Johan Santana’s Strikeouts
Johan Santana’s career credentials are unquestioned. The Venezuelan southpaw, a Rule V gem who won two Cy Young Awards with the Twins, has a 3.39 FIP in the majors. He’s got over a K per inning during his career, and he topped the seven WAR mark each season from 2004-2006. Santana was “merely” a four-to-five win pitcher in 2007-2008, before elbow surgery to remove bone chips ended his ’09 season early and caused him to post 2.8 WAR.
On the surface, the 31-year-old’s 2010 season looks like vintage Santana — in 78.1 innings, he’s got a 2.76 ERA. But the process behind those results isn’t as impressive.
While the Queens version of Santana in ’08 and ’09 didn’t miss bats at the same rate as his halcyon days with the Twins, he still managed swinging strike rates in excess of 11 percent (8-9% MLB average) with an overall contact rate in the 77-78% range (80-81% MLB average). This season, Santana is getting swinging strikes 9.4%, with a contact rate right around the big league average.
As a result, Santana’s strikeout rate has declined — from 7.9 batters per nine innings in ’08 and ’09 to 6.55 K/9 in 2010. His walk rate has climbed somewhat as well (2.76 BB/9, from the 2.4-2.5 BB/9 range the previous two years), though not alarmingly so. Santana’s expected FIP (xFIP), derived from a pitcher’s K’s, walks and a normalized home run per fly ball rate, is 4.48.
Now, that mark likely exaggerates the extent of Johan’s struggles. His BABIP is pretty low at .268, but Santana has generally posted lower-than average BABIP figures (.286 career). Santana gets a lot of fly balls (35.8 GB% in 2010, 37.8 GB% career), which have a lower BABIP than grounders. He induces a lot of weakly hit pop ups, with a 12.7% infield fly rate this year and a 13.2% mark for his career. Santana’s rate of stranding base runners (79.7%) is well above the 70-72% MLB average, but his career rate is 77.5%. It seems reasonable to suggest he’ll continue to have a LOB rate above the big league norm. Santana’s home run per fly ball rate (5.5%) almost assuredly will rise, though.
So, Santana hasn’t performed near as well as his ERA suggests, but probably not as poorly as his xFIP indicates. His falling K rate is worth examining further, however. The velocity on Santana’s four-seam fastball has declined again this season, as has the zip on his slider. But those aren’t the root causes for the reduced number of whiffs. Take a look at Santana’s whiff percentage by pitch over the 2008-2010 seasons (data from Trip Somers’ texasleaguers site):
Perhaps as a result of hitters not anticipating it as much, Santana has actually gotten a higher whiff rate on his four-seamer. His two-seamer has a very low whiff percentage in 2010 after getting an above average number last season. That most glaring difference, however, is the whiff rate on the changeup. Santana’s signature change got a whiff 22.4% in ’08 and 17.4% in ’09, but just 13.6% this season (12.1% MLB average). That’s a substantial drop.
Though his ERA is pristine, Johan Santana really isn’t in the conversation anymore when it comes to the absolute best starters in the game. That doesn’t mean he’s done being a quality pitcher, but he’s not fooling hitters with the same regularity these days.
A recent graduate of Duquesne University, David Golebiewski is a contributing writer for Fangraphs, The Pittsburgh Sports Report and Baseball Analytics. His work for Inside Edge Scouting Services has appeared on ESPN.com and Yahoo.com, and he was a fantasy baseball columnist for Rotoworld from 2009-2010. He recently contributed an article on Mike Stanton's slugging to The Hardball Times Annual 2012. Contact David at david.golebiewski@gmail.com and check out his work at Journalist For Hire.
Can someone please explain the difference between a pitcher’s contact rate (e.g. 80%) and their swinging strike rate (e.g. 11%)? Does the 80% mean that 80% of the time that the batter swings at the pitch, he hits it (fair or foul)? Thus, 20% of the time the hitter swings the bat he misses the ball?
Does the 11% mean that of all the strikes a pitcher throws (called strikes plus balls in play plus foul balls plus swings and misses), 11% are of the swing and miss variety?
The glossary doesn’t define swinging strike rate. Thank you!
As I understand it:
Contact rate = (hits/outs/fouls)/total pitches
Swinging strike rate = swing and miss/total pitches
Could somebody confirm?
The contact rate is defined by Fangraphs – “total % of contact when swinging at all pitches.” I assume this includes fair and foul balls. So if a pitcher has a contact rate of 80%, then 80% of the time batters swung against this pitcher, they hit the ball fair or foul.
However, using that example, if the batter makes contact 80% of the time when they swing, then they miss 20% of the time when they swing. So what do the swinging strike rates of ~8% – 12% refer to? I’m assuming they represent the percentage of all strikes that are swings and misses (as opposed to balls in play, fouls and called strikes). But Fangraphs doesn’t define this stat.
Contact % is hits/outs/fouls when swinging the bat pitches
Swing Strike % = swinging strikes / total pitches.
Doesn’t help that his fastball seems to have lost 4 MPH off his peak.
I wonder if some of the decline in his K rate this year might be only temporary. Remember that he’s recovering from the exact same bone-chip procedure he underwent following the 2003 season. In the first two months of the 2004 season, he experienced a declined K rate (7.97 K/9 in April and May, down from 9.61 K/9 in 2003). Then in his 13th start (June 9th) he had his first double-digit strikeout performance of the year and never looked back, bringing his K/9 up to 10.46 by the end of the season.
Obviously he’s not the 2004 Johan anymore, but this could be a similar situation, and perhaps we’ll see him at least return to his ’08-’09 strikeout levels. Also remember that during the first two months of last season, he struck out 86 batters in 66 innings (a K/9 rate of 11.74) and had four double-digit strikeout games, so he’s really not that far removed from being a high-strikeout pitcher.
Anyway, I would be curious to see if there was a dip in his fastball velocity during those first two months of ’04. If not, then maybe his lower K rate then was just a fluke. If there was a dip in velocity, though, it just might be an indicator that we can expect Johan to improve as the season goes along. (Though if that’s the case, the improvement certainly didn’t began today. His fastball was under 90 most of the afternoon, and in 6 2/3 IP he had only one K–and that was on a foul bunt by the pitcher.)
Santana is a remarkable 2nd part hurler.
Expect all that theory to be a big mistake when the lefty rakes the Ks from July.
If Santana played for a team whose park wasn’t so spacious, he’d have given up around 20 homeruns already. His change up won’t be worth anything if his fastball keeps losing velocity. The past two seasons he hasn’t been the Johan of old. He’s not a top ten pitcher anymore, and I wouldn’t count on him having a great second half. The Mets really don’t look like a team that will make the playoffs, and Johan is a pitcher who steps up when a team is making a run for the playoffs. Remember his complete game shutout in 2008 to give the Mets a last chance to make the playoffs.
are you a philly fan or a braves fan? or do you just not like the mets? becuase they absolutely look like a playoff team right now. add a SP acquisition and a well rested Beltran and i dont see how they aren’t making a push in late august.
is regular old ERA a better measure of Johan’s value than FIP? His 3.40 FIP is so much higher than his 3.10 ERA, and it can’t really be explained by playing for great defenses