Pwn3d - Tom Seaver

For this installment of Pwn3d, I thought I would take a look at the stats from the other side of the ball. Instead of looking at a dominating hitter, let’s delve into the numbers of a dominating pitcher…
  

During Tom Seaver’s career, he faced 309 batters that had at least 20 plate appearances against him. As you’ll soon see, Tom Terrific ruled the mound. A mere eight batters managed to hit over .400 against Seaver, while 111 players couldn’t even crack .200. That’s a Mendoza to Williams ratio of 13.9! Granted, Seaver did face his fair share of pitchers that are part of that group who couldn’t hit Tom, but that is still an amazing display of dominance. 

This is exemplified by the fact that 34 batters struck out at least one third of the time against Seaver. The most glaring example being Tony Perez who was Seaver’s favorite strikeout victim with 44 Ks, compared to a meager five walks.

In the same vein, only six players out of our sample of 309 batters never struck out to Tom Seaver: Craig Reynolds, Wade Boggs, Lou Whitaker, George Brett, Marty Barrett and Ken Landreaux. 

Another amazing feat is that Tom was rather stingy with the long ball. Approximately half of the sample players hit a home run off of Seaver with only a dozen breaking the five home run plane, which included such sluggers like Hank Aaron, Ron Santo, Steve Garvey, Joe Morgan, Willie McCovey, Ron Cey, Darrell Evans and Willie Stargell. Pretty impressive crowd, however, the one who smacked the most taters off of Tom Terrific was Rick Monday? 

Yup, Tom Seaver was Rick Monday’s favorite long ball pitcher with 11 home runs. And while Monday’s performance was good, it was not pwn3d worthy in this writer’s mind. That performance goes to the rarely discussed Steve Ontiveros, who somehow made Tom Seaver tremble whenever he was at the dish. The highest batting average Ontiveros had against any pitcher was Tom Seaver (.500) and the most home runs hit (2). Considering that Ontiveros hit a paltry 24 home runs in his career, I find it amazing that he hit even two against Tom Seaver. Also add the fact that Ontiveros somehow managed to draw 10 walks versus 2 strikeouts against Seaver. 

On the flip side, Don Sutton was truly pwn3d by Tom Seaver with 22 PA and no hits, but Sutton was a pitcher. So, we’ll move one spot down the dominance list and fall on Bob Aspromonte who shouldn’t even have bothered dressing and leaving the locker room when Seaver was on the mound. Aspromonte was an abysmal 1 for 25 against Seaver, but did manage to draw one walk and hit one sacrifice fly. But I won’t even call that performance the worst against Seaver. I think that title goes to Dal Maxvill who was a lowly 4 for 46 against Seaver, and struck out an amazing 20 times in 50 plate appearances! 

Seaver Pwn3d You!	You Pwn3d Seaver!
4 for 46 with 20 Ks!	9 for 18

Pwn3d - Wade Boggs

Pwn3d is a series that highlights players who either dominated or were dominated by an opposing pitcher/batter.   A minimum 20 Plate Appearance limit is required.

My first entry in this new series focused on my all-time favorite player, Tony Gwynn.  This entry will be about one of my least favorite players, Wade Boggs.  My distaste for Boggs is solely subjective, as I know he was a fantastic hitter.  However, until Boggs' collapse later in his career, all I ever heard about was Wade Boggs.

I guess it was my first taste as a child of "big city markets."  People and media were/are all nutso over Boston and New York players, even though small market teams had better players.  Even living in Southern California, I was more likely to see Wade Boggs on my television than Tony Gwynn, and it drove me nuts.

Out of all of my friends, if they were given the choice between Boggs and Gwynn, it was always Boggs.  People also always seemed quick to pick on Gwynn for his weight, yet ignore all the immoral/insane shit Boggs (allegedly) did.  Regardless, in the end, Tony Gwynn outlasted Boggs in the collective memory of baseball lore, and that makes me happy.

Yet, Boggs was a great baseball player, who somehow smacked 3,010 hits with all that chicken grease on his fingers.  So, using a 20 Plate Appearance limit, Boggs batted above .400 against 26 pitchers (Gwynn had 45).  I call this the Williams Line, since Teddy Ballgame was the last player to break this magical barrier.  At the other end of the spectrum, Boggs battled below .200 (Mendoza Line) against nine pitchers (Gwynn had 6).  This gives Boggs a W/M (Williams to Mendoza) ratio of 2.89 (Gwynn's was 7.5).  :-) 

For Boggs’ over .400 pitchers, the list includes only two prominent standouts, Brett Saberhagen (.450) and Phil Niekro (.407).  Those who kept Boggs under the Mendoza Line included Bob Welch (.195) and Dan Quisenberry (.105)

However, the #1 most abused and #1 least hit pitchers on the list are... 

Boggs Pwn3d You!	You Pwn3d Boggs!
9 for 17 (.529)	2 for 25 (.080)