Diamondbacks 1, Angels 6: First-Degree Byrnes

by Jim McLennan on Mar 21, 2009 12:31 AM EDT

He's baaaaack! Yep: Captain America, Flipper, The Pop-Up Toaster or simply Eric, our outfielder made his return to the line-up today, playing center-field and going 0-for-3 with a trio of flyouts to left [he'll be in LF tomorrow, and will likely see time at all three spots before long, in preparation for spelling everyone in the regular season]. He didn't get the chance to retire any batters in his four innings of work in the field, but did have to chase down a double to the gap during the second, and there was a triple over his head in the third. He joked afterwards, "I turned and ran, but the quarterback overthrew me. I have to question myself on playing too shallow after those balls got over my head." Still, Byrnes was satisfied: "It felt good. I'm excited to be back out there after nine months. Obviously, I would have liked to have squared up a couple of those balls. But I took a few good passes."

That's probably more than can be said for our defense, with Arizona committing three more errors, all from the left side of the infield. Stephen Drew opened that tally in the second inning, and Mark Reynolds added two more in due course, leading to three unearned runs on Jon Garland. Otherwise, our starter did struggle somewhat with his control, walking three in four innings, but only one of the four runs he allowed was earned. Good to see seven of the twelve outs recorded by Garland coming on the ground, compared to four in the air [the last one was a K, in case you were wondering]. Here is what he and Byrnes had to see about their outings today after leaving the game:

Audio courtesy of KTAR 620

Not a great deal of offense once again, with just six hits. Chad Tracy had two doubles, and is hitting a solid .355 on the season. He also scored our only run, being driven in by a Tony Clark single in the fourth, while Justin Upton drew two of the Diamondbacks' three walks. We did get Miguel Montero back, having returned from Venezuela after the unexpected death of his father, and he doubled in the ninth inning, as a pinch-hitter for Tracy. He seems glad to be back. "It keeps my mind a little busy. It's tough, but it's life, and you've just got to keep going. There's nothing we can do. It was just his time." Sad, nonetheless.

On the mound, Scott Schoeneweis and Tony Peña continued their springs with a scoreless inning of work each. On first glance at the boxscore, it looks like they're both equally impressive, with zero Cactus League ERAs. However, neither Schoeneweis nor Daniel Schlereth make it into the mlb.com spring stats for some reason, despite having pitched six and five innings respectively. SS's actual ERA is now 6.00 and Schlereth's 3.60, though Peña is a legitimate zero despite eight hits in 4.1 innings - his K:BB ratio is a nice 6:1 thus far. More on that tomorrow, however, as I look at the spring stats so far. Bobby Korecky was definitely not impressive, allowing three hits and two walks during the seventh and eighth, with an Angels hitter crossing the plate in each frame.

Bob Melvin announced the rotation, which can only be regarded as the least monumental news of the week. I'll forgive you if you struggle to stay awake for the rest of this paragraph, since it's entirely predictable. Brandon Webb (gasp!) will get his fourth Opening Day start for the team, with (shock!) Dan Haren following him. Doug Davis (stop the presses!) and Jon Garland (film at 11!) will be the #3 and #4, though Melvin didn't seem to think there was much of a gap between that pair. Finally, Max Scherzer (oh, I give up...) will be the fifth spot, but isn't needed until April 14, so may or may not be on the Opening Day roster.

Couple of links to finish things off. Dan Bickley thinks the Diamondbacks need a star, 'someone on the field to be more popular than...Mark Grace.' [Pauses to bang head on the table] It's precisely that kind of talk that gets fourth outfielders with TV shows signed to $30m contracts. I'm sure the Cubs have plenty of stars though... Over on ESPN, a much better story from Jerry Crasnick: D-backs digest disappointing season, and says that "Improving selectivity at the plate a priority for Arizona's young free swingers." No question there.

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Improving selectivity. . . .

