OUR PITCHERS ARE REALLY GOOD: Or, why we would have the best record in baseball if our offense didn't screw them over
The idea was brought up in yesterday's postgame thread (after TImmy's mediocre performance against the Braves) that in general a team should win most games where the starting pitcher goes 7 or more innings while giving up 2 earned runs or less. Yeah, I know a 'quality start' is 6IP, less than 3ER... but that's pretty weak and doesn't necessarily guarantee a win. But 2ER... most teams should be able to score at least two runs over a nine inning baseball game on most occasions. Most teams. Every team... except the Giants apparently. It sure seems like they manage to lose a lot of games where the pitchers make one mistake here or a mistake there. Or no mistakes at all. But is it really as often as we think or does it just feel that way since we have to suffer through each and every game? I thought I'd look into this all and got a little carried away, so bear with me while I divulge what I found...
TIMMY:
3/31 v LAD – 7IP. 0ER
6/29 v CHC – 7IP. 1ER
7/20 v LAD – 7IP. 1ER
8/2 v ARI – 7IP. 2ER
8/18 v ATL – 7IP. 1ER
CAINER:
6/19 v OAK – 7IP. 1ER
6/30 v CHC – 7IP. 0ER
8/6 v PHI – 8IP. 1ER
MADBUM:
5/2 v WSN – 7IP. 0ER
6/4 v COL – 7IP. 1ER
6/9 v CIN – 7IP. 1ER
8/4 v PHI – 8IP. 1ER
8/15 v ATL – 7IP. 2ER
VOGEY:
5/26 v FLA – 8IP. 1ER
7/8 v NYM – 7IP. 2ER
DURRTY:
5/28 v MIL – 7IP. 2ER
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Look at all those wasted gems. Pretty damn dismal. That's some serious wasted opportunity there, not to mention no wonder all our starters have terrible looking win-loss records. For their efforts in those games...
Timmy got 4 Losses and 1 No Decision
Cain got 1 Loss and 2 ND
Madbum got 4 Losses and 1 ND
Vogey got 1 Loss and 1 ND
Durrty got a ND
thanks a lot for all your hard work guys!
- - - - - -
But hey, maybe there's a bright side, I thought. I mean it feels like they win a lot of those awesomely pitched games too right? So, I thought I'd look it up and compare. And I found that our starters have gone 7IP allowing no more than 2 earned runs 42 TIMES THIS YEAR.
Timmy has done it 13 of his 26 starts (and has a 11-10 record how...?)
Cain has done it 10 times
Bum has done it 11 times
Vogey has done it 5 times
Zeets has done it 2 times
Durrty did it Once…
And how many wins do they have to show for what would be considered excellent contributions to a game? In those 42 starts TImmy (7), Cain (6), Bum (5), Vogey (3), Zeets (1), and Sanchey (0) have combined for 22 wins. 22. That's it. That's just barely over half. And while I was on a roll, I decided to look up Roy Halladay's stats to see how they compare in such situations.
Roy Halladay has 13 starts where he went 7IP or more and gave up no more than 2ER. Same number as Timmy.
From those starts Halladay got 11 wins, 1 ND, and 1 Loss… :[ If Timmy were to win these kind of starts at a similar ratio to the Doc, his record would be 15-7 as opposed to 11-10 and maybe he would be in Cy Young talks again this year.
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But anyways, back to what really matters. WINS. I'm sure all of our starters would gladly take their No Decisions with smiles in those games if the team got a win. So I went back to looking at the team results in such games regardless of whether the starting pitcher got a win, loss, or ND.
In games where the starting pitcher went 7IP or more, and gave of 2 ER or less
the Giants as a team went 22 for 42, a winning percentage of .523
the Phillies as a team went 43 for 51, a winning percentage of .843
NOW THAT IS STAGGERING. and depressing. if the giants had managed to win at the same percentage as the phillies when their starters went 7IP with less than 2ER… THEY WOULD HAVE 13 ADDITIONAL WINS. 13!!!! add those wins to their record and what do you have? 80 WINS. same number as the phillies have right now.
there you have it folks… the difference between the teams records can basically be explained by this, the Giants inability to win those games when thier starters have given them a more than decent shot. If the giants had just managed to win at a decent clip when their starters were exceptional, when most other teams would have no problem winning, they would be tied for the best record in baseball…
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Brian Sabean is history's greatest monster
Sabean has no clue how to build an offense.
