More Fun with FIP
by Rodney on Oct 7, 2008 12:12 PM CDT
29 comments
Stolen from EG, over here.
As much as Millwood made me bang my head against the wall this season, he wasn't nearly as bad as it seemed on the surface:
Millwood's FIP this year: 4.07. That ranked 22nd among the 59 AL pitchers with at least 20 starts....consider this five-man rotation that finished with higher FIPs than Millwood: Boston's Daisuke Matsuzaka, 4.12 FIP (18-3, 2.90 ERA); Tampa Bay's Matt Garza, 4.21 FIP (11-9, 3.70 ERA) and Scott Kazmir, 4.44 FIP (12-8, 3.49 ERA); Los Angeles' Joe Saunders 4.44 FIP (17-7, 3.41 ERA) and John Lackey, 4.70 FIP (12-5, 3.75 ERA).
WWNRD? Evidently, he was pretty firm with demands for Milly:
Nolan Ryan asked him to drop 20 pounds for next season.
Conditioning again. <snips> That, friends, was another part of Ryan's talk with Millwood. They need him to pitch more innings in spring and be ready to go deeper in games as soon as the regular season starts.
And just to make your reach for the Rolaids:
...first basemen made 10 errors (fourth most in the AL) and ranked 12th of 14 teams in zone rating (.832)
...third basemen ranked fourth in the AL in errors at the position with 23. They ranked 13th of 14 in zone rating at .754.
That's just FUGLY!
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This is just dumb,
“There seems to be some public perception that Michael Young is a below-average defender. I’d argue what he lacks in range he basically makes up with in arm strength.”
It dosent matter how strong your arm is if you can’t get to the ball.
by Kinslerhomer on Oct 7, 2008 12:38 PM CDT reply actions 0 recs
but..but..but
derek jeter is a good defensive SS, he can do the jump throw from the hole and he runs into the crowd at crucial moments!!!
< / sarcasm>
"I don’t know of a single thing Obama’s done except talk and write." - Newt Gingrich
by knockoutking on Oct 7, 2008 12:44 PM CDT up reply actions 0 recs
The media and their attempted defense of Michael Young
Is getting pretty pathetic.
"M’s fans are such weenies." - Zywica
by lonestarJon on Oct 7, 2008 8:37 PM CDT up reply actions 0 recs
Millwood
Welcome to the party, I’ve been saying this for weeks now. He was not as good as he needs to be, but he was not as bad as his ERA makes it seem. His veteran and default-ace status and big contract make him an easy target. Give him a better defense and we’re talking about him being the one thing you can count on in the rotation as long as he ups the innings total.
In essentials, unity. In non-essentials, liberty. In all things, love.
by t ball on Oct 7, 2008 12:42 PM CDT reply actions 0 recs
Not just optimism talking
but I expect really solid seasons from Padilla and Millwood next year. Millwood has to hit that 180 innings for his option to vest, and Padilla will be in a walk year, so I could see both of them coming out and going 200 innings with a 4.50 ERA. Padilla is exactly the sort of pitcher who responds to a walk year, and Millwood is due for a bounceback statistically.
by clark on Oct 7, 2008 12:58 PM CDT up reply actions 0 recs
He is probably average, and our best starting pitcher this season
One major worry though is that he is a prime candidate for regressing performance: continued drop in FB velocity, greater reliance on the fastball, missing less and less bats. It does appear that he is throwing more strikes on the other hand. His performance this year can’t be blamed completely on the defense – his ground ball rate dropped from 46% in 2006 to 39% this season, and line drive rate shot up from 20.8% in 2006 to 25.6% this season (and no defense is really great against line drives). Not sure exactly what to make of these numbers, could be really bad luck in one sense (evident from high BABIP), but also could be diminishing stuff. His BABIP has increased every year from 2005 to 2008, so has his Line Drive %, and his fastball velocity has decreased every year from 2005-2008. I can’t say that this has any bit of cause-effect relationship, but there might be something to it.
Oh yeah, and I think most of the complaint is that he is just not worth 12 million a year any more. Of course, the 2006 Millwood was a bargain.
by Telegraph on Oct 7, 2008 2:40 PM CDT up reply actions 0 recs
Good take
I agree it’s probably a combination of decreasing ability and bad defense. Sadly he may need to be lucky in coming years to be close to league average if his stuff keeps declining.
In essentials, unity. In non-essentials, liberty. In all things, love.
by t ball on Oct 7, 2008 4:47 PM CDT up reply actions 0 recs
Nolan Ryan asked him to drop 20 pounds for next season
wowwwwww should be interesting to see how that goes
"I don’t know of a single thing Obama’s done except talk and write." - Newt Gingrich
by knockoutking on Oct 7, 2008 12:44 PM CDT reply actions 0 recs
So
If Millwood drops the 20 pounds like Nolan wants and then comes out and posts worse numbers than this year is that Nolans fault?
Bryan Smith (12:17:17 PM PT): Justin Smoak and Josh Hamilton. The AL West might just have found their Bash Brothers, v. 2.0.
by bigsteve on Oct 7, 2008 1:13 PM CDT up reply actions 0 recs
I dont buy it
I watched almost every start and stats or no he looked bad.
the preceding post was a great success.
by DSheppard on Oct 7, 2008 1:03 PM CDT reply actions 0 recs
yikes
was that tongue and cheek?
because that is every “real” journalists’ answer to statheads. might as well throw in a reference to slide rules.