I read that piece by Crasnick and I have to DISAGREE with the basic assessment of the young hitters needing to be more selective. They have all obviously been schooled on the need to work the count and to my eye, Young, Upton & Reynolds take too many good pitches early in the count that they could otherwise be driving somewhere. Let’s go over some numbers. Here are the DBacks’ young hitters’ pitches/plate appearance for 2008 and rank (out of 72 qualifiers) in the NL (if they qualified):

Snyder 4.41 DNQ
Reynolds 4.24 3
Upton 4.18 DNQ
Montero 4.14 DNQ
Young 3.98 20
Drew 3.80 41
Jackson 3.54 66

The NL average last year was 3.81 (and the AL was 3.80 so the pitcher’s spot doesn’t skew the average much). It’s also worth noting that while Snyder & Montero spent significant time in the #8 spot and you’d think their numbers would be slightly skewed by both intentional walks and the “un-intentional” intentional walks, Snyder’s P/PA in the #8 spot actually went DOWN to 4.23 while Montero’s bumped up only slightly to 4.28

Now here’s the same hitters with their RC/27 outs:

Snyder 5.44
Reynolds 5.08
Upton 5.78
Montero 5.28
Young 4.81
Drew 6.08
Jackson 6.19

So the 2 most “impatient” young hitters on the roster were actually the most productive. I would argue that Drew & Jackson better grasp the understanding that walks are not a means unto themselves but merely an indicator that the batter is forcing the pitcher to give him better pitches to hit. I would argue that Reynolds, Upton & Young’s problem is not that they aren’t selective enough but that they are too selective and need to better recognize good pitches early in the count. I felt like I saw all 3 last year just let wayyyyyy too many fastballs down the middle go early in the count that they could have pounded somewhere.

Oh also, only 3 of the top 10 and 6 of the top 20 in the NL last year in RC/27 outs saw over 4 P/PA. Here the # P/PA for the top 5 in RC/27 outs:

Pujols 3.83
Chipper 3.72
Berkman 3.91
Holliday 3.88
Hanley Ramirez 4.13

(All stats from ESPN)

by golfmanthee on Mar 22, 2009 2:32 PM EDT reply actions

Nice analysis

I agree on the early count passivity. It drove me crazy too. But for Young, Reynolds, Upton, it’s more than swinging at these good early pitches – when they do recognize them, they need the ability or skill to put those pitches in play.

Your inverse relationship between P/PA and productivity is illuminating, but I think the intent to swing at early pitches is only part of it. CoJack is one of the more patient hitters on the team (by inclination), but when he sees a strike he likes, he immediately puts it in play (by ability), ending the AB. He typically doesnt need two or three strikes to do that, like CY, Mark, etc.

Maybe the question is, if you have a decent sense of the strike zone but great difficulty making contact, should you look for walks and better counts to hit, or get as many hacks in as you can, as early as you can?

If the FO is the focus of anything, something is seriously wrong with the picture ! - unnamedDBacksfan 2/20/09

by Diamondhacks on Mar 23, 2009 3:47 PM EDT up reply actions

Interesting piece on Chris Young

On Nick Piecoro’s blog. Here’s an excerpt:

In talking with Young about this earlier in the spring, he felt that he improved at recognizing those pitches down and away as the season progressed. "Yeah, guys kept throwing me off-speed to point where I started sitting on it," he said. "It was to the point where guys would throw a first-pitch, get-me-over slider and I was sitting on it and hit it out of the ballpark. Or they’d throw it to me with two strikes and I’d be ready for it. It definitely was an adjustment I had to make and I felt like I made it, to an extent. I haven’t perfected it by any means. But it’s definitely gotten better to where pitchers can’t throw me one pitch. They’ve got to mix it up still."

'As times goes by, as times goes by, they say "he's washed up", "he's finished" , "he's a loser", "he's all through". You know what? The only one that's going to tell me when I'm through doing my thing is you people here.'

by Jim McLennan on Mar 22, 2009 6:33 PM EDT reply actions