The Goods: Mets 1, Phillies 0

by Eric Simon on May 6, 2009 11:07 PM EDT

It's hard to imagine Johan Santana pitching much better than he is right now, but it's likewise tough to fathom the Mets' offense phoning it in during Santana starts any more convincingly than they have to this point. The argument that Santana is usually pitted against the other team's top starters only carries you so far; good hitters should be able to score at least a few runs against even the best pitchers in the league, and eventually this group will hang a four-spot up there, giving Santana enough run support to sweep a three-game series on his own. The SNY crew mentioned towards the end of tonight's telecast that the Mets have scored twelve runs in Santana's six starts, which is just mind-boggling offensive ineptitude. Nevertheless, Santana is 4-1 and has racked up some pretty interesting rate stats so far this season (these are all prior to Wednesday's start unless otherwise indicated).

17.8

Santana's swinging strike percentage (SwStr%) on Wednesday against the Phillies.

14.7

Santana's SwStr% in his first five starts of 2009. His career high was 14.9% in 2004.

.271

Santana's BABIP in 2009.

25.0

Santana's line drive rate (LD%) in 2009. The rule of thumb is to add 12% to a pitcher's line drive rate to arrive at his expected BABIP, which would put Santana's eBABIP a full 100 points higher than his actual BABIP. While the 25% is awfully high, it's not so surprising to discover a gap between expected and actual BABIP here considering Santana's unsustainable sub-1.00 ERA.

20.8

Santana's infield fly rate (IF%) in 2009, which is ridiculous. His career high was 12.3% in 2005. Why is IF% important? Simply put, almost every single infield fly turns into an out. I don't have the numbers in front of me but I recall that something like 99% of infield flies are converted into outs. Look no further than the utter incredulity we all felt when Carlos Delgado dropped that popup on Tuesday. Misplayed infield flies are so rare as to induce slackjawed befuddlement when one actually occurs. All of this means that an infield fly is just about as good as a strikeout and is almost a corollary to defense independent pitching.

33.9

Percentage of plate appearances that have ended with a strikeout when Santana has pitched this season. His career high was 30.1% in 2004.

86.8

Santana's LOB% in 2009, the highest of his career.

Swag Contest

Swag contest results can be found here and the next game's swag form already available. You can read more about the swag contest here.

SB Nation Coverage

* Boxscore
* Amazin' Avenue Gamethread
* The Good Phight Gamethread

Win Probability Added

Big winners: Johan Santana, +45.3% WPA, Francisco Rodriguez, +16.8% WPA
Big losers: David Wright, -17.0% WPA, Carlos Beltran, -10.8% WPA
Teh aw3s0mest play: Tatis fustercluck in seventh, +19.8% WPA
Teh sux0rest play: Ibanez ground-rule double in seventh, -10.7% WPA
Total pitcher WPA: +74.5% WPA
Total batter WPA: -24.5% WPA
GWRBI!: Grission!

Game Thread Roll Call

Nice job by future; his effort in the game thread embiggens us all.

Num	Name	# of Posts
1	future	164
2	JohnPeterson	115
3	supermets	85
4	MetsGeek	82
5	meigs1414	60
6	Catsmeat Potter-Pirbright	59
7	JADDENHOPKINS	59
8	Prince	53
9	Major	51
10	EMSfan9	51

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Comments

Seemed like there were a ton more infield flies tonight

It’s that low changeup. I bet it’s a big reason why his BABIP is so low, and maybe more sustainable that you would normally think.

King of the bling come to lay down the evidence//Not George Bush, L-Millz be da president

by Sam Page on May 6, 2009 11:39 PM EDT reply actions

Thanks!

For pouring ice cold water over tonight’s Johan’s performance!

I know THT came up with a new way to calculate xBABIP for batters, but was there ever correlating study done for pitchers?

