A CITIZEN'S BLOG

Okay, the title is a little tongue-in-cheek, but it is partly true. Don’t look now Phillies fans but Adam Eaton, the disaster who had a 6.29 ERA last season, the guy who was pitching so bad that the Phillies left him off their playoff roster with the Colorado Rockies despite the fact that the Phillies are paying him $24 million dollars over the next three seasons … Isn’t pitching half bad this season.

Let’s take you back to a year ago. In the 2006-2007 off-season the Phillies signed Eaton, a former Phillies draft pick the team had sent west to the San Diego Padres in a trade years earlier, to a three-year, $24 million dollar deal (someone correct me if the numbers are off on that figure). In a pitching-thin marketplace, Eaton was one of the better talents out there, having gone 7-4 with a 5.12 ERA the previous season with the Texas Rangers. Eaton, who had spent the previous six seasons with the Padres after breaking in during the ’00 season, had started just thirteen games for the Rangers and had given up 11 home runs. He struggled, but had put up good numbers from ’00 – ’05 for the Padres and the Phillies desperately wanted to augment their leaky pitching staff. So the red pinstripes cut a check and Eaton came back to the team that saw enough in him to take him in the draft.

Confused about what I’m talking about? Here are the stats I refer to defined with respect to pitching stats:
Earned Run Average (ERA): Runs Allowed * 9 / Innings Pitched = What a pitcher would give up if they hurled a nine-inning game.
Fielding Independent Pitching (FIP): (((13 * HR) + (3 * BB) – (2 * K)) / IP) + League Factor. Basically a measure of how a pitcher would have done if he had an average defense behind him.
Defense Independent Pitching Statistic (DIPS): The more sophisticated version of FIP developed by Voros McCracken that takes into account park factors and other considerations.
Home Runs per 9 Innings (HR/9): (HR * 9) / IP
Walks per 9 Innings (BB/9): (BB * 9) / IP
Strikeouts per 9 Innings (K/9): (K * 9) / IP

The end result was disaster. A 10-10 record that was largely the product of run support, as it was built on an ERA of 6.29. Eaton walked 71 hitters (3.95 BB/9) and gave up 30 home runs (1.67 HR/9). Opponents grounded into 19 double plays against him, more a product of them having so many runners on base than Eaton’s skills. Eaton’s 97 strikeouts in 161 and two-thirds of an inning (5.4 K/9) were respectable, but when coupled with his walk rate, they gave him a strikeout-to-walk ratio of 1.37 (K/BB). Eaton was so bad that he earned just one Win Share in 2007, two below what a bench player would have earned. (In contrast, Cole Hamels earned 15 in 2007.) The Phillies, in the playoffs despite Eaton’s struggles, took no chances and left Eaton off the team’s playoff roster against the Rockies. In the off-season the team tried everything they could think of to scrap together pitching talent on the cheap, taking Travis Blackley from San Francisco in the Rule 5 Draft, and signing Chad Durbin from the Detroit Tigers. Neither Blackley nor Durbin could oust Eaton from the job, however, and Eaton returned to the Phillies rotation for 2008.

The numbers don’t really reflect it, but Eaton’s been pretty good this season: yeah he doesn’t have a win yet, but he also doesn’t have a loss. His six starts were all no-decisions. There are a few things that impress me though once you look inside of the numbers:

First off, Eaton’s average Game Score for this season has been 48. His average Game Score in 2007 was 42. Game Score is a stat devised by Bill James where a pitcher begins with a score of 50 and then is awarded or subtracted points for various events: add a point for a strikeout, subtract one for a walk, subtract four points for a run allowed, etc.

Second, four of Eaton’s six starts have been Quality Starts. A Quality Start is a start where the pitcher allows three or less runs and makes it six innings or more. Eaton tossed just 9 of those in 30 starts last season.

The reason for Eaton’s success this season has been that he’s cut down on the extra-base hits. Eaton’s slugging percentage allowed is just .402, far less than the .520 he allowed in 2007. So far this season he’s allowed three home runs in 34 and one-third of an inning (0.79 HR/9). As a result, Eaton’s Fielding Independent Pitching (FIP) ERA has dropped this season to 4.09, nearly two runs better than last season’s 5.93 FIP. Incidentially, Eaton’s 4.09 FIP is just behind the 4.00 FIP posted by a certain Mets pitcher who we’ll call Johan S. … And Eaton's FIP is better than the Mets John Maine (4.71), the much-vaunted pitcher who Mets fans acted like I was crazy for believing wasn't the Second Coming.

What about DIPS, you ask? Well, Eaton's DIPS is a little worse: 4.35. Still, that's better than his real ERA and takes park factors into account. Additionally, Eaton's DIPS is better than Oliver Perez (4.38), Maine (4.86), Jamie Moyer (4.82) and the Giants Matt Cain (4.63).

It is a little too soon to hand out the Cy Young award to Eaton, however. He needs to improve his strikeout and walk ratios before he can be called out of the woods. His K/BB ratio this season is 1.46, barely improved over last season.

The inability to get strikeouts is where Eaton has struggled over the last few seasons. In Eaton’s first six seasons with the Padres his strikeouts per nine innings rate was 6.00 or better:

K/9:
2000: 6.00
2001: 8.41
2002: 6.75
2003: 7.18
2004: 6.91
2005: 7.00

Since then he’s been sub-6.00:

K/9:
2006 (Rangers): 5.95
2007 (Phillies): 5.40
2008 (Phillies): 5.34

He needs to improve that, and soon.

Here’s a little-known fact about Adam Eaton: there probably isn’t a pitcher in baseball tougher to get a steal off of. In 2007 fifteen baserunners tried to steal a base off Eaton. Nine failed, a success rate of just 40%. The previous season, in Texas, two in seven were successful. So far this season: one successful steal in three tries.

I had almost forgotten, but the Phillies begin a big four-game series with the Arizona Diamondbacks tonight in the desert of Arizona, the start of a week-long roadtrip that will take the Phillies to the Bay Area to play the Giants again. Cole Hamels and Tim Lincecum are set to rematch Friday Night after last night’s 6-5 Phillies win netted a no-decision for both pitchers.

I would consider a 2-2 split of the Phillies – Diamondbacks series to be a major victory for the Phillies. The 21-10 D-Backs are clearly the best team in baseball right now and boast the best pitching staff in the majors. How good is the D-Backs 1-2 punch of Brandon Webb (7-0, 2.49 ERA, 3.00 DIPS) and Dan Haren (4-1, 3.12 ERA, 3.34 DIPS)? Fortunately for the Phillies, they miss Haren and have to face just Webb in this series. Adam Eaton squares off with the Big Unit (1-1, 4.79 ERA, 3.84 DIPS) tomorrow night. The D-Backs are second in the N.L. in runs scored and lead the N.L. in slugging percentage and triples. Not surprisingly, their team ERA is also best in the majors. They have a number of talented players who are really producing well and they rely on no one person to be successful. While the D-Backs have hit 36 home runs, nobody has hit more than 7. They are balanced and deep. Young, fast, aggressive, the D-Backs are built to be a powerhouse for a long time to come. This will be a tough series for the Phillies to win. If I had to bet on which game the phillies could win, I’d bet on tonight’s Jamie Moyer vs. Max Scherzer matchup.

Tomorrow: I’ll talk a little about last night’s game and a little about the Reading Phillies Jeremy Slayden.

Labels: Blackley, Durbin, Eaton, Hamels, Moyer, Pitching, Rotation

If you ever wanted a nice illustration as to what Jimmy Rollins means to the Phillies, then look no further than last night's cringe-inducing 8-2 loss to the Mets to see. Rollins, scratched from the lineup after an injury on Tuesday night, was replaced by Eric Bruntlett, a player thrown in as balance in the Brad Lidge deal. Bruntlett promptly made not one but two costly errors in the third innings, helping the Mets score six runs and effectively ending the game for the Phillies. A couple of thoughts (today is a brief post):

-Remember how concerned people were about Adam Eaton's abilities in the #5 slot of the rotation? Maybe Kyle Kendrick is cause for more concern. Check out the line on Kendrick's performance thus far this season:

vs. Mets: 2.1 IP / 7 Runs / 1 Earned Run / 4 Hits / 6 Walks / 0 Strikeouts
vs. Reds: 5.0 IP / 4 Runs / 4 Earned Runs / 8 Hits / 2 Walks / 1 Strikeout

If you are keeping tally at home, that means that Kendrick has allowed eight walks in seven and one-thirds of an inning and has just one strikeout to show for it. To be fair to Kendrick, just one of the seven runs were earned as the Mets big 6-run inning was largely a product of Bruntlett's defensive miscues, but his struggles on top of a shaky spring and the fact that he needed so much defensive help to get to his 10-4 record last season leaves me feeling pessimistic about Kendrick's chances.

Unless Kendrick can start getting some strikeouts he is going to continue to struggle and his days as a starter are numbered.

-Chad Durbin tossed three and two-thirds nice innings in relief, not allowing any runs and giving up just a single walk while striking four Mets out. He makes a compelling case to take Kendrick's spot.

-If Jimmy Rollins is out for a while and the Phillies lost confidence in Bruntlett's abilities, what will the team do? One rumor I heard was that they'll bring shortstop Freddy Galvis in from Single-A Lakewood to play short, something that I can hardly believe. Galvis might be a defensive standout, but that would be a shocker to see happen. A more definite possibility would be bringing Jason Donald, currently playing at Double-A Reading, into the fold.

-What in the heck is up with the Phillies fielding? In nine games they've made 13 errors. Chase Utley has made three, a fact that shocks me.

Tomorrow, I'll give my thoughts on tonight's Adam Eaton - John Maine duel and I'll turn my eye towards the Cubbies.

Labels: Bruntlett, Durbin, Fielding, Kenderick, Mets, Pitching, Rollins, Rotation, Utley

And so the Mets (2-3) and Phillies (3-4) finally get to square off, in a series that has seen a lot of hype and anticipation developing around it over the last six months. Jayson Stark wrote in the pre-season about the emerging Phillies – Mets rivalry, challenging fans “to find two teams in the N.L. that are more closely matched – and more obsessed with each other – than these two.” The genesis for the immediate bad blood in this rivalry stretches back to the 2006-2007 off-season when Jimmy Rollins boldly predicted that the Phillies were the team to beat in the N.L. East (“I think we are the team to beat – finally.”), a claim roundly rejected by the Mets, the defending N.L. East champs, and most of the New York-focused media. The rivalry largely simmered during the regular season as the Mets got off to a lead and held it over the Phillies and Braves.

Let’s rewind to September 12, 2007. The Phillies had just gotten battered by the Colorado Rockies 12-0 at Citizens Bank Ballpark. Kyle Kendrick had gotten hammered badly. Meanwhile, the Mets had squeezed out a 4-3 win over the Atlanta Braves in Queens. The Mets record stood at 83-62, seven games (7.0) better than the 76-69 Phillies with a mere seventeen games left. The Mets second consecutive division title seemed assured. They would be playing October baseball for sure and seemed a likely pick to make it to the World Series against the Red Sox.

