relative stats pro's and cons
Joseph C. Earls (Tantasqua RS)
Trying not to repeat myself but seeing these as open questions still:
1- Do era-relative stats deserve to be totally re-adjusted, or might there
have been something in the game at the time (a run of great pitchers, say)
that we obliterate by adjusting them?
For example: I never heard Gibson say, "You know, I was my usual
self in 1968: the hitters just sucked so bad, every mistake I made, they
popped up."
I am NOT saying we take his 1.12 ERA (or McNally's or McDowell's under 2.00
that year at face value. I'm just wondering if hitting everything with a
era relative (or usually, it's a league by league, seasonal adjustment)
attitude misses a point: that maybe there is a sense in which that
performacne (or any other single season one) has validity OUTSIDE the season
it was accomplished in.
I think if you asked Gibson, he might say, "I'd never pitched better." i
think he would be right -- no matter what the rest of the league did.
A better example: Mickey Lolich goes 25-12, with 376 IP's in 1971. You can't
relative or "pitch=count" away a full 100 extra innings of excellence your
bullpen doesn't have to work. The man pitched 376 innings of sinking
fastball baseball (yes, we know Wood's 377 but this is Lolich) in the modern
era. You've got to be impressed with that, no matter the context.
ON THE OTHER HAND: Relativity helps one's sanity. I hate talking about
seasons like '30, '68 (despite my example), '87, and '94
when the stats were so off the norm that one has trouble "counting" them
completely. McGwire 49 homer'87 season (Boggs hits 24 homers? Tell me he
didn't know
the ball was juiced from the 1st day of spring training!), even Frank Thomas
and Junior in '94, maybe even Belle in '95 (with so little pitching around)
there's just a tainted feeling....
I may just have to get used to this offensive baseball, but, man, is it out
of historical context or what? Like early Civil War casualty figures: is
the worst to come?
2- I feel the same way about Park Adjustments. If Boggs, Koufax, others,
TAKE ADVANTAGE of their park, are we to penalize them the full amount? Or,
if Ralph Kiner ISN'T hurt by his park, are we to assume he'd have been even
greater in a neutral park? (Hypothetical: don't know Kiner's home/road, just
that pittsburg was tough, even with Kiner's Korner.) Maybe Kiner, like
Canseco seems to, just hit them far enough to get out of anyplace, and
adding a PA +4 homers to his totals each year for Pittsburgh is inaccurate:
he didn't, wouldn't have hit 4 more balls that solidly no matter where he
was.
Park Adjustment is very real: but a second question is, does it apply to all
players equally? If it might not, shouldn't we be careful with it?
3- I think Pitcher's Wins have to count for something.
Maybe they DON'T count as much as Bill Russell's 11 rings.
But I don't see how we got from thinking a base on balls was a
meaningful pitching stat only (25 years ago, before SABR) to where we now
consider W-L IRRELEVANT to a pitcher's performance.
I've read Run Support and Wins Above Team*, et al...
{* Tricky: as James found with Drysdale, suppose the "team' is Claude Osteen
and Sandy Koufax. How far above THEM are you supposed to go? Wins Above Team
assumes Pitcher plus staff of Joe Average,with extra wins coming from
offense, defense factors. Well, suppose you're Drysdale...not a fair stat. I
wonder how the Atlanta guys look in "wins above team?"}
But isn't there something that separates the Guidry's from the Blyleven's
(I use those as archetypes, so I don't want stat feedback on those guys in
particular) Question is: aren't there people who are Winners and Losers (or
Should Be Winners)?
Don't some pitchers do enough to win,whatever that takes?
4- Last, I find Innings Pitched an underrated stat. Few would argue that a
player who hit .300 with 20 HR's in 400 AB's had an equally good year as
someone who hit .300 with 30 HR's in 600 AB's. (Who has the other 200 AB's?
a .300 hitter? not unless you are a very lucky manager) Would player A have
sustained that level for another 200 aB's ? Maybe. But player B DID: it's a
fact.
Why is it , then, that Innings Pitched gets virtually ignored in all the
comparisons, ratios, etc.
-- You have the Lolich example above. You've probably read ad nauseum the
Koufax argument (IP's and W's are my only one-up on Maddux for Koufax). I
even wondered why it came about that IP's had dropped in the interest of
preserving careers where it seems, except in Atlanta, that nothing good has
come of it in baseball except too many weak pitchers getting too many
innings.
I've read most of the best stuff out the, but if a chapter would answer a
question better than you could, feel free to refer me. I know this is a lot
,but these issues have sat with me for afew years with no one to discuss
them with. (I'll cool down soon: when the phone bill comes in?)
Yours in baseball,
Joe Earls
Gehrig once had 111 RBI's ON THE ROAD. Is that scary or what?
Jennie Rosenbaum Matthews
Joseph C. Earls (Tantasqua RS) (jea...@k12.oit.umass.edu) wrote:
[cut]
&2- I feel the same way about Park Adjustments. If Boggs, Koufax, others,
&TAKE ADVANTAGE of their park, are we to penalize them the full amount? Or,
&if Ralph Kiner ISN'T hurt by his park, are we to assume he'd have been even
&greater in a neutral park? (Hypothetical: don't know Kiner's home/road, just
&that pittsburg was tough, even with Kiner's Korner.) Maybe Kiner, like
&Canseco seems to, just hit them far enough to get out of anyplace, and
&adding a PA +4 homers to his totals each year for Pittsburgh is inaccurate:
&he didn't, wouldn't have hit 4 more balls that solidly no matter where he
&was.
&Park Adjustment is very real: but a second question is, does it apply to all
&players equally? If it might not, shouldn't we be careful with it?
The idea behind park adjustments is that, *on average*, every ballpark
places *some* distortion on individual stats. Wade Boggs obviously took
advantage of the peculiarities of Fenway. However, we can't reward him
for taking the same level of advantage that a run-of-the-mill player
would take. After park adjustments, it's still pretty clear that Boggs
was taking extraordinary advantage of his home park. The point is that a
player should be rewarded/penalized for park effects only above and
beyond what the effect on a normal player would be expected to be.
&3- I think Pitcher's Wins have to count for something.
&Maybe they DON'T count as much as Bill Russell's 11 rings.
&But I don't see how we got from thinking a base on balls was a
&meaningful pitching stat only (25 years ago, before SABR) to where we now
&consider W-L IRRELEVANT to a pitcher's performance.
I really do find pitcher's "W-L" to be irrelevant. AL pitchers have
absolutely no control over how many runs their teams score, and the
influence of NL pitchers is infinitesimal. It's also not enough that a
pitcher's teammates have to score the runs: the timing must be right.
Suppose Jason Isringhausen goes seven strong innings, two outings in a
row. In Outing 1, he leaves with the Mets tied 2-2, but the Mets score
two in the ninth to win. In Outing 2, he leaves with the score 4-2, and
the Mets eventually win the game. What's the difference between these two
performances? (For simplicity, assume they're in the same park against
the same team.) Why does one deserve a "W" and one a no-decision? To take
this a step further, add an Outing 3 that is identical to the others,
except that the Mets lose 2-1. How was the "L" performance different from
the "W" performance?
BTW, I agree that innings pitched is an underrated stat, and that TB
could do a much better job at rewarding pitchers for it.
[cut]
Pat
--
Patrick G. Matthews or Jennie Rosenbaum Matthews?
I hope you can tell the difference :)
Ira K Blum
On Fri, 21 Jun 1996, Joseph C. Earls wrote:
>
> Trying not to repeat myself but seeing these as open questions still:
>
> 1- Do era-relative stats deserve to be totally re-adjusted, or might there
> have been something in the game at the time (a run of great pitchers, say)
> that we obliterate by adjusting them?
Well, there are two factors here. 1) when discussing records, you can't
just throw stuff out because it was done in 1930 or 1968, or 1894. If
that's when the record was set, then that's when the record was set. But
if you want to talk about value, and who was "better" its important to
include all factors. (both era and park.)
> I think if you asked Gibson, he might say, "I'd never pitched better." i
> think he would be right -- no matter what the rest of the league did.
You might find (I can't since my info's at home) that Gibson DID pitch
better in 1968 than he had before. even relative to the league. But
then again, maybe Yaz felt that he hit better in 1968 than in 1967, when
his BA was better.
> A better example: Mickey Lolich goes 25-12, with 376 IP's in 1971. You can't
> relative or "pitch=count" away a full 100 extra innings of excellence your
> bullpen doesn't have to work. The man pitched 376 innings of sinking
> fastball baseball (yes, we know Wood's 377 but this is Lolich) in the modern
> era. You've got to be impressed with that, no matter the context.
We'll talk about IP's later, but what happened to Mickey Lolich's
career? did he have arm problems? any guesses as to why?
> ON THE OTHER HAND: Relativity helps one's sanity. I hate talking about
> seasons like '30, '68 (despite my example), '87, and '94
> when the stats were so off the norm that one has trouble "counting" them
> completely. McGwire 49 homer'87 season (Boggs hits 24 homers? Tell me he
> didn't know
> the ball was juiced from the 1st day of spring training!), even Frank Thomas
> and Junior in '94, maybe even Belle in '95 (with so little pitching around)
> there's just a tainted feeling....
agreed.
One other point about ERA adjustments. There must be some point at which
the value of a low ERA becomes non-linear. Meaning, a guy with a 1.50
ERA over 250 innings is more than twice as valuable as a guy with a 3.00
ERA over the same 250 innings, as a shutout is almost always a win for a
team and you can't do better than that in a game. (therefore, the
distribution of runs per inning is more one-sided as you get closer to
the point of 0.00 ERA. so taking merely the average of all of these
innings becomes less meaningful as it is less representative of the peak
of the distribution.)
> 2- I feel the same way about Park Adjustments. If Boggs, Koufax, others,
> TAKE ADVANTAGE of their park, are we to penalize them the full amount?
