Former Sun Devil Willie Bloomquist has an abysmally bad showing in a statistic that we – even with our illustrious Arizona State degrees – can’t quite wrap our minds around.

There is going to come a time in your life – probably when you’re bouncing your grandson on your knee, regaling him with stories of ASU baseball players of old – when someone (probably said grandson) will ask you, “What player had the lowest isolated power number you’re ever seen?”

One of three things will happen. There’s probably a 90 percent chance you’ll say, “I have no idea what isolated power is because stats like that are for nerds.” There is maybe a seven percent chance you’ll say, “I don’t know, probably Omar Vizquel.” And there is a three percent chance you’ll say, “Oh, former Sun Devil Willie Bloomquist. Let me tell you ‘bout his 2008 …”

Bloomquist, who played at ASU from 1997 to 1999, has had a truly amazing year in regard to extra-base hits. On July 10, his best game of the season, Bloomquist went 3-for-6 with a double. And, um, that’s it. He didn’t have another extra-base hit before and he hasn’t had one since. And now that Bloomquist is on the disabled list with a hamstring injury, he will probably finish 2008 with exactly one at bat resulting in more than 90 feet of total bases.

Don’t take this as a knock on Bloomquist. That means Bloomquist has the lowest ISO —.006 — of any position player with a minimum 175 at bats in baseball this year, and the lowest in more than 30 years.

We know you’re asking yourself, so what is isolated power?

Well, ISO (as we seamheads refer to it) is slugging percentage minus batting average. Basically, it’s a good measure of power because it takes singles out of the equation. Batting average treats every total base the same, so when you eliminate the batting average, you eliminate one total base from each hit, thus eliminating singles. A player with a high ISO is accumulating more total bases per plate appearance than a player with a lower ISO. Anyway, it’s impossible to have a negative number for an ISO, but it’s not impossible to have a zero.

(See Mind Game by the editors of Baseball Prospectus to learn more.)

So just how incredible is it for a position player to make nearly 200 plate appearances and have such a low ISO? Well, how about this: the top three pitchers in the Arizona Diamondbacks’ rotation — Brandon Webb, Dan Haren and Randy Johnson — all have a higher ISO than Bloomquist this year.

Since 1975, only five players with at least 175 plate appearances have even been close to Bloomquist’s ISO, most recently Juan Pierre posting a .010 as a rookie in 2000. The last player to have a year like Bloomquist was Larry Lintz, who had one double in 183 plate appearances in 1975.

Bloomquist won’t finish with enough at bats for his batting average to qualify; he won’t even come close. And it’s a shame, because we might go a long time before anyone approaches a .006 ISO ever again.

So when you’re regaling your grandson with stories about big league ballplayers who nearly went through entire seasons without an extra-base hit, be sure to mention one of your favorite former Sun Devil infielders.

Extra Innings
Dennis Sarfate is headed back to the Orioles bullpen, which is probably a good thing. A member of ASU’s 2000 squad, Sarfate was having a nice season in relief, holding opposing batters to a .202 average. But he’s walked entirely too many batters this year and was not surprisingly torched in four starts …

And as we reported in this space last week, Andre Ethier continues to be a monster for the Dodgers. He’s batting .357 with four home runs since Manny Ramirez joined the Dodgers and he belted a game-winning homer on Sunday (and we have video to prove it).

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