Just before the first pitch is thrown, Ryan Lefebvre introduces Royals starter Jeremy Guthrie by saying that “He’s been hot lately, with five wins in his last six starts, including a win over Minnesota back on the 17th at Target Field.” An on-screen graphic notes that the right-hander’s ERA over that stretch is 3.57, while also listing his full-season ERA as 4.32. Guthrie has been getting wins, but to say he’s been hot coming into this start is misleading – only three of those last six starts have been quality starts. As for that win over the Twins on the road two weeks ago, Guthrie gave up a pair of homers as he allowed four runs in seven innings – the Royals won that game, 12-6. That’s not hot pitching.
“That’s right,” analyst Rex Hudler says. “He’s won three straight versus the Twins. So, he’s got a little confidence going in. Any pitcher would that’s got a defense behind him like Guthrie does. He’s solid with his pitches, been able to hit his spots, and that’s been the key. He’s got four nice pitches he’ll use.”
A good thing to do, in the service of viewers who might just be catching on to this first-place Royals team, would be to name Guthrie’s four pitches. The fact that Guthrie has won three straight starts against the Twins (saying “versus” out loud, outside the context of quoting a Supreme Court case, is a little bit of an “I want to sound smart” move) is barely relevant. The other two starts, aside from the one on August 17, were July 31 and August 5 of last year. Here is a complete list of Twins players who were in the starting lineup for both the July 31, 2013 game and the August 28, 2014 game: Trevor Plouffe.
If Guthrie is gaining confidence from pitching to people who are dressed in shirts that say “Minnesota,” that’s cool, but it’s about as useful as saying that Guthrie historically struggles when Angelina Jolie is on the cover of People magazine.
After a single by Brian Dozier and a double by Kurt Suzuki, the Twins open the scoring on a groundout by Kennys Vargas, who it was noted before the at-bat was 2-for-3 in his career against Guthrie – those career numbers all coming in that game two weeks ago, because Vargas’ career is less than a month old. A graphic comes on the screen noting that Guthrie has allowed 17 runs in the first inning this season.
There is a silent moment on the air.
“A lot of runs given up by Jeremy Guthrie in the first inning,” Hudler says. “But, however, he has a real good ability to settle down after that and start hitting his spots. At least, that’s what he’s shown.”
“And, to that point, all you have to do is go back to Guthrie’s last start,” Lefebvre says. “At Texas, on Saturday, he gave up a home run on his first pitch of the night. Shin-Soo Choo went deep, and then Guthrie retired the next 12.”
Oswaldo Arcia’s infield hit drives in the Twins’ second run before Plouffe flies out to leave Guthrie’s ERA in the first inning at 6.00 for the season. There are plenty of pitchers who struggle in the first inning. If they didn’t settle down, they wouldn’t stay in the major leagues for very long.
This is an issue that Guthrie has. There’s no need to dress it up.
Oh, and here’s Hudler’s analysis after Arcia’s infield hit: “Royals are saying, ‘You know what? Who cares? We gotta score to win anyway. Got ‘em right where we want ‘em.’”
Coming into this game, the Royals are 50-19 when scoring first, and 24-39 when their opponents score first.
OUT OF POSITION
The Royals quickly show that they are indeed a resilient bunch, or that Minnesota left-hander Tommy Milone is not very good. One or the other. After Alcides Escobar steals second base, with Alex Gordon at the plate, it gives Lefebvre the chance to present a statistic.
“Alex is hitting .281 overall, but you put a runner in scoring position, and you can add about 60 points to his average,” the play-by-play man says. “He’s one of the best in the league.”
It’s true that Gordon ranks seventh in the American League in batting average with runners in scoring position, among players with at least 50 plate appearances in those situations. It’s also true that exactly one hitter from last year’s top 10 in that category is in this year’s top 10: Cleveland outfielder Michael Brantley.
Here are Gordon’s year-by-year batting averages with runners in scoring position: .250, .222, .173, .232, .284, .273, .287, .343. For his career, he’s at .267, just under his .270 cumulative batting average. Perhaps you’re thinking that this just mirrors Gordon’s career, and that maybe learning to hit in clutch situations has been part of his rise to stardom, finally fulfilling his potential over the past couple of seasons.
Think again. George Brett debuted with the Royals with a cup of coffee in 1973, then played 20 full seasons with Kansas City, establishing himself as one of the greatest hitters of all time, with batting titles in three different decades. In those 20 full seasons, Brett had a higher batting average with runners in scoring position than his full-season average 10 times, and a lower batting average with runners in scoring position than his full-season average 10 times.
