If someone had said before the season that Carlos Quentin and Ryan Ludwick would play significant roles in their teams’ division races, listeners would have scoffed at the idea, if not said “who?” And if you had said Quentin and Ludwick would be candidates for their respective league’s most valuable player award, listeners would have doubled over in gales of laughter.
Now get serious and check Quentin’s and Ludwick’s performances and the numbers those performances have produced.
Quentin, the Chicago White Sox left fielder, was leading the American League in home runs with 34 through Sunday. He is also among the top five in runs batted in, runs scored, total bases and slugging percentage and is seventh in on-base percentage.
Ludwick, the St. Louis Cardinals right fielder, was among the top 10 in the National League in slugging percentage, runs batted in, home runs, extra-base hits, runs scored, total bases and batting average.
The White Sox have been in first place in the A.L. Central most of the season. The Cardinals have been a surprise contender in the N.L. Central. Quentin and Ludwick are among the primary reasons why their teams have been in those positions.
“I didn’t expect 30 home runs during the first week of August, but I thought he could be a 30-homer guy and more important, a good on-base percentage guy. We needed to fix some things from last year,” said Kenny Williams, the White Sox general manager, who might have made the best trade of the winter in acquiring Quentin for Chris Carter, a minor league infielder.
Quentin was available because the Arizona Diamondbacks had a lot of good young outfielders and no need or room for another one.
“There really wasn’t a spot for me,” the 25-year-old Quentin said. “I’m a pretty bright guy. I can look at things and say this might not work out for me, but there’s some value there. I was hurt, but if I have some value, maybe they can trade me. I wasn’t sure. I knew that they had an idea in their head. I felt I knew what the idea was. The trade happened quick, for my betterment. It gave me a chance to play and it gave them a chance to take that young talented group and bring them together even more”
The only question was Quentin’s non-throwing shoulder. It was operated on last October.
“His health was questionable,” Williams said. “Once I got confirmation from our doctors that he was going to be okay healthwise, I was confident he would return to being the player we have seen in the past.”
The White Sox had seen plenty of Quentin.
“We’ve been asking for him for a number of years,” Williams said. “We share a spring training complex so we’ve seen a lot of Carlos Quentin. We shouldn’t get any Brownie points for scouting when the guy was right in front of us for a number of years.”
Ludwick’s talent was more elusive. He was traded twice, from Oakland to Texas and from Texas to Cleveland, and he was signed twice as a minor league free agent, by Detroit and St. Louis. Injuries derailed his progress, and his emergence this year makes it seem like he came out of nowhere, like the long struggling actor who suddenly makes it big and prompts people to say he is an overnight sensation.
“I could see where people would say that,” Ludwick said, “but I wouldn’t say that. When I first came over to Cleveland,” he explained, referring to 2003, “before I hurt my knee, I was hitting cleanup between Victor Martinez and Travis Hafner. I had a pretty good August.”
Ludwick hit five home runs and drove in 21 runs in 25 August games. “I felt like I had finally started to prove to myself that I could play at this level, then boom the knee injury,” he said. “I missed almost the whole next year, missed the first half of the season,” he said.
His eventual success, though, has not surprised Ludwick. “I always expected it,” he said. “I was a prospect, an all-star at every level and I played in the futures game. From the media standpoint I had never had success at this level except for the last year.”
Ludwick served notice last season that he was ready for his close-up, hitting 14 home runs and driving in 52 runs in 303 at-bats.
“It’s all about confidence,” he said. “At every level I feel there’s a learning curve. Last year I got my confidence and went into the off-season knowing I could improve on that. There were areas I felt I needed to improve. I shortened my swing, and I hit the weight room hard.”
Perhaps the most intriguing aspect of Ludwick’s season is that he is ahead of his superstar teammate, Albert Pujols, in home runs, 31 to 26, and runs batted in, 93 to 77.
PERFORMING AMAZING-LEE
John Lackey (.833), Joe Saunders (.737) and Ervin Santana (.722) have winning percentages better than .700. Little wonder that the Angels of Anaheim have the best record in the major leagues.
But the Angels’ trio of starting pitchers aren’t close to Cliff Lee, whose 17-2 record translates to an .895 percentage. How remarkable is that? Lee pitches for the Cleveland Indians, who have a losing record. Their winning percentage, through Sunday, was .455.
The 440-point differential, Elias Sports Bureau research found, has been exceeded by only one pitcher-team differential in history for a complete season. The all-time difference is 441 percentage points for Roy Face, the Pittsburgh relief pitcher, who had an 18-1 record (.947), and the Pirates’ 78-76 record (.506).
