The Lowest Payroll in Baseball

Joe Posnanski on the Kansas City Royals:

And then there's the most startling one of all -- the folks are Royals Authority did a post with the rather frank headline: "Kyle Davies Is Historically Awful." It seems a harsh judgment for a nice guy like Kyle. but it's also pretty much indisputable. I like their numbers, but I'll try to do it even more simply:

Highest ERAs in baseball history with 125-plus starts:
1. Kyle Davies, 5.59
2. Jimmy Haynes, 5.37
3. Kevin Ritz, 5.35
4. Scott Elarton, 5.29
5. Jose Lima, 5.26

Three Royals on that list. Hmm. Anyway ...

At 125 starts, Davies has the fifth-highest WHIP ever -- and he comes by it honestly. His 4.29 walks per nine innings is absurdly high. His 10.21 hits per nine is, historically, even worse. His 78 ERA+ -- which adjusts ERA by era -- is the third worst ever behind Phil Ortega and Wade Blassingame. He has the sixth-lowest WAR. He is one of only 19 pitchers to start at least 125 games without throwing a single shutout. Over his entire career, major league hitters are hitting .286/.364/.461 which means he basically turns every hitter in the game into Ron Santo.

Here's my favorite one: Davies has a 32.8% quality start percentage -- meaning he throws a quality start fewer than one out of three times. That is the lowest percentage since 1950, which is how far back Baseball Reference figures the stat. No starter in the last 60 years has been LESS likely to throw you at least six innings and give up three or fewer runs.

That is just brutal.