That’s when everything changed. The next night the Phillies beat the Rockies 12-4. That weekend (September 14-16) the Mets and Phillies squared off for the final time that season. The Phillies rallied to win the first two games 3-2 and 5-3, then broke open a 5-5 tie to win Sunday’s game 10-6. It was the third series the Phillies had swept the Mets in during the season out of the five they played. It ran the Phillies record over the Mets to 12-5. The Mets lead had been cut in half, from seven games to three and a half.

The Mets continued to struggle, losing two in a row to the Nationals before taking four of their next five games. The Mets 7-6 win over the Florida Marlins on Sunday, September 23rd, seemed to righten the Mets ship. They still held a two and a half game lead over the Phillies. The Phillies had also been playing terrific baseball during this time, winning five of six against the Cardinals and Nationals only to drop two in a row. The last week was dramatic and exceptional, some of the best baseball played in a long, long time.

After dropping a 10-6 loss to the Atlanta Braves on Tuesday (the Mets had gotten clobbered 13-4 by the Nationals the previous day when the Phillies were idle, cutting the Mets lead to a mere two games), the Phillies beat the Braves 5-2 and 6-4. Meanwhile the Mets were spiraling out of control: they lost to the Nationals 10-9 on Tuesday, then 9-6 the next day. The Mets 3-0 loss to the Cardinals on Thursday meant that the Mets and Phillies had identical records at 87-72. Friday night the Phillies beat the Nationals 6-0 before 45,084 roaring fans at Citizens Bank Ballpark while the Marlins defeated the Mets 7-4 in front of 55,298 stunned New Yorkers in Queens. The Phillies had won twelve of their previous fifteen games while the Mets had dropped eleven of fifteen. Mustering all of their strength, the Mets beat the Marlins 13-0 while the Phillies lost to the Nationals 4-2. The teams were tied 88-73. If both teams lost or if both teams won on Sunday there would be a one-game playoff.

That never happened: Tom Glavine took the mound on Sunday and promptly surrendered seven runs in the first inning on the way to a 8-1 loss to the Marlins, their twelfth loss in seventeen games. The Phillies, meanwhile, jumped out to a 3-0 lead over the Nationals on their way to a 6-1 win. It was the Phillies thirteenth win in seventeen games.

The off-season simmered once more until the Mets jumped into the Johan Santana derby and beat out the Red Sox and Yankees. Buoyed with their acquisition of Santana, the Mets suddenly felt emboldened to talk trash, leading Carlos Beltran to declare: “This year, tell Jimmy Rollins WE’RE the team to beat.”

Tonight the rivalry is renewed.

The interesting thing about this series is how the Mets and Phillies aren't putting the strongest pieces they have on the board forward. Johan Santana and Pedro Martinez won't take the mound for the Mets, Santana having pitched (and lost) Sunday, while Pedro is on the D.L. Cole Hamels and Brett Myers hurled the Phillies last two games, so both teams are going with the back ends of their rotations. As I noted above, the Phillies and Mets enter this series with losing records.

Not exactly the makings of Yankees - Red Sox, Part II.

The Mets and Phillies are sending nearly the same teams to the field tonight that met last season. The Phillies have upgraded themselves at third base, adding Pedro Feliz to replace the light-to-no hitting Wes Helms and Abraham Nunez, and ably replaced Aaron Rowand with the Jayson Werth / Geoff Jenkins platoon. There is no reason to believe that the Phillies can't equal the 892 runs they scored in 2007 this season, or even exceed it.

The Mets, meanwhile, bring David Wright, Carlos Beltran, Carlos Delgado back along with Jose Reyes. Aside from Moises Alou, on the D.L. and replaced in the Mets lineup with ex-Phillie Endy Chavez, the Mets send substantially the same unit to the field that played last season - although the Mets did upgrade at catcher by acquiring Brian Schneider over Paul Lo Duca in what was basically a swap of catchers with the Nationals. The key to the Mets offense is the play of Jose Reyes, who might have won the 2007 N.L. MVP award had the Mets held on and won the N.L. East. In 2007 Reyes stole 78 bases, hit 12 triples and 12 home runs, scored 119 runs and had an .359 OBP. Reyes struggles down the stretch helped sink the Mets and probably elevated the candidacy of Phillies shortstop Jimmy Rollins, who shined while opposite number Reyes sank.

This season Reyes is off to a shaky start, hitting just .238 (.261 OBP) in five games (5-for-21) with a .283 slugging percentage (compared with a robust .421 last season). Reyes also is 0-for-1 in stolen bases. If Reyes isn't threatening the opposition the Mets offense loses its biggest gun and suddenly looks a whole lot more ordinary.

The Santana Issue. I might as well stop for a moment and talk about Johan Santana. I've gotten assailed by Mets fans more times than I can count on this score, but ... The acquisition of Santana improves the Mets, perhaps makes them 2-4 games better, but it isn't the smashing blow to the hopes of the rest of the N.L. that the Mets fans seem to think it is. Santana is a great pitcher, but great pitchers can lose 2-1 pitchers duels, and he only takes the mound once every four-to-five games. Baseball teams win, not individuals. This is what makes baseball a better sport than, say, the NBA. One man can propel an NBA team to a 25-30 game improvement, whereas baseball teams cannot rely on the impact of one player. I'll play the A-Rod card: A-Rod leaves Seattle before the '01 season and they improve by 26 games over their previous season's performance.

Comparisons: Based on last year's performances, here are now the Phillies and Mets stack up. Offensively, the Phillies have the clear edge here. They led the N.L. with 892 runs in 2007, whereas the Mets were fourth with 804 runs. The Mets did steal 200 bases last season - best in the N.L. - to the Phillies 138, but the Phillies were caught 19 times to the Mets 46. On-Base-Percentage? The Phillies led the N.L. with a .354 OBP to the Mets .342. The Phillies also led the Mets in home runs (213 to 177), doubles (326 to 294) and triples (41 to 27). The Phillies were also second in the N.L. in home runs and first in triples. Mets did hit better with runners in scoring position: .276 vs. .259 BA/RISP.

In terms of Pitching, the Mets have the clear edge. The Mets 4.26 team ERA was better than the Phillies 4.73 and they tossed twice as many shutouts as the Phillies: ten to five. The Mets also allowed fewer home runs (206 to 165) and got more strikeouts (1,134 to 1,050).

Fielding, the Mets have the edge once more, posting a superior Defense Efficiency Ratio (DER): .702 vs. .687, although the Mets had a higher Unearned Run Average (UERA): 0.39 vs. 0.33.

What is going to be the key to this series? I have a few.

Can the back end of the Mets rotation beat the Phillies? In particular, the Mets want to see a good game from #3 starter (now likely #2 starter) John Maine on Thursday night against Adam Eaton.

Will the Phillies usual Mets-killers make their appearance? Pat Burrell, who has three home runs and nine RBI in the Phillies first seven games, has a lifetime .921 OPS against the Mets with 41 home runs and 102 RBI in 134 games. If Burrell has a big series, then the Phillies will take at least two of the three games.

Putup or Shutup. Jimmy Rollins vs. Carlos Beltran. Last year J.Roll talked big but backed it up with an MVP performance. Can Beltran do the same after calling Rollins out in spring training? Last year J.Roll had a 1.057 OPS against the Mets with six home runs, 15 runs scored and 15 RBI, four doubles, two triples and eight steals in nine tries in 18 games with the Mets. If the Mets are going to beat the Phillies, Carlos Beltran needs to step up and be a leader and do something like that.

Ghosts of '07. Jose Reyes needs to shake his struggles down the stretch last season out of his head and play some baseball. More than any other player, the Mets need big things from him to beat the Phillies.

Today at 1PM, Jamie Moyer vs. Perez. Mets vs. Phillies. Battle of Armageddon, Take One.

Labels: Burrell, Eaton, Mets, Moyer, Pitching, Rollins, Rotation

Labels: Bullpen, Gordon, Hamels, Kenderick, Moyer, Myers, Pitching, Rotation

Enough with the Phillies offense. Let’s move along to the Phillies pitchers. Before I start talking any jargon, here are the stats, defined: Earned Run Average (ERA): Earned Runs (ER) Allowed * 9 / Innings Pitched (IP) = What a pitcher would give up if they hurled a nine-inning game. Fielding Independent Pitching (FIP): (((13 * HR) + (3 * BB) – (2 * K)) / IP) + League Factor. Basically a measure of how a pitcher would have done if he had an average defense behind him. A stat related to this is DER, or Defense Efficiency Ratio. That’s basically how often fielders converted balls put into play by the pitcher into outs. I might also talk about Defense Independent Pitching Statistic (DIPS): The more sophisticated version of FIP developed by Voros McCracken that takes into account park factors and other considerations. DIPS is the stat that revolutionized our understanding of pitching when it came out less than a decade ago. Basically DIPS stands for the proposition that pitchers cannot control the outcomes of balls they allow to be put into play, and thus, ought to be judged in a neutral manner. Finally, Home Runs per 9 Innings (HR/9): (HR * 9) / IP; Walks per 9 Innings (BB/9): (BB * 9) / IP; and Strikeouts per 9 Innings (K/9): (K * 9) / IP … Enough numbers. Back to the Phillies … The Phillies didn’t exactly light the world on fire with their pitching in 2007. The team threw just five shutouts, tied with the Pirates for second-fewest in the N.L … The worst: the Marlins with four. The best: the Padres with a whopping 20 … As a team the Phillies had an ERA of 4.73, much worse than the 4.43 league average. The Phillies FIP was slightly worse than that: 4.76, which ranks fifteenth in the N.L., worse than everyone save the Washington Nationals. The Phillies struck out 16% of the batters they faced, a little off the N.L. average of 17%, and they allowed 10% of those hitters to walk, again, a little off the N.L. average of 9%. The .451 slugging percentage the Phillies pitchers allowed was also worse than the N.L. average of .424 … I suppose that I ought to drop a few words here about the effect Citizens Bank Ballpark has on the Phillies and their pitching. A few years ago, when Citizens Bank opened, I argued pretty vigorously that it wasn’t a hitters park. After four years of data to look at, I am prepared to pretty much drop that argument. Citizens Bank’s Park Factor … hold on, a definition is in order here: “Park Factor” means you take the difference between what a team and its opponents do at home and what they do on the road, divide it and arrive at a number. 100 is neutral. Over 100 favors hitters. Under 100 favors pitchers … for 2007 was 103 for runs scored (3% easier to score a run), 145 for Home Runs (45% easier to hit a home run), and 101 for Batting Average (1% easier to get a hit). Citizens seems to compress hitting doubles (93) and triples (88). Interestingly, it might actually help pitchers in terms of generating strikeouts – 103 Park Factor – and compressing walks – 94 Park Factor – both generally things that we examine when we look at the quality of pitching. Generally speaking, however, the consensus is that a pitcher is going to have a harder go of it at Citizens than at any other ballpark in the N.L., with the possible exceptions of Great American Ballpark in Cincinnati, Coors Field in Denver, and Chase Field in Phoenix because of those home runs … And indeed, allowing those massive home runs has been a problem for the Phillies over the last several years. When the team brought groundball pitcher extraordinaire Jon Lieber to the team in ’05, I thought the move was a savvy one. And then Lieber gave up 33 home runs that first season with the Phillies. Last year the Phillies allowed 1.22 home runs per nine innings (HR/9). The N.L. Average was 1.04. Getting pitchers who can take care of business is a tricky business for the Phillies and something that the team is still trying to figure out. If the Rockies unlocked the mystery of Coors Field, however, than surely so can the Phillies.

