Brewer pitchers at the plate

[Jim Goulart]

Yahoo with a nice story here -- the buildup for the production in terms of Brewer pitchers at bat may not be able to live up to expectations, but it will be fun if it does.

[Funketown]

Fun article, but I think the author is a bit optimistic thinking Yovani could crack 30 HR's in a full season!

 

I'd peg Gallardo for a line of .200/.250/.400 over the course of the season, with 15 HR's.

[dadofandrew]

A good hitting staff can probably create about 40 runs a season more than a poor one. As Macha said, the ability to get bunts down (and avoid DP's) might lead to 15-20 more.

 

It's far from meaningless.

[Schlitz001]

The most amazing stat from that article? Narveson, Wolf and Gallardo had a combined OBP of .308 last year. That's more than either Lucroy, Betancourt or Gomez had last year.

[SoCal Brew Crew Fan]

According to fangraphs, the Brewers pitchers were .207/.249/.280/.530 last year...the top hitting group in the NL. The Cardinals were ranked 8th at .140/.175/.185/.360.

 

A .170 OPS advantage out of the nine hitter for 2/3 of the at bats there seems like a nice advantage. Am I reading it right that it's worth 2.2 wins vs. the median Cards? Not bad and they might be even better this year.

[dadofandrew]

I was comparing them to the year they were awful, probably '08, when Sheets was part of the staff. 2 wins over average, 4 wins over terrible sounds about right.

[topper09er]

When more than 20 scouts hovered around Apopka High's baseball field for one of his games, Greinke was asked by a National League scout, "Should we draft you or Scott Kazmir?"

Greinke quipped: "Me. I'm a better hitter."

[young guns]

A .170 OPS advantage out of the nine hitter for 2/3 of the at bats there seems like a nice advantage. Am I reading it right that it's worth 2.2 wins vs. the median Cards? Not bad and they might be even better this year.

Nice, then that well take away the Card's interleague schedule advantage. Hopefully they can, at worst, keep up the hitting and hopefully improve on last years numbers.

 

[TooLiveBrew]

I think it's a pretty safe bet that Narveson & Gallardo won't hit anywhere near their '10 levels. Gallardo's OPS+ last year was a staggering 124 (Narveson's wasn't shabby either at 96). But Gallardo's OPS+ was 33 as recently as 2009. He's probably going to be much closer to his career line of .218/.260/.418/.677, which is still fantastic for a pitcher. Narveson benefited from a BABIP of .471 last year, and I highly doubt he'll be as fortunate this year.

 

Overall I think the Brewers' starting pitchers will have a definite advantage at the plate over just about every team, but I don't think it'll account for 2 full wins -- maybe 1. I hope I'm wrong, but I just can't see the same level of success again.