Does this involve us crossing the Delaware? No idea.
Another rough day for the pitching staff yesterday, with the team’s ERA ballooning to a hefty 5.23. In the NL,We that’s ahead only of the Brewers. After the opening series they had in New York, it feels like Milwaukee will need to pitch consecutive shutouts for a week, just to get their ERA down below six. In comparison, seven games into the season last year, also coming off a series against the Yankees, the D-backs’ ERA was more than two runs better, at 3.05. Admittedly, they had also played the Rockies four times, But Arizona’s ERA was actually higher after that initial series at 3.50, and declined due to their performances during the Yankees set.
Is it time to be concerned? Well, one factor is the team’s FIP is considerably lower, at 4.40. However, that’s still below league average (3.83) and only tenth-best in the league. Given the pitching was expected to be a strength, with some suggesting it might be the best rotation in the National League, top to bottom, it has not yet lived up to the hype. Or, at least, only intermittently. Zac Gallen’s last start will likely rank among the best of the season in six months. On the other end, the FIP for Burnes, Kelly and Rodriguez are all above seven, though we’d be over-reacting violently to small sample sizes there, of one start for all of them except for Merrill.
The team BABIP is all the way down at .259, so it certainly does not feel like this has been bad luck. especially with a line-drive rate and exit velocity which are both only fractionally worse than league average. Home-runs have been a bigger problem, with thirteen allowed in 62 innings, trailing only those Brewers in the NL. You do have ones like Anthony Volpe’s wall-scraper off A.J. Puk, which would have gone out in Yankee Stadium and its carbon-copy being used by the Rays. But the median length is 387 feet, so they’re certainly not all cheap shots. Hopefully the team will do a better job of keeping the ball in the park against the Nationals, and if so, then better results should follow.