Xander Bogaerts’ nemesis stood atop the mound. Not some ace with a living room full of hardware. No, just a guy with a history of supplying Bogaerts with headaches.
Every neuron in Bogaerts’ brain tells him he should be able to conquer Luis Severino. Instead, he’s 2-for-32 against him. Severino haunts his nightmares.
In March, he thought it was finally his time. He thought the Law of Averages would have his back. He was due.
Twice, he stepped in to face Severino during the World Baseball Classic.
“Nothing,” said the San Diego Padres shortstop.
Two harmless flyouts to center.
“My bat doesn’t like him or something,” Bogaerts said.
There are frontline starters who silence nearly every bat they encounter, the Cy Young Award winners with mind-melting fastballs and gravity-bending sliders. Then, there are pitchers of lesser esteem who sometimes inexplicably hold a spell on certain hitters of high regard. Nothing about the results computes. The hitter knows the track record and can’t comprehend or shake it, even if it’s a small sample.
“Both parties are aware,” said Athletics slugger Brent Rooker.
For Bogaerts, Severino is the one who leaves him perplexed, the one who has him asking why this guy, of all guys, owns him.
“He’s probably the one,” Bogaerts said, “that I’ll be, like, ‘Man.’”
Severino stumps Bogaerts on July 1, 2018.
It doesn’t have to make sense. That’s baseball.
Kyle Gibson held Pete Alonso hitless in 17 at-bats.
“I think I actually have more outs than at-bats,” recalled Alonso, who has crushed Blake Snell and Corbin Burnes but could never solve Gibson, whom he has referred to as “The Nibbler.” Alonso did, in fact, hit into a double play against Gibson, along with six strikeouts.
Kyle Schwarber has clobbered Chris Sale, Kevin Gausman and Dylan Cease, but he wilted against Chad Kuhl. Schwarber said he faced Kuhl a lot when he “was not the best hitter.” He remembers Kuhl mostly as a Pittsburgh Pirate who tossed a sinker, cutter, a big curveball and a slider he couldn’t resist.
Kuhl kept Schwarber to three hits in 20 at-bats, with one walk and six strikeouts.
“I remember talking to him one time,” Schwarber said, “and being like, ‘Dude, I don’t hit you very well.’ … I would always swing at his slider and it was always a ball. Like, ‘Why am I always swinging?’ I know it’s coming, and I kept swinging.”
Kuhl gets the best of Schwarber on Sept. 4, 2017.
That’s how perennial All-Star José Ramírez assesses his 1-for-17 showing against journeyman reliever Taylor Rogers. Ramírez said Rogers throws him nothing but sinkers away, and he always hits a weak grounder to short.
“Sometimes, baseball is stupid,” Ramírez said, before flashing two thumbs up. “Sometimes, baseball is good.”
Jordan Lyles recorded a 5.22 ERA across 14 big-league seasons, but Trevor Story has an idea of how he fared against him.
“Not good!” Story shot back. Three hits in 27 at-bats, to be exact — with 13 strikeouts.
Story wondered if Lyles upped his game when the two crossed paths since they played together with the Colorado Rockies. Otherwise, it’s a simple matter of a hitting approach not jibing with a pitching style.
“There are always certain guys you don’t pick the ball up well (against),” Story said.
Paul Goldschmidt was thrilled when Ronald Belisario moved on from the Los Angeles Dodgers after the 2013 season. Belisario held Goldschmidt, then with the Arizona Diamondbacks, hitless in 10 at-bats. Pedro Báez joined the Los Angeles pen in 2014 and assumed the role of Goldschmidt’s primary tormentor.
In a 2016 sequence Goldschmidt remembers vividly, he slugged a home run off Báez that appeared to wrap around the right-field foul pole. He trotted around the bases and settled in the dugout, but a replay review reversed the decision. It was a foul ball. Goldschmidt returned to the batter’s box and struck out.
In his career against Báez, Goldschmidt, a five-time Silver Slugger Award winner, went 1-for-24 with nine strikeouts.
“You always think your next at-bat against them is going to be the one that gets it going,” Goldschmidt said.
Báez and Goldschmidt face off in Arizona on June 13, 2016.
At least, said Cleveland Guardians manager Stephen Vogt, that’s usually the hope.
“Other times,” Vogt said, “you’re like, ‘Come on, I’m facing this guy again?’”
For Vogt, a 10-year MLB vet and two-time All-Star, that was Colby Lewis, who posted a 4.70 ERA across parts of 11 seasons in the majors. Lewis held Vogt to two hits in 22 at-bats.
“I never understood why I couldn’t hit him,” Vogt said. “He got me every time.”
Steven Kwan, Cleveland’s leadoff hitter, knows that his numbers against Minnesota Twins righty Bailey Ober aren’t pretty.
“What, like, 2-for-28?” Kwan guessed.
He’s actually 3-for-23.
“Oh, I got a third one?” he said. “Hell yeah. It’s just his changeup. He has elite, elite extension and everything comes out the same. His fastball isn’t overpowering, but it looks like the not-very-fast fastball and then it just parachutes on you.
