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SF Giants: Scorekeeping change significantly changes Logan Webb's ERA

A scoring change in Logan Webb's start on August 24th lowered his ERA from 3.33 to 2.99 prior to his start on Tuesday.

Marc Delucchi

SF Giants: Scorekeeping change significantly changes Logan Webb's ERA
SF Giants: Scorekeeping change significantly changes Logan Webb's ERA /
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The SF Giants defense has doomed them many times this season. By almost every traditional and advanced metric, Giants defenders have been one of the worst groups in MLB. Obviously, San Francisco's pitchers have seen their production suffer because of it. After a scorekeeping change on Tuesday, though, Giants starter Logan Webb's numbers took a drastic improvement.

In Webb's start on August 24th against the Tigers, he allowed six runs across 4.2 innings pitched. Webb had cruised through four no-hit innings on just 57 pitches before hitting a speed bump in the fifth.

Webb allowed a pair of one-out hits and a walk to load the bases with just one out. Webb struck out Riley Greene and was just one out away from escaping the rally unscathed. After getting ahead of Victor Reyes 0-2, Webb induced what looked like an inning-ending groundball to Brandon Crawford. Instead, the ball bounced off the arm of the usually surehanded Crawford and went into centerfield, allowing two runs to score. That opened the floodgates. Webb allowed back-to-back singles following the play before he was lifted for southpaw Thomas Szapucki, who allowed a bases-clearing double. In the end, six runs scored.

It seemed like a pretty clear error on Crawford, but playing in Detroit, the home team's scorekeeper decided to give Reyes a hit. That decision meant all six runs that scored were earned runs on Webb's final line. That changed on Tuesday.

Now that Crawford has been charged with an error for the play, all six runs that scored became unearned. Webb's ERA on the season had jumped to 3.33 following his start on the 24th, but after the change, it dropped to 2.99 (it is now 2.89 after his outing on Tuesday night).

The SF Giants defense has cost them plenty of runs this season, forcing their pitchers into consistently higher-stress situations. Crawford's error on August 24th ultimately cost the team six runs. Now that he has been charged with an error, none of those runs will hurt Webb's overall line.

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Marc Delucchi
MARC DELUCCHI

Marc Delucchi (he/they/she) serves as the Managing Editor at Giants Baseball Insider, leading their SF Giants coverage. As a freelance journalist, he has previously covered the San Francisco Giants at Around the Foghorn and McCovey Chronicles. He also currently contributes to Niners Nation, Golden State of Mind, and Baseball Prospectus. He has previously been featured in several other publications, including SFGate, ProFootballRumors, Niners Wire, GrandStand Central, Call to the Pen, and Just Baseball. Over his journalistic career, Marc has conducted investigations into how one prep baseball player lost a college opportunity during the pandemic (Baseball Prospectus) and the rampant mistreatment of players at the University of Hawaii football program under former head coach Todd Graham (SFGate). He has also broken dozens of news stories around professional baseball, primarily around the SF Giants organization, including the draft signing of Kyle Harrison, injuries and promotions to top prospects like Heliot Ramos, and trade details in the Kris Bryant deal. Marc received a Bachelor's degree from Kenyon College with a major in economics and a minor in Spanish. During his time in college, he conducted a summer research project attempting to predict the future minor-league performance of NCAA hitters, worked as a data analyst for the school's Women's basketball team, and worked as a play-by-play announcer/color commentator for the basketball, baseball, softball, and soccer teams. He also worked as an amateur baseball scout with the Collegiate Baseball Scouting Network (later renamed Evolution Metrix), scouting high school and college players for three draft cycles. For tips and inquiries, feel free to reach out to Marc directly on Twitter or via email (delucchimarc@gmail.com).

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