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THE BASEBALL HISTORY COMES ALIVE BLOG
Please note: As we compose new blog entries, we will now send each one out to all our subscribers as we post them. Here’s a link to see the entire Blog Archives -GL
New Blog Topic: STRIKEOUTS CONTINUE TO SKYROCKET
It’s really an open secret, one that Major League Baseball seems to ignore. But for how long? Many veteran sportswriters are calling attention to it more often than ever with the bottom line being that the analytics-driven strikeout or home run game is doing irreparable damage to baseball. I’ve mentioned it in this space already and last Sunday I read a column by veteran sportswriter Bill Madden in the New York Daily News that once again brought home the extent to which the increasing number of strikeouts is affecting the game.
Anyone taking a close look at the long history of the game can see that for many years the strikeout was considered a mark of failure. Players simply hated to take that slow walk back to the dugout. Perhaps the epitome of the guy who most hated to fan was Joe Sewell, a Hall of Famer who played from 1920 to 1933. In 8,333 plate appearances, Sewell struck out just 114 times, never more than 20 times in a season In two separate seasons, he whiffed just four times, in 699 and 672 plate appearances. Totally amazing.
[see featured photo above of HOFer Joe Sewell]
Other great Hall of Famers from earlier days also hated to strikeout. The great Babe Ruth did fan on 1,330 occasions, but never more than 93 times in a season. Lou Gehrig struck out just 790 times, Ted Williams 709, Stan Musial 696, and Joe
DiMaggio only 369 times while hitting 361 home runs. None of them fanned more than 100 times in a season. The best pure hitter of recent vintage, Tony Gwynn, struck out only 434 times in 10,232 plate appearance, never more than 40 times in a season. These stats simply represent a point of reference.
Today, it’s completely different. In 2018, baseball reached an ignominious milestone. It was the first year in which there were more strikeouts league-wide (41,207) than hits (41,018). The difference grew in 2019 with almost 800 more strikeouts than hits, and in the pandemic shortened season of 2020, there were an incredible 1,147 more K’s than safeties.
Bill Madden pointed that as of Friday, April 23, less than a month into the current season, there were already 4,973 strikeouts throughout baseball with just 4,191 hits. To make the number even clearer, there was just one team, the Boston Red Sox, with more hits than strikeouts. And some of the numbers were daunting. A three-game series between the Yankees and Tampa Bay Rays produced 78 total strikeouts, while in a seven-inning game of a doubleheader between the Mets and Colorado Rockies, 17 of the Rockies 21 outs came via the strikeout. Real fun game to watch.
One more interesting stat. There are just two players currently in the Hall of Fame who have more strikeouts than hits – sluggers Jim Thome and Reggie Jackson. In fact, Mr. October is the all-time leader with 2,597 whiffs, nearly twice as many as Babe Ruth. Reggie fanned more than 100 times in 18 of his 21 big league seasons. He still managed 2,584 hits. He also hit 563 home runs and is remembered for his clutch performances in the World Series. But had he only fanned half that many times his lifetime batting average would have been much higher than .262.
Unfortunately, many of today’s young stars are following Reggie’s lead, hitting home runs but striking out in larger numbers than their total hits. And by all indications, the pattern will continue as long as players continue to swing for home runs without anyone caring how many times they strikeout. Many of the young general managers and computer whizzes in their analytics departments who are running the game today never saw baseball played with all its previous strategies, didn’t see how the game could be exciting with bunts, hit-and-run plays, long rallies, stolen bases, and squeeze plays. Today it just seems to be “keep swinging, get that launch angle right so you can put the ball in the air and hit it over the fence. And if you strike out while trying to do that, so be it.”
To many of us, today’s game has become boring, a description echoed by Boston’s manager Alex Cora when he watched the game during his year-long suspension. And he’s been joined by many others, including former players, veteran writers, and longtime fans. Baseball’s need for more action, i.e., more balls in play, isn’t going to happen if the current trend continues.
Bill Madden, in his column, had an insightful quote from former manager Buck Showalter. Said Showalter, “Years ago, guys striking out 150 or more times didn’t stay on their clubs long, but today players are learning you can make more money striking out a ton of times as long as you hit homers. There’s no shame in striking out anymore. Until players get penalized for striking out, not putting the ball in play with a runner on third and two outs, the game will continue as it’s going.” Right now, there’s no indication that’s going to happen.
And, no, I’m not forgetting the pitchers. Obviously, today’s game is loaded with power arms throwing high heat, guys who might accurately be labeled strikeout pitchers. And, yes, there have been great strikeout pitchers in the past when everyone didn’t strike out so often, guys like Nolan Ryan and Randy Johnson, Bob Gibson and Tom Seaver. But they were starters who more often than not went the distance. Today there’s a parade of hard-throwing relievers coming into games one after another, with most throwing gas. But knowing this, isn’t it up to the hitters to adjust, shorten their swings, and be more concerned with just making contact instead of always trying to hit it out? It would certainly make for a more interesting game.
I’ve said this before and maybe it bears repeating now. The first pitcher to record 3,000 strikeouts was Walter Johnson, who pitched from 1907 to 1927, with 12
years of his career in the Dead Ball Era when no one tried to hit home runs. Johnson fanned 3,509 hitters during his great Hall of Fame career. Today, the Big Train ranks just ninth on the all-time strikeout list and, in the future, may well move further down the list. But considering the way the game was played then as opposed to how it’s played now, it may be accurate to say that Walter Johnson was the greatest strikeout pitchers of all time.
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