Tagged: Addie Joss

Perfect Game, Imperfect Rest Of Career

With Mark Buehrle’s loss Monday, and Dallas Braden getting scratched from his start last night, the combined record since their achievements of the three active pitchers to have tossed Perfect Games has dropped to 8 wins and 18 losses.

Is there something about getting 27 outs in a row that psychologically alters a pitcher? The sudden realization that you can do it? The gnawing sensation that a “quality start” or even a six-hit shutout just isn’t the ceiling? Or is it possible that a Perfecto really is some sort of apogee of pitching skills, and not merely the collision of quality and fortune?
Whatever the impact of the Perfect Game on the Perfect Game Pitcher, nine of the 20 to throw them have not managed to thereafter win more games than they lost. Another was one game over .500. An eleventh was just three games over. Fully fourteen of the pitchers saw their winning percentages drop from where they had been before their slice of immortality (though obviously the figures on Braden, Buehrle, and Halladay are at this point embryonic)
Consider these numbers, ranked in order in change of performance before and after. First the good news: it is perhaps not surprising that of the six pitchers whose percentages improved afterwards, the two most substantial jumps belong to Hall of Famers.
Jim Hunter Before: 32-38, .457
Jim Hunter After: 191-128, .599
Jim Hunter Improvement: 142
Sandy Koufax Before: 133-77, .633
Sandy Koufax After: 31-10, .756
Sandy Koufax Improvement: 123

Koufax is a bit of an aberration, since that 31-10 record, gaudy as it seems, represents only one season plus about a month, before his retirement in November, 1966.

The other four improvements are a little more telling.

David Wells Before: 110-86, .561
David Wells After: 128-71, .643
David Wells Improvement: 82
Don Larsen Before: 30-40, .429
Don Larsen After: 51-51, .500
Don Larsen Improvement: 71
Mike Witt Before: 37-40, .481
Mike Witt After: 79-76, .510
Mike Witt Improvement: 29
Dennis Martinez Before: 173-140, .553
Dennis Martinez After: 71-53, .573
Dennis Martinez Improvement: 20

For everybody else, the Perfect Game has meant comparative disaster. We can again discern some unrelated factors: many pitchers threw their masterpieces late in their careers (Cone), late in life (Joss died about 30 months after he threw his), or not long before injuries (Robertson and Ward, the latter of whom would switch positions and become a Hall of Fame shortstop).

Still, the numbers don’t augur well for our trio of active guys. They are listed in here in terms of the greatest mathematical drop from career Winning Percentage before the game, to career Winning Percentage afterwards:

Dallas Braden Before: 17-23, .425
Dallas Braden After: 0-5, .000
Dallas Braden Dropoff: 425
David Cone Before: 177-97, .646
David Cone After: 16-29, .356
David Cone Dropoff: 290
Lee Richmond Before: 14-7, .667
Lee Richmond After: 61-93, .396
Lee Richmond Dropoff: 271
Roy Halladay Before: 154-79, .661
Roy Halladay After: 2-3, .400
Roy Halladay Dropoff: 261
Mark Buehrle Before: 132-90, .595
Mark Buehrle After: 6-10, .375
Mark Buehrle Dropoff: 220
Jim Bunning Before: 143-89, .616
Jim Bunning After: 80-95, .457
Jim Bunning Dropoff: 159
Len Barker Before: 33-25, .569
Len Barker After: 40-51, .440
Len Barker Dropoff: 129
Charlie Robertson Before: 1-1 .500
Charlie Robertson After: 47-79, .373
Charlie Robertson Dropoff: 127
Addie Joss Before: 140-79, .639
Addie Joss After: 19-18, .514
Addie Joss Dropoff: 125
Cy Young Before: 382-216, .639
Cy Young After: 128-116, .525
Cy Young Dropoff: 114
Randy Johnson Before: 233-118, .664
Randy Johnson After: 69-48, .590
Randy Johnson Dropoff: 74
Johnny Ward Before: 80-43, .650
Johnny Ward After: 81-60, .574
Johnny Ward Dropoff: 46
Tom Browning Before: 60-40, .600
Tom Browning After: 62-50, .554
Tom Browning Dropoff: 46
Kenny Rogers Before: 52-36, .591
Kenny Rogers After: 166-120, .580
Kenny Rogers Dropoff: 9 

Rogers’ fall off is not even what the typical decline of a pitcher would suggest, and Browning’s and Ward’s aren’t very spectacular. Then again, neither are the improvements of Witt or Martinez. 

Essentially the pitchers break down into three groups: four who improved, five who didn’t change much, and eleven who got worse and noticably so.
Maybe Armando Galarraga got a minor break after all. 

Doctor S chickendantz? Seriously? UPDATED

The update on Dirk Hayhurst’s surgery appears positive — fraying labrum, repaired, out most of the season but possibly not all of it. All in all, probably couldn’t have been better.

Now I’m not criticizing anybody’s name (I have never completely mastered pronouncing mine, although I have not misspelled it since about 1963), but the surgeon was Dr. Mark Schickendantz? I mean, how could you not go into orthopedic surgery at least with a weak smile on your face contemplating the fact that your surgeon’s last name includes the words “chicken dantz”?

The fella who took out my appendix two and a half years ago was named Kimmelstiel, complete with the “steel” pronounciation. A guy allowed to use scalpels, named Kimmelstiel. Heckuva surgeon, by the way.

Dr. Schickendantz. 

UPDATE: The author-pitcher quickly regained typing ability (one-handed) and reports himself feeling pretty good, all things considered, but with control of the remote ceded to the Mrs., he says he did briefly consider trying to get a hold of the anesthesiologist for a booster.

FROM A RESEARCHER’S NOTEBOOK: Just stumbled across this in the Fall 2009 edition of   The Society for American Research Journal: a law student at the University of North Carolina named Trent McCotter busted his research hump to analyze the official scoresheets from all of Ty Cobb’s games, to generate his splits. It is startling to consider that Cobb, in 2,109 games in which he faced righthanded starters, batted .375 lifetime (.347 versus lefties). Perhaps more impressive, Cobb’s numbers in games started by the pitching legends he faced:

Cobb Versus:           Games              Average

Walter Johnson            92                    .380

Rube Waddell               21                    .354

Cy Young                     25                    .354

Babe  Ruth                    21                    .338

Eddie  Plank                 54                    .333

Remember, Cobb hit .367 lifetime. He did better than that against Johnson, whom he always claimed he could hit because he knew Johnson wouldn’t pitch him inside because he was mortified at the thought of hitting batters in the pre-helmet days – and killing one of them. He actually managed a .454 on base percentage against The Big Train.

The pitchers McCotter’s research shows were most successful (and again it’s rendered slightly imprecise because the scoresheets don’t pinpoint when relievers might have faced him) were Addie Joss (.264), Red Faber (.277), Waite Hoyt (.299), and, remarkably, Red Ruffing (.229, albeit in ten games). Ruffing became an underrated Hall of Famer with the Yankees. But when Cobb faced him in the first four years of Ruffing’s career (and the last five years of Cobb’s), Ruffing was one of the majors’ worst for the then-dead end Red Sox. His career record on the day of Cobb’s retirement was 30 wins… and 71 losses!