Rebirth of a Sale, man

Adrian's Dome

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Is this a real question? A K has a 0% chance of hurting you. No seeing eye grounders, no possible boot by a fielder or an advancing of the runner. Sure a double play would be super but there is a non zero chance that something could go wrong. If you throw the third strike past him, there us no way he can hurt you.
Is that a real response?

What about a stolen base and an error by the catcher? Or a WP/passed ball?

It's a possibility the SS boots an easy play but the catcher can't have the ball get away or make a bad throw?

It's idiotic to speak in baseball absolutes.
 
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Sox Puppet

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Snell went 5 innings tonight, no runs, 1 hit, 2bb's, 5 k's, and if TB can hang onto the 4-0 lead they currently have, he'll get to 20-5. With a 1.97 ERA, and a sub 1.00 WHIP, I think him and Sale have had almost identical seasons. IMO, if Snell continues to get starts and continues to dominate, and finishes with 25 or so more innings than Sale, he'd get my vote. Wins don't mean a lot, but they mean something, and he doesn't just have more of them, he's heading up into twice as many territory. That's something, and when everything other category is pretty damn equal, it's as good a tiebreaker as any, IMO.
There's a reasonable case to be made here, assuming the voters don't dig too deeply into the advanced stats.

One other factor that should probably be accounted for is the "seniority effect." That is, Sale has been dominant for so long (but never won) that he "deserves" a tiebreaker, if it comes to that. Some voters may see Snell as a young kid with many more good years ahead of him and future chances to win it. Or they may even associate "Tampa pitching staff" in their minds with "weird, unconventional pitching shenanigans" and discount Snell because of that, through no fault of his own.

All of this is a way of saying -- I know we've come a long way since the times when W-L record was the arbiter of Cy Young candidacy, but I don't know if the BBWAA is as cold and methodical in its calculations as we are.
 

joe dokes

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Snell has made 6 more "real" starts than Sale. (Sale's 1 and 3 inning jobs would have been at AAA).
That's roughly 20% of a starter's season. I would put Snell ahead of Sale.
 

Red(s)HawksFan

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All of this is a way of saying -- I know we've come a long way since the times when W-L record was the arbiter of Cy Young candidacy, but I don't know if the BBWAA is as cold and methodical in its calculations as we are.
We don't even have to go back that far to see W-L being an influential factor for BBWAA voters...Rick Porcello two years ago. No question he had a phenomenal year, but really the only thing he had going for him versus the other top candidates (Verlander, Kluber, Britton) was his win total.

Verlander had him beat in innings, ERA, Ks, WHIP, and bWAR. Kluber trailed him in innings by 8 (with one fewer start), in ERA by 0.01, and WHIP by 0.047, but led him in Ks and bWAR. Britton was ridiculous all year with his 0.54 ERA.

In the end, Verlander got more first place votes but Porcello placed higher on more ballots to squeak it out.
 

The Needler

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Snell has made 6 more "real" starts than Sale. (Sale's 1 and 3 inning jobs would have been at AAA).
That's roughly 20% of a starter's season. I would put Snell ahead of Sale.
Snell has made four starts lasting 4 innings or fewer. But you go ahead and keep trying to find reasons to pick against a pitcher on your favorite team having a historic season.
 

joe dokes

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Yeah, I can't recall GS ever being considered for anything. It's IP.
When comparing two players side by side, is 33 6-inning starts better than 25 7-inning starts, when both put up great stats by any measure? Both are deserving.

Snell has made four starts lasting 4 innings or fewer. But you go ahead and keep trying to find reasons to pick against a pitcher on your favorite team having a historic season.
Yeah. That's what I'm doing. I'm such a bad fan.
 

Cesar Crespo

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When comparing two players side by side, is 33 6-inning starts better than 25 7-inning starts, when both put up great stats by any measure? Both are deserving.


Yeah. That's what I'm doing. I'm such a bad fan.
I think both are deserving of the award but if Sale doesn't get votes because of his IP, Snell getting the award with <20 more innings would be absurd.

edit: Basically, if you are willing to vote for Snell, you should be willing to vote for Sale. If you think Snell was more valuable this year, that's a debatable stance.
 