So what is the Phillies pitching staff going to look like in 2008? Here are the probable starters and relievers:

Pitching Staff:
SP – Cole Hamels
SP – Brett Myers
SP – Jamie Moyer
SP – Kyle Kendrick
SP – Adam Eaton
RP – Chad Durbin
RP – Clay Condrey
RP – Ryan Madson
RP – J.C. Romero
RP – Tom Gordon
RP – Brad Lidge

Let’s begin with the guys that take the mound at the start of a game. The Phillies starters struggled in 2007, despite a revamped rotation that featured high-priced talent like former White Sox hurler Freddy Garcia and former Padre (and former Phillies draft pick) Adam Eaton. Injuries soon forced Brett Myers, the team’s Opening Day starter to the bullpen as the new closer, while Garcia struggled before going on the Disabled List. Suddenly the Phillies deep rotation looked thin as the team was forced to bring Double-A pitcher Kyle Kendrick to the show to fill the gap in the summer last year when Jon Lieber joined Garcia on the Disabled List. The team that began the season with six starters was suddenly down to three. The patchwork rotation did seem to work as the season progressed. Still, statistically, the Phillies starters posted some terrible numbers. As a team the Phillies tied for eleventh in the N.L. in Quality Starts in ’07 … a Quality Start is a start where the Phillies pitcher goes at least six innings and allow three or fewer runs … The Phillies had 74 of those in 2007. Just three teams had fewer: the Cardinals (70), the Nationals (60), and the Marlins (49). The Phillies starters rank twelfth in the N.L. in ERA and OBP-allowed and in terms of slugging percentage allowed, they ranked fifteenth. Phillies pitchers did rank first in the N.L. in run support at 6.05, which helps to explain why the team won games despite their pitchers struggling so much. Whereas the San Diego Padres were accustomed to winning 2-1 games, the Phillies were usually locked in 7-5 shoot-outs.

The 2008 Phillies starting rotation is set with Cole Hamels and Myers occupying the #1 and #2 slots, followed closely by Jamie Moyer, Kendrick and Eaton at # 3, 4 & 5 respectively. Let’s start with Hamels … The Phillies are fortunate to have Cole Hamels, their star, their ace pitcher, who takes the mound tonight against the Nationals. Since he joined the Phillies staff in May of 2006, after a whirlwind sprint through the Phillies minor league system, Hamels has been a critical part of the team’s success. After going 9-8 with a 4.08 ERA that year, Hamels put everything together in his sophomore season and went 15-5 with a 3.39 ERA in 2007. Had Hamels not been injured and missed five or six starts, he might have figured more prominently in the Cy Young Award voting (though Jake Peavy and Brandon Webb were the clear #1 and #2 for the award last season). Hamels steadying pitching meant everything to the Phillies last season. His fifteen strikeout performance against the Reds on April 21 was not only tied for the second-best pitching performance in the N.L. in 2007 – utilizing Bill James Game Score pitching stat, which awards and detracts points for certain events – but it was a vital game in that it helped snap the Phillies out of their 4-11 start and help get them started on making up ground on the Mets. Overall, Hamels struck-out 23.8% of the batter he faced and finished third in the N.L. in terms of strikeouts per nine innings with 8.69. Not impressed yet? Don’t think Hamels will factor in the N.L. Cy Young award voting now that the mighty Johan Santana is here to grapple with defending champ Jake Peavy? Check this out: Hamels 4.12 strikeout-to-walk (K/BB) ration was better than Cy Young award winner Peavy’s 3.53 … And contrary to the image of Hamels as a fire-baller who just goes to the mound hurling 95 mph heat, Hamels threw the second-highest percentage of sliders in the N.L. last season: 34.5% … Batters hit just .200 with runners in scoring position against Hamels, second-best in the N.L. after the Braves John Smoltz. Hamels is dominating and will be an integral part of the Phillies rotation until at least 2010, or longer if the Phillies can sign him to a long-term deal … You have to admire the work Brett Myers did last season with the Phillies. The team’s Opening Day starter last season and this season, Myers said nary a peep when he was yanked from the rotation and sent to the bullpen to bolster the team’s closer situation when Tom Gordon faltered. Myers put up good numbers in the bullpen, saving 21 of 24 games for the Phillies and striking out 83 batters in just 68 and two-thirds innings of work … I thought it was kind of interesting to compare the performance Myers did with the Phillies last year with what Smoltz did with the Atlanta Braves from ’01 – ’04, when he moved from the Braves rotation to become their lights out closer (saving 154 of 168 games for the Braves). No longer having to pace himself, Smoltz fired the fastballs by hitters in the eighth and ninth innings during those years. Similarly, Myers turned up the strikeout quotient from 8.69 K/9 in ’05 to 8.59 K/9 in ’06 to 10.88 last season … Myers was an excellent starter for the Phillies in’05 (13-8, 3.72 ERA) and ’06 (12-7, 3.91 ERA), and he should return to that form in 2008. As you can see, his strikeout rates were consistently high both of those seasons, and his walk rate was a modest 2.84 and 2.86 in ’05 and ’06. The only flaw Myers has as a pitcher is the surprisingly high number of home runs he surrendered in those two seasons: 60. This is surprising to me because Myers tends to get many, many more groundballs than flyballs when balls are put into play. Amongst the Phillies pitchers he was very prone towards grounders:

2007 G/F ratio:
Geoff Geary: 1.57
Kyle Kendrick: 1.55
Jon Lieber: 1.52
Brett Myers: 1.32
Cole Hamels: 1.13
Jamie Moyer: 1.08
Adam Eaton: 1.06
Kyle Lohse: 0.95

I tend to think pitchers like Myers or ex-Phillie Jon Lieber possess the tools to be a successful pitcher for the team because groundball pitchers don’t allow home runs and give their defenses the ability to make outs. At Citizens Bank Ballpark these skills are musts … There is a lot of diversity in the baseball world, however, and I admit that the numbers don’t sway you one way or the other. Brandon Webb, who pitches in the offense-friendly confines of Chase Field (111 Home Run and Run Factor in 2007), had a groundball/flyball ratio of 3.34 in 2007, which was basically the largest ratio of any pitcher in baseball. Webb is a pretty good pitcher: second in the Cy Young Voting and a previous winner of the award. Jake Peavy has a G/F ratio of just 1.24. Then there is this really good pitcher named Johan Santana. Last season Johan Santana’s G/F was 0.92. So there is a lot of diversity in the pitching world and there is no one way to be effective … Back to Myers. I really think that Myers will pull out all of the stops and will turn in a stunning performance this season, rivaling that of Hamels. The two are a terrific one-two punch. If I had to guess what each will do this season …

