Don Sutton

Has a great 10mm card. zero HR chances against LH and (in Dodger '78 9-9-12-12) has what amounts to about 1 chance in 108 for RH. I have used him several times and he always seems to give up over 50 HR a year, obviously off the batter's card. Once or twice, I would chalk it up to the luck of the dice. But man, every year?

Is it just me?

It is not just you. It is ATG.
The card was not going to replicate his stats against lineups stacked with top hitters from different eras.

For his card to come close to reproducing the 1972 season within typical statistical variations, he would have to face onlythe 1972 schedule, players, and stadiums.

His biggest "asymmetric" advantage is the lack of those BP singles against lefties, which is much more uncommon than lack of BPHRs

at this moment thru 147 games, in Griffith Park a 0/0 #HR rated ballpark. Keefe, the most expensive card, has given up 26 HR's to RBP's alone. he doesn't have ANY HR opportunities on his card. he has allowed only 5 to LHB's. Hilltop IS in my division, but the other 2 parks r both rated 1/1 for #HR's. he has allowed 8 total ballpark opportunity HR's for the season. its bad luck and a Strat flaw. it is a 100 mil league for whatever that's worth. very frustrating. you feel like Strat has gone Astro on you when you invest that much in a pitcher with Zero, Nada, Zilch Homerun opportunities and he gives up over 30!!! Fug It!

Very nice card, but about .35 overpriced

The thing with Keefe is that he gave up so few home runs because of the era he pitched in, not some magic ability to keep the ball in the park. If he played against modern players, with a modern ball, and modern parks, he would have given up more home runs, and if he pitched regularly against superstar lineups he would have given upon a ton. If you replicate his conditions, and play in a league with all deadball parks, and deadball hitters, he'd give up very few home runs. But ATG teams play in all sorts of parks with very good hitters throughout the lineup. Keefe would have given up plenty of home runs to the Yankees or the A's of the 20s and 30's. It's all in the context. It isn't a "strat" problem it's just the nature of ATG. If you give all the deadball pitchers some mechanic to prevent home runs, everyone would use them even more, and then you'd have other silly stats like Bonds hitting only 20 home runs in a season.

All of that makes sense. I guess then there is a 'baseline' number of offensive HR's which all pitchers will give up. Pitchers like Keefe won't be adding to this baseline total. Pitchers with more HR's will add to that.

So, while Sutton gives up 50 per year, maybe a pitcher like Rasmussen will give up 65-75 because he has 4/108 hard HR's and another 3-4 BPHR per side.

It depends a lot on the salary cap you're playing at. It's not uncommon for pitchers with no, or minimal, HRs on their cards to give up 75 HR in a year in a 200M league. Consider that in a 200M league, teams might AVERAGE 300 HR a year. So a starter with a lot of innings is going to give up a lot of HR, entirely off the hitters cards, pitching against lineups stacked with superstars and in mostly HR parks.
In leagues with lower caps, the pitchers' HR totals will be lower, but it still won't be uncommon for a pitcher with no or minimal HR on their cards to give up 30 HR or more.