Long time readers will know that one focus of my blog has been on research of how teams win. A long-time classic sabermetric book, The Hidden Game of Baseball, by John Thorn and Pete Palmer, had been out of publishing, like, forever, until recently having another printing with a new Foreword and Preface added, and I just got my copy the other day. I am going to go over the chapter on what makes teams win in this post.
Showing posts with label Sabermetric Thoughts. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Sabermetric Thoughts. Show all posts
Tuesday, April 14, 2015
Wednesday, January 11, 2012
PQS in the Playoffs (second in series)
I published the first in the series last month here. The PQS stats there looked OK, but not too conclusive with just two year's worth of data. I'm covering 2009 and 2008 in this post.
2009
In 2009, the team with the higher PQS wins won 4 of the 5 times (with two ties). The team with the higher PQS average won 5 of 5 series (two ties). Higher DOM does appear to correlate with winning series in 2009.
In games where the pitcher was expected to win, the higher DOM pitcher's team had a 13-3 record (.813 win percentage). There were 14 ties. Where pitchers had a DOM start, their teams went 18-10 (.650 win pct), but there were 8 games where both pitchers had a DOM start, so removing those games leaves the games where one pitcher had a DOM and the other didn't, and those teams with the DOM went 10-2 (.867).
There was good but not great pitching with 47% DOM and 25% DIS starts overall. Pitching was pretty good, as indicated by the 47% DOM, but not great (DOM over 50%) or elite (DOM over 70%). In addition, there was a fair amount of bad pitching with 25% DIS (under 20% is good, under 10% great, under 5% elite).
2008
In 2008, the DOM's had it. The team with the most PQS wins, as well as best average PQS score, won all seven series. The expected team to win went 19-1 and teams where their pitcher had a DOM start went 20-7, or 14-1 when you remove all games where both starters had a DOM start. Teams where their starters had a DIS start went 3-18, or 1-16 when you remove all games where both starters had a DIS start.
2008-2011
The results appear very conclusive already. So I might not even continue going back to older series. Over the four seasons of playoffs, the expected team to win went 67-15, the team having a DOM start went 81-37, and 56-12 when you take out the ties. Teams with DIS starts had a 25-57 record, 11-43 without ties.
As I have been writing about for a number of years now, to maximize your team's chances of winning in the playoffs, you want to have a rotation of starters who have high DOM percentages The Giants have that with Lincecum, Cain, Bumgarner, and Vogelsong. And Sanchez was good too.
As the 2011 Phillies showed, you can get DOM starts from all your starters in a series and still lose the series to a lesser team. Getting DOM starts is no guarantee. But as the results of the past four seasons studied here shows, it is better than the alternative (DIS starts in particular).
One valid reaction to this is "so what, what's new about getting good starts means you win a lot?" First, this is the first study I know of that studied PQS advantage in the playoffs. Of course, it's better, but by what degree. And that is the second thing, it quantifies the advantage of getting a DOM start and the disadvantage of a DIS start. Teams with a DOM start went 81-37, those with DIS went 25-57, and more crucially, 11-43 when against better pitching.
2009
In 2009, the team with the higher PQS wins won 4 of the 5 times (with two ties). The team with the higher PQS average won 5 of 5 series (two ties). Higher DOM does appear to correlate with winning series in 2009.
In games where the pitcher was expected to win, the higher DOM pitcher's team had a 13-3 record (.813 win percentage). There were 14 ties. Where pitchers had a DOM start, their teams went 18-10 (.650 win pct), but there were 8 games where both pitchers had a DOM start, so removing those games leaves the games where one pitcher had a DOM and the other didn't, and those teams with the DOM went 10-2 (.867).
There was good but not great pitching with 47% DOM and 25% DIS starts overall. Pitching was pretty good, as indicated by the 47% DOM, but not great (DOM over 50%) or elite (DOM over 70%). In addition, there was a fair amount of bad pitching with 25% DIS (under 20% is good, under 10% great, under 5% elite).
