Who's Up First?

Let's start off with a question: What is the average number of pitchers who have had at least one at-bat for National League teams this year?

I just concluded a bit of research on pitchers hitting and I found out (essentially) nothing (well, kind of). The team with the most pitchers with at least one PA is in last place. The team with the fewest is in first. Not only that, but the NL teams that leads in this category are both in last place. That would seem to tell you that the best teams have fewer pitchers hit. The problem? The Yankees lead all AL teams.

Additionally, the AL teams that are in second place are in the first, third, fourth and fifth places in their respective divisions. Hmm...

The NL teams that are in second place in terms of amount of pitchers with PAs are teams in first and 2nd place.

The reason that I have not given you any numbers is because I wanted them to be a mystery only to be solved at the end of this excruciatingly long blog post. I know that I, for one, was quite surprised by how many pitchers have hit. In fact this all happened when I saw that the Blue Jays had 8 pitchers hit. I thought that was a lot. They only play 9 games a year without the DH. Assuming that there are 5 starters, even assume one starter goes down with an injury, you have 6 starters - there are an additional 2 pitchers that get At-Bats? I guess so.

In fact, they don't even lead their own division. So what do I know.

Answer: 14

Just me, once again, but that seems pretty high, too.

I wrote earlier that I learned essentially nothing from this exercise. That's true. What it does seem like to me, however, is that in the National League you can kind of get a gauge of how good the team is by seeing how many pitchers batted. Which, of course, makes sense. The worse your pitchers are, the more you'll use. The more you use, the higher the number of pitchers who step to the plate.

Here are the numbers. If they're not neat enough, you can write to your Congressperson.

Yankees 9
Red Sox 8
Rays 6
Blue Jays 8
Orioles 8

Tigers 7
W. Sox 5
Twins 6
Indians 8
Royals 6

Angels 4
Rangers 7
Mariners 7
A's 6

Average 6.78

Phillies 13
Marlins 16
Braves 12
Mets 14
Nats 18

Cards 13
Cubs 12
Brew 13
Astros 13
Reds 15
Pirates 14

Dodgers 16
Rockies 10
Giants 14
D-Backs 13
Padres 18

Average 14

Poll Results: I asked "Which injured Met will return to Major League action first?" It now seems as though the answer is Billy Wagner, who was not even an option in the poll.

I think I was hoping that by the time I reviewed the poll we would know the answer, but alas, that is not the case.

Anyway, the poll ended in a three-way tie between Carlos Delgado, Carlos Beltran and Jose Reyes.

Speaking of injured Mets, this is a great article from the SNY website. Feast your eyes. And remember, his point is so much better now that David Wright is down and out.