""If they'd have told me you can make the team but you've got to shine the shoes, I'd have been there shining shoes." -Bradley
by ab03 on Oct 7, 2008 1:05 PM CDT up reply actions 0 recs
accept that i fully understand and use various saber stats
but they arn’t perfect, and I dont have to believe them all at face value.
the preceding post was a great success.
by DSheppard on Oct 7, 2008 1:11 PM CDT up reply actions 0 recs
Without a doubt
he looked pretty bad at times, but he was not nearly so bad as most think. He was quite lucky the year he won the ERA title, but has been among the unluckiest pitchers in the league 2 of his 3 years here. Not a coincidence that the Rangers have a porous defense, I think.
In essentials, unity. In non-essentials, liberty. In all things, love.
by t ball on Oct 7, 2008 1:13 PM CDT up reply actions 0 recs
Well I will believe he wasnt AS bad as his stats say
but when a stat is presented as saying millwood was over half a run better than lackey in true performance this year, it just gets an immediate reaction from me…
but god.. 220 hits in 168.1 innings. his whip was nearly 1.6….. and just the visual of 91 mph fastballs down the middle…
i have a hard time believing that his true level was a 4.07 era this season.
plus rate stats aside, the guy missed significant time this year which was part of the frustration.
that said its not like I want to cut him, he should still be able to be an innings eater next year at least.
the preceding post was a great success.
by DSheppard on Oct 7, 2008 1:24 PM CDT up reply actions 0 recs
too many hits, yes
Not you, but some here act like he is no better than Mendoza, and I think he’s a league average guy.
In essentials, unity. In non-essentials, liberty. In all things, love.
by t ball on Oct 7, 2008 2:00 PM CDT up reply actions 0 recs
well definitely on that one
mendoza had a 1.93 whip
wheres a laughing face icon when you need one.
the preceding post was a great success.
by DSheppard on Oct 7, 2008 2:24 PM CDT up reply actions 0 recs
FIP
Like you, I’m not a big believer in the value of that metric.
"So he tore it up in AA. Yippee. ...Max Ramirez be damned." - bigsteve
by tricer on Oct 7, 2008 2:24 PM CDT up reply actions 0 recs
Admittedly it's very imperfect
But it is still a decent tool for helping discern which pitchers have been lucky/unlucky.
How do you feel about tRA? I think it’s much better than FIP as it attempts to take pretty much everything into account. The more I learn about it, the more I dig it. I know you’re skeptical of stathead metrics, but I suggest you give it a look.
FWIW tRA has Millwood at slightly below average for this year, but still better than pretty much anything else we through out there.
The 40 Trumps All!!!
by thedirkatron on Oct 7, 2008 2:40 PM CDT up reply actions 0 recs
This is the one I use
Although I am not sure how MLB determines what exactly a “line drive” is, and whether it is done in a consistent fashion.
by Telegraph on Oct 7, 2008 2:44 PM CDT up reply actions 0 recs
stathead metrics
I look at them all the time, just FIP in particular doesn’t seem right to me.
Thanks for the tRA link, I’ll check it out.
"So he tore it up in AA. Yippee. ...Max Ramirez be damned." - bigsteve
by tricer on Oct 7, 2008 2:51 PM CDT up reply actions 0 recs
I don't think there is much doubt
that you can look at most of the pitchers, and deduct a half run or so, That some of the extreme cases, like Millwood, you could deduct a full run, isn’t surprising.
This team gave up almost a 1000 runs this year. The defense easily cost them 100 runs or so versus an average defense. I don’t think it will be terribly tough to make some trade offs to gain some of those 100 runs back, if the team can make some tough choices.
"Oh well, McCain is pretty communist anyway,... we can be 70% communist with McCain,"-Sharky
by DJCahill on Oct 7, 2008 1:41 PM CDT reply actions 0 recs
how accurate or telling of a pitchers performance is FIP?
"Tommy Hunter will be the best pitcher on the Rangers in 2009" Me- August 14th, 2008
To: Luis Mendoza "Please die in a fire." LSJ; PLEASE
by Seth. on Oct 7, 2008 3:08 PM CDT reply actions 0 recs
It's an estimate
based on a theory. It’s probably only +/- 0.2 accurate.
"Oh well, McCain is pretty communist anyway,... we can be 70% communist with McCain,"-Sharky
by DJCahill on Oct 7, 2008 3:14 PM CDT up reply actions 0 recs
It's an okay tool for weeding out some of the luck that goes into pitching.
Basically it takes the thing a pitcher has direct control over (Walks, K’s, and HR’s) and assigns you and ERA based off those three stats, the idea being that balls hit into play have as much to do with the fielders behind a pitcher as it does with the pitcher himself. Obviously there are some holes in that logic (some guys really are better at inducing groundballs and/or weak fb’s than other guys) but it’s a good way of weeding out some guys who are pitching way above their paygrade. Like, say, Edwin Jackson.
The 40 Trumps All!!!
by thedirkatron on Oct 7, 2008 3:34 PM CDT up reply actions 0 recs
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