Still Blasts From The Past Despite The Number Of Slugfests, Total-Run Count Only Up Slightly

Mike Piazza and the Los Angeles Dodgers go crazy at Coors Field. Mo Vaughn and the Boston Red Sox romp at Fenway Park. The New York Yankees and Toronto Blue Jays hold a scorefest at SkyDome.

So many runs are crossing the plate this season, it seems, that it will take a calculator instead of a scoreboard to keep track.

Right?

“Well, actually, the increase isn’t what people might think,” said Tom Hirdt of the Elias Sports Bureau. “In fact, it’s not really much of an increase at all.”

Because for all the 17-11 slugfests there have been - White Sox-Red Sox and Dodgers-Rockies - there have been just as many low-scoring affairs.

These are the numbers:

Through the first two weeks this season, there has been an average of 10.50 runs per game.

Through the first two weeks of last season, there was an average of 10.36.

Basically, that’s a difference of about one broken-bat, RBI single every so often.

“It’s still too early to start talking about trends,” Hirdt said. “The only thing of interest is that last year was such a dynamo year for offense.”

And, for sure, from the time the Dodgers beat Florida 8-7 on opening night, hitters appeared to be ahead of pitchers.

That was mostly because of the shortened spring training. With workout time cut in half, down to three weeks, there just wasn’t as much time to get ready, and that led to an early run on runs.

The Oakland Athletics lost 13-1 to Toronto on opening night, and gave up 28 runs in their first three games. For a few days, it looked like such romps might become run of the mill.

“I think there’s a lot of things attributed to that,” A’s catcher Terry Steinbach said. “As soon as you see big scores right away, you assume it’s the pitchers’ fault.

“I know in a couple of our games where we had some big scores, we didn’t play defense. So you really have to go back and look at how those runs were scored,” he said. “Any time you take eight months off, counting a month-and-a-half in ‘94 and some of ‘95, I mean you can’t just step right in and expect everything to be right there.”

As expected, it took awhile for any pitcher to last nine innings. It didn’t happen until Cincinnati’s Kevin Jarvis pitched the first complete game of the year on Wednesday, the 16th day of the season.

Meanwhile, many hitters are taking advantage of pitchers who soon might be back in the minors. Because of the short spring, teams have been allowed to carry 28-man rosters - most of the extra players are pitchers - until Monday’s cutdown date to the usual 25.

By then, Vaughn, whose Red Sox scored 30 runs in their first three games, Matt Williams and Mickey Tettleton will already have hit their share of home runs.

Piazza chose to pick on the Colorado Rockies, playing at new Coors Field. In three games last weekend, he went 11-for-16 with three homers and 11 RBIs.

Denver, already a haven for hitters, seems to be even better this year, particularly for left-handers who pull. The right-field fence at Coors is only 350 feet, compared to 370 last season at Mile High Stadium.

Before Piazza’s power surge, though, remember that a few days earlier the Dodgers and San Francisco played a game that was scoreless into the 15th inning. On Thursday, too, Cincinnati and Florida also went into the 15th inning tied at 1.

Then again, there was a series at SkyDome, where the Yankees and Blue Jays played three games that totaled 48 runs and 81 hits.

“It’s not a very secure feeling - you see guys swinging the bats like that and you just hope you’re the last guy pitching and they finally got tired running around all those bases,” Yankees reliever Steve Howe said.”I would say yeah, in the sense of you know pitchers are executing more of their pitches. They’re eliminating more of their mistakes,” he said.