A lot of broadcasts overhype hitters’ numbers with runners in scoring position. Lefebvre says it so authoritatively, though, that it can’t just be brushed aside as noting how somebody has performed under specific circumstances. He’s using it as proof of Gordon’s superiority.
“Next pitch will be Milone’s 11th,” Hudler says as Gordon’s at-bat goes on. “It took Guthrie just 11 pitches to go through six hitters that first inning. Now, they did capitalize, they scored two runs – but Alex still getting some pitches on him.”
Yes, Guthrie needed only 11 pitches in the first inning because the Twins were busy smacking the ball around the park.
“That’s a clutch number,” Hudler continues as a graphic showing the league leaders in average with runners in scoring position is posted. “Especially the way he’s finishing the season – strong.”
“Annnd, he will add to that average!” Lefebvre calls as Gordon ropes a single into right field, followed by a significant silence as Escobar crosses the plate. “That’s 60 RBIs for Alex, three in this series. And the Royals immediately get a run back.”
This moment probably will not serve as the educational about the vagaries of hitting with runners in scoring position that is so sorely needed.
Neither the actual score nor the name of the player scoring the run is given. This is a failure in the basic component of Lefebvre’s role of providing play-by-play information.
WHERE’S YOUR MIND?
As the Royals continue batting in the bottom of the first, Lefebvre talks about how Milone had been successful against the Royals in first four career starts against them, but then Kansas City scored six runs against him the last time they met, and now, including that start, “12 of the last 13 have reached, going back to that huge inning in the rain on August 17.”
Hudler: “Milone has the stuff. But with those numbers, and the way the Royals are playing, I think their offense is in his mind.”
The camera cuts to Twins manager Ron Gardenhire, who takes a glance at the sunflower seeds in his hands before returning his gaze to the field.
“Now, Gardenhire, his mind’s on those sunflower seeds, and he’s just watching. But the pitcher’s the one who has the pitcher on him. And with Salvador Perez and (Josh) Willingham coming up, you’ve got to look up. Don’t hit into a double play. Stay off of that ball on the ground, if it’s low.”
This is some rah-rah nonsense from Hudler, and the shot at Gardenhire is unwarranted. He wasn’t doing anything unusual with the sunflower seeds, and it’s not like he looked away from the field for more than a second. Ah, whatever, best to just let it go.
“When your mind is on sunflower seeds, what kind of things are you thinking about?” Lefebvre says.
Dammit. Don’t the Royals have a rally going here with the heart of the order batting?
“Which one’s the biggest one, which one is gonna be the one that’s not –” Hudler says.
“The saltiest one?” Lefebvre interjects.
“—yeah, that’s not the rotten one,” Hudler continues.
The camera goes back to Gardenhire. He’s looking at the sunflower seeds in his hand again – this is some good work in the truck to keep catching him at that moment – then quickly goes back to looking at the field.
“Look at him,” Hudler says. “He’s an expert. He’s been chewing seeds his whole career.”
All of this nonsense is happening with the announcers yet to give the standard look at the Twins’ defensive alignment. That finally happens after Milone’s 20th pitch, and the graphic highlights Dozier for having started the third-most games this year among American League second basemen.
So, the camera goes to Dozier… and he’s taking care of some gentlemanly issues. After he tugs at his cup, he takes off his glove so that he can tug at the straps on his athletic supporter and get comfortable for the next play.
“He’s having a bit of a wardrobe malfunction,” Lefebvre says, breaching one of the golden rules of baseball broadcasting: DON’T POINT OUT HOW OFTEN BALLPLAYERS (AND SOMETIMES MANAGERS) GET HANDSY IN THE CROTCHULAR AREA. It’s all the time, because in the 140-year history of jockstraps, not a single one has ever stayed in place for more than 20 minutes at a time. Why managers? Maybe it’s just a muscle memory thing from their playing days, but Joe Torre spent half the Yankees’ dynasty sitting in the dugout with his hands down his pants and nobody ever said a word about the Al Bundy act.
Hudler’s a former player. He’ll know better than to continue this breach of baseball etiquette.
“There are always adjustments during the course of a game,” Hudler says.
Perez singles home Gordon. “Alex to third, Alex to the plate,” Lefebvre says as Gordon scores to tie the game. The first-name basis thing is grating.
FROM HOMERS TO HOMER
We’ve seen that Lefebvre’s basic play-by-play is lacking in quality, that Hudler’s analysis both misses the mark on the basics and wanders into off-topic nonsense at lousy times, and that the two feed into each other’s weaknesses.
