Top Play (WPA):
After another solid outing from Junior Guerra, Chris Capuano allowed a two-run home run to Gordon Beckham, of all people, that put the Braves in front (+.348).

The fact that the top play by WPA was not the game-winning hit speaks to the back-and-forth nature of protracted extra innings games.  While it obviously seems like the most impactful play must have been the one that won the game, the Brewers were already pretty heavy favorites at the time of Jonathan Villar’s RBI single.  Because each extra frame begins with each team at roughly 50/50 odds to win, each subsequent man to reach base increases the team’s odds to the point where there just simply isn’t much more room to go.

A home run would obviously be a sharp increase; the Brewers were even odds to win the game when the inning started, but by the time Villar came up–four batters into the inning–they were already up to about 85 percent.  This increase coming from just one hitter would clearly be a huge swing, but with any sort of gradual build, it is difficult to gather the type of momentum necessary for huge swings in WPA.

Bottom Play (WPA):
Although I will touch on their precise struggles with men in scoring position and less than two outs below, the Brewers did have a chance to win the game in the twelfth with the middle of their order coming up.  However, with Ramon Flores on third and two out, the Braves chose to intentionally walk both Ryan Braun and Jonathan Lucroy, setting the table for Chris Carter, who would subsequently strike out (-.166).

Ever since I wrote about Carter’s swing adjustments, he’s been pretty terrible.  He has struck out 29 times in his last 15 games and 17 times alone in the last week.  Betting that he would strike out with the game on the line was a good move by Atlanta.

Key Moment:
A week after a marathon loss to the Cubs, the Brewers again found themselves in an extended affair–although this one was against the NL-worst Braves rather than the NL-best Cubs.  And this one the Brewers were able to squeak out, as Villar delivered his RBI single with the bases loaded in the top of the 13th.

For a while, though, the Brewers looked like they were again going to fail to score with men in scoring position and no one out.  Our own Travis Sarandos looked at this phenomenon last week, and it looked like it was rearing its ugly head again when Martin Maldonado grounded into a forceout with the bases loaded and no one out and then Villar was pushed to an 0-2 count.

However, Villar delivered in what was very likely a cathartic moment for many members of the club, and he was able to stave off the “clutch” question for another day.

Trend to Watch:
Junior Guerra had another solid outing, which is sadly noteworthy on this Brewers team.  He remains the only starter on the club with a DRA below 4.00, although Jimmy Nelson has improved recently.  His continued success is a positive development on the heels of my article from Tuesday in which I discussed the impact of the pitching staff’s struggles on the rebuild: while not all the young pitchers will be successful, if only half of them work out, the Brewers will be happy.  One start obviously does not make a career, but silver linings are all the organization can really hold onto at this point when the context is considered.

On that Wednesday evening at PNC Park in Pittsburgh, LHP Tom Gorzelanny took to the mound to start for the Brewers against his former team. He gave up four runs, all earned, and struck out five over 5.1 innings in a 7-0 shutout loss for the Brewers. It was the last time a left handed pitcher started for the franchise.

Since that date, 123 different southpaws have started 2,933 games in the big leagues (through Wednesday). When Chase Anderson takes the mound this evening, he will be the 358th consecutive righty to start for Milwaukee. With no lefty starters banging on the door of the big leagues in the Brewers’ system, it looks like for now, that streak will only get longer.

Does this matter? Kinda, yeah. Miller Park skews positive for left-handed hitters: according to the BP Annual, the three-year park factors for Miller Park are 113 for Runs/LH and 121 for HR/LH, while those numbers are 103 and 113, respectively, for righties. Lefties at Miller Park have an all-time OPS of .771 and hit home runs every 28.0 at bats, and righties have compiled a .737 OPS while hitting dingers every 29.6 at bats. Left-handed hitters are historically more susceptible to same-hand platoon splits than righties, and Milwaukee is putting itself at a disadvantage by failing to neutralize opponents’ lefties at home.

