Thursday, July 07, 2005
Carpenter recent dominance
Ok, it’s mid-season, long enough time to make some valid judgements, I’m going to spend the next week or so going over this Cardinal team and looking at how individual pieces have done up to this point in time in the season. On the whole, it’s obvious that they have done very well, but how well is the topic of these articles.
I could very easily start with the best player on the planet, Albert Pujols, but his is typical Albert numbers and that just isn’t that fun….Let’s look at our other elite player up to this time in the season, a Pitcher (to bad we don’t have any aces) and a man that got the shaft for June pitcher of the month (more on that later) I’m of course talking about Chris Carpenter. As of right now he has probably been the fourth best starter in the national league, behind Clemens, Willis and Oswalt.
Quick look at the numbers between the four shows that that is probably the right order
(stolen from ESPN)
All of these pitchers have a strong case for making an all star appearance, what I really like is the small differences in unearned runs between the whole group, 1-4.
Ok, since this is about Carpenter, lets take a look at his last seven starts, I’ll start by saying, yes I know that it’s an optimum sample size and isn’t indicative of his true ability, but it is a stretch that is very impressive so should be acknowledged for it’s greatness.
Starting June 3rd, a game the Cardinals won 2-0, Cardinals are leading 1-0 going into the 8th inning, Albert crushes a homerun to make the score 2-0. Carpenter has pitched 115 pitches, he gets pulled for Ray King who allows a hit, gets pulled, Tavarez comes in and shuts them down. 8 innings pitched, 8 hits, 0 runs, not quite his best game, but good game.
June 8th, vs the Red Sox, we lose 4-0 (can you imagine our team not having offense against the Red Sox?) Carpenter pitches 6 innings, allows 3 runs in the 6th and gets pulled after the inning is over. Probably one of his worse performances, but I like the fact that it was one bad inning, the rest of the game he was fine. I guess this game really ticked him off, because from then on he has been the most dominant pitcher in the game.
June 14th, he goes a complete game against the toronto blue jays, one hit allowed, no runs of course, and recorded the highest game scores this season in baseball. 94. Great game as Cardinals win 7-0.
June 20th, another great performance against Cincy, going for back to back shutouts he runs out of gas in the 9th inning and allows a run and gets pulled….second inning all month that he has allowed a run. Cardinals win 6-1.
June 25th, another ho-hum performance as Carpenter throws another complete game shutout, Cardinals beating the pirates 8-0.
Numbers for the month of June?
40 innings pitched, 4 runs allowed, .90 era, 4-1 record, 2 shutouts, 2 complete games. 2 innings where he made a mistake, and 20 innings where the tying run was up to bat. And he didn’t allow a run to score. (reason for this comment later) this is dominance especially when you look at he actually had a bad game in the month.
Of course if it ended there it would have been a nice blip on the radar, one of hundreds of great months in the history of baseball, but it didn’t, he’s now had two starts in July, both look very similar to Junes numbers.
July 1st against Colorado he didn’t have his best stuff and had to be ‘bailed’ out by his bullpen as he goes 7 2/3 innig allowing…..you guessed it, no runs in a 6-0 victory.
July 6th against the diamond backs, his scoreless streak ends at 22(damn how impressive does Hershiser and Koufax and Gibsons streak seem when you compare it to what Carpenter has done) Pitching 8 innings, allowing one run (3rd inning since June 1st that he has allowed a run)
This streak consists of 55 2/3 innings, he’s allowed 5 runs for an era(and ra) of 0.81. He’s had a total of 3 innings where he allowed a run. That is some good stuff….for those that missed the announcement, Chad Cordero(I think that is his first name) won NL Player of the month for June.
He has a great case, he pitched 16.1 innings(Carpenter pitched 40) he allowed no runs(well 1 run, no earned, Carpenter allowed 4) he recorded 15 saves and actually had to pitch more than one inning one time(came in a 4-2 game in the 8th inning) Cordero pitched 8.1 innings where the tying run was up to bat, Carpenter pitched 20 (that is 4 more innings than Cordero pitched in the entire month) where the tying run was up to bat. Yet somehow Cordero gets the props because of some stat called the save? Gimme a break, If Carpenter had a 1.80 era I could see a case being made, but not a .90 era, it really isn’t that close. Oh well, I’m not bitter or anything, just felt like reminding everyone of the utter stupidity of the save stat. (and as a friendly reminder anytime someone points to save percentage and doesn’t include holds in the equation, tell them they are an idiot and need to count holds before giving you that stat---sorry, but that was for a differerent argument)
I could very easily start with the best player on the planet, Albert Pujols, but his is typical Albert numbers and that just isn’t that fun….Let’s look at our other elite player up to this time in the season, a Pitcher (to bad we don’t have any aces) and a man that got the shaft for June pitcher of the month (more on that later) I’m of course talking about Chris Carpenter. As of right now he has probably been the fourth best starter in the national league, behind Clemens, Willis and Oswalt.
