2024 Wake Baseball Thread: What Did We Do To Deserve This?

[WindyCityDeac]

Passed balls play no part in DRS for catchers? That's absolutely insane to me, keeping the ball in front of them is absolutely a skill that some catchers are better at than others, and passed balls obviously have a huge impact on defensive runs allowed.

If you go back through the game play by play, most situations you think should be passed balls are wild pitches. Rule of thumb is if it touches the ground it’s a WP. Any catching coach will tell you that a good catcher should stop most of those…but they won’t impact metrics

 

[deacon14]

If you go back through the game play by play, most situations you think should be passed balls are wild pitches. Rule of thumb is if it touches the ground it’s a WP. Any catching coach will tell you that a good catcher should stop most of those…but they won’t impact metrics

Fair enough, hadn’t thought about the human element of ruling wild pitches vs passed balls.

There’s still gotta be a way to assess how good a catcher is at keeping the ball in front of him

 

[WindyCityDeac]

Fair enough, hadn’t thought about the human element of ruling wild pitches vs passed balls.

There’s still gotta be a way to assess how good a catcher is at keeping the ball in front of him

Eh…it’s really hard. What looks like something a C should stop can have wicked spin when it hits the dirt. Most observers think a C should stop any Fastball, but one of the toughest pitches to block is fastball in the dirt, more so than a curve or slider. Staying down on a spiked fastball is a nightmare, you expect it to hop up and often times it just skids through the 5 hole

 

[Pilchard]

Some related baseball stats to catching/pitching:

WF 24 games

Wild pitches: 42
Passed Balls: 7

WF Opponents 24 games

WP: 32
PB: 1

UNC 26 games

WP: 12
PB: 4

Duke 25 games

WP: 18
PB: 6

NC State 22 games

WP: 23
PB: 6

Clemson 24 games

WP: 21
PB: 9

UVA 25 games

WP: 26
PB: 5

So, its not just anecdotal; there is a problem with the ball getting by the catcher for WF baseball. Hard to win when giving extra bases to the opponent every game.

 

[IAppreciateIt]

great data. and here's walk rates for those teams, it's not like we are particularly wild outside of WPs:

WF: 12%
UNC: 10.6%
Duke: 12.2%
NC State: 13%
Clemson: 10.9%
UVA: 11.9%

 

[deacon14]

42 wild pitches in 24 games is fucking insane. Even if half of those are the fault of the catcher, what the hell are our pitchers doing?

 

[Deacfreak07]

42 wild pitches in 24 games is fucking insane. Even if half of those are the fault of the catcher, what the hell are our pitchers doing?

Trying to hard to prove themselves as young people.

 

[Pilchard]

42 wild pitches in 24 games is fucking insane. Even if half of those are the fault of the catcher, what the hell are our pitchers doing?

It's like Little League, but in the college baseball you can take a lead...

 

[thatguy2016]

Burns and Hartle have a combined 5 wild pitches in 66 1/3 innings (0.075 per inning)

the rest of the staff have 37 wild pitches in 145 innings (.29 per inning)

 

[awaken]

It is also that our WP's and BP's are clustered in the last third of the game....with men on base....often 3rd base.

 

[WakeForest Fan]

 

[Norbit]

Welp, there goes our debate. Lets hope we dont throw off Burns' flow! Very excited for tomorrow.

 

[Deac6]

 

[DeacsNDayton]

I have a general admission ticket for Saturdays game that I will not be using if anyone needs one.

 

[Deacfreak07]

I look forward to the folks feeling most strongly about this move feeling most strongly that it was the wrong idea and proof that Walter is an idiot.

 

[Buttermaker]

Ok. I think most hope it works.

 

[Pilchard]

This was the time to make the move because the L'ville series was Thursday-Friday-Saturday. With the UNC series back to the Friday-Saturday-Sunday norm, Burns will be on his normal schedule for tomorrow's start.

FWIW, UNC's Saturday starter, Jason DeCaro (30 IP 3.56 ERA 1.25 WHIP .227 AVG Against), has been a little better than their Friday starter, Folger Boaz (29 IP 4.66 ERA 1.69 WHIP .294 AVG Against). So, it would be good to win tomorrow's game.

 

[Deacfreak07]

This was the time to make the move because the L'ville series was Thursday-Friday-Saturday. With the UNC series back to the Friday-Saturday-Sunday norm, Burns will be on his normal schedule for tomorrow's start.

FWIW, UNC's Saturday starter, Jason DeCaro (30 IP 3.56 ERA 1.25 WHIP .227 AVG Against), has been a little better than their Friday starter, Folger Boaz (29 IP 4.66 ERA 1.69 WHIP .294 AVG Against). So, it would be good to win tomorrow's game.

Last time I checked, a sweep means we win all three.

 

[Dkin]

Looking for a GA single for Fri

 

[IAppreciateIt]

FOLGER BOAZ?