It would seem that the franchise has caught on to the dearth of left-handed pitching depth in the system. The team spent first round draft picks on southpaws in 2014 (Kodi Medeiros) and 2015 (Nathan Kirby), acquired Wei-Chung Wang in the 2013 Rule 5 draft (you may or may not remember him, probably not, wasn’t a big deal or anything), and traded for Josh Hader in last July’s blockbuster that sent Carlos Gomez and Mike Fiers to Houston.

Still, those players are still quite a ways away from starting in the big leagues, so the streak doesn’t seem likely to be broken any time soon. Let’s take a look at the pitchers who are most likely to be Milwaukee’s first lefty starter since 2013:

Chris Capuano
Where is he? In the Brewers bullpen
When could he do it? Monday, April 18
Likelihood that he’ll break the streak: Not *super* likely. The Brewers have plenty of young, talented arms in Colorado Springs that can fill the fifth spot in the rotation while Matt Garza is sidelined, and the safe bet is that they’ll call up Zack Davies in a week and a half when the need for a fifth starter arises. Capuano is 37 and while getting a spot start would be a fun story for the fans, I wouldn’t hold my breath or anything. Capuano’s last start was July 28 of last year, when he gave the Rangers a five spot and failed to get out of the first inning in a game the Yankees won anyway when they scored 21 unanswered runs.

Brent Suter
Where is he? Triple-A Colorado Springs
When could he do it? The dog days of summer
Likelihood that he’ll break the streak: Nah. Suter is probably the least likely of a Sky Sox rotation that includes Davies, Jorge Lopez, Junior Guerra and Hiram Burgos to find himself getting a spot start in the big leagues. Davies, Lopez and Guerra are already on the 40-man roster, so he’d need to be added, and the 31st-round pick in 2012 is not considered a top prospect for the organization.

Josh Hader
Where is he? Double-A Biloxi
When could he do it? September
Likelihood that he’ll break the streak: This is probably your best bet right now, though it might not necessarily be this season. While many scouts continue to insist that Hader and his slight 6’3”, 160 lbs. frame is destined for the bullpen, Hader has continued to impress with big strikeout numbers and a solid three-pitch repertoire. The 22-year-old shot up prospect lists with a flashy 0.56 ERA in 16 innings in the Arizona Fall League, and he carried that over to his Opening Day start in Biloxi last night, striking out five over four shutout innings. Last season, the Brewers rewarded Jorge Lopez for his strong year in the Southern League with a cup of coffee in the big leagues in September, and Hader could certainly be on the same path.

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.

In the middle of the previous decade, it looked like Capuano was going to be a key piece of the next contending Brewers team. He won 18 games in 2005 and made the All-Star team in 2006, when he threw 221.1 innings with a 4.03 ERA (113 ERA+, back in that time of plentiful offense) and 3.7 K/BB. In 2007, he won his first five decisions and looked poised for another All-Star appearance, with a 2.31 ERA and 31 strikeouts through his first 39 innings.

And then it all fell apart. Not only did Capuano fail to win another game for the rest of the season, covering 18 starts and four relief appearances, the Brewers didn’t win a single game Capuano appeared in. In his final 111 innings, Capuano posted a brutal 6.08 ERA. Before he could even try and get things right in 2008, Capuano was forced to undergo the second Tommy John surgery of his career.

The success rate for a second Tommy John surgery, according to Baseball America, is 78.7 percent, about the same success rate for the surgery in general. Joakim Soria, Brian Wilson, Shawn Kelley, Brandon Beachy, Daniel Hudson and Kris Medlen have all made successful comebacks from a second Tommy John surgery. But by the time Capuano had rehabilitated from the second surgery and was back pitching for the Brewers’ rookie league teams in 2009, he was already 30 years old and had spent 26 months of the prime of his career rehabilitating his elbow. Beyond the physical pain, Capuano was put through a mental grind.

When Capuano returned to the Brewers in 2010, he was still working on that 22-game losing streak that ended his 2007 season. He started against the Marlins on June 3rd, 2010 in his post-surgery debut, served up three runs and seven hits in 3.2 innings, and took the loss. He then worked out of the bullpen in three losses through the rest of June. As a result, Capuano’s streak of appearing in Brewers losses was extended to 26 games, tying a major league record set by Ed Walsh in 1930 and tied by Paul Erickson in 1942 (minimum one full inning pitched per appearance).