When Bonds was on the team Sabean usually surrounded him with garbage. Sabean wasted arguably the best hitter in the history of MLB.
Now that the team has stellar pitching we can’t even get close to league average offense.
Grab your pitchforks!
TGWTWS...there isn't much else that needs to be said
Oy. Just...oy.
Is it me or did it seem like our hitters were phoning it in last night? Nothing seemed to be thought out. My mother-in-law was watching the game with me, and even she noticed it.
Please let last night be the “rock bottom” they had to hit before “recovering”.
As Bar None said – brutal. Thanks for your post.
NorCal passion trapped in SoCal pain...
I wanna rage.
The conisistency of offensive incompetence
makes it seem as though it would be nearly impossible to achieve without actually trying to be awful.
Relief! I Thank you for your Lefferts.
Buster Posey & Freddy Sanchez are out for the season.
Ta-da!!!
Get well soon, most of the Giants roster!
Nice research!
/hangs self
Proud parent of SD-born Shane Loux.
If Cain is with us, who can be against us? - atxgiantsfan
I’m opting for the more traditional McCoven technique of throwing one’s self down the stairs.
Hitting 74 on the radar gun but hitting my spots.
by VidaWantsYourCar on Aug 19, 2011 11:06 AM PDT up reply actions
When the Giants score four runs or more, in 2011, they are 40-6. Since the beginning of last year, they are 109-18. Imagine how good we’d be if we had a good offense.
But then they wouldn’t be the Giants.
by WasabiTorture on Aug 19, 2011 10:41 AM PDT reply actions 4 recs
I'm sometimes amazed at my own pessimism this year
I mean, we’re still in the mix. If Huff heats up, Beltran heals, well, stranger things have happened.
"Bruce Wayne is the Brian Wilson of Gotham." -DrDC
Excellent post
I’m a bit confused about your numbers, though. If there have been 42 games where the starters have gone 7IP and given up 2 runs or fewer, and they’ve won 22 of those games and lost 16 of those games, what about the other four games?
Your general point still stands, however. I will now light myself on fire.
"I could hear the angry MCC cacophany in my head."--Oldjacket, 7/4/10
Starters got 16 losses
Relievers presumably got the other 4.
Giants baseball: Together We're Crippled
by TheAntiBork on Aug 19, 2011 11:31 AM PDT up reply actions
or maybe that's it. that makes more sense.
though i did do this at 3am so it’s possible i made a mistake…
by you'vejustbeenCAINED on Aug 19, 2011 11:37 AM PDT up reply actions
YOU'RE RIGHT!
i miscounted. it’s actually 26 for 42. i’ll go change it right now.
by you'vejustbeenCAINED on Aug 19, 2011 11:32 AM PDT up reply actions
I'd love to see league average rate inserted, instead.
I’d love to know the league win% when a starter goes 7IP, 2ER. I don’t think it’d be as high as the Phillies. But it might be close to 75% or so. I think that’s a much better number to plug in for this kind of analysis than the Phillies win%.
I thought about this also
so i started compiling the info for that last night. almost done…
by you'vejustbeenCAINED on Aug 19, 2011 11:57 AM PDT up reply actions
I'n only doing the NL though cause it was taking me forever
but should still give us a pretty good idea
by you'vejustbeenCAINED on Aug 19, 2011 11:58 AM PDT up reply actions
Donno what else you expected to find
Similar ERA’s, not so similar offensive numbers, different records.
Difference between Giants and Phillies, consistent offense.
One more factor: poor fielding
Giants rank 13th out of 16 NL teams in errors (86) and 12th in % of unearned runs (43 out of 437 runs allowed = 9.8%). In other words, for every 9 runs our stingy staff allows, the defense gives away 1.
By the way, who is best in both categories? Philadelphia, with 53 errors and 4.8% unearned runs.
The only NL team that is worse on both measures? Houston, with 92 errors and 10.2% unearned runs.
