This made sense because Jeffress was only striking out 6.8 batters per nine innings, at the time, which is an abysmal rate for closers. Actually, it’s an abysmal rate for any pitcher in this day and age. But, if we look closer, we can see that Jeffress, over the past three years has beaten his DRA marks.

The same can be said for his former teammate who remains in Milwaukee, Blaine Boyer. Boyer’s strikeout per nine can only be described as laughable: Boyer is striking out 3.6 hitters per nine innings, which is by far the worst mark for any qualified relief pitcher in 2016. Yet, Boyer has an RA9 of 3.90 in 2016, which is respectable.

So, the question is, why is this happening? Why are these two pitchers consistently beating their DRA numbers? Is this three-year trend a suggestion that Boyer and Jeffress are doing something that DRA isn’t fully capturing or accounting for?

Well, if we look at Statcast data, we can see that Jeffress has an exit velocity against of 84.8 MPH, which ranks second among all current Major League pitchers with at least 50 results. Boyer ranks 9th with an exit velocity of 85.3 MPH. In 2015, Jeffress had an exit velocity of 87.3 while Boyer’s exit velocity was at 87.8. Here’s the distribution of the league’s exit velocity in 2016 and 2015.

So, Jeffress and Boyer have done a good job at limiting hard contact by exit velocity measure. That said, not all exit velocity is created equally, as was displayed in this article written at Baseball Prospectus, “The Need for Adjusted Exit Velocity”. Basically, raw exit velocity numbers have some bias to them, because they do not account for the ballpark or the opposing batter. But, in an email, Jonathan Judge told me that, “I think even with adjusted exit velocity, Jeffress and Boyer both do very well,” which makes sense because both pitchers’ ballparks don’t have a huge park effect either way. Plus, in 2016, both pitchers have faced above average opponents. Jeffress has an oppTAv of .271 and Boyer has one of .269.

DRA does try to account for pitchers limiting contact, but it doesn’t use exit velocity in its model. Therefore, the next question I asked Jonathan was whether DRA was missing something. Here’s what he had to say:

“I would definitely be willing to concede that DRA could be missing something as to those two specific to exit velocity. For the most part, I think a pitcher’s results tend to speak for themselves, but in the case of pitchers with a very specific, quantifiable skill, sometimes our general filters for players don’t fully capture the effect.  In other words, they tend to be conservative in allocating credit. While that is generally what we want, I have no problem with the idea that minimizing exit velocity, in and of itself, is a skill that could allow pitchers like Jeffress and Boyer to be evaluated more fairly.”

Mainly, the question that is trying to be answered here is whether Jeffress and Boyer’s true talent is closer to their respective RA9 than it is to their respective DRA. It’s a very difficult question to answer, and in reality, the answer probably lies somewhere in the middle.

But, what is certain is that both pitchers seem to have a strategy of throwing the ball down, in order to generate weak groundball contact. From MLB Advanced Media, here is Boyer’s zone and exit velocity, and then Jeffress’s:

Both have better than average groundball exit velocities (their groundball exit velocity is lower than the average), and most of their pitches are thrown low, which allows them to generate weak contact.

This makes these pitchers more valuable than they originally seem to be. In an era where strikeouts are all the rage, these two pitchers seem to be bucking the trend. Mainly, what they are trying to do is compensate for their low strikeout rates by limiting the contact made against them.

That said, only a few pitchers seem to have this sort of ability. This is not to denigrate DRA or any other metric. It’s just to show that baseball is still a very complicated game, and pitchers are complicated creatures that are difficult to understand.

Top Play (WPA):
Yonder Alonso’s single to center, which scored Danny Valencia and advanced old friend Khris Davis to 3B, broke the tie and gave Oakland a 3-2 lead (.228). Both Davis and Alonso would score on the next play as Marcus Semien hit a triple to make the score 5-2.

Milwaukee held a 2-1 lead entering the 6th inning, but relievers Blaine Boyer, Will Smith, and Michael Blazek couldn’t hold the lead, allowing those 4 runs on 5 hits and 2 walks in their 1.7 innings. Indicative of their evening, those relievers combined for one strikeout.

