2010 Giants: May PQS

This post has the Giants Pure Quality Start scores for the month of May 2010, PQS as defined in Ron Shandler's Baseball Forecaster annual book and they published the details here. I wrote on this first in 2006 and have compiled their stats on a regular basis, so I'm continuing it this season for continuity and historical comparison (there is the "PQS" label that you can click to see the old posts on this). Regular readers can skip to the next section.

This is the Quality Start with a sabermetric DIPS twist, and it gets really easy to calculate once you get used to it. I don't think it's the end all or be all, but then nothing really is that. It is, as I like to say, another piece of the puzzle. A dominating start is scored a 4 or 5 and a disaster start is scored a 0 or 1. DOM% is the percentage of starts that are dominating, DIS% is the percentage of starts that are disasters (any start under 5.0 IP is automatically a 0, or disaster).

Basically, you want to see a pitcher's DOM% to be over 40% and ideally over 50%, and you want their DIS to be under 20% and ideally under 10%. For example, Johan Santana has a 76% DOM and 3% DIS in 2006 (2.77 ERA), whereas Orlando Hernandez had a 52% DOM and 28% DIS (4.66 ERA), and Adam Eaton had a 31% DOM and 31% DIS (5.12 ERA). See my explanation down below on methodology plus read the link, there's a nice chart there showing the combination of high DOM% and low DIS%, and particularly how low DIS% is so important.

I wholeheartedly recommend buying Baseball Forecaster and learning more about their methods of analyzing baseball. It has been greatly illuminating for me, and if you want to get a taste for it without paying full price, they used to sell their old editions of their annuals on their website for half price or less (plus shipping); but that was before he sold the company off, and I haven't checked recently.

Giants Starters' PQS for 2010 Season

Matt Cain - (70% DOM, 0% DIS; 7:0/10): 5, 3, 4, 3, 5, 5, 3, 4, 4, 5

Tim "The Kid" Lincecum - (64% DOM, 18% DIS; 7:2/11): 5, 5, 5, 5, 5, 5, 4, 3, 3, 0, 1


Jonathan Sanchez - (40% DOM, 20% DIS; 4:2/10): 0, 5, 5, 3, 0, 3, 4, 4, 3, 3

Todd Wellemeyer - (33% DOM, 33% DIS; 3:3/9):  2, 0, 0, 3, 0, 4, 2, 4, 5

Barry Zito - (50% DOM, 20% DIS; 5:2/10):  5, 3, 4, 5, 3, 4, 1, 4, 3, 1


Giants season overall - 52% DOM, 18% DIS out of 50 games counted (26:9/50)

Giants Month of April - 55% DOM, 14% DIS out of 22 games counted (12:3/22)


Giants Month of May - 50% DOM, 21% DIS out of 28 games counted (14:6/28)

As god-like Lincecum was last month, he was only human in May.  Matt Cain was the dominant one in May with 5 DOM starts out of 6.  Wellemeyer actually had 3 DOM starts in May, making him second.  The other three starters had 2 DOM each.  And people wanted to trade away Cain - for shame, for shame, for shame.

That staff overall had a DOM of 52% and a DIS of 18%, which is pretty good both ways.  Generally, you want a DIS under 20%, and ideally under 10%, and a DOM over 50%, as a pitcher but our WHOLE staff overall was doing what very well starters alone can do in the majors.  Obviously, May was not as good a month, with both Lincecum and Zito coming back down to earth, but Cain helped to keep the rotation still good overall.


What's Good and What's Not

A DOM at or above the 40% mark is indicative of good pitching; above 50% is great; above 70% is elite. A low DIS is also indicative of good pitching, just look at the table in the link above showing DOM% and DIS% on the axes.

If you had to chose a high DOM% or a low DIS%, pitchers tend to have a lower ERA when you have a low DIS% vs. a high DOM% (obviously if you combine both, you have a much better chance of having an elite pitcher).

May 2010 Comments

The pitching was not as good in May and the offense worse.  That ended up with the Giants having a .500 month, 14-14.  Their NL West opponents have been beating up on them, except for the D-backs.  If not for that, particularly the 'Dres, the Giants could be ahead of the division by a lot.

With a record of 27-23, the Giants were third in the division, just ahead of D-Rox.  That rate works out to roughly a 88 win season.  So the Giants are playing at about the same level as last season.  With Posey possibly playing the rest of the season and Bumgarner joining the team during mid-season, those boosts could push the Giants up to the 90 win level, based on what the team has been doing and those additions.

Obviously things are different for the rest of the NL West.  The D-gers had sunk low but then had a hot winning streak and rose to challenge the 'Dres.  But SD held their own and still led the division by two games over them.  They have been amazingly good in keeping their runs allowed low plus scoring enough to win a lot of games, despite a number of hitters not producing for them.

People have been complaining about the offense but injuries have took their toll.  If the Giants didn't have so many interchangeable pieces, it would be even worse right now.  Luckily nobody offered Uribe a long-term contract nor gave Huff a higher contract.  Posey had a superb start to the season, but remember that other hitters (like Bowker or Matt Weiters) started out hot and then was figured out by the pitchers in the league and hasn't figured out how to adjust back.  Hopefully he can continue to hit and make the Giants have a tough decision.

Freddie Sanchez came back in the nick of time.  He has contributed both offensively and defensively, he has been a great addition and has stopped the cries of those who complained about giving him a contract.  That's why I don't like coming to a definitive conclusion until you have more data, and with a two year contract, there was still a lot of time for him to come back and produce.

The big negatives offensively this month was that both Sandoval and Molina stopped producing in the middle of the lineup while Rowand stopped hitting atop the lineup, plain and simple.  Three key spots just shut down. Still, despite that huge negative plus Lincecum and Zito scuffling some, we still came out of the month at .500, which is pretty good considering all these problems with the team in May.

June looks to be better.  Sandoval has been slowing heating up the second half of May and been much better the past week.  It is like he was weak for a while and has been slowly recovering his strength.   Huff has been a constant since the season began, except for the few games he scuffed and a columnist took him to task unfairly.  Torres has been a find, but I expect the pumpkin to pop up sometime, and hopefully Schierholtz can get hot next.  Sanchez has been great in the 2-spot and Posey has been very good since he joined the team.

In addition, Pat "the Bat" Burrell looks to be joining the team sooner or later.  He has been raking in the minors, so it appears inevitable that he will join the team at some point.  Hank Schulman speculated as soon as this Friday in Pittsburgh, given the lack of power right-handed bats on the bench.  I've speculated that Bowker would go down in that case, though he's been good pinch-hitting so far.