Starting Pitchers and Game Scores
Posted by Chris - 11/07/08 at 10:07 amAfter my post on WPA Plots — which you can find here — I had some interest in plotting Game Scores. Because I love visual aids, I decided to plot them for the Giants’ starters of Barry Zito, Matt Cain, Tim Lincecum, and Jonathan Sanchez. I didn’t include Correia or Pat Misch because they’ve both shared 5th starter duties this year and with Correia’s injury issues, I just excluded that rotation spot.
The ‘Game Score’ is a metric devised by Bill James that attempts to quantify how dominating a starting pitcher was in a game. It’s a simple calculation and it’s available freely on both Baseball Reference and ESPN.
From the Wikipedia entry on Game Scores, here’s how you calculate them:
- Start with 50 points.
- Add 1 point for each out recorded, so 3 points for every complete inning pitched.
- Add 2 points for each inning completed after the 4th.
- Add 1 point for each strikeout.
- Subtract 2 points for each hit allowed.
- Subtract 4 points for each earned run allowed.
- Subtract 2 points for each unearned run allowed.
- Subtract 1 point for each walk.
This metric does have a couple of problems when you consider the way the scores are counted. Strikeout pitchers will constantly score higher and because modern pitchers strikeout more hitters, they’ll outrank their historic counterparts who struck out fewer hitters. It also doesn’t consider the defense that the starting pitcher must play with. The pitcher is penalized both for runs, unearned runs, and hits given up, when those can be factors of a poor defense or just plain bad luck.
But, on the whole, it’s a fun metric that can be used to easily compare starts between pitchers. Each plot has the game score from each game started — I did not include Lincecum’s relief effort because, well, it wasn’t a start — and the baseline of 50 that each game starts at.
On to the plots!
Highest Game Score: 66 (tie)
Lowest Game Score: 11
Average Game Score: 43
Zito’s had two Game Scores of 66 for his best games of the year. They were on June 25th and his 10K performance on July 5th. His worst Game Score was on April 27th against the Cincinnati Reds, he gave up 8 earned runs in 3 innings.
Highest Game Score: 85
Lowest Game Score: 10
Average Game Score: 53
Cain’s best Game Score of the year was his dominant 10K game against the Cubs on July 1st. In that game he pitched 8 innings while giving up 2 hits, 3 walks, and 0 runs. His worst Game Score was April 18th start against the St. Louis Cardinals. In that game he gave up 9 earned runs in 3.2 innings pitched.
Highest Game Score: 75
Lowest Game Score: 40
Average Game Score: 59
Lincecum’s best Game Score was a recent game, his 11K duel against Justin Duchscherer and the Oakland Athletics on June 28th. His worst Game Score was his last start against the Mets on July 8th.
Highest Game Score: 79
Lowest Game Score: 23
Average Game Score: 53
Sanchez had his best Game Score of the year on April 25th when he went 8 innings against the Reds. In that game he gave up 4 hits, 1 earned run, 1 walk, and struck out 10 hitters. His worst start of the year was on June 12th against the Colorado Rockies. In that game he gave up 7 earned runs in 5 innings pitched, it was a classic 10-7 Coors Field game that Sanchez actually got the win for.
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These plots mirror the WPA Plots a lot. Zito has been bad, Cain up-and-down, Lincecum has been great, and Sanchez has had flashes of brilliance — even though he’s run into a couple of tough games lately. One thing that I’m worried about after working with these plots is how the Giants are going to handle Sanchez’s workload in the 2nd half of the season. He’s thrown 111 innings already this year and last year, between AAA and the majors, he threw 75.2 innings in total. 23.2 of those 75.2 innings came from Fresno and I’m a believer that major league innings induce more stress and create more wear and tear on a pitchers arm.
Sanchez’s development has been one of the few bright spots in this season and the Giants have to keep him healthy for this year and next.
I was surprised that Barry Zito didn’t have the lowest Game Score, Matt Cain inched him out by 1 point. Only 26.4% of Barry Zito’s starts have been at or over the 50 point baseline. Compare that to 63.1% for Cain, 63.1% for Sanchez, and 83.3% for Lincecum. Though, keep in mind that these are extremely basic percentages. I’d rather look at the distribution of their scores from the baseline but I’m currently away from my spreadsheet program. If I have time later, I’ll add them in the comments section.
Likewise, Lincecum could also have some workload concerns for this year — despite his freak nature and college workload — that the Giants should monitor and keep close eye on him. Not that they aren’t already doing that, but they’ve done some things with Lincecum this year that’s made me scratch my head, especially after they were very careful with him last year — shutting him down early, etc.