Hamels: 17-9, 3.75 ERA
Myers: 16-8, 3.85 ERA

But the Phillies rotation consists of more than Hamels, Myers and hoping for an off-day. Right after them is this guy named Moyer … It’s hard not to love what Jamie Moyer does. This will be his twenty-second season in the major leagues in a career that began with the Chicago Cubs in 1986 (I was nine years old and still in elementary school) and has seen him face 15,102 batters, win 230 games, and strikeout 2,125 hitters. At age 45 Moyer is beginning what might actually be his final season in the big leagues (it is the final season in a two-year deal he signed with the Phillies after he was dealt to the team from the Seattle Mariners in 2006) as he searches for that elusive World Series ring. Moyer has lasted so long in the majors because of his pitching style: he is a soft-tossing lefty like the Boston / Milwaukee Braves Warren Spahn, or the Atlanta Braves Tom Glavine. I think a few numbers will nicely illustrate what kind of a pitcher Moyer is: last season his fastball averaged 81.1 miles per hour, which made his the slowest in the National League. Moyer threw his fastball just 37.1% of the time, the lowest percentage of fastballs of any N.L. pitcher. Moyer’s favored pitch was the changeup, which he threw 28.2% of the time, the third-highest percentage of any N.L. pitcher. Crafty 'ol Jamie Moyer … Overall, Moyer’s results weren’t great in 2007. He posted a winning record at 14-12, but his ERA was 5.01. He allowed 30 home runs, or 1.35 HR/9, and the slugging percentage against him was a whopping .483 … Moyer increased his strikeout rate last season to 133 in 199 and one-thirds innings (6.0 K/9), which was a substantial jump over what he did in his final full season with the Seattle Mariners in 2005 (4.59 K/9). Moyer’s near 2-to-1 strikeout to walk ratio (2.01 K/BB in 2007) is a consistent trend of his throughout his career (1.86 in ’06 with the Mariners, and 1.96 in ’05) … Consistency is a nice theme when writing about Moyer. His 18 Quality Starts lead the Phillies and was roughly the same percentage of Quality Starts per start as Cole Hamels: 55% to 57% … The Bill James Handbook projects Moyer to go 11-10 with a 4.31 ERA in 2008. I think that’s about right. The Phillies have Moyer on the roster to provide veteran leadership and playoff experience (Moyer pitched well in the Phillies Game 3 loss to the Rockies in the NLDS last season), and to eat up 180-200 innings … Kyle Kendrick, victim of Brett Myers hilarious practical joke in the preseason, is set as the Phillies #4 starter, quite a jump for a guy who was in Double-A this time last season and probably didn’t expect to make it to Philadelphia until 2009. Kendrick’s career began a little early when injuries in the rotation forced him to Philly. Once here Kendrick made the most of his opportunity, going 10-4 with a 3.87 ERA. With 13 Quality Starts in 20 Starts, his 65% QS percentage was substantially better than Cole Hamels or Jamie Moyer last season. Bravo … But beneath the exterior or Kendrick’s success are some problems. Kendrick allowed a lot of balls to be put into play in 2007. Of the 499 batters he faced last year, he allowed 409 to put the ball into play. Kendrick struck-out an absurdly low percentage of batters: 49 in 121 innings, or 3.64 K/9. To his credit he didn’t walk many either: 1.85 BB/9. The key to Kendrick’s success was that Phillies fielders did a nice job converting those balls put into play into outs: they posted a .719 DER behind Kendrick, a groundball oriented pitcher. Thankfully for Kyle, he’s got a Gold Glove winner at shortstop and a future Gold Glove winner over at second base. What if the Phillies fielders don’t do that for Kendrick next season? Pitchers who rely on fielders rather than getting strike-outs tend to be very inconsistent and often get hammered. Their numbers yo-yo from season to season because the fluctuations in the quality of their defense, not their own abilities, decide the numbers. In Kendrick’s case he was also the product of excellent run support: a whopping 7.74 per nine innings pitched. That support helped Kendrick to tie for fourth in the National League in “Cheap Wins” (Bill James stat) with four. While Kendrick’s ERA was a solid 3.87, his Fielding Independent Pitching (FIP) ERA was a more robust – and Adam Eaton-like – 4.90. DIPS, a stat I trust a little more because it takes into account Park Factors, pegged Kendrick’s “real” ERA at 4.85, which was worse than what Jamie Moyer did (4.73) and much worse than Cole Hamels (3.63). My sense is that Kendrick will pitch nowhere near as well as he did last season and his ERA will hover in the 4.50 – 4.70 range. Kendrick has already struggled in the preseason, allowing 14 runs in seven and two-thirds of an inning of work (16.43 ERA). The Bill James Handbook declined to issue predictions for Kendrick based on one season of data, but I’ll make my own: 8-10, with a 4.65 ERA in 2008 … How bad was Adam Eaton in 2007? I think the raw stats alone tell the story: 10-10, 6.29 ERA, .520 slugging percentage against, 71 walks and 30 home runs allowed in 161 and two-third innings pitched (3.95 BB/9, 1.67 HR/9). His 10-10 record, which looks pretty decent - and, incidentally, Bill James credits Eaton with five of those ten wins as “Cheap Wins” - is a nice illustration why wins and losses are largely irrelevant when judging a pitcher’s abilities. Eaton got a lot of run support – 5.62 runs per nine innings pitched – and he survived that way. Eaton did pitch roughly as badly as his ERA indicates. His FIP ERA was 5.93 and his DIPS ERA was 5.69. Eaton’s problem was not like Kendrick’s in that he relies too much on his fielders – the team’s .691 DER was pretty average – but that he allowed far too many home runs and walks last year. Given that he only threw 65 innings with the Texas Rangers in 2006, I wonder if the Phillies knew what they were getting when they acquired Eaton in 2007. I think the team focused too much on Eaton’s strong 11-5, 4.27 ERA performance as a member of the San Diego Padres in ’05, failing to take into account the “Petco Park” factor … The Bill James Handbook pegs Eaton’s performance at 8-10 with a 4.89 ERA in 2008, which I think is a reasonable projection … In the event that Eaton or Kendrick struggle and the Phillies find a need to fill the gap, they will most likely turn their attention towards Chad Durbin, the former Detroit Tigers player, who is slated to begin the season in the bullpen, but seems likely to join the rotation at some juncture of the season. Durbin pitched in 36 games for the Tigers last season, starting 19 of them. Durbin’s record was a so-so 8-7 with a 4.72 ERA. Durbin failed to pry away the #5 starting job from Adam Eaton in spring training – partly because the Phillies have $21 million dollars invested in Eaton over the 2007-2009 seasons – but the job might still be his. Durbin threw 127 innings with the Tigers in 2007 and will need to improve on some areas of his game to be a viable starter in the National League. Durbin’s K/BB ratio was a less than stellar 1.35. He allowed far too many walks – 3.45 BB/9 – to be a successful pitcher. Durbin also allowed a fair number of home runs (1.48 HR/9) at Comerica Park (which had a Home Run Factor of 114 in 2007), which makes me wonder how many dingers Durbin will give up in 2008 … Durbin’s high 4.72 ERA masks a worse FIP ERA of 5.73 and a DIPS ERA of 5.48. The reason why Durbin’s ERA was “just” 4.72 last season was because the White Sox played terrific defense behind him, converting .731 of the balls he allowed to be put into play to become outs. The Bill James Handbook gives a pessimistic 4-6, 5.00 ERA assessment of Durbin might be right on the money … Moving deeper into the bullpen … I feel like I ought to cover the bullpen as a separate topic from the starting pitching because the two have very different roles. The starter typically needs to get those 6 or 7 innings in, keep the Phillies in the lead, then turn over the game in the eighth inning to the bullpen so they can clamp down on the opposition for the final two innings. That concentration on preserving leads and focusing narrowly on just an inning or two is very, very different from the mentality of the starter, who needs to pace himself and survive more challenges. The Phillies bullpen, I might add, was a major reason why the Phillies made the playoffs in 2007 … Check out the relief corps ERA and Innings Pitching in September of last year:

Innings Pitched / ERA
Romero: 15.2 / 0.00
Geary: 17.0 / 2.65
Myers: 18 / 3.00
Condrey: 12.1 / 3.65
Gordon: 16 / 3.94

Yes, you read that correctly. In fifteen and two-thirds of an innings pitched, J.C. Romero didn’t allow a single run. Zip. Zero. Zilch. Nada. Romero, Geary, Myers, Condrey and Gordon threw a combined 78 innings, or 30% of the Phillies September innings. While Jimmy Rollins was winning the MVP award, the bullpen was quietly winning the Phillies their first playoff berth in fourteen years … The Phillies primary set up options are going to be Condrey, Romero, Ryan Madson and Tom Gordon. Let’s talk about them next … Ryan Madson has been with the Phillies since he caught the eye of Phillies bloggers with his exceptional performance out of the bullpen in 2004: 9-3, 2.34 ERA. The nine Win Shares he had during his rookie season remains a career high. After that season Madson has had a somewhat uneven career with the Phillies. He struggled a little more in 2005, as his ERA rose to 4.14, as did the number of home runs allowed (0.70 in ’04 to 1.14 in ’05). However he was still a solid pitcher and his strikeout-to-walk ratio (K/BB) went from 2.89 in ’04 to 3.16 in ’05. The Phillies elected to give Madson a chance to become a starter in 2006, but he flopped in the role. He started 17 games and finished the season with an ERA of 5.69. His home runs spiked (1.34 HR/9), the slugging percentage allowed jumped nearly ninety points to .516, and his K/BB ration dropped below 2.00 to just 1.98. Back in the bullpen, Madson was largely back to his ’04 form, going 2-2 with a 3.05 ERA. His Home Runs allowed went from 1.34 to 0.80. Madson’s K/BB ration dropped (1.87), but he still clearly pitched better in his role in the bullpen … J.C. Romero, a cast-off from the Red Sox last season, was a startlingly welcome addition to the Phillies bullpen down the stretch. In 51 games with the Phillies Romero went 1-2 with a 1.24 ERA. But just those numbers don’t even come close to giving you the full story about Romero’s extraordinary season with the Phillies in 2007. Romero faced 143 batters in a Phillies uniform and threw 597 pitches. In that time he allowed just one home run (0.25 HR/9) and a .191 slugging percentage against. Romero is one of those pitchers who throws a lot of pitches because he doesn’t want to give a batter a chance to hit anything at all. Consider this: Romero threw 4.17 pitches per batter. How does that compare with some of the rest of the Phillies?:

Pitches / Batters Faced:
Romero: 4.2
Myers: 4.1
Hamels: 3.8
Gordon: 3.8
Madson: 3.7
Eaton: 3.7
Moyer: 3.6
Kendrick: 3.5

The consequence is that of the 143 batters Romero faced, he walked 25 (19%) and struck-out 31 (22%). To give you comparison, remember that 9% of batters in the N.L. walked and 17% struck-out last season. Romero is an opposite extreme to Kendrick. Just 61% of the batters he faced put the ball into play. That is pretty remarkable. Here is another remarkable fact: of the 87 batters who put balls into play against Romero, 64% of those were groundballs. The N.L. average for groundballs is 43% … Do I expect Romero to repeat a lot of those stats again in 2007? His 0.00 September ERA is an impossibility. While he did generally pitch well in 2007, Romero’s FIP ERA was 3.98, nearly three runs (specifically, 2.75 more) than his “real” ERA. A stunning 83.3% of the balls put into play behind Romero were turned into outs. Simply put, that will not happen again. A 3.00 ERA for Romero is far more likely this season … I wonder how many other baseball teams boast two pitchers over the age of 40 on their rosters. The Phillies do with 45-year old Jamie Moyer and with 40-year old reliever Tom Gordon on the roster. Gordon, whose career began so long ago in 1988 with the Kansas City Royals, arrived in Philadelphia in 2006 to replace Billy Wagner as the team’s closer. Gordon, who had been setting up Mariano Rivera’s saves for the Yankees for the past several seasons, was a worrisome choice to replace the fire-balling Wagner. Was he up to the task? Well, Gordon actually did well in the first half of 2006, and was one of the Phillies three representatives in the All-Star Game in Pittsburgh. He saved 34 of 39 games for the Phillies with a 3-4 record and a 3.34 ERA. Gordon may not be firing 100 mph fastballs at hitters, but he was effective: 10.3 K/9, 3.09 K/BB ratio, just the sort of numbers you want from your setup man … Gordon struggled a little in 2007, seeing his ERA balloon to 4.72 and blowing five of eleven save opportunities. The closer job he lost to Brett Myers and the team brought in Brad Lidge this season to occupy the role. Gordon still will function as the Phillies set-up man, however, a nice counterpoint to the left-handed Romero. I like Gordon a lot and I think he’ll be effective, although I wonder if he might cede the set-up man role to Ryan Madson as the season wears on if he struggles. Gordon’s FIP ERA, which was 2.37 in ’04 and 3.55 in ’05 with the Yankees, remained at 3.86 in 2006, but spiked to 5.07. Fluke? Or age finally catching up to Gordon. Gordon many fewer strikeouts in 2007, but then he faced many fewer batters in ’07 than he had the year before and was battling injuries. The fifty point spike in his slugging percentage allowed might be a fluke or it might portend struggles to come. We shall see. I will go out on a limb and give a pessimistic assessment, and say that Ryan Madson will likely step into Gordon’s role as eighth inning setup guy for Brad Lidge by the time we get to the end of the season. Certainly Gordon’s performance in the ninth inning of Opening Day against the Nationals has done little to persuade me otherwise … Clay Condrey went 5-0 in 2007 with the Phillies, an excellent illustration of the reason why sabremetricians tend to ignore won-lost records in evaluating pitchers. Condrey did so with an ERA of 5.04 and a FIP of 4.31. Condrey’s 1.68 K/BB ratio was pretty uninspiring. He surrendered more walks than the N.L. average and got fewer strikeouts. I don’t expect to see too much from Condrey except in mop-up duty here and there … Finally we wrap up with Brad Lidge. Lidge was the Phillies biggest off-season acquisition, secured at the cost of a viable prospect (Mike Costanzo), one of the Phillies best base-stealers (Michael Bourn) and a reliable relief pitcher (Geoff Geary). The acquisition of Lidge is a major risk for the Phillies. They surrendered good talent to secure him as the team’s closer, a role Lidge occupied for the Astros from 2004 – 2007. In his first two years on the job Lidge was 71 of 79 saves with a 2.06 ERA. Then Lidge surrendered a post-season home run and hasn’t been the same. His ERA spiked to 5.28 in 2006 and he blew 6 of 38 save opportunities. Last year his ERA lowered to 3.36, but he blew 8 of 27 save opportunities. Can Lidge recapture that ’04 – ’05 magic? I think he can and the trick will be to lower those walk rates. For a closer Lidge allows a decent number of walks: 30 in 2007 (4.03 BB/9), 36 in 2006 (4.32 BB/9). He needs to lower that so that his phenomenal strikeout rate ca catch up. Check out Lidge’s strikeout rate between ’04 – ’07:

