The Unwritten Book is Finally Written!
An in-depth analysis of: The sacrifice bunt, batter/pitcher matchups, the intentional base on balls, optimizing a batting lineup, hot and cold streaks, clutch performance, platooning strategies, and much more. Read Excerpts & Customer Reviews
From #5 :
"you’re talking about 5 extra WAR from that game which brings him up to around 45 for his career.
That number is a lot closer to a Hall of Fame case
(although it still only brings him up to Guidry’s level)"
Of course we would also need to credit Guidry for game 2 of the 1977 ALCS and game 4 of the 1977 WS. Likewise, both starts from the 1978 playoffs. Lastly, games 1 and 5 of the 1981 WS. So considering all playoff appearances, Guidry may move ahead further than he did with regular season WAR alone..
#7
I think (estimation here) it is about .4 runs per year for a NL pitcher. So about 22 fgRep. to 20 rRep. for a current AL pitcher and maybe 24 fgRep. to 20 rRep. for a current NL pitcher. Certainly enough to add a WAR or two to Wainwright's totals. So that would bring the WAR gap to around 2, or near 20 runs prevented that Rally picks up on that Fangraphs does not due to the factors I laid out earlier. Now how much of that is Wainwright vs. luck? Obviously, we can't tell yet - nor can we tell at this point which WAR is a better indicator of Wainwrights skill, But the replacement level is making a little difference. Nobody suggested 1-2 wins per year.
#5
Yes, but that is with the higher replacement production given to Wainwright in FG. Take away the extra replacement level increase due the the lower baseline and adjust down for Waino pitching in the NL compared to the AL (which FG does not do) and the gap is much larger. Presumably that gap is due to FG not considering any BABIP skill that exists (agreed with Cameron that it is virtually impossible to locate the skill with that few BFs), situational/timing issues, controlling the running game, DP's, XBH prevention, and all of the other secondary run prevention skills. That is why I always say that if I want to see a pitcher's WAR in a season or 3, I pick FGs before the pitcher has enough BFs for all of the pitching/defense codependent aspects of run prevention to be identified as skill. If I want to look at guys with long careers, I look at rWAR since the co-dependent run prevention aspects have had enough BF's to reach levels I am comfortable with. Way too many guys have too much influence over situational pitching/timing, DP's, controlling the running game, BABIP, XBhit prevention, wild pitches, etc. to ignore them at a long-career level.
#76
Wasn't there a 40-30-20-10 breakdown suggested a few years back with 40% being luck and 10% being park with pitching skill and defense there in the middle? Is that seasonal? I guess we could take out more of the luck portion and attribute it more to pitching skill as more BIP accrued?
Given Hudson's career BABIP (which is about .010 better than mates), the good defense he is playing in front of, and the sizable distance from league mean - doesn't it suffice to say that there is probably some skill, some luck, and some defensive help going on there? Probably in order of quantity going from 1. luck, 2. skill, and 3, defense? Maybe switch 2 and 3?
Colin -
Well, wouldn't 156 plays above average be about 120 runs? How is that possible when he is only about 100 hits or so on BIP better than his mates according to his .284 (or nearby) BABIP compared to his team's .291 (or nearby). How does that work? It looks like I am comparing apples to oranges.
Looking at the batted-ball type BABIP predictions, I can't help but think about Maddux. He was a RH GB pitcher with below average K's. Nothing outrageous in terms of infield flies. How was he about 2 SD from his mates on BIP? He doesn't seem to have many of the BABIP reducing indicators on his side. Has to be something with location/movement/pitch type. Glavine (about 1.7 SD away from mates) seems a little more obvious. He threw tons of change-ups low and outside and caused a vastly disproportionate number of balls to not be pulled. Same with Jamie Moyer (near 1.5 SD from mates). I can't think of many other guys that make me say "huh" for the bulk of their careers regarding how their BABIP reductions happened. Most of the rest have the high K or FB thing going.
#13
Maybe instead of saying that pitchers have no true talent outside of the .007 spread, maybe we should say that that all tenured MLB pitchers are talented enough to produce BABIP's close to .300. If they couldn't keep their BABIP close to .300, they would be out of the league pronto. In other words, near .300(in the modern game)is the best humans are capable of. Its not that pitchers are so bad at it that they can't get away from .300. So a .310 true BABIP pitcher is still exhibiting plenty of BABIP skill...enough to stay in the league, but not as much skill as a .290 BABIP pitcher. Maybe if it was phrased in those terms it wouldn't turn off so many people who only hear "your favorite pitcher was lucky, not good."
Mo vs. Glavine? In what terms? Glavine is about .006 better than his mates (maybe a little closer to .007 if we extract out Maddux and Smoltz) but with 14,000 BIP. Rivera has to be near .030 BABIP better than his mates but is closer to 3,000 BIP. I am guessing that puts Glavine around 1.5-2 SD away from his mates and Mo closer to 3? So we can be confident that Glavine's BABIP vs. mates is pretty locked in and he is solid BABIP reducer (maybe a 5% regression needed or so?), and we can look at Rivera as a very good BABIP reducer even after the much bigger regression. So Rivera's BABIP is so low, that it is likely that his true BABIP ability is better than Glavine's despite the BIP deficiency?
So rWAR has a higher replacement level but fWAR does not adjust for AL vs. NL. So which one of those has a bigger impact, the gap between the replacement levels or the difference between the league adjustments.
Rally said that if a pitcher has +20 in rWAR might be +22 in fWAR. How would that number change for a modern day pitcher in the NL vs. AL?
Another quick question - do both rWAR and fWAR set the same replacement levels? At one point, wasn't Rally doing .420 for starting pitchers and FG about .380?
Of course by 1990 (at least several years into most of the previous generations "big 9") very few if any looked like HOFers. Clemens looked good for it, but Maddux was just another good, but not great pitcher and Glavine looked as likely for a career as a #4 starter as a HOFer. Schilling was still a part-time reliever, and Brown looked nothing like he did from 1996-2000. Johnson was walking zillions of batters per year and didn't look like a complete pitcher at all. And Moose and Pedro hadn't even started yet.
So Tom is right - it is too early to call it.
Some help would be appreciated:
If a pitcher has a BABIP .010 better than his teammates after 13,000 BIP, than we can regress the 15% or so needed and still conclude that he had real BABIP skill.
What if his BABIP is only .002 better than teammates after 13,000 BIP? Is he close enough to his mates that regressing the 15% or whatever isn't needed and just ignore the .002 difference as random variance? Or do we conclude his BABIP skill (only .002 better than mates) is real but small and give him credit as having slight BABIP skill?
Looking at the linked list, is it safe to say that we can conclude that anyone with 1 SD over/under their mates is showing true BABIP "skill"?
Thanks!
But what about Maddux? He doesn't have the handedness benefit, he throws groundballs which are supposed to drive up BABIP, he doesn't have the high-K correlation going, yet he is still almost 2 SD away from his mates in terms of preventing hits on BIP. Glavine is 1.5 SD away from his teammates in terms of preventing hits on BIP without the Ks, FB,s and most of the other BABIP reducing indicators as well. It seems like Glavine throwing a larger % of change-ups (lower BABIP) low and away(lower BABIP) and preventing pulled balls may be the BABIP reduction factor there. But is Maddux really creating weak contact or is there something else going on? Are there other guys who have opposite of the BABIP reducing indicators that have great BABIP numbers compared to mates or are Maddux and Glavine unique? Like Moyer and Zito have the FB thing covered despite lack of Ks.
#11 -
Yes, I know that weak contact and BABIP are not equivalent, but Mike said "That’s not to say we will prove DIPS wrong (we won’t), but those who interpret DIPS to mean that pitchers have basically very little or no control over batted ball outcomes will be shown to be wrong." This is much more overarching than questioning "weak contact" only and is exactly what my post was referring too.
Do you really think I would be able to list so many of the factors involved with BABIP reduction and believe that weak contact and BABIP are equivalent at the same time?
#8
Since we know that the handedness of the pitcher, their K/BB/GB/FB rates, location of pitches, count on pitches, type of pitches thrown, and velocity all have at least a tiny bit of impact on pitcher BABIP, don't we already know a big chunk of what we need to? We know that pitchers have a true talent range around .02 on BABIP, and we know how many BIP it takes to reach r=.5, etc. for BABIP. It seems to me that we have a fairly solid handle on what is going on here. There aren't too many individuals who still claim that pitchers have no BABIP ability or have no ability whatsoever to induce weak contact. If they do, they need to hang out here more often.