Of course, since the penalty is offered to be the same regardless of
their home-road statistics. If Koufax had had a 3.00 ERA in Dodger
stadium and a 0.50 ERA on the road, and the park was still a pitchers
park, his park adjustment would have been unaffected. (as long as the
total home/away numbers were the same.) Players who take special
advantage of their home park are always less valuable to another team
then the team they are in. Players who are unduly hurt by their home
park are always more valuable to another team with a park which is more
conducive to that player.
> Or,
> if Ralph Kiner ISN'T hurt by his park, are we to assume he'd have been even
> greater in a neutral park? (Hypothetical: don't know Kiner's home/road, just
> that pittsburg was tough, even with Kiner's Korner.) Maybe Kiner, like
> Canseco seems to, just hit them far enough to get out of anyplace, and
> adding a PA +4 homers to his totals each year for Pittsburgh is inaccurate:
The point is that for the purpose of identifying value of Ralph Kiner,
Park adjustments don't simply add 4 homers. They are used to adjust
other numbers, like OPS, or RC, or LW runs, because they are not a
prediction of what that player would do in another park.
> he didn't, wouldn't have hit 4 more balls that solidly no matter where he
> was.
>
> Park Adjustment is very real: but a second question is, does it apply to all
> players equally? If it might not, shouldn't we be careful with it?
If used for value, yes. If not, then no. If Babe Ruth had come up as a
Washington Senator, and had had to hit in Griffith stadium, would he have
hit 700 HR's? consider that there was a year where there were 0 home
runs hit at Griffith by anyone, and that might color your answer.
> 3- I think Pitcher's Wins have to count for something.
Well, they have little predictive value. They tell something about the
pitcher, his durability, the hitting ability of the guys on his team, and
the way he has been used by his manager. But wins/season. Naahh.
> Maybe they DON'T count as much as Bill Russell's 11 rings.
BTW, how does Bill Russell wear 11 rings? is there one on a toe? did he
have one made into a bracelet? or what? What do the fans chant when a
team has 10 rings and is going for its 11th? "Go for the Nose!!!" :)
> But I don't see how we got from thinking a base on balls was a
> meaningful pitching stat only (25 years ago, before SABR) to where we now
> consider W-L IRRELEVANT to a pitcher's performance.
From 1987-1989, (three years) the NL ERA leader had a losing record.
What does this say?
> I've read Run Support and Wins Above Team*, et al...
I've seen here a study which showed that Jack Morris won no more games in
the 1980's as would be predicted by his ERA and Runs Support.
> {* Tricky: as James found with Drysdale, suppose the "team' is Claude Osteen
> and Sandy Koufax. How far above THEM are you supposed to go? Wins Above Team
> assumes Pitcher plus staff of Joe Average,with extra wins coming from
> offense, defense factors. Well, suppose you're Drysdale...not a fair stat. I
> wonder how the Atlanta guys look in "wins above team?"}
Don't know. but its one of those real big questions about Runs above
Team. I tend to ignore it.
> But isn't there something that separates the Guidry's from the Blyleven's
> (I use those as archetypes, so I don't want stat feedback on those guys in
> particular) Question is: aren't there people who are Winners and Losers (or
> Should Be Winners)?
If there are, then wouldn't it be obvious that Jack Morris was a winner
and Dave Steib was a loser. But examining ERA and Runs support, it was
shown that this is not the case. I don't know about Guidry and Blyleven,
though Blyleven won 289 games, so he's not that much of a loser.
> Don't some pitchers do enough to win,whatever that takes?
I would think that all of them do. Its just some of them can do more due
to more ability.
> 4- Last, I find Innings Pitched an underrated stat.
Well, in the linear weights formula for Pitching Runs, IP is extremely
important. Its why a pitcher with a 2.5 ERA and 250 Innings is worth
more than a pitcher with a 2.5 ERA and 150 Innings.
> Few would argue that a
> player who hit .300 with 20 HR's in 400 AB's had an equally good year as
> someone who hit .300 with 30 HR's in 600 AB's. (Who has the other 200 AB's?
> a .300 hitter? not unless you are a very lucky manager) Would player A have
> sustained that level for another 200 aB's ? Maybe. But player B DID: it's a
> fact.
Good premise, poorly stated. How about this one: Player A hits
.300/.350/.465 in 350 PA's, Player B hits .280/.340/.450 in 600 PA's.
Player C hits .225/.290/.330 in 250 PA's. Since Player C (replacement
level) was reqired to get 250 PA's on the team with Player A where Player
B didn't need Player C at all, Player B is obviously more valuable.
> Why is it , then, that Innings Pitched gets virtually ignored in all the
> comparisons, ratios, etc.
Its really not. But Its hard to compare IP in these days with IP in
bygone years, where pitchers worked in 4 man rotations, and pitched in
relief on their off-days, and where complete games were the rule instead
of the exception. But the value of these IP is still attached to the
pitcher.
> -- You have the Lolich example above. You've probably read ad nauseum the
> Koufax argument (IP's and W's are my only one-up on Maddux for Koufax). I
> even wondered why it came about that IP's had dropped in the interest of
> preserving careers where it seems, except in Atlanta, that nothing good has
> come of it in baseball except too many weak pitchers getting too many
> innings.
Well, I sit back and wonder how long a pitcher like Bobby Witt would have
lasted in the 1960's. Witt is a wild pitcher, who usually throws alot of
pitches per inning. If Witt was asked to finish every game he started
regardless of pitch count, he'd rack up some 150-170 pitch complete games
at a fairly early age (he hit the majors at 22). Its safe to say that he
wouldn't still be pitching at the age of 30 like he is now. People look
back at by-gone years and say "Why don't pitchers pitch more complete
games now? Look at what Mickey Lolich and Sandy Koufax and Robin Roberts
and all of those other past greats did." But they forget the careers
which lasted one year of being slagged with high pitch counts. Certainly
there are pitchers now who's careers are shortened by injury, but there
are also alot of really long careers which might never have happened if
not for pitch counts.
Ira
ib...@utdallas.edu
Go Rangers and Phillies (and Cowboys and Mavericks and Speed Racer Go!)
- Jeff Foxworthy
Please direct all flames to /dev/null
Scott Fischthal
>On Fri, 21 Jun 1996, Joseph C. Earls wrote:
>> 2- I feel the same way about Park Adjustments. If Boggs, Koufax, others,
>> TAKE ADVANTAGE of their park, are we to penalize them the full amount?
Only the full amount of the "penalty" that an average pitcher would have. In
other words, Koufax's value is only deflated by the "improvement" an average
pitcher would get. So if, for example, the average pitcher's ERA is 78% of
normal in Dodger Stadium, and Koufax's is 51%, Koufax doesn't get "penalized"
by 1/.49, but by 1/.22.
As it happens, Koufax was sometimes extraordinarily good in Dodger Stadium (in
1964, his home ERA was 0.85, his road ERA 2.93 (home ERA was 29% of road
ERA)), and at other times wasn't helped by Dodger Stadium any more than
average (in 1966, his home ERA was 1.52, his road ERA 1.96; that's a home ERA
78% of road ERA, which is exactly the same aid opposing pitchers got against
the Dodgers in Dodger Stadium as opposed to against the Dodgers on the road).
BTW, and interesting point is to look at Koufax's home vs. road ERAs from
1960-66:
Road Home League
3.00 5.27 3.76
2.78 4.29 4.03
3.55 1.75 3.94
2.31 1.38 3.29
2.93 0.85 3.54
2.72 1.38 3.54
1.96 1.52 3.61
Note the sudden flip in '62; that was when the Dodgers moved from the LA
Coliseum, a complete disaster for him (a hitter's park that was especially
kind to righthanded hitters) to Dodger Stadium (the best pitchers' park of the
last 50 years or so). Note also that his road ERAs, while good, aren't THAT
good (except for that last year, 1966) -- sort of like having ERAs in the
3.15-3.50 range in the current NL. I'm not saying Koufax wasn't an
outstanding pitcher (he was), but rather that almost all his value came from
taking advantage of Dodger Stadium, which he did uncommonly well. And he
does, in fact, get credit for doing so -- but only credit for doing UNCOMMONLY
well, for above and beyond the 10-22% push that EVERYONE gets.
Scott Fischthal
Mitchell J Plitnick
In <1996Jun21....@k12.oit.umass.edu> jea...@k12.oit.umass.edu
(Joseph C. Earls (Tantasqua RS)) writes:
>
>
>Trying not to repeat myself but seeing these as open questions still:
>
>1- Do era-relative stats deserve to be totally re-adjusted, or might
there
>have been something in the game at the time (a run of great pitchers,
say)
>that we obliterate by adjusting them?
>I am NOT saying we take his Bob Giboson's) 1.12 ERA (or McNally's or
McDowell's under 2.00
>that year at face value. I'm just wondering if hitting everything with
a
>era relative (or usually, it's a league by league, seasonal
adjustment)
>attitude misses a point: that maybe there is a sense in which that
>performacne (or any other single season one) has validity OUTSIDE the
season
>it was accomplished in.
I'd agree that, through random chance, there probably is a difference
in eras where there are more great pitchers, or hitters, in a
particular 10-year period than in another. I also think that it's a
tough thing to totally "normalize" all these stats overall, since, as
someone in this group frequently points out, it's very difficult to
improve particularly outstanding numbers. maddux, for example, would
likely gain less in his ERA, if pitching the exact same way in 1968 as
he did the last few years, than, say, david Wells would, for example,
simply because it takes more shutout innings for maddux to lower his
ERA than it does for Wells. I would definitely say these things must be
taken into account, just as the fact that Koufax pitched more innings
for his teams than Maddux needs to be taken into account, the whys and
wherefores notwithstanding. No stat can stand outside of FULL context
and be accurately guaging a player's value to his team. Nonetheless, in
order to gain some kind of perspective, one must adjust somehow. Even
if there were more top-flight pitchers in Koufax' day, the vast
majority of pitchers (and hitters) in ANY era are going to be much
closer to average. That's why there are stars. When the averages shift
as greatly as they did in 1968, 1987, 1930, 1994-and on, it's a pretty
sure bet it's not the players but changing conditions that have done
it.
