Boyd's World-> Breadcrumbs Back to Omaha-> Our Basic Currency -- Runs per Game About the author, Boyd Nation

Our Basic Currency -- Runs per Game

Publication Date: April 22, 2003

The Return of the Lefty

There's something interesting going on so far this season. Despite the fact that there were no major changes in either the rules or the equipment this year, scoring is down a bit around the nation. Here are the averages for runs per game for the last three seasons for all games between Division I teams:

2001  12.66
2002  12.72
2003  12.05

Now, that doesn't look like a lot (mostly because of the artifact of the numbers all starting with 12), but that's a 5.6% decrease, which is quite significant. If the current number stands up, the 6.03 runs per team per game for this year will be the lowest since 1977.

What makes this potentially even more interesting is that the usual trend is for scoring to decrease over the course of the season. I won't throw in yet another chart, but for four of the last five years, if you throw out the handful of January games, scoring has decreased each month throughout the season. The one exception, 2001, featured a small blip upwards in March, but follows the general trend. This means that the likely trend is for scoring to continue to decrease before the end of the season.

Nothing is universal, though, so I'd like to finish up with a look at the trends for each conference. These are much more susceptible to recruiting fluctuations, but the trends in a couple of the usual outliers, like the America East, are interesting. The Patriot League, on the other hand, continues toward almost 60's-ish lows.

ACC             13.81 13.87 12.11
America East     9.73  9.43 11.13
Atlantic 10     12.52 11.64 10.94
Atlantic Sun    10.57 10.32  9.95
Big 12          11.14 12.35 13.57
Big East        10.55 11.20 11.01
Big South       12.19 12.43 11.89
Big Ten         11.28 10.43 10.45
Big West        11.25 12.59 10.58
C-USA           11.94 11.88 10.35
CAA             11.63 11.28 11.63
Horizon         11.21  9.21  9.14
Ivy             11.64 10.92 11.46
MAAC            11.01 12.34 10.26
MAC             16.19 14.50 12.42
MEAC            13.63 14.56 11.60
MVC             13.22 12.03 10.49
Mid-Continent   15.21 11.18 13.83
Mountain West   14.29 16.11 15.11
NEC             10.66 11.29  9.04
OVC             12.59 13.87 12.34
Pac 10          12.02 13.82 13.80
Patriot         11.29  9.48  7.53
SEC             12.47 12.54 10.34
SWAC            14.28 13.06 13.75
Southern        12.86 12.44 11.94
Southland       11.17 12.03 11.65
Sun Belt        12.44 12.76 12.08
WAC             12.02 11.29  9.90
WCC             11.74 13.44 11.72

Pitch Count Watch

Rather than keep returning to the subject of pitch counts and pitcher usage in general too often for my main theme, I'm just going to run a standard feature down here where I point out potential problems; feel free to stop reading above this if the subject doesn't interest you. This will just be a quick listing of questionable starts that have caught my eye -- the general threshold for listing is 120 actual pitches or 130 estimated, although short rest will also get a pitcher listed if I catch it. Don't blame me; I'm just the messenger.

