Injuries happen

MaineFan said:

 

Excellent research and information here.

 

o

And thank YOU for breaking down the numbers even further. Have a greenie.

o

MaineFan said:

 

It looks as though the Orioles were around league average in DL days for hitters, but well below league average in DL days for pitchers. If the pitching luck runs out next season, it will be imperative they have as much depth as possible. I think that Duquette realizes this, and will continue to add that pitching depth.

 

o

Aside from the obvious of wanting my favorite team to avoid injuries altogether, I would prefer that the Oriole pitchers were hit less with the injury bug than the Oriole position players and/or DH's.

Pitching and defense has been between 60 and 70% of successful franchises for over a century, and probably always will be.

I suppose that you could also break it down even further, and talk about what percentage of injuries were allotted to starters vs. relievers, but for the time being, I am happy with the information and analysis that you and Frobby have provided.

o

o

Weams, Tony, and/or Paul, I may have inadvertently given Maine Fan a reddie instead of a greenie.

If I have, please change it.

Thanks in advance. 

o

And, thank YOU for breaking down the numbers even further. Have a greenie.

Aside from the obvious of wanting your favorite team to avoid injuries altogether, I would prefer that the Oriole pitchers were hit less with the injury bug than the Oriole position players and/or DH's.

Pitching and defense has been between 60 and 70 % of successful franchises for over a century, and probably always will be.

I suppose that you could also break it down even further, and talk about what percentage of injuries were allotted to starters vs. relievers, but for the time being, I am happy with the information and analysis that you and Frobby have provided.

Buried in that article are charts showing that the 2007-08 Orioles suffered a huge number of injuries to their pitchers while their hitters stayed relatively healthy. I remember clearly how painful the last 6-8 weeks of those two seasons were as we trotted out any live body we could find to the mound.

Buried in that article are charts showing that the 2007-08 Orioles suffered a huge number of injuries to their pitchers while their hitters stayed relatively healthy. I remember clearly how painful the last 6-8 weeks of those two seasons were as we trotted out any live body we could find to the mound.

Thanks, Frank. I did not know off of the top of my head that that was a major factor for the Orioles' collapses in those two seasons.

Those late-season collapses in that era of losing (1998-2011) were painful. For me, 2005 was probably the worst. We went from first place in late June to the outhouse in late September. When we started to slide, I would think to myself "We don't have to make the postseason, we just need to hang on for a winning season, and perhaps get the franchise pointed in the right direction in the future." It was like thinking that you were waking up from a bad dream, and then getting thrust back into a seemingly endless nightmare.

Thanks, Frank. I did not know off of the top of my head that that was a major factor for the Orioles' collapses in those two seasons.

Those late-season collapses in that era of losing (1998-2011) were painful. For me, 2005 was probably the worst. We went from first place in late June to the outhouse in late September. When we started to slide, I would think to myself "We don't have to make the postseason, we just need to hang on for a winning season, and perhaps get the franchise pointed in the right direction in the future." It was like thinking that you were waking up from a bad dream, and then getting thrust back into a seemingly endless nightmare.

I remember it being somewhere near the ASB in 2005 and thinking "If we can just play .500 here on out the Yankees will have a hard time catching us.".

Here's an injury tally for 2015.

Baltimore - Wieters 53, Hardy 39, Schoop 71, W. Wright 84, Lough 6, Flaherty 24, Paredes 10, Cabrera 15, Gausman 43, Garcia 75, Norris 27, Gonzalez 39, Pearce 33, M. Wright 32, Wilson 31, Roe 22.

Boston - Kelly 4, Uehara 58, Victorino 55, Hanigan 57, Masterson 39, Nava 48, Breslow 11, Hembree 35, Pedroia 58, Swihart 13, Buchholz 75, Betts 11, Porcello 24, S. Wright 14, Ramirez 35.

New York - Ryan 79, Nova 71, Pirela 27, Tanaka 37, Petit 34, Martin 20, Whitley 126, Capuano 38, Ellsbury 43, Santos 99, Heathcott 57, Beltran 12, Pineda 30, Moreno 59, Ackley 33, Mitchell 9, Sabathia 14, Teixiera 36.

Tampa - Colome 22, Franklin 38, Smyly 103, McGee 74, Moore 80, Loney 51, Jaso 83, Beliveau 153, Reifenhauser 39, Yates, 52, Jennings 123, Bechham 42, Odorizzi 31, Bellatti 27, Souza 45, Cabrera 11.

Toronto - Saunders 148, Stroman 141, Navarro 40, Travis 97, Reyes 26, Tolleson 109, Sanchez 43, Tulowitzki 18.

Totals:

Baltimore 601 (251 position players, 169 starters, 181 relievers)

Boston 537 (277 position players, 142 starters, 118 relievers)

New York 824 (321 position players, 316 starters, 187 relievers)

Tampa 974 (393 position players, 236 starters, 345 relievers)

Toronto 622 (438 position players, 141 starters, 43 relievers)

Tampa really took it on the chin in 2015. In addition to the listed players, Alex Cobb missed the entire year with TJ surgery. I don't think anyone who looks at this list can say that the Orioles had particularly bad luck with injuries compared to other teams.

A couple of notes:

- I included Teixeira and Tulowizki even though neither technically went on the DL because their injuries occurred near or after the date that rosters expanded.