How do they handle a big moment, a game-tying home run in the seventh inning? Gordon provides that, blasting off against Ryan Pressly to make it 5-5.
“Right-center field…” Lefebvre calls. “That’s deep – and – GONE!”
Lefebvre lets the crowd noise carry Gordon around the bases, which is a good choice that a good broadcaster makes before providing some more details, like “Gordon takes Pressly deep, and it’s 5-5!”
Instead, Hudler bursts forth with a series of words that come into his brain, some in complete sentences, some not.
“Gordonator does it again!” Hudler says. “2-and-0 pitch. Pressly tried to sneak a piece of cheese by Gordon. Ties it up. One swing. Right down the middle. Alex, good even swing. Smooth. Hit it to a deep part of the yard. Thirty-one come-from-behind wins by the Royals this year, and we’ve seen some of them just on this brief homestand. Late in games.”
At least Hudler mentioned that the game was now tied. Of course, if he is aware of the fact that the game is now tied, why is he talking about how many come-from-behind wins Kansas City has, other than to showcase that he is rooting for that to happen?
It does not happen. Bruce Chen comes in to pitch the 10th inning for the Royals, and loads the bases by giving up a triple, an intentional walk, and an unintentional walk with one out.
“We’ll see how Bruce navigates through this mess,” Lefebvre says. “But oftentimes, this is when Bruce Chen is at his best, when the other team thinks that they have him on the ropes.”
“Just got to finesse a way,” Hudler says. “Find a way. Infielders at double play depth. Bruce has induced four ground ball double plays this year in his short outings. He gets a lot of pop-ups from right-handers. With that off-speed pitch, they get out in front, and get frustrated that the bat head lags behind.”
While Lefebvre is technically right about Chen being “at his best when he’s on the ropes” this year, it’s only on a technicality, as opponents hit .333 against him with runners in scoring position, compared to .343 with the bases empty. He has a 6.46 ERA coming into this game, and it will be 7.45 in a matter of minutes. Chen is always on the ropes.
Now, about those four double plays that Chen has induced. That’s in 50 opponent plate appearances to this point with a runner on first base and less than two outs, including one bases loaded situation. That’s an 8% double play rate, while the major league average is 10.7%. Exactly what Hudler is talking about when it comes to right-handed hitters is a complete mystery – they have a .968 OPS against him this year, compared to .770 for lefty hitters. Jose Abreu leads the majors this year with a .969 OPS, so basically, when Chen is on the mound, every right-handed batter he faces is transformed into the best hitter in baseball. To be fair, it probably has been very frustrating for the right-handed batters who have actually made outs against Chen this year, as they have trudged back to the dugout saying, “How the heck did I not get a hit against Bruce Chen?”
Eduardo Nunez singles home one run. Jordan Schafer, a left-handed batter, brings home another two runs on the very next pitch with another single.
The Twins get three more runs. The Royals, mercifully, do not mount a comeback and extend this broadcast.
RANKINGS SO FAR
- Los Angeles-NL (Scully, Sportsnet LA) 2. San Francisco (Kuiper/Krukow, CSN Bay Area) 3. Chicago-NL (Kasper/Deshaies, CSN Chicago) 4. Oakland (Kuiper/Fosse, CSN California) 5. Arizona (Berthiaume/Brenly, FS Arizona) 6. New York-AL (Singleton/Cone, YES) 7. Tampa Bay (Staats/Anderson, Sun Sports) 8. Boston (Orsillo/Remy, NESN) 9. Los Angeles-AL (Rojas/Gubicza, FS West) 10. Seattle (Sims/Blowers, ROOT) 11. Cleveland (Underwood/Manning, SportsTime Ohio) 12. Chicago-AL (Harrelson/Stone, CSN Chicago) 13. Detroit (Impemba/Allen, FS Detroit) 14. Pittsburgh (Brown/Blass, ROOT) 15. Houston (Brown/Ashby, CSN Houston) 16. Colorado (Goodman/Huson, ROOT) 17. Atlanta (Caray/Simpson, SportSouth) 18. Toronto (Martinez/Tabler, Sportsnet) 19. New York-AL (Kay/Cone, YES) 20. St. Louis (McLaughlin/Hrabosky, FS Midwest) 21. Cincinnati (Grande/Welsh, FS Ohio) 22. Washington (Carpenter/Santangelo, MASN) 23. Kansas City (Lefebvre/Hudler, FS Kansas City) 24. Minnesota (Bremer/Morris, FS North)
