Not long after the season ended, I wrote an article here at VEB that tried to evaluate how Mike Maddux was doing as a pitching coach. The results were pretty positive. The Cardinals have displayed the ability to consistently outperform their computer projections in multiple categories – an improvement that we can somewhat credit to coaching. Ks rose. ERA vs. FIP fell. The pitching staff improved.
This came despite a walk rate that pretty consistently underperformed. The numbers and the strategy they implied were obvious enough that I found myself quipping (sarcastically), “Maddux don’t care about no walks, though!