Old Tyme stats kicking butt

Phil Gurnee ♦ July 6, 2017 ♦ 3 Comments

Alex Wood is 10 – 0 in the first half but starter wins aren’t supposed to mean anything anymore

Justin Turner is hitting over .380 just before the break but batting average isn’t supposed to mean anything anymore since we have wRC+ to hang with now. So why is everyone celebrating the batting average of Justin Turner? I’ve seen tweet after tweet from baseball people who are loving the batting average of Justin Turner even though they know that batting average is one of the hanger on stats from their father’s day.

What is an old man to do?

Embrace them old tyme stats is what he’ll have to do.

Only four pitchers since 1958 have gone into the all-star break with at least ten wins and zero losses. Alex Wood has done it in fewer starts than anyone. He has the lowest OPS against than anyone.

Those stats below are crazy:

Dave McNally started 25 games and threw 156 innings

Roy Face won 12 games and never started one of them

I              Player    Split Year  G  W L  ERA GS    IP  OPS
         Dave McNally 1st Half 1969 25 13 0 2.88 24 156.0 .604
             Roy Face 1st Half 1959 32 12 0 1.13  0  56.0 .503
    Stephen Strasburg 1st Half 2016 16 12 0 2.62 16 106.2 .584
            Alex Wood 1st Half 2017 15 10 0 1.67 13  80.2 .476

Provided by Baseball-Reference.com: View Play Index Tool Used
Generated 7/6/2017.

How about Los Angeles Dodgers with undefeated records at the break?

Player           Split Year  W L  ERA GS    IP  SO9 SO/W
Alex Wood     1st Half 2017 10 0 1.67 13  80.2 10.8 4.41
Rick Rhoden   1st Half 1976  8 0 2.91 16 108.1  3.5 1.31

Provided by Baseball-Reference.com: View Play Index Tool Used
Generated 7/6/2017.

Only two Dodgers have ever hit the break with at least eight wins and zero losses.

Rick Rhoden didn’t exactly wow the hitters now did he? Contact Contact Contact must have been his game. I remember three things about Rick Rhoden

1. Vin told the same story over and over about the scissors on the water slide that messed up his leg and thus had one leg longer than the other.
2. He was a good hitting pitcher who could scorch a line drive to RCF.
3. He was traded for Jerry Reuss in what turned out to be a brilliant trade even though at the time you were dealing a 25-year-old for a 30-year-old pitcher.