Greinke is Unhittable
Zack Greinke last allowed an earned run on September 13th. Since then he’s made five starts, 34 innings, and allowed zip. During that time Greinke has posted some impressive lines:
9/18 Mariners 7 IP 7 K 1 BB 2 LD
9/23 Tigers 7 IP 4 K 2 BB 5 LD
4/8 White Sox 6 IP 7 K 3 BB 2 LD
4/13 Indians 5 IP 9 K 2 BB 5 LD
4/18 Rangers 9 IP 10 K 0 BB 6 LD
Quite a few things have been different for Greinke. Greinke is hardly walking anyone, yet only 42% of his pitches are being registered as in the strike zone. Part of the reason he is avoiding the free pass is thanks to an impressive 64% first pitch strike rate. Throw in a decreased contact rate, and it’s pretty clear that Greinke has good stuff.
The most notable change in pitch usage has been the increased presence of Greinke’s curveball. Since 2007, his curve has went from 8% usage to 14% to 18%. Along with a slider and change-up, Greinke has scaled down his fastball usage. Intriguingly, his fastball has seen an improvement in horizontal movement since doing so, gaining almost an entire inch of movement inwards to righties. Greinke’s curve has a violent break and his ability to control the speed of it is quite impressive. It’s been measured as low as 60 MPH and as high as 85.
Give Dayton Moore some points for getting Greinke signed to an extension last off-season.
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Zac-KKKKKKKKKK
but…but..but…CHONE only projected a 4.14 ERA!!!!
To be fair, Greinke didn’t exactly have the most conventional career path.
During the 1968 season, Bob Gibson during a two month period:
made 11 starts
pitched 11 complete games
pitched 8 shutouts
gave up 3 earned runs in 99 innings
Does anyone know of any other comparable stretch by a major league pitcher?
There’s always Hershiser’s 1988 scoreless inning streak (plus the three starts before it):
made 9 starts
pitched 9 complete games
pitched 7 shutouts
gave up 4 earned runs in 82 innings (10 innings in one game)
Not quite as good as Gibson’s stretch, but comparable.
Rob, thanks for the information on Hershiser’s 9 game stretch during his 1988 season.
Interesting, the three runs Gibson gave up during his 11 game stretch in 1968; one run was scored from third on a wild pitch with two outs; another was scored from first on a two out double; and third was also scored from first on a two out double. He was every so close to pitching 11 straight complete shutouts.
Late 1999 Pedro Martinez was about as hot as any pitcher could be…
7 starts over two months, 2 CG, 1 SHO & the near-no-no against the Yankees, went 6-0. allowed 5 earned runs in 55 innings.
Go a little deeper, though, and it gets better. In those 55 innings, he allowed 28 hits. He struck out 96 men (13 more than Gibson did in 99 innings), and walked 8. He did hit three guys, but one of them was Chuck Knoblauch. Gibson would have done the same.
During these 7 games, he faced six teams that scored more than 850 runs that year and one that scored 686. Gibson faced 10 that scored less than 610 and one that scored 690. Against the Cleveland Indians, who scored 1009 runs in 1999, Pedro had by far his worst outing of the stretch. In 7 innings he allowed 8 hits, a walk, and two earned runs. He also struck out 14.
Pretty damn good. If all you wanted was shutouts, then certainly you’re not going to find anything better than Gibson. Maddux in September 1995 was fantastic, and Randy Johnson’s whole tenure with the Astros was pretty impressive as well, although in a more pitcher-friendly environment.
Steve, great and informative detail.
In today’s game where a starters are asked to pitch 6 innings and give up no more than 3 runs, it is inconceivable to imagine a time where a pitcher would pitch11 straight complete games; let alone pitch 8 shutouts during that stretch.
Makes one wonder what the Cardinals’ bullpen did to pass the time during each of Gibson’s games during that stretch.
LD?
Line drives hit against. Basically: were guys making solid contact?
I’m beginning to question just how important line drive rate is, although I do think lower is better.
But compare Greinke’s 20 line drives in 34 innings over his last two starts to Tim Lincecum’s 7 line drives in 16.1 innings in Tim’s three starts this season. Or, if we take Tim’s last five starts, it’s 11 line drives in 29.2 innings.
Yet you have twice written informatively about Tim’s struggles in his first two starts this season, and while Greinke has yet to yield a run in those five starts, Lincecum’s ERA has been over 4.00 in his last five outings.
Also, while Tim’s ERA fell by about a third from 2007 to 2008, his line drive rate actually ROSE by about a third.
I think what we’re talking about here is to some degree due to sample size. But I do think the surprising results might be enough to at least give us pause.
The one thing line drive rate doesn’t tell us about the line drives hit is how hard those liners were struck. In Lincecum’s case, his career line drive rate hasn’t been particularly low. But the low slugging percentage he has allowed gives an indication that the line drives he has yielded probably weren’t as hard hit as against most other pitchers.
As for Greinke, all I can say is WOW!
This isn’t directly related to this post, obviously, but were you able to ascertain if Tim Lincecum’s release point in his last start was closer to the higher 2008 release point you identified?
If Tim’s problem were the timing of his lower body forward thrust and his upper body torque as Tim indicated he had learned from watching film, I would have expected his arm slot to be higher once again.
Certainly the results were there. All things considered, I think this might have been Tim’s best major league start. He walked no one, only one of the hits he yielded was hard hit, he struck out 13 — but perhaps most importantly he threw 75 strikes on 99 pitches.
I wonder what release point says to us here.
How is it that no one has mentioned Fernando Valenzuela yet?!? Fernandomania took ahold of the nation in 1981 when he started the season by throwing 7 straight complete games, 5 of them shutouts. This after he ended 1980 by throwing 17.2 scoreless innings out of the Dodgers bullpen. In total, he gave up 2 ER over 80.2 IP.
Also, I like Hershiser’s 6-game stretch instead of his 9 game stretch. 6 games, 55 IP, 0 runs.
Nine innings, no earned runs… but does Aviles’ blunder cost him the streak, or are we considering it to still be alive? If so, 43 innings… Hershiser’s only 2-3 starts away!