Eagle-Tribune Blogs: Burt Talks Sports

The blood has started to re-emerge in my legs and fingers after a horrific 26.2 miles the other day and I am ready to jump back aboard the blogging bandwagon. (In summary, I think I going to start concentrating on getting a fake ID for Masters sprint competitions.)

Along with the marathon the week has also included a 5-year-old’s birthday, which has allowed me to break down the flipability for every conceivable Hot Wheel car over the past 24 hours. And, of course, there has been the busy-work that comes with a job switch (which we can talk about at a later date.) That reminds me, very few understand how important a man named Mike Sperling was to this blog. He is The Eagle-Tribune’s blogmaster and has managed to help create a fantastic new blog world from the ashes.

On to baseball …

This just in: Tim Wakefield is pitching pretty good. Good enough to be the American League-leader in ERA at the moment (1.35 in 20 innings). In fact, the Red Sox pitching staff leads the league in ERA as a whole (2.55), second in the majors only to the Mets. This is Boston’s lowest ERA through 13 games since the 2001 figure of 1.83 through 14 games.

And remember when I pinpointed one of the few spring training statistics that might have mattered, walks? Well, it is carrying over to the regular season as Red Sox are totaling just 2.71 walks per 9 innings (second in the AL only to Toronto). The Sox pitchers have also allowed a total of 6 home runs, giving them the best homer-to-9 inning ratio in the league. All good stuff.

To me, this stat might be the most encouraging: The Red Sox relievers have issued the fewest walks (8) of any team in the majors. This is how good bullpens are born, just ask Minnesota’s Terry Ryan who has always prioritized throwing strikes when finding relievers. (Full disclosure: The Red Sox’s bullpen has also faced the fewest hitters in the majors, 130. But it still comes in as the best in the bigs for walks-per-9 at 2.25.)

Here is some added info from the crack Red Sox media relations staff:

Wednesday marked the 8th straight game in which the Red Sox have allowed 3 or fewer runs. It is the longest such streak for Boston since 11 consecutive games, April 12-25, 1988. Over the last 8 games, Boston’s team ERA is 1.77 (14 ER/71 IP) Overall, club has allowed 3 or fewer runs in 11 of 13 games in 2007.

Boston’s rotation has posted a 1.64 ERA (10 ER/55.0 IP) in the last 8 games and has a 2.44 season figure, 2nd lowest in the majors to Oakland at 2.07. Starters have held the opposition to a major league low .205 batting average and have worked at least 6 innings in 8 straight and 10 of the last 11 games Boston is tied with Detroit with MLB high 10 quality starts.

The starters have earned a decision in each of the 1st 13 games of 2007. The last time that Red Sox starters had a decision in more than the 1st 12 games of a season was 1918. In that year, the starters earned the win or loss in the season’s 1st 39 games from April 15-May 30 before Carl Mays lost in relief in a 13-inning defeat at Detroit on June 1.

Back to Wakefield … I was wondering if there any kind of advantage he was gaining from following the multi-pitched Matsuzaka. Remember last season when the Red Sox pitched Wakefield in Game 2 between Schilling and Beckett, hoping for some sort of velocity befuddlement? In trying to find an answer back then, I turned to some experts.

I interviewed former Yale professor Robert Adair, who holds the distinction of being the only person ever to hold the title of “Physicist of the National League,” a position he held (thanks to former commissioner Bart Giamatti) from 1987-90. Here is an excerpt from that article.

“It takes about 150 milliseconds for any voluntary reaction,” Adair said. “For example, if I tell you to blink your eyes when you see the light turn on, that latency will be about 150 milliseconds. What it basically amounts to is the knuckleball can change direction in that amount of time. The minus side, of course, if you don’t throw it perfectly you have a soft batting practice pitch.

“The fastball is a real problem because it takes about 150 milliseconds to get the signals (from your brain), and it takes about 50 milliseconds more to send signals to the muscles. So the batter actually has to make up his mind to swing at a really hard fastball when the ball is only a third of the way from the pitcher. He can correct a little before the ball is halfway through, but when the ball is past halfway to the plate he can close his eyes, the lights could go out, and it wouldn’t make a difference at all. You’ve just got to adjust.”

Adair’s point is that the adjustment for the Rangers’ hitters this week will be at what point their decision-making takes place. With the fastball pitchers, whose ball is spinning at 1,800 RPM (54 times faster than the old LP records), and about a dozen rotations before it reaches the plate, the batter’s commitment must be made at the beginning of the 0.4 seconds it will take to reach the strike zone.

“When Randy Johnson or one of these hard throwers throw their fastball you really have to make up your mind by the time the ball has hardly left the pitcher’s hand,” Adair said. “These guys really watch the hand, which is very important to hitting the fastball.”

When it comes to Wakefield’s knuckleball, which has virtually no spin at all and comes in as much as 20 mph slower than a fastball, the hitter’s tactics have to wait.

“Let’s just say Wakefield could control a perfect knuckleball on every pitch. The only way you could hit is by luck,” said Adair, who admitted that because of his wife’s love for the Red Sox he is forced to either “root for Boston or not eat.”

“With a fastball pitcher you’ve got a shot at it because you can see where it’s going,” said Adair. “But then they might put a bite on it and the room to make an adjustment becomes about a third of the distance to home plate. You’re a bit helpless.”

Now, we know Matt Stairs isn’t wrestling with milliseconds and such when taking his glorious, all-or-nothing hacks. But it is all food for thought, nonetheless.

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