The Royals went 10-19 in May, thanks in large part to an offense that was among the worst in the American League. The pitching staff, after a flaming hot start however, was not blameless either, as Royal hurlers have struggled for well over a month now. While overall the team's pitching numbers have been trending downward for a long time, the Royals nevertheless posted a slightly better monthly ERA in May (4.41) than they did in April (4.78).

Before looking at the May splits, it's worthwhile to take a look at the starter/bullpen breakdowns for the entire season.

There's a lot to digest there, and I didn't even include K/9 or HR data, for the sake of clarity. First, it looks like the starters are getting killed by BAA (bad defense?) because their control of the strikezone is surprisingly good, second-best in the AL in fact, behind only Oakland. The bullpen's K/BB number is also good, although only fourth best in the league, but they've also allowed fewer hits, contributing to a better ERA. Second, I'm stunned to see that the best Royal bullpen in decades has already fallen behind league average, a shocking development that does not reflect well on Trey Hillman's usage patterns, considering the number of good options he has to work with. Bullpen management is perhaps the area in which the manager has the most impact on a team's performance, and to this point, it would be hard to say that Hillman has done well there. In Hillman's defense (somewhat), the bullpen has been hit hard by the longball (18 allowed, fourth most in the league). Overall, the Royals rank 6th in strikeouts, rarefied air for a franchise that has spent most of the decade finishing somewhere between 12th and 14th, year after year.

Before we head-off to the land of individual performance (great wines there, by the way, but the roads are terrible) let's take a look at the staff numbers month by month:

Again, since the beginning of April was so superb, I don't think anyone would guess that actually, the pitching improved across the board in May. One final note on the overall pitching numbers: the Royals have only allowed 10 unearned runs, which is one of the lowest totals in the AL. This either means the Royals have been lucky in how they've timed their errors or that the staff has actually been a tick better than some AL staffs who have hidden lots of bad pitching behind "unearned" runs. The Twins for instance, have allowed over 30 invisible runs, at least in terms of ERA.

Here are the May numbers for the starters, sorted by innings pitched:

Gil Meche put in a very quiet, effective May, truly anchoring the staff, but his gains were offset by meltdowns by Bannister (although his nice Sunday start is obviously not in these numbers) and Tomko. Hochevar and Greinke were so-so, although I'm not quite sure how Greinke allowed so many runs, in spite of a lowish WHIP and decent strikeout numbers. Also, take a look at Banny's numbers: he's been striking out more guys than the mythology around him (and his detractors) would suggest. It's not as if he's 2004 Jimmy Gobble or anything.

And about that guy Gobble, here are the May reliever numbers, sorted again by IP:

Wow, four homers allowed by Peralta, eh!?!? Was anybody expecting to see Ramirez's May ERA that high? Like a few staff pitchers, his overall ERA still looks low, because he logged all those 0.00 ERA innings to start the season. It's fairly clear that Ramirez torpedoed the pen this month, and the sooner Hillman realizes the league may be catching up to him, the better. Likewise, did anyone notice that Yabuta had a decent month? Or that Nunez, whom I sorta thought was fading -- posted a 0.84 ERA in May?

Baseball Prospectus keeps a stat called Leverage, which keeps track of how important the situations a reliever's usage have occurred in. Guess which reliever has the highest leverage score in Hillman's pen? Brett Tomko, of course. As for more used relievers, the leverage rankings go like this: Nunez, Soria, Ramirez, Mahay, Gobble, Nomo, Peralta, Yabuta and Musser. Ideally, at the end of the season, we'll see Soria #1 (not third) and possibly Mahay higher in the chain.  For what it's worth, according to BP's numbers Yabuta, Gobble, Tomko and Peralta have all been below average relievers, and Tomko & Peralta have also been below replacement level. Oh, and Nomo, of course, but he's gone.

Lastly, a word about defense. BP's defensive efficiency stat rates the Royals as the 10th best defense in the American League, with a D-Eff of 0.699 , i.e., 69.9% of the balls in play have been turned into outs by the defense. The Rays lead the league at 72%. The Mariners are last at 68.2%. (Again, the closeness of these numbers should tell you something about the essential realities of the game: 30% of balls in play become hits, give or take a percent.) According to the numbers at the Hardball Times, the Royals have the second-worst defense in baseball however, just ahead of the Mariners.

