Braves Hitters Dominated, But Win
Today, I was reminded of Cliff Lee‘s performance on May 6 of the this past year against the Braves. In 7 innings, he struck out 16 while only walking one, yet lost the game. Now that I have the great Baseball-Reference Play Index, I decided to search for all such games. Here are all the games where the starting pitcher got the loss despite striking out at least 16 and walking no more than one.
| Rk | Player | Date | Tm | Opp | Rslt | App,Dec | IP | H | R | ER | BB | SO | HR | Pit | Str | GSc |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Cliff Lee | 2011-05-06 | PHI | ATL | L 0-5 | GS-7 ,L | 7.0 | 9 | 3 | 3 | 1 | 16 | 0 | 117 | 87 | 62 |
| 2 | Jake Peavy | 2006-05-22 | SDP | ATL | L 1-3 | GS-7 ,L | 7.0 | 3 | 2 | 2 | 1 | 16 | 1 | 114 | 74 | 78 |
| 3 | Pedro Martinez | 2000-05-06 | BOS | TBD | L 0-1 | CG 9 ,L | 9.0 | 6 | 1 | 1 | 1 | 17 | 0 | 130 | 91 | 87 |
| 4 | Randy Johnson | 1999-06-30 | ARI | CIN | L 0-2 | CG 8 ,L | 8.0 | 7 | 2 | 2 | 0 | 17 | 1 | 134 | 96 | 77 |
| 5 | Randy Johnson | 1997-06-24 | SEA | OAK | L 1-4 | CG 9 ,L | 9.0 | 11 | 4 | 4 | 0 | 19 | 2 | 142 | 100 | 68 |
| 6 | Sid Fernandez | 1989-07-14 | NYM | ATL | L 2-3 | CG 9 ,L | 8.0 | 6 | 3 | 3 | 0 | 16 | 1 | 121 | 91 | 74 |
| 7 | Dwight Gooden | 1984-09-17 | NYM | PHI | L 1-2 | CG 8 ,L | 8.0 | 7 | 2 | 1 | 0 | 16 | 0 | 78 | ||
| 8 | Jim Maloney | 1965-06-14 | CIN | NYM | L 0-1 | CG 11 ,L | 11.0 | 2 | 1 | 1 | 1 | 18 | 1 | 106 |
As you see, only eight pitchers have had such poor luck, and the Braves have won three of those games. John Smoltz started both the 1989 and 2006 games, while Lonnie Smith hit a walk-off HR in the ’89 game. If anyone has ideas for such searches, let me know and I’ll try to incorporate them into posts.