Thankfully, Capuano was given the ninth inning of Milwaukee’s July 3rd, 2010 12-5 blowout victory over St. Louis to end the streak. On July 19th, 2010, Capuano made his second start of the season and defeated the Pirates with five innings pitched and just three hits and one run allowed.

Baseball has hurled a lot at Chris Capuano, but he has pushed through it all. His results have been mediocre since his return — 4.38 ERA (86 ERA+) in 694 innings since 2010 — but baseball will always need for lefties, and Capuano has been there to answer the call every year. When Capuano was hurt before the 2008 season, I thought there was no way we’d see him back in Milwaukee again. And when I first wrote about Capuano’s unfortunate record-setting streak back in 2010 I thought there was no way I’d still be writing about Capuano and the Brewers half a decade later.

Capuano is as persistent as it gets in baseball. I don’t know if he’ll be productive for the Brewers. It’s been a while since he’s been good, and he’s a 37-year-old with an elbow kept around only by the greatest miracles of modern surgical science. At this point, however, I think we should know better than to bet against him.

Let’s roll it and pick up some talking points to share with the folks around you while you wait in line for your Ryan Braun autograph:

FanGraphs || Tanking: Does MLB Really Have a Problem? (Jan. 25, 2016)

There’s been a lot of hand-wringing in the past week or so over the concept of “tanking” in baseball, particularly in the National League, which is projected to have the six worst teams in the majors, including the Milwaukee Brewers. David Cameron (@DCameronFG) dispels the notion, mostly based on the fact that the practice isn’t likely to provide much payoff. While teams like Milwaukee, Colorado and San Diego have underwhelming rosters, they’re certainly not actively trying to lose, as each has signed free agents to bolster their 2016 rosters in addition to their rebuilding efforts. Tanking in the NBA works because an elite rookie can come in and make an impact right away, and a single player can alter the fortunes of a franchise. Neither of those is true in Major League Baseball.

The Hardball Times || The Art of the Tank (Jan. 26, 2016)

But dadgumit, if you’re going to tank, you may as well do it right. The Astros pulled off what was likely the first and only truly successful “tank” in Major League Baseball. They’re coming out of a period in which they sold off every conceivable asset — aside from a few players, such as Jose Altuve — in order to stockpile assets and gain higher draft picks to make the postseason in 2015. Chris Gigley (@cgigley) takes us through the steps to a proper Astros-style rebuild, which starts with really going for it wholesale and being honest, both with yourself and with your fans.

Beyond the Box Score || The rise and fall of catcher framing (Jan 27, 2016)

Henry Druschel (@henrydruschel) digs into some of the numbers regarding pitch framing, which have received a significant upgrade very recently from the folks at the Baseball Prospectus main site. Druschel notes that after a spike in the relative importance of framing in the early part of the decade, the gap between the best and worst framers has shrunk, and the rate at which it’s shrinking is growing. Michael Bradburn covered the steady decline of Jonathan Lucroy’s pitch framing in recent years, which has plummeted from otherworldly to just league average. As teams begin to understand the true impact pitch framing has — and as our ability to understand and quantify it grows — it may serve to nullify its effects for the elite framers as the rest of the league catches up.

FanGraphs || Projecting the DFA’d Rymer Liriano (Jan. 25, 2016)

Unbeknownst to them, FanGraphs was devoting a big chunk their coverage to the Brewers on Monday. Three days before the Brewers swung a trade for outfielder Rymer Liriano, the recently-DFA’d-former-Top-100 prospect from San Diego, Chris Mitchell (@_chris_mitchell) took a crack at projecting him out with his KATOH system. While it projects just 1.9 fWAR over the next six years, Mitchell leans on Dan Farnsworth to get another perspective, and he provided a glowing report. While Liriano’s contact issues are a red flag, it appears that the Brewers have acquired, at worst, a solid fourth outfielder with a chance to become something more.

