Yanks Pen A Gang Of Two?
Posted by Steve L. on August 12th, 2009 · Comments (15)
Here’s how the Yankees bullpen has done since June 23rd:
Pitcher G W L Sv IP ERA K9 BB9 HR9 Brian Bruney 14 1 0 0 13.3 7.42 9.45 6.75 2.70 Phil Coke 22 3 0 0 18.0 7.00 7.50 3.00 1.50 David Robertson 17 1 1 1 17.3 4.67 11.94 4.15 1.56 Alfredo Aceves 13 3 0 1 26.3 4.10 6.15 2.05 1.37 Mark Melancon 5 0 1 0 8.0 2.25 5.62 1.12 0.00 Phil Hughes 19 1 1 1 22.3 1.21 11.28 2.01 0.00 Mariano Rivera 21 0 0 18 21.3 0.42 9.28 1.69 0.42
Some notes: Melancon has not pitched all that much since the Yankees took off back in Atlanta on June 23rd. So, basically, the pen has been Rivera, Hughes, Aceves, Robertson, Coke and Bruney.
But, of those latter six, only Rivera and Hughes have been outstanding during this time. Aceves and Robertson have been so-so. And, Coke and Bruney have been very bad. So, should the Yankees be concerned about their bullpen? What happens if their big starters – Sabathia, Burnett and Pettitte can’t go seven innings every time and then turn the game over to Hughes and Rivera?
Not worried at all. Yeah, Bruney’s been bad, and Robertson has been so-so, but Aceves and Coke both have 2 outings skewing their numbers, which is why ERA is not a great stat for evaluating relievers. Coke has 22 appearances since that date, and has allowed runs in just 5. An outing where he turned a 3 run deficit into a 9 run deficit has killed his ERA, but he has pitched pretty well. Same with Aceves- he had back to back bad appearances, but otherwise he has been pretty excellent. His WHIP for that period, including his two bad outings and his one start, is a bit under 1.
FWIW, Aceves and Coke have had very few “shut down” outings out of the pen for the Yanks, all season:
http://www.bb-ref.com/play-index/shareit/hbuF
They both have WHIP’s of 1.15 or lower. It is not like they are allowing a lot of baserunners, Steve, so I would say it is not worth much. I doubt very many teams have a guy like Aceves as the third best guy in their pen, and you can do a lot worse than Coke as your lefty.
@ yagottagotomo1:
agreed as far as rate stats for a reliever not being the best indicator of success…for instance if u take the 1 really bad appearance in that high scoring game vs. the angels on july 11 out, robertson’s whip drops to 1.31 (not great but better) and his ERA down to 3.38 which i’d take
Oh, so, we take out the stats that we don’t like – and people call me a cherry-picker!
Steve, I didn’t take anything out. All I noted is that their poor ERA’s are skewed by few bad outings rather than a larger number of middling outings, and that I therefore have faith in them.
@ yagottagotomo1:Corey said “u take the 1 really bad appearance in that high scoring game vs. the angels on july 11 out”
I never said that you said it.
Some context is in order:
I did searches on all 30 teams for the number of relief appearances >= 1 IP, and then >= 1P AND 0 Base Runners.
Then, I checked all 30 teams to find the closer and best setup reliever (on some teams, the best setup guy was a somewhat subjective call)
First: the overall major league averages. The average major league team has had 176 relief appearances of 1 inning or more, not counting closers and #1 set-up relievers. The average number of shutdowns per team is 38. The average percentage of shutdown innings is 21.7%
The teams with greatest number of >= 1 IP games is the Padres, at 229, followed by the A’s and the Dodgers. Not surprisingly, those three teams are also the top 3 in shutdown innings, although the Dodgers were tied with the A’s in that category.
The Yankees have had 179 innings of >= 1 IP, and of these, 38 were shutdowns. The Yanks rank 15th in such innings, 17th in shutdowns, and 20th in percentage at 21.2%
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Is this measure indicative of a quality team?
