October 10, 2011

Staying Out of Trouble

When I looked at Shaun Marcum‘s stats today, it struck me that he kept himself out of trouble by not facing too many batters with runners in scoring position. It turns out he was just slightly above average, but I thought the data was interesting. The following table shows all pitchers with at least 600 batters faced in 2011, the number they faced with men in scoring position, and the percentage of total PA with men in scoring position:

Pitcher Batters Faced RISP BF RISP Pct
James Shields 975 157 16.1
Josh Tomlin 662 109 16.5
Justin Verlander 969 167 17.2
Jered Weaver 926 164 17.7
Michael Pineda 696 130 18.7
Cliff Lee 920 174 18.9
Jordan Zimmermann 662 126 19.0
Alexi Ogando 693 132 19.0
Colby Lewis 839 165 19.7
Joshua Collmenter 621 123 19.8
Mark Buehrle 858 170 19.8
Clayton Kershaw 912 183 20.1
Joe Saunders 874 177 20.3
Chris Carpenter 996 202 20.3
Derek Holland 843 172 20.4
Cole Hamels 850 174 20.5
Brandon McCarthy 690 143 20.7
Bronson Arroyo 855 178 20.8
Ricky Romero 917 193 21.0
Max Scherzer 833 176 21.1
Philip Humber 676 143 21.2
Bartolo Colon 694 147 21.2
Mike Leake 693 148 21.4
Yovani Gallardo 865 186 21.5
Dan Haren 953 205 21.5
Kevin Correia 660 142 21.5
Jeff Karstens 668 144 21.6
Gavin Floyd 798 173 21.7
Doug Fister 875 192 21.9
David Price 918 205 22.3
Shaun Marcum 823 184 22.4
Zack Greinke 715 160 22.4
Javier Vazquez 798 179 22.4
Hiroki Kuroda 838 188 22.4
Bruce Chen 654 147 22.5
Chris Capuano 802 181 22.6
Kyle Lohse 775 175 22.6
C.J. Wilson 915 208 22.7
Tim Hudson 884 201 22.7
Jeremy Hellickson 774 176 22.7
Ted Lilly 800 182 22.8
Gio Gonzalez 864 197 22.8
Josh Beckett 767 175 22.8
Tim Stauffer 777 179 23.0
Madison Bumgarner 844 195 23.1
Jon Lester 799 186 23.3
Johnny Cueto 631 147 23.3
Jason Vargas 857 200 23.3
CC Sabathia 985 230 23.4
John Danks 728 170 23.4
Luke Hochevar 835 195 23.4
Chris Narveson 699 164 23.5
Wandy Rodriguez 808 191 23.6
Wade Davis 795 188 23.6
Mat Latos 799 189 23.7
John Lannan 808 192 23.8
Ryan Vogelsong 752 179 23.8
Ivan Nova 704 168 23.9
Brandon Morrow 777 186 23.9
Brian Duensing 711 171 24.1
Kyle McClellan 607 146 24.1
Aaron Harang 719 173 24.1
Ian Kennedy 900 217 24.1
Jeremy Guthrie 889 216 24.3
Ervin Santana 949 232 24.4
Chris Volstad 719 176 24.5
Justin Masterson 908 223 24.6
Joel Pineiro 631 155 24.6
Matt Harrison 772 190 24.6
Brett Myers 917 226 24.6
Roy Halladay 933 230 24.7
Paul Maholm 687 171 24.9
Anibal Sanchez 830 208 25.1
Zachary Britton 666 167 25.1
Matt Garza 839 211 25.1
Jhoulys Chacin 827 208 25.2
Daniel Hudson 921 232 25.2
Jair Jurrjens 627 158 25.2
Livan Hernandez 751 190 25.3
Nick Blackburn 670 171 25.5
Tim Lincecum 900 230 25.6
R.A. Dickey 876 225 25.7
Carl Pavano 955 247 25.9
Jaime Garcia 826 214 25.9
Felix Hernandez 964 250 25.9
Jason Hammel 739 192 26.0
Carlos Zambrano 634 165 26.0
Ryan Dempster 881 230 26.1
Randy Wolf 903 237 26.2
Trevor Cahill 901 238 26.4
Rick Porcello 784 208 26.5
Freddy Garcia 626 167 26.7
Bud Norris 795 213 26.8
Tyler Chatwood 633 170 26.9
James McDonald 754 204 27.1
Chad Billingsley 829 225 27.1
Ubaldo Jimenez 822 224 27.3
Mike Pelfrey 860 236 27.4
Ricky Nolasco 891 245 27.5
J.A. Happ 698 192 27.5
Brad Penny 803 221 27.5
Matt Cain 907 250 27.6
Fausto Carmona 833 230 27.6
Jake Westbrook 809 224 27.7
Tim Wakefield 677 188 27.8
Jeff Francis 803 223 27.8
Dillon Gee 706 199 28.2
A.J. Burnett 837 237 28.3
Jo-Jo Reyes 641 182 28.4
Jonathon Niese 694 199 28.7
Edwin Jackson 861 247 28.7
Derek Lowe 830 239 28.8
John Lackey 743 226 30.4
Charlie Morton 769 245 31.9

Note that quite a few Cy Young contenders reside at the top of the list. One likely reason for James Shields and Justin Verlander going so deep in games is they seldom gave a manager a reason to take them out. A manager pulls a pitcher when he show signs of tiring, or gets in trouble late. By keeping batters and runners out of scoring position, those pitchers allowed themselves to face a few extra batters, and in the case of Shields it led to a very high complete game total.

There is a huge difference between CC Sabathia (23.4%) and Justin Verlander (17.2%), by the way. FanGraphs rates CC ahead of Justin in terms of WAR, but this is another example of why that’s wrong. Justin stayed out of trouble, and CC had to pitch out of trouble constantly. In the case of pitching against a good offense (like the Red Sox), that didn’t pan out well.

Pirates fans should also worry a little about Charlie Morton’s “good” season. As John Lackey and A.J. Burnett show, if you keep putting players in scoring position, they often come around to score.

1 thought on “Staying Out of Trouble

  1. Brett Carow

    Brewers:
    Gallardo 21.5%
    Marcum 22.4
    Greinke 22.4
    Narveson 23.5
    Wolf 26.2

    Cardinals:
    Carpenter 20.3
    Lohse 22.6
    McClellan 24.1
    Garcia 25.9
    Westbrook 27.7
    Jackson 28.7

    Probably a close correlation to WHIP?

    ReplyReply

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