Most fielding metrics have shown Maddux to have been saved 30-60 runs by his defenses and Glavine 50-80 runs. How does this info. on their fielding abilities change those numbers, if they do?
post #22
We know for a fact that Glavine had a largely disproportionate number of BIP go to the right side of the field compared to other pitchers. Not sure what impact that has. Looking at Colin's scatterplot, we see Glavine as an extreme outlier. which is nothing new to Glavine, who seems to be an outlier in many regards.
Question - if Glavine's infields were + 81 total for his career, and only +23 from 93-02 when they were at their alleged pinnacle, than that means from 1987-1992 and 2003-2008 (with some presumed mediocre to poor 1987-1990 and 2003-2005 seasons included) his infields were +58. Am I missing something?
Also, what can we derive from the fact that Glavine is the only pitcher on wither list to not have a negative correlation from PIT_PM to OIF_PM? Anything?
Are the OIF-PM affected by the pitcher's BABIP abilities or only the infields defensive ability? In other words, does it capture all plays made above or below regardless of who gets the responsibility or is it just showing the fielders responsibility?
I know the BABIP by count numbers are not impressive, and we heard the same thing regarding BABIP by pitch location and BABIP by type of pitch thrown, etc. But all of these "almost" not worth mentioning BABIP factors can be adding up to make a solid dent in the .020 difference we see in some good and bad BABIP. Of course pitcher handedness, K rates, defense, and luck are bigger factors but should we disregard all of these "little" things that may be adding up to effect BABIP in statistically significant ways altogether? I am not sure.
I know we talked about how to deal with Sosa's "clutch" and WAR, but what about pitchers? How would a 60 WAR pitcher, for example, be affected by a -3 "clutch" for example? IS there anyway to determine that?
Sorry for the bombardment of questions, but I have one more: on his "DIPS20" page (http://www.tangotiger.net/DIPS20.htm), Tom shows Maddux to have been +100 hits compared to teammates through 2000 and Glavine to have been +74. Even though neither probably increased those levels too much, they probably did a little bit. What is causing the discrepancy in your numbers and Tom's? Infield singles? Different hit databases used?
Thanks again as always!
One possible thing I can think of is: that a majority of the 60+ runs prevented by Maddux's defense or 80 prevented by Glavine's defenses are not hits prevented by BIP, but by DPs, outfielder arms, outfielders keeping singles from becoming doubles, etc. That would still leave room to credit them for their BABIP differences between them and mates. This may match up with the fact that the strength of the Braves defenses were their outfields too. Of course as ground-ball pitchers, TZ may be punishing them unfairly as a majority of their BIP went to their less amazing infielders. I think PZR considers that and both Maddux and Glavine do have better PZR based WAR from 2001-2006 than rWAR.
I get that, but I am still confused about something. If Maddux prevented 54 runs on hits compared to his league, and his defense saved him over 60 runs (due mostly, I am assuming to BABIP prevention), than wouldn't that imply that Maddux did nothing on his own merit in regards to BABIP? But we know for a fact that he prevented tons of hits on BABIP compared to his teammates. How does that all work out? Same with Glavine - his defense saved him 80 runs and he is +72 preventing hits on BIP. However, we know that he prevented many hits on BIP compared to his mates. What am I missing?
Thinking about Strasburg's slightly better-than-a-month-ago BABIP and how it is affected by his team's defense, it reminded me of a question that hopefully Rally or somebody else can answer. On the pitcher pages at baseballprojections, do the runs in the H+ column consider how many runs a pitcher himself prevents compared to league, or is it runs saved by hits on BIP by the pitcher plus his defenses? So if Maddux is +56, does that mean he prevented 56 runs compared to his teams on BABIP or just league on BABIP? The glossary says "compared to league with no contextual adjustments", but the site also says that the X column includes all of Maddux's defensive support, and the H+ column and X column can't both contain his defensive support. If it is true that Maddux received 64 runs of defensive support (most due to BABIP reduction) and only prevented 56 compared to league on BIP, that would imply that Maddux's real skill in BABIP was non-exsistant. That leads me to believe that H+ is comparing pitcher to his teammates. Is this correct?
I love how Dan Gilbert accused James of quitting and being a coward, etc. Yet, Gilbert was offering a man he accused of quitting on his team and a coward over 20 million a year to play for him? What does that say about Gilbert?
Rally,
Will converting to new TZ affect pitchers? If so, how?
Since we are talking fielding and TZ, here is another question I asked on another post but have yet to receive comment for yet. Hopefully it isn't too far off topic.
say a pitcher like Jiminez has an incredible GIDP rate due to high GB rates but the infield defense behind him is also above average. How does Total Zone treat the extra double plays that he induces? Does his team defense get all of the credit for the extra double plays turned? Does Jiminez’ WAR see the benefits or is it somewhere in-between?
This got me thinking - say a pitcher like Jiminez has an incredible GIDP rate due to high GB rates but the infield defense behind him is also above average. How does Total Zone treat the extra double plays that he induces? Does his team defense get all of the credit for the extra double plays turned? Does Jiminez' WAR see the benefits or is it somewhere in-between?
Well, Jiminez is getting pretty close to the 1,500 BIP mark, so we could estimate that r=.4 or so, right? So regress 60% and his adjusted BABIP for the season is .275. That would be about 9 hits worth of "luck" or 7 runs worth. Plug that into his ERA and it goes up to about 1.80. Still not accounting for the Rockies' defense or LOB%, of course.
It's just funny, because about 7-8 years ago, many in the sabermetric community were claiming Ozzie might not even be HOF worthy. I will say, that the discovery of the actual impact and run value of defense is one of sabermetric's most valuable "discoveries" the past 10 years. Right up there with the quantitative value of positional differences and the fact that pitchers have less control on BIP than we originally thought. Those were the three that changed my perceptions of the game the most.
True, but I don't think even the most avid Cardinal fans would put Ozzie in the top 20-30 players all-time. Well, assuming at least moderate knowledge of baseball history.
If the data is right, than its right. But I wonder out of curiosity how the perception of this quickly-being-accepted metric will be when the Rolens and Ozzies of the world end up with more WAR than Jimmie Foxx and other "legends". Isn't that the expected result if they are being hugely shortchanged defensively?
If Fangraphs adjusts their runs-to-wins converter, than career rWAR and fWAR should come out extremely close to the same, correct? Will that be true for pitchers as well when FGphs gets to that point for pre- 2002 years?
So PZR is really the gap from expected hits allowed considering all known factors (defense, park, hit location, velocity, etc.)and real hits allowed. How that gap happened varies from pitcher to pitcher - some may be luck and some other factors.
Looking over this for the first time today.
Does this apply while crediting pitchers for preventing runs on hits allowed on BIP too? Does a prevented single on a BIP = .8 runs?
I'd like to see how the Lopez/Mather 3 inning combo compared to any other 3+ inning relief outings by positioned players historically. I would also like to see if Kyle Loshe could be a better full-tile LFer than Carlos Lee.
I am 99% a sat guy, but I have no problem putting borderline WAR guys in the HOF for being really famous, outstanding in the postseason, or for breaking some significant record. So would Brock be in my HOF since he is well short of WAR greatness, but had all three of the criteria I listed above? I don't know. Probably not, but I'd consider putting a 45 WAR guy in if he met those criteria. If a guy is too far below that, there is nothing that would get him in my HOF short of an incredible peak. It is a spectator museum for fans, and there seems to be some element of truth to the idea of the fans getting to see the players enshrined that they want to see, right? Dizzy Dean is a guy I would elect to a HOF, but not a HOM type club.
Alex - I have looked at that and love it for long career pitchers. The consistent,long-career FIP out-performers do well with PZR. Doesn't seem to be much different from rWAR, however besides using UZR instead of TZ.
Just look at the Eagles this year. One extra-loss difference changed them from a #2 seed to a #6 seed. That could have been the difference of one fluky catch, a single bad bounce, or an isolated blown ref call. Yet if they beat the #1 seed as a #6, people who don't get it will say "what a huge upset, blah, blah, blah." When before the Dallas loss everybody was picking them as an NFC favorite.
Somewhat related, I'd love to see NFL-like playoff scenarios/brackets of every MLB season the past 10 years or so after 16 games played. I wonder how many times the Royals or Reds or Pirates would have made the playoffs?
The Steelers may have technically "snuck" into the playoffs in 2005 based on seed, but they had a 11-5 record in a crazy-loaded AFC. Not only that, but two of the Steeler's losses that year came with Batch as main QB instead of Roth. In fact, they were favored in every game they played in the playoffs, minus the Colts game. That includes vs. the Seahawks, who were either the #1 or #2 seed from the NFC. That was a great team that proved it in the playoffs. 16 games isn't enough sample size to determine if a 13-3 team is really "better" than a 10-6 team anyway.