Batters and BABIP: http://www.hardballtimes.com/main/article/batters-and-babip/

by All Shook Down on May 7, 2009 12:05 AM EDT reply actions

I'm getting tired of Vic Torino

He’s turning into a more talented version of Eckstein, and I was convinced that his bloop in the 8th would lead to the tying run. Thank god Pedrito managed to get through that. I love how everyone on the planet knows a slider down and away is coming to Howard and he STILL can’t hit it or lay off it.

4-1 against Altanta and Philadelphia this season. That makes up for shitty losses to Florida. Make it 5-1 tomorrow!

2009 Mets: maybe its the Phillies turn to have a terrible bullpen?

by Greenpoint Ian on May 7, 2009 12:13 AM EDT reply actions

I can't stand Torino

That bloop was infuriating. I think I hate him because of the little league helmet, his propensity for annoying long at-bats/bloop hits, and his overly dramatic/intense playing style.

by jasondg on May 7, 2009 12:19 AM EDT up reply actions

The definition of grit.

King of the bling come to lay down the evidence//Not George Bush, L-Millz be da president

by Sam Page on May 7, 2009 12:37 AM EDT up reply actions

he's not white

He’s Asian/Pacific Islander, so that’s a strike against his grit.

2009 Mets: maybe its the Phillies turn to have a terrible bullpen?

by Greenpoint Ian on May 7, 2009 12:39 AM EDT up reply actions

The Hawaiian grit machine

He’s the Hawaiian David Eckstein.

The instrument has yet to be invented that can measure my indifference to that remark.

by zmanmetfan on May 7, 2009 8:44 AM EDT up reply actions

Problem is

He’s actually a good player.

by All Shook Down on May 7, 2009 5:10 PM EDT up reply actions

Well he falls down

http://philadelphia.phillies.mlb.com/media/player/mp_tpl_3_1.jsp?w_id=515186&w=2006/open/tp/archive09/090206_atlphi_phi_dp_tp_350.wmv&pid=mlb_tp&gid=2006/09/02/atlmlb-phimlb-1&mid=200609021641882&cid=mlb&fid=mlb_tp350&v=2

by Mount17 on May 7, 2009 12:43 AM EDT up reply actions

No still doesn't make up for the shitty losses to Florida

by meigs1414 on May 7, 2009 8:34 AM EDT up reply actions

Johan

One thing I noticed just now while perusing Fangraphs is that he’s throwing the FB 66% of the time so far, as opposed to 59% last year. Same velocity. He’s really cut down on sliders, as he’s throwing the change with the same frequency. This is all prior to tonight’s start, of course.

by jasondg on May 7, 2009 1:01 AM EDT reply actions

I think

The velo is actually a little up. I could be wrong, but I feel like it took him a month or two last year to really start getting it up. IIRC, he was more 89-91 early last year and he didn’t really start hitting 94 until the summer. This year he’s been regularly hitting 94 a few times each start and he’s rarely, if ever, been below 90 on the heater.

"All energy flows according to the whims of the great magnet

What a fool I was to defy him"

-HST

by Mark Himmelstein on May 7, 2009 1:11 AM EDT up reply actions

Fangraphs had it

averaging at 91.3, compared to 91.2 last year. It did seem like he was throwing pretty hard, tonight. But yeah, if he was sitting 89-91 early last year, the 91.3 so far is favorable. Good point.

by jasondg on May 7, 2009 9:09 AM EDT up reply actions

hey, why was Santos starting?

just a day off for the Hippo? seems like odd timing after he was 3-5 with 2 2B in Atlanta on Tuesday.

by JoshNY on May 7, 2009 1:09 AM EDT reply actions

Damn! The Mets are a .500 team

This is great. After Saturday’s crappy game, with the Mets at 3-games under, I was about as low on this team as I’d been in a while. It is nice to see the pen hold leads on consecutive days. But damn the Mets need to win some games by four runs for a few days in a row. I like that idea about wearing Brewers jerseys this weekend. Solid plan.

"The people of Houston are spending money like oil's selling at $40 a barrel."

by IanB in MD on May 7, 2009 8:24 AM EDT reply actions