Old man Andy Baggarly soaks up the Arizona sun and brings you great features about Giants Camp. Here’s a look at Keaton Winn, whose fastball split combo makes him the talk of the town. Here’s a feature about the Rogers twins, who should have been on the same team years ago. Here’s a profile of the two left-handers beating infielders in the 40-man roster who will get more major league action than you think. Baseball is coming and he’s there writing the stories to prepare you.
I don’t. I have had a contentious relationship with the sun since the day I was born. You can keep it. I’d rather stay in a room with the blinds down, staring at baseball stats on a computer and witnessing the punishment of someone from a Greek myth who stole the secret of roasted peanuts from Mount Olympus. Except it’s not a punishment for me. i really enjoy it
On my travels I found some numbers. Funny numbers. Scary Numbers. Interesting numbers. With apologies to Jayson Stark whose format I swipe, here are some numbers on the Giants that I can’t get out of my head.
0
Zero. As in the number of times Alex Wood made a pickoff throw to first base last season.
If that seems a little unusual, that’s because it is. He wasn’t the only pitcher not attempting a first base pickoff last season; There were nine pitchers who faced at least 100 batters without attempting a pickoff. But Wood was the only starting pitcher. Among pitchers with at least 100 innings pitched, the second fewest first-base pickoff attempts came from Marco Gonzales with 11.
This is not a Jon Lester situation where Wood is scared/unable to throw in a pocket. He made two pickoff attempts at second base, which entails a much higher level of difficulty, and earlier in his career he was a league leader in first pickoff throws. He had 12 in his freshman season with the Giants. Until last season he was a regular pitcher.
Now he is not. And things are going well for him.
2
Two. As in the number of successfully stolen bases against Wood as a Giant. There have been 247 times a runner has had a chance to take second place against Wood since he’s been on the team. Six players tried it. Two were successful.
One of those stolen bases was a two-strike one-out special by the Pirates in 2021 where the batter could have been called for obstruction. The other came in 2022 when Evan Longoria was almost in outfield with no one covering third base. This one was also against the pirates. This team is always one step ahead.
So Wood doesn’t keep runners around in the traditional way, but he doesn’t allow stolen bases either. Not surprisingly, stealing against a left-hander isn’t easy, but Wood takes it to another level, and he does it counterintuitively.
We’ve already looked at how well-positioned Wood is to adapt to pitch clock, but this suggests he’s also well-positioned to adapt to rules that also limit pickoff attempts. If he gets close to runners just by being left-handed and getting to the plate quickly, he might be immune to all the new rules.
However, there is a caveat. No one keeps a “kicked off the rubber” statistic, and I honestly have no idea how many times Wood dismounts and appears to fall over. If he does it often, he’ll be quite affected by the new rules that treat a step-off attempt and a pickoff attempt the same. Here’s Giants legend Joe Martinez explaining it.
Still, I take the pitcher, who keeps runners close and doesn’t allow stolen bases under the old rules, over the others. Logan Webb is one of the most common pickoff attempts in the National League, and Alex Cobb has historically been an easy steal if you’re looking for a little pessimism.
3
Three. The number of batsmen in the prospective 2023 lineup who previously had a 30-homer season. That seems unusual. Is it unusual?
At least for the Giants, it’s unusual. Since Barry Bonds “retired” after the 2007 season, they’ve only once had three 30-homers in the same lineup over a decade ago. On July 9, 2011, the Giants had Miguel Tejada in second place, Pat Burrell in sixth place, and Aubrey Huff in sixth place. That was three 30-homer players in the same lineup. How scared the Mets must have been!
Technically, the Giants had four 30-homer hitters in 2011, but Tejada and Carlos Beltrán didn’t overlap. Here’s a full list, presented to you in screenshot format because it’s not interesting enough to make a fancy spreadsheet:
The 2014 team won the World Series, you know. It’s pretty easy to see why.
Of course, the last time a player had a 30-homer season for the Giants was in 2004. Imagine if you told someone back then—someone from the era of the BALCO triceps and 200-pound shortstops— that the Giants wouldn’t have another 30-homer season in nearly two decades. How many championships do you predict? Minus three, give or take.
This isn’t a number to get you excited about the Giants 2023. Michael Conforto and Joc Pederson’s 30 homer seasons were in 2019 and Mitch Haniger’s in 2021. It’s not that they’re leaving the Boffo power seasons and trying to repeat them, and neither of those 30 -Homer seasons came during a home game schedule at Oracle Park.
Still, this is the first time since 2003 that the lineup has had at least three hitters with a reasonable chance of hitting 30 homers. Chances are the Giants have a 30-homer batter this season, if only because of the train-heavy approach and stadium, but they’re better than they’ve been in a long time.
