Washington Nationals: Pitching to Adam Dunn

by natsstats on May 24, 2010 8:52 AM EDT

Last month, I wrote a post on Federal Baseball indicating that MLB pitchers were afraid to pitch to Adam Dunn. At the time, pitchers had thrown 44.49% of all pitches in the strike zone, while only throwing strikes to Dunn 35.05% of the time. As a result, 30% of Dunn's plate appearances resulted in walks.

Over the Nats last 20 games, Dunn has walked less and hit more – 10 walks in 70 plate appearances. This 14.29% walk rate is still substantially higher than the major league rate of 8.16% during the same time frame, but is also closer to Dunn’s 16.8% career walk rate. Check out my new post on NatsStats for the May update on the approach MLB pitchers are taking with Adam Dunn.

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I think the extension of the analysis in your article is to figure out if he's seeing more LOOGY's now that Zim's back.

I think that teams are more afraid of Zimmerman than Dunn. They think that Zimmerman can hit anything hard and in key situations, they’d rather send a LOOGY up against Dunn who will throw some breaking balls that give him trouble and some fastballs in the zone that they can get by him. That’s the tough part for Dunn is that he gets the LOOGY in a lot of situations that can be challenging for him.

Other than that, this is a really good analysis of some of the reasons that Dunn’s been hitting the ball more. It’s been kind of nice to see him willing to hit for some average lately. More doubles, that nice big hit in Saturday’s game and a willingness to hit for contact rather than The Three True Outcomes.

Ian Desmond...because the future starts now for the Washington Nationals.

by souldrummer on May 24, 2010 1:28 AM EDT reply actions

I’ve seen reference to LOOGY a number of time before but don’t know what it stands for… please help me out.

Also, Dunn has been hitting for average more lately but he’s also just missed on a number of swings that he either hit fly balls on or crushed foul. I’m waiting for him to go on a HR tear…. this road trip would be a nice time to do so.

by PerryMason on May 24, 2010 9:30 AM EDT up reply actions

Left-handed One Out GuY.

A reliever who comes in to get a scary left-handed batter out: typically a lefty with a very big platoon split. Sean Burnett would theoretically be our LOOGY, except he’s pretty decent against righties, too. Ray King was our LOOGY back in 2005-7.

"And everybody lived happily ever after. Except the Phillies and the Mets. The End." --Sasskuash
Friend of Dukes and Desmond #3

by Doghouse on May 24, 2010 9:52 AM EDT up reply actions

I think Riggles believes in LOOGY'S quite a bit.

That was one reason that he was using Bruney more earlier in the year. He always wanted to save Burnett as a possible LOOGY despite his ability to work to righties as well. Having Slaten up here and pitch well in games like he did yesterday has given us more flexibility because we have two lefties who can pitch to righties a little bit as well.

I think that Victor Garate in Syracuse is probably the best example of a guy who may evolve into a pure lefty specialist. I believe he’s the guy we got in the waiver wire trade for Belliard with the Dodgers after the deadline last year, and I’ve been intrigued by him for a little while.

Doghouse and others: do you know a way to find lefty/righty splits for minor league players. Milb.com doesn’t really do the job and Fangraphs isn’t as strong on minor league data.

Ian Desmond...because the future starts now for the Washington Nationals.

by souldrummer on May 24, 2010 10:02 AM EDT up reply actions

That was the great thing about Bruney

He would walk lefties as well as righties

by d_c_guy on May 24, 2010 5:15 PM EDT up reply actions

Dunn don’t care bout no stinkin’ LOOGY’s!

by PerryMason on May 24, 2010 10:25 AM EDT up reply actions

but stinkin LOOGY’s care bout Dunn
therefore…

There’s a syllogism in here somewhere but I can’t come up with it and I’m heading out the door…

by PerryMason on May 24, 2010 10:27 AM EDT up reply actions

Trotksy was a GM?

"And everybody lived happily ever after. Except the Phillies and the Mets. The End." --Sasskuash
Friend of Dukes and Desmond #3

by Doghouse on May 24, 2010 11:16 AM EDT up reply actions

good choice especially since Trotsky was assassinated in Mexico
(Beware of you travel schedule Bowden)

by PerryMason on May 24, 2010 2:18 PM EDT up reply actions

You guys are weird.

;-)

Rob

"Winfield goes back to the wall. He hits his head on the wall and it rolls off! It's rolling all the way back to second base! This is a terrible thing for the Padres!" -- Jerry Coleman

by RobBobS on May 24, 2010 4:04 PM EDT up reply actions