When somebody is peddling crap I can usually let it slide but this time you have gone too far. Efficiency on the mound is the single most important factor in winning that I know of. If you do not know about something study it, take the time to educate yourself then you can reasonably discuss it. Just making **** up makes you look like an ass. Just making **** up and asserting it as factual makes you look like a dumb ass. Don't be an ass.
The Astros are so thin in upper level infielders that it is hard to imagine that Wagner would not get some time as an Astros second or third baseman over the next couple of seasons.
Pitch to contact became outdated somewhere around 2008. You have no idea what you are talking about. There is a reason staffs are 13 guys deep and everyone throws max effort all the time and k’s per 9 are higher than they’ve ever been. Literally it’s because nobody is trying to pitch to contact and have efficient innings anymore. it’s the same reason guys are swinging for the fence with launch angle all the time- the stuff is so nasty and at full tilt nobody feels like stringing together hits is the way to go anymore. Pitchers try to strike everyone out and hitters try to hit Hr all the time. It’s literally unarguable. You seriously have zero idea what you are taking about if you believe anything differently than that. It’s literally modern baseball strategy everywhere.
K’s for the league. It’s a steady climb up and to the right on a graph https://www.baseball-almanac.com/hitting/histrk4.shtml relief pitchers are all fine highs https://syndication.bleacherreport....d-taking-over-mlb-in-2022-and-beyond.amp.html starting pitchers throwing fewer pitches than ever https://baseballwithr.wordpress.com...-limit-and-pitcher-efficiency/comment-page-1/ average pitches per game continues to Climb https://www.baseball-reference.com/blog/archives/7533.html None of this values efficiency- in fact it’s the exact opposite. Throw as hard as you can as long as you can don’t let the other guy hit it, Waste pitched up 02, 1-2 trying to get them to chase- balls to the wall and we will bring in a guy throwing 101 mph in the 6th to relieve you.
Top 15 GB/FB ratios by qualified starters last season: Framber Webb Wright Alcantara Marty Perez Fried McClanahan Bassitt Bieber German Marquez Montgomery Burnes Pablo Lopez Jose Quintana Gallen That's a bunch of pretty good ****ing pitchers. Yes, in this day and age (and forever) you have to miss bats, but making hitters make contact where they can't do damage with it is a very valuable skill, I don't know why you're dismissing it so much.
I think you're conflating a lot of different ideas. max effort pitching and pitching to contact are not necessarily mutually exclusive concepts. Max effort pitching does not equal strikeouts, nor does pitch efficiency = worse results. McCullers can throw max effort all day and not crank out a ton of K's. His stuff (sinkers and curveballs) generates a ton of weak contact. I read an article the other day that said 15 pitches per inning is the optimal number of pitches to have the best results. Baked into that lower number is cheap outs. Sounds like you're living in a FIP-only world. If anything, that is probably a decade or two behind modern baseball. The Astros consistently outperform because they've run out a top 5 defense for most of the last 6 years. Pair weak contact with a strong defense and you get outs. Now I'm not dismissing anything you've said about general trends in more frequent max effort throwing, launch angle, or any of that. But you are asserting that every team's winning strategy is attempting to strike out 27 opposing batters by throwing 180+ max effort pitches in a game and that's just wrong.