#15 - people forget that the Cardinals were 15 games over .500 in June. Unfortunately, from about 2 weeks earlier through the end of the year, they: lost Pujols for a month, Molina for a month, Edmonds for a month, Eckstien for a month, their #2 pitcher(Mulder) for the season and their closer (Izzy) for the season. Both Rolen and Encarnacion were very banged up and may had gone on the DL if they disclosed their pain. What you clearly had was a very talented team (same core that won 205 games the previous 2 years with a W.S. trip and a NLCS trip to boot) who were on pace for over 90 wins in June, when they got hit by a 2009 Mets-scale epic rash of injuries the rest of the way. Suddenly, they get healthy come playoff time and roll. Everybody acts shocked to this day that an 83-win team won the series. Another example of people looking at W-L record with no context whatsoever.
Not even close to the least talented team to ever win the W.S. I will admit, however, that Weaver was pretty darn fluky!
I have seen many more people use rWAR for career evaluations and more use fWAR for projections or to evaluate short-career pitchers, which seems appropriate. I agree that many people do not understand the differences between the different WAR models, and that we should be careful to use the best models for the best situations and discuss the differences to newbies.
Which "leaves out" more?
ERA - defensive support, leveraging/quality of batters faced, park factors, bullpen support, the pitcher's responsibility regarding unearned runs
FIP - event timing/sit. splits/LOB%, etc., what BABIP skill does exist, pitcher defense, DP inducing, HBP, WP, leveraging/quality of batters faced, park factors, XBH prevention, pick-offs, controlling running game
Most pitchers can't prevent enough runs by controlling the running game or limiting doubles or defending their position well in any given season to make a huge difference in their FIP or ERA. That is why FIP works so well at a seasonal level - it leaves in what pitchers control the most, and as a fair trade-off for most pitchers (the Glavine's being examples,) takes out what is least impactful and controllable. However, over 15-20 seasons, those secondary run prevention tools add up to be tons of runs for many pitchers.
Take RA+ - if you could just adjust for defensive support you should get pretty close to "true" RA+ for long career guys. BABIP and HR/FB have had enough PA's to stabilize, leveraging and quality of batters faced is not a huge factor for modern starters, park is considered already, and bullpen support tends to be a smallish factor for most pitchers over long careers. Outside of defensive support, what else would dramatically skew a long- tenured pitcher's "real" RA+ level?
I guess my point is, given a very long career, some defensive-adjusted RA+ would be better than FIP or ERA. And then use FIP for future performance and evaluating pitchers with only a handful of seasons under their belt. FIP definitely is very useful. Like many have said, it does what it is intended to do.
I have a lot of question regarding tRA*
1. How do the batted ball weights affect a guy like Greg Maddux? Most GB pitchers would give up a higher number of runs per batted ball since BABIP is higher for GB, traditionaly. However, Maddux was an extreme GBer and a major BABIP reducer. Likewise, what if a flyball pitcher routinely gives up a lot more hits on FB than average?
I know that tRA* regresses K rates, etc. to league averages, but that seems unfair to pitchers who have proven to have the ability to repeat great performances in each area.
Also, are the linear weights used in tRA* similar to baseRuns in which each pitcher's own run environment is calculated or are the weights only compared to a league average baseline?
This is why I like Rally's WAR for long careers, it takes out defense support and gives credit to the pitcher for everything else. Even though it looks like it suffers from the same GB/FB linear weights assumptions that tRA* does. Given enough BF, rWAR should give a pretty good idea of a pitcher's ability, since it includes all of those things I mentioned in post #2 . Of course FIP, etc. is still best for pitchers who only have a season or two under their belts.
Agreed, Nick.
I just wish there were advanced statistics out there which did accurately pinpoint the contributions of guys like Glavine. Seems to me that for long career guys like Glavine, that a metric which only takes out defensive quality would be best, such as rWAR. I guess for short career or single season pitchers, there is too small of a sample size to determine much about the pitchers like Glavine.
Glavine is such an interesting case, because he just so happens to be very good at just about everything FIP leaves out. Stranding runners/impressive stretch and windup splits? Check. BABIP reduction compared to teamates? Check. High GB rates which drive up GBDP and lower XBH? Check. Hold runners well and limit HB and WP? Check. Defend your position well? Check. Hit well? Check.
Of course Glavine was no FIP disaster either. A 3.90 or so FIP is still higher than the second tier class of pitchers of his era: Moyer, Wells, Rogers, Pettitte, etc. And none of them had near the collection of secondary run producing skills mentioned above. His walk rate was above average and his HR/9 rate was all-time good. Those pesky K's kept him from being a top 15 or so all-time pitcher.
Bottom line: Glavines' case is very unique and should be looked at as such. There needs to be a lot more guys like him to prove that FIP doesn't work too well.
"The rate of HIV infection among heterosexual women in the 1st world, even skanky ones, is incredibly low."
This is true, but is it worth taking that risk?
Not trying to speculate, but if the confessions (from the adulteress's mouth) are true, then Woods knowingly and repeatedly has sexual intercourse with at least one woman without using protection. Nobody knows if this was the pattern of behavior, but I don't know why he would use protection with some and not others. Assuming he is not a complete moron and knows the serious, potential dangers involved with being very promiscuous and very unprotected, it speaks volumes about his character. Having unprotected sex with that many "loose" women (assuming there were more than one) is like playing Russian Roulette with himself, the mistresses, and his wife.
So back to my main question, when Greg Maddux ends up with +60 PZR runs from 2001-2006, what that means is that he prevented 60 runs due to some combination of skill and luck compared to what he "should have" given his defense and batted ball distribution? Correct?
Brian - what if your method says that pitchers have a worse BABIP on GB than league average BABIP, but Greg Maddux's BABIP on GB is better than league average? Will he be unfairly "hurt"?
Isn't it easier (albeit not quite as accurate) to just see how many hits on BIP a pitcher has allowed compared to his own teammates? Compare his DER to the teams' DER? You don't weed out luck, but that should take care of most of the defense issues.
Thanks! That does make sense. That was my hunch - but so many people use the term "luck" interchangeably with defensive support, that I was not 100% sure.
Quick question:
One one of the threads a few years back, Tom said that Greg Maddux had been the "luckiest" pitcher in terms of PZR from the data from 2001-2006, with nearly 60 runs worth of "luck" and Glavine and Moyer were high up there too. Does "lucky" mean that their defenses saved them those 40-60 runs, or that they gave up 40-60 fewer runs that what they "should have" based on trajectory,location etc., and the reasons why could be a combination of skill, luck, etc.? Tom did mention that he suspected that Maddux, Moyer etc. were "smart" pitchers and inferred that they were doing something out there which "helped" their PZR. Just looking for some expert clarification. Thanks!
From Guy in 2006 -
"Through 2005, Pedro gave up 194 HR on 6390 BIP. For 2002-2006 his OF% was .35, and since your own analysis suggests that GB/OF tendency is a stable skillset, let’s assume that’s his career rate. Even if he was a bit more of a GB pitcher early in his career, it won’t significantly change the conclusion. That means 194 HR on 2237 FB or .087 HR/FB (I’ll include any HR on LD, just to be generous). The 95% confidence interval is +/-.013, so we can say there’s a 97.5% chance that Pedro’s true rate is 10.0 or below.
Repeat for Glavine (300 HR, 12884 BIP, .29 OF%), and we get .080 HR/FB, +/-.01, or a 97.5% chance he’s below .09. I’m too lazy to figure out the chances that each are truly above average (<.12), but it’s well over 99%. So, saying it’s “pretty clear” they have this skill actually understates the conclusion we can reach."
For Maddux, Clemens, and others we see the same thing. In fact, doesn't HR/FB correlates about as well as BABIP from year-to-year? And very few vote to completely disregard BABIP prevention as partially skill anymore.
So the fact that there is some HR/FB ability shouldn't be in question. The question is - does Grienke have enough track record to "prove" that his 2009 HR/FB is legit? If not, how much should we regress? Or should we just give him the benefit of the doubt with all of it?
I have seen a lot here about how well Mussina, Schilling, Glavine, Smoltz, and Brown do according to Smith's WAR. They are all near 70 WAR, when the median WAR for HOF pitchers is closer to 60. I have been in a lot of discussions lately defending the HOF legitimacy of these pitchers. Before continuing these debates, I would like to know if there are any outside factors that WAR may be whiffing on that would make any of them a "non" HOFers? Biases with Total Zone? LQ? Some type of "# of times through the lineup in comparison to older pitchers" thing?
Basically, should I continue to use their high-WAR totals as solid evidence for HOF status, or are there too many question/doubts regarding WAR that it may not be worth it? How high of a WAR does a pitcher need to eliminate doubt concerning their HOF deservedness? Is there any reason to believe that any of them are in reality noticeably better or worse than their WAR would indicate?