K/9:
2004: 14.93
2005: 13.12
2006: 12.48
2007: 11.82

Those are staggering numbers, not even ones that Billy Wagner, Lidge’s predecessor at both the Astros and Phillies closer could accomplish … Lidge begins the season on the D.L. and ought to return back shortly. His presence in the Phillies bullpen is essential to the Phillies long-term prospects because a bullpen-by-committee approach won’t work and Gordon probably can’t shoulder the load. If you are looking for a reason why the Phillies might miss the playoffs, look no further than Lidge’s balky knee … So there you are. That is the Phillies pitching preview. I’m sorry that it took me as long as it did, but it is done. Now, on to the fielders.

Labels: Bullpen, Durbin, Eaton, Gordon, Hamels, Kenderick, Lidge, Madson, Moyer, Myers, Pitching, Predictions, Rotation

Yeah, I was supposed to post my Season Preview for the Phillies today but I am a little behind. Stay tuned, I expect to post Wednesday. Hopefully.

In the meanwhile, check out this article from The Hardball Times talking about the Bobby Abreu deal. If you want to skip to the conclusions: the Phillies got nothing for Abreu but got to dump his salary on the only team in the MLB that could take it.

Also, apparently Adam Eaton has won the #5 starter job from Chad Durbin and Travis Blackley, apparently pitching well enough to take the job. Count on Durbin, who will move to the bullpen, to get some starts if / when Eaton and Kyle Kendrick struggle.

Labels: Durbin, Eaton, Kenderick, Odds 'n Ends, Pitching, Predictions, Rotation

Labels: Eaton, Kenderick, Myers, Odds 'n Ends, Pitching, Rotation, Savery, Spring Training

Recently I appeared on Philly Sports Talk Now with Jim and Rich and they asked me who in the Phillies minor league system might be ready to step in this season and make an impact for the team, since some of their pitching appeared to be so lackluster. Carlos Carrasco was mentioned and I noted that Carrasco seemed to be major-league ready. I neglected to mention another pitcher who is generally flying under the radar screen of most observers and even Phillies fans: Josh Outman. Outman might just be as good as Carrasco, not that anyone is noticing …

Outman, taken in the 2005 Draft out of Central Missouri State, will enter his fourth year in the Phillies system in 2008, most likely beginning the season in Double-A Reading before making the move to the Phillies new Triple-A affiliate in Allentown. Outman began his career in Batavia, throwing for the Muckdogs and going 2-1 with a 2.76 ERA (9.5 K/9) before he moved along to Lakewood, the Phillies Single-A affiliate, to be teamed with Matthew Maloney and Carrasco. The three made a fearsome trio, guiding the Blue Claws to a victory in the South Atlantic League (SAL):

Maloney: 16-9, 2.03, 9.6 K/9
Outman: 14-6, 2.45, 9.3 K/9
Carrasco: 12-6, 2.26, 9.0 K/9

Maloney, who has since been dealt to the Cincinnati Reds in a deal the team will likely come to regret, was invited to Double-A ball for 2007, while Outman and Carrasco started the season in Advanced Single-A Clearwater, playing for the Threshers. Maloney and Carrasco – generally rated as the sole Top 100 prospect in the Phillies system – have earned notice for their skills, but Outman has curiously been over-looked by scouts. Carrasco pitched well in Clearwater (6-2, 2.84) and advanced to Reading for Double-A ball. In Double-A, Carrasco has struggled a little, going 6-4, but seeing his formidable strikeout and walk totals stall:

K / BB ratio:
2006 (LAK): 2.44
2007 (CLE): 2.41
2007 (RED): 1.06

Carrasco’s ERA jumped from 2.84 in Clearwater to 4.86 in Reading. Part of all of that is the general advantage pitchers have in the Florida State League (FSL), of which Clearwater is a member. But a bigger factor he is that Carrasco has been challenged for the first time in his minor league career. How he responds will be interesting.

Outman, likewise, pitched well in FSL ball (10-4, 2.45 ERA, 2.16 K/BB ratio) and earned the invite to Reading. What has caught my eye is that Outman has out-pitched Carrasco in Reading. While his record was just 2-3, with a 4.50 ERA, his strikeout-to-walk ratio was an impressive 1.47. Outman seems to have weathered the change a little better. What has also caught my eye is the fact that Outman has been pitching in Arizona League baseball this winter and has turned on some solid numbers. In five games pitched he’s tossed thirteen and two-thirds innings with a 3.95 ERA and thirteen strikeouts to three walks.

So Outman is a formitable prospect and just as ready for the majors as Carrasco, in my opinion. According to Top Prospect Alert, Outman ranks as the Phillies fourth-best prospect and third-best pitching prospect after Carrasco and 2007 first-round draft pick Joe Savery. Since Kyle Kendrick made the jump in the Phillies hour of need from Double-A to the majors last season, it wouldn't be outside of the realm of possibility to see Carrasco or Outman make the jump to Philadelphia in 2008. For all of the attention given to Carrasco, Outman could turn out to be the mainstay in the Phillies rotation for years and years to come.

Labels: Carrasco, Minors, Outman, Pitching, Rotation

I wanted to take another look at the Phillies pitching and was casting around for ideas when I decided to look at Pitching Runs Created (PRC). PRC is a stat developed by The Hardball Times (THT) David Glassko to get a universal baseline for how a pitcher performs. The idea of PRC is to give you a means to compare the contributions of pitchers as they compare to hitters. (see, Dave's article on PRC.)

I’ve dismissed PRC in the past (see, my review of THT’s Baseball Annual), stating that I didn’t understand how it works and what it is supposed to measure. I suppose that my real issue is that it seemed like an attempt to graft a hitters stat, or a hitters measurement, onto a pitcher. I’ve decided to give PRC a chance and wanted to see how and what it turned up in looking at the Phillies stats.

In applying PRC, I elected to try and come up with some way to smooth out the numbers to compare everyone to everyone. I rarely post Runs Created for hitters without noting what their Runs Created per 27 Outs were: ((RC / Outs) * 27) = RC/27. I decided to take PRC, divide it by innings pitched, and post PRC per 200 Innings pitched. 200 Innings, of course, being the number the workhorse on a team’s pitching staff will hurl in a season.

Cole Hamels, for example, had 101 PRC in 183 & 1/3 innings pitched, so: ((101 PRC / 183 & 1/3 IP) * 200 IP) = 110.2 PRC/200.

So let’s turn our attention towards the Phillies …

PRC/200:

Starters:

Hamels: 110.2

Kendrick: 82.6

Lohse: 75.4

Lieber: 71.8

Moyer: 68.2

Garcia: 62.1

Eaton: 53.2

Not surprisingly, PRC rates Hamels as the strongest of the Phillies starting pitchers and gives a big edge to Kyle Kendrick, who had a nice season with the Phillies despite posting some pedestrian strikeout numbers (3.8 K/9). Also, not surprisingly, Adam Eaton rates dead-last on the list, even worse than Freddy Garcia. The real surprise to me is Jamie Moyer, who actually led the Phillies in innings pitched with 199 and one-third of an inning, rates so poorly. I like Moyer so much as a pitcher

Let’s go back to Hamels. First, let’s compare PRC/200 in ’07 (110.2) to ’06 (93.72). Hamels obviously improved, but I think those numbers go to illustrate what a strong debut Hamels had in 2006 to begin with. Next, I compared Hamels with some of the top pitchers in the National League. Hamels rates very well:

PRC/200:

Jake Peavy: 128.1

Cole Hamels: 110.2

Brandon Webb: 109.2

John Smoltz: 108.9

Roy Oswalt: 103.8

Brad Penny: 103.8

Aaron Harang: 102.8

Tim Hudson: 96.3

Carlos Zambrano: 91.5

What caught my eye was the fact that Hamels actually rates better under this scale than Webb, the 2006 Cy Young Award winner and 2007 consensus runner-up to Jake Peavy. Hamels, you’ll recall, tied for sixth in the Cy Young voting, just getting a handful of votes, behind Brad Penny, Aaron Harang and Carlos Zambrano, tied with Smoltz and Jose Valverde, a relief pitcher with the Diamondbacks (PRC/200: 136.9).

Valverde’s numbers raise an interesting issue. Does PRC rate relief pitchers too high? I’ve noticed that a lot of relievers rate higher than I’d expect. Billy Wagner: 128.8 PRC/200. Francisco Cordero: 123.2. Trevor Hoffman: 101.2. Now let’s turn our attention to the Phillies:

Bullpen:

Romero: 225.9

Madson: 117.9

Myers: 96.1

Gordon: 80.0

Condrey: 64.0

Alfonseca: 60.0

Geary: 59.4

Mesa: 46.2

I think my theory is borne out a little here. Does anyone really feel that Ryan Madson was a better pitcher than Cole Hamels? That he’s more effective? I know that starters and relievers do different things, but I find it hard to believe that Madson out-pitched Cole Hamels. But, I’ll keep an open mind.

Moving along … How great was J.C. Romero’s campaign in 2007? After being cast-off by the Red Sox, Romero hooked up with the Phillies, pitched in fifty-one games, finishing with a 1.24 ERA. He allowed just one home run in thirty-six innings.

Any thoughts? Comments?

Labels: Bullpen, Hamels, Kenderick, Moyer, Pitching, Romero, Rotation

Spring Training is almost upon us Phillies fans! Hard to believe that the preliminary stages of the 2008 season are just days away.

