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On the NL Cy Young
By Capitol Avenue Club | November 19, 2009
I suppose I should write something about this. It seems to be the most prestigious award these days, seeing as the voters get it right some times.
Many people view the selection of Tim Lincecum as a giant victory for statheads. First of all, I’ve never viewed it as something to be attained. The voting and awards are what they are. It’s not a “victory” for “us” if Lincecum wins, it means the right person won the award. I’ve never really been concerned with it, I guess. Vote for the right person, vote for the wrong person, I don’t care. I’ve got better things to worry about than a post-season award. As Bill James said:
To address the question on a somewhat more sophisticated level. . .changing opinions is not a rear-guard action. There are cutting-edge thinkers, there are well-informed people who keep up with the cutting-edge thinking, and then there are several grades of people who lag behind the curve. You don’t change opinions by worrying about the people who lag behind the curve. They’ll catch up eventually. You change opinions by addressing the people who are nearer the head of the parade.
My philosophy is, “Eventually, they’ll catch up. For now, on to more important things.”
Secondly, looking only at the winner invokes the same fallacy as a “Moneyball-hater” does when he argues the invalidity of the book’s philosophy by citing an oft-uttered, Joe Morganesque talking point, “The A’s have never won a World Series”. It’s necessary to look at the entire voting process, not just the winner.
So let’s take a look at the voting. In my mind there were five candidates worthy of discussion. Five players squarely in the conversation. They are: Tim Lincecum, Javier Vazquez, Dan Haren, Adam Wainwright, and Chris Carpenter. The voting looked like this:
| Rank | Name | Votes | 1st Place |
| 1 | Tim Lincecum | 32 | 11 |
| 2 | Chris Carpenter | 30 | 9 |
| 3 | Adam Wainwright | 32 | 12 |
| 4 | Javier Vazquez | 1 | 0 |
| 5 | Dan Haren | 1 | 0 |
Lincecum barely beat Carpenter, who barely beat Wainwright, who got the most 1st place votes. Vazquez and Haren were basically left in the dust.
Now, let’s look at a few of their advanced stats (leader among the 5 in bold):
| Name | ERA | ERA+ | WHIP | IP | K | K/9 | K/BB | FIP | tRA+ | WAR |
| Tim Lincecum | 2.48 | 176 | 1.047 | 225.1 | 261 | 10.42 | 3.84 | 2.34 | 146 | 8.2 |
| Chris Carpenter | 2.24 | 183 | 1.007 | 192.2 | 144 | 6.73 | 3.79 | 2.78 | 140 | 5.6 |
| Adam Wainwright | 2.63 | 157 | 1.210 | 223.0 | 212 | 8.56 | 3.21 | 3.11 | 125 | 5.7 |
| Javier Vazquez | 2.87 | 143 | 1.026 | 219.1 | 238 | 9.77 | 5.41 | 2.77 | 131 | 6.6 |
| Dan Haren | 3.14 | 146 | 1.003 | 229.1 | 223 | 8.75 | 5.87 | 3.23 | 130 | 6.1 |
I performed a meta-analysis, giving equal weight to all of the listed categories. It was clear that Lincecum was going to win. For the record, my ballot was 1. Lincecum, 2. Vazquez, 3. Haren.
| Name | ERA | ERA+ | WHIP | IP | K | K/9 | K/BB | FIP | tRA+ | WAR | Total |
| Tim Lincecum | 2 | 2 | 4 | 2 | 1 | 1 | 3 | 1 | 1 | 1 | 18 |
| Chris Carpenter | 1 | 1 | 2 | 5 | 5 | 5 | 4 | 3 | 2 | 5 | 33 |
| Adam Wainwright | 3 | 3 | 5 | 3 | 4 | 4 | 5 | 4 | 5 | 4 | 40 |
| Javier Vazquez | 4 | 5 | 3 | 4 | 2 | 2 | 2 | 2 | 3 | 2 | 29 |
| Dan Haren | 5 | 4 | 1 | 1 | 3 | 3 | 1 | 5 | 4 | 3 | 30 |
Yep. 1. Lincecum, 2. Vazquez, 3. Haren, 4. Carpenter, 5. Wainwright.
Back to the question at hand, is the voting a victory for statheads? No. It isn’t. Is it progress? Yes, it is. But there’s still a long way to go.
Earlier, Rob Neyer writes, (after I correctly predicted that Keith Law was the lone vote for Vazquez. Big props to Keith, by the way):
Meanwhile, I’m ready to nominate for sainthood the only voter who gave Javier Vazquez his only support, a second-place vote (unless this was an Atlanta voter, in which case I must regrettably chalk it up to the typical provincialism).
The fact that we’re ready to nominate someone for sainthood for doing something rational means the war (if there ever was one) ain’t over.
By the way, Keith Law explains his ballot in a blog entry and concludes with this:
As for the win total of each pitcher: I ignored that, because, as I’ve said for years, it tells us nothing useful about how well the pitcher performed.
I could get behind that.
