Believers in sabermetrics — and Breslow is one — can point to a specific number as the reason his 2011 ERA nudged up to 3.79, the highest in his six major-league seasons. Opponents had a batting average of .348 on balls they put in play, which was 80 percentage points higher than his career average. Simply put, opponents found holes.
Several other factors indicate that 2011 was a fluke. Breslow’s ratios of strikeouts and walks per nine innings remained about the same as in previous years. On top of that, he gave up about half as many home runs as in each of the previous two seasons.
All signs are promising.
“Any time you have a large enough sample size to draw some significance, there is a season that exists as an outlier -- you would expect a regression to the mean. That’s what averages say,” said Breslow, acquired to add a second left-hander to the bullpen.
The mean in previous seasons he received consistent work was 65 appearances, a 3.06 ERA, a 1.10 WHIP and an ability to go two innings at a time.
Breslow , 31, has long been a fan of the deeper numbers mined in Bill James’ ground-breaking research. Breslow and then-Oakland teammate Brandon McCarthy met and briefly spoke with James last fall at the Bay Area premiere of “Moneyball.”
Breslow graduated from Yale in 2002 with degrees in molecular biophysics and biochemistry and an inclination to attend medical school. His background has led him to be labeled the smartest man in baseball, although his clubhouse manners say otherwise.
“He doesn’t have that type of ego where he has to show everybody how smart he is," Oakland manager Bob Melvin said. "In fact, he goes just the opposite direction to make sure he fits in."
Ten years later, after putting off NYU medical school, he is still going strong, his career resurrected when then-San Diego general manager Kevin Towers signed him out of a tryout camp for independent league players before the 2005 season.
“Nothing will make you think about what your contingency plans are more than getting fired,” Breslow said.
“He’s really maximized his opportunity in the game,” said new and former teammate Brad Ziegler, who also made the major leagues after a stint in an independent league.
“He can think through things, the logical side of it.”
There was no “ah-ha” moment to his immersion in advanced metrics, Breslow said, although the processes involved are similar to the analysis a doctor might make. He became interested with medicine when, at 9 years old, doctors mended his broken wrist. His sister’s battle with cancer — she is a survivor — increased his awareness, too.
“Solutions to problems are fascinating to me. It probably makes sense, considering the way I would look to sabermetrics to answers for things,” he said.
“I think a differential diagnosis would be the medical equivalent of a scouting report or a plan of attack for a hitter. Well, what if I throw this? How does he respond to this? What are the tendencies? What are the symptoms?”
The traditional stat lines did not go deep enough.
“I like definitive, quantitative explanations for things. The more you understand the game, the more you understand how circumstantial certain things are, how arbitrary certain statistics are and how foolish it is to manage according to those arbitrary statistics,” Breslow said.
The practical application comes when deciding if changes are necessary.
"You kind of look at it in terms of the big picture and say, 'Do I need to stick this out and expect to return to what my career numbers are, or is something drastically different and do I need to make an adjustment?,'" he said.
The read after 2011?
No drastic changes are necessary.
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