Still, all this is precisely why the point of these adjustments is NOT
to say Player X is better than player Y who played 30 years before, but
simply to measure, as precisely and objectively as possible how much
each player helped his team. As to debates such as Koufax/Maddux, they
simply add more evidence as to who was BETTER to one side or the other.
>2- I feel the same way about Park Adjustments. If Boggs, Koufax,
others,
>TAKE ADVANTAGE of their park, are we to penalize them the full amount?
Or,
>if Ralph Kiner ISN'T hurt by his park, are we to assume he'd have been
even
>greater in a neutral park? (Hypothetical: don't know Kiner's
home/road, just
>that pittsburg was tough, even with Kiner's Korner.) Maybe Kiner, like
>Canseco seems to, just hit them far enough to get out of anyplace, and
>adding a PA +4 homers to his totals each year for Pittsburgh is
inaccurate:
>he didn't, wouldn't have hit 4 more balls that solidly no matter
where he
>was.
>Park Adjustment is very real: but a second question is, does it apply
to all
>players equally? If it might not, shouldn't we be careful with it?
Same thing as above. It simply measures the relative contribution. It's
not trying to (and, in fact, does not) tell us how good Ted Williams
would have been in yankee Stadium, or how Joe DiMaggio would have fared
in fenway (and, boy, isn't it fun to just contemplate the uproar in
Boston and NY if THAT trade had happened). It does tell us this, and
I'll use the Park Effects Poster Boy as an example: Dante Bichette
obviously takes excellent advantage of his home park. On the road, he's
the same stiff he always was, but at home, he's a monster. Sure, it's
Coors that does it, but he takes better advantage of the conditions
there than most do. Since there's no way to know precisely what Mark
McGwire would do there (though it staggers the imagination even to
think about it), we instead try to simply guage the value of Bichette's
production at home in terms of contribution to his team. Obviously,
it's a lot easier for both teams to score runs at Coors. So, a Bichette
3-run HR at home helps his team win less than a McGwire 3-run HR at
home. That's what park adjustment does, it does NOT necessarily tell us
what Bichette would hit for the A's--though it certainly tells us his
(and anyone else's) numbers would be affected. We can approximate how
much, but park adjustments do not imply exact transferrence of those
numbers, only how much each player, given the conditions each played
under, helped his team.
>3- I think Pitcher's Wins have to count for something.
I don't. In 1989 Storm Davis pitched terribly and went 19-7. Two years
before, Nolan Ryan pitched very well and went 8-16. Pitcher's wins
depend A LOT on the performance of the opposing batters, the
performance of the opposing pitchers, the performance of the pitcher's
team's defense and offense and the decisions of that pitcher's
manager.We've all seen pitchers get wins for 1/3 of an inning's work,
or when they've gotten hammered. We've all seen them get losses when
they've pitched well, and none of the above are uncommon occurances.
Even if you pitch for a good team, you never know what kind of run
support you will happen to get in the particular 40 or so games you
start. Just look at the run support numbers for each pitcher of any
team. Some will be similar, but you'll find plenty of instances where a
given starter happens to get a lot more, or a lot less run support than
the rest of his own staff.
Sure, it's a decent bet that a pitcher who goes 14-4 pitched well.
Unless that pitcher happened to have been Bob Wickman in 1993.
Obviously, it's more likely that pitchers who have more wins than
losses have pitched better than those with the reverse (at least as far
as starters are concerned), but how much more likely? Some, but not a
whole lot. Obviously, I'm sure you'd agree, a pitcher will likely win
more games with the Indians than he will with the Mets if he pitches
equally well, right? Probably true, unless the pitcher has an extreme
run of luck one way or the other regarding run support. No matter how
you slice it, wins and losses are TEAM stats--they give, at best, light
indication of a pitcher's performance.
>Maybe they DON'T count as much as Bill Russell's 11 rings.
>
>But I don't see how we got from thinking a base on balls was a
>meaningful pitching stat only (25 years ago, before SABR) to where we
now
>consider W-L IRRELEVANT to a pitcher's performance.
>
>I've read Run Support and Wins Above Team*, et al...
>
>{* Tricky: as James found with Drysdale, suppose the "team' is Claude
Osteen
>and Sandy Koufax. How far above THEM are you supposed to go? Wins
Above Team
>assumes Pitcher plus staff of Joe Average,with extra wins coming from
>offense, defense factors. Well, suppose you're Drysdale...not a fair
stat. I
>wonder how the Atlanta guys look in "wins above team?"}
>
>But isn't there something that separates the Guidry's from the
Blyleven's
>(I use those as archetypes, so I don't want stat feedback on those
guys in
>particular) Question is: aren't there people who are Winners and
Losers (or
>Should Be Winners)?
>
>Don't some pitchers do enough to win,whatever that takes?
Put simply, no. This line of thinking implies that pitchers like dave
Stewart or Jack McDowell simply take it easy unless they're in
immediate danger of losing a game. Hogwash. These guys are trying to
get every batter out. The pitchers who "do enough to win" are, quite
simply, the better pitchers, which is precisely why they do enough to
win.
Ever notice how the guys who "do enough to win" never win for bad
teams?
>4- Last, I find Innings Pitched an underrated stat.
I snipped your argument because I agree with it, by and large. Thought
I'd end on an agreeable note. 8-)
---Mitchell---
Wenthold Paul G.
>On Fri, 21 Jun 1996, Joseph C. Earls wrote:
>
>>
>> Why is it , then, that Innings Pitched gets virtually ignored in all the
>> comparisons, ratios, etc.
>
Just to note that IP doesn't get ignored at all in pitching runs,
for example. You might do something like (league ERA - pitcher's
ERA)*IP in order to get the pitcher's runs above average. Thus,
it is first order dependent on IP. This is the basis for
Dale Stephenson's peak value calculation, for one example.
And if you look at that, Maddux is well ahead of Koufax in terms
of peak, and about the same outside the peak.
And Maddux will continue to rack up runs.
FWIW, playing time is also included in things like Nelson Lu's
park corrected runs created for hitters, too.
paul
--
!! Joe: "He will come back to you. Don't worry." !!
!! Meg: "But how do you know he'll come back?" !!
!! Sister: "BECAUSE HE'S A BASEBALL STAR, THAT'S HOW HE KNOWS!"!!
!! (from the Broadway hit "Damn Yankees" starring Jerry Lewis) !!
Greg Sarcasm Is A Way Of Life Spira
>>
>> 1- Do era-relative stats deserve to be totally re-adjusted, or might there
>> have been something in the game at the time (a run of great pitchers, say)
>> that we obliterate by adjusting them?
The problem is that we really have no way of figuring out when
we have a run of great pitchers or great hitters, except by how
thye perform compared to everybody else. Its very possible that
pitching today is significantly better than it was in the mid-sixties,
despite the much higher ERAs - there's no real way of knowing.
>> 2- I feel the same way about Park Adjustments. If Boggs, Koufax, others,
>> TAKE ADVANTAGE of their park, are we to penalize them the full amount?
As others have said, its perfectly reasonable to reward them for
any "extra" advantage they take of their home parks. For one thing,
we can never discount that the player in question might be able
to adjust well for other home parks as well.
>> 3- I think Pitcher's Wins have to count for something.
>> But I don't see how we got from thinking a base on balls was a
>> meaningful pitching stat only (25 years ago, before SABR) to where we now
>> consider W-L IRRELEVANT to a pitcher's performance.
>> I've read Run Support and Wins Above Team*, et al...
>I've seen here a study which showed that Jack Morris won no more games in
>the 1980's as would be predicted by his ERA and Runs Support.
Close.
>> {* Tricky: as James found with Drysdale, suppose the "team' is Claude Osteen
>> and Sandy Koufax. How far above THEM are you supposed to go? Wins Above Team
>> assumes Pitcher plus staff of Joe Average,with extra wins coming from
>> offense, defense factors. Well, suppose you're Drysdale...not a fair stat. I
>> wonder how the Atlanta guys look in "wins above team?"}
I find Wins Above Team kind of amusing, but for the reasons
stated, not very helpful.
>> But isn't there something that separates the Guidry's from the Blyleven's
>> (I use those as archetypes, so I don't want stat feedback on those guys in
>> particular) Question is: aren't there people who are Winners and Losers (or
>> Should Be Winners)?
No. See my stuff below.
>If there are, then wouldn't it be obvious that Jack Morris was a winner
>and Dave Steib was a loser. But examining ERA and Runs support, it was
Here are reprints of my studies. I do have to do Catfish Hunter one of these
days.
Here, once again, are the various things I've posted on this:
First, on Jack Morris:
A while ago I looked at Jack Morris' career and compared his projected
won-loss total to his actual won-loss record. I did this using
the pythagoream method (Runs Scored Squared Divided By (Runs Scored
Squared plus Runs Allowed Squared) to determine the projected record.
I obtained run support figures from the Bill James Abstract (1979-1985),
Elias (1986-1990), and the STATS Scoreboard (1991-1993). Runs allowed
figures came from the GABSB. I assumed the same number of decisions
for each year that Morris actually had.
The first column is Morris' projected record based on the runs he allowed
and the run support he recieved. The second column is Morris' assigned
won-loss record. The third column indicates how many more wins his
actual record credits him with as compared with the projection based
on his run support. The fourth column is Morris' projected record
based on the runs he allowed and the league average run support. The
fifth column indicates how many more wins his actual record credits
him with compared to the projection based on league average run
support.