If the pitchers’ records are subtracted from their teams’ records, the differences are 503 points in Face’s case and 520 points in Lee’s. Without Lee’s record, the Indians have a .375 percentage.
Lee, of course, has to finish the season before his performance is placed in historical perspective, but it’s pretty darn impressive right now.
FIGURING PITCHERS
Go figure. Toronto has two pitchers with double-digit victory totals. But Roy Halladay, with a 14-9 record, has a 2.64 earned run average while A.J. Burnett, with a 15-9 record, has a 4.67 e.r.a., two whole runs more than Halladay has allowed.
How about this one? Livan Hernandez has won 11 games with Minnesota and Colorado, and he has a 6.07 e.r.a. Johan Santana gained his 11th victory for the Mets Sunday, and he has a 2.75 e.r.a.
Miguel Batista of Seattle has the highest e.r.a. in the majors among regular starters, 6.63, but 31 other regular starters have e.r.a.’s over 5.00 (4 besides Batista are over 6.00). Probably the most astounding is Barry Zito, who has a 6-15 record and a 5.73 e.r.a. Peter Magowan will step down at the end of the season as the San Francisco Giants managing partner, and he will take with him the knowledge that he approved Zito’s $126 million contract.
At the other end of the e.r.a. spectrum 11 pitchers are under 3.00. Lee, at 2.43, is the leader, but the pitcher to watch is Boston’s Daisuke Matsuzaka. I say that because he was my pre-season pick to win the American League Cy Young award. He has a 14-2 record and a 2.74 e.r.a. and would probably have more wins, the way he has pitched, had he not missed four starts in June with an injury.
Only one pitcher in the under-3.00 group has not reached double digits in victories. Jake Peavy of San Diego has a 2.61 e.r.a., the majors’ fourth lowest and N.L.’s second lowest, but only a 9-8 record.
OH MY ACHING BODY
Maybe baseball is a young man’s game. The 40 somethings are certainly having a difficult time.
Of 19 players 40 or older who were on opening-day rosters or otherwise affiliated with teams, eight are on the disabled list and three others have been on the list this season. Three players have had to go on the list more than once.
Tom Glavine, who in his first 21 seasons in the majors didn’t know what the disabled list was, is the most recent 40-plus player to visit the list more than once. He was on it with a sore elbow for two months, came off Aug. 14 and pitched four innings, then went back on the next day with a strained elbow.
Moises Alou, the Mets’ would-be left fielder, is on the list a third time with a strained calf, meaning he has been on the list a total of 117 days through Sunday and has been active only 24 days. Mike Timlinm the Boston reliever, served two brief stints on the list earlier in the season.
Then there are Curt Schilling of Boston and Orlando Hernandez of the Mets who have been disabled the entire season, Schilling because of his biceps, Hernandez his foot.
Others currently on the disabled list are John Smoltz of Atlanta, Tim Wakefield of Boston, Tom Gordon of Philadelphia and Kent Mercker of Cincinnati. Randy Johnson of Arizona and Omar Vizquel of San Francisco both began the season on the disabled list.
Eight 40 somethings have been unscathed: Jamie Moyer, Kenny Rogers, Greg Maddux, Doug Brocail, Luis Gonzalez, Trevor Hoffman, Matt Stairs and Jeff Kent.
ADIOS, SENOR CABRERA
It was the best of times and the worst of times for the players Cabrera.
Last Thursday Fernando Cabrera, pitching in relief of Daniel Cabrera, gained his first victory in 25 appearances over two seasons with Baltimore. The next day the Yankees demoted a struggling (.242) Melky Cabrera to the minor leagues two and a half seasons into his major league career.
The Cabreras seem to run into each other. In an Orioles game against Detroit last month Miguel Cabrera slugged a three-run home run against Daniel Cabrera in the first inning and knocked in another run against him in the second.
But in the sixth inning, with the game tied, 9-9, Fernando Cabrera, pitching in relief, struck out Miguel Cabrera with the lead run at third base, and the Orioles went on to win in 11 innings. Fernando struck out Miguel again on Sunday as he pitched three scoreless innings and gained another victory.
Melky’s demotion reduced the majors’ Cabrera population to six. Only two of them, the Colombians Orlando and Jolbert, are related. The brothers are both shortstops, the younger Orlando for the White Six, Jolbert with the Reds.
Miguel, the Tigers’ first baseman, and Asdrubal, an Indians second baseman, are from Venezuela; Daniel, like Melky, is Dominican, and Fernando is the lone Puerto Rican Cabrera.