Miscellaneous items of interest as the Phillies prepare for the postseason...
Hitting
The Phillies' offense has not been the force it was in 2008-2009, and far below 2007. But we should be careful not to overstate it -- they have still scored runs at the 3rd highest rate in the NL, behind only Cincinnati and Colorado.
They also have the 3rd highest scoring in road games, behind Cincinnati and Milwaukee.
R/G | Phils | NL | % | rank |
2007 | 5.51 | 4.71 | 117% | 1 |
2008 | 4.93 | 4.54 | 109% | 2 |
2009 | 5.06 | 4.43 | 114% | 1 |
2010 | 4.70 | 4.34 | 108% | 3 |
The Phillies have the 2nd lowest strikeout rate in the NL, behind only St. Louis, Last year they had the 6th lowest K rate.
Stealing
Since July 1st, the Phils lead the NL in these categories (with the #2 team):
- Stolen Bases: 67 ... 53 (Col)
- Success Rate: 83% ... 77% (Hou)
- Stolen Base attempts: 81 ... 78 (Mets)
Hot and Cold
5 of the 8 regulars have an OPS over .900 in September:
Utley .967
Howard .977
Werth .920
Ibanez .962
Ruiz .925
On the other hand,
Rollins has a .626 OPS since June 22
Polanco has a .650 OPS since August 1
Victorino has a .712 OPS since July 9 (although .824 in September)
Bring on the lefties!
The Phillies have scored more (in the entire game) when the opposing starter is a lefty:
RHP Starter... 4.63 runs per game
LHP Starter... 4.85
Pitching
ERA | Phils | NL | ERA+ | rank |
2007 | 4.73 | 4.43 | 97 | 13 |
2008 | 3.88 | 4.29 | 113 | 4 |
2009 | 4.16 | 4.19 | 101 | 6 |
2010 | 3.67 | 4.04 | 111 | 5 |
The Phillies have the 5th best ERA in the NL, but they do lead in these categories (with #2 team):
- WHIP: 1.25 ... 1.26 (SD, Atl)
- K/BB: 2.89 ... 2.49 (SD)
- Walks: 399 ... 464 (StL)
- Shutouts: 20 .. 19 (Mets, SD)
They're also 2nd in Quality Starts (93) behind SF (94).
Roy Halladay has dominated the NL East: 14-1, 1.61 ERA, 0.84 WHIP
Roy Oswalt's ERA with the Phillies is now down to 1.65 in 12 starts (1.31 after his 1st start)
Phillies' starters NL rank (out of 45 qualifiers)
ERA | FIP | xFIP | SIERA | WHIP | |||||
Halladay | 3 | 3 | 1 | 1 | 2 | ||||
Oswalt | 5 | 11 | 8 | 7 | 1 | ||||
Hamels | 14 | 20 | 7 | 6 | 15 | ||||
Blanton | 41 | 35 | 23 | 27 | 38 | ||||
Kendrick | 42 | 43 | 43 | 45 | 31 |
Joe Blanton's xFIP is better than that of: Tommy Hanson, Jonathan Sanchez, Clayton Richard, and Matt Cain
Odds and Ends
Records by Division
As expected, the East dominates the AL. In the NL, the East is slightly ahead of the West, with the Central far behind.
AL | East | .531 |
Central | .494 | |
West | .481 | |
NL | East | .513 |
Central | .473 | |
West | .509 |
In case you haven't seen this, the Phillies tied the record earlier this month for knocking out pitchers in consecutive games.
Not stat-oriented, but I remember Eric Show, and I didn't know much about him beyond the John Birch connection -- his story.