Free The New Ballgame: Understanding Baseball Statistics for the Casual Fan by Glenn Guzzo Page B

"closer" whose primary
duty is to pitch the final inning when his team needs to preserve a narrow lead
(no more than three runs). If he succeeds, the relief pitcher earns a save-the
stat that has the most to say about how many millions of dollars per year that
pitcher will earn.
    The save, the brainchild of Chicago baseball writer Jerome Holtzman,
didn't become an official statistic until 1969 and has been calculated differently at various times. Today, leading closers accumulate 40 saves or more.
The record is 57, by Bobby Thigpen of the Chicago White Sox in 1990.

STREAKS AND MILESTONES
    You are probably familiar with this sort of
propaganda whenever there's a big spike in
the price of gas at the pump: "Over the last
five years, gas prices are stable relative to
inflation." Yeah? What about that 30% increase over the last seven months? And the
70% increase over the last three years? Look
closely and you find that each time the propaganda flows more freely than the gasoline,
the time frame keeps changing.
    In recent years, baseball teams have accelerated the practice of promoting their players on ballpark scoreboards by picking out the
most favorable statistical trends. This could
be useful in a "who's-hot, who's-not" sort
of way, except that the team doesn't broadcast when its $12-million-a-year slugger is
1-for-24 and hasn't homered in three weeks.
Instead, we get an assortment of truths, halftruths, and nothing but deceptive truths.
    Said slugger, whose .226 batting average is on the scoreboard, we're
told, "is hitting .290 over his last 45 games." Go back far enough, and you
can find a period of usefulness somewhere, all the while concealing that he
has hit all of five homers with 14 runs batted in over those 45 games-this
guy's killing the team.

    When Bruce Sutter was
inducted into the Hall of
Fame in 2006, he was the
first "pure" reliever to earn
the honor. Three other
pitchers-Hoyt Wilhelm,
Rollie Fingers and Dennis
Eckersley-owe their
enshrinement to their
relief pitching, but all had
been starting pitchers
for part of their careers.
Sutter is the only pitcher
in the Hall never to have
started a game.

    Here's another deception: "Joe (insert any name here) has hit safely in
10 of his last 14 games." Yeah. But is he hitting well? Take those two 0-for-5s
and two 0-for-4s, add six 1-for-4s, two 1-for-3s, a 2-for-3 and a 2-for-4 and it
turns out that Joe is hitting.218 during this "hot streak."A player can get a hit
every day for two weeks, but if it's a string of 1-for-4s, he's still hitting only
.250 during his streak.
    When presented forthrightly, the good news can be useful.
    A hitting streak may be mentionable when it reaches 10 consecutive games, interesting when it hits 20. It won't get national attention until
it reaches 30 because one of baseball's shiniest records is Joe DiMaggio's
56-game hitting streak in 1941-an achievement never seriously challenged.
(But note: Not only did Boston's Ted Williams out-hit New York's DiMaggio
that year, .406 to .357, Williams also hit for a higher average during DiMaggio's streak, .412 to .408.)
    Here are a few of the most noteworthy streaks and single-game accomplishments that might be challenged someday at a ballpark near you:
    • Most consecutive games with a home run: 8 by Yankee Don
Mattingly.
    • Most consecutive hits: 12 by the Red Sox' Pinky Higgins and Tiger
Walt Dropo.
    • Most consecutive scoreless innings pitched: 59 by Dodger Orel Her-
shiser in 1988, breaking the mark of 582/-1 innings by Dodger Don
Drysdale twenty years earlier.

    • Most strikeouts in a game by a pitcher: 20 by the Red Sox' Roger
Clemens (twice), rookie Cub Kerry Wood in 1998, and Diamondback Randy Johnson.
    • Most consecutive no-hitters: 2, four days apart in 1938 by Cincinnati
left-hander Johnny Vander Meer. Every time a pitcher throws a nohitter, everyone with a sense of baseball history watches to see if he
can do it the next time