The Sports Post || Chris Capuano, Milwaukee, and a familiar feeling (Jan. 27, 2016)

The Brewers took us on a trip down memory lane this week, bringing back former fan-favorite Chris Capuano, now 37 years old, on a minor-league deal. Shaun Ranft (@Shaun_TSP) followed and found himself back in the early part of the century and in the middle of the last major rebuilding phase Milwaukee undertook. Cappy is back and while he may be a long shot for the major-league rotation, he represents a bit of nostalgia and, therefore, looks like an astute pickup for struggling team who will need to give its fans something to cheer about.

This pickoff — which brought the Diamondbacks’ win probability back down to 52.6 percent, an eight-percentage-point drop — was one of a mere six pickoffs on the year for the Brewers. This club hasn’t accrued many of those recently, ranking at or below the Major League average for nine straight seasons. But before that time, there lived a man who transcended the norm, whose ability to catch runners leaning took the league by storm.

Christopher Frank Capuano pitched rather terribly in 2015, with a 7.97 ERA and 6.50 DRA across 40.2 innings for the New York Yankees. That fact, coupled with the fact that he turned 37 in August, makes me think he’ll hang up his cleats at some point in the next few months. When he does so, someone at BP Milwaukee will write a career retrospective to memorialize him, as they should. For now, though, I want to focus on one esoteric element of his performance.

Coming to the Brewers in the 2003 offseason (along with a cast of thousands), Capuano joined the starting rotation at the beginning of 2004. He’d remain there through 2007, piling up 678.2 innings of 4.38-ERA ball. Tommy John surgery and the subsequent recovery kept him off the mound in 2008 and 2009, but he posted a 3.95 ERA in 66.0 frames during the 2010 season before signing with the Mets. All told, he worked his way to a 4.34 ERA over 744.2 innings with Milwaukee — solid considering his run environment, but not especially noteworthy.

With that said, he truly excelled at one thing: Pickoffs. In the 2004-07 stint, he caught an astounding 26 baserunners, by far the most in the National League. He averaged 7.7 pickoffs on a per-200 inning basis, which also led the league (among pitchers with at least 500 innings):

In both areas, his at-one-point-teammate Doug Davis came in second — but Davis was no match for Cappy. (On that note, I’ll also mention that Capuano has more pickoffs than any other pitcher in Brewers history, despite placing 19th in innings.)

How did that affect Capuano’s game? Well, he allowed just 10 stolen bases in those four seasons, along with 13 failed attempts — nine of which came on Capuano’s throws. In other words, potential basestealers went 11-for-15 against him when we take out his contributions. Throwing primarily to catchers without arms (and to an aging Damian Miller), Capuano had to survive on his own. And as we’ve seen, he didn’t just survive, he thrived.

The extent of his excellence becomes more clear when we look at defensive metrics. According to DRS, Capuano’s ability to keep opponents from moving ahead saved the Brewers 13 runs from 2004 to 2007. That may not seem like much, but over that same span, Baseball-Reference puts Capuano’s pitching itself at 14 runs above average. This means that by holding runners on base — by possessing such a deadly pickoff move — Capuano essentially doubled his value.

This also had ripple effects elsewhere. With runners scared to take off against him, Capuano prevented them from coming around to score. His 73.0 percent strand rate from 2004 to 2007 topped the Major League average of 71.1 percent, while ranking a solid 34th out of 89 NL qualifiers. Despite mediocre walk rates and not enough strikeouts, Capuano managed to do pretty well for himself, because he didn’t allow the competition to make things worse.

In terms of pickoffs, Capuano’s most successful single campaign was 2005, when he snared a dozen runners over 219.0 innings. No pitcher has reached that mark since; its last occurrence before then came in 1992, when Terry Mulholland accumulated 15 pickoffs. In more advanced terms, that translated to six stolen base runs saved, a figure that only three other pitchers have topped since 2003:

When you’re in the company of Cueto and Shields, you’ve done something right. Perhaps aided by that tenacity, Capuano pitched to a career-best (with Milwaukee) 3.99 ERA in 2005.

That would ultimately prove to be his zenith. Umpires dinged Capuano for four balks that year, which took a toll on his pickoff attempts:

Major League rules 8.01 and 8.05 apply to legal pitch deliveries and balks. The section that has been giving Capuano and Davis trouble is 8.05(c), which rules it a balk when, “the pitcher, while touching his plate, fails to step directly toward a base before throwing to that base.”