Projected Actual Difference Projected Difference
1979 16-8 17-7 +1 16-8 +1
1980 16-15 16-15 0 16-15 0
1981 16-5 14-7 -2 13-8 +1
1982 15-18 17-16 +2 17-16 0
1983 21-12 20-13 -1 20-13 0
1984 18-12 19-11 +1 16-14 +3
1985 17-10 16-11 -1 17-10 -1
1986 20-9 21-8 +1 18-11 +3
1987 19-10 18-11 -1 18-11 0
1988 14-14 15-13 +1 14-14 +1
1989 6-14 6-14 0 8-12 -2
1990 15-18 15-18 0 14-19 +1
1991 19-11 18-12 -1 17-13 +1
1992 18-9 21-6 +3 14-13 +7
1993 6-13 7-12 +1 6-13 +1
Total 236-178 240-174 +4 224-190 +16
Jack's early years and this year are not included.
Now, I think the conclusion is fairly obvious. Jack's records are
clearly the result of how many runs are scored when he pitches and
how many runs he allows. Thus, his ERA (or RA), along with his innings
pitched, are a perfectly accurate measure of how valuable Jack has
been to his teams.
***********************************
Next, a look at run support and records:
Let's take a look at last year, for example.
There were 13 pitchers in the major leagues who had less than 4 runs
a game of support. EVERY SINGLE ONE had a record under .500. Combined,
the group had a record of 113-181.
There were 12 pitchers in the major leagues who had at least 6 runs
a game of support. EVERY SINGLE ONE had a record over .500. The
worst record in the group - Tim Leary - was 3 games over .500. Combined,
the group had a record of 173-85.
It's just amazing to me that some people don't get this. The
evidence is as clear as humanly possible. When a pitcher gets
great run support, he will post a good w-l record. When a
pitcher gets terrible run support, he will post a bad w-l record.
It's as simple as that.
The number one factor in determining a pitchers w-l record is his
run support. It is, in fact, more important than the pitcher's
performance. (For those wondering why it's MORE important, it's
because 1) defense counts too and 2) the range of run support is
a little greater than the range of ERAs)
***************************
And here's an essay which was made up to counter people's
belief In "pitching to the score." Its a play by play of
Jack Mcdowell's first 9 starts in 93 (at which point Peter
Gammons was yabbering that Jack's good w-l record and poor
era was the result of "pitching to the score."
******************************
>
>
>4/6/93 - WS score 3 in top of 1st. Mcdowell blows lead by
>allowing 4 runs in 1st and 3rd. Chicago scores 6 in 4th.
>Mcdowell pitches 6 innings, gets win.
>
>4-11 - Mcdowell allows 1 run in top of first. Chicago
>scores 1 in bottom of first. Mcdowell allows 2 runs in 5th.
>Chicago scores 4 in 6th. Mcdowell allows 1 in 7th, is
>taken out, gets win.
>
>4-16 - WS score 1 in top 2nd. Mcdowell allows 2 in bottom
>2nd. WS score 1 in top 3rd, tying it. Mcdowell allows 2 in
>the bottom 3rd. Chicago scores 7 rest of game. Mcdowell
>pitches 7 innings, gets win.
>
>4-22 - Mcdowell allows 1 run in 2nd, 1 more in 6th. Chicago
>scores 3 in 8th and 9th to give Mcdowell victory.
>
>4-27 - Mcdowell allows 3 runs in 2nd. Chicago scores 9 in
>next 5 innings. Mcdowell allows 1 more run in 8th, wins.
>
>5-2 - Mcdowell allows 3 runs in 1st and 2nd. Chicago
>scores 1 in 6th. Mcdowell allows 3 more runs in 7th, gets
>loss.
>5 - 8 - WS score 5 runs in 1st. Mcdowell gives up 6 runs in
>2nd and 3rd. White Sox score 5 in 4th and 5th. Mcdowell
>allows 1 in 6th, finishes and gets win.
>
>5-14 - Mcdowell pitches 9 innings, shuts out Rangers, gets
>win. Chicago scores 3 in first 2 innings and 1 in 8th.
>
>5-19 - Chicago shut out. Mcdowell allows 2 in 8th and loses
>
>In these 9 starts, Mcdowell has allowed the go-ahead run to score
>*10* times.
>6 times McDowell has had at least a 3 run lead, and 1 of 2
>things has always happened - either he blows the lead, or he
>shuts the other team down by allowing only 0 or 1 run. Not
>once has he been given a large lead and allowed the other
>team some runs but not enough to catch up - his ERA with
>large leads that he doesn't blow is miniscule; 30 of the 33
>runs he's allowed have allowed the opposition to either
>catch up or take a bigger lead over the White Sox. Not only
>is that not "pitching to the score," but it's the exact
>*opposite*. Only if you believe that Mcdowell is psychic
>and knows that it doesn't matter if he puts them 3,5 runs
>down or blows a lead, they'll come back, can you argue that
>Mcdowell is "pitching to the score" - the score that will be,
>that is.
>
>
**********************************
And here's an examination of the won loss record that would
be projected for a starter with the same run support and runs
allowed as the following pitchers, often cited as pitchers who
"know how to win," and these pitchers actual record. None
show any tendency to win any more games than the average
pitcher would with their run support and runs allowed. If these
pitchers allowed unimportant runs that weren't important to
winning and losing, it would show up here. It doesn't. These
pitchers' "knowing how to win" reputation is completely a result
of their run support. When their support fails - as Mcdowell's has
the last year and a half, and Gooden's did after the Mets offensive
juggernaut collapsed, they not-so-mysteriously no longer "know
how to win."
Jack Mcdowell
Year Proj W-L Act W-L
88 5-10 5-10
90 14-9 14-9
91 19-8 17-10
92 22-8 20-10
93 22-10 22-10
94 10-9 10-9
Total 92-54 88-58
Dave Stewart
84 7-14 7-14
87 19-14 20-13
88 21-12 21-12
89 19-11 21-9
90-94 67-45 64-48
Total 133-96 133-96
Doc Gooden
84 16-10 17-9
85 25-3 24-4
86 15-8 17-6
87 15-7 15-7
88 19-8 18-9
90 19-7 19-7
91 13-7 13-7
92 10-13 10-13
93 16-11 12-15
Total 148-74 145-77
******************
From what I can figure out, the following 60s-80s pitchers got
better support than Nolan Ryan: Jim Kaat, Jim Palmer, Catfish
Hunter, Don Sutton, and Steve Carlton.
The following 60s-80s pitcher got similar support (average) as compared
to Ryan: Tommy John, Bob Gibson
The following 60s to 80s pitchers got worse support than Ryan:
Tom Seaver, Bert Blyleven, Phil Niekro, Ferguson Jenkins and
Gaylord Perry.
These estimates are based on the park adjusted offensive rankings
of these players' teams during their careers.
*********************************
Finally, On Sandy Koufax
*********************************
Thanks to data from David Smith and Retrosheet, I've managed
to redo my little presentation on Koufax and his run support,
so I thought I'd post it here.
A theory that some pitchers "pitch to the score" and "know
how to win" (in a way other than always allowing the fewest
number of runs possible) has been advanced by not a small
number of people. (The reverse, that some pitchers tend to
give up runs more often in close games, is also a popular
theory, though it's invoked less often) This, some say, makes
it worthwhile to look a pitchers won-loss record in addition to
his ERA, because the amount of runs a pitcher allows would then
not be completely indicative of his value if he gives up those
runs in a pattern that contributes to more wins than the average
pitcher with the same rate of runs allowed.
Over the years, I've seen virtually no evidence that would lead
me to believe that this theory holds any water for modern-day
pitchers. However, I realized, just because it was clear that this
theory was not applicable to the performances of most pitchers
didn't mean that it might not be applicable to a few pitchers.
So I decided to look at the careers of individual pitchers and
look at the relationship between their run support and runs
allowed totals and their won-loss records.
It's pretty obvious to everyone that there's a relationship
between wins and the difference between the number of runs a
team allos and the number of runs a team scores. Baseball
researcher Pete Palmer has found that, over the years, about
10 extra runs usually leads to an extra victory in the win column.
However, a better tool exists with which to estimate how many
wins and losses you expect from the runs a team scores and
allows. This method, made popular by Bill James, involves
squaring the number of runs scored by a team and dividing
that result by the addition of the squaring of the team's runs scored
to the squaring of the team's runs allowed. In other words..
Runs Scored Squared
__________________________________________
Runs Scored Squared + Runs Allowed Squared
This results in a winning percentage, which you would then multiply
by the number of games the team has played to get the number of wins,
and then subtract the number of wins from the total games played
figure to get the number of losses. Thus, you now have a good estimate
of how an average team which scores and allows that number of runs
would do in terms of wins and losses. In general, most teams finish
fairly close to the result you would get from the formula. Teams
that win an unsually high percentage of close games, however, will
usually win more than the formula projects, and teams that lose an
unusual percentage of close games (compared, in both cases, to how they do
in non-close games) will do worse than the formula projects.
The best recent example of this on a team level is the 1984 New
York Mets. That team went 54-31 in games decided by a margin of 1 or
2 runs, and 36-41 in all other games. Because they did so much
better in close games than in other games, thus making greater
efficiency of their runs scored and runs allowed totals, they finished
with a won-loss record of 90-72 while the formula predicted a
record of 78-84.
Note that it has been found that a power of 1.83 works a bit better
than a power of 2 for this formula. However, since a button with
a power of 1.83 is not found on most calculators, and since that
kind of exactness is not required for these kind of estimations,
I'll stick with using a power of 2.
In the past, this formula has been used mostly with teams. However,
we can also estimate the expected winning percentage of a pitcher
by using the number of runs he allows and his run support with the
formula. And if a pitcher really "pitches to the score" - thus
allowing fewer runs in close games than in games in which he is
granted a large lead - his won-loss record should be better than
the record projected for the average pitcher with that pitcher's
runs allowed and run support totals. That pitcher's career should
show a pattern of him winning more games than we would expect. And,
of course, the opposite should be true for a pitcher who allows more
runs in close games than in blowouts.
