Posted by toddcommish on 3/1/2012 12:06:00 PM (view original):
The biggest problem I have with BABIP and FIP is that there are multiple ways to achieve a low rate, thus rendering any analysis incomplete at best, grossly inaccurate at worst.
We've been throwing out examples of how a pitcher can have a fabulous BABIP or FIP, and still not be an effective pitcher.
And tec, it's 74.8% of stats that are fabricated. Over 98% of the experts agree on this.
BABIP only adds context. If one pitcher has an average ERA and WHIP and a second pitcher has a slightly lower ERA and WHIP, it might be easy to say that the second pitcher was better.
But if the second pitcher had a gold glover at every position behind him and the first pitcher had Mo Vaughn at every position behind him, it might make us take a closer look, right?
BABIP helps with that.
I'd be willing to bet the second pitcher with the gold glove defense would have a lower BABIP. That doesn't mean he's a better pitcher, he just had a better defense. Looking past stats dependent on BABIP (and using stats like FIP), allows us to evaluate the pitchers without noise from the defense (and luck).
3/1/2012 1:00 PM (edited)