Gavin Williams, one of two aces on the Cleveland Guardians roster, had opened Monday’s start against the Chicago White Sox with five scoreless innings. He had to put out a couple of fires already, so his mental and physical energy was starting to dwindle come that sixth frame.
He opened that inning by allowing a single to Andrew Benintendi. The next batter, Tristan Peters, would define Williams’ outing.
Had Williams quickly retired Peters, he would have left with a runner at first base and one out, or perhaps manager Stephen Vogt would have kept him in the game and given him a chance to find his way out of it. However, he lost an 18-pitch battle to Peters, who worked a valuable walk to put runners at first and second with no outs.
Having reached 113 pitches after that battle, Williams was taken out of the game, and the rest is history: Chicago went on to score six runs in that inning, two of them charged to Williams.
That long plate appearance sure made researchers work.
“The 18-pitch plate appearance was the longest Williams has endured in his major league career. According to Elias Sports, it tied for the third-most pitches in a plate appearance since 2000, and tied for the longest plate appearance ending in a walk over that span, which is as far back as Elias could confirm,” Joe Noga of Cleveland.com wrote.
There you have it. Williams, in his MLB career at least, had never had to endure such a long plate appearance. And hey, he was very competitive despite not getting what he wanted: he threw some nasty pitches to Peters that he either took or fouled.
The fact that only two at-bats since 2000 featured more pitches than the Williams-Peters battle is nothing short of amazing. It was two talented guys competing, both physically and mentally.
In many ways, that battle decided the game and paved the way for Chicago’s 7-3 win. But the ‘war’ is far from over: Cleveland still controls its own destiny and can take possession of the AL Central with wins on Tuesday and Wednesday.
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