Over the past year, I've tested many pitchers to whom a "pitch
to the score" reputation has been attached, including Jack Morris,
Jack Mcdowell, Doc Gooden, and Dave Stewart. I have also tested
the careers of two pitchers with the opposite reputation, Dave
Stieb and Jose DeLeon. In no case have I found any pattern whatsoever
of a pitcher winning or losing more games during his career than the
formula projects. In all these cases I found pitchers who tended to win
and lose the number of games that their runs allowed and run support
totals project them to win and lose.
The pitchers who get a reputation of "pitching to the score" have
one thing in common - they all have gotten generally positive
run support through most of their careers. It seems apparent
to me that pitchers get this reputation because they get better
run support than most other pitchers and thus have a W-L record
that looks better than their ERA or RA. In general, these pitchers
get good run support because they are on good offensive teams
for a good number of years. Jack Morris is the best example of this;
in his entire career, he was on only one below average offensive
team (1989) and was on a large number of great offensive teams.
The "pitch to the score" theory seems to be an effort to imbue
a pitchers won-loss record with a value other than luck.
Another thing that pitchers with this reputation often have in
common is that they pitch a lot of innings. This leads to more
wins (as well as losses), and the number of wins often seems to
impress people more than the won-loss record itself, if Cy Young
voting is used as a measure. Of course, pitching more innings
is generally a good thing, and makes a pitcher (especially
an effective one) more valuable, but it has little to do with
the issue at hand.
Note that in these examinations of careers, we estimate a
player's projected won-loss record by multiplying the
formula's estimation of expected winning percentage by the
number of decisions a pitcher actually had. This solution isn't
perfect - obviously a good or bad bullpen can greatly affect the
number of decisions a pitcher has - but it is the only one
available, and I don't think it represents a serious problem.
Also note that no positive correlation has been found between pitchers
run support compared to team runs scored from year to year in the
AL, so there is no evidence that pitchers have an ability to
inspire teams to score more runs in their starts. Of course,
in the NL, pitchers batting does affect run support, but that has
no real bearing on the issue at hand.
In addition to studying 1980-present pitchers, I've been interested
in looking at pitchers of the past to see if maybe a "pitch to the
score" ability did exist in the past. Certainly, I do believe that
it did exist in the far past, when baseball was a less competitive
game. But I'm more interested in the recent past. Sandy Koufax
is one pitcher who it has been speculated "pitched to the score,"
and thus was even better at contributing to winning than his great
ERAs indicate. Thanks to David Smith and Retrosheet, I now
have run support data as well as an ability to separate Koufax's
starting performances from his relief performaces, and I was able to
examine the prime of his career to see if he "pitched to the score."
The following is a chart of his run support, his average runs allowed
per 9 innings in his starts, the w-l records that the formula
projects for his starts, and his actual w-l record in his starts.
The run support figures used are his run support per 9 innings when
Koufax was in the game. Run support per start is also available
(and in some cases, though not for Koufax, is the only information that's
been published for pitchers), and it does have the advantage of
including runs scored after Koufax was relieved, which certainly do affect
his records, but overall I think the run support for the innings Koufax
was still in games is slightly more indicative of the quality of
his support.
Note that Koufax had one win in relief in 1961, so his record
here differs from whats in baseball encyclopedias.
Year Run Support Runs Allowed Projected W-L Actual W-L
1961 4.11 3.89 16-14 17-13
1962 5.00 2.98 15-6 14-7
1963 4.18 1.97 25-5 25-5
1964 3.48 2.00 18-6 19-5
1965 3.70 2.43 24-10 26-8
1966 4.26 2.06 29-7 27-9
Total 127-48 128-47
Obviously, it doesn't look like Koufax "pitched to the score" either,
so his ERAs are indicative of his value.
>> -- You have the Lolich example above. You've probably read ad nauseum the
>> Koufax argument (IP's and W's are my only one-up on Maddux for Koufax). I
>> even wondered why it came about that IP's had dropped in the interest of
>> preserving careers where it seems, except in Atlanta, that nothing good has
>> come of it in baseball except too many weak pitchers getting too many
>> innings.
In general, I, like many others here, think that while pitching today
is harder than ever and thus more wearing on the arm, making pitch
counts more neccessary, a 4 man rotation with strict pitch counts would boost
IP for the better pitchers and work quite well.
Greg
CanyonFish
In article <Pine.SOL.3.91.960621...@apache.utdallas.edu>,
Ira K Blum <ib...@utdallas.edu> writes:
>We'll talk about IP's later, but what happened to Mickey Lolich's
>career? did he have arm problems? any guesses as to why?
I don't know about his arm, BUT I do know that he was a fat-assed
doughnut-eating lard bucket who thought conditioning consisted of a few
twelve ounce curls and a walk to the fridge. He never took care of
himself.
Joseph Tyson (canyo...@aol.com)
Bellport, Long Island, NY
Member: SABR, NYSOWA, OWNE, Oakdale Sportsmans Club,
Peconic Cigar Smoker's Society.
"Life is a sh*t sandwich and every day you take another bite" - Joe
Schmidt
**************************************************************************
*****************
Jennie Rosenbaum Matthews
Wenthold Paul G. (went...@jila02.Colorado.EDU) wrote:
&>On Fri, 21 Jun 1996, Joseph C. Earls wrote:
&>> Why is it , then, that Innings Pitched gets virtually ignored in all the
&>> comparisons, ratios, etc.
&Just to note that IP doesn't get ignored at all in pitching runs,
&for example. You might do something like (league ERA - pitcher's
&ERA)*IP in order to get the pitcher's runs above average. Thus,
&it is first order dependent on IP. This is the basis for
&Dale Stephenson's peak value calculation, for one example.
APR (like ABR) is a "mix" of rate stats and counting stats: players get
superior numbers by having both a high rate of production and playing
time. However, APR gives a zero value to IP at the league average ERA. I
tend to believe that average hitting is more readily available than
average pitching, and thus that league average pitching has some value.
That's the crux of the "Don Sutton for the HoF" argument: while Sutton
was hardly one of the very best of all-time and is quite clearly behind
several contemporaries, his incredible longevity (the ability to put up
moderately but not exceptionally above average for a long, long time)
makes him more valuable than TB would suggest.
Thus, while APR does reward IP, IMHO, APR does not reward it enough.
Michael David Jones
>1- Do era-relative stats deserve to be totally re-adjusted, or might there
>have been something in the game at the time (a run of great pitchers, say)
>that we obliterate by adjusting them?
There might have been. The real question is whether there is less
distortion in adjusting them or in leaving them unadjusted. As with
most other things, a little common sense goes a long way. In 1968, for
example, league ERAs were waaay down. MLB lowered the mound, changed
the strike zone, and sonfofagun, ERAs went up. That looks like a
pretty good reason to think pitching stats from 1968 should be
adjusted without looking at anybody's numbers.
>I am NOT saying we take his 1.12 ERA (or McNally's or McDowell's under 2.00
>that year at face value. I'm just wondering if hitting everything with a
>era relative (or usually, it's a league by league, seasonal adjustment)
>attitude misses a point: that maybe there is a sense in which that
>performacne (or any other single season one) has validity OUTSIDE the season
>it was accomplished in.
I don't think so. Things have value only in context. If I offer to buy
something from you for $100, would you accept without knowing whether
it was $100 American, $100 Canadian, or $100 Grenadian? Gibson's
performance, to go with the current example, was clearly one of the
all-time great seasonal performances. But how can you say more than
that? Only by looking at its value in context.
>A better example: Mickey Lolich goes 25-12, with 376 IP's in 1971. You can't
>relative or "pitch=count" away a full 100 extra innings of excellence your
>bullpen doesn't have to work. The man pitched 376 innings of sinking
>fastball baseball (yes, we know Wood's 377 but this is Lolich) in the modern
>era. You've got to be impressed with that, no matter the context.
True. OTOH, there's a lot of difference between being impressed by
Lolich's total and saying that Lolich would have been able to
accomplish the same thing today. And there's still the question of
whether Lolich's feat was more or less impressive than David Cone's
229 last year. You might say more, and I'd probably agree, but why
should either of us think so?
...
>2- I feel the same way about Park Adjustments. If Boggs, Koufax, others,
>TAKE ADVANTAGE of their park, are we to penalize them the full amount? Or,
>if Ralph Kiner ISN'T hurt by his park, are we to assume he'd have been even
>greater in a neutral park? (Hypothetical: don't know Kiner's home/road, just
>that pittsburg was tough, even with Kiner's Korner.) Maybe Kiner, like
>Canseco seems to, just hit them far enough to get out of anyplace, and
>adding a PA +4 homers to his totals each year for Pittsburgh is inaccurate:
>he didn't, wouldn't have hit 4 more balls that solidly no matter where he
>was.
This is a different issue. It's pretty easy to get a pretty accurate
picture of how much the park affects play *on average*. If a player
takes better-than-average advantage of his home field, that will still
show up after park adjusting. Park adjustments are meant to adjust for
*value* of performance. If it's 20% easier to get hits in Fenway Park
than in Oakland Coliseum, then a guy who hits .300 is Oakland is
a more valuable (for average) than a guy who hits .300 in Fenway.
>3- I think Pitcher's Wins have to count for something.
>Maybe they DON'T count as much as Bill Russell's 11 rings.
>But I don't see how we got from thinking a base on balls was a
>meaningful pitching stat only (25 years ago, before SABR) to where we now
>consider W-L IRRELEVANT to a pitcher's performance.
