THE BOOK--Playing The Percentages In Baseball

So, chances are, teams aren’t valuing a pitcher’s hitting enough.

It’s possible.  The best hitter of the current era (and 3rd best since 1955) is Mike Hampton.  (Micah hasn’t qualified yet.) Hampton is worth +4 runs.  Near the bottom is Ben Sheets at -2 runs.

Like I said, 1 SD = 1.15, so 95% of the pitchers are +/- 2.3 runs.  So, it has less impact than say someone’s baserunning (not basestealing).  And no team really pays for baserunning.

One of the problems with teams taking full advantage of pitcher hitting is that, one, with runners on base, decent and good hitting pitchers bunt WAY too often, and two, pitchers in general tend to bat in low leverage situations, I assume, especially the poor hitting ones.  I would be interested to see, Tango, what the average leverage is for pitcher hitting.

That being said, one of the many mistakes that managers make is letting his starter bat in the 4th, 5th, and 6th innings (and even earlier sometimes), when the starter is not that good of a pitcher (to want to keep him in the game).

I’ll reiterate what we continually say, and what is in The Book, for those who have not read/heard it:  The most powerful thing a team/manager can do, I think, is to utilize the “never let your 4th and 5th starters bat” strategy.  I have mentioned before that I would tweak that to make it a little more workable, which is to never let him hit unless the leverage is real low, or a sac bunt is almost as good as hitting away, or the pitcher is a real good hitter of course.  Extremely powerful strategy, and while I am surprised that no one has done it yet, I think it is only a matter of time before someone does.  It think La Russa did something like that 10 or 15 years ago, where he had a number of relievers pitch a game starting from inning 1.  I assume he rarely let them bat, but with him, you never know.  He is often just as likely to do something really stupid as he is to do something really smart.

The average wOBA of an average starter through the order each time: .345, .353, .361.

The average reliever wOBA the first time through the order: .341.

If the average reliever is .341 the first time through the order, how bad would a back of the bullpen guy be?  He’ll be right around that .361 mark. 

A 4th and 5th starter however will not be .345/.353/.361 but something about 20 points worse across the board.  His FIRST time through the order is already worse than the back of the bullpen guy.

Basically, it really makes no sense to have a 5th starter try to pace himself for 5 or 6 innings.

Is this adjusted at all for the fact that an NL pitcher will start a handful of interleague games where he’ll be replaced by a DH?

I was reading about Larussa’s three-pitcher strategy recently.  It only lasted a few games, and the legend is that the pitchers revolted because the starter could never earn a win.

Pending an apocalyptic statement from a front office that “pitcher wins” are entirely irrelevant, and will not be considered in salary negotiations, it will be necessary for 1st and 2nd pitcher (i.e. the 5th and 6th “starters") in a multi-pitcher strategy to be rotated.  This allows the “chances to win” to be shared. From each according to his abilities, to each according to his needs.  Socialist pitching!

Mike, that is actually a good point.  The proposal in The Book is to follow the #4 starter with the #5 and vice versa (although that is not always necessary), so the 4th and 5th starters still should be able to get around the same number of wins are always, although as you say, their win total will be tied up in the pitching of the other guy.

One thing.  If the starter does not go 5 IP, then the scorer can give the win to anyone, I think.

Under this system, it might actually be that the 4 and 5 starters will get MORE wins than normal.  Normally the 4th and 5th starters get a lot of ND because they don’t often pitch more than 5 or 6 innings anyway.  Under this system, if the game is won, the second pitcher in is probably going to get the win if the team was winning while the first pitcher was in the game (and he pitches well), OR when the team takes the lead while the second pitcher is in the game.  He gets the double whammy!