Jeremy Guthrie seems to be an interesting person. His
Twitter feed is often full of shoe giveaways and other assorted things. As a
baseball player, and from a statistical perspective, he is equally interesting.
Throughout his career, he has maintained a below-average K% and yet has
remained an effective “innings eater”*. He doesn’t generate ground balls more
than other pitchers, and he doesn’t strand more baserunners than other
pitchers. He is roughly average in those categories. However, he does have a below
average (or above average, depending on your perspective) career BABIP;
essentially, fewer balls in play go for base hits against Guthrie than the
league average, which is odd because the vast majority of pitchers have little
to no control over their BABIPs.
*Innings eaters. A
nice way of saying, “You’re not very good, but you’re not bad, and you’re
healthy, which is valuable”