Finally, question for Rally - is pitcher defense considered/separated out from team defense in WAR or not.
Thank you!
Another idea - it seems like most of the white guys who get the "scrappy" label are pretty small in stature. Maybe it is more of a size thing that a race thing. Are white players in the MLB significantly shorter than the black players?
I think the way that the media made over and drooled over guys like Ozzie, Griffey, Jeter, Gwynn, Puckett, and others makes it difficult to claim a strong, overreaching racial bias. And the media can't get enough of hispanic players like Pujols and Manny and Pedro, etc. Now will an "angry-urban black man" like Bonds get more negative attention than a guy like Giambi? Sure, but there are many other factors regarding their personalities and histories that contributed to their perceptions. Does some racial bias exist? Of course, but I think it is pretty subtle to non-existant for a majority of writers, etc. I do agree that "hustle" has been attributed more to whites than blacks. "Why" is another issue.
I definitely agree that the positional difference bias and the homerun/RBI/lack of understanding real value bias is far, far greater than the racial bias and most writers have it. This is clearly why Utley is so vastly underrated while Rollins and Howard are so overrated.
Great info! Just for the record, Jason Marquis didn't throw a single pitch in the 2006 playoffs. Doesn't really change anything, but I know you like to be accurate in all that you write.
Has anybody calculated the WAR median for postion HOFers? I would bet that it is closer to 60.
Also, how does the WAR mean for pitchers compare to position players?
I am sure Tom Glavine and Johan Santana (.84 and .85 FBs pulled per 1 FB hit Op.F.) couldn't agree more with the last point.
I did some research on modern lefties, and these two had by far the largest % of flyballs hit opposite field.
Johnson .99
Wells 1.03
Moyer 1.19
Key .96
Rogers 1.14
Finley .91
Buehrle 1.16
Langston 1.17
Zito 1.36
John .97
Tanana 1.35
Kaat .99
Carlton 1.07
Koosman 1.06
Cuellar 1.33
Valenzuala 1.21
I would love to see if type of pitch and location is the main reason why.
Since many pitchers with long careers do show ability to supress BABIP (compared to teamates) and HR/FB, and since FIP and FIPx do not directly consider the long-term accumulating affects of controling the running game, wild pitches, balks, GB% rate (which affects XBH rates and GIDP), situational split (stretch/windup) data that may be a significant "skill" in some cases (larger percentage of walks with 1B open, etc.), and any "real" LOB% results that aren't alredy captured by the "TTO", how many BFs does a pitcher need before FIP or FIPx are no longer effective ways to evaluate their careers? I have no concerns or questions about using FIP for evaluating young pitchers with limited data or predicting general performance for a vast majority of pitchers without track records. But is it reliable for pitchers who have had more than enough BFs to almost regress completely in the partial-pitcher, partial-luck, run prevention tools?
I have often wondered for pitchers with 10,000 or more PA's, if ERA+ is not closer to "true talent" than FIP. ERA+ leaves out team defense and quality of batters faced (not a big issue for post WW2 pitchers) and has shaky park-affects. FIP leaves out everything I mentioned above. Which one leaves out more? Many people use FIP as a career evaluation method for guys with tons of BFs and I am not sure if this is a very good use of the stat. I think Tom is right: a problem with the user, not the stat.
Conclusion, I want to know your opinions on if the following statement is correct:
FIP is a great stat to predict future performance or get a good idea of the skill level of pitchers without a lot if history, but not so great at evaluating pitchers with very long careers?
Some might not like hearing that their favorite players are "lucky."
Let's say Chipper is your favorite player and you take offense to the notion that his talent might not be as good as his production would indicate becasue of what MGL is suggesting. One should not fret too much, as it is very likey that those ranked above him had equal if not more "luck" on their side. It shouldn't change our overall perception of players since everybody regresses - not just Chipper.
Well, if TZ does not pick up on harder to field groundballs or flyballs - you may have your answer as to why Maddux is being shortchanged in comparison to Perry and Niekro. Maddux is an extreme groundballer, but still has a great BABIP average. This is a rarity. Glavine was less of a groundballer than Maddux, but still a groundballer with a lower than expected BABIP (even vs. teamates). Glavine's LD% and IFF% are leage average (if not worse), but still produced a BABIP .017 better than league and .008 better than non-Maddux/Smoltz teamates.
In regards to Maddux vs. Neikro and Perry:
I am not familiar with how the team defensive support is calculated, but is it possible that Maddux is being hit too hard here?
The glossary points out that a pitcher's BIP rate is prorated, but does it assume the same GB/FB rate for each pitcher? The strength of the Braves' defenses were their outfields, and Maddux was an extreme groundballer. If DEF assumes a league average GB/Fg rate, than Maddux gets unfairly docked.
Also, Maddux had the unique situation of having a bunch of other true BABIP reducers on his team for a long time. Glavine, Smoltz, Avery, Neagle, Wohlers, Stanton, and I am sure others all have BABIP lower than teamates to the tune of 1 standard deviation or more. I know it is imposible to seperate the responsibility perfectly on a team like this, but maybe all of these Braves pitchers are getting hurt unfairly by DEF - assuming too much responsibility on the defense and not enough on the pitchers.
I have seen other calculations that show Maddux losing 20-30 runs by his defense, but never close to 60. Of course that was 20-30 runs prevented compared to average...but wouldn't runs lost vs. average be the same as runs lost vs. replacement?
Likewise...did the 60's - 70's Braves really lose Niekro 100+ runs?
Any thoughts? Trying to figure all of this out - a relatvie sabermetric newbie.
From #5 : "you’re talking about 5 extra WAR from that game which brings him up to around 45 for his career. That number is a lot closer to a Hall of Fame case (although it still only brings him up to Guidry’s level)" Of course we would also need to credit Guidry for game 2 of the 1977 ALCS and game 4 of the 1977 WS. Likewise, both starts from the 1978 playoffs. Lastly, games 1 and 5 of the 1981 WS. So considering all playoff appearances, Guidry may move ahead further than he did with regular season WAR alone..
The greatness, or not, of Josh Hamilton (Matthew Cornwell) —
#7 I think (estimation here) it is about .4 runs per year for a NL pitcher. So about 22 fgRep. to 20 rRep. for a current AL pitcher and maybe 24 fgRep. to 20 rRep. for a current NL pitcher. Certainly enough to add a WAR or two to Wainwright's totals. So that would bring the WAR gap to around 2, or near 20 runs prevented that Rally picks up on that Fangraphs does not due to the factors I laid out earlier. Now how much of that is Wainwright vs. luck? Obviously, we can't tell yet - nor can we tell at this point which WAR is a better indicator of Wainwrights skill, But the replacement level is making a little difference. Nobody suggested 1-2 wins per year.
The greatness, or not, of Josh Hamilton (Matthew Cornwell) —
#5 Yes, but that is with the higher replacement production given to Wainwright in FG. Take away the extra replacement level increase due the the lower baseline and adjust down for Waino pitching in the NL compared to the AL (which FG does not do) and the gap is much larger. Presumably that gap is due to FG not considering any BABIP skill that exists (agreed with Cameron that it is virtually impossible to locate the skill with that few BFs), situational/timing issues, controlling the running game, DP's, XBH prevention, and all of the other secondary run prevention skills. That is why I always say that if I want to see a pitcher's WAR in a season or 3, I pick FGs before the pitcher has enough BFs for all of the pitching/defense codependent aspects of run prevention to be identified as skill. If I want to look at guys with long careers, I look at rWAR since the co-dependent run prevention aspects have had enough BF's to reach levels I am comfortable with. Way too many guys have too much influence over situational pitching/timing, DP's, controlling the running game, BABIP, XBhit prevention, wild pitches, etc. to ignore them at a long-career level.
Jazz: how to win at hangman (Matthew Cornwell) —
#5 Thank gosh the context needed was already provided by the article!
Jazz: how to win at hangman (Matthew Cornwell) —
I am totally going to beat my wife now - she usually creams me!
Understanding DIPS (Matthew Cornwell) —
Cyril - don't take my word for it. I seem to remember it, but it could be something else.
Understanding DIPS (Matthew Cornwell) —
#76 Wasn't there a 40-30-20-10 breakdown suggested a few years back with 40% being luck and 10% being park with pitching skill and defense there in the middle? Is that seasonal? I guess we could take out more of the luck portion and attribute it more to pitching skill as more BIP accrued?
Understanding DIPS (Matthew Cornwell) —
Given Hudson's career BABIP (which is about .010 better than mates), the good defense he is playing in front of, and the sizable distance from league mean - doesn't it suffice to say that there is probably some skill, some luck, and some defensive help going on there? Probably in order of quantity going from 1. luck, 2. skill, and 3, defense? Maybe switch 2 and 3?
