Sac up for the old man

Tonight in Philly, Jamie Moyer became the oldest player in MLB history to throw a complete game shutout. The 47-year-old lefty threw 105 pitches, 71 for strikes, and allowed just two baserunners -- two singles to Troy Glaus -- and faced just one batter over the minimum. It's career win #262, dropped his ERA for the season to 4.38, and raised his record to 4-2 for the year. It's really not stretching the truth to say that Moyer has been their second best starting pitcher in 2010. About the only thing that Moyer didn't do tonight was hit; the 0-for-4 dropped him down to .182.

Part of this is just Moyer keeping a great run by the Phillie starting pitchers going, and part of it is also that the Brave offense isn't all that serious right now... but none of that gets into the larger issue of where Moyer is now. Here's a few more numbers for the man who really is unparalleled in MLB history. He's now 51-33 in his 110 Phillies starts, in just under 600 innings. He's done that despite an ERA that's almost always over 4, with a WHIP that's always over 1.35, and being quite homer prone, with one coming every six innings or so -- 92 as I write this. And that leads me to the following theory; the Phillies, as a team, just seem to swing the bats better when Moyer is on the hill. And they always bring the leather, too.

Now, I realize that you can probably run the numbers to show that what I'm seeing anecdotally has no bearing in the real world. But it's just not the feeling you get from the games in which Moyer starts, and it just doesn't jibe with what your gut says... which is that any time that you play a baseball game with a man who is old enough to be the father if many of his teammates on the hill, you probably sack up. Especially when he's the active leader in wins, and the 40th all-time. And he doesn't even throw hard.