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MLB - Official 2012 Season Thread: Bringing in Bobby V to Change Our Culture |OT2|

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P

Puddles

Banned
Kemp has been mostly worthless for awhile now.

Back in April or May, he would have hit a 3 run shot or at least a 2 run double in that at-bat.
 
G

geeko

Member
DUFFMCWALIN said:
5.5 games up.
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X

XiaNaphryz

LATIN, MATRIPEDICABUS, DO YOU SPEAK IT
I missed this the other day:

http://www.fangraphs.com/blogs/index.php/marco-scutaro-and-baseball-at-its-simplest/

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What you see above are six Marco Scutaro swinging strikes. These are all six of Marco Scutaro’s swinging strikes since he joined the Giants toward the end of July. Just six times over 170 plate appearances has Scutaro swung at the baseball and missed it. His first one came on July 30. Then August 8, then August 9. Then August 22, twice, then September 4. Marco Scutaro has practically gone two-week periods without swinging and missing.

For the sake of additional reference, that’s six swinging strikes over more than a month. On July 31, Brandon Hicks batted three times against James Shields, and he swung and missed seven times. Brandon Hicks had more swinging strikes in one game than Marco Scutaro has had over 38 games.

This isn’t a new thing for Scutaro — he’s always been an outstanding contact hitter. But he’s been extra-outstanding since joining the Giants, and that presumably has helped to drive his early success. One of the problems with Pence is that, since he joined San Francisco, his batting approach has been worse, as he’s gone after more balls. Scutaro’s approach has been better, at least in that he hasn’t really missed, not that he ever really missed.

And this leads us somewhere else, somewhere a little less 2012-specific. Over the last three years, Marco Scutaro has posted the highest contact rate in baseball among players with at least 500 plate appearances. He just edges out Juan Pierre, and Jeff Keppinger is looking up from third. Over the last three years, Scutaro has also seen the highest rate of pitches in the strike zone among players with at least 500 plate appearances. At 56.5 percent, he beats Denard Span by a full percentage point. He also beats Chone Figgins and Jack Wilson, suggesting that pitchers have been more comfortable going right after Marco Scutaro than Chone Figgins and Jack Wilson.

And while, over the last three years, Scutaro hasn’t been thrown the highest rate of fastballs, he has been thrown a very high rate of fastballs — 64.1 percent, where the average is more like 58 percent. Scutaro’s name is at the bottom of the first page on the FanGraphs fastball-rate leaderboard. Add in cutters and Scutaro moves up a few more slots.

So, in Marco Scutaro, we have a guy who usually gets fastballs, usually in the strike zone, and when he swings he usually hits the ball. Scutaro’s actual swing rate isn’t that high, as he’s a selective sort, but when he swings, he either puts the ball in play or fouls it off. This year about five of every nine Scutaro swings have put the ball in play. As a Giant, it’s been more like six of every ten.
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In theory, it can get simpler than this, but in reality, I don’t think it gets much simpler than this, not as long as we exclude pitchers as hitters. The Marco Scutaro Experience is the Marco Scutaro Experience, and it’ll remain that way until Scutaro gets worse and stops playing. For now, the Giants know exactly what they have in him. And I mean pretty much exactly.
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