Wednesday, September 30, 2009

Kyle Baked Us A Pie!

Pie for breakfast? Go ahead, Fackers, you know you want to.

Delicious, isn't it? Don't sound so surprised. Don't you remember Kyle's peanut butter cookies? His fiancee (now wife) called him "Betty Crocker" in that Daily News article fluff piece/transparent attempt by his publicist to make people hate him less that was published just before last season, but he really out did himself last night, didn't he?

At 10:11 PM last night, PeteAbe chimed in with this update to his game thread:
Farnsworth in to pitch. Krazy Kyle for my last game. How appropriate. Back in a bit with reaction from the 4-3 victory. Where is Soria?
(Pete answered his own question after the game, noting that Soria converted a 46 pitch save on Sunday against the Twins and wasn't available.)

Moments later, Matt sent me a text that read:
Farnsworhtless?!?! Get the pie ready.
With all due respect to John Sterling, sometimes you can predict baseball.

They've only been tracking blown saves since 2002, but over that span Kyle Farnsworth has converted 24 saves and blown 26. During that same time frame Mariano Rivera has saved 311 and blown 28. Granted, you can blow a save even when you don't have a chance to convert one, which is how Scott Proctor has a lone career save but 14 blown ones.

Still Farnsworth has a mind-numbingly bad save conversion rate considering his ERA is only about a half of a run higher in save situations and his peripherals don't vary significantly based on game situation or leverage. WPA says he's about as clutch as you would expect a late inning reliever with a career ERA just under league average to be.

He famously blew a save against the White Sox by serving up a three run homer to Jim Thome on Opening Day in his first appearance as a Royal. After two scoreless innings, he was tagged with the loss in back to back games and his ERA sat at 18.90. Then he went 17 games and 17 2/3 IP without giving up a run to bring his ERA down to 3.00 but over that span was inserted to the game with a lead only 4 times, and in those games the average margin was six runs. Then, in his very next outing Trey Hillman brought him into a tie game in the bottom of the tenth and he lost the game before recording an out.

Before last night, The Farns had given up only one run in his last ten games. But lo and behold as soon as he was placed in to save situation, shit hit the fan. it wasn't really his fault though. He gave up real one base hit; the other two never even left the infield. But thanks to a throwing error by his catcher and some otherwise terrible luck, Krazy Kyle was the goat once again.

I hated him as much as the next guy when he was on the Yankees, but when they traded him for Pudge Rodriguez and he openly cried in the locker room, I have to admit, my first reaction wasn't to mock him, it was to feel sorry for the guy. It's not like he wanted to blow all of those games, and you would probably cry too if you boss came into your office and informed you that you had to pack up your things and more to fucking Detroit.

A while back, Joe Posnanski put together a few Kyle Farnsworth facts, which are similar to Chuck Norris facts, except exactly opposite:
  • Every dog has his day … except Kyle Farnsworth.
  • When Kyle Farnsworth gets 21, it’s not blackjack.
  • A rolling stone gathers no moss … it’s all on Kyle Farnsworth.
  • A broken clock is right twice a day … which is more than Kyle Farnsworth.
  • When Kyle Farnsworth lands on Free Parking in Monopoly, he has to pay.
  • Two wrongs don’t make a right. They make a Kyle Farnsworth inning.
  • There’s no crying in baseball, except when Kyle Farnsworth comes in.
Yours in the comments.

4 comments:

  1. Even a blind squirrel gets a nut once in a while... but not Kyle Fransworth.

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  2. From the bottom, the only way you can go is up...unless you're Kyle Farnsworth.

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  3. Never say never, unless you're saying "Kyle Farnsworth should never pitch with the lead".

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  4. If you don't have anything nice to say, you're probably talking about Kyle Farnsworth.

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