“When a guy is dominating you, it’s like, ‘Ha ha, nightmares.’ But Ober, it’s like, ‘I don’t even want to think about it.’ I just delude myself and erase my mind.”
Andrew Chafin, a lefty who has bounced around to eight teams, has given Kwan fits, too. Kwan usually runs one of the league’s lowest strikeout rates, but Chafin has struck him out three times in six encounters. It should be four, Kwan contends.
“It’s like, ‘I can’t strike out again.’ I know how many strikeouts (I have against him). He walks me. I’m like, ‘Oh, that was a close one.’ I go to the video and (the 3-2 pitch) was a strike, but the umpire called it a ball. I’m like, ‘Oh, my God. They spared me.’”
Rooker suggested the history between a batter and a pitcher becomes “a thing” after 10 at-bats. His shortcomings against Seattle Mariners righty Logan Gilbert (1-for-18, 11 strikeouts) certainly qualify, though Gilbert has given plenty of hitters trouble.
“Generally, I know what he does to get me out,” Rooker said, “and I’m trying to figure it out and combat it, but I haven’t yet.”
Nick Pivetta (0-for-8, six strikeouts) and Tanner Houck (0-for-6, five strikeouts) have stymied Rooker, too.
“That adds up,” he said.
Sometimes it’s a specific function of the pitcher’s delivery or arsenal that a hitter can’t override. Schwarber noted that Reynaldo Lopez’s “fastball away feels like it takes off. The fastball in feels like it’s a little bit more ‘cutty.’ Curveball in is really slow.” Schwarber is hitless in 12 at-bats against Lopez, with eight strikeouts.
Schwarber struggles against Lopez on Sept. 21, 2018.
Rhys Hoskins went 2-for-21 against Mike Foltynewicz in 2018 and ’19, when Hoskins was piling up homers and doubles with the Philadelphia Phillies. Hoskins described his heater as “an invisiball” that he never saw well.
Eugenio Suárez compiled a 1.298 OPS in 54 plate appearances against five-time All-Star left-hander Jon Lester, but he hasn’t yet solved southpaw J.P. Sears.
“It’s crazy,” Suárez said. “You’d never expect JP — he’s just fastball/changeup on me, and I’m 0-for-10 with seven strikeouts. He owns me.”
In the top of the fourth inning on Aug. 4, 2025, Goldschmidt told a Yankees coach: “All right, we’ll see how well I’m really swinging it,” before explaining his track record with Rangers righty Jon Gray, who was entering in relief.
Goldschmidt singled in their first duel, but he struck out and grounded out in his next two trips to the plate. In all, Goldschmidt is 3-for-21 with eight strikeouts against Gray, and he’s well aware of it.
The hitters know the history. Starling Marte recalled how Julio Teheran struck him out three times in one game in 2013. In all, Marte went 5-for-30 against Teheran. When reminded that he went 0-for-9 with four strikeouts against Rubby De La Rosa, Marte replied: “Arizona, right? Some pitchers, you feel comfortable against them, but you say, ‘Damn.’”
Chicago Cubs shortstop Dansby Swanson struggled to combat Tanner Roark’s slider early in his career, which explains his 2-for-20 effort against him. Jhoulys Chacín (0-for-12) gave him fits for similar reasons. Andre Pallante’s “herky-jerky” delivery (1-for-12) and Eliesier Hernandez’s funky release (1-for-16) have proved troublesome, too.
“I see it good,” Swanson said, “it’s just, when I hit it, I hit it foul.”
Bogaerts notched his 1,000th hit off J.A. Happ, but it was one of only nine in 49 at-bats against the southpaw.
“Sometimes when you throw very hitable (pitches),” Bogaerts said, “then you try to maybe do a little too much.”
He went 2-for-22 against Lance Lynn.
“His ball was very sneaky,” Bogaerts said.
CC Sabathia is a Hall of Famer, but that’s not the version Bogaerts remembers.
“This is CC when he wasn’t (throwing) 99 mph or whatever,” Bogaerts said of the pitcher who held him to seven hits in 39 at-bats. “I probably would’ve had no chance.”
And then there’s Kyle Gibson.
“Jesus Christ,” said Bogaerts, who went 6-for-27 against Gibson and, as Gibson remembers it, would shake his head in frustration and then flash a smile.
Gibson recorded a 4.60 ERA across 13 big-league seasons, but he quieted Miguel Cabrera, Robinson Canó, Salvador Pérez, Matt Chapman, George Springer, Carlos Correa and other stars.
“Giant slayer,” Kwan said.
Gibson retires Alonso on April 9, 2019.
Even the mention of Alonso’s name makes Gibson chuckle. Gibson said he refused to offer Alonso anything juicy over the plate, even if he risked walking him. Hence, the nickname Alonso supplied him.
Gibson would try to make Alonso think he was using a different approach, but really, he was seeking a two-strike sinker on the outside part of the plate to either strike him out or induce weak contact.
“Tell Pete ‘The Nibbler’ says hello,” Gibson said, laughing.
Said Alonso: “Very happy he retired.”
With contributions from The Athletic’s Dennis Lin, Chad Jennings, Sahadev Sharma, C. Trent Rosecrans, Charlotte Varnes and Brendan Kuty