This post has the Giants Pure Quality Start scores for the month of June 2014, PQS as defined in Ron Shandler's Baseball Forecaster annual book and they published the details here (unfortunately, they removed the article; this link gets you at least to the PQS definition, read down to middle for details). 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).
These are just my opinions. I cannot promise that I will be perfect, but I can promise that I will seek to understand and illuminate whatever moves that the Giants make (my obsession and compulsion). I will share my love of baseball and my passion for the Giants. And I will try to teach, best that I can. Often, I tackle the prevailing mood among Giants fans and see if that is a correct stance, good or bad.
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Monday, June 30, 2014
Thursday, June 19, 2014
Your 2014 GIants: Dissecting 1-8 PQS Style
Wow, mea culpa for even looking at how good the Dodgers would have to play to catch the Giants. This game can be such a humbler. I wondered how badly the starters did in PQS in the streak so far.
ogc thoughts
Would you believe that in those 9 games, the Giants starters had 5 DOM (56% DOM which is pretty good) and only 1 DIS (11% DIS which is very good). If a starter did that over a full season, he should have a very good season, very low ERA.
Bumgarner lost two DOM starts (teams normally win around 70-80% of them), Lincecum and Vogie each lost one DOM start, with Hudson the only one winning a DOM start. Of course, he was the one with the disaster start, first one in 13 starts for the rotation: again, any pitcher doing that over a season is usually having a very good season.
And they only have 2 DIS starts over their last 39 starts, again, great numbers. Meanwhile, they had 23 DOM starts for roughly 60% DOM, which is good. So the starters have been very good for a very long stretch, and nothing in the last 9 games signal that anything is changing for them, other than that the team has been losing games that they should have been winning going 1-4 in DOM starts is a pretty big aberration (though I just noticed that they only had 1 DOM start in the last four starts). As long as they don't stress and change something they should be fine.
And the reports from the beats are that they are treating this as an aberration. As one of the players noted, the Giants could have as easily been 3-0 as 0-3 in the Rockies series, and 2-2 and not 1-3 in the Nats series. And the beats also noted that the clubhouse was pretty laid back, not stressing at all. Well, with the lead that they had, and they still have a pretty good lead, they should not feel any extra stress.
So I'm trying not to worry. The logical side says that things are still fine, as long as the Giants starters are going strong, we will be fine. The emotional side of me, of course, is spiraling along with other Giants fans.
Go Giants!
ogc thoughts
Would you believe that in those 9 games, the Giants starters had 5 DOM (56% DOM which is pretty good) and only 1 DIS (11% DIS which is very good). If a starter did that over a full season, he should have a very good season, very low ERA.
Bumgarner lost two DOM starts (teams normally win around 70-80% of them), Lincecum and Vogie each lost one DOM start, with Hudson the only one winning a DOM start. Of course, he was the one with the disaster start, first one in 13 starts for the rotation: again, any pitcher doing that over a season is usually having a very good season.
And they only have 2 DIS starts over their last 39 starts, again, great numbers. Meanwhile, they had 23 DOM starts for roughly 60% DOM, which is good. So the starters have been very good for a very long stretch, and nothing in the last 9 games signal that anything is changing for them, other than that the team has been losing games that they should have been winning going 1-4 in DOM starts is a pretty big aberration (though I just noticed that they only had 1 DOM start in the last four starts). As long as they don't stress and change something they should be fine.
And the reports from the beats are that they are treating this as an aberration. As one of the players noted, the Giants could have as easily been 3-0 as 0-3 in the Rockies series, and 2-2 and not 1-3 in the Nats series. And the beats also noted that the clubhouse was pretty laid back, not stressing at all. Well, with the lead that they had, and they still have a pretty good lead, they should not feel any extra stress.
So I'm trying not to worry. The logical side says that things are still fine, as long as the Giants starters are going strong, we will be fine. The emotional side of me, of course, is spiraling along with other Giants fans.
Go Giants!
Monday, June 16, 2014
Your 2014 Giants Draft: Full List
Just realized that I never posted the Giants full draft list. Here is a link to the MLB list. The names by round:
- Beede, Tyler
- Garcia, Aramis
- Davis, Dylan
- Webb, Logan
- Coonrod, Samuel
- Ewing, Skyler
- Harrison, Seth
- Slater, Austin
- Woods, Stetson
- Gage, Matthew
- Brody, Greg
- Henning, Jameson
- Lacen, Luis
- Rivera, Kevin
- Moss, Benton
- Ginkel, Kevin
- Smith, Caleb
- Agosto, Edrick
- Amion, Richard
- Underwood, Bret
- Crownover, Matt
- Reyes, Mark
- Johnson, Jordan
- Petersen, Michael
- Murray, Byron
- Cole, Hunter
- Kaden, Connor
- Sabo, Nick
- Cruz, Ryan
- Covington, Cov
- Nelson, Nick
- Williams, Hunter
- Deacon, Deac
- Susnara, Timothy
- Hart, Mitch
- Taylor, Zach
- Christman, Garrett
- Santiago, Benito
- Ryan, Joe
- Mahan, Riles
Sunday, June 15, 2014
Your 2014 Giants: 14th Rotational PQS
It has been a rough turn through the rotation, but the starters were still dealing and performing well on a PQS basis.
ogc thoughts
As we know, the team got beat up this turn of the rotation, losing 4 of 5. As we also know, that was mostly the bullpen's fault, not the starters, don't need PQS to know that. Still, wanted to report on this turn.