2008
In 2008, the DOM's had it. The team with the most PQS wins, as well as best average PQS score, won all seven series. The expected team to win went 19-1 and teams where their pitcher had a DOM start went 20-7, or 14-1 when you remove all games where both starters had a DOM start. Teams where their starters had a DIS start went 3-18, or 1-16 when you remove all games where both starters had a DIS start.
2008-2011
The results appear very conclusive already. So I might not even continue going back to older series. Over the four seasons of playoffs, the expected team to win went 67-15, the team having a DOM start went 81-37, and 56-12 when you take out the ties. Teams with DIS starts had a 25-57 record, 11-43 without ties.
As I have been writing about for a number of years now, to maximize your team's chances of winning in the playoffs, you want to have a rotation of starters who have high DOM percentages The Giants have that with Lincecum, Cain, Bumgarner, and Vogelsong. And Sanchez was good too.
As the 2011 Phillies showed, you can get DOM starts from all your starters in a series and still lose the series to a lesser team. Getting DOM starts is no guarantee. But as the results of the past four seasons studied here shows, it is better than the alternative (DIS starts in particular).
One valid reaction to this is "so what, what's new about getting good starts means you win a lot?" First, this is the first study I know of that studied PQS advantage in the playoffs. Of course, it's better, but by what degree. And that is the second thing, it quantifies the advantage of getting a DOM start and the disadvantage of a DIS start. Teams with a DOM start went 81-37, those with DIS went 25-57, and more crucially, 11-43 when against better pitching.
Click title to read more
Wednesday, August 10, 2011
Offense is Hygiene, Defense is Core Competencies
I posted the below in response to a complaint about the Giants SS solutions since the Aurilia era.
Click on title of post to see the full post
(why does Blogger provide a jump break function but then does not let the reader know that they need to click something to see the full post, I wonder how many people thought I forgot to write my post. I'm almost at the point of stopping using this "feature")
Click on title of post to see the full post
(why does Blogger provide a jump break function but then does not let the reader know that they need to click something to see the full post, I wonder how many people thought I forgot to write my post. I'm almost at the point of stopping using this "feature")
Wednesday, February 04, 2009
In Search Of: Sabean-metrics
The Giants recently promoted Bobby Evans to VP of Baseball Operations and Jeremy Shelley to Senior Director of Baseball Operations/Pro Scouting. Henry Schulman has a good account of this here, and Joan Ryan has a nice personal interest story on Shelley here.
Part of the Plan
Clearly, this is part of Neukom's strategy this off-season, to dispel the notion that the Giants are stuck in the dinosaur age in terms of the use of sabermetrics. He mentioned it in the first Clubhouse meeting with season ticket holders, refering to a "mathematician" who had been doing this for the Giants for 15 years now, and given that Shelley has been with the Giants for 15 years and what Ryan wrote about him, he must have been the guy Neukom was refering to; however, Ryan noted that Shelley was a Finance major at Santa Clara University.
And it is not like the Giants didn't leak some of that usage previously. I recall references to stats from Felipe and Sabean 3-5 years ago that were sabermetric principles, like OBP. The main unknown was how much did they use sabermetrics, were they tyros or very experienced. Based on what I got from Schulman's post, he has some depth.
For instance, Schulman noted that the Giants quoted how Renteria defense was good going to his left. I haven't checked this, but this clearly looks like a reference to Baseball Musing's Probabilistic Model of Range, which is based on the most advanced statistical methodology for studying defense, UZR, which Mitchel Lichtman created and Baseball Musing's David Pinto continued on-line, when Lichtman worked for the Cardinals and couldn't do it publicly anymore.
OK, it does appear to be PMR: http://www.baseballmusings.com/cgi-bin/DisplayCharts.py?PlayerID=1178&fpos=6&year=2008 If you look at his dotted line in the graph, which is the difference between his predicted and actual outs, he is much better going to his left (i.e. towards 2B) than he is going to his right. He is also below average in terms of balls that goes right where the shortstop spot is (look at the peak, the green predicted line is above his red actual). He is also bad with liners. And that jibes with his low 95.24 ratio for 2008.
