Late Innings

The HOF results are in, as we all know by now. Rickey Henderson was an easy choice (in better shape than most outfielders today by the way), Jim Rice brought about years of debate. And then of course there’s still Bert Blyleven and Jack Morris. Blyleven is another area for debate. I’m only 27, and I grew up watching him in the twilight of his career, as an, um, Angel (same goes with Henderson believe it or not.) Blyleven’s statistics clearly warrant entrance, especially if Goose Gossage made it.

Any ways, the always exciting Jon Heyman chimes in about this, and this drew the ire of BA’s Rich Lederer:

Unlike me, you covered Blyleven when he pitched for the Angels toward the end of his career. Unlike you, I umpired a game behind the plate that he pitched. In other words, I saw Bert’s curveball, the one that Bill James and Rob Neyer ranked as the THIRD-BEST EVER in The Neyer/James Guide to Pitchers, up close and personal.

Wow, that was incredibly entertaining. Heyman was a common punching bag for FJM, and he’s pissed me off a few times as well, particularly in regards to awards voting.

If You Don’t Qualify for the ERA Title…

I read an interesting blog today on Adjusted ERA+. The 2008 statistics for relievers last season were astonishing… Mariano Rivera at 314, Joakim Soria at 268, even Francisco Rodriguez at 198… Keep in mind that Pedro Martinez is second all time at 160 for his career. Long story short, I’m still not over the MVP voting results from last year. Particularly with Rodriguez, who managed to garner a first place vote from some baseball writer (I’ve postulated many times to be Heyman.) I’m also disappointed with the fact that Albert Pujols wasn’t an unanimous selection.

Whoever cast that first ballot vote violated the cardinal sin of BBWAA voting, which is Thou Shalt Not Vote for a Reliever. If you cannot qualify for the ERA title, then you shouldn’t be the MVP, it’s that simple. However there are writers who still give merit to players who do well in statistics that measure opportunity, not value. I’m obviously referring to the save (e.g. Rodriguez) and the RBI (e.g. Ryan Howard.)

We can demonstrate this little quandary with the following analogy. Let R1 and R2 be relief pitchers, pitching in season S. At the end of S, both pitchers accrued the following statistics:

• R1: 81 G, 81.0 IP, 81 S, 200 ERA+
• R2: 162 G, 162.0 IP, 0 S, 400 ERA+

Obviously I’m trying to demonstrate that R2 pitched twice as well as R1, however it is easily seen that the better pitcher didn’t accumulate any saves. The first pitcher saved half of his team’s games. If being generous, that is if he saved 75% of the team’s wins, then his team won 108 games throughout the course of S. His team clearly made it deep into the playoffs.

Now when November comes around, and it’s time to chose an MVP, which of the two pitchers would garner MVP consideration. First things first, from what we see, R2 would easily win the ERA title (since he pitched in just enough innings.) He also would shatter the single-season ERA+ record for simply qualifying. However I’d be curious to see how many voters threw votes at R1. Heyman I’m sure would be one, since he’d shatter the single-season saves record (currently held by Rodriguez.) And as I stated sentences ago, R1 was on a hefty playoff contender, something BBWAA voters consider heavily when choosing awards.

Had R2 not qualified for the ERA title, I’m sure that he wouldn’t get any MVP consideration himself, since he didn’t accrue any saves. Going from the numbers I gave above, his team was either blown out or won their games handsomely. He could have also exclusively pitched every seventh inning throughout the season for the team.

Saves don’t tell us anything about a player’s value. The same thing goes with RBI. Using another odd hypothetical case, take some hitter who drives in 150 runs during the season, all on sacrifice flies. How the hitter accomplished this could be done a number of ways (e.g. the hitter before him was a triples machine.) The hitter could have a .290/.390/.515 line, he could have a .180/.285/.300 line, we don’t know.

In either case I’m on Lederer’s defense here. Heyman made me lose my share of hair of the past few years. So what if he breaks rumors before everyone else. He needs to look deeper at a player’s stats before voting on any postseason award, not just on saves and RBIs.