Giants baseball: Together We're Crippled
I think our fielding is fine
The only players I don’t feel particularly confident in are Tejada, Cabrera, Whiteside, and Fontenot at SS/3B. There are a few borderline guys like Huff, Keppinger, and Rowand, but then there’s Torres, Sandoval, Sanchez, Posey, Belt, Ross, Schierholtz, and Crawford. We’re 9th in UZR and 11th in UZR/150 in MLB (4th and 4th in the NL) – overall above-average though not spectacular. Eyeballing it may not be a great way to evaluate defense, but fielding percentage is probably worse.
Seth Rosin can hit the side of a barn with a baseball. From space.
Giants baseball: We're stupid enough to WIN that (TM)
I think evaluating the team's defensive ability by errors/fielding percentage isn't a good idea.
but saying that the amount of errors the team has made this year, regardless of how good they actually are as fielders, has hurt us, I think, is fair.
However, the league average for percentage of unearned runs is 8.79, so the giants aren’t very fair off of league average in that category. For a contender, however, it’s a pretty poor showing.
Adopted Giant: Mike Fontenot
He's like Grant, but fun size.
Well, any nonzero error count is bad just because errors are bad, and it hurts you even if the other team doesn’t score – best case scenario after an error is a one-pitch out, but that’s still one more pitch your pitcher had to throw that they shouldn’t have, and one more pitch they can’t throw at the end of the game or that could result in an injury.
The team’s .982 fielding percentage is kinda bad, but even if you’re going to take issue with that I think once again the injuries are largely to blame – we’ve had so many guys playing out of position because we needed them to, and I think that’s really hurt our error rate. For example:
Fontenot has most of his innings at short and carries a .959 there
Rowand has a bunch of innings in left and has a .969 there
Nate has a .941 in LF
Then you’ve just got some bad players (Tejada with a .949 at SS) and some shenanigans (Pablo with a .960)
Seth Rosin can hit the side of a barn with a baseball. From space.
Giants baseball: We're stupid enough to WIN that (TM)
pablo is not nearly as good a first baseman
as he is a third baseman. i’d be willing to bet some of his errors are over there. this is just by the eye test, but he seems much more comfortable/exceptional over at third.
by you'vejustbeenCAINED on Aug 20, 2011 2:43 PM PDT up reply actions
And yet
That’s his percentage at 3B. He hasn’t made an error as a 1B since 2009, and his career number at 1B is .991 but at 3B it’s .961.
Pablo is certainly a better 3B than 1B, though that’s just because he has a great arm and it’s wasted at 1B, and he is a pretty good 3B IMO. Fielding percentage is just stupid.
Seth Rosin can hit the side of a barn with a baseball. From space.
Giants baseball: We're stupid enough to WIN that (TM)
I have my stairs ready.
"He knocks a stake through the heart of the Cardinals! The Cardinals are dead! The Giants are going to the World Series!!!" -Jon Miller
It's Posey time!!
My Adopted Squirrel: Heath Hembree
Number of games from 2010-present in which the Giants have given up 2ER or less
128
The Phillies?
120
by bernardking on Aug 20, 2011 10:44 AM PDT reply actions 2 recs
Concerning defense:
I have a program under development that rates team defense by essentially seeing how many runs an average defense would gain or lose over the season instead of the actual defense.
If anyone wants to look at it, the URL is:
http://highboskage.com/PHP/test/defense.php
The teams are displayed in order of quality of fielding, best first. For each team, there are two stat lines: the top one is the actual (where Q is number of outs, which is just IP x 3) and the second one is what would result if the defense were perfectly average. The last two stats are the difference in runs saved or cost, and that figure pro-rated to a full season.
As I write, San Francisco’s defense appears to be costing the team 31 seasonal runs compared to an MLB-average defense, which is about three wins’ worth; it is the second-worst in the NL, with only the Reds trailing.
I repeat that this is still experimental, but I am thinking it is probably pretty accurate. (But, for example, it doesn’t distinguish between leagues.)
Professional baseball analyst since 1980.
Wir sind gewohnt, daß die Menschen verhöhnen was sie nicht verstehn.—Goethe

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