26.7
That’s the average number of seconds Taylor Rogers spent between pitches last season, making him the 30th slowest pitcher in baseball. We knew Camilo Doval was one of baseball’s slowest assists, which may have helped his fastball be one of baseball’s fastest, but Rogers is even slower. On a pitching staff that works fast, Doval and now Rogers will be the anomalies.
Does that mean anything? Considering the Giants just gave Rogers a $33 million contract, I suspect that’s not the case. Pitchers are creatures of habit and there will be adjustment, but it’s hard to imagine the pace and pitch clock being overlooked by analytical teams. Shohei Ohtani was about as slow as Rogers. Pretty sure teams won’t shun him in the offseason.
Although the Giants are blessed with some of baseball’s fastest pitchers (Webb, Wood, Jakob Junis, Sean Manaea, Sam Long), we’re all breaking new ground here. It’s at least something to keep in mind.
.199
One ninety nine. This is the left-handed batsmen’s batting average for the 2022 Giants versus left-handed pitching. It was the fourth worst left-to-left batting average of any team since the new stadium opened, min 500 AB. It’s the sixth-worst grade by a team since the Giants moved to San Francisco.
No, batting average isn’t the freshest and most meaningful stat these days, but OBP, SLG and OPS were pretty terrible too. The Giants’ left bats couldn’t hit left pitchers.
That’s not a problem, you think. The Giants and manager Gabe Kapler are aware of this, and as such they have relied heavily on platoon matchups and pinch hitting. Except that last season, the Giants had more left-handed hitters versus left-handed pitchers than almost any other team in baseball. The Cardinals gave lefties 164 at-bats against lefties last season and they hit .238/.368/.335. The Giants gave Mike Yastrzemski 123 at-bats against lefties last season, and he hit .179/.250/.325.
You can see how this could be a problem.
Conforto won’t help this problem, but Haniger will, since he’s mostly free of crazy platoon splits. JD Davis has a similar profile and will also help. You could think of the Giants as hyper-platoon maniacs, but they weren’t even close to last season’s most extreme Platoon Advantage roster, so they’ll have to do their best to keep their worst lefties away from left-handed pitching .
LaMonte Wade Jr., being the left-hander of a first base move, is a little menacing, but Yastrzemski, who moves to dedicated center move duty with Austin Slater, will help. Brandon Belt who is in Canada will help. However, if you’re wondering about the Giants’ extreme right-handed infield permutation, this may help explain.
What the Giants really need is a bunch of switch hitters. The 2012 Angels had just eight plate appearances with a left-handed hitter facing a left-handed pitcher. Six switch hitters and a cavalcade of right-handers do it for you.
.297
Two ninety seven. That’s what Pederson would have achieved last year if the new shift rules had been in place. Seriously. I know this because I’ve just hit every grounder and line driver Pederson in 2022 on the center and right side.
I wasn’t kidding about the sun being my enemy.
If you’re as damaged as I am, you can come with me yourself. Here are the balls he put in play on the pull side, and here are the balls he put in play in the middle. The new shifting rules prevent shortstops from playing to the right of second base and they prevent second basemen from being fielded in the outfield grass. How many hits were taken away from Pederson last season?
I counted a safe hit that was taken away by a second baseman outfield.
I also counted eight maybes, but those aren’t included in the .297 average up there. Who knows where the second baseman would have settled if the shift hadn’t been available?
It’s the balls down the middle that have robbed Pederson the most. Check out this 1st and 3rd one-out situation that turned into a double play at the end of the inning:
I was skeptical that Pederson would be helped so much by the shift rules, considering the shortstop could still be fielded to the left of second base. But it was eight balls up in play where it would have been hard to imagine the defense stopping the ball, even with the shortstop near the second. Here’s another one:
There were also three maybes with the balls in the middle in play, meaning if you gave him the benefit of the doubt on all close calls….323, Pederson would have scored.
Even assuming all of those maybes and wannabes were just singles, they would still have given Pederson a .323/.400/.574 line last season. That’s a season you wouldn’t have wondered why he received the qualifying offer.
Now, this isn’t a peer-reviewed study, and it’s extremely sketchy to assume that all balls somehow hit in the shift would have been singles, but you get the idea. If Pederson scores 10 extra hits, that’s a big deal. I suspect the Giants absolutely took that into account when extending that qualifying offer to Pederson, especially when they paired it with plans to add additional outfielders that could make him a DH.
1,904
The number of words I have written so far is more than enough. I hope, however, that I have shared some of my numbers sickness with you. Because of the rule changes, this could be one of the more chaotic seasons in recent memory, and the Giants could be disproportionately affected. Could be in a good way, could be in a bad way.
All I know is this: If the Giants don’t get a 30 homer season soon, I’m going to freak out. I’ll turn the tables at the backyard BBQ, don’t test myself. It’s absolutely annoying and it needs to stop.
Also, if they could hit over the Mendoza line in left-to-left situations, that would be great too.
(Photo by Alex Wood: Darren Yamashita / USA Today)