Here is his historical ratios:
2006: 101.12 (but only 92.01 for turning DP)
2007: 98.87
2008: 95.24
Here are the UZR:
2006: 2.0
2007: -1.7
2008: 0.9
They don't quite match up in 2008, but was pretty good for the previous two years.
So Shelley seems to be relatively knowledgeable, PMR is a bit advanced, you have to seek it out plus then need to understand all that.
Schulman noted that at an early partners meeting, once Neukom had took over the Giants, he had Shelley come to the boardroom and explain all the analysis that he does. He also noted that Neukom is "keen on alternative statistics."
Giants Sabermetrician
I know that some Sabean-Naysayers would say that's an oxymoron, so I thought that would be a good title. Joan Ryan notes that his closeted status up to now have been to keep the Giants secret weapon on the down-low. I've seen his name in the media book for years and all they ever list him as was head of their information systems, though he was named Director of Baseball Operations previously before this promotion.
Ryan describes what he does:
Ryan's account is also nice because he's living the dream, and his start with the Giants shows that he was in the right place at the right time, much like his predecessor, Ralph Nelson, who rose from being the team's statistician to nearly GM (he eventually helped put together the Arizona Diamondbacks; one of my friends in high school, Jim Nelson, wrote him to see if there was a way he could get in, but just got a nice perfunctory letter in return).
Go Giants!
Part of the Plan
Clearly, this is part of Neukom's strategy this off-season, to dispel the notion that the Giants are stuck in the dinosaur age in terms of the use of sabermetrics. He mentioned it in the first Clubhouse meeting with season ticket holders, refering to a "mathematician" who had been doing this for the Giants for 15 years now, and given that Shelley has been with the Giants for 15 years and what Ryan wrote about him, he must have been the guy Neukom was refering to; however, Ryan noted that Shelley was a Finance major at Santa Clara University.
And it is not like the Giants didn't leak some of that usage previously. I recall references to stats from Felipe and Sabean 3-5 years ago that were sabermetric principles, like OBP. The main unknown was how much did they use sabermetrics, were they tyros or very experienced. Based on what I got from Schulman's post, he has some depth.
For instance, Schulman noted that the Giants quoted how Renteria defense was good going to his left. I haven't checked this, but this clearly looks like a reference to Baseball Musing's Probabilistic Model of Range, which is based on the most advanced statistical methodology for studying defense, UZR, which Mitchel Lichtman created and Baseball Musing's David Pinto continued on-line, when Lichtman worked for the Cardinals and couldn't do it publicly anymore.
OK, it does appear to be PMR: http://www.baseballmusings.com/cgi-bin/DisplayCharts.py?PlayerID=1178&fpos=6&year=2008 If you look at his dotted line in the graph, which is the difference between his predicted and actual outs, he is much better going to his left (i.e. towards 2B) than he is going to his right. He is also below average in terms of balls that goes right where the shortstop spot is (look at the peak, the green predicted line is above his red actual). He is also bad with liners. And that jibes with his low 95.24 ratio for 2008.
Here is his historical ratios:
2006: 101.12 (but only 92.01 for turning DP)
2007: 98.87
2008: 95.24
Here are the UZR:
2006: 2.0
2007: -1.7
2008: 0.9
They don't quite match up in 2008, but was pretty good for the previous two years.
So Shelley seems to be relatively knowledgeable, PMR is a bit advanced, you have to seek it out plus then need to understand all that.
Schulman noted that at an early partners meeting, once Neukom had took over the Giants, he had Shelley come to the boardroom and explain all the analysis that he does. He also noted that Neukom is "keen on alternative statistics."
Giants Sabermetrician
I know that some Sabean-Naysayers would say that's an oxymoron, so I thought that would be a good title. Joan Ryan notes that his closeted status up to now have been to keep the Giants secret weapon on the down-low. I've seen his name in the media book for years and all they ever list him as was head of their information systems, though he was named Director of Baseball Operations previously before this promotion.
