Friday, May 25, 2007

Juan Pierre: Number 15 and Rising

While at the airport flipping through the pretty charts and graphs in USA Today, I came across a "Fewest Pitches Seen per Plate Appearance" Leaderboard. Somewhat surprisingly, the top two spots belonged to the Milwaukee Brewers. Johnny Estrada on average sees only 2.99 pitches per plate appearance!?! A floor lamp placed in the batter's box would average more. Think about it.

Fewest Pitches Seen/PA, thru May 20
Rank Player Team Pitches/PA
1 Johnny Estrada MIL 2.99
2 Kevin Mench MIL 3.05
3 Jason Tyner MIN 3.07
4 Pablo Ozuna CWS 3.11
5 Paul Bako BAL 3.13
6 Jay Payton BAL 3.13
7 Kenji Johjima SEA 3.15
8 Matt Diaz ATL 3.15
9 Corey Patterson BAL 3.15
10 Moises Alou NYM 3.19
11 Juan Castro CIN 3.20
12 Mike Sweeney KC 3.23
13 Aaron Miles STL 3.26
14 Jay Gibbons BAL 3.27
15 Juan Pierre LAD 3.27

But at least Estrada never bats leadoff. The free swinging Juan Pierre, on the other hand, was the top Dodger on the list at #15 overall. Seeing 14 other names ahead of him clearly motivated Pierre, as he promptly went out and made 4 outs on 9 pitches the night the list was published.

In case you're wondering, the only other Dodger in the top 50 was Jeff Kent at #45 with 3.47 pitches/PA. The only Dodger in the top 50 Most Pitches Seen per Plate Appearance was Wilson Betemit (#23 with 4.23 pitches/PA). Here are the complete lists.

2 comments:

Joshua Worley said...

For the purposes of the strike zone, where are the knees of the floor lamp?

Eric Karros said...

Good question. I guess as long as the ump calls it consistently, both pitcher and lamp should be cool -