27 Outs: Bryce, Felix, and the Millers

27 Outs is a weekly look around the league at some of the interesting statistics, storylines and anecdotes that caught our eye.

1. How's that for a record-setting week? The first days of May were improbable at the plate, unthinkable on the mound and unprecedented in the field. It was even unbelievable in the broadcast booth. As exciting as it was, the sobering reality is it's May 11 and roughly one-fifth of the baseball season is over. Five of the 30 weeks are in the books. Thirty-two of 162 games have been played. Forget shortening the season, how about lengthening it?

2. At this pace, there's a good chance Bryce Harper would still hit 50 homers even in a shortened 154-game schedule. Harper's power surge has him halfway to his career-high total in 100 fewer games, while his six long balls this month have him on track to hit 56 this season. Chris Davis and Jose Bautista are the only players to hit 50 since 2007.

3. But it's not all about the home runs with Harper, who smashed three in one game, tied a MLB record with five in two games and became the first player in 10 years to hit six in three games. He's also taking free passes at a career-best pace, putting him on track to walk a whopping 137 times this season. That's 18 fewer than Harper had combined during his first three years.

4. Why the sudden change in plate approach? A lot of it comes down to maturity as a hitter. Harper is swinging at fewer pitches - whether they're in the zone or not - and that selectiveness has him in the driver's seat in most at-bats. He's hitting the ball harder, more consistently and whiffing less on breaking pitches.

5. Harper's co-leader in walks, Joc Pederson, has also been putting up crooked stats of late. The Dodgers rookie went deep seven times in nine games, and at one point, his last seven hits were all home runs. He'd have Rookie of the Year locked up by now if it weren't for one of the more talented groups of first-year players in recent memory:

Even more impressive: all four rookies are older than 22-year-old Bryce Harper.

6. Speaking of home runs, who's the only player in baseball with at least three but no other extra-base hits? Hint: it's not Pederson. (Answer is 20 Outs away.)

7. Michael Pineda was on the positive end of a lopsided pairing Sunday, becoming the first pitcher in Yankees history to strike out at least 16 batters without issuing a walk. The towering right-hander now has 34 strikeouts to one free pass over his last four starts, and the scary thing for opposing teams is that he's just starting to throw his slider to devastating results.

8. Half of Pineda’s 16 strikeouts Sunday were by way of his deadly pitch - according to ESPN Stats & Info - which is two more than his combined slider strikeout total entering the outing. It's probably no coincidence that Pineda’s 22 swinging strikes - 12 off the slider alone - were the third-most in a game this season. His slider has been especially tough on lefties, who are slugging just .286 against it this season, though one wonders how hitters are even making contact with it given its ridiculous break.

9. Put your hand up if you had Pineda as the best starting pitcher in the AL East five weeks into the season. However, at this rate, with Rays pitchers Alex Cobb and Drew Smyly, and Yankees starter Masahiro Tanaka sidelined, there might not be anyone left pitching in the division by the time the year is over.

10. Good thing then the Yankees and Rays rank first and third, respectively, in the AL in starters WAR. It probably won't last given both clubs' health concerns, but it certainly helps that the division rival Blue Jays' rotation has produced the fewest wins above replacement in all of baseball.

11. That's as good a segue as any into this week's The Good, Bad and Ugly: Cy Young Edition.

The Good (great) is Felix Hernandez, who has a league-leading 6-0 record and 0.84 WHIP, in addition to the fourth-best ERA (1.85) in the AL and third-most strikeouts behind Pineda and Chris Archer. King Felix, who's also tied for the MLB lead in David Schoenfield's improved quality start stat "The Felix" with five starts of at least seven innings and two runs or fewer, also became the fourth-youngest pitcher to strike out 2,000 batters.

Felix's 2,001 strikeouts rank sixth among active pitchers:

12. The Cy Young hasn't been so kind to R.A. Dickey, who threw 18 Felixes in his award-winning 2012 season, eight during his first year in Toronto, seven last season and has just one so far in 2015. Dickey's 5.00 ERA wouldn't look so bad if his 5.76 FIP didn't look worse. The 40-year-old is almost averaging more walks (3.80) per nine than strikeouts (4.00), but the most unbelievable stat might be that no other Blue Jays starter has thrown more innings than the struggling knuckleballer.

