Halladay and Hits

My friend PK analyzed Doc Halladay's stats and came up with this intriguing finding:

He gives up a ton - a ton - of hits. It's admirable how few walks he yields, but the price he pays for that precision -- his ball is always around the plate -- is that he gives up a ton of hits. In 115 innings, he's given up 108 hits so far this year.

To put that in perspective, in 100 innings, Josh Johnson has given up just 72 hits. He has 26 BBs, 10 more than Halladay, but his ERA is 1.80 and Doc's is 2.43. The reason? He gives up so many fewer hits. He's effectively wild. Bases on balls are the evil bogeyman of baseball, but for a great pitcher, walking a couple guys per 9 innings is not that big of a deal.

Jimenez has given up just 65 hits in 101 innings. In 109 innings, Adam Wainwright has given up 80 hits; Matt Cain, in 100 innings, just 72 hits. They all have better ERAs than Halladay.
This year's hit parade for Halladay is historically on average. In '09, over 239 innings, he gave up 234 hits. It's just the way he pitches.

This is not a complaint of mine, he's a really wonderful pitcher. It's just that I now realize, he's not a historically significant pitcher. He's not Pedro/Maddux/Big Unit, he's not a Seaver, he's not a Palmer.

He's never had an ERA below 2.50. (There was 1 season where he had a 2.40-ish ERA, but only in 19 starts.)

He is just always so around the plate, that as batters you know where the ball is gonna be and you go up there hacking. And since the ball is around the plate, in good spots, when you put wood on the ball, there's a good chance you're gonna hit it solidly. I really have no idea how he ever threw a perfect game.