Ryan Howard has now had 752 PAs against left handed pitchers. His line?

.221/.304/.440 (OPS: .744) with strikeouts in 41.4% of ABs. In 2008 against LHP he has hit:

.184/.254/.337 (OPS: .591), striking out just over 44% of the time.

It is time to stop playing Ryan Howard against left handers. More evidence and ideas inside.

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Jimmy Rollins is frequently maligned for hacking at the first pitch of his at bats. In fact, his Baseball Reference page even states that "[he] is often criticized for swinging at the first pitch, which normally leads to him flying out or grounding out."

However, recently, in the post "A Stroll Through Spring Stats", dajafi decided to look up the numbers. In the last 3 years, Rollins has put the first pitch into play 299 times with a line of:

.338/.341/.535

At first glance, these numbers seem pretty impressive. He certainly does significantly better than he has hit cumulatively over the last 3 years:

.285/.340/.455

So, should Rollins be swinging at more first pitches? Already, hitting the first pitch 299 seems like an awfully high percentage of times to put the ball into play on the first pitch. It doesn't even count swings and misses! To answer this question, let's compare Rollins to the rest of the league and the Phillies.

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