The Needler

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I thought we were having a conversation about who deserved the award, not who we were rooting for to get it.
I thought your last post linked to an article that persuasively established Snell is not deserving to be even in the top 3. At this point people are bending over backwards to find reasons to give it to a guy who is undeserving when one who is has been staring them in the face.
 

FinanceAdvice

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I was at the game vs. Mets. Sale a tad rusty but was still dominant and left with a lead vs. deGrom. Sale in my opinion is the Cy Young winner. On a somewhat related issue, it looked depressing to see Pomeranz and Cora taking him out of the game. I believe he just pitched himself out of a spot in the play-offs.
 

The Needler

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I think both are deserving of the award but if Sale doesn't get votes because of his IP, Snell getting the award with <20 more innings would be absurd.
This is especially true when Verlander and Kluber have started more games and pitched significantly more innings than Snell, and have been better in pretty much every way except for luck.
 

joe dokes

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I think both are deserving of the award but if Sale doesn't get votes because of his IP, Snell getting the award with <20 more innings would be absurd.

edit: Basically, if you are willing to vote for Snell, you should be willing to vote for Sale. If you think Snell was more valuable this year, that's a debatable stance.
That's fair. But, not to belabor the point, these days 20IP is 3 games. When things are tight, I think that should carry some weight.
 

Cesar Crespo

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That's fair. But, not to belabor the point, these days 20IP is 3 games. When things are tight, I think that should carry some weight.
That's why GS is a terrible number to use, because if you don't count Sale's last 2 starts, it isn't 3 games. It's 6.
 

The Needler

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Um, no. Snell has a better K/9 and FIP than Kluber and a better HR/9 than either.

[edited to remove unnecessary snark]
As you know from the link you posted, Snell appears to have been a beneficiary of a good deal of luck in his HR rate, and both Verlander and Kluber have a better xFIP. EDIT: And great, Snell has a very small edge in K/9, but a huge deficit in K:BB. You could also just replace Kluber with his teammate Bauer, who's only thrown 3 fewer innings than Snell, and has been a better pitcher over those innings, too.

Why'd you bold and italicize "significantly"? 33 IP is not a significant number, yet less than half that is enough to tip the scales in favor of Snell over Sale?
 
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Savin Hillbilly

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As you know from the link you posted, Snell appears to have been a beneficiary of a good deal of luck in his HR rate, and both Verlander and Kluber have a better xFIP.

Why'd you bold and italicize "significantly"? 33 IP is not a significant number, yet less than half that is enough to tip the scales in favor of Snell over Sale?
I didn't realize that I had. It's possible I selected and bolded that word by mistake and then hit the "I" instead of the "B" when trying to undo that.

There's one other thing in Snell's favor that I hadn't considered: FIP, and therefore fWAR, doesn't say anything about strength of opposition AFAICT. And when you look at this factor with relation to the Cy contenders, Snell clearly deserves the biggest bump for it:

BB ref pitcher comparison for 6 Cy contenders

Snell is the only one of the contenders who had to make multiple starts against all of the most potent offenses in the league. The AL has been a two-tiered league this year, with five beast offenses--not coincidentally, the five playoff teams--pretty clearly separated from the pack. Here's how many starts each of the six contenders in the comparison link had to make against those top 5 offenses:

Sale 5
Snell 11
Kluber 5
Bauer 4
Verlander 6
Cole 8

Cole is the only one who had to make more than about half as many starts as Snell against the league's top offenses -- and 5 of those 8 were against Oakland, the weakest of the bunch. Snell had to face the Sox four times, and the Yankees three times; none of the others had to face either team more than twice. You might think, "well, at least he got to pitch to the bad teams a lot too," but not so: just twice vs. the O's and once vs. Toronto.

BBref's WAR factors this in; Fangraphs' apparently does not. When you talk about luck, this needs to be in the discussion along with BABIP.

(It would be interesting to see some of the component rate stats, like BB/9 and HR/9, broken down relative to opposition. Snell's HR/9 of 0.9, for instance, is already respectable in the 2018 environment, but looks even better on a guy who made seven starts against the Sox and Yankees.)
 

The Needler

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Not a subscriber, so no idea what those tables say.