Actually, I think they probably do count just about as much as
Russell's rings. What do they tell you, after all? That Russell played
on some awfully good teams. They don't tell you anything about how big
a part he played *on* those teams. Similarly, think about what has to
happen for a pitcher to get a win:
1. His team has to score runs.
2. He has to allow fewer runs than his team scores.
3. His team has to score those runs *before* he leaves the game.
4. His bullpen has to hold the lead.
How much control does a pitcher have over these things? None over #1,
a fair amount over #2 (his defensive teammates have something to say
about it), none over #3, and none over #4. When you look at it that
way, what *can* pitcher's wins mean?
>But isn't there something that separates the Guidry's from the Blyleven's
>(I use those as archetypes, so I don't want stat feedback on those guys in
>particular) Question is: aren't there people who are Winners and Losers (or
>Should Be Winners)?
>Don't some pitchers do enough to win,whatever that takes?
Not really. There are too many things that go into getting a "win"
that are outside a starting pitcher's control.
>4- Last, I find Innings Pitched an underrated stat. Few would argue that a
>player who hit .300 with 20 HR's in 400 AB's had an equally good year as
>someone who hit .300 with 30 HR's in 600 AB's. (Who has the other 200 AB's?
>a .300 hitter? not unless you are a very lucky manager) Would player A have
>sustained that level for another 200 aB's ? Maybe. But player B DID: it's a
>fact.
I agree. I think Plate Appearances is underrated for the same reason.
But this gets back to the difference between rate stats and counting
stats. They tend to tell you two different things. Let's say you're
comparing two hitters. One has a batting average of .340 in 100 AB
before missing the rest of the year from an injury. The other had 141
more hits in 650 AB. Which is better?
Well, it depends. The guy with more hits hit .270. His performance was
probably more valuable to his team (within the limited perspective of
batting average). On the other hand, the guy who hit .340 is *probably*
the better player, in the sense that he's likely to turn in a more
valuable performance next year (all other things, such as age, being equal).
>Why is it , then, that Innings Pitched gets virtually ignored in all the
>comparisons, ratios, etc.
It doesn't get ignored all that often, it just gets wrapped up into
things like Pitching Runs, which is essential (ERA-League_ERA)*IP.
...
Mike Jones | jon...@rpi.edu
I've never been prejudiced by sex! Entertained, yes, but never
prejudiced!
- Justice Dan Snow (First Monday in October)
Joseph C. Earls (Tantasqua RS)
Greg--
That's terrific data. Quite a job to put it together.
You certainly do a number on the myth/concept of "pitching to the score."
I have 3 follow-up questions:
1- What do you do then, with the James's stat of Koufax's 18-4 in games
(it was 1963-64, by the way) in which he got 3 runs or less? Does that say
anything about the psyche or talent of Sandy Koufax?
2- Is there anything, in stat terms or non-provable theory, about teams
playing better (i.e. run support) behind certain pitchers? What are players
perceptions on this? Are players' perceptions wrong, if they have any? (For
ex: I know that the Phillies, as bad as they were in 1972, actually played
well behind Carlton that incredible year (27-10). With Carlton on the mound,
they did not play as badly as a 59-93 would be expected to. They did
everything better.
3- I think you cheated a little on Run Support. We know pitchers don't
control it, but your range of total certainty was 3.99 support for sure
losers and 6.01 for sure winners.
I don't think you have to convince anyone Runs Support is critical.
I just don't believe that among the 300 athletes pitching in baseball now,
there aren't some who pitch a little better when the game hangs in the
balance, and some a little worse. That is, I guess I instinctively believe
that some athletes know how to win. If clutch performance exists in other
sports, why does it not exist in baseball? Given enough AB's and innings
pitched, studies will turn it into a "myth". But in athletic terms, does it
make sense that all players perform the same, whether the score is 3-2 or
9-2?
-- Maybe it's because the stats are after the fact...Koufax's low ERA
projects him to 25 wins, say, according to your study -- but Koufax's ERA
was being forged in situations we would consider "clutch" i.e. close games.
Thus our perception is not, "ERA means everything, I guess", nor is it
"Koufax has some magic win wand he waves when he has to." but "That SOB is
unhittable in a close game." Koufax's low ERA might be INHERENT evidence, to
a fan, that he is a clutch pitcher and "knows how to win".
-- Maybe human decisions (like a manager giving Koufax the ball because he
thinks he's "tough in the clutch") create situations (that is, plenty of
IP's) to create the illusion of "clutch": except if it's an illusion, why is
Koufax getting all those innings?) (Or McDowell, or Morris...)
-- So, I'd like to see numbers and/or anecdotes on the 4.01 --5.99 guys,
too. Or, rather, if there are any conclusions based on those numbers that
"ability to win" (not "pitching to the score" per se) is measurable.
I DO appreciate one last thing, besides all the evidence: your pointing out
the scoring element of "W" that makes it one level less reliable than even
"Team X was X Wins - Y -Losses when this guy started." I just find it gets a
little more reliable when the Wins are above 25. :-)
Finally: (maybe this should be a new thread but you're obviously someone who
can answer this question: In assessing the value of offensive events --
walks, stolen bases, CS's, even the deadly sac bunt -- or even the value of
relief pitching -- has anyone done a study that divides Baseball into Close
games versus Earl Weaver 3 Run Homer games? Or, did they include late
innings versus full spectrum 9 inning games?
That is, might an SB have a value , late in a close game, slightly greater
than its generic value? Might
the 73 innings of a great closer actually be 73 of the most IMPORTANT
innings to have your best pitcher on the mound for,and thus worth far more
in W-L than someone else's 73 innings?
This sounds silly, maybe, but Computer baseball might be a neat model. In
season after season of Strat-O-Matic versus the computer, I have a winning
record in 1 run games because I use mop-up men when it doesn't matter and my
good relievers when it's close, tend to run more when it's close and wait
around for the big inning when it's not.
I know if you've read so far your reaction in not "No sh**" -- it's to see
that my question relates directly to HOW certain games are won and lost.
Assuming all managers are as competent as me (the computer manager might not
be in SOM), isn't it true that THEY manage
manage differently as the game progresses and/or develops -- or should.
Actually, SOM or the other games are great for replaying a season dozens of
times to really see not who the "best team was", but how much variance ther
is in W-L even given very similar stats, from Replay 1 to Replay 20.
Well, thanks for your post.
Joe Earls
a previous article, sp...@panix.com (Greg "Sarcasm Is A Way Of Life" Spira) says:
>In <Pine.SOL.3.91.960621...@apache.utdallas.edu> Ira K Blum <ib...@utdallas.edu> writes:
>
>>>
>>> 1- Do era-relative stats deserve to be totally re-adjusted, or might there
>>> have been something in the game at the time (a run of great pitchers, say)
>>> that we obliterate by adjusting them?
>
>The problem is that we really have no way of figuring out when
>we have a run of great pitchers or great hitters, except by how
>thye perform compared to everybody else. Its very possible that
>pitching today is significantly better than it was in the mid-sixties,
>despite the much higher ERAs - there's no real way of knowing.
>
>>> 2- I feel the same way about Park Adjustments. If Boggs, Koufax, others,
>>> TAKE ADVANTAGE of their park, are we to penalize them the full amount?
>
>As others have said, its perfectly reasonable to reward them for
>any "extra" advantage they take of their home parks. For one thing,
>we can never discount that the player in question might be able
>to adjust well for other home parks as well.
>
>>> 3- I think Pitcher's Wins have to count for something.
>
>>> But I don't see how we got from thinking a base on balls was a
>>> meaningful pitching stat only (25 years ago, before SABR) to where we now
>>> consider W-L IRRELEVANT to a pitcher's performance.
>
>>> I've read Run Support and Wins Above Team*, et al...
>
>>I've seen here a study which showed that Jack Morris won no more games in
>>the 1980's as would be predicted by his ERA and Runs Support.
>
>Close.
>
>>> {* Tricky: as James found with Drysdale, suppose the "team' is Claude Osteen
>>> and Sandy Koufax. How far above THEM are you supposed to go? Wins Above Team
>>> assumes Pitcher plus staff of Joe Average,with extra wins coming from
>>> offense, defense factors. Well, suppose you're Drysdale...not a fair stat. I
>>> wonder how the Atlanta guys look in "wins above team?"}
>
>I find Wins Above Team kind of amusing, but for the reasons
>stated, not very helpful.
>
>>> But isn't there something that separates the Guidry's from the Blyleven's
>>> (I use those as archetypes, so I don't want stat feedback on those guys in
>>> particular) Question is: aren't there people who are Winners and Losers (or
>>> Should Be Winners)?
>
>>> -- You have the Lolich example above. You've probably read ad nauseum the
>>> Koufax argument (IP's and W's are my only one-up on Maddux for Koufax). I
>>> even wondered why it came about that IP's had dropped in the interest of
>>> preserving careers where it seems, except in Atlanta, that nothing good has
>>> come of it in baseball except too many weak pitchers getting too many
>>> innings.
>
>
David Joseph Grabiner
In article <1996Jun21....@k12.oit.umass.edu>, Joseph C. Earls (Tantasqua RS) writes:
> Trying not to repeat myself but seeing these as open questions still:
> 1- Do era-relative stats deserve to be totally re-adjusted, or might there
> have been something in the game at the time (a run of great pitchers, say)
> that we obliterate by adjusting them?
What is usually relevant here is the importance of the statistic to
winning games. A pitcher who posts a 3.00 ERA when the league ERA is
3.00 has pitched well enough to win half the time; a pitcher who posts a
4.50 ERA when the league ERA is 4.50 has done just as much to help his
team win.
> I think if you asked Gibson [in 1968], he might say, "I'd never
> pitched better." i think he would be right -- no matter what the rest
> of the league did.
That may be the case, but it was harder for everyone to score runs that
year, so his outstanding ERA didn't help his team as much as it would in
a year with stronger offense.
> A better example: Mickey Lolich goes 25-12, with 376 IP's in 1971. You can't
> relative or "pitch=count" away a full 100 extra innings of excellence your
> bullpen doesn't have to work. The man pitched 376 innings of sinking
> fastball baseball (yes, we know Wood's 377 but this is Lolich) in the modern
> era. You've got to be impressed with that, no matter the context.