In practice, that means a pitcher must limit his stride within the 45-degree angle between first base and home plate.

…

According to Capuano, it’s beginning to have an effect. He has begun limiting his number of pickoff moves.

“You have to constantly try to change things up and use it more sparingly,” Capuano said. “It cuts down on your pickoffs, but it doesn’t affect your ability to keep runners close. You have to really make sure that you’re not cutting it close to the [45-degree] line. Moving that runner up on a balk is exactly what you’re trying not to do.”

In 2006, Capuano’s pickoffs fell to six, then to two in 2007. From there, he went to surgery, which harmed his throws. He told the New York Times in 2011 that the elbow injuries had forced him to change his delivery from the stretch. On the field, that meant that he only picked off nine runners between 2010 and 2015 — a third of what he had accomplished from 2004 to 2007, and in slightly more innings (694.0). Father Time claims us all, and Capuano, devilishly talented though he may have been, couldn’t escape that fate.

But enough of the doom and gloom. Let’s get to the best part: video! Sadly, no footage of Capuano’s Milwaukee pickoffs appears to exist; however, we can still watch him bust a move from later in his career. Here, he catches Starlin Castro in 2011 with the Mets:

Here, as a Dodger in 2012, he spies Garrett Richards leaning out too far:

Here, in a rare burst of competence for the Bronx Bombers, he hoses George Springer:

And, as one final treat, he’ll gun down Hayato Sakamoto in the Japan All-Star Series:

In all of these clips, we see the same characteristics — Capuano always has one eye on the runner, and when he sees him trailing the bag by enough (or taking off), he breaks from his delivery and rifles it to the first baseman. It’s that sort of move that assassinated so many runners while he pitched for the Brewers; although he never fulfilled his full potential, this area of his game made him one of the most captivating players to watch.

Since Capuano left the team five years ago, no one has really filled his shoes. Chris Narveson and Randy Wolf picked off a fair amount of runners, but their poor performance overall abbreviated their tenure in Milwaukee. Yovani Gallardo also stood out somewhat in this regard, and he likely will continue to do so for whichever team signs him in the coming months. That isn’t to say that the Brewers have no hope for the future. Jungmann notched seven pickoffs over his 632.2-inning minor-league career; more impressively, Josh Hader has racked up 12 in just 363.1 frames on the farm. If they can blossom into capable Major League starters, they could terrorize runners like Capuano once did.

That being said, the Brewers have not had to deal with a ton of pitcher injuries this year. The only real significant injury to the pitching staff has been to Wily Peralta. He went down on May 5th with a strained left oblique and has yet to return to the lineup. Matt Garza was placed on the 15-day disabled list on Monday with right shoulder tendinitis, but according to this article from the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, it looks like it’s nothing too serious. The right-hander should only miss one start. According to Garza, he’s been pitching with this injury for some time (the article didn’t specify when the injury occurred). If he’s been pitching through shoulder tendinitis for most of the season, it could conceivably explain some of his struggles. As for Peralta, he reportedly has thrown a successful bullpen session.  

#Brewers RHP Wily Peralta threw first bullpen today since going on DL with oblique. Said went well.

— Tom (@Haudricourt) June 29, 2015

Therefore, the Brewers may shortly get him back into the rotation, probably sometime after the All-Star Break.

The Peralta injury also opened the door for Taylor Jungmann, who has been effective since making his debut. While his 2.43 ERA is excellent, he does own a 3.54 FIP, which is roughly league-average. It should be noted, though, that his 3.00 DRA (Deserved Run Average) is above-average. I would expect Jungmann to experience some regression in the second half — but remain an above-average pitcher — and that’s definitely a nice discovery for the Brewers, considering their starting-rotation woes.

