Reds Bullpen = Awesome

[jmcclain19]

By Awesome, I mean Awesomely Bad.

Everyone knows from watching just how ugly the blood bath has been, but I decided to look a little further.

Here are some fun with numbers for the month of June

Houston Astros Series
Starters - 18.0IP, 13H, 4ER, 5BB, 15K, 1.00WHIP, 2.00ERA
Relievers - 11.0IP, 12H, 6ER, 2BB, 3K, 1.27WHIP, 4.91ERA

St. Louis Cardinals Series
Starters - 17.2IP, 18H, 6ER, 4BB, 10K, 1.25WHIP, 3.06ERA
Relievers - 9.1IP, 5H, 4ER, 2BB, 3K, 0.75WHIP, 3.86ERA

Chicago Cubs Series
Starters - 26.2IP, 22H, 10ER, 5BB, 18K, 1.01WHIP, 3.38ERA
Relievers - 9.1IP, 15H, 9ER, 2BB, 7K, 1.82WHIP, 8.68ERA

Milwaukee Brewers Series
Starters - 20.0IP, 20H, 8ER, 6BB, 24K, 1.30WHIP, 3.60ERA
Relievers - 9.0IP, 6H, 3ER, 4BB, 6K, 1.11WHIP, 3.00ERA

Chicago White Sox Series
Starters - 14.2IP, 23H, 15ER, 6BB, 11K, 1.98WHIP, 9.21ERA
Relievers - 12.1IP, 20H, 12ER, 3BB, 4K, 1.87WHIP, 8.76ERA

New York Mets Series
Starters - 21.0IP, 21H, 8ER, 4BB, 12K, 1.19WHIP, 3.43ERA
Relievers - 5.0IP, 9H, 8ER, 4BB, 1K, 2.60WHIP, 14.40ERA

Which gives us the following for the season

Starters - 443.2IP, 467H, 209ER, 119BB, 335K, 1.32WHIP, 4.24ERA
Relievers - 198.0IP, 223H, 113ER, 74BB, 135K, 1.50WHIP, 5.14ERA

Here is how both the Bullpen and the Starters fair when compared to the Rest of baseball

Bullpen IP - 23rd out of 30
Bullpen ERA - 25th out of 30
Bullpen WHIP - 26th out of 30
Bullpen Hits Allowed - 23rd out of 30
Bullpen AVG Against - 28th out of 30
Bullpen OBP Against - 25th out of 30
Bullpen SLG Against - 30th out of 30
Bullpen OPS Against - 29th out of 30

Starters IP - 6th out of 30
Starters ERA - 6th out of 30
Starters WHIP - 7th out of 30
Starters Hits Allowed - 22nd out of 30
Starters AVG Against - 13th out of 30
Starters OBP Against - 6th out of 30
Starters SLG Against - 16th out of 30
Starters OPS Against - 10th out of 30

So there you have it Reds fans. The Bullpen and the Starters are near polar opposites in comparison to the rest of baseball.

The aspect of baseball that is typically toughest to construct, and therefor by far the most expensive(and the Reds Achilles Heel), starting pitching, is excelling for the Reds in just about every way. Keep in mind too, that the Reds starters numbers include 40 innings of Dave Williams blowouts, so the numbers since his depature have been even higher against the league.

The part of baseball which is typically, in comparison, the easiest and cheapest to construct, is failing the Reds and will, in the end, cost the team any shot at a post season birth.

What may be most maddening about the stats above, is that there are 22 other teams in baseball who have asked their bullpen to throw more innings than the Reds have in 2006. So naturally the question must be asked, if they have been bad with so little work, how much worse would it be if they had to throw more innings?

[oneupper]

Originally Posted by jmcclain19

What may be most maddening about the stats above, is that there are 22 other teams in baseball who have asked their bullpen to throw more innings than the Reds have in 2006. So naturally the question must be asked, if they have been bad with so little work, how much worse would it be if they had to throw more innings?

Great work Jim...but there are two answers to that question.

1) With more work, the BP would have put up even worse numbers.
2) Many BP pitchers have been underutilized and therefore come in rusty.
BP pitchers need work too.

I'm inclined to think 2), mainly because its hard to imagine it being worse...

But of course, we'd never know.

[RBA]

Do we really need stats to know the obvious?

[Marc D]

We've seen it play out many times the past few years. Its option 1.

You give these guys more IP and your gonna get numbers that aren't just the worst in MLB this year. WOY would have to start putting into historical context.

[RBA]

Wrong thread.