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=== Riddle Me This, Bat-Ter ===

If you just joined us, Bonderman is one of the game's great mysteries.  His career xFIP is 4.03, because his career norms of 7.1 strikeouts, 3.1 walks, 1.1 homers, and 47% grounder rate --- > suggest a very good starter.  

For example, Ricky Romero's component stats for 2010-12 are very similar to Bonderman's, lifetime.  Derek Holland and Matt Harrison are loosely comparable to Bonderman, from a Three True Outcomes standpoint.  Jeff Neimann, 2010-12, is a carbon copy for Bonderman.

Yet here sits Bonderman with a career ERA of 4.89.  How in the world do you post an actual ERA that is over 20% higher than it should be - over the course of 1,200 innings?  Many theories have been tested.

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=== Here, Snipey Snipey ===

Could it be that Bonderman gives up big innings?  ... no, motownsports.com studied this carefully, and Bonderman does not give up crooked numbers more often than expected.

Could it be that he has a poor windup from the stretch, and/or pitches badly with men on base?  No, that certainly isn't it:  Jeremy Bonderman has a sweet compact delivery that translates to the stretch better than average.  In fact, his career SLG allowed with RISP is actually lower than his SLG allowed with nobody on base -- I doubt you'd see that very often.

Could it be that he has gopheritis, and the homers are "bunching" the bases into runs scored?  No, he doesn't have gopheritis; 1.1 is league average.

Maybe his "luck stats" -- strand rate, BABIP, and HR/fly ball -- are going against him?  Not a lot to see here ... his HR-per-fly rate is 11.7% , only a few tenths above average, and a lot of that is because of his lost 2009-10 seasons.  His strand rate is 67.3% life, instead of 70%, so maybe his bullpens have let him down a tad.  His BABIP is .306, perfectly normal.

Dr. D pulls his last handful of hair out of his head...

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=== Round Up the Un-Usual Suspect ===

Some pitchers have low BABIP's, because batters don't get good swings off them.  Usually these guys have terrific change-speed games.  Jamie Moyer, with a 27% hit rate, was the poster boy.  The young Zito.

Jeremy Bonderman is the inverse of this.  Batters seem to anticipate his velocity unusually often -- not way more often, but in baseball I've heard that percentages matter.  A baseball who guesses the velocity, he sets the back leg, loads up a bit more, and launches whistling RBI's through the defense.

Mike Marshall always said, "it's not when the batter guesses location.  It's when he guesses velocity."  With two pitches, you cannot afford to let the batter rule one pitch out!

Only about two degrees off subject ... there was a discussion on Tango, some years back, in which Bonderman was blamed for throwing fastballs on 3-1 .... Every. Single. Pitch.  ....mmmmmmmSound familiar anybody?  And, sure enough, the Tigers message boards are peppered with complaints about Bonderman being stubborn, pigheaded, refusing to have an idea out there...

Review some tape, check the rest of the data, and there y'go Amig-O.  Brandon League.  Complete with the wipeout offspeed pitch that he's in love with.  Jeremy Bonderman is Brandon League minus 5 MPH.

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Here's a funny inversion for you.  You know how Blake Beavan can get to 1-and-2 practically at will -- but has no putaway pitch whatsoever?  Jeremy Bonderman is the photo-negative of that.  Get Bonderman to two strikes, and you've got one of the best pitchers in the game.  It's scuffling out of a 1-0, 2-0, 3-1 count that is the issue...

Allow Beavan and Bonderman to stand out there playing "best ball," and you'd have yourself a regular Hisashi Iwakuma then.

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=== New Stat Proposal ===

Sabermigos run screaming into the night at the suggestion that ERA could tell you more about a pitcher than could xFIP.  But settle down, settle down.  We've got one tweak to your formula and presto, you've got The Unified Theory of Everything.

xFIP + Pitchability = ERA.

Bonderman seems to test the outer boundaries of pitchability penalties, and it has cost him about a run per nine innings.  

We're kidding a bit, because the K/BB/HR stats are of course themselves driven in part by pitchability.  You get a swing and miss (low xFIP) because you select the pitch for the occasion.  But you also yield a normal fly ball, or a line shot down the 1B line with men on base (high ERA), because you threw another flippin' fastball on 3-and-1.

In any sport, man.  I got no use for athletes who refuse to THINK out there.

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Leaving us ... where?

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