This should not be adjusted away, because innings do not vary with
time. There are nine innings, and one win, and one loss, in every
baseball game, and 162 games in every season. 376 innings of
above-average pitching is worth twice as much as 188 innings of
above-average pitching.
> 2- I feel the same way about Park Adjustments. If Boggs, Koufax, others,
> TAKE ADVANTAGE of their park, are we to penalize them the full amount? Or,
> if Ralph Kiner ISN'T hurt by his park, are we to assume he'd have been even
> greater in a neutral park? (Hypothetical: don't know Kiner's home/road, just
> that pittsburg was tough, even with Kiner's Korner.) Maybe Kiner, like
> Canseco seems to, just hit them far enough to get out of anyplace, and
> adding a PA +4 homers to his totals each year for Pittsburgh is inaccurate:
> he didn't, wouldn't have hit 4 more balls that solidly no matter where he
> was.
> Park Adjustment is very real: but a second question is, does it apply to all
> players equally? If it might not, shouldn't we be careful with it?
This is the same issue. Park adjustment does not ignore a player's home
performance, but adjusts it at a rate which depends only on the park.
If an average team would have an ERA of 3.50 in a normal park and 2.80
in Dodger Stadium, then an average pitccher in Dodger Stadium would have
an ERA of 3.15. If Koufax's ERA was 2.10, that's 2/3 of what an average
pitcher would do in Dodger Stadium, and it leads to just as many wins as
an ERA of 2.31 for a pitcher who pitches only 1/18 of his games in
Dodger Stadium. If Koufax's actual split was 1.00 in Dodger Stadium and
3.20 on the road, he should be given credit for these achievements.
> 3- I think Pitcher's Wins have to count for something.
> Maybe they DON'T count as much as Bill Russell's 11 rings.
> But I don't see how we got from thinking a base on balls was a
> meaningful pitching stat only (25 years ago, before SABR) to where we now
> consider W-L IRRELEVANT to a pitcher's performance.
> But isn't there something that separates the Guidry's from the Blyleven's
> (I use those as archetypes, so I don't want stat feedback on those guys in
> particular) Question is: aren't there people who are Winners and Losers (or
> Should Be Winners)?
> Don't some pitchers do enough to win,whatever that takes?
People who have looked haven't found any evidence. There doesn't seem
to be any pitcher who has an ability to allow four runs per game for a
team which scores four runs per game and go .450 or .550.
> 4- Last, I find Innings Pitched an underrated stat. Few would argue that a
> player who hit .300 with 20 HR's in 400 AB's had an equally good year as
> someone who hit .300 with 30 HR's in 600 AB's. (Who has the other 200 AB's?
> a .300 hitter? not unless you are a very lucky manager) Would player A have
> sustained that level for another 200 aB's ? Maybe. But player B DID: it's a
> fact.
And player A's team didn't get the benefit of what he would have done
when he missed two months with an injury, or sat on the bench because he
couldn't hit lefties; instead, they had to use his injury replacement or
his platoon partner.
> Why is it , then, that Innings Pitched gets virtually ignored in all the
> comparisons, ratios, etc.
This is an important point. Innings pitched serve exactly the same
funciton of measuring playing time. If a pitcher has positive value,
then the more innings he pitches, the more he helped his team win.
Total Baseball's Pitching Runs is one statistic which counts innings
properly. (However, the baseline is in the wrong place; Pitching Runs
counts zero for an average pitcher whether he pitcches one inning or
240. Most MLB teams could gain quite a lot from an average pitcher who
could pitch 240 innings, bumping their fifth starter and spot starters
to AAA or long relief,)
--
David Grabiner, grab...@math.huji.ac.il, http://www.ma.huji.ac.il/~grabiner
I speak at the Hebrew University, but not for it.
Shop at the Mobius Strip Mall: Always on the same side of the street!
Klein Glassworks, Torus Coffee and Donuts, Projective Airlines, etc.
Greg Sarcasm Is A Way Of Life Spira
In <1996Jun23....@k12.oit.umass.edu> jea...@k12.oit.umass.edu (Joseph C. Earls (Tantasqua RS)) writes:
>Greg--
>That's terrific data. Quite a job to put it together.
>You certainly do a number on the myth/concept of "pitching to the score."
> I have 3 follow-up questions:
>1- What do you do then, with the James's stat of Koufax's 18-4 in games
> (it was 1963-64, by the way) in which he got 3 runs or less? Does that say
>anything about the psyche or talent of Sandy Koufax?
My tendency is to believe that the data James shows sounds great to everyone,
but really isn't that impressive given how 1) Koufax was such a great pitcher
and 2) He was pitching in such a low-scoring enviorment. I specifically
set out to look at Koufax because of what James wrote, and I just see no
way to reconcile the fact that he clearly didn't win more games than
he should have given his ERA with what James points out except to say
that James' data sounds a lot more convincing than it is meaningful.
>2- Is there anything, in stat terms or non-provable theory, about teams
>playing better (i.e. run support) behind certain pitchers? What are players
>perceptions on this? Are players' perceptions wrong, if they have any? (For
>ex: I know that the Phillies, as bad as they were in 1972, actually played
>well behind Carlton that incredible year (27-10). With Carlton on the mound,
>they did not play as badly as a 59-93 would be expected to. They did
>everything better.
David Grabiner did a study of AL pitchers support a few years back to
see if there was any correlation in support compared to the team average
support from year to year. There was no correlation; in fact, there was
a small negative correlation (meaningless, probably). In the NL, of
course, there should be some correlation because of pitchers' hitting.
As far as Carlton, the reality of 72 is certainly remarkable, but if it
isn't due to luck, then why didn't it happen to Carlton in other years?
>3- I think you cheated a little on Run Support. We know pitchers don't
>control it, but your range of total certainty was 3.99 support for sure
>losers and 6.01 for sure winners.
The range is a bit artificial, but it's designed to make a point,
not be a strict statistical study.
>I don't think you have to convince anyone Runs Support is critical.
There are some people.
>I just don't believe that among the 300 athletes pitching in baseball now,
>there aren't some who pitch a little better when the game hangs in the
>balance, and some a little worse. That is, I guess I instinctively believe
>that some athletes know how to win. If clutch performance exists in other
>sports, why does it not exist in baseball? Given enough AB's and innings
>pitched, studies will turn it into a "myth". But in athletic terms, does it
>make sense that all players perform the same, whether the score is 3-2 or
>9-2?
I'm not sure we can say the perform the same, just that the results appear
to be, if not the same, very similar. For example, its clear to me that
pitchers with a big lead do pitch differently - they throw more strikes,
give up less walks and more solo homers. But the long term results in
terms of ERA seem to be the same. I happen to believe that there probably
is such a thing as clutch pitching, but that it tends to be more a runners
on base thing than a score related thing. As for why I and others don't
really believe in clutch hitters, on the other hand, I'd theorize that
activities like batting, at an extremely high level, require such reaction
that major league hitters can't put any more effort into an at-bat than
they already do (unlike say a basketball player, who might be able to give
a little extra when it's needed).
>Finally: (maybe this should be a new thread but you're obviously someone who
>can answer this question: In assessing the value of offensive events --
>walks, stolen bases, CS's, even the deadly sac bunt -- or even the value of
>relief pitching -- has anyone done a study that divides Baseball into Close
>games versus Earl Weaver 3 Run Homer games? Or, did they include late
>innings versus full spectrum 9 inning games?
> That is, might an SB have a value , late in a close game, slightly greater
> than its generic value? Might
>the 73 innings of a great closer actually be 73 of the most IMPORTANT
>innings to have your best pitcher on the mound for,and thus worth far more
>in W-L than someone else's 73 innings?
>
I think the latter is clearly somewhat true, though I don't think a closer
is worth nearly as much as baseball seems to think he is. And yes, a stolen
base is almost certainly worth more in a close game in terms of winning -
but a caught stealing is more costly as well. However, I don't think
you'll find something that's inherently bad - like a sac bunt by a non-pitcher
- is any more valuable when the games is on the line.
Greg
Jennie Rosenbaum Matthews
Joseph C. Earls (Tantasqua RS) (jea...@k12.oit.umass.edu) wrote:
[cut]
&I just don't believe that among the 300 athletes pitching in baseball
&now, there aren't some who pitch a little better when the game hangs
&in the balance, and some a little worse. That is, I guess I
&instinctively believe that some athletes know how to win. If clutch
&performance exists in other sports, why does it not exist in baseball?
Clutch *performance* most certainly exists: when somebody hits a 2-run
dinger in the ninth to allow his team to tie it up and send the game to
extras, that a "clutch" performance. However, there does not seem to be
clutch *ability* in baseball: that is, it does not seem that a subset of
players have the ability to *consistently* perform better in "clutch"
situations than in all situations.
&Given enough AB's and innings pitched, studies will turn it into a
&"myth". But in athletic terms, does it make sense that all players
&perform the same, whether the score is 3-2 or 9-2?
It makes sense to me: to get on a roster for any of the major league pro
sports, a guy has to be incredibly skilled and incredibly tough both
physically *and* mentally. I really doubt a MLB player feels the
"pressure". OK, maybe a 20-year-old rookie, but in general I really
believe this to be true.
That being said, I *do* think a "clutch pitching" ability can exist, but
I think it's of very limited usefulness. I don't think it's possible for
hitters to "try harder" in clutch situations. They can make small
adjustments that may, say, increase the likelihood of hitting a homer or
hitting a single, but these adjustments have some negative side effects
that probably (in my humble guessing opinion) zero out the benefit of the
adjustment.
