How is pitcher "effectiveness" best measured?

[cuzmail]

Consider a game ending at 1 - 0. The losing pitcher(s) allowed one run

The one run could be unearned. It doesn't have to go against the pitcher.

 

[cuzmail]

I didn’t miss your point at all. I’m talking about the process of some highly gifted people. If they wanted to, the folks who generate the numbers could easily differentiate, but they don’t. In any sport that runs stats, there are a wide range of abilities, but you don’t see numbers broken down that way for the general observer.

Are you saying that in SB there are a lot of adult teams playing kid teams, or pros playing beginners? That doesn’t happen in BB because teams are put into groups, and a team of adults would never play a team of kids in a tournament, nor would you ever see a team of pro players playing a team of beginners.

Judging by this reply not only did you miss the point you took liberties in expanding it in the opposite direction.

 

[cuzmail]

What difference does it make if those numbers are generated by a program, if you don’t have access to them? You seem to be of the belief that amateur numbers are totally open to the public the way ML numbers are, and they aren’t! So how could anyone categorize how good/bad a team way by OOPB?

By all means, if something works for you, use it. But, its not something I would do.

Who said anything about SB stats being available to the public? Who said anything about public numbers at all until the quote above? Why do we only have to consider public stats in judging a pitcher's effectiveness?

 

[Scorekeeper]

Thank you for that. I had not thought of utilizing "mistakes" in that sense, but I think it is a very good idea. While I find it difficult to hold a pitcher responsible for a run that scores because the short stop sails a throw over the first baseman's head, I have no problem charging the run to a pitcher if she is the one making the throwing error.

If you noticed, the name of the report(whipplus1), comes because I was working on WHIP stuff when I thought it up. That’s why WHIP is on the report. FWIW, the best pitcher on the team, and the best pitcher over 4 seasons, had the lowest mistakes per inning, but the highest WHIP.

 

[Scorekeeper]

The PPR stat doesn't consider pitcher "efficiency". Gomez would be more effective if he averaged 80 pitches/9 innings and Elgin averaged 120/9 innings.

Why do anything per 9 innings when we only play 7 inning games?

I’m not so sure Gomez would be more effective if he cut down on the number of pitches. He doesn’t throw “real” hard, but he’s just wild enough to get some advantage from it. My thought is, if he backed off just a smidge to get a bit more control, it would really hurt him.

 

[Scorekeeper]

JAD,

Are those numbers you “believe” are true, or have you actually checked them?

I’m not saying they aren’t good numbers, just wondering where you got them.

 

[Scorekeeper]

Judging by this reply not only did you miss the point you took liberties in expanding it in the opposite direction.

All I can say is, we’re evidently on two very different pages. Rather than argue about it, I’ll just concede.

Who said anything about SB stats being available to the public? Who said anything about public numbers at all until the quote above? Why do we only have to consider public stats in judging a pitcher's effectiveness?

Of coursed one can make a judgment based on only 1 pitch in 1 game, but one needs access to all the numbers available to make an “informed” judgment.

 

[BuckeyeGuy]

Hey Joe Morgan, welcome to the 1950s.

I'm glad you went on to elaborate but W/L is generally a terrible measure of a pitcher's effectiveness. In 1987 Nolan Ryan was the best pitcher in the NL. He had a record of 8-16. I think he was the first pitcher to lead the league in Ks, ERA, BA against and not win the CY-young award.

I do get it a the youth levels if P1 & P2 are close but P1 helps you in the field a lot more than P2 that yes you might be better off pitching P2.

W/L is really all that matters, though, as your example shows. Best does not always equal effective. Of course, that sort of begs the question "What is an effective pitcher?" If wins are the currency we're dealing in, there can be no greater measure than W/L.

I'm a numbers guy, love playing with the stats, and I don't disagree that the best pitcher can be determined through use of stats. I grew up walking to Anaheim Stadium watching Ryan and Tanana pitch for my miserable Halos, I get it. But when we say "effective," what effect are we discussing?

 

[coach james]

Correct. Basic math of batters faced vs. batters reaching base....

Mebbe I’m dense, but I don’t see how getting an opponent’s OBP for 1 game is a way to judge that team’s competitive “quality”. I’m a firm believer that small samples don’t necessarily make the numbers useless, but they do restrict how valuable they are. If a team plays 25 games, you should use the results of all 25 games, not just 1.

My answer was not perfect. However I thought the OP was asking for the quickest and easiest way to measure how effective a pitcher is in the simplest form.
If Sally pitches to 20 batters and only 2 of them reach base safely. The OBP for her outing would be .100....
Suzie pitches to 20 batters and 10 of them reach safely. Suzie's OBP is a lousy .500
Easy way to get "effectiveness" in its simplest form.

 

[Sweet Lou]

W/L is really all that matters, though, as your example shows. Best does not always equal effective. Of course, that sort of begs the question "What is an effective pitcher?" If wins are the currency we're dealing in, there can be no greater measure than W/L.

It is thinking like this that nearly kept Bert Blyleven out of the Hall of Fame and gave Yohan Santana's Cy young award to Bartolo Colon.

I'm a numbers guy, love playing with the stats, and I don't disagree that the best pitcher can be determined through use of stats. I grew up walking to Anaheim Stadium watching Ryan and Tanana pitch for my miserable Halos, I get it. But when we say "effective," what effect are we discussing?

Personally I believe W/L record is not a very good indication of how good or effective a pitcher is.

I used to park in front of some old ware house and walk across the railroad tracks to save money on parking for games at the Big A when I was in college.