10:03 AM Wed, Sep 10, 2008 | Permalink
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By Michael Salfino
Let's continue with our series on baseball's lucky and unlucky players by focusing this week on Fortunate Son pitchers.
Again, I'm not meaning to use "luck" as a slur. I understand that all major league players are in the 99.9th percentile of baseball skill. Relative to each other, some seem to be lacking in ability. But relative to us, they all are gods. Pick some big leaguer you think is a scrub, and I guarantee you that if you saw him hitting fungoes or tossing the rock at the local field with mere mortals like yourself, you'd shake your head in awe.
Once you get to the show, though, it's all relative. Sometimes we think that players have extreme years relative to career numbers or scouting projections because of significant changes in their ability or dedication. But I'm convinced it's mostly random.
Baseball managers and executives generally refuse to accept the influence of chance because they'd rather believe in the supremacy of talent and their ability to control the fate of their teams (and their careers) by first identifying and then nurturing it.
Can anyone quarrel with the notion that at least a handful of the nearly 700 major league players (plus the many who shuffled on and off rosters) are certain to have been extremely lucky or unlucky in '08? In other words, their performance increases or declines can be attributed almost entirely to random chance?
Let's try to find those pitchers who were most lucky, according to stats that I believe best isolate luck: average against on balls in play (BIP), percentage of baserunners stranded, and rate of home runs on all fly balls allowed.
Next week, using some different metrics, we'll highlight unlucky hitters. Then we close out the season with lucky hitters. Let's do away with the recommendations, though all of these guys should be viewed as "Sells" for 2009. Unlike the unlucky guys, you know all of them will have jobs to begin the season and likely long leashes.
We're focusing on qualifying starters because sample sizes with relievers are too small. Thanks to Baseball Info Solutions for the data and HardballTimes.com for the ease with which it can be analyzed.
John Lackey, Angels: The average pitcher allows about a .300 average on balls in play (BIP). Lackey this year is at .269, knocking about three-quarters of a run off his ERA. Note the Angels defense is allowing a .300 average on BIP. Interestingly, Lackey seems to have been very unlucky in homers (16.9 percent of fly balls clear the wall, 8.8 percent last year).
Armando Galarraga, Tigers: The league's BIP average versus him is .239. You can credit the pitcher, if you want, but history shows most pitchers' BIP averages widely fluctuate in a seemingly random way.
Gavin Floyd, White Sox: BIP average against is .242. The K-rate is OK now (6.5/9). But increases there in '08 have been more than offset by an elevated walk rate.
Daisuke Matsuzaka, Red Sox: BIP this year is .265; last year it was the .299 we'd expect. If he's harder to hit, why are the Ks down? His command is better, you say? But the walks are up. Also note that 80 percent of his baserunners have been stranded (average is 70 percent). Normalize these things and his ERA this year is, gulp, 4.89.
Joe Saunders, Angels: What can be more random than allowing a .330 BIP last year versus .264 in '08?
Jake Peavy, Padres: His home park seems to suppress BIP, similar to the Oakland Coliseum. His strand rate has ranged from 73 to 84 percent and this year sits at the high end of his spectrum - 83.3 percent.
Johan Santana, Mets: The Ks are down 20 percent, despite going to the league where the pitcher hits. But his strand rate is an all-time-high 82 percent. Note his BIP allowed is always consistently well above average, so assume that there's mostly skill involved here.
Cliff Lee, Indians: When you win 21 of 28 starts, you're lucky, since wins are a team stat. In another era, Lee would be threatening 30 wins for a team that isn't even .500. Consider that Denny McLain won 31 games in 41 starts in '68.
Dana Eveland, A's: Yes, he's a ground-ball pitcher, but that's why we look at homers allowed as a percentage of fly balls hit. Eveland's rate is 6.6 percent - about one-third lower than average.
Mike Pelfrey, Mets: Another ground-ball specialist with much better stuff than Eveland. But red flag any pitcher with a rate of homers on fly balls under 7 percent. Pelfrey's is 6.9. Last year, it was 10.5 percent, about average. If that was his '08 rate, he'd have allowed five more homers. Since 1.85 runs score on an average homer, that's about nine more runs allowed and, assuming they're all earned, a readjusted ERA of 4.07 (actual is now 3.62).
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A simple explanation for Dice-K's numbers this year may simply be that his pitches have a lot of movement, evident if you watch him pitch. Movement makes it hard for the pitcher to throw strikes consistently, resulting in a lot of walks, hit batsmen, wild pitches and lots of base runners. Movement also makes it hard for hitters to make solid contact and results in a high strand rate. Certainly, Dice-K has enough command to throw some of his pitches for strikes, but his pitching style is to rely on a wide pitch selection to keep hitters off-balance, including some breaking balls that are intended to break out of the strike zone. He might have better command if he were to limit his pitch selection, but perhaps Dice-K is not confident that he can dominate using just fastballs and sliders. Mixing in change-ups, cutters and curve balls means he has to maintain five or more pitches. It does not make sense to "normalize" his numbers to reach a 4.89 ERA, when his numbers follow a consistent pattern from start to start (and generally involve a sub-3 ERA). He’s also been consistent in allowing ZERO hits in 15 bases loaded situations to date. That can't all be luck (although there have been sacrifice flies, hit by pitches, etc. with bases loaded).
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