The Pittsburgh Pirates moved into a tie for first place in the NL Central yesterday, as Jeff Karstens tossed an 83 pitch complete game shutout against the Astros. That moved Karstens to 8-4 on the season, and his 2.34 ERA now is the third best in the league. Joe talked a little about Karstens recently, and Pat talked about the whole team – but I thought I’d add my two cents.
First, the Pirates. They’re 48-43, but things aren’t as rosy as they appear. The offense is bad – their .677 OPS is 24th in the majors and last in the NL Central (even below Houston). The reason they’ve scored as many runs as they have is that they’ve hit well in the clutch (~.730 OPS with runners in scoring position). That isn’t the kind of thing to really bet on continuing. And the pitching – ERA aside – hasn’t been that great either. Their K/BB ratio is under 2, and puts them 25th in the majors. I’m personally really happy for Pirates’ fans right now, but if they win that division I’ll eat my hat*.
* Hat may or may not be made out of sandwiches.
Karstens is just a specific example of what’s going on with the team overall. Take a look at his numbers compared to last year (2010, 2011):
K/9: 5.3, 5.0
BB/9: 1.9, 1.5
HR/9: 1.5, 1.4
In 2010 he had a 4.92 ERA. From the above, does it really make sense he’d more than cut his ERA in half?
Right now Karstens is benefiting from his defense turning balls in play into outs at a very high rate. His batting average on balls in play is .235, which is the 4th lowest in the majors and well below his career numbers. And he’s leaving a ton of runners stranded; his 88.7% left on base rate is more than 4% better than the next closest pitcher in the baseball. It doesn’t really look like Karstens is doing something vastly different than he did in 2010 – it’s more likely the case that he wasn’t as bad as he looked last year, and isn’t as good as he’s looked this year. But I imagine Pirates’ fans aren’t complaining at the moment.
Also last night: The Rays picked up their 50th win, beating Boston with the help of a Ben Zobrist grand slam; exciting game in Cincinnati, as Chris Heisey homered twice, robbed Albert Pujols of a home run, saw Pujols give the Card’s a lead with a late-inning home run, and then celebrated on Brandon Phillips’ walk-off blast; the Braves picked up their 10,000th franchise win as the beat up on the Nat’s 11-1; and much more.
What to watch tonight: Two of the game’s better lefties, CC Sabathia and Ricky Romero, face off in Toronto; Jered Weaver and Trevor Cahill go head-to-head in the first game of the Angels-A’s double header; and the other AL West pitching match-up isn’t too shabby either (CJ Wilson vs. Felix Hernadnez). Full schedule with probable pitchers here.
