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chris almighty

thanks to everyone who has responded so far to friday's post about card'l love and affection. i don't know if cardinal fans are the "best" or if we have a "special" bond with our team, one unlike any other in fandom; i don't really care about that. i just like reading the stories, all of which have been really good so far. if you haven't had a chance yet, check out the posts that are up there and add your own.

we can't let the fallout from reggie's busted wheel distract us entirely from another suffocating mound performance by carp yesterday. how good is this guy? baseball analysts notes today that carpenter is excelling in not just one but two aspects of successful pitching: strikeouts and groundouts. get lots of either one, and you're usually a very good pitcher. good lots of both, and you're a rare bird indeed. per BA: "Carpenter is unique in averaging one strikeout per inning (with some rounding help) combined with a groundball/flyball ratio exceeding 2.00. . . . Brandon Webb in 2003 and Kevin Brown in 2000 were the only pitchers who came close to striking out one batter per inning while getting two times as many groundballs as flyballs."

about a month ago i noted with admiration that carpenter had recorded zeroes in 47 of his previous 52 innings. little did i know he was just getting warmed up; in his four starts since then he has yielded just 1 run in 34.2 innings. so that's 86 innings pitched, 80 zeroes on the scoreboard. he's getting into gibson '68 territory. at his best in that famous year, hoot threw 8 shutouts in a span of 10 starts and only allowed 1 run in the other two games -- 88 zeroes in 90 innings, an era of 0.20. let's put carp's last 10 starts up against gibson's great 10-start run and, just for fun, the best 10-start segment from john tudor's seminal 1985 season. gibson data from retrosheet; tudor and carp, the day-by-day database:

ip h r er bb so cg sho w-l era
gibson 68 90 51 2 2 12 85 10 8 10-0 0.20
tudor 85 83 56 9 9 9 52 6 5 9-1 0.98
carpenter 05 78.2 48 9 9 14 82 3 3 8-2 1.03

let's carve it up another way. carp has yielded just 2 runs in his last six starts, covering 50.2 innings pitched (0.36 era). what was gibson's best six-start segment? tudor's? how does carp's run stack up against drysdale and hershiser's 50-plus-inning shutout skeins?

ip h r er bb so cg sho w-l era
hershiser 88 55 30 0 0 9 34 5 5 5-0 0.00
drysdale 68 54 27 0 0 9 42 6 6 6-0 0.00
gibson 68 54 30 1 1 7 39 6 5 6-0 0.16
carpenter 05 50.2 20 2 2 7 54 3 3 6-0 0.36
tudor 85 51.1 33 5 5 6 29 4 3 6-0 0.88

look at carp's hits allowed -- just 20 in his last 50 innings pitched. not even gibson managed that. you could make a strong case that carp's six-start line is the most dominant on this chart -- a lot fewer hits, a lot more strikeouts than anyone else. he has allowed a full hit per 9 innings less than these other guys ---- a hit a game stingier than the stingiest pitcher-months of the last half-century.

so yeah, we're getting into some historic territory with this run.

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Didn't
Maddux break Bulldog's record a few years back?

Carpenter has been amazingly dominant over this stretch, I wonder how many wins he can rack up, since unlike Jon Garland his hot streak is coming mid season rather than at the beginning.

by Marc Normandin on Jul 18, 2005 12:00 PM EDT reply actions   0 recs

Eras
Also, the offense in this era is greater than in either Gibson/Drysdale's or Hershiser/Tudor's.

This is the first time in my fandom that I assume a pitcher on our side will not just win the game, but shut out the opposition. It's a lot of fun.

by levistahl on Jul 18, 2005 12:19 PM EDT reply actions   0 recs

that's a damn good
point --- thanks for adding that.

think houston has seen enough of chris carpenter this year? he has faced them three times: 24 innings, 15 hits, 2 walks, 1 run.

by lboros on Jul 18, 2005 12:34 PM EDT up reply actions   0 recs

I saw Gibby's
'68 season, and what Carp has done in the last month and a half is eerily similar. I agree with levistahl; it sure is fun watching him pitch.

by cardsrul on Jul 18, 2005 12:22 PM EDT reply actions   0 recs

let's hope
Carp continues to be like '68 Gibby in all but one game.

by rockin redbird on Jul 18, 2005 3:00 PM EDT up reply actions   0 recs

i think orel
still has the record . . . . anybody know for sure?

among the many fun things about this carpenter stretch has been his meanness. last month he gave up a meaningless 9th-inn homer with a 7-run lead; it broke up a shutout, and carp was so pissed he barked at the hitter (felipe lopez i think) as he rounded the bags. personally i like to see that kind of cruelty; it's what you need to get thru the postseason.

but that's a long way off, and you wonder how sharp carp will be then. nobody can pitch like this indefinitely

by lboros on Jul 18, 2005 12:23 PM EDT reply actions   0 recs

Hershiser
Yep, he's still got the record at 59.

Didn't they mention Thompson had a shot at breaking it in the minors last year?

by mll2k3 on Jul 18, 2005 1:37 PM EDT reply actions   0 recs

Thompson's record ...
... is 57 2/3 innings, which for practical purposes is the minor league record.
matty fred is a weblog, too!

by matty fred on Jul 18, 2005 2:12 PM EDT up reply actions   0 recs

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