Quick look at the numbers between the four shows that that is probably the right order
(stolen from ESPN)
| Player | G | GS | IP | H | R | ER | BB | SO | W | L | ERA |
| Roger Clemens | 17 | 17 | 115.0 | 74 | 20 | 18 | 33 | 108 | 7 | 3 | 1.41 |
| Dontrelle Willis | 17 | 17 | 123.2 | 111 | 28 | 26 | 23 | 92 | 13 | 3 | 1.89 |
| Roy Oswalt | 18 | 18 | 129.1 | 109 | 38 | 35 | 27 | 88 | 11 | 7 | 2.44 |
| Chris Carpenter | 18 | 18 | 129.1 | 106 | 40 | 36 | 33 | 128 | 13 | 4 | 2.51 |
| John Smoltz | 18 | 18 | 124.1 | 114 | 41 | 37 | 33 | 96 | 9 | 5 | 2.68 |
| Pedro Martinez | 17 | 17 | 122 | 80 | 39 | 38 | 23 | 129 | 9 | 3 | 2.80 |
All of these pitchers have a strong case for making an all star appearance, what I really like is the small differences in unearned runs between the whole group, 1-4.
Ok, since this is about Carpenter, lets take a look at his last seven starts, I’ll start by saying, yes I know that it’s an optimum sample size and isn’t indicative of his true ability, but it is a stretch that is very impressive so should be acknowledged for it’s greatness.
Starting June 3rd, a game the Cardinals won 2-0, Cardinals are leading 1-0 going into the 8th inning, Albert crushes a homerun to make the score 2-0. Carpenter has pitched 115 pitches, he gets pulled for Ray King who allows a hit, gets pulled, Tavarez comes in and shuts them down. 8 innings pitched, 8 hits, 0 runs, not quite his best game, but good game.
June 8th, vs the Red Sox, we lose 4-0 (can you imagine our team not having offense against the Red Sox?) Carpenter pitches 6 innings, allows 3 runs in the 6th and gets pulled after the inning is over. Probably one of his worse performances, but I like the fact that it was one bad inning, the rest of the game he was fine. I guess this game really ticked him off, because from then on he has been the most dominant pitcher in the game.
June 14th, he goes a complete game against the toronto blue jays, one hit allowed, no runs of course, and recorded the highest game scores this season in baseball. 94. Great game as Cardinals win 7-0.
June 20th, another great performance against Cincy, going for back to back shutouts he runs out of gas in the 9th inning and allows a run and gets pulled….second inning all month that he has allowed a run. Cardinals win 6-1.
June 25th, another ho-hum performance as Carpenter throws another complete game shutout, Cardinals beating the pirates 8-0.
Numbers for the month of June?
40 innings pitched, 4 runs allowed, .90 era, 4-1 record, 2 shutouts, 2 complete games. 2 innings where he made a mistake, and 20 innings where the tying run was up to bat. And he didn’t allow a run to score. (reason for this comment later) this is dominance especially when you look at he actually had a bad game in the month.
Of course if it ended there it would have been a nice blip on the radar, one of hundreds of great months in the history of baseball, but it didn’t, he’s now had two starts in July, both look very similar to Junes numbers.
July 1st against Colorado he didn’t have his best stuff and had to be ‘bailed’ out by his bullpen as he goes 7 2/3 innig allowing…..you guessed it, no runs in a 6-0 victory.
July 6th against the diamond backs, his scoreless streak ends at 22(damn how impressive does Hershiser and Koufax and Gibsons streak seem when you compare it to what Carpenter has done) Pitching 8 innings, allowing one run (3rd inning since June 1st that he has allowed a run)
This streak consists of 55 2/3 innings, he’s allowed 5 runs for an era(and ra) of 0.81. He’s had a total of 3 innings where he allowed a run. That is some good stuff….for those that missed the announcement, Chad Cordero(I think that is his first name) won NL Player of the month for June.
He has a great case, he pitched 16.1 innings(Carpenter pitched 40) he allowed no runs(well 1 run, no earned, Carpenter allowed 4) he recorded 15 saves and actually had to pitch more than one inning one time(came in a 4-2 game in the 8th inning) Cordero pitched 8.1 innings where the tying run was up to bat, Carpenter pitched 20 (that is 4 more innings than Cordero pitched in the entire month) where the tying run was up to bat. Yet somehow Cordero gets the props because of some stat called the save? Gimme a break, If Carpenter had a 1.80 era I could see a case being made, but not a .90 era, it really isn’t that close. Oh well, I’m not bitter or anything, just felt like reminding everyone of the utter stupidity of the save stat. (and as a friendly reminder anytime someone points to save percentage and doesn’t include holds in the equation, tell them they are an idiot and need to count holds before giving you that stat---sorry, but that was for a differerent argument)