Bottom Play (WPA):
The worst play of the game also occurred in that fateful bottom of the 7th inning. Blazek started the inning allowing a Steven Vogt triple and Valencia reached on a Jonathan Villar error. Vogt’s triple was crushed to the deepest part of the park, but Kirk Nieuwenhuis had a shot at catching it, but the ball bounced off the heel of his glove. After those two hitters reached, Khris Davis did the Brewers a favor and grounded into a fielder’s choice which resulted in Vogt getting thrown out at home (-.156).

Trend to Watch:
Brewers starter Jimmy Nelson was in and out of trouble all night. He induced only 3 swings and misses, down from 6 in his disaster start in San Francisco last week. The A’s contact rate in the game was 93%, running up to 97% for pitches in the strike zone, both well above Nelson’s seasonal and career numbers. With so much contact, Athletics hitters still only swung at 43% of Nelson’s pitches, also below his season average.

Nelson’s first inning was a slog, as he needed 32 pitches to get his three outs. He gave up 2 hits and a walk, and escaped his jam with a well timed double play. This set the tone for the evening, as Nelson only pitched one clean inning, but only gave up 1 run. He stranded 87.5% of his base runnners last night, also above his season strand rate of 76.2%.

Nelson survived and gave the Brewers a chance to win, but his performance last night is not sustainable for a successful pitcher. Nelson didn’t fool batters, and he got lucky that he stranded so many runners.

Quick Hits:
It was Milwaukee’s first game in Oakland since the 2002 season. Back then, the stadium was known as Network Associates Coliseum. The Athletics won that game 8-0 as Mark Mulder pitched a shutout. Ben Sheets started for the Brewers and was chased after four innings.

Up Next: The Brewers finish their west coast trip with an afternoon game against Oakland. Junior Guerra will look to bounce back from his worst start of the season last week in Los Angeles, where he allowed 5 runs to the Dodgers in just five innings. The 5 runs were the most he’s allowed in a game all season, and he gave up a home run for the third straight start. For the A’s, Daniel Mengden makes his third career start. Last time out, he pitched 6.3 innings against Texas, allowing 2 runs ( 1 earned) and striking out 7. First pitch is 2:35.

This is how the night started for Case Anderson.

TOP PLAY (WPA): In a game when the Brewers got clobbered, you wouldn’t expect them to have the top play, but they did.

While the final result of the game displayed a lopsided affair, the game was actually quite close for the majority of the time.

In the sixth inning, the Brewers were down 4-3. They were fighting their way back after falling behind 2-0, then tying it up 2-2, only to fall behind again 4-2. Hill led off the inning with a double. Ramon Flores was the next batter and on the first pitch of the at-bat, he lined a double, which scored the run and tied the game 4-4. Unfortunately, that same inning Brandon Crawford made an exceptional play.

Usually, when a player going from second to third gets thrown out by the shortstop, it’s usually the base runners fault. This time, though, I wouldn’t blame Flores. The ball went up the middle and Crawford made a beautiful play.

Oh ya, and that was also the BOTTOM PLAY (WPA).

KEY MOMENT:
Sometimes I think WPA gets it right and displays the most important play in the game, and sometimes I don’t. This is one of those times where I don’t.

This, for the most part, was a close game until the seventh inning when the Giants blew the game wide open. The score at the time was 5-4 for the Giants and it was their turn to hit. The inning got off to a good start for the Brewers as Denard Span and Joe Panik were retired quickly. But then trouble ensued. Belt singled on a line drive. Posey followed with a ground ball to second base, which Gennett dove for and stopped the ball. Unfortunately for the Brewers Gennett’s throw to second wasn’t on time, and the inning continued. Matt Duffy then singled as well and the bases were loaded for Brandon Crawford.

Blaine Boyer was able to work a 0-2 count on Crawford and was only one pitch away from getting out of the inning. But, on the 0-2 pitch, Crawford hit a broken-bat bloop single into center field, which scored two runs giving the Giants a 7-4 lead. The Giants would end up scoring two more runs in the inning which basically put this game out of reach.

Trend To Watch:
Blaine Boyer struggled tonight. He also still has a 2.03 ERA, but ERA is a flawed pitching metric. His DRA is actually quite poor at 5.31, which is one of the worst on a subpar Brewers pitching staff.