They had another good turn, with 3 DOM starts and zero DIS starts. Bumgarner, Hudson, and Lincecum contributed the DOM this turn. Bumgarner is up to 61% DOM and 21% DIS. Hudson is up to 67% DOM and 0% DIS. LIncecum is up to 57% DOM and 29% DIS.
Cain and Vogie had MID starts. Cain is down to 44% DOM and 11% DIS, Vogie to 50% DOM and 14% DIS.
As recounted in prior posts, they have had a great stretch of pitching over the past 7 turns of the rotation now, covering 35 games, with just 1 DIS start in all those games. They are now up to 56% DOM and 16% DIS, both very good.
To see how pitching well has helped their record, I redid all the stats to cover W/L by PQS type. We know of course that pitching well means you have a better chance of winning, but what exactly are the results. For DOM starts, they have won 28 of 38, .737 winning percentage. For MID starts, they are at .526, but had been in the mid-to-high .500 until this week. For DIS starts, they are .364 winning percentage. These are very similar to the results we have seen in the playoffs when I calculated those results.
But as we have seen this week, it is not the be all and end all, at least not like many years ago when starters went 7-8 innings regularly. You need a strong bullpen too, strong closer too. The offense gave them three leads in the Rockies series but the bullpen failed the rest of the team by blowing all three games.
Luckily, most of the year, the bullpen has been aces, and have won many more games than they have lost this week. They have held the fort many a times when the starter faltered early and allowed the offense the time to catch up and win many games in the late innings. But obviously, the bullpen will need to show that this was just a blip and not a continuing trend, a random bit of bad luck that all happened in one series against one particularly bad opponent, and at home of all places, I believe that they will come out of this fine, the bullpen has performed for us for years now, no reason to think anything has really changed all of a sudden.
The team just needs to lick their wounds and get settled on the road, clear their minds and move on.
ogc thoughts
As we know, the team got beat up this turn of the rotation, losing 4 of 5. As we also know, that was mostly the bullpen's fault, not the starters, don't need PQS to know that. Still, wanted to report on this turn.
They had another good turn, with 3 DOM starts and zero DIS starts. Bumgarner, Hudson, and Lincecum contributed the DOM this turn. Bumgarner is up to 61% DOM and 21% DIS. Hudson is up to 67% DOM and 0% DIS. LIncecum is up to 57% DOM and 29% DIS.
Cain and Vogie had MID starts. Cain is down to 44% DOM and 11% DIS, Vogie to 50% DOM and 14% DIS.
As recounted in prior posts, they have had a great stretch of pitching over the past 7 turns of the rotation now, covering 35 games, with just 1 DIS start in all those games. They are now up to 56% DOM and 16% DIS, both very good.
To see how pitching well has helped their record, I redid all the stats to cover W/L by PQS type. We know of course that pitching well means you have a better chance of winning, but what exactly are the results. For DOM starts, they have won 28 of 38, .737 winning percentage. For MID starts, they are at .526, but had been in the mid-to-high .500 until this week. For DIS starts, they are .364 winning percentage. These are very similar to the results we have seen in the playoffs when I calculated those results.
But as we have seen this week, it is not the be all and end all, at least not like many years ago when starters went 7-8 innings regularly. You need a strong bullpen too, strong closer too. The offense gave them three leads in the Rockies series but the bullpen failed the rest of the team by blowing all three games.
Luckily, most of the year, the bullpen has been aces, and have won many more games than they have lost this week. They have held the fort many a times when the starter faltered early and allowed the offense the time to catch up and win many games in the late innings. But obviously, the bullpen will need to show that this was just a blip and not a continuing trend, a random bit of bad luck that all happened in one series against one particularly bad opponent, and at home of all places, I believe that they will come out of this fine, the bullpen has performed for us for years now, no reason to think anything has really changed all of a sudden.
The team just needs to lick their wounds and get settled on the road, clear their minds and move on.
Saturday, June 14, 2014
Your 2014 Giants: Coasting Along
The Giants are 43-25 and the Dodgers are 36-33. How far ahead are we?
Wednesday, June 11, 2014
Your 2014 Giants Second Round Pick: Mr. Clean
Catcher Aramis Garcia was the second round pick by the Giants, the 52nd pick overall in the draft. He was one of 15 semi-finalists for the Johnny Bench Award (which Posey won), his second year in a row that he attained that distinction.
Tuesday, June 10, 2014
Your 2014 Giants: 13th Rotational PQS
Lucky 13? La Machine!
ogc thoughts
The Giants rotation kept the good times rolling. In the 13th turn of the rotation, they had 4 DOM starts and zero DIS starts, pushing DOM up to 55.6% overall and dropping DIS to 17.5%. Hudson, who has been the stud of the rotation for the season is the odd man out this week, but he still didn't throw a disaster start.
