The daymares of Carlos Frias

Carlos Frias allowed more earned runs in his fifth daytime start than in all the night starts of his career. (Jon SooHoo/Los Angeles Dodgers)

By Jon Weisman

The grand ol’ game of baseball has been primarily a night sport for decades and decades now — even Wrigley Field has been playing ‘neath the lights (when they’re working) for almost 30 years.

In his short MLB career, Carlos Frias has somehow defied that trend. The 25-year-old righty is making his 13th big-league start today — and his seventh in the sunshine.

You could excuse Frias if he wouldn’t mind a little cover of darkness.

The weird thing is that Frias’ first Major League start came in the daytime, and he pitched six shutout innings in what became an enervating 14-inning defeat September 3 at the hands of Washington.

Since then, his daytime ERA in five starts is 12.86.

Frias’ second start September 17 tilted things about as far in the negative direction as you can imagine — his infamous 10-hit, eight-run, two-out Coors Field debut. And that’s not even the most runs he’s allowed in a game. On May 24 against San Diego, Frias surrendered a first-inning grand slam and 10 runs overall in four innings.

Those two outings alone are responsible for 18 of the 37 daytime runs Frias has allowed in his career (including relief). He surrendered another six runs in his last start, a 4:15 p.m. outing June 20 against San Francisco.

At night, Frias had a 1.23 ERA in his first five starts plus five innings June 15 at Texas, before finally being touched up for a four-run sixth inning.

I’m not suggesting any of this is much more than coincidence, and I’m sharing it more because it’s odd than for any conclusions to be drawn. But one other thing that I notice is that Frias appears to have worked much more around the plate in his day starts — his strikeouts are up, his walks are down. Maybe he’s been too much in the zone?

Hopefully for the Dodgers, today’s the day he turns these daytime stats into a true anomaly.