Understanding DIPS (Matthew Cornwell) —
Colin - Well, wouldn't 156 plays above average be about 120 runs? How is that possible when he is only about 100 hits or so on BIP better than his mates according to his .284 (or nearby) BABIP compared to his team's .291 (or nearby). How does that work? It looks like I am comparing apples to oranges.
Understanding DIPS (Matthew Cornwell) —
Looking at the batted-ball type BABIP predictions, I can't help but think about Maddux. He was a RH GB pitcher with below average K's. Nothing outrageous in terms of infield flies. How was he about 2 SD from his mates on BIP? He doesn't seem to have many of the BABIP reducing indicators on his side. Has to be something with location/movement/pitch type. Glavine (about 1.7 SD away from mates) seems a little more obvious. He threw tons of change-ups low and outside and caused a vastly disproportionate number of balls to not be pulled. Same with Jamie Moyer (near 1.5 SD from mates). I can't think of many other guys that make me say "huh" for the bulk of their careers regarding how their BABIP reductions happened. Most of the rest have the high K or FB thing going.
Understanding DIPS (Matthew Cornwell) —
#15 Well, we know that relievers have a better BABIP as a whole anyway, so we would have to adjust for that, of course.
Understanding DIPS (Matthew Cornwell) —
#13 Maybe instead of saying that pitchers have no true talent outside of the .007 spread, maybe we should say that that all tenured MLB pitchers are talented enough to produce BABIP's close to .300. If they couldn't keep their BABIP close to .300, they would be out of the league pronto. In other words, near .300(in the modern game)is the best humans are capable of. Its not that pitchers are so bad at it that they can't get away from .300. So a .310 true BABIP pitcher is still exhibiting plenty of BABIP skill...enough to stay in the league, but not as much skill as a .290 BABIP pitcher. Maybe if it was phrased in those terms it wouldn't turn off so many people who only hear "your favorite pitcher was lucky, not good."
Understanding DIPS (Matthew Cornwell) —
Mo vs. Glavine? In what terms? Glavine is about .006 better than his mates (maybe a little closer to .007 if we extract out Maddux and Smoltz) but with 14,000 BIP. Rivera has to be near .030 BABIP better than his mates but is closer to 3,000 BIP. I am guessing that puts Glavine around 1.5-2 SD away from his mates and Mo closer to 3? So we can be confident that Glavine's BABIP vs. mates is pretty locked in and he is solid BABIP reducer (maybe a 5% regression needed or so?), and we can look at Rivera as a very good BABIP reducer even after the much bigger regression. So Rivera's BABIP is so low, that it is likely that his true BABIP ability is better than Glavine's despite the BIP deficiency?
Mail: rWAR v fWAR (Matthew Cornwell) —
So rWAR has a higher replacement level but fWAR does not adjust for AL vs. NL. So which one of those has a bigger impact, the gap between the replacement levels or the difference between the league adjustments. Rally said that if a pitcher has +20 in rWAR might be +22 in fWAR. How would that number change for a modern day pitcher in the NL vs. AL?
Mail: rWAR v fWAR (Matthew Cornwell) —
Another quick question - do both rWAR and fWAR set the same replacement levels? At one point, wasn't Rally doing .420 for starting pitchers and FG about .380?
This generation of pitchers (Matthew Cornwell) —
Of course by 1990 (at least several years into most of the previous generations "big 9") very few if any looked like HOFers. Clemens looked good for it, but Maddux was just another good, but not great pitcher and Glavine looked as likely for a career as a #4 starter as a HOFer. Schilling was still a part-time reliever, and Brown looked nothing like he did from 1996-2000. Johnson was walking zillions of batters per year and didn't look like a complete pitcher at all. And Moose and Pedro hadn't even started yet. So Tom is right - it is too early to call it.
Career DIPS numbers (Matthew Cornwell) —
Some help would be appreciated: If a pitcher has a BABIP .010 better than his teammates after 13,000 BIP, than we can regress the 15% or so needed and still conclude that he had real BABIP skill. What if his BABIP is only .002 better than teammates after 13,000 BIP? Is he close enough to his mates that regressing the 15% or whatever isn't needed and just ignore the .002 difference as random variance? Or do we conclude his BABIP skill (only .002 better than mates) is real but small and give him credit as having slight BABIP skill? Looking at the linked list, is it safe to say that we can conclude that anyone with 1 SD over/under their mates is showing true BABIP "skill"? Thanks!
Reader Mail of the Week: There's nothing to be wrong about (Matthew Cornwell) —
But what about Maddux? He doesn't have the handedness benefit, he throws groundballs which are supposed to drive up BABIP, he doesn't have the high-K correlation going, yet he is still almost 2 SD away from his mates in terms of preventing hits on BIP. Glavine is 1.5 SD away from his teammates in terms of preventing hits on BIP without the Ks, FB,s and most of the other BABIP reducing indicators as well. It seems like Glavine throwing a larger % of change-ups (lower BABIP) low and away(lower BABIP) and preventing pulled balls may be the BABIP reduction factor there. But is Maddux really creating weak contact or is there something else going on? Are there other guys who have opposite of the BABIP reducing indicators that have great BABIP numbers compared to mates or are Maddux and Glavine unique? Like Moyer and Zito have the FB thing covered despite lack of Ks.
How many runs does a great fielding pitcher save? (Matthew Cornwell) —
Rally - do you see anything in this study that may make you adjust WAR at all, or is all of this already captured in WAR some way or another?
Reader Mail of the Week: There's nothing to be wrong about (Matthew Cornwell) —
#11 - Yes, I know that weak contact and BABIP are not equivalent, but Mike said "That’s not to say we will prove DIPS wrong (we won’t), but those who interpret DIPS to mean that pitchers have basically very little or no control over batted ball outcomes will be shown to be wrong." This is much more overarching than questioning "weak contact" only and is exactly what my post was referring too. Do you really think I would be able to list so many of the factors involved with BABIP reduction and believe that weak contact and BABIP are equivalent at the same time?
Reader Mail of the Week: There's nothing to be wrong about (Matthew Cornwell) —
#8 Since we know that the handedness of the pitcher, their K/BB/GB/FB rates, location of pitches, count on pitches, type of pitches thrown, and velocity all have at least a tiny bit of impact on pitcher BABIP, don't we already know a big chunk of what we need to? We know that pitchers have a true talent range around .02 on BABIP, and we know how many BIP it takes to reach r=.5, etc. for BABIP. It seems to me that we have a fairly solid handle on what is going on here. There aren't too many individuals who still claim that pitchers have no BABIP ability or have no ability whatsoever to induce weak contact. If they do, they need to hang out here more often.
How many runs does a great fielding pitcher save? (Matthew Cornwell) —
Most fielding metrics have shown Maddux to have been saved 30-60 runs by his defenses and Glavine 50-80 runs. How does this info. on their fielding abilities change those numbers, if they do?
How many runs does a great fielding pitcher save? (Matthew Cornwell) —
post #22 We know for a fact that Glavine had a largely disproportionate number of BIP go to the right side of the field compared to other pitchers. Not sure what impact that has. Looking at Colin's scatterplot, we see Glavine as an extreme outlier. which is nothing new to Glavine, who seems to be an outlier in many regards.
How many runs does a great fielding pitcher save? (Matthew Cornwell) —
Question - if Glavine's infields were + 81 total for his career, and only +23 from 93-02 when they were at their alleged pinnacle, than that means from 1987-1992 and 2003-2008 (with some presumed mediocre to poor 1987-1990 and 2003-2005 seasons included) his infields were +58. Am I missing something? Also, what can we derive from the fact that Glavine is the only pitcher on wither list to not have a negative correlation from PIT_PM to OIF_PM? Anything?
How many runs does a great fielding pitcher save? (Matthew Cornwell) —
Are the OIF-PM affected by the pitcher's BABIP abilities or only the infields defensive ability? In other words, does it capture all plays made above or below regardless of who gets the responsibility or is it just showing the fielders responsibility?
BABIP by count, applied to pitchers' frequencies (Matthew Cornwell) —
I know the BABIP by count numbers are not impressive, and we heard the same thing regarding BABIP by pitch location and BABIP by type of pitch thrown, etc. But all of these "almost" not worth mentioning BABIP factors can be adding up to make a solid dent in the .020 difference we see in some good and bad BABIP. Of course pitcher handedness, K rates, defense, and luck are bigger factors but should we disregard all of these "little" things that may be adding up to effect BABIP in statistically significant ways altogether? I am not sure.