Ryan describes what he does:
In short, Shelley decodes baseball statistics. He finds meaning in numbers. He excavates databases like an archaeologist at a dig - except Shelley uses his unearthed artifacts to piece together a picture of the future instead of the past.
He projects how players are likely to perform over a season, or over the course of a contract. He and his team figure out before each season, for example, how many runs the Giants are likely to score and how many they are likely to give up. They go through each guy in the lineup. They add and subtract. They move decimal points around. They substitute this player for that one and recalculate everything. They use arcane formulas they have developed over the years and that they share strictly on a need-to-know basis, and, really, almost no one outside baseball operations needs to know.
"I'm a little uncomfortable saying anything more than that,'' Shelley tells me. "What I
can say is that analysis in baseball has gotten so sophisticated and it's changing all the time. I read, read, read - every baseball web site, every publication, everything."And every day, it seems, I see some new stat or method of analysis out there. We're always asking ourselves Does this make sense? Does this help us?''
Ryan's account is also nice because he's living the dream, and his start with the Giants shows that he was in the right place at the right time, much like his predecessor, Ralph Nelson, who rose from being the team's statistician to nearly GM (he eventually helped put together the Arizona Diamondbacks; one of my friends in high school, Jim Nelson, wrote him to see if there was a way he could get in, but just got a nice perfunctory letter in return).
Go Giants!
Sunday, January 27, 2008
Pitcher's Command: Giants Starters
The Hardball Times have an article on what's important when looking at a pitchers' K/BB ratio. The standard is that you want starters with K/BB over 2.0 and ideally over 2.4. But are there other factors that should guide your opinion on which pitcher is better?
Walks Not Always Bad
What the study by Derek Carty does is separate starting pitchers into three categories: low strikeout pitchers, solid in both, and high walk. Low strikeout pitchers was categorized as having: 2.00+ K/BB, 5.00- K/9, 50+ IP. Solid in both pitchers had: 2.00+ K/BB, 2.75+ BB/9, 7.00- K/9, 50+ IP. And High walk pitchers had: 2.00+ K/BB, 3.50+ BB/9, 50+ IP.
When the pitchers were split in those three categories, what he found was that pitchers with high walks had the best ERAs. In the NL, the High Walk pitchers had an ERA of 3.85, while the other two had 4.21 and 4.28 ERAs. The split was even wider in the AL, the High Walk pitchers had a 3.75 ERA, while the other two had 4.40 and 4.48 ERAs. How can that be when it has been drummed into us that high walk pitchers are to be avoided or at least strongly admonished?
What he concluded is that: "All K/BB rates should not be treated equally." Which, as he noted, is pretty obvious from the data. He also noted:
Of course, what a lot of Giants fans have been saying, me included, is that Lincecum and Cain need to get their walks under control if they are to become elite pitchers. But as this study shows, even if you walk a lot (over 3.5 BB/9), as long as you strike out a lot as well, that mitigates the danger inherent in walking batters and adding runners, as a lot of strikeouts means less balls in play, and less BIP means less hits, and less hits means less run scoring hits, even if you happen to walk more than is usually prudent.
All in all, they are not just another brick in the wall, they are clearly among the elite in the majors and we have the privilege of getting to see two of them pitch for our beloved team, the Giants. Just another piece of evidence that keeping them is better than trading them away for even very good players like Rios. As the table shows, there are only 17 of them like that in the NL, and we got two of them.
That is a strength, that is a competitive advantage. An advantage throughout the season, an advantage any season we make the playoffs. Now Sabean has to build us a lineup that is capable of scoring enough runs for the pitchers to win more often than not.
Strong Starting Rotation IS Competitive Minimum Now In NL West
I think that it should be noted that while it is a competitive advantage in general, it is the competitive minimum in the NL West starting in 2008 (in order of finish):
I think there are a number of strengths to having Cain and Lincecum together. Both Cain and Lincecum ranked among the leaders in a number of the leaderboards for starting NL pitchers in the Bill James 2008 Handbook and in THT 2008 Annual. If one should falter, the other should be good, there should always be one pitching like an ace - if you only have one ace, like when we only had Schmidt on top, when he did poorly, there was no one else around to pick up the slack, and the team suffered. Their high K/9 pitching will help us in the playoffs. And in short series, like the playoffs, they can pretty much take over them as a tandem.