Addendum: AL Cy Young Analysis
| Name | ERA | ERA+ | WHIP | IP | K | K/9 | K/BB | FIP | tRA+ | WAR |
| Zach Greinke | 2.16 | 205 | 1.073 | 229.1 | 242 | 9.50 | 4.75 | 2.33 | 153 | 9.4 |
| Felix Hernandez | 2.49 | 174 | 1.135 | 238.2 | 217 | 8.18 | 3.06 | 3.09 | 134 | 6.9 |
| Justin Verlander | 3.45 | 133 | 1.175 | 240.0 | 269 | 10.09 | 4.27 | 2.80 | 135 | 8.2 |
| CC Sabathia | 3.37 | 127 | 1.148 | 230.0 | 197 | 7.71 | 2.94 | 3.39 | 123 | 6.0 |
| Roy Halladay | 2.79 | 155 | 1.126 | 239.0 | 208 | 7.83 | 5.94 | 3.06 | 134 | 7.3 |
| Name | ERA | ERA+ | WHIP | IP | K | K/9 | K/BB | FIP | tRA+ | WAR | Total |
| Zach Greinke | 1 | 1 | 1 | 5 | 2 | 2 | 2 | 1 | 1 | 1 | 17 |
| Felix Hernandez | 2 | 2 | 3 | 3 | 3 | 3 | 4 | 4 | 3.5 | 4 | 32 |
| Justin Verlander | 5 | 4 | 5 | 1 | 1 | 1 | 3 | 2 | 2 | 2 | 26 |
| CC Sabathia | 4 | 5 | 4 | 4 | 5 | 5 | 5 | 5 | 5 | 5 | 47 |
| Roy Halladay | 3 | 3 | 2 | 2 | 4 | 5 | 1 | 3 | 3.5 | 3 | 30 |
1. Zach Gerinke, 2. Justin Verlander, 3. Roy Hallady, 4. Felix Hernandez, 5. CC Sabathia. I had Felix 3rd instead of Halladay.
Topics: Atlanta Braves | 8 Comments »
November 19th, 2009 at 5:44 PM
Matthew Pouliot of NBC Sports does his best to encourage ignorance. I generally like Pouliot’s work, but this is beyond garbage.
November 19th, 2009 at 8:28 PM
FIP doesn’t “translate into wins and losses?” So home runs allowed, K’s and walks, don’t affect the outcome of a decision? :)
November 19th, 2009 at 8:46 PM
Oh man, Pouliot gets in even deeper in the comments section. I don’t know what he’s trying to prove or what his latest muse is, but he’s really digging himself a ditch to die in.
November 19th, 2009 at 8:47 PM
“So, the Cards were 23-11 in Wainwright’s starts, while the Braves were 18-14 when Vazquez pitched. That’s the real world for you”
he’s a real tough guy huh….
November 19th, 2009 at 8:51 PM
i loved his rationale of “if dice K’s numbers had been spread” etc etc.
November 20th, 2009 at 4:45 AM
Im probably getting drilled here… but i believe Pouliot has a point. At least, i believe it’s debatable.
Obviously the last paragraph and the Dice K / Washburn comments are ill advised. But i think his overall point is valid.
Aren’t we looking just for this season?
KLaw is citing FIP / WAR and a supposed stronger competition. He refutes that argument by saying that Wainwright had a tougher OPS against (not the greatest measure, but still valid) and he says that FIP is a good metric to proyect future performance, not to value past performance (also valid).
My problem for taking FIP into the equation is this:
Suppose a 1 IP, 1 Walk, 1 HR line for two pitchers. FIP does not care if the HR came before or after the walk. So, one pitcher gave up two runs and the other gave up one. FIP says they are both the same.
We are not comparing the careers of Clemens and Maddux. I agree that in 5000 innings this things even out. But in 200 innings you need to take context into account.
Wainwright had a higher WPA and RE24 than Vazquez. Even Jair Jurrjens was better in this metrics than Javier.
My point is… I really don’t know if Vazquez had a better season than Wainwright. But if it was my job to cast this votes and i was sort of representing the sabermetric community in these ballots then i would have a much better explanation why i came to that conclusion than citing FIP and WAR.
Or as the shawshank warden would say: Am i being obtuse?
November 20th, 2009 at 11:19 AM
Guillermo (November 20th, 2009 4:45 AM EST) My point is… I really don’t know if Vazquez had a better season than Wainwright.
Right. Whether or not Waino or Vazquez had a better season is up for debate. Pouliot basically says K-Law’s selection of Vazquez was indisputably wrong.
It’s one thing to say, “I wouldn’t have voted for this guy and here’s why, but I see why Keith Law did”. It’s an entirely different thing to say, “In particular, I take issue with Law’s choice to place Vazquez between Lincecum and Wainwright on his ballot.” That’s a direct quote by the way. The former means “we may not see eye to eye, but I still respect the guy’s opinion”, the latter means “this guy’s choice, and therefore his value as a baseball analyst, is terrible”.
November 20th, 2009 at 11:35 AM
Yeah, you are right.
But in fairness, Keith Law plays the absolutes in a lot of his chats and columns.
I say it’s fair game if somebody goes the same way when discussing his arguments.