Plunk Everyone

Only two batters got hit by a pitch yesterday – Nyjer Morgan and Nick Markakis. Morgan’s was his 14th of the season, and that’s his career high. It’s also tied for the 4th most plunks in a season by anyone with a first name that starts with an N. And, it’s the most plunks in a season by anyone with a J in his first name without his name starting with a J (unless you count the time AJ Pierzynski had 15).

Red Sox pitcher Kyle Weiland threw the pitch that hit Nick Markakis, and that was the 87th batter the Red Sox have hit this year. This is the 9th time since 2001 that a team has hit 87 batters or more in a season, and 4 of those teams have been the Red Sox. Between 1901 and 2000, no team hit more than 84 batters in a season.

BACON race update:
Jacoby Ellsbury – .841
Robinson Cano – .825
Ryan Braun – .823
Jose Reyes – .813
Miguel Cabrera – .809

Batters, not miles per hour. Wolf hit his 13th batter of the year, keeping him within striking distance of the NL leaders for the Phil Knell award (for the pitcher who hits the most batters) this season. He hit Jay Bruce yesterday, and now has 95 career plunks. He joins Dave Bush, Jamey Wright and Pete Broberg as the only pitchers who have hit 13 batters in a season for the Brewers. Bush and Wright did it twice, and actually all those guys were over 15 HBPs. Wolf is tied for 10th in hit batters during the Randy Wolf Era (1999 to present). He’s tied with Pedro Martinez and Jamie Moyer for plunks thrown in that span of years.

Johnny Damon got his 49th HBP last night on a throw from Josh Beckett, and was controversially denied his 50th as well. He would have become the 416 major leaguer to get hit 50 times, but that milestone will have to wait at least another day because he got hit while trying to check his swing with 2 strikes and the third base umpire called it a swing. So, Damon only has 49 HBPs. The Red Sox have hit 85 batters this year leaving them 8 hit batters away from their single season record.

In Colorado, Alex White of the Rockies hit Giants catcher Chris Stewart, and that was the 999th plunk ever recorded at Coors Field.

BACON race update:
Jacoby Ellsbury – .836
Robinson Cano – .831
Ryan Braun – .823
Jose Reyes – .819
Miguel Cabrera – .818

Prior to yesterday, if you wanted to find a rookie who got hit by 18 pitches in a season in the National League, you’d have to go back to 1956 when a rookie named Frank Robinson took 20 plunks for the Reds.  But now Danny Espinosa is such a rookie.  DJ Carrasco hit him in the 6th inning yesterday for Espinosa’s 18th of the season.  He leads the NL in HBP by one plunk over Justin Upton, and he’s just the 4th National Leaguer and the 11th player ever to get 18 plunks in a season as a rookie.
From Carrasco’s perspective, that was the 67th time the Mets have hit a batter this season – just three away from their single season record of 70 set in 2008.

Alex Rios took an HBP for the White Sox last night, giving the team 78 HBPs for the season. They’re one plunk away from tying the franchise record for plunks in a season. The White Sox got hit 79 times in 2005 and tied that total in 2010.

BACON race update
Jacoby Ellsbury – .835
Robinson Cano – .830
Ryan Braun – .821
Miguel Cabrera – .818
Jose Reyes – .817

John Lackey struck again last night, striking Brett Lawrie with a pitch for his 19th hit batter of the season. He’s the 10th player in the 21st century to hit 19 batters. No other pitcher has hit more than 14 batters this year so Lackey has a commanding lead in the race for the AL Phil Knell Award, and the overall major league hit batters title for 2011. That was the 101st plunk Lackey has ever thrown in the Majors.

There are only three active pitchers who have hit more batters than Lackey, and one of them also hit a batter last night. Jamey Wright threw his 142nd career plunk, moving him into a tie for 24th place on the all time list with Frank Foreman. He hit Andruw Jones, who is also no stranger to plunks as that was the 92nd of his career. Wright has now personally plunked Andruw Jones 3 times in his career, but only once this year. That’s only the 2nd hbp this season where both the batter and the pitcher had over 90 career HBPs.

Reed Johnson also took another HBP yesterday, for a career total of 113. He’s 52nd on the all time plunks list, and he’s either 9th or 7th among active players, depending on whether you’re counting Miguel Tejada and Aaron Rowand as active right now.

Robinson Cano got his 40th career plunk last night, making him the 18th player to get hit that many times for the Yankees.

BACON race update:
Jacoby Ellsbury – .841
Robinson Cano – .830
Ryan Braun – .821
Miguel Cabrera – .817
Jose Reyes – .817

Ted Lilly threw a pitch that hit Miguel Montero last night, and that wouldn’t be very interesting except that Lilly already hit Montero twice this year. That ties Lilly and Montero with Nick Blackburn and Carlos Quentin for the most HBPs this year for a single pitcher/batter matchup. Prior to this year, no pitcher had hit the same batter three times in a season since 2009 when Ryan Dempster took offense to other people sharing his first name and hit Ryan Braun three times. There haven’t been two 3-plunk matchups in the same season since 2007 when Justin Verlander hit Casey Blake three times, Daisuke Matsuzaka hit Alex Rodriguez three times and Roy Oswalt hit Josh Willingham three times. The only modern incident of a batter getting hit 4 times in a season by the same pitcher was in 1995 when Tom Candiotti hit Jeff Kent 4 times.

Roy Oswalt hit Carlos Lee for the 2nd time this season, giving the former Astros ace 25 plunks at Minute Maid Park. Lee has only taken 3 plunks this year. Overall, that was the 76th of Oswalt’s career.

BACON race update:
Jacoby Ellsbury – .838
Robinson Cano – .827
Ryan Braun – .818
Miguel Cabrera – .815
Jose Reyes – .814