The rest of the rotation is pretty good too. Zito is comparable to the other teams' #3 starters, given that others have injury history, short history of success, and/or are old. Only the D-gers appear to be comparable, or even superior, to our top 3.
However, Lowry pushes us above other rotations. I think Lowry is head and shoulders above any other teams' #4 starter. None can really match his performance and experience. And while he has had health problems, the others' #4 had worse injuries or has less successful experiences which put them much below him.
Given Bochy's history of protecting pitchers, I see him not letting Lowry go as deep into games as he did in 2007, in terms of number of pitches. He let him go to 100 or more pitches in half his starts (13 out of 26) and he went 105 or more pitches 6 times, over 110 pitches 3 times, and he reached 125 pitches one time. Though he still only averaged 98.5 pitches per game in 2007 and the number of starts over 100 is much much less than what Alou put him through, I think Bochy's going to restrict him even further in 2008. I think he will continue to target him at about 100 pitches, but will not let him go beyond 105 pitches anymore, and perhaps could even try to keep him under 100 each game. I could also see the Giants try to rearrange the rotation in the second half to give him less starts overall.
Lastly, Correia is about as questionable and potentially good as any other #5. This can go either way in wide swings, but generally, a team's #5 starter should not affect the top 4 overall competency much, unless he has a totally breakout or totally disastrous season.
Lots of Groundballs Are Good Too: Sign Lincecum Soon
He also noted a table he put together that showed that pitchers who can get more than 50% groundballs are also able to keep their ERAs low. So that's a way a pitcher can get away with poorer K/9 and/or BB/9 rates. Still, while Lincecum is a high K/9 pitcher, he also gets a lot of groundballs in his balls-in-play too, a great combination to have in a pitcher. And hence another reason why he should not be traded.
The only reason he should be traded is if the Giants medicos decide that his arm really is ready to fall off. Otherwise, we should sign him soon and buy out all his pre-free agency years plus get an option on his first free agent year, if not try to get his second year as well.
Walks Not Always Bad
What the study by Derek Carty does is separate starting pitchers into three categories: low strikeout pitchers, solid in both, and high walk. Low strikeout pitchers was categorized as having: 2.00+ K/BB, 5.00- K/9, 50+ IP. Solid in both pitchers had: 2.00+ K/BB, 2.75+ BB/9, 7.00- K/9, 50+ IP. And High walk pitchers had: 2.00+ K/BB, 3.50+ BB/9, 50+ IP.
When the pitchers were split in those three categories, what he found was that pitchers with high walks had the best ERAs. In the NL, the High Walk pitchers had an ERA of 3.85, while the other two had 4.21 and 4.28 ERAs. The split was even wider in the AL, the High Walk pitchers had a 3.75 ERA, while the other two had 4.40 and 4.48 ERAs. How can that be when it has been drummed into us that high walk pitchers are to be avoided or at least strongly admonished?
What he concluded is that: "All K/BB rates should not be treated equally." Which, as he noted, is pretty obvious from the data. He also noted:
"Pitchers who achieve their K/BB rates using pinpoint control and poor strikeout rates are not nearly as good of a bet as those who achieve their K/BB rates by getting a high number of strikeouts, even if they have below-average control."Leave Them Young Giants Starters Alone
Of course, what a lot of Giants fans have been saying, me included, is that Lincecum and Cain need to get their walks under control if they are to become elite pitchers. But as this study shows, even if you walk a lot (over 3.5 BB/9), as long as you strike out a lot as well, that mitigates the danger inherent in walking batters and adding runners, as a lot of strikeouts means less balls in play, and less BIP means less hits, and less hits means less run scoring hits, even if you happen to walk more than is usually prudent.
