FTW
Gettin’ Lucky, An Article About Pitching, Not Josh Hamilton.
August 11, 2009 by kris · 3 Comments
The Deadspin photos of Josh Hamilton are pretty killer, and the shot-glass in the fly trick is A-PLUS in my book but this is an article about pitching.
Who’s Getting Lucky?
Matt Cain (2.44 ERA & 3.92 FIP) — Cain loves to party and he’s got the numbers to show it. Cain comes in with a .260 BABIP and a ridiculous 0.87 LOB%.
J.A. Happ (2.74 ERA & 4.01 FIP) — For some reason the Blue Jays wanted this Pitching STUD! Number 3 starter in the Roy Halladay deal. Much like Cain, J.A. Happ’s leaving an insane amount of runners on base (0.87 LOB%.) Pitching in Philly, Happ and his 0.251 BABIP is going to kill you very, very, very, soon.
Edwin Jackson (2.62 ERA & 3.85 FIP) — There’s no debating Jackson has put it together, but he’s had a good chunk of luck, too. I started out the season claiming that the Rays’ pwned the Tigers by nabbing Matt Joyce, but it appears as though I may have been wrong. Jackson’s another guy with a BABIP under .260 and a LOB% of over 80%. Unlike the previous two however, Edwin Jackson’s genuinely improved. The key to Jackson has always been control, and a 2.86 BB/9 is incredibly solid.
Kevin Millwood should not have an ERA below 4.00 ever, and hopefully he’s not owned in your league. Jarrod Washburn is indeed the bane of my existence.
Wandy Rodriguez (2.51 ERA & 3.65 FIP) — I’m a proud owner of Wandy, and I love trotting him out there, but there’s no point in acquiring him now. Wandy’s left-on-base percentage is a pretty hefty 83%, while he’s BABIP is a solid .290 — be wary. I love Wandy’s strike-out rate, but get the “fading fast feeling” when it comes to the final 2 or 3 weeks of the season.
Chris Carpenter (2.26 ERA & 2.99 FIP) — I missed out on the Carpenter boat, mainly because I’m uber-injury-paranoid, but so it goes. Carpenter’s making it work with 6.33 K/9 and a beautiful 4.58 K/BB rate. Unfortunately, Carpenter’s sub-1.00 WHIP probably won’t last as his BABIP numbers start to trend towards at least .285ish, rather than his current .264 BABIP. Carpenter’s leaving ‘em on base with the best of ‘em at an 81% clip. I was wrong on Carpenter, but at this point I’d be acquiring him as a 1.20-WHIP, 3.00 ERA guy.
Clayton Kershaw (2.73 ERA, 3.21 FIP) — I’m a Kershaw guy, but his current 5BB/9 is worrisome with his current .261 BABIP and 78% LOB. Most of Kershaw’s statistics are maintainable, but I definitely wouldn’t be acquiring him at his current price.
Ricky Romero (3.66 ERA, 4.23 FIP) — There’s a lot of talk up ‘ere in Canada about Romero winning rookie of the year, but he’s still fairly bland in fantasy circles — and for good reason. Romero’s probably a 4.00 ERA – 4.25 ERA pitcher the rest of the way home, and with the departure of Alex Rios the outfield defense isn’t getting any prettier. A few more runs are probably going to start crossing the plate, and Romero’s 80% LOB will suffer.
A few other guys that I feel the need to mention,
Adam Wainwright could be pushing the envelope and a neat little quarter o’ run increase the rest of the way home in his ERA should probably be expected. The same goes for Jered Weaver — expect a little bump, and if you can get someone to buy him dollar-for-dollar, I’d pull the trigger.
Last, but not least, Matt Garza’s (3.63 ERA, 4.23 FIP) got some regressing to do with his current .263 BABIP and 78% LOB. I think Garza has it in ‘em the rest of the way home though, so if you’re trying to deal with a stat nerd — I’d be targeting Garza and bringing up his “luck.”
Hopefully this quick piece serves useful to someone. If you haven’t jumped on the fangraphs.com train, please do so – all the statistics are exportable into Excel or Open Office and easily sortable. Basically, all you’ve gotta do is pull a formula out of your ass, or a text book, and let Excel do the work.
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It’s to the point in fantasy where you can’t be happy owning anyone anymore. Can’t guys just have a good season and that be the end of it..without all this over hyped BABIP and FIP and strand % mumbo-jumbo trying to explain away the success they are having.
People have been trying to say Wandy was going to fall off for the past two months now…and still he continues to pitch like a tier 1 pitcher. At some point when September rolls around and he’s still getting it done you just have to tip your cap to the guy and realize he may just have turned the corner….and it’s not like it came out of no where…the guy has been on the rise steadily for two years now and this season he’s finally cured the problems he had on the road, for the most part.
Hey Adam, thanks for the comments and I agree with you for the most part. Statistics constitute about 30 to 40 percent of the entire equation in most of my decisions. Too many people tend to forget the simplistic part of why players are under, or over-performing expectations.
Stuff like schedule, and just general improvement. While Wandy’s been lucky, I can almost certainly guarantee you that his success or failure the rest of the way home will depend more on his schedule than anything else. As for his road-woes, I’ve just started assuming that he’s been hittin’ the clubs and leaving the wife behind every time he goes out on a road-trip. There’s no other reason to explain such a drastic drop-off.
People tend to forget just how often statistical outlying seasons occur. Wandy’s completely capable of keeping his ERA sub-3.00 for the rest of the season, but the law of averages may come back to bite him in the ass.
Houston appears to be playing 2 more series on the road than at home, and they’ve got a fairly rough schedule, so:
If I could 3.50ish ERA, 1.20 WHIP and around the same K-Rate from someone I could acquire in a Wandy deal, I’d probably pull the trigger.
yeah good point about the schedule…the only problem with Wandy is that you won’t get a whole lot of value in a trade in the types of leagues I play in. I’ve tried to trade him a few times and every time I was getting anything of real value in return..so it seems he is just one of those guys that you just hold onto and enjoy the surprising year.
The same goes for guys like Adam Lind, Greinke, Hill etc. Nobody is going to give you top dollar for those guys because they simply don’t trust what they are doing.