Monday, February 8, 2010

Jeff Keppinger, and that low walk rate

A Friday post got some of us wondering about Jeff Keppinger's high percentage of pitch selectivity and the surprisingly low number of walks. So let's take us a gander.
















SplitPAsAvg.Walk%BABIP
1st Pitch41.486n/a.438
After 1-0148.20814.9%.270
After 2-065.19627.7%.209
After 3-021.00066.7%.000
After 0-1155.2413.2%.270
After 1-1143.2766.3%.308
After 2-186.24312.8%.269
After 3-136.11147.2%.118
After 0-246.1590%.200
After 1-283.2222.4%.053
After 2-269.2884.3%.321
Full Count38.17923.7%.185


Alright, so a little analysis:

-Keppinger had 27 walks in 344 plate appearances, for a 7.8% walk rate.
-Keppinger either hit a home run, or got out in 41 of those appearances (11.9%). It's worth noting that, of Keppinger's seven homers in 2009, three of them came on the first pitch.
-Keppinger's highest OPS in a non-three-ball count was at 1-1, in which he hit .333/.333/.513 (though he hit .486/.500/.857 when connecting on the first pitch.)
-After 3-0, Keppinger walked in 14 of his 21 plate appearances.
-Keppinger got to a three-ball count in just 18.3% of his plate appearances, and worked the count full in 11.0% of his PAs.
-The count he saw the most often was 2-2 (49 PAs), just ahead of 1-2 (47 PAs). With a 2-2 count, Keppinger hit .306/.306/.408.
-He drew a first-pitch ball in 48.8% of plate appearances lasting more than one pitch.
-Keppinger drew just five walks after getting a first-pitch strike. So once he was behind, he was going to stay behind, with OPS' of .592, .424, and .587 (0-1, 0-2, 1-2, respectively).