One of Boyer’s biggest problems is that he simply doesn’t strike anybody out. This season he’s only striking out 3.2 hitters per nine innings, which is the worst strikeout rate among all Brewers pitchers. Boyer is going to have to improve upon this or else his bullpen roll could be in jeopardy.

DOG ON A SKATEBOARD

1. Dogs are cool!
2. Dogs skateboarding are even cooler.

DUDE’S GLOVE IS WAY TOO BIG:

The glove, the hair, the girl on her phone, it’s just all really good.

GENNETT’s SWING:

this swing is how my heart feels pic.twitter.com/BiEvU7GTTF

— Grant Brisbee (@mccoveychron) June 14, 2016

Top Play: This was an interesting game by WPA, as the Brewers pulled out the victory despite the Giants having the top play and the Brewers having the bottom one.

With the Brewers leading 3-2 heading into the sixth inning, manager Craig Counsell pulled Taylor Jungmann after five solid innings and turned to veteran Chris Capuano to face the top of the Giants lineup. Presumably, the hope was that the lefty would be able to get both Angel Pagan and Joe Panik, with the former being a switch-hitter who is much stronger against righties and the latter being a pure left-handed hitter. However, Capuano proved unable to do that, as Pagan tripled to lead off the inning (+.148).

The fact that this didn’t turn into a rally is a testament to Blaine Boyer, the pitcher who followed Capuano. Buster Posey was able to drive Pagan in, but the leadoff man on third with no one out could be a disaster scenario. In fact, teams in that situation average 1.3 runs per inning. However, despite a Hunter Pence single and subsequent error and an intentional walk to Brandon Belt, Boyer was able to escape with no further damage and keep the game tied.

Bottom Play: As I mentioned earlier, despite winning the game, the Brewers had the lowest WPA on any play in this game—and that play came in the half-inning following Boyer’s tightrope walk to escape.

The Brewers had an early hook on starter Taylor Jungmann, but Bruce Bochy let his new acquisition Jeff Samardzija pitch into the sixth. And after retiring Ramon Flores to lead off the inning, Samardzija was chased by back-to-back singles by Aaron Hill and Kirk Nieuwenhuis. Jonathan Villar followed with a walk against new pitcher George Kontos, which brought up Domingo Santana.

At this point in an inning—bases loaded, one out—teams in 2015 scored 1.52 runs. Just one run would have worked for the Brewers, as it would have given them the lead heading into the last third of the game. And there are many ways to drive that run in, even without getting a base hit. Santana, however, did not manage to do so, instead grounding into a double play (-.209).

Trend to Watch: As I continue to write about how Scooter Gennett doesn’t deserve a ton of playing time, he does his best to prove me wrong. Gennett went 1-3 with two walks on Wednesday, boosting his season line to .400/.538/.700.

Gennett is likely to get the lion’s share of the at bats until Orlando Arcia makes his debut, simply because the Brewers don’t have anyone else with any sort of potential they could play in his stead. However, I have gone on the record continually saying that once Arcia is ready, Gennett should be marginalized.

But if he continues to hit like this and maintains his 1.238 OPS through June, I would agree that he should get some playing time later on in the season.

Key Moment: Jeremy Jeffress was supposed to begin the season as co-closers with Will Smith, but Smith’s knee injury has forced the lefty to the disabled list and installed Jeffress as the club’s closer. He got his first save of the season on Wednesday, which bodes well for both him and the Brewers.

It doesn’t take much to establish oneself as a capital-c Closer, and a few months as the undisputed ninth-inning option would probably give Jeffress that label, especially if he is reasonably effective. Players’ careers have turned on far less, and Smith’s injury—while unfortunate for the team’s overall effectiveness—has provided Jeffress with the opportunity to seize this job, and he might not have been given that chance had Smith stayed healthy.

And from the team’s perspective, this wouldn’t be all bad news. Jeffress’s saves numbers would go up, thereby boosting his value in arbitration, but his short track record means he likely wouldn’t be excessively expensive even if he had an excellent 2016. On the field, though, this would allow the team to deploy Smith as more of a fireman than the traditional closer role allows. And because Smith is the better pitcher, being able to insert him into jams in the seventh or eighth innings would be a more effective usage.

Of course, I am getting ahead of myself a bit here. One save does not a closer make, but it is a good sign for Jeffress to lock down his first as he tries to solidify his hold on the job.