Thursday, April 17, 2008

Inside Edge

Today on espn.com's "3 Things to Watch" for tonight, they had this little tidbit about Fausto Carmona:

"Fausto Carmona earned his newly-signed four-year contract extension by winning 19 games with a 3.06 ERA (second-best in the AL) last season, a stunning improvement from the 1-10 record that Carmona compiled as a starter and reliever in 2006 for the Indians.
On Saturday, in his first start since signing the deal, Carmona walked a career-high eight in 3 1/3 innings in a 7-3 loss to the A's. Here is how Oakland shortstop Bobby Crosby described his team's approach against Carmona: "He has some of the best stuff in the game. You have to wait him out and hope he makes a mistake." The A's refrained from swinging at Carmona's sharp sinker, a strategy that has worked against the righty this season. In three starts, Carmona has walked a major league-leading 17 batters, all on fastballs. As the table below shows, hitters are laying off his sinkerballing fastball at an alarming rate thus far.

Carmona's fastball (regular season)
2007
2008
Strike pct.
64
56
Pct. in the zone
52
48
Chase pct.
24
13
Chase pct. on three-ball counts
29
0


The last line of the table speaks volumes. On three-ball counts in the 2007 regular season, hitters swung on 23 of 80 (28.8 pct) fastballs that were off the plate. This year, on 18 fastballs thrown out of the zone on three-ball counts, none have been chased (one was called a strike). Hitters tend to chase more on three-ball counts because they are geared up to get a pitch to hit with the count in their favor. The fact that they haven't gone after Carmona's pitches in this situation shows just how much he has missed the zone.
While Carmona has shown a wild streak to start the season, the 24-year-old's stuff has remained dominating, as opposing hitters are batting just .185 (10-for-54) against him.
The Indians right-hander blamed faulty mechanics for his control problems in his last start, and the first chance to correct those issues will come tonight at Progressive Field against the Tigers."



Why have hitters all of a sudden become so patient when facing Fausto? Has he been exposed? Or is he just going against some of the better hitters in the league?


I think "snowman on old 16" is right, we need to release the midges.


(Funny story: during the infamous midge game in last year's ALDS, some bug expert tried to call the Indians and explain to them that the bug spray will actually attract those bugs rather than repel them. So Joba was basically a midge magnet, along with the rest of the Yankees. He should've just been a man like Fausto and let them fly all around him.)


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