Best and Worst Clutch Hitters of the Retrosheet era (Matthew Cornwell) —
I know we talked about how to deal with Sosa's "clutch" and WAR, but what about pitchers? How would a 60 WAR pitcher, for example, be affected by a -3 "clutch" for example? IS there anyway to determine that?
Introductions: Strasburg, BABIP... BABIP, Strasburg (Matthew Cornwell) —
Sorry for the bombardment of questions, but I have one more: on his "DIPS20" page (http://www.tangotiger.net/DIPS20.htm), Tom shows Maddux to have been +100 hits compared to teammates through 2000 and Glavine to have been +74. Even though neither probably increased those levels too much, they probably did a little bit. What is causing the discrepancy in your numbers and Tom's? Infield singles? Different hit databases used? Thanks again as always!
Introductions: Strasburg, BABIP... BABIP, Strasburg (Matthew Cornwell) —
Does that consider his own baserunner environment (fewer guys on base) or just the league average baserunning environment?
Introductions: Strasburg, BABIP... BABIP, Strasburg (Matthew Cornwell) —
Thanks, that makes sense. So if Maddux allowed 84 fewer hits, than how many runs prevented is that? About 45?
Introductions: Strasburg, BABIP... BABIP, Strasburg (Matthew Cornwell) —
One possible thing I can think of is: that a majority of the 60+ runs prevented by Maddux's defense or 80 prevented by Glavine's defenses are not hits prevented by BIP, but by DPs, outfielder arms, outfielders keeping singles from becoming doubles, etc. That would still leave room to credit them for their BABIP differences between them and mates. This may match up with the fact that the strength of the Braves defenses were their outfields too. Of course as ground-ball pitchers, TZ may be punishing them unfairly as a majority of their BIP went to their less amazing infielders. I think PZR considers that and both Maddux and Glavine do have better PZR based WAR from 2001-2006 than rWAR.
Introductions: Strasburg, BABIP... BABIP, Strasburg (Matthew Cornwell) —
I get that, but I am still confused about something. If Maddux prevented 54 runs on hits compared to his league, and his defense saved him over 60 runs (due mostly, I am assuming to BABIP prevention), than wouldn't that imply that Maddux did nothing on his own merit in regards to BABIP? But we know for a fact that he prevented tons of hits on BABIP compared to his teammates. How does that all work out? Same with Glavine - his defense saved him 80 runs and he is +72 preventing hits on BIP. However, we know that he prevented many hits on BIP compared to his mates. What am I missing?
Introductions: Strasburg, BABIP... BABIP, Strasburg (Matthew Cornwell) —
So...can anybody help me with my question?
Roy Halladay's Bobby Orr career (Matthew Cornwell) —
I don't consider golf period. :)
Introductions: Strasburg, BABIP... BABIP, Strasburg (Matthew Cornwell) —
Thinking about Strasburg's slightly better-than-a-month-ago BABIP and how it is affected by his team's defense, it reminded me of a question that hopefully Rally or somebody else can answer. On the pitcher pages at baseballprojections, do the runs in the H+ column consider how many runs a pitcher himself prevents compared to league, or is it runs saved by hits on BIP by the pitcher plus his defenses? So if Maddux is +56, does that mean he prevented 56 runs compared to his teams on BABIP or just league on BABIP? The glossary says "compared to league with no contextual adjustments", but the site also says that the X column includes all of Maddux's defensive support, and the H+ column and X column can't both contain his defensive support. If it is true that Maddux received 64 runs of defensive support (most due to BABIP reduction) and only prevented 56 compared to league on BIP, that would imply that Maddux's real skill in BABIP was non-exsistant. That leads me to believe that H+ is comparing pitcher to his teammates. Is this correct?
Lebron James and puppy dogs (Matthew Cornwell) —
I love how Dan Gilbert accused James of quitting and being a coward, etc. Yet, Gilbert was offering a man he accused of quitting on his team and a coward over 20 million a year to play for him? What does that say about Gilbert?
Can this be right? (Matthew Cornwell) —
Well, at least the Cards chose the old-fashioned, highly probable way of losing today! Thank goodness!
TotalZone updates (Matthew Cornwell) —
Rally, Will converting to new TZ affect pitchers? If so, how? Since we are talking fielding and TZ, here is another question I asked on another post but have yet to receive comment for yet. Hopefully it isn't too far off topic. say a pitcher like Jiminez has an incredible GIDP rate due to high GB rates but the infield defense behind him is also above average. How does Total Zone treat the extra double plays that he induces? Does his team defense get all of the credit for the extra double plays turned? Does Jiminez’ WAR see the benefits or is it somewhere in-between?
Out rate on groundballs over the season (Matthew Cornwell) —
This got me thinking - say a pitcher like Jiminez has an incredible GIDP rate due to high GB rates but the infield defense behind him is also above average. How does Total Zone treat the extra double plays that he induces? Does his team defense get all of the credit for the extra double plays turned? Does Jiminez' WAR see the benefits or is it somewhere in-between?
Reader Mail of the Day: Effect of BABIP on ERA (Matthew Cornwell) —
Well, Jiminez is getting pretty close to the 1,500 BIP mark, so we could estimate that r=.4 or so, right? So regress 60% and his adjusted BABIP for the season is .275. That would be about 9 hits worth of "luck" or 7 runs worth. Plug that into his ERA and it goes up to about 1.80. Still not accounting for the Rockies' defense or LOB%, of course.
How lucky has Scott Rolen been with his opportunities to field? (Matthew Cornwell) —
It's just funny, because about 7-8 years ago, many in the sabermetric community were claiming Ozzie might not even be HOF worthy. I will say, that the discovery of the actual impact and run value of defense is one of sabermetric's most valuable "discoveries" the past 10 years. Right up there with the quantitative value of positional differences and the fact that pitchers have less control on BIP than we originally thought. Those were the three that changed my perceptions of the game the most.
How lucky has Scott Rolen been with his opportunities to field? (Matthew Cornwell) —
True, but I don't think even the most avid Cardinal fans would put Ozzie in the top 20-30 players all-time. Well, assuming at least moderate knowledge of baseball history.
How lucky has Scott Rolen been with his opportunities to field? (Matthew Cornwell) —
If the data is right, than its right. But I wonder out of curiosity how the perception of this quickly-being-accepted metric will be when the Rolens and Ozzies of the world end up with more WAR than Jimmie Foxx and other "legends". Isn't that the expected result if they are being hugely shortchanged defensively?
All WAR, all the time (Matthew Cornwell) —
If Fangraphs adjusts their runs-to-wins converter, than career rWAR and fWAR should come out extremely close to the same, correct? Will that be true for pitchers as well when FGphs gets to that point for pre- 2002 years?
PZR for 2010 (Matthew Cornwell) —
So PZR is really the gap from expected hits allowed considering all known factors (defense, park, hit location, velocity, etc.)and real hits allowed. How that gap happened varies from pitcher to pitcher - some may be luck and some other factors.
PZR for 2010 (Matthew Cornwell) —
And by "luck" you mean luck and possible BABIP skill, correct?
Why saving a play is worth 0.8 runs (Matthew Cornwell) —
Looking over this for the first time today. Does this apply while crediting pitchers for preventing runs on hits allowed on BIP too? Does a prevented single on a BIP = .8 runs?
The 20-inning game (Matthew Cornwell) —
I'd like to see how the Lopez/Mather 3 inning combo compared to any other 3+ inning relief outings by positioned players historically. I would also like to see if Kyle Loshe could be a better full-tile LFer than Carlos Lee.
NHL 1984 draft (Matthew Cornwell) —
Ah - the 1984 NHL draft - the draft in which Tom Glavine got selected higher than Brett Hull and Luc Robitille.
Bias among Holy Writers vis-a-vis WAR for the HOF (Matthew Cornwell) —
I am 99% a sat guy, but I have no problem putting borderline WAR guys in the HOF for being really famous, outstanding in the postseason, or for breaking some significant record. So would Brock be in my HOF since he is well short of WAR greatness, but had all three of the criteria I listed above? I don't know. Probably not, but I'd consider putting a 45 WAR guy in if he met those criteria. If a guy is too far below that, there is nothing that would get him in my HOF short of an incredible peak. It is a spectator museum for fans, and there seems to be some element of truth to the idea of the fans getting to see the players enshrined that they want to see, right? Dizzy Dean is a guy I would elect to a HOF, but not a HOM type club.
Mike Silva Chronicles - Part 4: FIP (Matthew Cornwell) —
Alex - I have looked at that and love it for long career pitchers. The consistent,long-career FIP out-performers do well with PZR. Doesn't seem to be much different from rWAR, however besides using UZR instead of TZ.