Walks Drawn: 0

Caught Stealings:1

Extra-base Hits: 1

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Runs Scored: 0

Oh, and Joakim Soria never appeared in a game that was tied 0-0 going into the 9th. Instead, the 9th inning (with the heart of the Angel order coming up) was left in the hands of Ramirez, Gobble and Peralta. Gobble and Peralta are probably fourth and fifth best relievers on the team.

But, if the Royals had been winning 4-1, and the 7-8-9 hitters were due up, Soria woulda totally slammed the door. Totally.

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p.s. I would be remiss without paying respect to Brett Tomko tonight: seven innings pitched, two walks, seven strikeouts, no runs allowed. Your Tomko ERA Update stands at 4.98, and he is now 30th amongst active pitchers in innings pitched.

Simple question: as of today, April 5, 2008, who has been paid more,over their career, Brett Tomko or Mark Grudzielanek?

Gimme your first guess. Don't study it, just take a guess.

No internet searching allowed, post your guesses in the comments. If you really want to stretch your brain, post a total as well. Answers revealed tomorrow morning, around noon.

(There is no point to this, moral or otherwise, and I'm certainly not trying to make one. Just asking a simple question about a subject we all have an interest in. I was just listening to some '90s U2 and one thing led to another.)

One of the old arguments I used to have with my girlfriend was about whether following sports was somehow better than following celebrities, or being a hardcore movie buff, or whatever. It wasn't contentious or anything like that, just something that became a discussion. In defense of sports, which actually most of the time I find to be quite boring and even annoying, I trotted out the standard line that the games, unlike a television show, aren't scripted, which always brings us back. In this case, I consider that to be a cliche that happens to be true. And it's hard to find a more random game, at the microlevel, than baseball.

We got a taste of that yesterday.

Continue reading this post »

First off, I'd like to point out how weird things can be when we're talking about professional sports. On the one hand, lets call it the hand of baseball, if you landed from Mars yesterday and read the comments here on Tomko you'd think he was basically a bum off the street, little better than a contest winner or a good high school pitcher. And to be sure, he's definitely one of the four or five least essential members of the roster at this point (although that could change). So, all told, as we say now, he is what he is, a back of the rotation retread who might possibly turn into something adequate in the bullpen, and one of the blandest transactions a general manager can make. But, on the other hand, lets call it, the hand of reality, Tomko is far from a replacement level dude on the fringes of existence. He's turning 35 in the spring, and in those 34 years since he was born in Cleveland he's attended college for free, and already earned, thanks to his latest payday, over $20,000,000. He's not a six zero man, he's a seven zero man. Then there's the matter of his marriage, aka to Ms. February 1998. So, in the real world, he's a total success, baller, badass, cool guy, or whatever you want to call him. There aren't even adequate decimal points around to quantify how elite he is, how high up on the pyramid of society he's reached. But, in the field that actually earned him all that clout, he's actually not a baller... There is no point to this, just that I think its strange. Lastly, I was thinking last night, is there really an analog to being Tomko-level in other fields. You know, someone who doesn't push you to a higher level, but who does, at least potentially, keep things from being 5% more terrible than they might otherwise be? I'd love to hear your suggestions.

Now, a baseball note.

I do think that we've all been right to point out that Tomko is moving to a tougher pitcher's park as well as a tougher league. Moreover, since he's been bouncing around the NL West exclusively the last few years, its worth noting that he not only gets to pitch in his pitcher-friendly home park (be it in SF, LA, or SD), but he's also gotten to pitch in those other friendly parks in the division a disproportionate number of times.

California Dreamin' Tomko Style

2004. 194 IP total: 79.2 in SF, 11 in SD, 22.1 in LA, 112.3 total in CaliWest, 58% of total
2005. 191 IP total: 88 in SF, 10.2 in SD, 17.2 in LA, 115.4 in CaliWest, 60% of total
2006. 112 IP total: 2 in SF, 20.1 in SD, 53.1 in LA, 75.2 in CaliWest, 67% of total
2007. 131.3 IP total: 4 in SF, 20.1 in SD, 46.1 in LA, 70.2 IP in CaliWest, 54% of total

Of course, there's also the mitigating factor, to an extent, that he also should be pitching in Denver and Arizona a little bit more than a non NL-Wester, but its a weaker factor here, since he never was a Rockie or D'Back. Ohh, and there was that one season when Coors was a neutral park too. Since 2004, he's pitched a total 33.2 IP in Coors, but, again, 14.2 of those were in the weird 2006 year of the humidor, which was also coincidentally his busiest season in Denver by far. As for Arizona, his total since 2004 is 36.3 innings (16.2, 9, 3, 8.1).

So, make of all this what you will.