With the Mets acqusition of Johan Santana and the Braves revamped rotation, I've been mulling over pitchers and how important they'll be to the Phillies in 2008. The Phillies 2008 rotation looks like this, I think:

1. Cole Hamels
2. Brett Myers
3. Jamie Moyer
4. Kyle Kendrick
5. ?

Hamels and Myers are poised to be the Phillies primary starters (give Hamels the edge to start Opening Day), while Jamie Moyer will undoubtedly return for his 2,000th baseball season, still tossing sub-80 mph fastballs and changeups, the solid #3 guy in the rotation (although I think the Phillies might be better off trying to start Moyer behind Hamels, as they make a nice ying-yang combo for hitters to transition from). Kendrick seems to have earned a spot as the #4 starter with his solid (10-4, 3.87 ERA) season last year. So the question is: who will be the #5 starter?

Last year’s #5 starter, Adam Eaton, struggled … a lot. While Eaton’s 10-10 record was pretty respectable, his 6.29 ERA was not. So bad was Adam Eaton’s season that the Phillies banished him from the roster for the National League Divisional Series against the Rockies. Eaton’s immense salary – he’s in the second year of a three year, $21+ million dollar contract – guarantees that he’s going to figure into the Phillies plans for 2008. Whether that is as a starting pitcher or as a reliever, a role the Phillies envisioned for Jon Lieber last season when he was unseated by Eaton as a starter, remains to be seen.

Confused about what I’m talking about? Here are the stats I refer to defined:
ERA – Earned Run Average: (Earned Runs * 9) / IP = ERA
FIP – Fielding Independent Pitching: (13*HR+3*BB-2*K / IP) + League Factor Evaluates a pitching by how he would have done with an average defense behind him by keeping track of things that a pitcher can control (walks, strikeouts, home runs allowed) as opposed to things he cannot (hits allowed, runs allowed).
HR/9 – Home Runs allowed per nine innings: (HR * 9) / IP
BB/9 – Walks per nine innings: (BB * 9) / IP
K/9 – Strikeouts per nine innings: (K * 9) / IP

No doubt 2007 was a season that Adam Eaton wants to forget … Eaton surrendered 71 walks and 30 home runs in just 161 & two-thirds of an inning pitched, while striking out just 97 batters. The nearly 1:1 ratio of walks to strikeouts (actually 1.36-to-1) is very atypical of Eaton, although his K/BB ratio has been trending downwards over the years: 2.94 in 2004, 2.27 in 2005, and 1.79 in 2006. Part of Eaton’s problem was that he gave up thirty home runs … incidentally, the “Citizens Bank Ballpark” explanation doesn’t really help explain why Eaton gave up so many dingers in ’07: his 1.88 HR/9 rate at home was enormous, but his 1.48 HR/9 rate on the road wasn’t much better … which I think led Eaton into making bad pitches. A pitcher so used to hurling at Petco (in 2004 and 2005) might need some time to adjust.

The 2008 Bill James Handbook says that Eaton will do better in ’08: 8-10, 4.89 ERA (and 1.29 HR/9, 3.31 BB/9 and 6.46 K/9). Tangotiger’s Marcels system locks Eaton in at 10-8 with a 5.39 ERA (and 1.40 HR/9, 3.6 BB/9 and 6.0 K/9) in 2008.

But Eaton isn’t the only candidate. There are two others, Chad Durbin and Travis Blackley. I want to talk about Blackley, the Phillies Rule 5 draftee from the San Francisco Giants. Blackley has just thirty-four innings of major league experience. He threw just eight and two-thirds of an inning for the Giants last season before being exposed in the Rule 5 draft. Blackley’s scant MLB experience is too small of a sample to look at, so we’ll look at what Blackley did with the Giants Triple-A franchise in Fresno, California, and with the Seattle Mariners Double-A franchise in Tacoma, Washington.

In San Antonio in the Texas League in 2006, Blackley threw 144 innings and finished with a 8-11 record and a 4.06 ERA. Defense or park effects helped Blackley’s numbers a little here, however, because his Fielding Independent Pitching (FIP) ERA was somewhat higher: 4.68 … I mention park effects because it seems like San Antonio was the most pitcher-friendly park in the Texas League, and Fresno in the Pacific Coast League (PCL) wasn’t too far behind … Blackley’s numbers were quite good: 6.25 K/9, 2.81 BB/9, 1.13 HR/9. He seemed to have good control. After being traded to the Giants, Blackley went into their farm system and arrived in Fresno. His performance left something to be desired: 10-8, with a 4.66 ERA. Blackley’s FIP was an Adam Eaton-esque 5.08, and his strikeout and walk rates were worse than the PCL averages:

Blackley / PCL
BB/9: 3.77 / 3.45
K/9: 6.71 / 7.03

So will Blackley unseat Eaton? The numbers don’t support it, but if the Phillies want to develop him they’ll have to leave him on their roster in 2008 or else ship him back to the Giants. My gut tells me that Blackley will find his way into the Phillies bullpen.

Finally, we come to Chad Durbin. Durbin, who played on the Detroit Tigers American League-pennant winning squad in 2006, found his way onto the Phillies roster this off-season and is trying to unseat Eaton. Durbin’s numbers (8-7, 4.72 ERA, 4.65 K/9, 3.00 BB/9 and 1.48 HR/9), don’t exactly support him either. As bad as Eaton’s 5.93 FIP was in 2007, Durbin’s wasn’t much better: 5.73!

Marcels rates Durbin at 6-6 with a 4.67 ERA in 2008. Bill James rated Durbin at 4-6, 5.00 ERA and 1.4 HR/9, 3.4 BB/9, 6.0 K/9.

Incidentially, Bill James had no prediction for Blackley because he didn't toss many MLB innings.

I think Eaton has the edge in this race for two reasons:

1. The Phillies have already invested significant amounts of money into Eaton and it would be humiliating to the team to see Eaton, their big free agent in 2007, riding the pine while a guy making the MLB minimum is starting in his place.

2. It isn't obvious to me that Blackley or Durbin would be better choices. Sure, Eaton got shelled, but he's put up good numbers in the past and could do so again.

I'd like to see Blackley be given the shot, but the smart money here is on Adam Eaton.

Labels: Blackley, Eaton, Pitching, Rotation

The conventional wisdom out there is that the Mets have basically guaranteed themselves a 2008 N.L. East division title with their acquisition of Johan Santana. Suddenly Santana turns to Mets mediocre rotation into one of the best pitching staffs in the National Leagie. I beg to differ. The Mets may have upgraded themselves considerably – and they now definitely have a leg up on the opposition – however, even with Santana, the Mets don’t have the best starting rotation in the N.L. East.

I’m going to use pitching projections from the 2008 Bill James Handbook here because James predictions are uncannily accurate and they make as good a starting reference point as anything …

Let’s start with the Mets …

Win – Loss Record / ERA / K/BB ratio
Johan Santana: 16-8 / 3.00 / 4.00
Pedro Martinez: 10-4 / 2.88 / 4.65
John Maine: 12-11 / 4.05 / 2.08
Oliver Perez: 9-12 / 4.69 / 2.34
Oliver Hernandez: 8-7 / 3.95 / 2.31

Now Pedro’s numbers are based on his throwing just 125 innings, so I guess this presumes that he might still have some nagging injuries. That’s a reasonable presumption. The teaming of Pedro and Santana really might be deadly, but the rest of the Mets rotation looks pretty spotty. Maine and Perez had great, but largely fluky seasons in 2007. The Mets will have a great 1-2 punch at the top of the rotation, but that's it.

Let’s move onto the Phillies …

Cole Hamels: 15-7 / 3.33 / 3.75
Brett Myers: 6-5 (29 saves) / 4.17 / 2.51
Jamie Moyer: 11-10 / 4.31 / 2.09
Adam Eaton: 8-10 / 4.89 / 1.94
Kyle Kendrick: unk.

The projections for the Phillies are a little screwy because they have Myers as the Phillies closer and there is no data for Kendrick to gain an accurate idea about because he’s pitched just one season. My gut tells me that Myers would probably have an ERA closer to 4.00 and his win-loss would be close to Hamels 15-7 if they ran his numbers as a starter … Hamels numbers strongly suggest that he’ll turn in another strong season and might be a player in the Cy Young race if he tosses enough innings … Eaton will be better than he was in 2007, but only with Adam Eaton would a 4.89 ERA be considered an improvement (2007 ERA: 6.29).

Basically, the Phillies rotation will be solid, but not great, though if Hamels and Santana cancel each other out, then the Phillies might have a slight edge here if Pedro struggles.

Let's move on to the Braves.

John Smoltz: 17-7 / 3.22 / 4.06
Tim Hudson: 15-9 / 3.67 / 2.19
Chuck James: 12-8 / 3.86 / 2.38
Tom Glavine: 11-10 / 3.99 / 1.59
Buddy Carlyle: 7-6 / 4.11 / 2.97

If the 2008 Atlanta Braves rotation isn’t the best in the N.L. East, I’ll eat my hat. Say whatever you want about the Braves, but they do know how to assemble pitching staffs and they’ve assembled another good one with their ’08 team. Glavine might not be the Cy Young Award winner he used to be, but he’ll be hurling behind a good defense and he’ll do what he does best: get lots and lots of pop-fly outs. Smoltz and Hudson look like Cy Young contenders, and James looks like a solid #3.

Clearly the Braves are tops here. It’s the ‘90s all over again.

Labels: Braves, Eaton, Hamels, Kenderick, Mets, Moyer, Myers, Pitching, Rotation

It flew under the radar but one of the best and most interesting moves made by any MLB team this off-season was the Cubs decision to sign former Phillies (and former Cubs) hurler Jon Lieber to a 1-year deal worth $3.5 million dollars. After the blockbuster Tigers – Marlins deal that moved Dontrelle Willis and Miguel Cabrera to Motown and the unconsumated ménage a troi with the Twins and the Red Sox and Yankees over Johan Santana, the Lieber signing, as quiet as it was, might well turn out to be the most significant deal of the 2007-2008 off-season.

When Jon Lieber signed with the Phillies in 2004 I applauded the move, though I had reservations about Lieber’s health. Lieber, in his three years with the Phillies largely did what I figured he’d do: he didn’t surrender a lot of walks (1.69 BB/9 in ’05, 1.28 in ’06 and 2.54 in ’07), he was pretty good about home runs (1.29 HR/9 from ’05 to ’07), and he got lots and lots of ground balls (681 groundballs to 524 flyballs, or a 1.30 G/F ratio, between ’05 and ’07). The high number of grounders would be the key to Lieber’s success in Philadelphia I felt after seeing what pitching at Citizens Bank Ballpark did to a number of the Phillies pitchers.