It will be interesting to see what happens post banning shift to those guys. I think they still perform much better than guys who don’t keep the ball on the ground but we are talking past each other. you pulled the guys who had the best results and said- look/ they are good pitchers… you can see that because they had the best results! But you are talking about the best results. 99/100 GM types are going to look at- who misses the most bats in grading and determining the quality of pitcher. And- when forming a plan for how they are going to pitch a guy they are going to look for the hole in his swing where they can punch him out- they aren’t playing to contact. look at Framber to see how the game has changed. He’s the ultimate ground ball Pitcher right? Biggest in the history of baseball. And yet, his k per inning pitcher is almost identical to Sandy Koufax and just slightly behind Nolan Ryan! The greatest strikeout pitcher ever and he’s got a K/9 IP on par with the guy “synonymous with weak contact” in todays game. Framber goes 105 or 110 pitches all the time, he’s one of the biggest work horses in the game and he still misses bats with the same quality as all time greats HOFers. Here is you k/9 leaders from last year. Just like on the Gb list you won’t find much but awesome pitchers. 1 Spencer Strider Atlanta Braves P 15.2 2 Hunter Greene Cincinnati Reds P 14.8 3 Jacob deGrom Texas Rangers P 14.6 4 Nick Lodolo Cincinnati Reds P 14.3 5 Jeffrey Springs Tampa Bay Rays P 13.5 6 Dylan Cease Chicago White Sox P 13.2 7 Joe Ryan Minnesota Twins P 12.3 8 Lance Lynn Chicago White Sox P 11.8 8 Kodai Senga New York Mets P 11.8 10 Pablo Lopez Minnesota Twins P 11.7 11 Logan Webb San Francisco Giants P 11.6 12 Shohei Ohtani Los Angeles Angels P 11.4 13 Kevin Gausman Toronto Blue Jays P 11.3 14 Mitch Keller Pittsburgh Pirates P 11.2 15 Shane McClanahan Tampa Bay Rays P
Honestly, the pitchers today are just flat out better than the guys of the past. Someone like Spencer Strider would look like a ****ing alien pitching in the 60s-80s. The median pitcher from the previous era would be a replacement level player today if that.
This is true in every single sport anyone cares about with them exception of college basketball and the only reason it’s not true of college basketball is because in the past Michael Jordan played 3 years and Hakeem and Ewing played all 4 whereas now those guys play 0 and 1. In any sport where the talent pool is- best in the world- this is true.
FIP is much more valuable in determining who is going to be better the next year. It’s predictive. Otherwise- you have a selection bias where you are just looking at the actual results and there’s engineering then when luck, randomness, defense and a bunch of other stuff play in. In order of importance (and what gets guys drafted and promoted) Can you miss bats? Can you control the strike zone Do induce weak contact. if you could crest a super power for a pitcher and it was- never let a ball hit the bat that would be first. Never throw a ball is probably second. Never allow a fly ball is 3rd. Maybe never allow a fly ball is second and never throw a ball is 3rd but both fall behind “miss bats”. and of course the value of defense is I Portent. Turning balls in play into outs is always going to be preferable to the other and the astros are awesome at that. But they can still be awesome at that and do better with a guy that strikes out 12/9 vs 6/9. Any other metric you are pointing to has a selection bias because whoever is at the top Necessarily had a good run at that or they wouldn’t be at the top of the statistic. But the xFIP guys are going to be the ones with the most interest because that’s the most predictive stat out there for future success.
Again, I don't disagree with a good deal of your points. I agree that if you wanted to build a singular pitcher in a lab and clone him 13 times it'd probably be Gerrit Cole, a FIP king. But taking someone like Urquidy and saying throwing him 4IP/80 pitches of max effort/high stress gets better results long-term than sprinkling in some pitches specifically to get a cheap pop fly or grounder, I don't agree with that. But we can agree to disagree. You have in-depth knowledge and a deep fandom of baseball and I respect that.
You were the one that jumped in calling me an ass when that’s what I was talking about. You engaged me not the other way around.
The most valuable pitcher in any rotation is the guy who regularly goes 7-8 innings in 85-95 pitches. They call them Aces for a reason. While I admit to being perhaps a little too close to the line my intention was to recommend better behavior not to name call. This is what you had to say, "There is no benefit to valuing efficiency." & "You seriously have zero idea what you are taking about if you believe anything differently than that." That sir is not only untrue it is also bad behavior and it called for the response you received. Hope I have helped.
You realize that McCullers has a career 10.0Ks per 9 IP? Verlander has 9.1. Lance does get lots of ground ball outs but it's not by trying to avoid Ks.
Fair point. I do tend to think of Verlander in his Astro's career onward where he's closer to the 11k/9 range. His career k rate was dragged down a lot in early 2010's due to injuries. But yes you are correct, i didn't give a great example there.
Ryan Clifford has back-to-back games with three hits for Fayetteville. All of the games in which he's had a hit have been multi-hit games.
If you look at JV’s stats I think it’s probably instructive. He was a big strikeout guy and awesome, then he stopped striking out a bunch of guys and was mid- then he came to the astros and scrapped the ball low in the coke for the high fast ball with the carry up on the sole and he became an ace again after striking a bunch of dudes out again. Basically the entire point I’m making.