All in all, they are not just another brick in the wall, they are clearly among the elite in the majors and we have the privilege of getting to see two of them pitch for our beloved team, the Giants. Just another piece of evidence that keeping them is better than trading them away for even very good players like Rios. As the table shows, there are only 17 of them like that in the NL, and we got two of them.
That is a strength, that is a competitive advantage. An advantage throughout the season, an advantage any season we make the playoffs. Now Sabean has to build us a lineup that is capable of scoring enough runs for the pitchers to win more often than not.
Strong Starting Rotation IS Competitive Minimum Now In NL West
I think that it should be noted that while it is a competitive advantage in general, it is the competitive minimum in the NL West starting in 2008 (in order of finish):
- D-backs: Arizona upped the ante with their bold trade for Dan Haren to pair with Brandon Webb. They also have The Big Unit, Randy Johnson, contributing as well, plus Micah Owings and Doug Davis. Still, Johnson is a big question mark with no established or up-coming starter in the wings other than untested Yusmeiro Petit and while Owings had a great season and a better second half, curiously, he was much worse on the road than at home - 3.81 ERA at home vs. 4.96 ERA on the road - suggesting that his home numbers was the fluke and thus he should suffer a sophomore slump in 2008. Other negatives: despite low groundballs%, his BABIP was a strong .280, suggesting that he should suffer a regression to the mean and see his BABIP rise to the .300 area; his K/9 is a relatively weak 6.25; his BB/9 is borderline at 2.95 (3.0 is max you want to see it at); he pitched more games at home, where he did well, than on the road, and this should even out in 2008. He falls into the Solid in Both category, which had the worse ERA among the three categories. Even with Haren, too many question marks to be top rotation, but still strong and led by two ace-type starters in Webb and Haren (though as I had cautioned previously, Haren probably will not pitch as well as last year, despite moving to NL, he was lucky in a number of ways).
- D-Rocks: Colorado has a nice set of starters who could be comparable to the Giants rotation: Jeff Francis, Aaron Cook, Jason Hirsh, and Ubaldo Jimenez, with Franklin Morales waiting in the wings. However, while Francis and Cook are solid, they are not as good as any other team's top two starters. Hirsh still needs to put things together and pitch to his potential, though since he's in the back of the rotation, he did OK last season. Jimenez needs to show that he can pitch like he did in 2007 for a full MLB season, when batters get another chance to figure him out. He did do a lot (LOT) worse in September than he did in August (with low BABIP too, though he does get a significant amount of groundballs and give up less line drives). Same for Morales, whenever he gets a chance to start, D'Rocks have Kip Wells in the rotation at the moment.
- D-Dres: San Diego has Jake Peavy and Chris Young heading their rotation, and a year ago, they were probably the elite of the NL West, but now the other teams have caught up and perhaps even passed them up. The rest of their rotation includes the incomparable Greg Maddux (but very old now), Mark Prior (who hasn't been healthy in ages), and Randy Wolf (who hasn't been healthy AND good for ages now, and will be 31 in 2008; you don't get healthier with age).
- D-gers: LA has Brad Penny, Derek Lowe, and Chad Billingsley heading their rotation, plus Hiroki Kuroda and Esteban Loaiza, and Jason Schmidt lurking around, saying he's feeling better and probably competing with Loaiza for the last spot in the rotation.
I think there are a number of strengths to having Cain and Lincecum together. Both Cain and Lincecum ranked among the leaders in a number of the leaderboards for starting NL pitchers in the Bill James 2008 Handbook and in THT 2008 Annual. If one should falter, the other should be good, there should always be one pitching like an ace - if you only have one ace, like when we only had Schmidt on top, when he did poorly, there was no one else around to pick up the slack, and the team suffered. Their high K/9 pitching will help us in the playoffs. And in short series, like the playoffs, they can pretty much take over them as a tandem.
The rest of the rotation is pretty good too. Zito is comparable to the other teams' #3 starters, given that others have injury history, short history of success, and/or are old. Only the D-gers appear to be comparable, or even superior, to our top 3.