Date   Team   Pitcher   Opponent   IP   H   R   ER   BB   SO   AB   BF   Pitches
Apr 4 Wake Forest Kyle Sleeth Florida State 8.0 11 7 6 6 8 34 41 153 (*)
Apr 12 Old Dominion Justin Verlander North Carolina-Wilmington 9.0 9 2 2 1 12 36 37 142
Apr 12 Wake Forest Kyle Sleeth North Carolina State 7.2 9 9 7 4 8 31 39 130
Apr 18 Maine Mike MacDonald Northeastern 7.1 9 6 6 4 7 30 36 130 (*)
Apr 18 Central Florida Von Stertzbach Florida Atlantic 8.1 6 3 2 3 8 29 33 127
Apr 18 Minnesota Glen Perkins Illinois 9.0 7 0 0 1 15 33 35 147 (*)
Apr 18 Nebraska Aaron Marsden Texas 9.0 6 2 2 2 11 30 36 121
Apr 18 Old Dominion Justin Verlander William and Mary 7.0 6 6 2 5 7 28 35 142 (*)
Apr 18 Texas Christian Clayton Jerome East Carolina 8.0 6 2 1 2 8 29 32 125
Apr 18 Houston Brad Sullivan St. Louis 8.0 4 2 2 2 16 29 32 133
Apr 18 Toledo J. R. Duffey Central Michigan 9.0 9 5 3 3 7 33 39 138 (*)
Apr 18 Illinois State Josh Kauten Ball State 5.2 18 12 12 0 3 34 35 121
Apr 18 Southern Illinois Jake Alley Southwest Missouri State 9.0 6 0 0 4 8 31 36 142 (*)
Apr 18 Northern Iowa Chris Rosselot Creighton 9.0 4 2 2 2 3 32 34 121
Apr 18 Fairleigh Dickinson Jesse Anziano Monmouth 9.0 7 4 4 2 13 32 36 142 (*)
Apr 18 Austin Peay State Dustin Smith Murray State 8.0 10 6 5 1 5 35 37 142
Apr 18 Eastern Illinois White Southeast Missouri State 9.0 5 1 1 4 11 32 37 147
Apr 18 Southeast Missouri State Tim Alvarez Eastern Illinois 9.0 8 5 5 1 7 34 37 156
Apr 18 Tennessee Tech Ben Downs Morehead State 9.0 6 1 1 3 13 31 36 145 (*)
Apr 18 Arkansas-Little Rock B. Cherry New Orleans 7.0 9 5 5 3 7 28 31 127
Apr 18 St. Mary's Bowden San Diego 9.0 8 5 5 4 6 33 37 139 (*)
Apr 19 South Carolina David Marchbanks Mississippi State 3.0 3 3 3 0 3 12 12 44
Apr 19 South Carolina David Marchbanks Mississippi State 7.2 5 1 1 1 7 25 27 98 (*)
Apr 19 Virginia Andrew Dobies North Carolina State 7.2 9 7 6 5 7 30 35 137 (*)
Apr 19 Texas Tech Nathan Fouts Kansas State 7.1 9 5 4 4 6 28 32 148
Apr 19 James Madison Kurt Isenberg Towson 8.2 6 4 4 6 9 31 38 154
Apr 19 Texas Christian Kyle Shoemaker East Carolina 9.0 6 3 3 1 6 32 33 122
Apr 19 Marist Chris Tracz Fairfield 8.0 8 2 1 2 9 33 36 150 (*)
Apr 19 Central Michigan Joey Fahndrich Toledo 9.0 12 3 3 2 2 35 41 140 (*)
Apr 19 Toledo Shawn Hurst Central Michigan 8.0 11 6 6 3 6 34 38 146 (*)
Apr 19 Murray State Craig Ringwald Austin Peay State 8.0 7 0 0 1 8 29 30 128
Apr 19 Southeastern Louisiana Brad Miller Sam Houston State 7.2 9 5 5 2 7 33 35 122
Apr 19 Louisiana-Lafayette Jordy Templet Florida International 9.0 8 0 0 3 9 34 38 149 (*)
Apr 19 Portland Kristjanson Santa Clara 9.0 10 5 4 2 6 33 39 130 (*)
Apr 20 South Carolina Chris Hernandez Mississippi State 9.0 7 2 1 2 6 33 35 120
Apr 20 Rhode Island Jared Trout Massachusetts 7.0 8 5 4 2 9 28 32 125
Apr 20 Old Dominion Ricky Shefka William and Mary 8.2 12 5 5 2 2 38 42 152 (*)
Apr 20 Wisconsin-Milwaukee Mikel Schaefer Butler 9.0 3 1 1 8 11 27 35 139 (*)
Apr 20 Wright State C. Abrams Illinois-Chicago 9.0 9 4 1 4 13 37 42 160 (*)
Apr 20 Ohio Rob Harmon Akron 6.2 6 1 1 4 8 26 31 130
Apr 20 Alabama Seth Johnson Mississippi 6.1 8 5 4 2 4 28 32 122
Apr 20 New Orleans Chris Bourgeois Arkansas-Little Rock 9.0 4 1 1 2 7 29 32 129
Apr 20 Arkansas-Little Rock Aaron Carter New Orleans 10.0 6 1 1 1 8 35 36 123
Apr 21 Tennessee Dusty Johnson Tennessee Wesleyan 8.1 9 2 2 3 7 32 36 142 (*)
Apr 22 Sacred Heart Rob McKee Manhattan 9.0 5 2 2 7 9 30 39 148 (*)
Apr 23 Massachusetts Mike Crane Harvard 8.0 13 4 3 1 5 33 36 127
Apr 23 Fairleigh Dickinson Pleeter Sacred Heart 9.1 4 3 3 4 12 30 36 141 (*)
Apr 24 Louisiana Tech Adam Kirkendall Rice 8.0 5 2 1 7 7 25 34 125

(*) Pitch count is estimated.

The Verlander and Sleeth starts from April 12 are corrections based on actual pitch counts. Marchbanks finished a suspended game and then started the second game.

If you're interested in reprinting this or any other Boyd's World material for your publication or Web site, please read the reprint policy and contact me

Google

Boyd's World-> Breadcrumbs Back to Omaha-> Our Basic Currency -- Runs per Game About the author, Boyd Nation