Pitchers who have allowed the most extra base hits

Earlier in the week, the Yankees opened up a “huge” lead of a 1.5 games because the Orioles stumbled and dropped three of four, including two of three to the Blue Jays.

Well, guess what? The Yankees lost ugly to the Blue Jays last night, 6-0, and have now dropped two of three overall (and the third time in five games) and their lead is now one game and one game in the (all together now) all important loss column.

We may have also have seen the last of Ivan Nova (12-8) in an important game after he allowed four runs and six hits in 4.2 innings, who walked two and struck out four. Two of the hits he allowed were of the extra-base variety.  In Nova’s last two starts, he’s lasted all of seven innings and has allowed seven runs on six extra base hits.

This season, Nova has thrown a lot of pitches in the middle of the plate and he has paid the price

Ivan Nova has allowed 52 doubles, seven triples, and 28 homers

But this is nothing new this season for Ivan, who has often been terrible. Nova leads the majors in allowing extra base hits and was the inspiration of this list of pitchers who have surrendered the most extra base hits.

This is a great list because it is a telling stat about the pitcher’s effectiveness.

Here are clues to looking at the list below:

• Ignore the won-list record.
• Look at the ERAs and you will see only six these 25 pitchers have an ERA below 4.00.
• You will see only four below 3.90.
• You will see only Hiroki Kuroda and Matt Harrison with ERAs below 3.50.
• You will see Ivan Nova on top.

Rk	Player	XBH	Tm	G	W	L	W-L%	ERA
1	Ivan Nova	87	NYY	28	12	8	.600	5.02
2	Ian Kennedy	84	ARI	31	14	11	.560	4.14
3	Bruce Chen	80	KCR	33	11	13	.458	5.13
4	Jon Lester	78	BOS	32	9	14	.391	4.94
5	Phil Hughes	78	NYY	31	16	13	.552	4.10
6	Jeremy Guthrie	78	TOT	32	7	12	.368	4.82
7	Mike Leake	76	CIN	29	8	9	.471	4.73
8	Luke Hochevar	74	KCR	31	8	15	.348	5.43
9	Clayton Richard	74	SDP	32	14	13	.519	3.91
10	Henderson Alvarez	73	TOR	30	9	14	.391	4.91
11	Randy Wolf	71	TOT	30	5	10	.333	5.65
12	Ervin Santana	71	LAA	29	9	12	.429	4.93
13	Joe Blanton	71	TOT	30	9	13	.409	4.86
14	Rick Porcello	70	DET	30	9	12	.429	4.68
15	Jason Vargas	70	SEA	32	14	11	.560	3.94
16	Tommy Hanson	70	ATL	30	13	9	.591	4.38
17	Ricky Romero	69	TOR	31	9	14	.391	5.76
18	Hiroki Kuroda	69	NYY	31	14	11	.560	3.34
19	Ubaldo Jimenez	68	CLE	31	9	17	.346	5.55
20	Mat Latos	68	CIN	32	13	4	.765	3.52
21	James Shields	67	TBR	32	15	9	.625	3.62
22	Tim Lincecum	67	SFG	32	10	15	.400	5.15
23	Edwin Jackson	67	WSN	29	9	10	.474	3.77
24	Matt Harrison	67	TEX	31	18	10	.643	3.26
25	Dan Haren	67	LAA	29	12	12	.500	4.32

Provided by Baseball-Reference.com: View Play Index Tool Used
Generated 9/28/2012.

Ivan Nova Versus Lefties

Ivan Nova hasn't lost a game for the New York Yankees since June 3rd of last season. And while wins and losses are the worst gauges of a pitcher's performance, his streak of 14 wins dating back to June 10th of 2011 is impressive nonetheless.

What's especially impressive has been Nova's performance against left-handed hitters.  Since the start of his streak on June 10th, Ivan Nova has held lefties to a .227 batting average and a .285 wOBA, compared to .274 and .324 to righties respectively.  He's given up just three HRs to lefties in those 20 games, compared to nine HRs to righties.

Ivan Nova Pitch Location to LHB, June 10th - PresentIvan Nova vs. LHB, June 10th to PresentNova has kept the ball away from lefties for the most part and limited the damage. His sinking fastball down and away has likely contributed much to his overall success. While the win streak is bound to end at some point this season, Nova should continue to see good results if he keeps up this pitching pattern.

Ivan Nova's Curveball

Ivan Nova Curveballs

	P	Zone%	Chase%	Miss%
2011 Season	589	41.3%	26.0%	26.6%
4/9/2012	23	60.9%	55.6%	45.5%

Ivan Nova's curveball was really working last night. In two strike counts, he threw the pitch ten times, resulting in no hits and five strikeouts. Of those five strikeouts, four came on curveballs located out of the zone. I'd like to think that he was able to set that up by locating his curve in the strike zone throughout the game. If batters were aware that Nova was willing to throw the pitch in the zone, they were probably more likely to hack at it in two strike counts.

The two hits he gave up on curves were both located inside the strike zone: a double by Wieters in the 4th on a 2-1 pitch with the bases empty, and a single by Adam Jones in the 6th on an 0-1 pitch with the bases empty.

The one backwards K Nova recorded with his curveball last night came in the bottom of the seventh against Robert Andino. That must be why he was so testy after the game....