Pitcher | PA | BA | OBP | SLG |
Lee | 38 | .278 | .316 | .417 |
Buehrle | 25 | .217 | .280 | .478 |
Liriano | 25 | .182 | .250 | .364 |
Danks | 20 | .053 | .053 | .053 |
Sabathia | 20 | .158 | .158 | .158 |
Saunders | 19 | .250 | .333 | .438 |
Gobble | 15 | .385 | .429 | .923 |
Perez | 15 | .167 | .333 | .417 |
Perkins | 15 | .364 | .533 | .455 |
Thornton | 15 | .143 | .200 | .143 |
Santana | 14 | .000 | .077 | .000 |
Sowers | 14 | .286 | .286 | .500 |
Lily | 10 | .100 | .100 | .100 |
Logan | 10 | .222 | .222 | .556 |
Joe Poz mentions a thought I'd been mulling in his piece about Granderson (he makes a Granderson Central quip- FreeBradshaw, you'd email me and let me know if you were really my sports writing idol travelling incognito among the unwashed blogging masses, right?).
In the AL Central, Granderson must have faced some great left handed pitchers. If those guys dominated him, it would go a long way to quelling my still substantial worries that we've traded for a platoon player.
Granderson had a .245 OBP against lefties. As the chart to the left indicates, familiarity breeds contempt; Granderson beat his average against 7 of the 9 pitchers against whom he had the most PA.
The JoePoz "good lefties" theory: busted.
My new hypothesis: Granderson simply doesn't pick up the ball well.
It certainly explains his profile as a high strikeout hitter- his success depends on his natural talents (reaction and bat speed) overcoming his limitations. The incredible difficultly of this limitation is highlighted when he faces a left- he has less time with both eyes on the ball and the pitch breaks away from him, so it's harder to pull.
So tell me, with the usual disclaimers about small sample sizes and bad luck, do you think I'm wrong?
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