Considering these factors, it seems safe to say that the Brewers pitching staff has not overly been affected by pitching injuries in 2015. At least not up to this point. This, however, has not always been the case. Look at the 2008 season. In that year, Brewers pitchers missed 624 days due to injury. The injuries also impacted significant players, as Yovani Gallardo and Chris Capuano missed more than 200 days. Gallardo suffered two major injuries, to his knees, that year. The most significant one was the first knee injury, which was a torn ACL that caused him to miss 144 days. Chris Capuano on the other hand, had Tommy John surgery, which shelved him for the entire season. It went on to affect the rest of his time with the Brewers.

Throughout their time with the Brewers, both players were plagued with injuries, but again, do they deserve the label of being injury-prone? The methodology I used is the same as the one I outlined on Monday — read about it here. With that said, the data shown below is from 2004 to 2014.

* Injury happened in the minors.

Both Vince Perkins and Randy Choate’s injuries happened while they were in the minors. They never threw a single inning with the Brewers, which is why there’s nothing in their innings-pitched column.

At first glance, Gallardo definitely seems like a player who was hampered by a lot of injuries, and he has. He has the fifth-most days missed due to injury since 2004, and he ranks third in the number of separate injuries he suffered during that time compared to other Brewers players. While that is true, he also pitched many more innings than any other Brewers pitcher on the list. Therefore, labeling him as “injury-prone” may be misguided. Chris Capuano and David Riske, I would argue, are players who better fit that profile. Here is a visualization that should aid my argument.

The data here is a lot less clustered than the one with position players. It’s harder to find outliers or players who fit the profile of injury-prone. The one obvious case, though, is of David Riske. He barely pitched for the Brewers, and yet since 2004, he has missed the second-most games. His career took a nosedive when he suffered Tommy John surgery in 2009. He attempted a comeback in 2010, pitching a total of 23.1 innings that year and posting a 5.01 ERA. That proved to be the last year he pitched in the big leagues. This is just another reminder that not every pitcher, after having Tommy John surgery, makes it back or finds success. It is a massive surgery and has ended the career of many pitchers, including Riske. It also seriously affected the career of Chris Capuano, who after suffering his second Tommy John surgery in 2008 didn’t pitch again in the bigs until 2010. While the surgery didn’t end his major-league career, it was a major cause for his end in Milwaukee. In 2010, he only pitched 66 innings for the Brewers. He then isigned with the Mets the following offseason.

PITCHERS VS. POSITION PLAYERS

The other part of all this that I found interesting was that while the position players suffered more injuries, on average, the pitchers missed many more games.

While, this certainly isn’t a league-wide study and simply a look at the Brewers, it wouldn’t surprise me if this were the norm for the rest of the league. Position players probably have to deal with more nagging injuries, while with pitchers when something breaks, it’s more serious.

THE DIFFERENCE

The table above, on the other hand, is an overall look at the data from 2004 until 2014. Let’s look at the difference in days missed between Brewers position players and pitchers for each individual year.

The biggest difference obviously came in 2011. That year Manny Parra, Brandon Kintzler, and Mitch Stetter all basically missed the entire season due to injury. Kintzler only pitched 14.2 innings, Stetter pitched even fewer innings, and Parra missed the entire season. These injuries, though, were to three relief pitchers and didn’t end up hampering the team all that much — especially considering the fact that the Brewers finished first in their division that year.

What some, however, might find most surprising is that in 2013, 2012, 2007, and 2004, position players had more injuries than pitchers. While this is probably not the norm, this can, and does, happen. In 2013, for example, the Yankees pitchers only missed 350 days, while their position players missed 1170 days due to injury, according to Jeff Zimmerman. In that same article, he also shows the top-ten differences in days missed between position players and pitchers from the data he recorded.

CONCLUSION

Obviously, what I’ve done here isn’t a scientific study. I have mostly provided data, in an effort to give us a better sense of which Brewers players can be labeled as injury-prone, although the argument is mostly anecdotal. I would also be interested in seeing how this data relates to the rest of the league. The Brewers, for example, are well-known for having far fewer Tommy John surgeries than other teams in the majors. Today, though, I wasn’t able to provide that. Accumulating this type of information takes a lot of time, so providing better context will have to wait for a later date.

What I hope this has done is not necessarily answer all questions, but also raise new ones for both Brewers fans and general baseball fans.