Mike, since you're such a big fan of Sheehan's opinion, here's a piece he wrote where he specifically talks about what stats he likes to use in player evaluation:

http://www.joesheehan.com/?q=node/151

"For pitchers, it's about innings, run prevention and doing it yourself: strikeouts matter."

Posted by tecwrg on 2/25/2012 6:49:00 PM (view original):
At this point, I'm willing to agree about disagreeing with jrd about Carlton v. Hunter.  He is unmovable in his conviction about Carlton.  I have mounds of evidence that tell me that his performance is indistinguishable from Hunter's during the period in which their careers coincided, and that they were equals in talent.

On the other hand, jrd's reliance on and application of certain advanced statistics and his disregard of others show that in terms of baseball intelligence, he is massively retarded.  His "debate" skills involve avoiding direct answers to questions, rehashing the same flawed arguments over and over, and constant reiteration of the point he is unable to intelligently defend.  In short, he is an idiot.

Enjoy the rest of your weekend.

Says the guy who argued that Pitcher A (8 years of Roger Clemens) was better than PItcher B (8 years of Clemens plus 5 more).

I don't know if I'll be able to look myself in the mirror after being called an idiot by a guy who is dumber than a box of rocks.

Posted by Jtpsops on 2/25/2012 6:46:00 PM (view original):

Posted by jrd_x on 2/25/2012 6:43:00 PM (view original):
I've never argued that a pitcher didn't control location or that the pitch didn't affect contact.  Just that once contact is made, whether or not the ball becomes an out is not in the pitchers hands.

K, for one final attempt...let's try this a different way. Let's say you're right in a literal sense...the pitcher has no control because he's not (for the sake of this argument) the one fielding the ball.

 

Which has a better chance of being turned into an out - a ground ball on the infield, or a liner to the gap?

A ground ball.

But it's not binary.  Pitchers don't just give up all liners to the gap or ground balls.

Instead of think of it as two ground balls.  A pitcher can make a good pitch and the ball can easily be an out to the SS or a hit between the SS and the 3b.  The quality of the pitch doesn't change that, just luck.

We have the data for every pitch thrown for the last 60 years or so.  BABIP is out of the pitcher's hands.  

So why keep it?

Why don't we have a stat called MGSUSS - Most Games Started Under Sunny Skies?

I mean, the pitcher has absolutely no control over it, but it would be a fun stat, right? And we could even throw it into these discussions of a player's effectiveness as if it means something.

"Dude, Bob Wilson is the greatest pitcher of all time!"..."I dunno man. The numbers are there, but did you ever see John Johnson pitch?? It was always sunny for his games. Made him a hell of a lot of fun to watch."

Posted by jrd_x on 2/25/2012 6:50:00 PM (view original):

Posted by tecwrg on 2/25/2012 6:49:00 PM (view original):
At this point, I'm willing to agree about disagreeing with jrd about Carlton v. Hunter.  He is unmovable in his conviction about Carlton.  I have mounds of evidence that tell me that his performance is indistinguishable from Hunter's during the period in which their careers coincided, and that they were equals in talent.

On the other hand, jrd's reliance on and application of certain advanced statistics and his disregard of others show that in terms of baseball intelligence, he is massively retarded.  His "debate" skills involve avoiding direct answers to questions, rehashing the same flawed arguments over and over, and constant reiteration of the point he is unable to intelligently defend.  In short, he is an idiot.

Enjoy the rest of your weekend.

Says the guy who argued that Pitcher A (8 years of Roger Clemens) was better than PItcher B (8 years of Clemens plus 5 more).

I don't know if I'll be able to look myself in the mirror after being called an idiot by a guy who is dumber than a box of rocks.

This coming from the guy who continues to prove he doesn't know the difference between "more" and "better".

Posted by Jtpsops on 2/25/2012 7:15:00 PM (view original):

Posted by jrd_x on 2/25/2012 6:50:00 PM (view original):

Posted by tecwrg on 2/25/2012 6:49:00 PM (view original):
At this point, I'm willing to agree about disagreeing with jrd about Carlton v. Hunter.  He is unmovable in his conviction about Carlton.  I have mounds of evidence that tell me that his performance is indistinguishable from Hunter's during the period in which their careers coincided, and that they were equals in talent.

On the other hand, jrd's reliance on and application of certain advanced statistics and his disregard of others show that in terms of baseball intelligence, he is massively retarded.  His "debate" skills involve avoiding direct answers to questions, rehashing the same flawed arguments over and over, and constant reiteration of the point he is unable to intelligently defend.  In short, he is an idiot.

Enjoy the rest of your weekend.

Says the guy who argued that Pitcher A (8 years of Roger Clemens) was better than PItcher B (8 years of Clemens plus 5 more).

I don't know if I'll be able to look myself in the mirror after being called an idiot by a guy who is dumber than a box of rocks.

This coming from the guy who continues to prove he doesn't know the difference between "more" and "better".

