by Ron Shandler

About four hours after the results of the American League Tout Wars competition were posted online, I received the following e-mail from one of my loyal subscribers...

"Hey Ron, how come you drafted such a crappy pitching staff?"

Wow.

When looking at my pitching staff, I was using descriptors like "conditional potential" and "moderate upside." "Crappy" wasn't quite what I had intended when I drafted this bunch...

I've always been amazed at the hypocrisy in people. In one breath they'll tell you that pitching is a crapshoot and in their very next breath they'll pass judgment on your choice of pitchers. So, which is it? If pitching is such a crapshoot, then why can't this $55 staff of ne'er-do-wells do as well as the $139 staff assembled by the Patton/Kreutzer team that has names such as Randy Johnson, Andy Pettitte, David Cone, and Armando Benitez?

The fact is, in rotisserie terms, pitching is a crapshoot. We measure the talents of our roto hurlers using four statistical categories that are crappy evaluators of performance. So how can we expect to place accurate dollar values on our pitchers when we really have little clue as to how many wins or saves they are going to post, and what their ERA/WHIP is going to be?

WINS

Predicting wins is an incredible shot in the dark. Even the pitchers we consider in the upper echelon of major league hurlers hurt us when we attempt to project how many games they will win each year. To wit, a hurler who always goes for over $20 in roto drafts...

During these six years, this pitcher earned back that $20-plus investment four times. And even if Roger Clemens has an off year in 1998, we'll likely be throwing those 1999 roto dollars at the hope of still another rebound.

It takes five events to occur in order for a pitcher to notch a single "W"...

1. He has to pitch well, allowing few runs to score.
2. His team's offense has to score more runs than he gives up.
3. His team's defense has to successfully convert his batted balls into outs.
4. His bullpen has to hold any lead he leaves the game with.
5. His manager has to leave him in the game for at least 5 innings, and after that, cannot pull him if his team is still behind.

...and of these five events, four of them are completely out of his control. Yet we continue to place value on our roto hurlers based upon their ability to win games.

SAVES

Big roto dollars chase the scarce commodity of saves every year. But unless your pitcher has a name like Hoffman, Wohlers or Rivera, you're likely chasing the fickle whims of a major league field manager.

It takes six events to occur in order for a pitcher to notch a single save...

1. His team's starting pitcher and middle relievers have to pitch well.
2. His team offense has to score more runs than allowed.
3. It has to be a relatively close game.
4. His manager has to give him the opportunity to take the mound in a save situation.
5. He has to pitch well.
6. His manager has to allow him to finish the game.

...and of these six events, five of them are completely out of his control.

In reality, the only thing we're really throwing our roto dollars at is Event #4. We don't care whether the pitcher is any good or not; we only care that he's going to be given the ball in the 9th.

And so pitchers like Matt Karchner go for $19 and Heathcliff Slocumb go for $11, even though neither has any business being on a mound with a game on the line in the ninth inning. But we're not paying for their skills; we're paying for their role. And that could change tomorrow.

ERA

No matter how good we perceive a pitcher to be, we all know that his ERA might fluctuate by a run or more each season. Yet, year after year, those hurlers who post even one exceptional campaign or offer even the remote promise of a low ERA will garner inflated draft day bids. Why else did we bid up these pitchers...?

• Pedro Martinez - $42 - yet only one sub-3.40 ERA in the past four years.
• Brad Radke - $18 - yet the only time he ever posted a sub-4.00 ERA was during the second half of 1997.
• Jaret Wright - $16 - yet only 90 IP of major league experience with a 4.38 ERA.
• Scott Erickson - $11 - yet only one sub-4.80 ERA in the last five years.
• Rick Reed - $19 - yet only two sub-4.00 ERAs in parts of nine major league seasons.
• Al Leiter - $14 - yet only one ERA under 3.64 in four major league seasons.
• Dustin Hermanson - $14 - yet the only time he ever posted a sub-3.50 ERA was during his first 72 IP of 1997.
• Bobby Jones - $14 - yet the only times he posted a sub-4.00 ERA was in 1994 and the first half of 1997.

Three things need to happen in order for a pitcher to post a low ERA...

1. He has to pitch well, allowing few batters to reach base and allowing few runners to score.
2. His team's defense has to successfully convert his batted balls into outs.
3. His team's bullpen has to strand those runners they inherit.

...and of these three things, two of them are completely out of his control.

While defensive lapses may not greatly impact an ERA (given a kind official scorer), a poor bullpen can wreak havoc with a pitcher's numbers.

WHIP

Oddly enough, the one category that most people pay least attention to (go ahead, 'fess up) is the one that is the best evaluator of some element of a pitcher's skill. But WHIP is far from perfect.

WHIP measures the number of baserunners a pitcher allows. This, however, is only half of the story. The other half - the baserunners who end up scoring - are the ones that win and lose ballgames. There are some pitchers who allow many baserunners but who have an uncanny knack for stranding them. Others allow few baserunners, but once they're aboard, it's just a short trek home. WHIP does not distinguish between these two skills sets.

