from Amazon
Monday, January 16, 2012
Yet another number-cruncher who disregards numbers in favor of watching a game
Great job by Jeremy, who shows that the way in which we collect data to represent outcomes does NOT necessarily link 100% to that player:
Jeremy Greenhouse: Ben, I obviously agree with your sentiments here. I remember watching all of Thornton’s appearances at the beginning of the season and thinking how unlucky he was. I’m going through the video again.
Thornton’s first appearance is in a 7-1 blowout. 0.2 innings scoreless. Disregard.
Second appearance, CHW 7, KC 6. Overpowers LHB Alex Gordon for a K. Gets 0-2 on Billly Butler, just misses a K, and then Butler sharply singles through the right side. Pinch runner steals second as A.J. Pierzynski drops the pitch. Thornton gets 1-2 on Kila, throws a low-and-outside fastball that hits its spot, but Kila reaches and serves it the other way for a double. Tie game. Thornton Gets Escobar, Pena, Getz, Aviles, and Cabrera to ground out.
Third appearance, CHW 7, TB 4. Thornton gets 1-2 on RHB Elliot Johnson, jams him up and in, but Johnson bloops it to right, and the RF plays it for a single. Gets 1-2 on RHB Felipe Lopez, makes several hittable pitches that Lopez fouls off but eventually gets the K on a 10-pitch AB. Got 0-1 on Sam Fuld, but do not have video of the remaining pitches in the AB. Fuld reached on an error by Alexei Ramirez. Thornton gets 1-2 on LHB Johnny Damon, throws a slider low and away that Damon reaches for and bloops to left. Juan Pierre drops it. 1-1 on RHB B.J. Upton, breaks his bat, but Upton gets a clean single. First pitch to LHB Dan Johnson is over the heart of the plate, and Johnson homers. Sox lose 9-7.
Here is a summary:
“Of the two botched 9th innings recorded by Thornton in past few days, the amount that can be blamed on him is negligible. In Kansas City on Wednesday, Thornton induced weak contact from Kila Ka’aihue reaching for a pitch off the outside corner, and was rewarded with a game-tying double. It stunk, but the Sox won, so people get over those sort of things.
On Friday night facing Rays with a 3-run lead, after allowing a leadoff single, Thornton induced a groundout from Sam Fuld that the second-best defensive shortstop in baseball short-armed for an error. For the next batter, Thornton got a lazy fly ball out of Johnny Damon, only to have the second-best defensive shortstop in baseball miscommunicate with the third-best defensive left fielder in baseball, resulting in said elite-fielding left fielder letting the ball bounce in and out of his glove. Even after all this, Thornton recovered to break Justin Upton’s bat with a hard fastball, and witnessed it drop over the infield for an RBI single.”
Fourth appearance, CHW 1, OAK 0. Gets 0-2 on RHB Adam LaRoche. LaRoche hammers a slider for a double. 2-0 on RHB Coco Crisp, Crisp gets his hands inside on a fastball and hits a nice line drive that is caught by the 1B. 2-0 on LHB Daric Barton, another hittable fastball that Barton hits to deep left and Juan Pierre drops on the warning track. Tie game. Yanked.
Fifth appearance, comes on with bases loaded, one out, CHW 4, OAK 2. Overpowers LHB Ryan Sweeney for a K. First pitch to Cliff Pennington jams him up and in, but Pennington fists it over the 2B’s head for a two-run single. Tie game. 1-2 on DeJesus, groundout. Comes out for the next inning, Ellis grounds out, and then Thornton loses it. Five-pitch walk to RHB Conor Jackson, five-pitch walk to RHB Josh Willingham, 3-1 on RHB Coco Crisp, Crisp lines a fastball over the middle up the middle for a single. 2-2 on Barton, Barton singles.
Personally, I think Thornton was pretty awesome for most of it. He pitched like a LHB who throws 95-MPH fastballs for strikes. Most of the time, that’s going to get the job done. There were a couple of times I wanted to question his pitch mix, but you need such a large sample of pitches to be able to say that a pitcher is pitching sub-optimally rather than randomizing his distribution. The in-play pitches to LaRoche and Johnson deserve some analysis. There were three crucial errors made behind him, Pierzynski being his catcher, a couple jam shots, and one hard-hit ball that got caught. His two walks actually occurred after he had blown all four saves. That’s all I got.