Would you rather... (Matthew Cornwell) —
Just look at the Eagles this year. One extra-loss difference changed them from a #2 seed to a #6 seed. That could have been the difference of one fluky catch, a single bad bounce, or an isolated blown ref call. Yet if they beat the #1 seed as a #6, people who don't get it will say "what a huge upset, blah, blah, blah." When before the Dallas loss everybody was picking them as an NFC favorite. Somewhat related, I'd love to see NFL-like playoff scenarios/brackets of every MLB season the past 10 years or so after 16 games played. I wonder how many times the Royals or Reds or Pirates would have made the playoffs?
Would you rather... (Matthew Cornwell) —
The Steelers may have technically "snuck" into the playoffs in 2005 based on seed, but they had a 11-5 record in a crazy-loaded AFC. Not only that, but two of the Steeler's losses that year came with Batch as main QB instead of Roth. In fact, they were favored in every game they played in the playoffs, minus the Colts game. That includes vs. the Seahawks, who were either the #1 or #2 seed from the NFC. That was a great team that proved it in the playoffs. 16 games isn't enough sample size to determine if a 13-3 team is really "better" than a 10-6 team anyway.
Would you rather... (Matthew Cornwell) —
#15 - people forget that the Cardinals were 15 games over .500 in June. Unfortunately, from about 2 weeks earlier through the end of the year, they: lost Pujols for a month, Molina for a month, Edmonds for a month, Eckstien for a month, their #2 pitcher(Mulder) for the season and their closer (Izzy) for the season. Both Rolen and Encarnacion were very banged up and may had gone on the DL if they disclosed their pain. What you clearly had was a very talented team (same core that won 205 games the previous 2 years with a W.S. trip and a NLCS trip to boot) who were on pace for over 90 wins in June, when they got hit by a 2009 Mets-scale epic rash of injuries the rest of the way. Suddenly, they get healthy come playoff time and roll. Everybody acts shocked to this day that an 83-win team won the series. Another example of people looking at W-L record with no context whatsoever. Not even close to the least talented team to ever win the W.S. I will admit, however, that Weaver was pretty darn fluky!
Sabermetric Lesson: WAR (Matthew Cornwell) —
I have seen many more people use rWAR for career evaluations and more use fWAR for projections or to evaluate short-career pitchers, which seems appropriate. I agree that many people do not understand the differences between the different WAR models, and that we should be careful to use the best models for the best situations and discuss the differences to newbies.
Mike Silva Chronicles - Part 4: FIP (Matthew Cornwell) —
Which "leaves out" more? ERA - defensive support, leveraging/quality of batters faced, park factors, bullpen support, the pitcher's responsibility regarding unearned runs FIP - event timing/sit. splits/LOB%, etc., what BABIP skill does exist, pitcher defense, DP inducing, HBP, WP, leveraging/quality of batters faced, park factors, XBH prevention, pick-offs, controlling running game Most pitchers can't prevent enough runs by controlling the running game or limiting doubles or defending their position well in any given season to make a huge difference in their FIP or ERA. That is why FIP works so well at a seasonal level - it leaves in what pitchers control the most, and as a fair trade-off for most pitchers (the Glavine's being examples,) takes out what is least impactful and controllable. However, over 15-20 seasons, those secondary run prevention tools add up to be tons of runs for many pitchers. Take RA+ - if you could just adjust for defensive support you should get pretty close to "true" RA+ for long career guys. BABIP and HR/FB have had enough PA's to stabilize, leveraging and quality of batters faced is not a huge factor for modern starters, park is considered already, and bullpen support tends to be a smallish factor for most pitchers over long careers. Outside of defensive support, what else would dramatically skew a long- tenured pitcher's "real" RA+ level? I guess my point is, given a very long career, some defensive-adjusted RA+ would be better than FIP or ERA. And then use FIP for future performance and evaluating pitchers with only a handful of seasons under their belt. FIP definitely is very useful. Like many have said, it does what it is intended to do.
Mike Silva Chronicles - Part 8: Hall of Fame (Matthew Cornwell) —
rWAR has them pretty close, for anybody interested: Gwynn: 68.5 Raines: 64.9 Of course Henderson: 113.1 :)
Title Drop (Matthew Cornwell) —
"For Your Eyes Only"? Even though the female lead may have said "darling" after that?
Mike Silva Chronicles - Part 4: FIP (Matthew Cornwell) —
I have a lot of question regarding tRA* 1. How do the batted ball weights affect a guy like Greg Maddux? Most GB pitchers would give up a higher number of runs per batted ball since BABIP is higher for GB, traditionaly. However, Maddux was an extreme GBer and a major BABIP reducer. Likewise, what if a flyball pitcher routinely gives up a lot more hits on FB than average? I know that tRA* regresses K rates, etc. to league averages, but that seems unfair to pitchers who have proven to have the ability to repeat great performances in each area. Also, are the linear weights used in tRA* similar to baseRuns in which each pitcher's own run environment is calculated or are the weights only compared to a league average baseline? This is why I like Rally's WAR for long careers, it takes out defense support and gives credit to the pitcher for everything else. Even though it looks like it suffers from the same GB/FB linear weights assumptions that tRA* does. Given enough BF, rWAR should give a pretty good idea of a pitcher's ability, since it includes all of those things I mentioned in post #2 . Of course FIP, etc. is still best for pitchers who only have a season or two under their belts.
Mike Silva Chronicles - Part 4: FIP (Matthew Cornwell) —
Agreed, Nick. I just wish there were advanced statistics out there which did accurately pinpoint the contributions of guys like Glavine. Seems to me that for long career guys like Glavine, that a metric which only takes out defensive quality would be best, such as rWAR. I guess for short career or single season pitchers, there is too small of a sample size to determine much about the pitchers like Glavine.
Roy Smalley, (personal) Hall of Famer (Matthew Cornwell) —
Terry Pendleton - 26 WAR
Mike Silva Chronicles - Part 4: FIP (Matthew Cornwell) —
Glavine is such an interesting case, because he just so happens to be very good at just about everything FIP leaves out. Stranding runners/impressive stretch and windup splits? Check. BABIP reduction compared to teamates? Check. High GB rates which drive up GBDP and lower XBH? Check. Hold runners well and limit HB and WP? Check. Defend your position well? Check. Hit well? Check. Of course Glavine was no FIP disaster either. A 3.90 or so FIP is still higher than the second tier class of pitchers of his era: Moyer, Wells, Rogers, Pettitte, etc. And none of them had near the collection of secondary run producing skills mentioned above. His walk rate was above average and his HR/9 rate was all-time good. Those pesky K's kept him from being a top 15 or so all-time pitcher. Bottom line: Glavines' case is very unique and should be looked at as such. There needs to be a lot more guys like him to prove that FIP doesn't work too well.
The Tiger apology (Matthew Cornwell) —
"The rate of HIV infection among heterosexual women in the 1st world, even skanky ones, is incredibly low." This is true, but is it worth taking that risk?
The Tiger apology (Matthew Cornwell) —
Not trying to speculate, but if the confessions (from the adulteress's mouth) are true, then Woods knowingly and repeatedly has sexual intercourse with at least one woman without using protection. Nobody knows if this was the pattern of behavior, but I don't know why he would use protection with some and not others. Assuming he is not a complete moron and knows the serious, potential dangers involved with being very promiscuous and very unprotected, it speaks volumes about his character. Having unprotected sex with that many "loose" women (assuming there were more than one) is like playing Russian Roulette with himself, the mistresses, and his wife.
PZR (Matthew Cornwell) —
So back to my main question, when Greg Maddux ends up with +60 PZR runs from 2001-2006, what that means is that he prevented 60 runs due to some combination of skill and luck compared to what he "should have" given his defense and batted ball distribution? Correct?
PZR (Matthew Cornwell) —
Brian - what if your method says that pitchers have a worse BABIP on GB than league average BABIP, but Greg Maddux's BABIP on GB is better than league average? Will he be unfairly "hurt"?
PZR (Matthew Cornwell) —
Isn't it easier (albeit not quite as accurate) to just see how many hits on BIP a pitcher has allowed compared to his own teammates? Compare his DER to the teams' DER? You don't weed out luck, but that should take care of most of the defense issues.
PZR (Matthew Cornwell) —
Thanks! That does make sense. That was my hunch - but so many people use the term "luck" interchangeably with defensive support, that I was not 100% sure.
PZR (Matthew Cornwell) —
Quick question: One one of the threads a few years back, Tom said that Greg Maddux had been the "luckiest" pitcher in terms of PZR from the data from 2001-2006, with nearly 60 runs worth of "luck" and Glavine and Moyer were high up there too. Does "lucky" mean that their defenses saved them those 40-60 runs, or that they gave up 40-60 fewer runs that what they "should have" based on trajectory,location etc., and the reasons why could be a combination of skill, luck, etc.? Tom did mention that he suspected that Maddux, Moyer etc. were "smart" pitchers and inferred that they were doing something out there which "helped" their PZR. Just looking for some expert clarification. Thanks!