Confused about what I’m talking about? Here are the stats I refer to defined:
ERA – Earned Run Average: (Earned Runs * 9) / IP = ERA
FIP – Fielding Independent Pitching: (13*HR+3*BB-2*K / IP) + League Factor Evaluates a pitching by how he would have done with an average defense behind him by keeping track of things that a pitcher can control (walks, strikeouts, home runs allowed) as opposed to things he cannot (hits allowed, runs allowed).
DER – Defense Efficiency Ratio: (Batters Faced – (Hits + Walks + Hit By Pitch + Strikeouts)) / (Batters Faced – (Home Runs, Walks + Hit By Pitch + Strikeouts)) How often fielders convert balls put into play into outs.
HR/9 – Home Runs allowed per nine innings: (HR * 9) / IP
BB/9 – Walks per nine innings: (BB * 9) / IP
K/9 – Strikeouts per nine innings: (K * 9) / IP

Lieber never really enjoyed the success that I thought he’d have in the red pinstripes. The quality of the defense behind him was never particularly good:

DER
2005: .722
2006: .697
2007: .672

Consistently, Lieber’s defense-neutral statistics showed that he threw better than his numbers indicated:

FIP / FIP compared to ERA
2005: 4.13 / -0.07
2006: 4.60 / -0.33
2007: 3.82 / -0.91

After being utilized as a long-reliever and trade bait after the Phillies acquired Adam Eaton and Freddy Garica, Lieber ended up being pressed into the rotation before he too went down. I think he pitched rather well: Lieber’s 3.82 FIP would have made him a top-12 pitcher in 2007. And, not that anyone noticed, but Lieber’s June 9th outing against the Kansas City Royals had the best game score* of any outing by an N.L. pitcher in 2007: Lieber notched a game score of 92 that night on his way to striking out eleven while scattering three hits in a nine-inning shutout.

* a state Bill James came up with assigning an overall number to a pitcher’s outing while evaluating how they pitched.

Instead, his pedestrian ERA in '07, age (38 in 2008), and arm trouble (missed 2003 season with surgery) resulted in having to take a 50% pay cut to return to Chicago. Re-signing him was apparently never in the Phillies plans.

So what are the Cubs getting? A pretty good #4 pitcher: the Bill James Handbook says that Lieber will go 10-8 with a 4.04 ERA in 2008, which I think is pretty reasonable and in-line with Lieber’s career stats. He could end up being a very durable starter for the Cubs and a valuable edition for the playoffs since he’s had some experience, playing with the Yankees in 2004.

Good luck in the Windy City, Jon Lieber. He might be a key piece of the puzzle for the Cubs as they gun for their first World Series title in 100 years. I'll miss seeing him pitcher for the Phillies.

Labels: Lieber, Pitching, Rotation

Nobody likes to hear it, because it’s dull. But the reason you win or lose is darn near always the same – pitching.

-Earl Weaver

Being a major league baseball pitcher is a lonely job, standing on a mound, charged with hurling the ball past the batter, isolated and yet relying heavily on the other eight players on the field to get the job done. As the game of baseball evolved during the late 19th Century the role of the pitcher evolved as well. Originally, pitchers were expected to fairly loft the ball over the plate so the opposition could hammer it for hits or outs, but then role of the pitcher evolved in the 1870’s and 1880’s to be permitted to attempt to put the ball past the batter and be rewarded when the batter missed the ball.

Since then, there has been a battle in baseball over the rules to make things easier or harder for pitchers. In the early days of baseball the rules favored batters: the pitchers mound was moved back, for example, to today’s sixty feet, six inches. When hitters began to dominate too much, the owners began things like making foul-tips into strikes. The shift back to hitters began in the 1920’s and continued into the 1960’s, when baseball expanded the strike-zone out of fear that it had become too easy to hit home runs after Roger Maris broke the hallowed record of Babe Ruth with 61 home runs. By the end of the 1960’s, pitchers dominated the game so much that Bob Gibson’s 1.12 ERA was remarkable, but not entirely so. Worried they had over-did things, baseball moved back to the batters and reinterpreted the strike zone again. Today, with smaller parks and juiced players, the game is a paradise for hitters and a disaster for pitchers.

You cannot win without good pitching is the conventional wisdom in baseball and it appears that, for once, the conventional wisdom on something has hit the mark. Managers like Earl Weaver (see above) know that the pitcher is a vital part of your team because they handle the ball on each and every play. Good pitching is vital for success on the baseball mound. Teams cannot survive with mediocre pitching.

Confused about what I’m talking about when I toss letters like ERA and FIP all over the place? Well, here are the stats I refer to defined:
WHIP – Walks plus hits by innings pitched: (BB + H) / IP = WHIP
ERA – Earned Run Average: (Earned Runs * 9) / IP = ERA
FIP – Fielding Independent Pitching: (13*HR+3*BB-2*K / IP) + League Factor Evaluates a pitching by how he would have done with an average defense behind him by keeping track of things that a pitcher can control (walks, strikeouts, home runs allowed) as opposed to things he cannot (hits allowed, runs allowed).
DER – Defense Efficiency Ratio: (Batters Faced – (Hits + Walks + Hit By Pitch + Strikeouts)) / (Batters Faced – (Home Runs, Walks + Hit By Pitch + Strikeouts)) How often fielders convert balls put into play into outs.
HR/9 – Home Runs allowed per nine innings: (HR * 9) / IP
BB/9 – Walks per nine innings: (BB * 9) / IP
K/9 – Strikeouts per nine innings: (K * 9) / IP


Since the Phillies have moved to Citizens Bank Ballpark, they have not exactly been known as a team that features a strong pitching staff. In fact, since 2004, the Phillies have finished 13th, 10th, 11th, and 13th in ERA in the N.L. each season. Citizens Bank Ballpark has become Coors Field East in the minds of fans and the general public and the Phillies have become the Colorado Rockies of the mid-1990’s, the team that scores a lot of runs because they have to. 2007 was no exception. To combat this, the Phillies management focused like a laser beam on the team’s pitching. In 2007 the Phillies invested considerable time and money into their pitching staff, adding starters Freddy Garcia and Adam Eaton and they attempted to ship surplus starter Jon Lieber to another team for help in the bullpen. However, the 2007 season was a calamity for the Phillies pitchers:

Garcia was a bust, pitching poorly and then injuring his arm on the way to a 1-5, 5.90 ERA season.

Eaton likewise disappointed, going 10-10 with a 6.29 ERA. Eaton was such a liability that the Phillies left him off the playoff roster.

Lieber, trade bait and consigned to the bullpen, became a starter once Garcia went down and pitched well, not that his numbers – 3-6, 4.73 ERA – indicate (more on that later), but he too went down.

The Phillies ended up giving starts to rookies J.D. Durbin (10 starts), Kyle Kendrick (20 starts), J.A. Happ (1 start), and Zack Segovia (1 start). In one less-than-memorable weekend in mid-summer, the Phillies started three rookies (Durbin, Happ and Kendrick) for a four-game set with the Mets and got hammered, losing three of the four games and watching the Mets lengthen what seemed to be a formidable lead at the time.

When the starters were not going down the Phillies bullpen was busy collapsing. After early struggles, the Phillies were forced to send Brett Myers to the mound to be the team’s closer. Along the way the Phillies attempted to utilize cast-offs like Jose Mesa and Antonio Alfonseca to plug their leaky bullpen. It was, in short, a difficult season for the Phillies pitchers, but many turned in terrific performances in 2007 and ought to be recognized amid the chaos. Plus, there are positive signs for the future.

Let’s start with some the positives.

As everyone knows, the Phillies accomplished a remarkable feat and managed to close a massive gap with the New York Mets and erase a seven-game edge as the season came to a close. A factor, along with the terrific play of Phillies like Jimmy Rollins and Chase Utley, was the Phillies bullpen down the stretch: looking at the Phillies stats, I saw that the Phillies pitching improved somewhat in September. Not significantly, but just enough to improve the team. While the N.L. ERA for September was 4.70, the Phillies were 4.56 (September ERA+: 103). The Phillies also bettered the N.L. averages for the month in walks, strikeouts and strikeout/walk ratio:

Phillies / N.L.
BB/9: 3.34 / 3.44
K/9: 7.06 / 7.02
K/BB: 2.12 / 2.04

Not surprisingly, Cole Hamels was terrific in his limited action in September: 1-0, 2.25 ERA in three starts, with 11.81 K/9, 2.25 BB/9, a 1.06 WHIP and no home runs allowed in sixteen innings of work. But Hamels limited performance doesn’t explain why the Phillies pitching improved in September. Certainly the rest of the starting pitchers didn’t improve much, if at all. Kyle Lohse was 2-0, but he had a 5.10 ERA. Adam Eaton was terrible: 1-2, 6.65 ERA. Jamie Moyer was unspectacular: 2-2, 4.67 ERA (1.29 HR/9, 3.38 BB/9, 7.27 K/9), which is basically in line with what he did the rest of the season: 12-10, 5.08 ERA (1.36 HR/9, 2.89 BB/9, 5.73 K/9) (from April – August).

No, the Phillies bullpen turned in a stunning performance in September. Collectively Brett Myers, Tom Gordon, J.C. Romero, Geoff Geary and Clay Condrey made 79 appearances in the 28 games, hurling 79 innings and accumulating a 7-2 record with 10 saves and a 2.62 ERA. Want to see the biggest reason why the Phillies made the playoffs? Their bullpen was terrific down the stretch, keeping the Phillies in tough games. Check out how good the five pitchers were:

ERA HR/9 BB/9 K/9 K/BB
Myers: 3.00 / 0.50 / 3.00 / 8.50 / 2.83
Geary: 2.65 / 0.52 / 2.65 / 4.76 / 1.80
Gordon: 3.94 / 0.56 / 1.69 / 7.31 / 4.33
Romero: 0.00 / 0.00 / 4.02 / 6.32 / 1.57
Condrey: 3.65 / 0.73 / 1.46 / 3.65 / 2.50
Collectively: 2.62 / 0.46 / 2.62 / 6.26 / 2.39

Romero didn’t allow a single home run or earned run in his fifteen and two-thirds innings of work despite allowing seven walks. I suspect that Romero is one of those pitchers who tries to hit the edge of the strike-zone on every pitch and not give the hitter anything to work with. While he did allow seven walks, he only surrendered four hits (Tom Gordon, in contrast, allowed fifteen hits and three walks in his sixteen innings). Those fifteen and two-thirds innings of work got Romero that three-year, $10 million dollar extension this off-season.

Cole Hamels was, as usual, terrific in 2007: 15-5, 3.39 ERA. Hamels will be just 24 on Opening Day, 2008, and already is in the midst of a bright future. After a strong debut season (9-8, 4.08 ERA), Hamels won fifteen games in 2007 and dominated the opposition. Had he not been injured late in the season, Hamels might have played a role in the N.L. Cy Young balloting and might have made a strong run at third place or possibly even second. His walk-to-strikeout ratio of 4.12 was actually better than Jake Peavy’s 3.53 and Brandon Webb’s 2.69. He was unquestionably the Phillies best pitcher and ought to be on a short list with Peavy and Webb for the 2008 Cy Young.

