PHILADELPHIA–Phillies starter Aaron Nola should be an All-Star this year, but on Tuesday night, the Giants helped the right-hander look like a Cy Young contender.
Nola induced 26 swings and misses on 109 pitches, the second-most whiffs generated by any pitcher in a single game this season. His curveball darted out of the zone and his changeup complemented a pair of fastballs he commanded on either side of the plate, so it wasn’t a surprise that Nola established a new career-high with 12 strikeouts.
One element of Nola’s performance that might raise concerns for the Giants is that he picked up his final strikeout in the sixth inning, meaning San Francisco did little to test the Phillies’ defense early in a game decided by two runs.
It’s not the first time an opposing starter has carved up Giants hitters and cruised to a win this year, a trend that may prove troublesome if it continues throughout the season.
Through 37 games, the Giants have already struck out at least 10 times in 18 contests and posted a 6-12 record in those games.
After Nola exited Tuesday’s game, three Phillies relievers combined for five more strikeouts as the Giants ended a nine-inning game with 17 punchouts for the second time this season. Prior to 2018, the Giants had only struck out 17 times once in a nine-inning game and that was an 18-strikeout day against Dodgers left-hander Sandy Koufax on August 31, 1959.
Between 1960 and 2017, the Giants had never struck out more than 16 times in a nine-inning game. In the past three weeks, they’ve done so twice.
Contact is down around baseball as the so-called “launch angle revolution” has inspired players to swing for the fences, but teams that strike out more than others aren’t necessarily doing themselves any favors.
The club with the lowest strikeout rate in the Major Leagues last season was the Houston Astros, and they won the World Series. But was their ability to put the ball in play a predictive measurement for their overall success?
The 2016 champions, the Chicago Cubs, ended the regular season with the eighth-worst strikeout rate of any team, so striking out at a high clip isn’t guaranteed to prevent success.
On the opposite side of the equation, the 2018 Kansas City Royals currently lead the league with the fewest strikeouts per nine innings this season, but they’re already 12 games under .500.
Over the course of a season, a team is bound to face pitchers who earn their paychecks because they miss bats with such regularity, but the Giants have already matched up against several of the league’s strikeout leaders.
Nationals starter Max Scherzer leads all of baseball with 13.94 strikeouts per nine innings and he racked up 17 swings and misses and 10 strikeouts in a 15-2 win over the Giants. D’Backs left-hander Patrick Corbin, who ranks second in the National League in strikeouts per nine innings, has faced the Giants twice and picked up 17 strikeouts over 14 and 1/3 innings.
Angels left-hander Garrett Richards hasn’t thrown enough innings to qualify for the leaderboard, but his 11.8 strikeouts per nine innings would rank fourth among all Major League pitchers. His outing against the Giants padded his total, as he punched out 11 San Francisco hitters in the club’s first 17-strikeout game of the year.
Is a high strikeout rate destined to doom the Giants over the course of a 162-game season? The data available suggests it’s difficult to draw any significant conclusions, but whiffing so frequently probably won’t crush the Giants’ bid to contend.
The New York Yankees have won 17 of their last 18 games and strike out at a nearly equivalent rate to the Giants. Of course, the Yankees have hit a Major League-best 51 home runs, but they’re not the only team that’s succeeding despite their swings and misses.
The Phillies are on the brink of surpassing the Braves for the National League East lead and their 9.83 strikeouts per nine innings is the third-worst rate in baseball. The first-place team in the National League West, the Arizona Diamondbacks, are also striking out more often than the Giants, and they don’t rank among the top half of baseball in total homers.
With six weeks of the regular season in the books, it’s too soon to say if a Giants team that posted the sixth-best strikeout rate in baseball in a 98-loss season will be held back by having the league’s eighth-worst strikeout rate to date.
Instead, it might be better to hold off from big-picture conclusions and evaluate strikeout rates on a micro level.
Center fielder Austin Jackson’s strikeout rate is up 13 percentage points this season compared to his career rate of 23 percent. Jackson has struck out in 17 of his 29 at-bats against right-handed pitchers, and the Giants know Jackson is best served by playing in favorable matchups against lefties.
If left fielder Mac Williamson returns from the disabled list and picks up where he left off, the Giants won’t need to use Jackson against right-handed pitchers. But with just four healthy outfielders on the roster and a limited amount of options for manager Bruce Bochy to turn to, Jackson has had to take more at-bats against righties.
“Right-handers, he’s had his struggles,” Bochy said. “He’ll try to get a little more contact here and put the ball in play, but in the early go he just hasn’t gotten on track.”
Shortstop Brandon Crawford and third baseman Evan Longoria are the two regular starters whose strikeout rates have spiked at least five percentage points above their career averages this season, but both players struggled through tough stretches at the beginning of the year.
“We said the same thing about Crawford a week ago and you see how he’s picked it up,” Bochy said. “It’s going to take a good game or two and (Jackson) will get rolling.”
Thanks to a late April surge, Longoria cut down his strikeout totals and raised his batting average. During the first week of May, Crawford did the same. Though a higher strikeout rate for either player shouldn’t dramatically alter the Giants’ ability to drive in runs, the club might actually benefit if both players attempt to lift the ball in the air more often.
Longoria leads the Giants in extra base hits and big swings from Crawford have the potential to extend big innings because he usually hits in the sixth slot or lower in the Giants order.
Ultimately, the Giants have posted a better record when they don’t strike out so frequently, but on some days, they’re bound to run into All-Star candidates like Scherzer, Corbin and Nola. Those are games they’re more likely to lose anyway, so perhaps it’s too soon to evaluate how an increased strikeout rate may be hurting the Giants’ chances.
And perhaps Nola will contend for that Cy Young Award after all.