Thank you Keith Law... and I acknowledge Will Carroll's contribution (Matthew Cornwell) —
From Guy in 2006 - "Through 2005, Pedro gave up 194 HR on 6390 BIP. For 2002-2006 his OF% was .35, and since your own analysis suggests that GB/OF tendency is a stable skillset, let’s assume that’s his career rate. Even if he was a bit more of a GB pitcher early in his career, it won’t significantly change the conclusion. That means 194 HR on 2237 FB or .087 HR/FB (I’ll include any HR on LD, just to be generous). The 95% confidence interval is +/-.013, so we can say there’s a 97.5% chance that Pedro’s true rate is 10.0 or below. Repeat for Glavine (300 HR, 12884 BIP, .29 OF%), and we get .080 HR/FB, +/-.01, or a 97.5% chance he’s below .09. I’m too lazy to figure out the chances that each are truly above average (<.12), but it’s well over 99%. So, saying it’s “pretty clear” they have this skill actually understates the conclusion we can reach." For Maddux, Clemens, and others we see the same thing. In fact, doesn't HR/FB correlates about as well as BABIP from year-to-year? And very few vote to completely disregard BABIP prevention as partially skill anymore. So the fact that there is some HR/FB ability shouldn't be in question. The question is - does Grienke have enough track record to "prove" that his 2009 HR/FB is legit? If not, how much should we regress? Or should we just give him the benefit of the doubt with all of it?
Best Players born 1961-1970 (Matthew Cornwell) —
I have seen a lot here about how well Mussina, Schilling, Glavine, Smoltz, and Brown do according to Smith's WAR. They are all near 70 WAR, when the median WAR for HOF pitchers is closer to 60. I have been in a lot of discussions lately defending the HOF legitimacy of these pitchers. Before continuing these debates, I would like to know if there are any outside factors that WAR may be whiffing on that would make any of them a "non" HOFers? Biases with Total Zone? LQ? Some type of "# of times through the lineup in comparison to older pitchers" thing? Basically, should I continue to use their high-WAR totals as solid evidence for HOF status, or are there too many question/doubts regarding WAR that it may not be worth it? How high of a WAR does a pitcher need to eliminate doubt concerning their HOF deservedness? Is there any reason to believe that any of them are in reality noticeably better or worse than their WAR would indicate? Finally, question for Rally - is pitcher defense considered/separated out from team defense in WAR or not. Thank you!
Is Chase Utley really black? (Matthew Cornwell) —
Another idea - it seems like most of the white guys who get the "scrappy" label are pretty small in stature. Maybe it is more of a size thing that a race thing. Are white players in the MLB significantly shorter than the black players?
Is Chase Utley really black? (Matthew Cornwell) —
I think the way that the media made over and drooled over guys like Ozzie, Griffey, Jeter, Gwynn, Puckett, and others makes it difficult to claim a strong, overreaching racial bias. And the media can't get enough of hispanic players like Pujols and Manny and Pedro, etc. Now will an "angry-urban black man" like Bonds get more negative attention than a guy like Giambi? Sure, but there are many other factors regarding their personalities and histories that contributed to their perceptions. Does some racial bias exist? Of course, but I think it is pretty subtle to non-existant for a majority of writers, etc. I do agree that "hustle" has been attributed more to whites than blacks. "Why" is another issue. I definitely agree that the positional difference bias and the homerun/RBI/lack of understanding real value bias is far, far greater than the racial bias and most writers have it. This is clearly why Utley is so vastly underrated while Rollins and Howard are so overrated.
How can we tell if a pitcher is any good? (Matthew Cornwell) —
Great info! Just for the record, Jason Marquis didn't throw a single pitch in the 2006 playoffs. Doesn't really change anything, but I know you like to be accurate in all that you write.
Studes takes on WAR graphs (Matthew Cornwell) —
Has anybody calculated the WAR median for postion HOFers? I would bet that it is closer to 60. Also, how does the WAR mean for pitchers compare to position players?
The shift, by pitch type (Matthew Cornwell) —
Correction, I meant to say LF/RF, not Pull/Opp. Field.
The shift, by pitch type (Matthew Cornwell) —
I am sure Tom Glavine and Johan Santana (.84 and .85 FBs pulled per 1 FB hit Op.F.) couldn't agree more with the last point. I did some research on modern lefties, and these two had by far the largest % of flyballs hit opposite field. Johnson .99 Wells 1.03 Moyer 1.19 Key .96 Rogers 1.14 Finley .91 Buehrle 1.16 Langston 1.17 Zito 1.36 John .97 Tanana 1.35 Kaat .99 Carlton 1.07 Koosman 1.06 Cuellar 1.33 Valenzuala 1.21 I would love to see if type of pitch and location is the main reason why.
The best of this week at BPro (Matthew Cornwell) —
Since many pitchers with long careers do show ability to supress BABIP (compared to teamates) and HR/FB, and since FIP and FIPx do not directly consider the long-term accumulating affects of controling the running game, wild pitches, balks, GB% rate (which affects XBH rates and GIDP), situational split (stretch/windup) data that may be a significant "skill" in some cases (larger percentage of walks with 1B open, etc.), and any "real" LOB% results that aren't alredy captured by the "TTO", how many BFs does a pitcher need before FIP or FIPx are no longer effective ways to evaluate their careers? I have no concerns or questions about using FIP for evaluating young pitchers with limited data or predicting general performance for a vast majority of pitchers without track records. But is it reliable for pitchers who have had more than enough BFs to almost regress completely in the partial-pitcher, partial-luck, run prevention tools? I have often wondered for pitchers with 10,000 or more PA's, if ERA+ is not closer to "true talent" than FIP. ERA+ leaves out team defense and quality of batters faced (not a big issue for post WW2 pitchers) and has shaky park-affects. FIP leaves out everything I mentioned above. Which one leaves out more? Many people use FIP as a career evaluation method for guys with tons of BFs and I am not sure if this is a very good use of the stat. I think Tom is right: a problem with the user, not the stat. Conclusion, I want to know your opinions on if the following statement is correct: FIP is a great stat to predict future performance or get a good idea of the skill level of pitchers without a lot if history, but not so great at evaluating pitchers with very long careers?
Most people still don't understand the concept of regression toward the mean... (Matthew Cornwell) —
Some might not like hearing that their favorite players are "lucky." Let's say Chipper is your favorite player and you take offense to the notion that his talent might not be as good as his production would indicate becasue of what MGL is suggesting. One should not fret too much, as it is very likey that those ranked above him had equal if not more "luck" on their side. It shouldn't change our overall perception of players since everybody regresses - not just Chipper.
Historical pitcher WAR (Matthew Cornwell) —
Well, if TZ does not pick up on harder to field groundballs or flyballs - you may have your answer as to why Maddux is being shortchanged in comparison to Perry and Niekro. Maddux is an extreme groundballer, but still has a great BABIP average. This is a rarity. Glavine was less of a groundballer than Maddux, but still a groundballer with a lower than expected BABIP (even vs. teamates). Glavine's LD% and IFF% are leage average (if not worse), but still produced a BABIP .017 better than league and .008 better than non-Maddux/Smoltz teamates.
Historical pitcher WAR (Matthew Cornwell) —
In regards to Maddux vs. Neikro and Perry: I am not familiar with how the team defensive support is calculated, but is it possible that Maddux is being hit too hard here? The glossary points out that a pitcher's BIP rate is prorated, but does it assume the same GB/FB rate for each pitcher? The strength of the Braves' defenses were their outfields, and Maddux was an extreme groundballer. If DEF assumes a league average GB/Fg rate, than Maddux gets unfairly docked. Also, Maddux had the unique situation of having a bunch of other true BABIP reducers on his team for a long time. Glavine, Smoltz, Avery, Neagle, Wohlers, Stanton, and I am sure others all have BABIP lower than teamates to the tune of 1 standard deviation or more. I know it is imposible to seperate the responsibility perfectly on a team like this, but maybe all of these Braves pitchers are getting hurt unfairly by DEF - assuming too much responsibility on the defense and not enough on the pitchers. I have seen other calculations that show Maddux losing 20-30 runs by his defense, but never close to 60. Of course that was 20-30 runs prevented compared to average...but wouldn't runs lost vs. average be the same as runs lost vs. replacement? Likewise...did the 60's - 70's Braves really lose Niekro 100+ runs? Any thoughts? Trying to figure all of this out - a relatvie sabermetric newbie.
Historical pitcher WAR (Matthew Cornwell) —
Does WAR include a pitcher's offensive contributions as well?