However, Lowry pushes us above other rotations. I think Lowry is head and shoulders above any other teams' #4 starter. None can really match his performance and experience. And while he has had health problems, the others' #4 had worse injuries or has less successful experiences which put them much below him.
Given Bochy's history of protecting pitchers, I see him not letting Lowry go as deep into games as he did in 2007, in terms of number of pitches. He let him go to 100 or more pitches in half his starts (13 out of 26) and he went 105 or more pitches 6 times, over 110 pitches 3 times, and he reached 125 pitches one time. Though he still only averaged 98.5 pitches per game in 2007 and the number of starts over 100 is much much less than what Alou put him through, I think Bochy's going to restrict him even further in 2008. I think he will continue to target him at about 100 pitches, but will not let him go beyond 105 pitches anymore, and perhaps could even try to keep him under 100 each game. I could also see the Giants try to rearrange the rotation in the second half to give him less starts overall.
Lastly, Correia is about as questionable and potentially good as any other #5. This can go either way in wide swings, but generally, a team's #5 starter should not affect the top 4 overall competency much, unless he has a totally breakout or totally disastrous season.
Lots of Groundballs Are Good Too: Sign Lincecum Soon
He also noted a table he put together that showed that pitchers who can get more than 50% groundballs are also able to keep their ERAs low. So that's a way a pitcher can get away with poorer K/9 and/or BB/9 rates. Still, while Lincecum is a high K/9 pitcher, he also gets a lot of groundballs in his balls-in-play too, a great combination to have in a pitcher. And hence another reason why he should not be traded.
The only reason he should be traded is if the Giants medicos decide that his arm really is ready to fall off. Otherwise, we should sign him soon and buy out all his pre-free agency years plus get an option on his first free agent year, if not try to get his second year as well.
Friday, April 27, 2007
Adjusted K/BB: My Thoughts
I got into a discussion about K/BB on Lefty's new site (oh, I guess I better change my link to him at some point...).
Here is what I posted, in two comments there, I thought it is interesting enough to share, plus you can poke holes in my idea :^) :
Still not perfect, since the pitcher at some points avoids an extra base hit of some sort, but I would need a frequency table for those to calculate. But this is probably close enough, the degree of accuracy improvement probably is enough without adjusting for extra-base hits.
Taking Zito's 2006 season, which was a down year for his BABIP, he had a 6.15 K/9 and 4.03 BB/9 with a .280 BABIP for a 1.53 K/BB. He saved 13 hits which worked out to 0.53 H/9 and an equivalent of 0.78 BB/9. That dropped his BB/9 to 3.25 and his K/BB rose to 1.89 - not ideal but very close to the 2.0 target.
For his 2005 season, which saw a similar ERA but much lower BABIP, he had a 6.74 K/9 and 3.51 BB/9 with a .252 BABIP for a 1.92 K/BB. He saved 30 hits which worked out to 1.19 H/9 and 1.76 BB/9, which dropped his BB/9 to 1.75 and his K/BB jumped to 3.85, which is very good.
I also noticed another interesting factoid by looking at the value of various batting results. An intentional walk is worth just slightly more than half that of a regular walk: .315 vs. .176, which is 56% the worth of a regular walk. Thus when calculating these K/BB, particularly for NL starting pitchers, you need to reduce his BB/9 by the reduce value of an IBB, almost 50% less.
Ooops, maybe it is not worth the trouble. I thought there would be an increase in IBB for NL starters vs. AL starters, but Zito does not seem to have less IBB, he seems to have about the same as Morris or Ortiz, they had maybe one or two more IBB in a season. Not a heck of a difference between the two leagues.
