TODAY’S SPORTSTAT — Brewers’ Hader has unlimited potential on and off diamond
By JERRY TAPP
Here’s some free advice for the Milwaukee Brewers marketing department:
Get going on producing some t-shirts made for left-handed reliever Josh Hader. The slogan on the shirt should read … “Don’t Be a Hader” … or … “Be a Hader”
Hader is certainly putting together a season that has never been seen in baseball history, let alone during the Brewers 50 years as a franchise. Through games of May 19, Hader has 56 strikeouts in the 16 games he’s pitched. Not all that impressive; but if you consider that Hader has 56 strikeouts in only 27.1 innings pitched — more than two strikeouts per inning – that’s pretty darn impressive.
Hader is on a pace to have just under 200 strikeouts (197 to be exact) over the season. Considering that Hader has compiled these gaudy numbers coming out of the bullpen as a reliever, it’s important to point out that no relief pitcher in history has ever had 200 strikeouts in a season.
Let me be more precise: The MLB record for most strikeouts in a season by a pitcher who did not start a game that year is 181. Dick Raddatz fanned 181 in 1964 for the Boston Red Sox as a reliever who did not start a game that season.
Here’s a look at the pitchers who struck out 150 or more batters in a season without the benefit of starting a game.
150 or more strikeouts/No starts
181: Dick Raddatz, 1964, Boston
166: Mark Eichhorn, 1986, Toronto
162: Dick Raddatz, 1963, Boston
157: Brad Lidge, 2004, Houston
153: Dick Selma, 1970, Philadelphia
151: Goose Gossage, 1977, Pittsburgh
The Brewers record for most strikeouts in a season by a pitcher who did start a game was set last year by closer Corey Knebel. He had 126 strikeouts. He is followed on this list by Julio Machado (98 in 1991), John Axford (93 in 2012), Will Smith (91 in 2015) and Tyler Thornburg (90 in 2016).
Will Hader break the MLB record?
Will he shatter the Brewers mark?
There are still a lot of games to be played this season. But I for one won’t bet against Hader. The Brewers and Craig Counsell have figured out a way to use Hader quite effectively. It’s definitely one thing I will keep an eye on as the season progresses.
Follow Jerry on Twitter @StatsonTapp
Jerry Tapp
Jerry Tapp is a freelance writer from Racine, WI with a major concentration on sports statistics and numbers that define sports teams and players. He began his foray into sports stats-focused writing as a regular contributor to the “Numbers” column in Inside Sports magazine in the mid-1980’s and then began writing a weekly “Stats on Tapp” column for the Racine Journal Times. That column was eventually nationally syndicated by Universal Press Syndicate. He later wrote sports stats items for the Washington Post under the “Stat of the Day” heading. After launching his blog, www.statsontapp.com in 2011, Jerry turned his sports stats attention to sports websites. He wrote regularly for Bleacher Report, BallHyped, football.com and Heavy.com. Today he keeps busy writing weekly columns of stats-centric articles for three sports websites, Today’s Pigskin (NFL), Today’s Knuckleball (MLB) and Today’s Fastbreak (NBA), and as a monthly contributor to the Milwaukee Brewers “GameDay” publication that is distributed to fans attending games at Miller Park.