Ray’s Ramblings: Who Am I?

Let’s just give right in. Can you guess who the players are?

QUESTIONS

1 – I led baseball last year in batting average (.338) and was third in OBP (.440).

2 – I was third in baseball last season with a 1.000 OPS.

3 – I led baseball with 45 doubles last season.

4 – I led baseball in triples last season with 15.

5 – I’ve scored 94 runs in two of the last three seasons only missing out when I appeared in just 123 games in 2014.

6 – I’ve scored 99 runs in each of the last three seasons.

7 – I led baseball last season with a .387 BABIP.

8 – I led baseball last year with 16 bunt hits.

9 – No player in baseball pulled the ball more than I did with a 60.2 percent pull rate in 2015.

10 – I led baseball with a 39.0 percent opposite field mark on batted balls in 2015.

11 – No one really talks about me but I was 10^th in baseball in ERA last year. I even switched teams this offseason.

12 – I was 16^th in baseball in Fielding Independent Pitching in 2015.

13 – I led baseball last season with a 1.11 BB/9 mark.

14 – I had the worst run support in baseball last season at 2.54 runs per nine innings.

15 – I was fifth in baseball last season with 2,242 strikes thrown.

16 – I was second in baseball in pitches pulled by batters at 46.8 percent behind only CC Sabathia (47.5).

17 – I led baseball last season in curve balls thrown at 30.9 percent of all my pitches.

18 – I had the second most effective change up in baseball last season behind only Zack Greinke.

19 – I was the only pitcher in baseball who posted a swinging strike rate of over 40 percent on pitches outside the strike zone.

20 – I was fourth in baseball with a 68.4 percent strike rate and I changed teams this offseason.

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ANSWERS

1 – Miguel Cabrera was at .338 in average and .440 in OBP, marks that bettered his career average of .321 and his career OBP of .399. So much for him slowing down.

2 – Joey Votto was third in OPS with a mark above his .957 career mark. The 1.000 rate he posted was the third time in his career that he’s been above 1.000.

3 – Michael Brantley hit 45 doubles last season, his second straight season with a mark of 45.

4 – Eddie Rosario led baseball last season with 15 triples. Not bad for a rookie. His triple total matched his walk total of 15 that led him to a mere .289 OBP for the Twins.

5 – Shin-soo Choo scored 107 times in 2013 and 94 times in 2015. He gets on base, and he scores runs. Tons of them.

6 – Two men have scored 99 runs each of the last three seasons. Mike Trout is pretty obvious, but do you know who the other one is? Try the Cardinals’ Matt Carpenter.

7 – Odubel Herrera led baseball in BABIP last season with that unsustainable rate of .387. That number is going to crater and with it his batting average will dip unless his overall game improves.

8 – Only two men in baseball had double-digit bunt hits last season: Erick Aybar had 11, Dee Gordon 16. Though Dee led baseball with 16 last season that’s actually four less than the 20 bunt hits he had in 2014.

9 – Brian Dozier led baseball with a 60.2 percent pull rate. The only other player above 55 percent was Chris Davis (56.0). That was a career-high mark for Dozier who posted a mark of 54 percent in 2014.

10 – DJ LeMahieu pushed more batted balls to the opposite field than any other bat in baseball. DJL better his career mark of 34.5 percent last season on his way to a .362 BABIP and .301 batting average.

11 – John Lackey was 10^th in the game with a 2.77 ERA better than Max Scherzer (2.79), Madison Bumgarner (2.93) and Shelby Miller (3.02).

12 – Gio Gonzalez was 16^th in FIP (3.05) which was better than Matt Harvey (3.05), Sonny Gray (3.45) and Cole Hamels (3.47). Maybe you shouldn’t give up on GG after all.

13 – Bartolo Colon was the leader in walk rate last season at 1.11 as he walked 24 batters all season (194.2) innings. He made 31 starts and 33 appearances last season.

14 – Shelby Miller was at the top, of the worst, in terms of run support at 2.54 runs per nine innings. No other pitcher in baseball was below 3.10. Miller went a mere 6-17 last year with the Braves. Luckily he’s with the D’backs this season.

15 – Jeff Samardzija threw 2,242 strikes last season trailing only Max Scherzer (2,380), David Price (2,322), Clayton Kershaw (2,303) and Chris Sale (2,255). JS walked a mere 2.06 batters per nine innings last season.

16 – Sabathia at the top of the pull list makes sense, but Yordano Ventura second at 46.8 percent? That’s what happens when you throw your heater 60 percent of the time and batters need to ratchet up their swing to catch up to your 96 mph heat.

17 – Jose Quintana threw more curves, as a percentage, than any hurler in baseball at 30.9 percent. Good thing he did too as according to Fangraphs his curveball was the fourth most effective in baseball in terms of runs above average.

18 – Danny Salazar produced the most runs above average with his changeup of any pitcher in the American League last season behind only Zack Greinke in all of baseball.

19 – Carlos Carrasco led all hurlers with a 40.1 percent swing rate on pitches outside the strike zone. Jacob deGrom led the National League at 36.5 percent whereas Carrasco’s teammate, Corey Kluber, was fourth at 36.4 percent.

20 – Wei-Yin Chen was fourth in baseball with a 68.4 percent first strike rate better than Clayton Kershaw (68.2) and behind only Max Scherzer (71.3), John Lackey (70.8) and Jose Quintana (69.3).

Ray Flowers can be heard Monday through Friday, 7 PM EDT and Friday on SiriusXM Fantasy Sports Radio (Sirius 210, XM 87). You can also hear Ray Sunday nights at 6 PM on the channel talking fantasy sports. Follow Ray’s work at Fantasy Alarm and on Twitter (@baseballguys).