Snell is the only one of the contenders who had to make multiple starts against all of the most potent offenses in the league. The AL has been a two-tiered league this year, with five beast offenses--not coincidentally, the five playoff teams--pretty clearly separated from the pack. Here's how many starts each of the six contenders in the comparison link had to make against those top 5 offenses:

Sale 5
Snell 11
Kluber 5
Bauer 4
Verlander 6
Cole 8

Cole is the only one who had to make more than about half as many starts as Snell against the league's top offenses -- and 5 of those 8 were against Oakland, the weakest of the bunch. Snell had to face the Sox four times, and the Yankees three times; none of the others had to face either team more than twice. You might think, "well, at least he got to pitch to the bad teams a lot too," but not so: just twice vs. the O's and once vs. Toronto.
That's all pretty vague, especially when you're talking about a lefty. A team's overall .800 OPS doesn't really mean the same when it sits its best hitters, right? What matters is the quality of the batters actually faced. To that end, BP keeps those numbers. The overall OPS of the hitters Snell and Verlander have faced is each .743.

BBref's WAR factors this in; Fangraphs' apparently does not. When you talk about luck, this needs to be in the discussion along with BABIP.
Where do you find that information? EDIT: nm, I see it. Not clear if fangraphs' RA9-WAR does, though.
 
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strek1

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Curious about the buildup of Sale to be ready for the Post Season. So he has 2 more starts and presumably a sim game or lots of bullpen throwing. Not paying much attention to Spring Training - how does this progression compare to a normal Spring? Does everyone think they are basically using that ST formula to build him up to a normal PC?
 

Red(s)HawksFan

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Curious about the buildup of Sale to be ready for the Post Season. So he has 2 more starts and presumably a sim game or lots of bullpen throwing. Not paying much attention to Spring Training - how does this progression compare to a normal Spring? Does everyone think they are basically using that ST formula to build him up to a normal PC?
I'd call it an accelerated ST formula in the sense that pitchers typically get 6-7 outings (not always starts) to progressively build pitch counts in spring training. I think the difference is that in spring training, the pitchers typically are coming off 4-5 months of inactivity whereas Sale is ramping up after just a month of inactivity. I think they're counting on him having retained at least some of his pitch count stamina from earlier in the year, allowing him to get up to speed a little sooner now than he might in March.
 

SirPsychoSquints

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Not a subscriber, so no idea what those tables say.




That's all pretty vague, especially when you're talking about a lefty. A team's overall .800 OPS doesn't really mean the same when it sits its best hitters, right? What matters is the quality of the batters actually faced. To that end, BP keeps those numbers. The overall OPS of the hitters Snell and Verlander have faced is each .743.


Where do you find that information? EDIT: nm, I see it. Not clear if fangraphs' RA9-WAR does, though.
https://www.fangraphs.com/library/war/calculating-war-pitchers/
Our version of WAR does not adjust for opponent strength.
 

williams_482

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I was talking in WAR terms, i.e., without reference to actual game outcomes. I just meant that by making more starts, Snell had brought his way-above-average performance to bear on more of his team's games than Sale has brought his way-way-above-average performance, and that this might make him more valuable in a way that I'm not sure WAR will account for.
One can reasonably quibble with the exact baselines used here, but WAR is explicitly designed to account for this sort of difference.

It is reasonable to assume that the innings Sale "could have" pitched but didn't were (or normally would be) taken by replacement level fill in pitchers. Snell has been worth 6.6 rWAR in 169 IP thus far. Sale (before today) has been worth 6.7 rWAR in 150 IP, and required that a replacement level (0 WAR) pitcher pick up those extra 19 IP. If Sale himself had thrown those extra 19 innings but at an the same performance level as a replacement level pitcher, he would still be worth 6.7 rWAR.

Where this breaks down is with times through the order issues. Is Sale had reached 150 innings by making 30 starts and averaging 5 innings each (instead of making 25 starts averaging 6) then he likely would have faced hitters a 3rd or 4th time much less frequently. There's a big effect there, which WAR makes no effort to account for, but it's not a direct function of volume.
 

Deathofthebambino

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Snell goes 6 2/3rds today, gives up 3 hits (all singles), 2bb's, and 11k's, no runs. He's now 21-5 (he's won 9 consecutive starts), with a 1.90 ERA and a .96 WHIP, 211/60 K/BB. I don't care that he's only pitched 175 innings, I'll be shocked if he doesn't win.
 

