. Dickey vs. Miami Wednesday: CG, 1 R, 5 hits, 10 Ks, no walks, 84 strikes, 34 balls. – Snapped Jose Reyes’s 26-game hitting streak. – First pitcher this year with 3 games of 10+ SO/no walks. (Last with more than 3: Randy Johnson, 2004.) – Reclaimed NL leads with 15 Wins, 165 SO & 162.1 IP. – Extended his leads of 1.00 WHIP & 4 CG. – Last Mets SO leader was David Cone, ’91. – Last Mets Wins leader was Dwight Gooden, ’85 (ditto CG; last Met with more than 4 CG was Gooden ’93). It’s nice to… Read more »

deal

Kyle Kendrick threw an excruciaing 53 pitches in the dreadful 2nd inning of the Braves @ Phils game.

Game Pix here including Tim Hudson throwing pitch that Rollins Homered off of, and Michael Bourn at the plate for Pitch he would homer on.

http://phungo.blogspot.com/2012/08/snapshots-2012-08-08-braves-phillies.html

Reply to deal

Thanks for that, deal.

I see that Kendrick had 2 strikes on 6 batters in that 2nd inning, but no Ks. Even though his K rate this year is over 6 for the first time, it’s amazing he’s lasted this long with a career rate of 4.4 SO/9 — 4th-lowest of the 193 active pitchers with 500+ IP.