The Padres have the highest percentage at 26.6%, The Cards are the only current playoff team in the top 5; they’re 2nd at 26.4%. However, they also have the fewest appearances of >= 1IP, so that might be a function of LaRussa’s extreme use of short relief appearances.(i.e., a very quick trigger; give up a runner, and you’re out of there, long before you can finish an inning).
The Dodgers and Rockies are in 6th and 7th, they are the only other playoff teams in the top 10.
Where are the other top teams?
The Red Sox are 15th at 22.4%; the Phillies are 16th at 22.2%; the Angels are 22nd at 20.2%; the White Sox (not really a top team, but put in here because they “became a good team” by beating the Yanks three games in a row) are 24th at 18.5%, and the Tigers (not really a top team, but inserted here because they’re still a playoff team, as of today) are 26th at 17.4%
So, is this measure indicative of a quality team, no, not really, in my opinion.
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Are these differences significant?
Well, if to reach the same percentage the Cards have achieved, the Yanks would need another 9 or 10 shutdown innings, or about 1 shutdown inning every 11 or 12 games or so. The difference between the Yanks and the vaunted Red Sox pen, “the best bullpen in major league baseball” is 2 shutdown innings, or 1 inning every 55 games or so.
So, no, it doesn’t seem to me that these differences are very significant.
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In my next try, I’ll use scoreless innings, instead of innings without a baserunner.
Oops. Forgot to mention the 3rd step in the study; I removed the innings and shutdown innings for the closer and top setup guy from the team totals (and did the same with Rivera and Hughes).
Sorry; something seems to have gone wrong with the counts from my searches; I’m double checking now. My results above may be way off on some teams. I’ll be back later when I figure this out.
OK, I’ve double checked the figures, and what I think went wrong is that on the top 2 relievers, I only used games in which they pitched exactly 1 inning in the 1st search, nor 1 +.
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Taking it from the top, the average number of relief appearances from pitchers other than the nominal closer and top set-up man is 160 per team. The average number of baserunner shutdowns is 38. The % of shutdown appearances is then 23.7%.
The top 3 teams in appearances are the Padres, Marlins and Nationals. The Yanks are 17th with 158.
The top 3 teams in shutdown appearances are Padres, Athletics and Dodges (same totals at in post #8 above),
The top 5 teams in shutdown percentage from other than the top two relievers:
1. Dodgers 30.1%
2. Rays 29.3%
3. Diamondbacks 29.2%
4. Athletics 29.1%
5. Padres 28.8%
As for the other playoff teams, the Cards are 8th, the Rockies are 10th, the Red Sox are 12th (25.6%), the Yanks are 15th (slightly above average at 24.1%), the Phillies are 19th, the Angels are 22nd, the White Sox are 3rd, and the Tigers are 25th.
Top have a percentage as good as the Red Sox, the Yanks would still need just 2 more shutdown innings, or 1 additional inning every 55 games or so. To get to the Dogers’ level, they’d need 10 more, or about 1 more every 11 games or so.
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OK, now that a good structure for reliability is in place, I’ll turn to runs scored next.
Ok, for scoreless innings:
The league average number of scoreless appearances of 1 inning or more by relievers other than the closer and top set up man, per team, is 110.5, for a scoreless appearance percentage of 69.0
The top 3 teams in scoreless appearances of 1 inning or more are the Padres, Dodgers and Marlins. The Yanks are 35th at 102.
The top 3 teams in scoreless appearance percentage are the Dodgers, Rays and Marlins. For the other playoff team, the Red Sox are 5th, the Phillies are 11th, the Cards are 19th, the White Sox are 20th, the Angels are 23rd, the Tigers are 25th, and the Rockies are 28th (which explains the trades for Betancourt and Beimel, who I listed as the top setup men for the Indians and Nationals, respectively)
To get where the Red Sox are, the Yanks would need to have an additional 16 scoreless innings, or about 1 a week. This starts to become a significant difference. They’d need 28 to catch the Dodgers, or about 1 every 4 games.
