Beaneball

A's in the leader boards

We're far enough into the season now that I can start cataloging which A's are at the top of the leaderboards in the American League (I used to do the bottoms as well, but Jason Kendall makes me depressed, so that's enough of that). Here we go!

Homers, Nick Swisher, T9th, 6
On Base, Nick Swisher, 5th, .426
Slugging, Nick Swisher, 9th, .562
OPS, Nick Swisher, 7th, .990
EqA, Nick Swisher, 7th, .335
Secondary Average, Nick Swisher, 2nd, .505
Isolated Power, Nick Swisher, 8th, .270
Walks, Nick Swisher, T4th, 21
Walks per plate appearance, Nick Swisher, 2nd, .186
Walks per strikeout, Shannon Stewart, T6th, 1.17
Pitches per plate appearance, Nick Swisher, 10th, 4.19
IBB, Nick Swisher, T5th, 4
HBP, Mark Ellis, T5th, 4
At-bats, Eric Chavez, 8th, 133
Pitches seen, Eric Chavez, 9th, 588
Sacrifice Flies, Todd Walker & Mark Ellis, T3rd, 2
Ground/Fly Ratio, Mark Ellis, 1st (most flies), 0.47
GIDP, Nick Swisher, T5th, 6

And for the pitchers:

Expected Wins, Dan Haren, 4th, 3.8
Expected Wins, Chad Gaudin, 6th, 3.3
SNLVAR, Dan Haren, 1st, 1.7
SNLVAR, Chad Gaudin, 3rd, 1.5
SNLVAR, Joe Kennedy, 10th, 1.3
ERA, Dan Haren, 1st, 1.89
ERA, Joe Kennedy, 4th, 2.18
ERA, Chad Gaudin, 5th, 2.40
WHIP, Dan Haren, 2d, 0.96
WHIP, Chad Gaudin, 10th, 1.14
Strikeouts, Dan Haren, T9th, 40
Strikeouts per walk, Lenny DiNardo, T4th, 7.00
Quality Starts, Dan Haren, T1st, 7
Quality Start Percentage, Rich Harden, T1st, 100%
Quality Start Percentage, Dan Haren, T4th, 88%
Average Game Score, Rich Harden, 2d, 65.7
Average Game Score, Dan Haren, 5th, 61.4
Saves, Huston Street, 7th, 9
Games, Huston Street & Alan Embree, T6th, 17
Starts, Dan Haren, T1st, 8
Innings, Dan Haren, T3rd, 52 1/3
Innings, Joe Blanton, 5th, 47 1/3
Holds, Alan Embree, T6th, 7
Complete Games, Joe Blanton, T2d, 1
Batters Faced, Dan Haren, T2d, 208
Batters Faced, Joe Blanton, T7th, 193
Games Finished, Huston Street, T3d, 14
Blown Saves, Huston Street & Justin Duchscherer, T4th, 2
Save Opportunities, Huston Street, T5th, 11
Double Plays, Joe Blanton, T5th, 6
Pitches thrown, Dan Haren, 2d, 812
Ground/Fly Ratio, Jay Marshall, 3d, 6.40

Posted by Jason Wojciechowski in Oakland A's at 18:57 | |

It's a Blowout!

The A's did unspeakably awful things to the Royals today. The team:

Scored 17 runs.
Put runs on the board in six of the nine innings.
Scored multiple runs in four of those innings.
Had 18 hits and seven walks.
Smashed six homers and three doubles.
Allowed just four hits to the Royals, none after the sixth inning.

The individual offensive player achievements in the game, from most awesome to least awesome:

Dan Johnson went 4-4 with two homers, a double, a single, and walked twice. They never got him out. He had four RBI and four runs scored. And he was the front half of a back-to-back homer series with Jack Cust in the seventh.
Jack Cust hit two bombs despite having only four major league at-bats in the last three years.
Danny Putnam came on for an injured Chris Snelling and went 3-4 with two singles and his first big league homer.
Eric Chavez popped his fourth homer of the year, a three-run shot.
Shannon Stewart went 4-6 as the leadoff man, raising his batting average 20 points in the process. (Putnam's jump was even more dramatic - the kid's hitting over .200 now!)
Todd Walker went 2-3 after coming in for Nick Swisher in the fifth inning.
Mark Ellis scored two runs despite going 0-4 (he had two walks).
Marco Scutaro hit his first double of the year.
Travis Buck scored a run as a pinch-runner. He also played defense.
Nick Swisher walked again.
Adam Melhuse went 0-6. (He's making it really hard for us Kendall-haters to advocate for a change - when he's the alternative, it's tough to make too much noise.)
Chris Snelling went 0-2 and got hurt.

Posted by Jason Wojciechowski in Oakland A's at 18:46 | |

Utterly predictable?

Chris Snelling has left today's baseball contest with the Royals with an injured knee. We knew this was going to happen, right? An injury-prone player acquired by the A's, doing a pretty decent job at the plate ... he was bound to get hurt. And Jack Cust is making his second appearance in the field today. He also hit his second homer of the year. How many dingers did Piazza have? You know what I'm for? I'm for Piazza catching when he comes back and Kendall being cut.

Posted by Jason Wojciechowski in Oakland A's at 15:17 | |