Quote:
Originally Posted by G1911
What gets me is that strikeouts are treated as if they are meaningless for a batter, a not very significant measure and it's okay to rack up 150-200 of them.
Yet, they are treated as very important, one of the most important measures, for a pitcher.
As this is a direct adversarial relationship, this doesn't make sense. If a particular outcome of a plate appearance is really important positively for a pitcher, it is really bad for a batter and vice versa.
I don't so much care that we either go back to not liking batter strikeouts or not, but this should be consistent.
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I think analytics has a lot to do with this thinking. For hitters, the thinking, if I remember correctly, is that a strikeout is better then hitting into a double play so a high strikeout total is no big deal. For pitchers, strikeouts are good because you don't have to worry about fielders making a play. That’s why they're important for pitchers but not a concern for hitters. Not sure I agree with the thinking for hitters since a lot of good things can happen when you just put the ball in play.