So maybe “shutdown” isn’t the right criterion to show the difference between the parts of the bullpens that are not “front-line”. Maybe the right criterion is “effective”.
It would really help the Yanks if their middle/set-up relievers were more consistently effective in keeping runs off the board. That’s not really the “Well, duhhhhh!” statement that it appears to be. The Yanks could really use more consistently effective work from the middle and back of their pen.
Of course, if Bruney was to recover his reliability from before his injuries, that would go a long way toward closing this gap.
Part III – WXRL…
(No, not the little country music radio station broadcasting out of Lancaster, NY)
WXRL is Baseball Prospectus’ stat which shows the equivalent of WPA for hitters. It is the “wins gained” based on the game score/inning/runners on/outs situation that a reliever has pitched in, adjusted for the ability level of the hitters faced, and their position in the lineup, and compared to average production of a replacement-level pitcher. (This has NOTHING to do with a team’s offense. The “state” of the game at the time of a reliever’s entry is compared to the state at end of the inning. Same for any subsequent innings he pitches, until he exits. What runs the offense does or does not score for him while he’s in the game is thereby eliminated from the wins gained total.)
I added up the WRXL for all pitchers on each team who had thrown 20 innings on the season (to elmiminate the Anthony Claggetts of the baseball world), but did not add in the figures for the closer and top set up man.
The best WXRL total in the majors for relievers, excluding the closer or top set up man, is held by the Marlins, at +4.299 wins. 2nd is the Rangers at +3.769 wins. The Yankees are 3rd at +3.705.
That’s right, 3rd in all of MLB.
The other playoff teams:
Phillies: 6th at +3.481 wins
Red Sox: 9th at + 3.196 wins
Dodgers: 13th at + 1.838 wins
Cards: 15th at 1.606 wins
Tigers: 22nd at +1.006 wins
Angels: 25th at +0.534 wins
White Sox: 26th at +0.516 wins
Rockies: 27th at +0.143 wins
Biggest surprise? The Rays, who are 4th at +3.491 wins.
The only minus teams are the Indians, the Nationals, and the Royals. No surprise they’re among the worst teams in the majors; their bulk of their relievers are below replacement level.
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So, is the back of the Yanks’ pen a strength or a weakness? You be the judge.
Jeez; two typos in #12 above….
Yanks are 15th in scoreless relief appearances of 1 or more innings, not 35th.
Also, completely omitted them in the scoreless relief percentage discussion, they’re 25th at 64.6%, and the Tigers were actually 24th, not 25th.
…and one last thing: inherited runners.
The percentage of inherited runners that relievers have allowed to score in the AL as a whole this season is 35%.
The Yanks have the lowest percentage of inherited runners scoring at 28.3% (49 of 173 inherited runners have scored).
The other AL playoff teams: Angels are 2nd at 28.5%; Red Sox are 3rd at 30.3%, White Sox are 7th at 35.4%, Tigers are 9th at 36.4%, and the Rangers are 11th at 37.2%
Mariano has been right near the team average at 27.8% (5 of 18). Phil Hughes has been outstanding at 9.1% (1 of 11). Albaladejo has actually done well, 4 of 17 for 23.5%. Coke (10 for 40) and Bruney (2 for
check in at 25%, Aceves’ rate is higher than team average at 33.3% (6 of 18). Robertson (41%, 9 of 22) and Melancon (44.4%, 4 of 9) have done poorly so far. The five in the back of the pen have combined to allow 31 of 97 to score, or 32.0%. This is worse than the team average, but better than the AL league average.
Some interesting numbers among the “not here”: Marte: 60% (3 of 5), Ramirez 28.6% (4 of 14), and amazingly enough, neither Jose Veras nor Brett Tomko allowed an inherited runner to score this season while with the Yanks. Veras has 4 runners; Tomko had 6.