Via Fangraphs (click to embiggen)
- Shaky: Gio Gonzalez (-3.0%) does the best he can with a floating strike zone, fanning 11 over 5.2 IP, but walking 4 and giving up 3 ER. Enjoy your no-decision.
- "Hitting" early: Steve Lombardozzi (+16.1%) gets a bunt single to score Harper from first base in the first inning thanks to a clown rundown (+12.3%). Denard Span (+10.2%) follows up later that inning with a two-run single featuring more circus defense (+13.1%).
- Refreshingly boring: Craig Stammen (+12.9%) earns a shutdown with 4 outs (thanks to some clown baserunning) in relief to hold the one run lead, as does Tyler Clippard (+11.5%), who throws a clean aeyth.
- More junk time heroes: Lombo doubles in a meaningless extra run in the aeyth (+5.1%), while Adam LaRoche (+4.0%) triples in two superfluous tallies two batters later (+4.2%).
- #DRAMA: Rafael Soriano (-21.3%) melts down in the 9th, letting in two runs because non-save situation = teh boring... and gets pulled after getting one out.
- #DRAAAMAAAAA: Ian Krol (-14.6%) gets his own meltdown after coming in to get the last two outs in the 9th, walking one, fanning one, then giving up a two-run single to tie it (-37.2%) before getting the last out.
- #DRRAAAAAAAMMAAAA!!!!! Bryce Harper (+52.5%) salvages my fandom with a two-out, two-run walkoff bomb to the opposite field (+44.0%).
So, Doghouse, is today's home plate ump Mike Winters getting a spot on The List?
Look for yourself! What is this strike zone I don't even...
via www.brooksbaseball.net (click to embiggen)
via www.brooksbaseball.net (click to embiggen)
Red are called strikes, green are called balls. This is just... WAT? Low strikes.. sometimes... wide strikes... sometimes... high strikes... sometimes... even the obligatory balls over the plate. It wasn't biased, I suppose, since both teams seemed to get hit with the random calls. Still, make your zone consistent. That means the same zone for both teams, and the same zone for the whole game. Also, the "wide" strikes were much worse than the typical one-ball-width most umps give around the plate (the dashed-box "as usually called" strike zone on the plots versus the solid-line rule-book zone)--they were essentially in the LH batters' box for the RHs. As Dave Jageler put it, "it's a different interpretation." Or, as I'd yell if I were at the ballgame today, "LAAAAAAAASSSSIIIIIIIIIIIIKK!!"