The Needler

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Verlander went 6 innings, 1 hit, 11 k, 0 BB yesterday. He’s got 208 IP, 2.85 FIP, .909 WHIP, 280/36 K:BB.
 

uk_sox_fan

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There's one other thing in Snell's favor that I hadn't considered: FIP, and therefore fWAR, doesn't say anything about strength of opposition AFAICT. And when you look at this factor with relation to the Cy contenders, Snell clearly deserves the biggest bump for it:

BB ref pitcher comparison for 6 Cy contenders

Snell is the only one of the contenders who had to make multiple starts against all of the most potent offenses in the league. The AL has been a two-tiered league this year, with five beast offenses--not coincidentally, the five playoff teams--pretty clearly separated from the pack. Here's how many starts each of the six contenders in the comparison link had to make against those top 5 offenses:

Sale 5
Snell 11
Kluber 5
Bauer 4
Verlander 6
Cole 8

Cole is the only one who had to make more than about half as many starts as Snell against the league's top offenses -- and 5 of those 8 were against Oakland, the weakest of the bunch. Snell had to face the Sox four times, and the Yankees three times; none of the others had to face either team more than twice. You might think, "well, at least he got to pitch to the bad teams a lot too," but not so: just twice vs. the O's and once vs. Toronto.

BBref's WAR factors this in; Fangraphs' apparently does not. When you talk about luck, this needs to be in the discussion along with BABIP.

(It would be interesting to see some of the component rate stats, like BB/9 and HR/9, broken down relative to opposition. Snell's HR/9 of 0.9, for instance, is already respectable in the 2018 environment, but looks even better on a guy who made seven starts against the Sox and Yankees.)
So in a quick-and-dirty attempt to go into the quality of opposition argument, I took bbref data for every batter faced by Sale, Snell and Verlander. I selected OPS (just because) and for any batter that had fewer than 450 PAs I replaced his 'missing' PAs with league average ones. I then took the weighted average of OPS-against for each of the three pitchers (weighted by the PAs each pitcher faced each batter).

The result is that Snell has faced the strongest opposition (as expected) with a waOPS of .760 in his 678 PAs (or betters faced). Against this opposition he has allowed an actual OPS-against of .554, or 27% below that expected from a MLB-average pitcher.

Verlander has had surprisingly tough opposition (to me anyways) with a waOPS of .758 over 812 PAs, just a hair behind Snell. But his OPS-against is significantly higher at .607 so he has allowed 20% lower OPS than an average pitcher would have against his portfolio of batters.

Sale has faced comparatively easy competition with a waOPS of .742 for the hitters he's pitched to. Against this group, however, he has allowed an OPS-against of .526 or over 29% better than an average pitcher would have.

If we were to bring Sale's 595 batters faced and Snell's 678 up to Verlander's 812 by averaging in league-average OPS-against the winner would be Snell (.584) over Sale (.593) followed by Verlander (.607).

Yes, I know there's serious problems with OPS-against and that Snell and Verlander have easier Park Factors in their home ballpark than Sale, but I did say quick-and-dirty...
 

RedOctober3829

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He was regularly reaching 95 tonight
You and everyone else should be more worried about Sale. His fastball velocity has dipped each start since the Baltimore start in August. It went from 98.1 in Baltimore to 96.1 on 9/11 to 94.4 on 9/16 to 93.5 on 9/21. Unless he's holding back velocity like he did in April which is entirely possible, I'm concerned that the shoulder is not up to the point where it needs to be in order to be at his best in October.
 

The Needler

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So in a quick-and-dirty attempt to go into the quality of opposition argument, I took bbref data for every batter faced by Sale, Snell and Verlander. I selected OPS (just because) and for any batter that had fewer than 450 PAs I replaced his 'missing' PAs with league average ones. I then took the weighted average of OPS-against for each of the three pitchers (weighted by the PAs each pitcher faced each batter).
This strikes me as an adjustment of dubious validity. I understand you're trying to be quick-and-dirty, but Joey Rickard shouldn't somehow be given credit for being a league average hitter for over half of his PA when he has a lifetime .677 OPS. Likewise in the other direction.
 

normstalls

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Didn't Sale tweak his mechanics mid season and turn his shoulders/body more away from the hitters while in the wind up? I thought after he made that adjustment that is when his velo really went up and we were seeing him touch 100. Best that I could tell he was not doing this in his last outing. Seemed like he reverted back to his previous mechanics.
 

