| 12 October 2010
Before the 2010 baseball season began, we asked you guys to make your predictions for the expected starting roster. It's time to look back and see who knew their 2010 Red Sox the best.
Daniel Bard (see original post here)
Below you'll find Bard's actual 2010 stats in RED, my predictions in italics and the Fan Predictions.
We all saw Daniel Bard's potential in 2009: 63 Ks in 49 innings, 100 MPH fastballs, etc. But I think most of us expected him to experience some growing pains in his first full season in the bigs.
Turns out "most of us" were wrong and Bard proved to be one of the elite RPs in the American League in 2010.
Bard logged more game and more innings than most of us expected... only Serpico0077 predicted more than 70 inning pitched - save for DickHealy who expected record-breaking numbers from Bard this season.
I predicted 4 saves and a healthy number of holds, but truthfully, I expected the Sox to be cautious with Bard and I expected better performances from guys like Okajima and Delcarmen. But when the bullpen imploded, Bard became Francona's one reliable option, and he tallied an AL best 32 holds and finished among the leaders in innings pitched.
Interestingly, most of us expected high strikeout numbers from Bard, even though no one predicted more than 70 appearances. Bard's 76 Ks in 74.2 innings gave him a smidge more than a strikeout per inning, which put him among AL leaders like Matt Thorton (81 K/60.2 IP), Joba Chamberlain (77 K/71.2 IP) and Joaquin Benoit (75 K/60.1 IP). BafF092003 and treeroot7 guessed closest with 78 Ks.
Bard's K totals were impressive, but he also walked 30 batters, which, unfortunately, put him among the leaders in the that category as well. However, he only allowed 45 hits, giving him a .176 BAA which ranked him 2nd only to Benoit in the AL. That enabled him to keep his WHIP down below our projected average of 1.19. BillMorlock came closest at 1.09 but as we will see in the ERA category, no one really expect Bard to be as unhittable as he was.
As we mentioned with Papelbon, the ERA of a reliever isn't a very useful stat. Becuase of the limited innings, a few bad outings can balloon a relievers ERA, even when he is having a solid season overall. Though he did allow 6 homers, Bard allowed just 16 runs in 2010 and logged a 1.93 ERA. For comparison, Joba allowed 35 runs over 71+ innings and finished with a 4.40 ERA, while Benoit allowed just 9 runs through 60 innings and finished with a 0.68 ERA.
We all expected Bard to be good, but 1.93 was much better than any of our participants expected - especially compared to Papelbon's final ERA of 3.90.
Bottom Line: We didn't have anyone come close enough in multiple categories to declare a free t-shirt winner for this round, but many of you made predictions for other players, so be sure to check back through October as we breakdown the other guys.
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