Here is what I posted, in two comments there, I thought it is interesting enough to share, plus you can poke holes in my idea :^) :
While I totally agree that K/BB is a key statistic to follow, it is going to be skewed a bit for the Giants because Sabean seems to want to corner the market on pitchers with high BB-rate/low BABIP and those pitchers often have low K-rates too.Just thought of a proxy. TangoTiger has worked on expectancy tables and my 2006 The Hardball Times had the value of a single as .465 and the value of a walk as .315 (which they got from Retrosheet.org from work by Tom Ruane), which works out to be 1.48 times more valuable. Assuming you save at least a single and replace with a walk, that changes the team's ratio to 5.4 K/9 and 2.7 BB/9 or a K/BB of 2.0, which is the minimum you would want it to be. Zito's would fall to 6.87 vs. 2.38 or 2.89 K/BB.
Cain, Zito, Lowry and Ortiz have been lower than the .300 mean that most pitchers regress to, as someone noted above. Couple that with Zito, Lowry, Morris, and Ortiz's relatively low K-rate and you have a bad K/BB for the team.
Also, one should look at their BB/9 rate to see whether that is very bad or not. It is bad at 3.7 (ideally under 3), but again, low BABIP mitigates against a slightly higher BB/9.
I think the team needs an adjusted K/BB. I'm not sure how to calculate it but for a pitcher with a lower BABIP, you have some formula to "shift" an amount out of his BB into H to make up for the reduced BABIP, and that is his adjusted K/BB.
Doing a extremely rough estimate, a BABIP in the .275 range would result in about a 0.7 drop in H/9. Dropping the BB/9 rate from 3.7 to 3.0 vs. a 5.4 K/9, the K/BB is now 1.8, very close to the ratios Lefty noted.
That's not even accounting for the fact that a walk is not equivalent to giving up a hit, that should result in an adjusted BB/9 that's lower, though I have no idea how to proxy for that.
Trying a better example, using career numbers (Morris), I got a 0.68 drop in H/9 when the BABIP is .275. That's basically the same as above (1.79), but I think makes a stronger case about the ratio of conversion from H's to BB's, though still not accounting for extra-base hit effect.
Career BABIP:
Zito = .269
Cain = .244
Lowry = .289
Morris = .299
Ortiz = .289, but includes horrid last two seasons.
Doing my best to take out 2005 and 2006, Ortiz career BABIP is .284. That works out to about a drop of 0.44. But his K/BB is still horrible, about 1.5 after the adjustment.
Zito's very low BABIP works out to 0.78 less H/9. Career K/9 of 6.87, BB/9 of 3.53, K/BB 1.95. Adjusted BB/9 of 2.75 results in K/BB of 2.50, which is in the elite category (best are over 2.4).
Still not perfect, since the pitcher at some points avoids an extra base hit of some sort, but I would need a frequency table for those to calculate. But this is probably close enough, the degree of accuracy improvement probably is enough without adjusting for extra-base hits.
Taking Zito's 2006 season, which was a down year for his BABIP, he had a 6.15 K/9 and 4.03 BB/9 with a .280 BABIP for a 1.53 K/BB. He saved 13 hits which worked out to 0.53 H/9 and an equivalent of 0.78 BB/9. That dropped his BB/9 to 3.25 and his K/BB rose to 1.89 - not ideal but very close to the 2.0 target.
For his 2005 season, which saw a similar ERA but much lower BABIP, he had a 6.74 K/9 and 3.51 BB/9 with a .252 BABIP for a 1.92 K/BB. He saved 30 hits which worked out to 1.19 H/9 and 1.76 BB/9, which dropped his BB/9 to 1.75 and his K/BB jumped to 3.85, which is very good.
I also noticed another interesting factoid by looking at the value of various batting results. An intentional walk is worth just slightly more than half that of a regular walk: .315 vs. .176, which is 56% the worth of a regular walk. Thus when calculating these K/BB, particularly for NL starting pitchers, you need to reduce his BB/9 by the reduce value of an IBB, almost 50% less.
Ooops, maybe it is not worth the trouble. I thought there would be an increase in IBB for NL starters vs. AL starters, but Zito does not seem to have less IBB, he seems to have about the same as Morris or Ortiz, they had maybe one or two more IBB in a season. Not a heck of a difference between the two leagues.
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