Running 2011 Baseball Thread, Vol. I: Dedicated to spnited

Awesome.

 

Expected fielding-independent pitching.

FIP takes the fielding-independent pitching stats (walks, home runs and strikeouts) and extrapolates them into something that looks like ERA (so people who aren't familiar with the stat can at least be comfortable with the scale. A good FIP looks like a good ERA, and a bad FIP looks like a bad ERA, etc.)

Now, you might want to sit down for this one, because it's going to induce some rage...

xFIP is what a pitcher's FIP would look like if exactly 10.5% of the fly balls he allowed turned into home runs. It turns out that percentage is pretty wild from year-to-year for pitchers, but in the long run they tend to come back to the average. So xFIP is a little more predictive than FIP. Unless a guy has a long history of his fly balls not turning into outs, it's a safe guess that a guy with a lower HR/FB% won't be able to keep it up in the long run. If you've left a pitch in a spot where a guy can hit a fly ball with it, you've also left it in a spot where he could have hit a home run with it if he had done a better job hitting it.

Non-statistical translation of first post, for dudes like Moddy:

"Valverde has had a nice season, but he's had a lot of balls hit right at guys and he's been leaving some up in the zone that he hasn't gotten punished for, but I don't know if he can keep it up."

 

What if some this pitcher's fly ball outs were home runs instead? That's a stat? That's a talk show call. What's the acronym for "How better this guy would be if were Sandy Koufax?"

 

A fly ball is just a ball the pitcher left hitable that the batter failed to convert on.

If an old scout says "He's leaving balls up in the zone. He hasn't been burned yet, but the batters will start to catch up to him," a certain type of person would nod sagely.

If a young stathead says "Only 5.3% of his fly balls have been home runs this year, compared to a career average of 12.7%. That's unsustainable," the same person reacts with derision.

They are saying the same thing.

Now, personally, I think xFIP is a step too far. I can look at a guy's HR/FB ratios without needing it to be crammed into an ERA-based scale with some (with apologies to OOP) arbitrary formula.

 

Rick, I do not wish to start a stat argument, because it is my oft-expressed belief that most newer stats (they're not really new anymore) are indeed shorthand expressions of long-known baseball facts. But I will point out that unless a pitcher does have Koufax's or Pedro's stuff and control, his ability to make the batter "just miss" is basically the skill that keeps him employed. If a pitcher is allowing fewer homers off his fly balls, he's become a better pitcher. That's a positive, not a negative. Reversion to the mean is an assumption, and even when it happens, tends to take awhile.

 

Reversion to the mean doesn't really take awhile. It may take awhile for the averages to get into shape, but the safest assumption going forward is the mean.

Over the course of a career, an elite pitcher is going to come in at around 9% and a tomato can is going to come in around 12%. But from season to season? There's going to be a lot of fluctuation, and it's worth looking at.

Like I said, I agree xFIP has some flaws. I don't like shoehorning it into an ERA-like formula and I don't like using a blanket 10.5% for everyone.

But looking at a guy's HR/FB% and comparing it to his career numbers is highly instructive.

Zach Grienke is an instructive case. Career percentage? 9.0%, right where you'd expect a pitcher of his stuff to be. In 2009, he came in at an amazing 4.5%. You can take one look at his career and say "He can't keep that up" (well, nobody can keep that up). In 2011, it's been 13.6%. If I were keeping a list of pitchers to watch out for bounceback seasons in 2012, he'd be on it.

Jose Valverde's career number is 9.8%. When I think about what I expect him to do next year, or even in the immediate playoffs, that's the number I'll use. Not the 6.4% he's managed so far.

 

Valverde is a relief pitcher. He pitches fewer innings, and therefore his stats of all kinds are more subject to fluctuation on a season by season basis. A manager in the playoffs won't and can't say, "my closer might revert to the mean." If he does, after the season they'll think about replacing him. For teams, reversion to the mean is a winter worry.

 

In Game 1 (the real Game One on Friday) I noticed Sabathia was getting just about every call on the outside corner before the delay started, where as Verlander wasn't.

 

Because we haven't had a shut-down closer for a long time. Fernando Rodney was famous for outings like last night's, not to mention Todd Jones, whose antics were so bad that my buddies and I invented "The Todd Jones Save Manual: A Guide To Artistic Relief Pitching" with such caveats as "Make sure to load the bases right away so even more people can witness your artistry first-hand," "ERA stands for Extreme Relief Artistry, so make sure it's as high as you can," and "Blow a save once in a while. Keeps 'em honest."

So Valverde is a more entertaining version of the same crap we've been dealing with for 15 years, and he always manages to finish the game and do his little dance. Works for me.

 

Are you kidding with this last sentence?

Baseball saber acronyms are the most derided element on this board - and among sports fans generally, I think.

 

Rick, the xFIP thing is really interesting. I hadn't ever heard of that before, but it makes sense. I was wondering why Greinke's stats seemed so off from his peripherals. This is it.

Do Cy voters only list top three? It would be interesting to see where he would finish in a top 10 ranking, considering his 16-6 record, 4.47 SO/BB, and 201 strikeouts in 171 innings.

He basically just had the greatest season that never was.

 

From Grantland's Shane Ryan: