Paul Daugherty: Winning is Overrated?

Wednesday, February 20, 2008

Winning is Overrated?

I keep banging on this because I don't understand the thinking... have had several people, on the blog and e-mail, tell me that I shouldnt look at a pitcher's W-L record when determining what kind of a player he is. In essence, wins and losses don't tell the story.

Uh, yes they do.

What's the point in playing, if not to win? Is it to lose, but to argue that I pitched well, they just didnt get me any runs? Do clubs win championships this way? The fact that J. Blanton has 42 wins in the last 3 years is somehow diminished, because he doesnt pitch as well on the road as he does at home. The notion that Blanton was 7-5 at home and 7-5 on the road last year is lost on some people.

This is when statistics get in the way of truth. Winning is winning. Give me 14-10 over 9-15. I don't care what any of the guy's other numbers say. The only number that matters is the W.

It's not about Blanton anymore. The Reds don't seem interested in winning this year -- it's more of a test-drive for next year, to see how the kids do -- it's about the thinking of those who would argue every stat but the only stat that counts.

26 Comments:

at 9:20 AM

Anonymous said...

I agree with your point on statistics but think that there are more relevant statistics than wins and losses. How many losses were due to poor run support? What kind of defense did he have supporting him? Blanton was 7-5 at home and on the road, but his ERA was almost double on the road last year.

I still think we should make a move, he eats innings and can get you to the seventh.

at 9:27 AM

Anonymous said...

Agreed.

For those who can't get past stats though...consider that a move from AL to NL would likely improve Blanton's stats, for reasons of which statheads surely are aware.

at 9:30 AM

Anonymous said...

Paul,

I think the biggest thing your overlooking is how did Arroyo go 9-15 last year? Because of a horrible bullpen and the bats going cold. There were 24 games in which he gave up 3 runs or less only winning 9 of those contests. I haven't looked at our other starters from last year but if our bullpen only plays a little better than last year that might add up to 10 more wins.

at 10:01 AM

Cheviot Sports Authority said...

Paul, you are way off base on this one. Sometimes it is just a matter of being in the right place at the right time. My favorite example is of course Eric Milton: 13-10, 15-7, 13-9, 14-6 every year with an ERA near 5.00. We all know his performance here. Another favorite is Jimmy Haynes 15-10, next season 2-12.
Or lets go back a little bit when pitchers routinely pitched 225-250 innings, Jim Merritt 20-12 next season 1-11.
Show me a pitcher who pitches 200 innings, does not give up more hits than innings pitches with good control and I will show you a good pitcher. Run him out there and his wins will come. Keep running the Eric Miltons out there and you will soon start paying the price.
I do not put Blanton in the class with Eric Milton or Jimmy Haynes but he is not the player that I would lose any sleep over not getting.

at 10:03 AM

Allan said...

Winning now instead of next year would be nice. The future never comes. Let's win NOW.

at 10:06 AM

Anonymous said...

I think we all agree that wins are ultimately what matter. No doubt.

But I think the point is that if you're considering trading for someone (Blanton, or anyone), you are trying to evaluate JUST HIM. Just the player you might acquire.

Wins and losses have too much to do with your teammates, or even sometimes w/ just luck (good or bad run support).

ERA is a better measure of what kind of pitcher Blanton is.

And better yet, you want to try to figure out what sort of ERA he'd put up pitching half his games in GABP. (Switching to NL probably would help a little, but switching to GABP from Oakland would probably hurt a lot more.)

Put this all together in my opinion Blanton looks like a pitcher who would probably be durable and who would probably put up an ERA in the 4.50 or 4.60 range in Cincinnati.

And you decide whether or not to deal for him based on that.

at 10:08 AM

Anonymous said...

By the way... does anyone remember what pitcher we signed not too long ago who was 14-6 the year before we got him, and 71-57 on his career at that point?

Eric Milton.

And we know how that turned out.

at 10:14 AM

Anonymous said...

Paul, you really need to follow your teams more. Bailey and Votto for Bedard or Haren...yes, in a heartbeat. For Blanton...no way. Fly ball pitcher who doesn't strike a tremendous amount of batters out in Great American Ball Park? Sounds not good at all.

Maybe you complain about not pony-ing up for Bedard or Haren. I will say that Jay Bruce better be Ken Griffey Jr. at this point. But to just pull the trigger and not get adequate value in return is not wise.

at 10:45 AM

Anonymous said...

So, two pitchers, A and B.

A went 20-10 with an ERA of 5.00 and average run support of 7.5 (say, on the Red Sox).

B went 10-20 with an ERA of 3.00 and average run support of 1.5 (say, on the Devil Rays, excuse me, the Rays).

You'd try to sign A over B?

Wins are the result of a lot of things . . .

at 10:47 AM

Anonymous said...

Doc,

I respect your arguement that "The only number that matters is the W." Especially with a perennial loser, you want to embrace a guy with a history of winning.

But I'm reluctant to assign much importance to a pitcher's record. Give me the guy who pitches well and goes 9-14 for one season. A hard-luck W-L record tends to even out.

You're putting a lot of faith in Blanton's ability to make the Reds a contender, just because he has 42 wins over the past three years. His lifetime ERA over 4.00 suggests to me that he's merely an adequate pitcher.

In 2005, the Reds went out and got another pitcher with 42 wins over his previous three full seasons and a lifetime ERA over 4.00. Eric Milton didn't work out so well.

Thanks.

Kurt in Raleigh

at 10:52 AM

Anonymous said...

Two words, Doc:

ERIC MILTON

Thats the kind of thinking that led to $26 million being flushed away. In the four full seasons before joining the Reds (he was injured one year & pitched in 3 games) he won 55 & lost 32.

Winning is important, but the starter can't control the offense, defense or bullpen. Other stats are a far better indicator of a pitcher's effectiveness & chances of success going forward.

John Burroughs
Hyde Park

at 1:15 PM

Anonymous said...

Who are the other teams beating down Oakland's door with offers for Blanton?

There is no rush. If a deal is to be made, it will be on the Reds' terms, and for far less than what is currently being asked.

at 2:03 PM

Anonymous said...

Paul, a friend and I were discussing baseball on the phone last night.

"The Reds," he said, "Have been 70/70 for the past umpteen years."

It's what they do with those other 22 games that matters.

at 2:06 PM

SportsMania said...

I think we have to put this in perspective. Winning isn't the only thing to look at when trading/signing a pitcher.
Winning is part, but the stats are another part. A guy that doesn't get a who lot of run support, yet still wins is huge. But those guys who are in the right place at the right time, you have to discount them a little. Pitchers don't win games alone (ok, at least rarely).
When you bring a pitcher into GABP you have to consider stats like his groundball to flyball ratio. Too many flyballs go from easy outs to homers in GABP.
Joe Blanton is an above average pitcher but no much more than that. His career winning percentage is only .553. He is not worth giving up a tons of prospects for.
You also have to consider whether or not the wins are a product of the system, so lets also look at three other highly touted former Oakland pitchers:

Mark Mulder
Record with Oakland: 81-42 (.659)
Record with St. Louis: 22-18 (.550)

Barry Zito
Record with Oakland: 102-63(.618)
Record with San Fran: 11-13 (.458)

Tim Hudson
Record with Oakland: 92-39(.702)
Record with Atlanta: 43-31 (.581)

All three have significantly lower winning percentages. This would suggest that we should expect Blanton's winning percentage outside of Oakland to be closer to .420.

at 2:20 PM

Anonymous said...

Paul, you seriously don't understand why won-loss record is a deceptive stat for starting pitchers?

Do you understand why ERA is not the best performance measure for a relief pitcher?

So, if a pitcher tosses five innings, gives up six runs on 12 hits, but the team wins, you believe the victory to be the best means of measuring this pitcher's worth?

C'mon. You're smarter than that.

at 2:30 PM

Anonymous said...

Team wins and loses are everything.

Individual pitcher win and loses are very little. Way too often an individual pitcher gets credit for a win or hung with a loss due to timing, not his individual performance.

What we're all looking for is starting pitchers who put their teams in a position to win. And the ability to do that is best measured by stats other than the actual wins and losses atributed to any one individual.

at 3:09 PM

matty buckets said...

Great posts by all. I hate to bring up Milton again but what were your thoughts when they signed him? Were you applauding it as a great move? When he was signed, Dan O'Brien went on an on about how he was a "winner" and "winners will find ways to win games". It wasn't true about him and isn't true about Blanton.

at 3:34 PM

RedsManRick said...

Team wins and losses are everything. But no single player controls whether or not a team wins or loses. Everybody makes some contribution.

Pitcher wins are a poor and arbitrary measurement of how a pitcher contributed to his team's won or loss. I don't mean to be rude, but this is baseball statistics 101 material.

As for yet another example, take Nolan Ryan's 1987 season.

211.7 IP, 34 Games Started
8-16
2.76 ERA
1.14 WHIP
270 Strikeouts

Do you honestly believed he was outpitched by his teammate Jim Deshaies?

152.0 IP, 24 Games Started
11-6
4.62 ERA
1.36 WHIP
104 Strikeouts

It's just not that hard to find copious examples of when W-L completely distort how well a pitcher pitched. Frankly, if you changed the words from "wins" to the more accurate "times the pitcher was pitching when the team took a lead that held up", this conversation wouldn't be happening because nobody would use it as a stat.

Team won and losses matter. But single players aren't solely responsible and acting like they are doesn't help us understand anything.

at 4:22 PM

Anonymous said...

Jimmy Haynes, 15 wins in 2002.

Eric Milton, 14 wins in 2004.

Maybe some wins aren't as valuable as others. I think the Reds are still paying Milton.

at 4:39 PM

Chris said...

"Inning-eater"?

Even Todd Coffey is an inning-eater if you leave him in long enough. Not a viable stat.

at 6:48 PM

oldtimer said...

Lots of good points.

Two things stand out.

Winning is not an intangible.
And stats can lie.

Do you think Nolan Ryan would tell you he had a good year when he was 6-14? Hmmmmph...I think not. Maybe a frustrating year, but not a good year. I'm sure he wanted to "bounce" back the next season.
As a matter of fact, he had a lot of .500 level seasons early in his career and was considered a fireballer who didn't win enough to ever be great. He relieved on the '69 Amazin Mets as a rook.

There are very few starters in the Hall who haven't won far more games that they lost. It's baseball's ultimate measure of success for a pitcher.

Trades are a crap shoot. What happened before may not happen again. Skill levels improve and deteriorate. A change of scenery can infuse new life inti a guy. A pitcher in a big ballpark who pitches up with no worries can choose to start pitching down in the new small park. It's just not that simple to predict the future from the past in baseball. Otherwise the same teams would hoard their magic formualae and win every year.

Pete Rose always seemed to win wherever he went (as a player). Mike Schmidt had his best seasons with Pete, as did Morgan, Bench, Perex, Concepcion, on and on. Knowing how to win and having done it imparts a confidence in a close game that you just don't manifest coming from a losing environment. The original point that knowing how to win and having done it is the most important stat rings true throughout baseball history.

Any other stats be damned.

Sorry Doc didn't mean to agree wid ya, don't take it personal.

at 8:07 PM

Anonymous said...

Wow, Paul loses some credibility after saying that. Good thing the rest of you get it, though. Clearly, Blanton's 5.11 road ERA last year indicates that he benefits from the ballpark in Oakland and all that foul territory. It can help you get out of lots of jams. Blanton is not a fly ball pitcher, but he clearly got hit hard on the road. His 7-5 road record just means that he got some run support by people outside of his control. Now NL hitter unfamiliarity might shave off a half a run per 9, as would not having to face a DH, but I'd still expect him to be about a 4.75 ERA in our park and that is not worth our prospects.

at 9:18 PM

Anonymous said...

Hey oldtimer, HOF pitchers tend to have good to great ERAs, pitch 200 innings, and give up less hits than innings pitched. If you do those things, you will win plenty of games. This does not, however, support your argument.

at 9:53 PM

Anonymous said...

Wow, Paul, you can't be serious. Look at Matt Cain. He's considered one of the top young pitchers in the NL, and last year, we won seven games, despite having an ERA of 3.65 with 200 innings and 163 K's. Would you want him, or Blanton more?

at 11:40 PM

Anonymous said...

You keep beating a dead horse. The Reds, in all the time that I can ever remember, have never had a core of young pitching prospects like they have now. Bailey, Volquez, Cueto, Maloney.

Aren't you the least bit curious to run these guys out there and see what they can do?

Throw that away for Joe Blanton? I think not.

at 3:36 PM

Anonymous said...

Hey Doc,

You never showed back up here to comment. I don't agree w/ your original premise (I commented above) but I'm curious what you thought of the arguments here?

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Wednesday, February 20, 2008

Winning is Overrated?

26 Comments: