04/20/24
May 17, 2010
Rivera Gives Up First Grand Slam in 8 Years: After walking in a run for the first time since 2005, New York Yankees closer Mariano Rivera gave up a grand slam home run to Minnesota Twins outfielder Jason Kubel in a 6-3 loss Saturday. "Throw your pitch and sometimes they are going to hit it," Rivera said.
With that, Rivera's numbers against the Twins take a big tumble:
61.0 IP
1.18 ERA
59 K
11 BB
.456 OPS against
Only the Tigers are more abused by Rivera.
posted by grum@work at 01:17 PM on May 17, 2010
Only the Tigers are more abused by Rivera.
What a wonderful distinction.
posted by Ying Yang Mafia at 02:37 PM on May 17, 2010
He's the best ever and all that but was the 8 years really all that much of an achievement?
Never having really thought about what pitcher gives up the fewest grand slams I looked up a couple of numbers and it seems for all teams over the last 8 years its about 350 innings between grand slams on average. Looks like it was about 450 innings for Rivera, good but not up to his usual standards.
Anyone know where I could see grand slam stats for someone like Pedro or Maddux for comparison? I'm kind of curious now.
posted by deflated at 03:03 PM on May 17, 2010
Anyone know where I could see grand slam stats for someone like Pedro or Maddux for comparison? I'm kind of curious now.
Did someone turn on the grum-signal?
Greg Maddux gave up 3 grand slams in his career, over 5008 IP.
Pedro Martinez gave up 4 grand slams in his career, over 2827 IP.
posted by grum@work at 05:29 PM on May 17, 2010
grum - I'm damned curious - where do you pull your stats from and what does the grum-signal look like? flagon of beer?
posted by kokaku at 05:53 PM on May 17, 2010
Wow, ask and you shall receive. Grum, add me to the list who'd like a look at a database with those kind of stats in it (and if the grum-signal doesn't involve beer it should).
And Maddux gave up 3 in 23 seasons as a starter? Way to make Rivera look like Jose Mesa.
posted by deflated at 06:15 PM on May 17, 2010
Baseball-Reference.com is the Mecca for baseball stats. I pay a small annual subscription to run searches on their database.
However, one of the free tools is the "Home Run Log" for each pitcher.
You can see the breakdown of HR with runners on specific bases, and the total innings is on the main page for each player.
Oh, and for the record, Jose Mesa only gave up 2 grand slams in 1500+ innings pitched.
posted by grum@work at 06:26 PM on May 17, 2010
I think the better off-beat stat in the last couple of weeks is that the Cubs broke the Yankees' record of 7,003 games without being no-hit. The Yankees had a streak that ran from 1958 to 2003, while the Cubs haven't been no-hit since Sandy Koufax threw a perfecto against them on September 9, 1965. They broke the record in their 11-1 loss at Pittsburgh a week and a half ago.
posted by TheQatarian at 07:05 PM on May 17, 2010
Never knew B-R had that - there goes my productivity for the week.
I have lost faith in "Grand Slam per IP" as a measure of greatness on learning that Carlos Silva has never given one up. Inconceivable.
posted by deflated at 09:21 PM on May 17, 2010
I don't think that word means what you think it means.
posted by boredom_08 at 09:49 PM on May 17, 2010
Oddly enough, Trevor Hoffman gave up his first Grand Slam this year.
posted by drezdn at 10:25 PM on May 17, 2010
I have lost faith in "Grand Slam per IP" as a measure of greatness on learning that Carlos Silva has never given one up. Inconceivable.
Well, it's pretty hard to have 3 men on base when you don't walk enough guys in between the hits. If there is anything Silva can do, it's get the ball over the meat of the plate...
posted by grum@work at 10:49 PM on May 17, 2010
And Maddux gave up 3 in 23 seasons as a starter? Way to make Rivera look like Jose Mesa.
To be fair they stuck Rivera in with the bases already loaded. Maddux and Martinez were never called upon to pitch in those situations, they'd have to load the bases themselves and then give up the grand slam, all without being replaced by a reliever.
posted by Ying Yang Mafia at 04:04 PM on May 18, 2010
The pitch looked pretty decent, but Kubel just went down and got it. It was good to see the Twins finally break their losing streak against the Yankees.