A month into the 2011 season, scoring remains down half a run compare to the same point in 2010.
| Category | 2010 | 2011 |
|---|---|---|
| Runs per game | 9.1 | 8.6 |
| HR per game | 1.9 | 1.8 |
| Other hits per game | 15.5 | 15.3 |
| Walks per game | 7.3 | 6.5 |
| Strikeouts per game | 14.2 | 14.2 |
Once again, the main culprit here is fewer walks. Hits and home runs are down a little bit, but games are seeing one fewer base runner, and it’s mostly due to fewer walks. While you might blame umpires for that, I would expect strikeouts to go up if the umps were calling pitches differently, and that’s not happening. I wonder if the success of control artists like Cliff Lee and Roy Halladay inspired pitchers to try to throw more strikes.
Of course, it could be on the batter’s side, with teams bringing in less selective hitters as they spend more on building pitching staffs.
Talked about this before, but it’s easy to get hung up on year-to-year changes, which may only be noise. A longer view is necessary. Since 2000 walks per game have declined 14% while strikeouts per game have incresased 10%.
Hitters haven’t gotten enormously less selective over the past decade. The strike zone has clearly gone on steroids.
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