Devizier

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You and everyone else should be more worried about Sale. His fastball velocity has dipped each start since the Baltimore start in August.
The velocity drop is directly tied to stretching out his innings. I think your latter explanation -- he is holding back a little -- is the correct one. This follows the pattern early in the season. I'll worry when the team gives cause to.
 

RedOctober3829

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The velocity drop is directly tied to stretching out his innings. I think your latter explanation -- he is holding back a little -- is the correct one. This follows the pattern early in the season. I'll worry when the team gives cause to.
Let's hope that's all it is. The team won't say anything to the contrary unless they're going to shut him down. I'll worry when we see him in Game 1 and he can't go beyond the 5th inning and his velocity is still low.
 

uk_sox_fan

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This strikes me as an adjustment of dubious validity. I understand you're trying to be quick-and-dirty, but Joey Rickard shouldn't somehow be given credit for being a league average hitter for over half of his PA when he has a lifetime .677 OPS. Likewise in the other direction.
An odd example as Rickard's OPS is .724 and the league average I used was .732...

The idea was how to deal with SSS problems. I figured those that had very few PAs shouldn't pollute the weighted average with 0.000 or 2.000 type OPS.
 

The Needler

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An odd example as Rickard's OPS is .724 and the league average I used was .732...

The idea was how to deal with SSS problems. I figured those that had very few PAs shouldn't pollute the weighted average with 0.000 or 2.000 type OPS.
Not really an odd example, especially when one of the adjustments you probably should be making is excluding the PAs against the pitcher himself. Rickard had a career OPS of .659 coming into the season, and he has an OPS of .691 against pitchers other than Snell this year, and yet you are crediting him with an OPS of about .730 for the purposes of your exercise. You don't see a problem with that?

Maybe you should throw out hitters with too few PAs (though that line should almost certainly be way fewer than 450 PAs); maybe you should use an adjustment based on their prior year's stats, when available. I'm not sure what the best adjustment is, but I'm pretty sure it's not a flat addition of league OPS up to an arbitrary 450 PAs.
 

Devizier

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If you want a simple projection, why not use a player's rest of season projections? Freely available and they've taken care of all the regression for you. It's still a huge assumption but it's better than just assuming an average performance.
 

Apisith

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Let's hope that's all it is. The team won't say anything to the contrary unless they're going to shut him down. I'll worry when we see him in Game 1 and he can't go beyond the 5th inning and his velocity is still low.
Lowest velocity since April. I'm worried for sure.
 

NJ_Sox_Fan

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I mean I'm all for grasping at any straw possible, but unless we see something different as the game goes on, I am officially going to DEFCON 5 panic mode
 

Adrian's Dome

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Red Sox Stats‏ @redsoxstats 9m9 minutes ago
A bunch of Sale changeups have been categorized as fastballs on nesn that inning, he's actually throwing 50% changeups so far. He had hardly been throwing it all year until he threw a bunch his last start as well. Maybe trying to iron out a 3-pitch mix before the playoffs?
In a completely meaningless game with a D- lineup out there, a guy who has been working himself back slowly and deliberately isn't out there throwing absolute bullets?

Shocker.

The reactionary panic from the first few replies today is insane.
 

Ed Hillel

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In a completely meaningless game with a D- lineup out there, a guy who has been working himself back slowly and deliberately isn't out there throwing absolute bullets?

Shocker.

The reactionary panic from the first few replies today is insane.
I mean he’s been babied for 6 weeks now, it’s obvious they have some concern about something. Then his starts go from 100 to 96 to 91. Saying it’s “insane” to be concerned is silly.

Maybe he’s fine, but it’s certainly fair game to be worried.
 

Adrian's Dome

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I mean he’s been babied for 6 weeks now, it’s obvious they have some concern about something. Then his starts go from 100 to 96 to 91. Saying it’s “insane” to be concerned is silly.

Maybe he’s fine, but it’s certainly fair game to be worried.
It literally is insane.

What justification would there be to have him out there throwing 99-100 in a meaningless (by every sense of the word) game?

They aren't even remotely trying to win. It does not matter. Be logical. There's no way he's sitting 90-91 maxing out his fastball.
 

TheRooster

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While I understand the panic, Dome has a great point. If he could only hit 91 with his FB, why would he keep pitching?