Hamels was so good that I really don’t want to spend too much time talking about him when we have other topics. Let’s move on …

Jon Lieber … Ever felt like you were under-appreciated at work? Ever thought that the flashy, show-boater at the next desk over always kept you from getting your due as a worker? Now you know Jon Lieber must feel. Lieber signed a 3-year, $21 million dollar deal with the Phillies in the winter of 2004-2005 and went 29-30, with a 4.55 ERA as a Phillie from 2005 to 2007. He never got much respect and was consistently viewed by fans and the media as a bust. Now Lieber is a free agent and will likely sign a 1-year deal with some team in need of pitching help. I think the team that signs him is going to get a steal, personally.

All Jon Lieber did was provide the Phillies with 464 & 1/3 innings of solid work the last three seasons and give a vastly under-rated performance. Every season Lieber’s defense-neutral stats showed that he was a talented pitcher who was always doing a better job then his numbers reflected.

What do I mean by that? Alright, a little history is in order. Voros McCracken was a paralegal in Chicago working for a law firm and playing fantasy baseball on the side. McCracken was looking for ways to evaluate pitchers and came up with a stupendous idea: what if pitchers cannot control what happens to the ball once it is put into play? McCracken ended up developing DIPS – Defense Independent Pitching Statistic – as a consequence. DIPS, simply put, takes, things that a pitcher can control – walks, strikeouts, home runs – and evaluates them by striping out things that a pitcher cannot control – namely hits and earned runs allowed. McCracken’s work was posted on the internet and eventually found its way to the eyes of Bill James, who positively commented on McCracken’s work in his Historical Baseball Abstract.

By the way, if you are interested in reading more on McCracken and DIPS, Michael Lewis’ Moneyball (pages 234-243) and Alan Schwarz’ The Numbers Game (pages 210-214) deal with McCracken’s ideas and how they permeated baseball over the least decade.

Alright, back to Lieber. Jon Lieber is pretty tough to get a walk out of. In 2004, with the Yankees, he allowed just 18 in 176 innings. That’s less than a walk every nine innings of work. Lieber never quite got that level of dominance with the Phillies, but as a Phillie he allowed just 1.68 BB/9. Jon Lieber didn’t allow many home runs either: just 7 in 78 innings with the Phillies in 2007. While Lieber wasn’t the king of strikeouts – a respectable 54 in 78 innings, or 6.1 K/9 – he was good and his stinginess in these other aspects of the game show you what a terrific pitcher he is. Here are the Phillies starters DIPS and how much their DIPS numbers were under (or over) their “real” ERAs:

Starters DIPS:
Hamels: 3.63 / +0.24
Lieber: 3.74 / -0.99
Moyer: 4.73 / -0.28
Durbin: 4.74 / -0.41
Kendrick: 4.85 / +0.98
Eaton: 5.69 / -0.60

Maybe you don’t think much of Jon Lieber, but think about this: Lieber’s 3.74 DIPS isn’t far off the mark of pitchers like Brandon Webb (3.18 DIPS), Tim Hudson (3.40 DIPS) or Greg Maddux (3.55 DIPS). There is nearly a full run variance between Lieber’s ERA and DIPS because year-in and year-out, the Phillies fielders don’t convert enough of the balls put into play behind Lieber into outs. Check out the Phillies DER behind Lieber:

DER:
2005: .722
2006: .697
2007: .672

Now, the idea that pitchers have no ability to influence balls put into play is not widely accepted. Baseball Prospectus, for example, argues that some pitchers can influence balls put into play (e.g., Jamie Moyer) and that sometimes pitchers do play a role in how the fielders do. I think Lieber deserves more credit than he gets, however, as a terrific pitcher who knew his role on the team: he was pitcher who threw lots of sliders, which hitters grounded into 6-3 put-outs.

Kyle Kendrick. As great as Jon Lieber’s DIPS stats were, Kyle Kendrick’s were not. The two make an interesting pair to discuss, as their pitching styles are intertwined. Kyle Kendrick began the 2007 season sitting in Reading, Pennsylvania, with the Double-A Reading Phillies. Injuries to Garcia and Lieber and Myers move to the bullpen sent the Phillies to their farm system searching for arms. Kendrick was the most major league-ready of the Phillies minor leaguers and made the trip to Citizens Bank Ballpark.

In Kendrick’s first start, he allowed three runs on six hits and two walks in six innings of work in a no-decision the Phillies went on to win. Kendrick followed with three wins in a row. Ultimately, Kendrick finished the season 10-4 with a 3.87 ERA. The Phillies won 13 of the 20 games he started and Kendrick never failed to make it to the fifth inning but one time, logging 121 innings of work for the Phillies.

As you can see from the DIPS numbers above, Kendrick’s 4.85 DIPS is pretty terrible and nearly a full run over his “real” ERA. Kendrick and Lieber are terrific examples of how pitchers can throw similar games with similar styles and yield different results. Lieber and Kendrick are the two most ground-ball oriented starters the Phillies had in 2007:

Starters G/F ratio:
Kendrick: 1.55
Lieber: 1.52
Moyer: 1.08
Eaton: 1.06
Garcia: 1.02
Lohse: 0.95

And the Phillies fielders did different things with those groundballs. They converted .719 of Kendrick’s grounders into outs. They converted .672 of Lieber’s into outs. That is where the enormous disparity between Lieber and Kendrick’s DIPS and ERAs come from.

I am a big proponent of groundball pitchers. I tend to think they have more success because groundball oriented pitchers made fewer mistakes that turn into three-run home runs. Backed with a good defense, a groundball pitcher can be deadly. Is it any coincidence that extreme groundball pitchers are some of the best? Brandon Webb (3.34 G/F), Tim Hudson (2.76 G/F), and Greg Maddux (2.15 G/F) are all extreme groundball pitchers. Add in the propensity of fly balls to turn into three-run home runs at Citizens Bank Ballpark, and pitchers like Lieber and Kendrick are the types to succeed in a Phillies uniform, I believe.

Now, there are some flaws to Kendrick’s game and Phillies fans should really treat that 10-4 record as illusory. He won’t be that good in 2008, people. Perhaps no other pitcher in the majors got the run support that Kendrick enjoyed in 2007: 7.74 runs per game. It’s not hard to win games when your offense supplies you with nearly eight runs per start.

I also don’t care for how many balls put into play Kenderick allows. He faced 499 batters in 2007, of which 16 got home runs, 25 got walks, 7 were hits by pitches, and 49 were struck out. Kendrick got only 3.64 K/9, a far, far lower percentage than Lieber (6.23). Kendrick needs his fielders. That means 402 of the 499 batters he faced put balls into play. That’s roughly four in five batters. That’s a lot of work for the defense and I don’t think Kendrick can count on his fielders to replicate their terrific work in 2008.

Jamie Moyer … “Hitting is timing. Pitching is upsetting timing.” – Warren Spahn. Warren Spahn would have loved Jamie Moyer. The soft-tossing lefty was one of the great pitchers of the 1950’s and Moyer is probably the pitcher who comes the closest to replicating Spahn in the modern era of fire-balling hurlers … Here are some fun facts that illustrate Moyer’s pitching style:

According to the 2005 Bill James Handbook, Jamie Moyer had the second-slowest fastball in the American League in 2004, clocking in at 81.6 mph to Tim Wakefield’s 75.9 mph ‘fastball’. Moyer threw the largest percentage of changeups of any A.L. pitcher: 31.0%. Moyer also relied on his fastball less often than all but three other pitchers (45.7% of the time, compared to Wakefield’s 9.3%). Moving on … according to the 2006 Bill James Handbook, Jamie Moyer once more had the second-slowest fastball in the American League in 2005, clocking in at 81.8 mph to Tim Wakefield’s 76.1 mph ‘fastball’. Moyer threw the second-largest percentage of changeups of any A.L. pitcher: 27.3% to Kenny Rogers 32.9%. Moyer also relied on his fastball less often than all but Wakefield: 40.1% of the time, compared to Wakefield’s 11.9%

Moyer’s style is to toss these changeups and slow fastballs over the plate and watch batters flail helplessly at them. Moyer’s pitchers tend to be hit for shallow fly balls, which means more work for the Phillies outfielders. This tendency towards flies strongly suggested to me that Moyer might struggle with the Phillies, given Citizens Bank Ballpark’s unforgiving nature (see: Kendrick, Kyle), I assumed that a flyball pitcher like Moyer would be a failure. Between 2001 and 2006, Moyer allowed 1520 ground-balls to 1723 fly-balls: 0.87 G/F ratio.

Much to my stunned amazement, Moyer has pitched alright as a Phillie. Oh sure, 14-12 with a 5.01 ERA is nothing to brag about, but his 4.73 DIPS shows that his pitching is better than it looks. It is tough to get a walk out of him and for being a finesse pitcher he gets some strike-outs: 133 in 199 innings. Teams behind Moyer always do well defensively (the Phillies posted a staggering .753 DER behind him in 2006 in his eight starts and his 21 double plays induced were tops on the Phillies in 2007), which suggests to me that Moyer is one of those special pitchers who influence the performance on their fielders.

Let’s talk very briefly, before we move on to the relief corps, about the failures of the Phillies starters. The Phillies acquired Freddy Garcia in the hopes that he would be a stud the team could team with Myers and Hamels. Garcia went 17-9 with a 4.53 ERA for the White Sox in 2006 and was a good bet, with his heavy curveballs and high groundball percentage (1.07 G/F in 2006, but a 1.60 in 2005), to survive Citizens Bank. Instead he injured his arm and went 1-5 with a 5.90 ERA … Adam Eaton, a former Phillies draft pick the team dealt to the San Diego Padres back at the beginning of the decade, was added in the hopes that he’d round out the rotation as the solid #5 pitcher. Instead, Eaton struggled, going 10-10 with a 6.29 ERA. Just eight of Eaton’s thirty starts were “Quality Starts” meaning that they went at least six innings and he gave up three or fewer runs, probably the worst percentage on the Phillies. Eaton did little right, allowing a whopping 71 walks in 161 innings, while striking out just 97 batters. Eaton also served up a stunning thirty home runs. Eaton struggled so much he was left-off the playoff roster. Ouch. Let’s hope he will improve in 2008, but his 2007 performance and $7.2 million-dollar salary are a testament to the fact that oftentimes the marketplace in baseball yields odd results … Kyle Lohse came to the Phillies in a trade late in the year and hurled well, I am sure to the delight of his agent, Scott Boras. He went 3-0 with a 4.72 ERA with the Phillies, allowing just six home runs in 61 innings of work. Not too shabby. No doubt Boras will convert that solid, workmanlike performance into a multi-million dollar contract with some team foolish enough to sign him … Generally speaking, the Phillies starters were terrible in 2007, ranking twelfth in terms of ERA. Lots of room for improvement here.

Labels: Bullpen, Eaton, Garcia, Geary, Gordon, Hamels, Lieber, Moyer, Myers, Pitching, Romero, Rotation