How do you not get it that "more" is a component of "better?"

More doesn't always equal better as tec showed us with his Koufax/Moyer example.

But, as tec also showed us with his wonderful 8 seasons of Clemens vs 13 seasons of Clemens example, if two pitchers put up the exact same stats for x amount of years, one stops pitching, and the other continues to pitch at a high level for several more years, the guy who pitched longer is the better pitcher.

So, let's say for the sake of argument that Hunter was able to match Carlton's stats for the years he pitched - they were exactly the same stat wise from 65 to 79. And then Carlton went on to finish his career exactly as he did.  That would make Carlton the better pitcher.  Just like Clemens 8 vs Clemens 13.

And that would be generous to Hunter, since he wasn't better than Carlton in any stat other than WHIP...and well, we know how that goes.

Posted by Jtpsops on 2/25/2012 7:15:00 PM (view original):
So why keep it?

Why don't we have a stat called MGSUSS - Most Games Started Under Sunny Skies?

I mean, the pitcher has absolutely no control over it, but it would be a fun stat, right? And we could even throw it into these discussions of a player's effectiveness as if it means something.

"Dude, Bob Wilson is the greatest pitcher of all time!"..."I dunno man. The numbers are there, but did you ever see John Johnson pitch?? It was always sunny for his games. Made him a hell of a lot of fun to watch."

We already have that, it's called pitcher W/L.

Posted by jrd_x on 2/25/2012 6:43:00 PM (view original):
I've never argued that a pitcher didn't control location or that the pitch didn't affect contact.  Just that once contact is made, whether or not the ball becomes an out is not in the pitchers hands.

I'll go back about 30 pages.

Are all struck balls created equal?

Posted by MikeT23 on 2/25/2012 8:39:00 PM (view original):

Posted by jrd_x on 2/25/2012 6:43:00 PM (view original):
I've never argued that a pitcher didn't control location or that the pitch didn't affect contact.  Just that once contact is made, whether or not the ball becomes an out is not in the pitchers hands.

I'll go back about 30 pages.

Are all struck balls created equal?

No.

A pitcher can induce weak contact.  A pitcher can induce ground balls.  A pitcher can induce fly balls.  A pitcher can suppress home runs.  A pitcher can miss bats.

But a pitcher cannot control whether a ball in play becomes a hit or an out.  Which is why the career BABIP leaderboard isn't exactly a who's who of awesome pitchers.  (But the FIP leaderboard is)

For ****'s sake.  Inducing weak contact, ground balls, fly balls and supressing homeruns is no control?

This is exactly why I dismissed you as an idiot.

Hell, I showed you a chart where your precious BABIP is affected by location of the pitch.   You conceded that pitchers control location.    What else do you need to admit that pitchers largely control the AB?

Posted by MikeT23 on 2/25/2012 8:51:00 PM (view original):
For ****'s sake.  Inducing weak contact, ground balls, fly balls and supressing homeruns is no control?

This is exactly why I dismissed you as an idiot.

A. Home runs aren't ball in play.
B. Just because the pitcher induced weak contact doesn't mean the SS will be able to get to it.  At this point the skill of the defense and luck are the key factors.
C. If better pitchers were able to control balls in play, why are Mel Stottlemeyer, Charlie Hough, Dave Stieb, and Mike Cueller four of the ten best all time?
D. Why is the top ten FIP list a much better list of pitchers?

If I had to guess, I'd say those four didn't strike out a lot of batters. 

Not walking batters, not allowing them to hit it a long way and not allowing them to hit it all are things we learned in Little League.   If the top 10 FIP are the 10 best pitchers in history, you're onto something.  Otherwise, you're telling me something an ironworker who thought every batted ball qualified as a hit yelled at me when I was 7.

"B. Just because the pitcher induced weak contact doesn't mean the SS will be able to get to it.  At this point the skill of the defense and luck are the key factors."

Defense - yes. Luck, no.  If your defense sucks, they'll get errors - not allow hits. If their range is weak, then yes, a pitcher will give up more hits. But if he knows a lot of balls slip through his 3B and SS, he can pitch further inside so that the ball is pulled right at the 3B, or he can pitch away and try to get hitters to push the ball towards his good fielders.

And you're again assuming everything is reachable by a defender. I'll repeat (AGAIN) that even if you put the best person in terms of range at each position, a very big chunk of the field would still be out of any fielder's range. I'll concede that bloops and seeing eye singles can be fluky and are not necessarily the result of bad pitching, but those get cancelled out by scorching liners right at defenders. I'll bet 90% of basehits are struck cleanly through a hole, dropped into the OF in front of a fielder, or ripped to the gap. All of those occurrences are on the pitcher.

I'm still amused by jrd's assertion that home runs are completely the responsibility of the pitcher, yet balls in play are outside of his control.

As if there is a drastic difference in the pitcher's role in inducing a line drive that clears the outfield wall by six inches, and a line drive that hits six inches from the top and stays in play.

That's simply retarded.