Pitchers, however, are a bit different. In a normal 9-inning game, a
hitter will only come up four times, perhaps five. Thus they don't
have to pace themselves. Pitchers, in particular starting pitchers, do
have to pace themselves somewhat. In a "clutch" situation, a pitcher
could possibly abandon the attempt to pace himself and "put something
extra on it". This can't be done all the time, and it probably increases
the chances of injury.
(Note: it used to be common practice for pitchers to "coast": not pitch
all out unless they were facing a dangerous hitter or if they were in a
jam. For example, Christy Mathewson alluded to this strategy in his book.
Nowadays, pitchers go pretty much all out on every pitch--one of the many
reasons today's pitchers can't match prior IP records. Still, even with
today's close-to-full-bore pitching strategy, I think it's conceivable
that, for a limited number of pitches, some pitchers can increase the
effort, but perhaps at great cost and/or risk.)
Roger Moore
grab...@sunset.ma.huji.ac.il (David Joseph Grabiner) writes:
>This should not be adjusted away, because innings do not vary with
>time. There are nine innings, and one win, and one loss, in every
>baseball game, and 162 games in every season. 376 innings of
>above-average pitching is worth twice as much as 188 innings of
>above-average pitching.
Just a small nit, but a pitcher who can pitch 376 innings of above
average baseball is slightly more than twice as valuable as a pitcher who
can pitch only 188. To take a slightly more extreme case, a hypothetical
pitcher who can pitch two spots in the starting rotation is worth more
than two separate starters who pitch just as deep into their games.
Why? Because each team has a limited number of spots on its roster. The
hypothetical two spot starter leaves space on your bench for an extra
reliever, pinch hitter, or defensive replacement. This is an extra
benefit of an inning eating pitcher which doesn't apply to position players.
--
Raj (r...@alumni.caltech.edu)
Master of Meaningless Trivia (818) 585-0144
Jonathan Bernstein
Greg "Sarcasm Is A Way Of Life" Spira (sp...@panix.com) wrote:
: >I just don't believe that among the 300 athletes pitching in baseball now,
: >there aren't some who pitch a little better when the game hangs in the
: >balance, and some a little worse. That is, I guess I instinctively believe
: >that some athletes know how to win. If clutch performance exists in other
: >sports, why does it not exist in baseball? Given enough AB's and innings
: >pitched, studies will turn it into a "myth". But in athletic terms, does it
: >make sense that all players perform the same, whether the score is 3-2 or
: >9-2?
: I'm not sure we can say the perform the same, just that the results appear
: to be, if not the same, very similar. For example, its clear to me that
: pitchers with a big lead do pitch differently - they throw more strikes,
: give up less walks and more solo homers. But the long term results in
: terms of ERA seem to be the same.
Is there evidence on this? I haven't seen it poster here, I don't think.
If it's true, then I certainly would expect there to be variation among
MLB pitchers with regard to "knowing how to win". If there are different
ways of pitching depending on the score, then I would expect pitchers to
vary along which types of pitching they excel at.
: I happen to believe that there probably
: is such a thing as clutch pitching, but that it tends to be more a runners
: on base thing than a score related thing.
Actually, I expect that clutch pitching is fairly likely to exist, and I
haven't seen any evidence one way or another. I wonder if we'll ever have
enough information to figure out whether some pitchers really are
psychologically incapable of handling a "closer" role, for example;
unfortunately, I highly doubt it.
With regard to pitching to the score, I think you've done a great job of
debunking it for the pitchers in question, but not for the concept in
general. The problem is that pitchers' *reputations* for being good
at pitching to the score are likely to be correlated with run support,
while pitchers' *ability* (if such ability exists) to do so should have
nothing to do with run support. What's needed, and AFAIK hasn't been
done, is a large scale study to determine how much variation around
expected W-L (given RS and RA) exists for individual pitchers. I doubt if
the data is readily available.
There's also the problem that RA isn't independent. Basically, the best
thing I've seen is the Jack McDowell study, but once again proving that
the guy with the massive run support didn't have any special ability
doesn't imply that no one had it.
JHB
LO...@maine.maine.edu
canyo...@aol.com (CanyonFish) wrote:
>In article <Pine.SOL.3.91.960621...@apache.utdallas.edu>,
>>career? did he have arm problems? any guesses as to why?
>
>doughnut-eating lard bucket who thought conditioning consisted of a few
>twelve ounce curls and a walk to the fridge. He never took care of
>himself.
>
I believe he went to the Denny McLain School of Body Maintenance.
In fact Cecil Fielder picked up a graduate degree (and a truck
load of donuts) there. It's a Detroit thing.
Ron
RJ Wessell
In article <4qjs7f$1...@panix3.panix.com>, sp...@panix.com (Greg "Sarcasm
Is A Way Of Life" Spira) wrote:
For example, its clear to me that
> pitchers with a big lead do pitch differently - they throw more strikes,
> give up less walks and more solo homers. But the long term results in
> terms of ERA seem to be the same. I happen to believe that there probably
> is such a thing as clutch pitching, but that it tends to be more a runners
> on base thing than a score related thing. As for why I and others don't
> really believe in clutch hitters, on the other hand, I'd theorize that
> activities like batting, at an extremely high level, require such reaction
> that major league hitters can't put any more effort into an at-bat than
> they already do (unlike say a basketball player, who might be able to give
> a little extra when it's needed).
>
This has been a very thought-provoking thread, and I'd like to express
my appreciation to everyone involved. One thing that I haven't seen
addressed yet, however, regarding the concept of "pitching to the score",
is that it seems counterintuitive to me that throwing more strikes, giving
up less walks and more solo homers should be expected to increase a
pitcher's ERA. Indeed, these seem to be the very traits that have been
most associated in studies I've seen with pitching success. If one also
figures in the fact that in close games, it is common to see fielders
"guarding the lines", the defensive value of which I would tend to regard
as dubious, it seems that the most natural hypothesis to take before
looking at the data would have been that pitchers with a lead should be
more efficient in those innings, not less. "Pitching to the score" looks
suspiciously like a calculated attempt by sportswriters to justify their
love for players that don't match up statistically to others that are less
near and dear to the writer's heart.
R.J. Wessells
Greg Sarcasm Is A Way Of Life Spira
In <4qldod$f...@agate.berkeley.edu> j...@uclink2.berkeley.edu (Jonathan Bernstein) writes:
>Greg "Sarcasm Is A Way Of Life" Spira (sp...@panix.com) wrote:
>: I'm not sure we can say the perform the same, just that the results appear
>: to be, if not the same, very similar. For example, its clear to me that
>: pitchers with a big lead do pitch differently - they throw more strikes,
>: give up less walks and more solo homers. But the long term results in
>: terms of ERA seem to be the same.
>Is there evidence on this? I haven't seen it poster here, I don't think.
Well, there's evidence of the former. The latter is really my conclusion
from the fact that the former is true plus my studies on support.
>If it's true, then I certainly would expect there to be variation among
>MLB pitchers with regard to "knowing how to win". If there are different
>ways of pitching depending on the score, then I would expect pitchers to
>vary along which types of pitching they excel at.
>With regard to pitching to the score, I think you've done a great job of
>debunking it for the pitchers in question, but not for the concept in
>general. The problem is that pitchers' *reputations* for being good
>at pitching to the score are likely to be correlated with run support,
>while pitchers' *ability* (if such ability exists) to do so should have
>nothing to do with run support.
Well, one would hope that if there was an ability to pitch to
the score, reputation would somewhat correlate with that ability.
You are right, of course, that I have not done a systematic study of this,
and have instead just offered up evidence that the pitchers most frequently
claimed to pitch to the score don't. I think that this is very
pwerful evidence that really should throw the ball into the court of
anyone who wants to prove "pitching to the score," but you're
right that it's not the final word.
What's needed, and AFAIK hasn't been
>done, is a large scale study to determine how much variation around
>expected W-L (given RS and RA) exists for individual pitchers. I doubt if
>the data is readily available.
>There's also the problem that RA isn't independent. Basically, the best
>thing I've seen is the Jack McDowell study, but once again proving that
>the guy with the massive run support didn't have any special ability
>doesn't imply that no one had it.
I've lost you here (on the first part).
Greg
Jonathan Bernstein
Greg "Sarcasm Is A Way Of Life" Spira (sp...@panix.com) wrote:
: In <4qldod$f...@agate.berkeley.edu> j...@uclink2.berkeley.edu (Jonathan Bernstein) writes:
: >Greg "Sarcasm Is A Way Of Life" Spira (sp...@panix.com) wrote:
[...]
: >If it's true, then I certainly would expect there to be variation among
: >MLB pitchers with regard to "knowing how to win". If there are different
: >ways of pitching depending on the score, then I would expect pitchers to
: >vary along which types of pitching they excel at.
: >With regard to pitching to the score, I think you've done a great job of
: >debunking it for the pitchers in question, but not for the concept in
: >general. The problem is that pitchers' *reputations* for being good
: >at pitching to the score are likely to be correlated with run support,
: >while pitchers' *ability* (if such ability exists) to do so should have
: >nothing to do with run support.
: Well, one would hope that if there was an ability to pitch to
: the score, reputation would somewhat correlate with that ability.
One could hope, but I highly doubt it. No one with the run support Roger
Clemens has is ever going to get a reputation for it. No one with the
overall (lack of) quality of a Greg Gohr is going to get that reputation,
even if he is good at it (relative to how bad he is at everything else).
: You are right, of course, that I have not done a systematic study of this,
: and have instead just offered up evidence that the pitchers most frequently
: claimed to pitch to the score don't. I think that this is very
: pwerful evidence that really should throw the ball into the court of
: anyone who wants to prove "pitching to the score," but you're
: right that it's not the final word.
I guess I don't; to me, the expectation would be that the high-profile
"pitch to the score" guys would be the high run support guys. If there
was no mechanism that would make it likely, or at least reasonable, that
there would be differing abilities, I'd say the ball was in their court,
but as it is, I can't say anything more than that it's unknown whether the
ability exists.
JHB