- I counted Gausman, M. Wright, Capuano and Colome as starting pitchers.

The Yankees, of course, get an asterisk. When you put together a roster filled with late-30's players you have to include the injury factor. Otherwise, yeah, the O's did not seem to be particularly hard-struck.

Yeah, I agree about the Yanks, if you buy older players, injuries happen. I don't think we got hit that hard this year, but last season was hard. It may not have calculated up to the amount of others, but it was who was hurt (or out like Davis' suspension) and the time they happened to be out.

Buck is slow to move guys to the DL.

Hardy and AJ missed time to injury when they were called "day to day," but were actually NFW.

Tillman probably should have been on the DL with a sprained ankle the entire month of April, if not longer.

Wieters was unavailable to play nearly half the time he was active because he couldn't play on consecutive days for most of the season.

I'm guessing we were pretty close to Toronto in games missed. And, since our core up the middle is so important to our defense, and that's where our injuries were, I don't consider us lucky.

Buck is slow to move guys to the DL.

Hardy and AJ missed time to injury when they were called "day to day," but were actually NFW.

Tillman probably should have been on the DL with a sprained ankle the entire month of April, if not longer.

Wieters was unavailable to play nearly half the time he was active because he couldn't play on consecutive days for most of the season.

I'm guessing we were pretty close to Toronto in games missed. And, since our core up the middle is so important to our defense, and that's where our injuries were, I don't consider us lucky.

I don't consider us lucky either, but it's hard to argue we were wildly unlucky. And I don't think Buck is particularly slow to move guys to the DL, though I agree this year we had some guys miss a lot of games while on "day to day" status, especially Jones. Bottom line, we had our fair share of injuries but nothing that's an outlier.

Here's an article from Jeff Zimmerman of the Hardball Times tracking injuries for all 30 teams for 2015. According to this, the O's were the 6th-healthiest team in baseball in 2015, and 8th-healthiest over the last 3 years. According to Zimmerman:

Tampa ~ 1500 days (I said 974 games)

Boston ~ 1050 days (537 games)

Yankees ~ 1000 days (824 games)

Toronto ~ 775 days (622 games)

Orioles ~ 700 days (573 games)

At some point I will have to study his list more carefully to see why it differs so much from mine.Two big differences are that (1) Zimmerman is counting guys who missed the entire season, like Cobb (Tampa), Workman (Red Sox), Vazquez (Red Sox), and Izturis (Blue Jays), and (2) Zimmerman is counting total days (there are 182 in a season) while I am counting games (162 in season). Also, he uses the official MLB transactions page, while I used the ESPN version that probably misses some transactions. For example, on the Orioles I missed Tyler Wilson's 31-day stint on the DL, and apparently Bundy was on the major league DL for 10 games at the end of the season.

http://www.hardballtimes.com/2015-disabled-list-information-and-a-little-more/ -- article

https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1fdvGvZqq5_rNSyBtFXvqUPJRjHLQe6vNfHNE6CyLzJE/edit?pref=2&pli=1#gid=0 -- data

Here's my unofficial tally of games missed on the DL by the Orioles over the last 10 years (position players/starting pitchers/relievers):

2006: 273/35/15 (excludes Penn getting appendicitis immediately after being called up and before he pitched).

2007: 153/356/105 (excludes Benson, who missed the entire year)

2008: 26/172/253 (excludes Baez and Ray, who missed the entire year)

2009: 206/209/0

2010: 281/12/358

2011: 396/126/47 (excludes Duchscherer, who missed the entire year).

2012: 695/105/161

2013: 409/104/41

2014: 208/50/18

2015: 251/169/181

Here's my unofficial tally of games missed on the DL by the Orioles over the last 10 years (position players/starting pitchers/relievers):

2006: 273/35/15 (excludes Penn getting appendicitis immediately after being called up and before he pitched).

2007: 153/356/105 (excludes Benson, who missed the entire year)

2008: 26/172/253 (excludes Baez and Ray, who missed the entire year)

2009: 206/209/0

2010: 281/12/358

2011: 396/126/47 (excludes Duchscherer, who missed the entire year).

2012: 695/105/161

2013: 409/104/41

2014: 208/50/18

2015: 251/169/181

This is the perfect illustration for why the current rotation will improve this year. A healthy Hardy will also help exponentially

Veri interesting! Schoop, Weiters, Hardy all healthy....that'd be great.

This is the perfect illustration for why the current rotation will improve this year. A healthy Hardy will also help exponentially

Even though 169 games missed by the starters might sound light a lot, it really isn't. That only amounts to about 32 starts missed. In some cases, I think guys were put on the DL just to give them a blow when they were doing poorly (Norris). Also, of the 169 games, I think 63 were by Wright and Wilson, who might not have started even if they'd been healthy.

Jimenez - 32 starts

Chen - 31 (optioned to the minors briefly)

Tillman - 31

Gonzalez - 26 (he was legitimately on the DL)

Norris - 11 (he was put on the DL and then briefly put back in the rotation before being yanked permanently, then DFA'd)

Gausman - 17 (he was on the DL for a while but I don't think he was in the rotation at the time; that came later in the season)

Wright - 9

Wilson - 5

Any season where you only use 8 starters, and 3 of the guys in the OD rotation never go on the DL, is a pretty healthy season IMO.