WHIP also does not distinguish between its component parts. Is a pitcher's inflated ratio due to a lack of control and high walk numbers? Or is a high WHIP due to an excess of batted balls finding their way through a porous defense? These are two very different deficiencies in a pitcher's skills set.

So, there we are... Four statistical categories and not one is an accurate and complete measure of any real pitching skill.

But the Rotisserie gods force us to use these categories to place value on our pitchers.

I rebelled. I drafted both of my Tout Wars pitching staffs without looking at one projection of wins, saves, ERA or WHIP.

In a standard pitching line, there are only three statistical categories that are true measures of some element of individual pitching skill. These are the only three that are largely unaffected by evil external forces - team offense, defense, bullpen or management.

Walks
Strikeouts
Home Runs Allowed

These are the only stats I look at. And used correctly, they provide a more accurate picture of pitching skill than any other of the traditional gauges.

We can use these three stats to measure fundamental skills. We can monitor a pitcher's ability to get the ball over the plate, his control (K/BB). We can monitor his ability to dominate hitters, his strikeout rate (K/9IP). And we can monitor his ability to keep the ball in the park (HR rate), an important skill in these times of elevated offenses. If a pitcher scores high in these three base skills, we can reasonably assume that they will fare well on the mound overall. And every year, the league's top performers consistently do have excellent control, dominance and the ability to prevent big hits.

The most important aspect of these three ratios is that they do not fluctuate from year to year anywhere near as much as Wins, Saves, ERA and WHIP. And they allow us to better spot trends in a pitcher's development or decline. This goes to show that pitching skill really does not fluctuate any more than batting skill does. The crappy stats we use to measure pitching skill are what are prone to the wild swings that drive us nuts.

Let's take another look at my crappy pitching staff...

And let's look at some more expensive buys at the Tout Wars AL draft...

My crappy pitching staff clearly has a better skills set. And they cost me about $10 less per player, giving me about $90 more that I could spend on offense.

But the big question is, will that better skills set translate into more wins and saves, and a lower ERA and WHIP? If you believe that a pitcher with better intrinsic skills will ultimately put up better numbers, then the answer is yes. But, in all honesty, it's not all cut and dried as it appears.

The second group of pitchers - which would have cost me nearly $150 - all have better defined roles coming into 1998. There are more #1 and #2 rotation starters (as opposed to my collection of #4s and #5s), and more potential closers.

So if I had paid the big bucks for this higher profile group, what would I have really been spending my money on?

• More innings, for sure. But in the world of volatile ERAs, I'm not sure more innings is something I really want.
• More wins, which is something that may come with more innings. But there again, unless I know for sure which teams are going to fare well, I really don't have a good handle on any individual pitcher's wins.
• More potential saves. Yes, I'd pay big bucks for the small group of guaranteed closers (and I did fork over $31 for Jeff Shaw in the NL), but spending even $57 for Slocumb, Fetters and Karchner does seem a bit of a high risk investment.

In essence, I'd be paying that extra $90 for these pitchers' roles. And I'm not so sure that's worth $90 to me. Because a pitcher's role will ultimately come down to his performance. If he doesn't perform, he'll lose the role.

There's no question that I own a high risk group, but the real risk I take is that Lou Piniella and Tom Kelly and Mike Hargrove all will see these pitchers' superior skills at some point. Granted, this can be a major leap of faith. But in these days of expansion-diluted pitching staffs, we need to find some faith somewhere. What better place than in pure raw skill?

And I also see the upside...

For several years, I kept hyping the potential of the following pitcher...

...and while he was an easy $1 pickup in 1994, you'd be hard-pressed to pay less than $25 these days for Denny Neagle.

Now check out the following stats...

...and you'll know why I wasn't too disappointed to grab Jose Lima for a buck for my NL team. That's how it all works.

Could my crappy pitching staff crash and burn? Absolutely. But I'd prefer to spend the extra money on offense and take a chance on the pitching skills, in hopes that the opportunities for wins and saves would eventually present themselves.

And it's clearly a better approach than those people who knowingly stock up on $1 late-round crapshoot hurlers without making any effort to distinguish between those pitchers with upside and the true dogs.

The pitching staffs I assemble each year consistently finish in the top three in ERA and WHIP. Most times, the biggest sacrifice is innings, which ultimately translates into a poor finish in wins. But given the true challenge of predicting wins, those are not prudent dollars to invest anyway.

So I sit here watching $38 worth of Randy Johnson get shelled in his first few starts and $35 worth of Roger Clemens pull a groin muscle after seven pitches. I feel badly for their owners. My $14 Chuck Nagy also started slow. But he was over $20 cheaper.

Billy Taylor may or may not get many saves, even though his skills set is far superior to brittle Mike Fetters. But he was over $20 cheaper.

Crappy pitching staff? Perhaps. Check back with me in October.

Have I told you about my $205 offensive lineup?