Comment Starter: Concerned about any workloads for the starters? And what do the Giants exactly do with Sanchez in the 2nd half? It seems careless to keep running him out there but at the same time, I’d hate to see them just sit him down after he’s made some really good progress as a starter.
July 11th, 2008 at 10:54 am
I hate summer repeats…
j/k, but i did just read the abbreviated version of this over at McC.
Is the 75 innings for Sanchez a previous career high? I don’t know squat about biomechanics or anything, but going from 75 to 200ish innings sounds like a recipe for dead arm to me. Maybe there’s a not-serious-injury-related trip to the DL in Dirty’s future. Call up Henn, I don’t care, but don’t shred Jonathan’s arm this season!!
July 11th, 2008 at 11:03 am
Yeah, I posted it over there, too!
Sometimes I’ll do that because I wanted to share it and not everyone at McC reads BCB.
Sanchez’s innings total might be slightly higher for last year because I think he pitched in winter ball or the AFL, or something, but I can’t find any totals if he did. At most, he probably tacked on 30-some innings, which brings him to around 100 for last year, if he did pitch in such a league.
I’ve always thought that Sanchez was unfairly pegged as an injury risk because of his size, despite that he threw 125 innings in ‘05 as a starter. The Giants then started to move him around between starting and relieving and he never built upon those 125 innings.
Here’s his total innings per year (includes minors and majors).
2004 - 48 IP
2005 - 125.2 IP
2006 - 95 IP (55 in the minors, 40 in the majors)
2007 - 75.2 IP (23.2 in the minors, 52 in the majors )
2008 - 111 IP (on pace for over 200 IP)
These totals don’t have any winter league stuff in them because I can’t readily find the information.
Put aside the debate of whether or not major league innings are more stressful than minor league innings (which I think they are) and you can see that Sanchez is heading into new territory as far as workloads for him go. I definitely want to protect his arm, but it’s a tricky situation. Do you sit him when he’s had such good success? Or do you continue to start him? Use a 6-man rotation?
I’m really not sure right now and I wonder if the Giants have any idea?
July 11th, 2008 at 11:20 am
“I wonder if the Giants have any idea?”
One can only hope that Tidrow or someone else not named Bochy, Righetti, or Sabean is paying attention to these things, or we might have a Situation Mark Prior in our future. Six-man rotation seems like a fine idea, but Boulderdome would NEVER go for it (That’s not playing the game the right way!).
Jeebus, please don’t let them end Dirrrrty’s career!
July 11th, 2008 at 12:13 pm
Nice. I was wondering how these graphs would turn out.
I’m surprised Lincy’s graph isn’t a little more drastic. He seems to hover pretty consistently between 50-70. With all his K’s, you’d think (I’d think) he’d have hit 80 at least a coupla times this year. Otherwise, it’s just as expected.
As far as Sanchez, I’m not worried. At some point you have to turn these kids loose. Admittedly it’s a huge jump to 200IP, but I think this is as good a time as any to see what kind of horse he is. If I remember correctly, all of DS’s past injuries have been non-arm ones (an oblique thing I think, and maybe a back thing). His arm has never been fragile, so until there is a noticeable let-down with him, a drop in velocity, or a prolonged bout of poor command, I think you have to just let him keep taking the hill every 5th.
July 11th, 2008 at 3:52 pm
Media guide has no info on the AFL either. Maybe mlb.com? I googled and found Project Prospect blurb on him: strained oblique so he didn’t even pitch one pitch in 2007’s AFL.
I would also adjust his numbers from the bullpen in terms of wear and tear on his arm, though I don’t have a rule of thumb, nor have seen one. I would do that because 1) pitchers throw harder when they are relievers, and 2) they get up and down in the bullpen throwing a lot, pitches that aren’t counted but should be more than a starter would be throwing. I would agree that minor league IP is easier because you’re facing AAAA hitters or worse mostly, but unless you were cruising like Lincecum was, there is still a good amount of stress involved with throwing in AAA, as you want to prove yourself to the team.
Just pulling it out of my nether region, if you assume 1.5 times, then he has had around 125 IP for two years then 100 IP last season. Krukow has always said that you don’t want to jump more than 25 IP over the previous year, so assuming he has been conditioned for 125 IP from the prior two seasons, that would put his warning level at 150 IP, or about 40 IP, or 7 starts away. That would put us around early to mid August. Then I would follow what MrLomez said and watch him, before shutting him down around the end of August.
I would not worry too much about the starters, but I would probably like to see a 6-man rotation by September, along with Sanchez being taken out. Misch could be one starter, maybe bring up someone doing well to take other spot. That would also lessen load on Cain and Lincecum.
July 31st, 2008 at 8:54 am
[...] the Game Scores Plots from earlier in this month, I mused about Sanchez’s workload and how the Giants might handle it. One thing that I’m [...]