13. It could be worse for Dickey, because it is for Corey Kluber. His season took an ugly turn this week when he tied the dubious record for most consecutive team losses for a reigning Cy Young winner with seven. Yes, Kluber is surrendering hits at an alarming rate - 51 in 44 2/3 innings - but his strikeout rate is better than Johnny Cueto's, his walk rate is lower than Clayton Kershaw's and he's giving up fewer home runs than Madison Bumgarner. Doesn't sound like an 0-5 pitcher, does it?

14. Just because wins and losses are everyone's favorite stat: Kluber and CC Sabathia are 0-10, while Mike Pelfrey, Nick Martinez and Nathan Eovaldi are 8-0.

15. Every division leader has at least 20 wins, but the composition in the leagues couldn't be more opposite. If the playoffs started today, the AL would feature a most unlikely five: the Yankees, Royals, Astros, Tigers and Twins. Compare that with the NL, where the matchups couldn't possibly be any more compelling. The Padres and Nationals would meet in the wild-card game with the winner to play the Cardinals, while the Mets and Dodgers (and Matt Harvey and Clayton Kershaw) are lined up for a first-round division series. It's May 11, but that doesn't mean we can't dream.

16. The Cardinals have won 22 of their first 31 games, no thanks to the Jason Heyward-Shelby Miller swap. Not even the Cardinals have had success in unlocking Heyward's power stroke, as the 25-year-old enters the week without a home run in his last 58 plate appearances. Miller, meanwhile, has embraced his cutter in Atlanta, throwing it more than ever before to incredible results. Miller's cutter has limited right-handers to a .111 average, .167 slugging and minuscule 0.056 isolated power.

17. It doesn't matter when or what Andrew Miller throws to the opposition because they're not hitting it anyways. How dominant has the Yankees new closer been? He's thrown 15 2/3 scoreless innings to start the year with 20 strikeouts, and no team other than the Rays even has a hit off the high-priced lefty. Here's what domination looks like plotted:

18. Miller and Dellin Betances, of course, are a big reason why the Yankees are already sitting eight games above .500. The duo has yet to allow an earned run in 35 innings this season.

19. Which isn't quite as impressive as Wandy Rodriguez's new Texas Rangers record of 34 straight batters retired. What's more remarkable, the record or the fact Wandy Rodriguez set it?

20. Perhaps it shouldn't come as a surprise then that pitchers continue to dominate hitters just over a month into the season. There's been hardly any change in league average trends five weeks in, and as long as Bartolo Colon is pitching - and hitting, for that matter - we shouldn't expect that to reverse any time soon.

21. The 41-year-old Colon, by the way, has 41 strikeouts to one walk in seven starts. The last time he threw four balls to a hitter? The sixth inning of Opening Day.

22. From one end of the spectrum to the other, Chase Utley's .099 average through the Phillies' first 30 games was the lowest mark among qualified players in over 100 years. He's since upped it to .116, but things are not looking good for the veteran second baseman, who has just one extra-base hit in 95 plate appearances this season.

23. Things are much better offensively for the Blue Jays, who enter play Monday with the most runs in the majors. Toronto is the only team in baseball with three players in the top 20 in fWAR over the past calendar year.

24. Did you know? WiI Myers and Dee Gordon are your MLB leaders in runs and hits, respectively.

25. Did you see? This Carlos Rodon slider to strike out Joey Votto in the lefty's first major-league start ...

26. Answer to Out No. 6: Hanley Ramirez has 10 homers but no doubles or triples. He's never had more home runs than doubles in a season.

27. Oh yeah, Alex Rodriguez hit a pretty historic home run last week, too. And in some respects, so did Kris Bryant. It took the Cubs phenom 74 at-bats to go deep for the first time, which is 29 fewer at-bats than it took A-Rod. It's never too early to leaderboard watch.

- Videos courtesy: MLB.com
- Stats courtesy: Baseball-Reference.com, FanGraphs, Brooks Baseball