It will be amazing to some (it was to me!) that Vogie bad start yesterday was rated a DOM start. The only problem with his start was that the BABIP gods made him pay in spades in this game, otherwise he struck out enough and didn't walk much or give up two homers, and made it to 6 innings.
Hudson is still the team leader in DOM but at 63.6%, he is now just ahead of Bumgarner who has 61.5%. Madison, after a poor April, ending with a disaster start, has fired off 6 DOM starts in 7 starts, with one MID start in there, pushing him back up to the levels he is used to being in. Lincecum and Vogie with their DOM starts are now up to 53.8%, but Vogie is only at 15.4% DIS vs. Lincecum's high 30.8%. Cain finally had a start that mattered and he is now at 50% DOM (only 12.5% DIS, which is very good and probably would usually lead the team if not for Hudson's 0% DIS so far). Petit did not get a start, so he's still at 40%DOM/20% DIS.
The moving averages for DOM% are all at 67% and higher, as the rotation has been like a machine for seven turns of the rotation now, with many DOM starts and very vew DIS starts. All the DIS% moving averages are now 10% or lower.
So far in June, 6 DOM starts out of 8, with only 1 DIS for a sterling 75% DOM/13% DIS, which is elite for any one pitcher, but amazing for a whole rotation to be doing. Hopefully they can keep this going throughout June and beyond.
ogc thoughts
The Giants rotation kept the good times rolling. In the 13th turn of the rotation, they had 4 DOM starts and zero DIS starts, pushing DOM up to 55.6% overall and dropping DIS to 17.5%. Hudson, who has been the stud of the rotation for the season is the odd man out this week, but he still didn't throw a disaster start.
It will be amazing to some (it was to me!) that Vogie bad start yesterday was rated a DOM start. The only problem with his start was that the BABIP gods made him pay in spades in this game, otherwise he struck out enough and didn't walk much or give up two homers, and made it to 6 innings.
Hudson is still the team leader in DOM but at 63.6%, he is now just ahead of Bumgarner who has 61.5%. Madison, after a poor April, ending with a disaster start, has fired off 6 DOM starts in 7 starts, with one MID start in there, pushing him back up to the levels he is used to being in. Lincecum and Vogie with their DOM starts are now up to 53.8%, but Vogie is only at 15.4% DIS vs. Lincecum's high 30.8%. Cain finally had a start that mattered and he is now at 50% DOM (only 12.5% DIS, which is very good and probably would usually lead the team if not for Hudson's 0% DIS so far). Petit did not get a start, so he's still at 40%DOM/20% DIS.
The moving averages for DOM% are all at 67% and higher, as the rotation has been like a machine for seven turns of the rotation now, with many DOM starts and very vew DIS starts. All the DIS% moving averages are now 10% or lower.
So far in June, 6 DOM starts out of 8, with only 1 DIS for a sterling 75% DOM/13% DIS, which is elite for any one pitcher, but amazing for a whole rotation to be doing. Hopefully they can keep this going throughout June and beyond.
Sunday, June 08, 2014
2014 Giants May PQS
This post has the Giants Pure Quality Start scores for the month of May 2014, PQS as defined in Ron Shandler's Baseball Forecaster annual book and they published the details here (unfortunately, they removed the article; this link gets you at least to the PQS definition, read down to middle for details). 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).
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).
Saturday, June 07, 2014
Friday, June 06, 2014
Your 2014 Giants First Round Pick: RHP Young Beedah
The Giants select RHP Tyler Beede from Vanderbilt. So the closest I got to calling it was that I was right that it was a pitcher. And that is OK, this was just a fun exercise to go through each year, the Giants just go their own way most of the time, they are too hard to read in terms of the draft, so all you can do is play along. "Young Beedah", by the way, is his rap name, as he likes to rap some in his spare time. Look out Vanilla Ice!
I was dismayed initially by that pick because I had read some negative stuff about Beede, which was from people from his school. Then, thinking about it afterward, while shopping (I guess it cleared my head), I remembered that there were Giants fans who wanted to trade Cain because "he's a loser," so I resolved to have an open mind, as I usually do after a Giants first round draft pick, and see what I can find out about our draft selection. My research follows.
I was dismayed initially by that pick because I had read some negative stuff about Beede, which was from people from his school. Then, thinking about it afterward, while shopping (I guess it cleared my head), I remembered that there were Giants fans who wanted to trade Cain because "he's a loser," so I resolved to have an open mind, as I usually do after a Giants first round draft pick, and see what I can find out about our draft selection. My research follows.
Wednesday, June 04, 2014
Your 2014 Giants: Drafty Thoughts
As I do every year, I'm posting my thoughts on the Giants draft, based on the mock drafts that I've been perusing. If you know the draft already or seen the mocks, I'm not going to be adding much knowledge to you, this is for the people who don't have the time to read all this stuff.
Timmy 2.0: Base Status Not On Start in Cincy
I saw one beat beating down on Timmy after his horror start in Cincy. I assume there are many more elsewhere, I don't have to go elsewhere to see it, I know it by heart anytime a Giants player is considered down, the "fans" just beat up on him. Throw in his big salary, and that's a perfect storm.