Justice Served, IV

A couple of interesting letters regarding the lists:

First Steve

I saw your list of the post-season records of pitchers, and one thing stands out to me: How is it possible for Sandy Koufax to have three losses with a
.95 ERA? Well, I know exactly how it's possible, but crikey, the 60s were brutal for hitters.

(It's actually amazing how many of the pitchers with low ERAs had a lot of losses. I wonder if their opposing pitchers were also on those lists.)

To wit I replied:

Actually the Dodger defense was the main culprit:

On Oct 6, 1959, Koufax lost 1-0 against one-year wonder Bob Shaw of the White Sox even though the Dodgers out-hit the Sox 9-5. The only run scores on a Sherm Lollar doubleplay ground ball after Nellie Fox and Jim Landis singled (and Fox advanced to third). He pitched 7 innings, gave up 5 hits, one run (earned), and one walk, and struck out 6. The crowd was 92,706 at the Coliseum, a World Series record at the time.

On Oct 7, 1965, he lost 5-1 to Jim "Kitty" Kaat, who drove in 2 runs for Minnesota. The Dodgers committed 3 errors on the night--one of the runs he gave up was on a Giliam error on Versalles to lead off the sixth. Oliva doubled him in and then scored on a Killebrew single. Koufax's line was 6 IP, 6 H, 2 R, 1 ER, 1 BB, 9 K.

On Oct 6, 1966, he lost 6-0 to the Orioles Jim Palmer. The game hinged on three Willie Davis errors in the fifth. With Boog Powell on first and one out (after a botched Deron Johnson bunt attempt), Davis dropped a Paul Blair fly ball after losing it in the sun, men at second and third. Then Andy Etchebarren flied to shallow center and Davis dropped the ball again, scoring Powell. Davis' throw to third to nab Blair was wild scored Blair and moved Etchebarren to third. Etchebarren then scored on a two-out Luis Aparicio double down the left field line. All three runs were unearned. Koufax did give up a sixth-inning triple to Frank Robinson and a run-scoring single to Powell. A Deron Johnson single, a Ron Fairly throwing error, and an IBB to Blair loaded the bases with one out. Koufax then induced Etchebarren to ground into a doubleplay to avoid further damage. The Dodgers had six errors on the night (5 while Koufax was pitching). His line was 6 IP, 6 H, 4 R, 1 ER, 2 BB, 2 K.

Thanks to Neft and Cohen's World Series book.

Jeff Moore asks:

I was surprised that Scott Brosius didn't make any of those lists. I'm not arguing for him because I don't have the stats, but he always seemed to be hitting .300 in the world series and getting the big hit, even though he was only playing well every other regular season.

Do you have his stats for world series or post-season only?

Why, yes, I do.

Brosius made the service list with 58 postseason apperances. His OPS in the playoffs overall wasn't great, just .693. His .862 OPS in the World Series just missed the list. He did have some great series (1998 Div Series, ALCS, and WS; 99 WS; and 20000 WS), but he was pretty bad in the other series. I guess when you have 196 ABs, numbers start to come down to earth.