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  • October 26, 2007 04:48 PM ET

Tourney Greats Central # 6 ( All Sport ) The best starting pitcher in each division going by this season.

PHIMan - PHILS NLCS! (94-24-5) vs thejetstolehome: hiatus? (20-9-4)
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A.L East ??? Josh Beckett
A.L Central ??? C.C Sabbathia
A.L West ??? Dan Haren

N.L East ??? Cole Hamels
N.L Central ??? Aaron Harang
N.L West ??? Jake Peavy

I do not see how you can argue with Josh Beckett here. He had the most win in the whole MLB. He will more than likely win the AL Cy Young and missed a couple of starts.

Alright C.C Sabbathia had a fantastic season. He finished with a 19-7 record. He had an ERA of 3.21 and had 209 Ks in 241 IP. He is a workhorse.

Dan Haren had a good season also. He finished with a 15-9 record, but could have had a better record if it was not for the Athletics lack of run support. He finished with a 3.07 ERA and 192 Ks in 222 IP.

This was the toughest decision in picking Cole Hamels, but he had a great year. He missed 7 starts. He finished with a 15-5 record and a 3.39 ERA. He would have had more wins if it was not for his injury. He had 177 Ks in 183 IP. That is great. The other contender here was Tim Hudson. Cole had more Ks and a better Win%. Cole also has a better K/9 and H/9. Hitters have a worse average against Hamels than they do against Hudson.

Jake Peavy is the front runner for the cy young and i am out of room


My only contentions would be the AL Central and the AL West.

Dan Haren had a great year but I'm gonna take John Lackey.

He was 19-9 with a 3.01 ERA, 179 SO, 52 BB and a 1.210 WHIP. He and Haren had essentially identical years so I did a little extra searching and found that Lackey had a better FIP ERA, meaning if the defense weren't behind him, he would have a better time than Haren. This stat isn't utilized enough, which is another discussion for another day.

For the AL Central, I'm going to take the man who is still thet best pitcher in baseball: Johan Santana.

His W/L record wasn't too impressive but we all know how overrated that is, especially with how poor the Twins offense was this year. Johan was 15-13 with a 3.33, and a 1.073 WHIP. He gave up only 183 hits in 219 innings and struck out 235 batters. His K/9 is a ridiculous 9.6. Johan is still the best pitcher in baseball and if he had C.C's offense behind him, he would be on his way to his next Cy Young award. Like I've always said, there's Johan and there's everyone else.


Alright there are a few reasons why I think Haren had a better season than Lackey.

Haren has more Ks than Lackey and Haren has pitched in less innings. Haren would have more wins and less losses if he had a better offense like Lackeys offense.

Dan Haren has also let up less hits than Lackey which could mean that Haren has better pitches and is harder to hit.

Haren has a better K/9, H/9 and a better strikeouts to walks ratio than Lackey.

Now to explain why Sabbathia had a better season than Sanatana.

Wins
Sabathia- 19
Santana- 15

Loses
Sabathia- 7
Santana-13

ERA
Sabathia- 3.21
Santana- 3.33

Walks
Sabathia- 37
Santana- 55

HR Allowed
Sabathia- 20
Santana- 33

Complete Games
Sabathia- 4
Santana- 1

Winning Percentage
Sabathia- .731
Santana- .536

As you know we are going by this season and Sabathia had a better season than Santana. Sabathia is a Top 2 or 3 Cy Young candidate. And by the stats shown above Sabathia had the better numbers than Santana.

Going back to Haren. Haren at one point had an ERA under 2.00 I belive and also was a really high cy young candidate.


You said in your Haren v. Lackey something about offense--obviously, a guy with a 3.31 ERA isn't supposed to lose 13 games like Santana did. The Twins' offense this year was absolutely god awful. Put Johan on the Indains, or any good offensive team for that matter, and he'll match or better what Sabathia did. Sabathia got more than half a run of support more per game than Santana--that adds up.

Yes, he walked more guys than C.C. but he still had a lower WHIP, gave up less hits, had a lower BA against (.225-.259), a lower OBP against (.273-.292), and a lower OPS against (.678-.684). Johan also had a better K/9 by almost 2 strikeouts.

As for Lackey, he had a lower FIP and ERA than Haren, gave up less runs in a few more innings, had less walks. As for being harder to hit, Lackey had a better OPS against than Haren (.680-.687) and gave up less HRs (18-24), with 19 less TB against.


So since we are only counting this year, would you have Santana over Sabathia if you were voting for the A.L Cy Young.

Here is another comparison.

ERA- Sabathia
Wins- Sabathia
IP- Sabathia
K- Santana
BB- Sabathia has walked less
HR Allowed- Sabathia has allowed less
Hits allowed- Santana has let less
CG- Sabathia
Shutouts- Tied with 1
WHIP- Santana

As you see Sabathia wins most of the categories above. Also C.C has caught 10 people trying to steal compared to Santanas 6.

Although Santana has a less BAA, hitters against Sabathia have a lower SLG than against Santana.

Sabathia has a better strikeouts to walk ratio. A whole 1.00.

Now to Haren and Lackey.

ERA
Lackey- 3.01
Haren- 3.07

K
Lackey- 179
Haren- 192

Hits Allowed
Lackey- 219
Haren- 214

BAA ( opponents BA )
Lackey- .254
Haren- 247

K to BB Ratio
Lackey- 3.44
Haren- 3.49

Haren had 13 games where he pitched at least 6 innings and let up 3 runs or less and did not win the game. Lackey only had 7 of these games.

Sabathia had 9 games where he let up 2 earned runs or less and still did not win the game. Santana had 10 games ,which is 1 more than Sabathia, like this.


Alright let's go over this again:

The difference between their ERAs is minimal, and since ERA isn't always 100% reliable, they might as well be the same.

Wins--whose team is better? Sabathia, like I said, had a ton more run suppor per game. Using baseball-reference.com's run support measurements, it has Sabathia at 5.10 per game with Johan and 4.44 per game. That's almost a full run per game. Had Santana been given equal run support as Sabathia, he'd be getting CY consideration. Again. Santana had five games this season where he gave up 3 earned or less runs and got a no decision due to poor offense. He also had five games in which he gave up three earned or less and got a LOSS! On a team with a good offense, like Cleveland's, those are wins.

Walks--Sabathia had less than Santana but Santana still managed a lower OPS and lower OBP against. Johan beats CC in two of 3 on-base categories, not to mention BAA.

K/BB--Sabathia wins here, but per 9 innings, Santana had almost two more. Even if Santana was walking a little more, I'll take the higher amount of strikeouts.

Comments (35) Add A Comment

October 26, 2007  05:13 PM ET
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I will xpalain about Harang in my next argument

October 26, 2007  05:16 PM ET
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don't bother, i agree with you.

October 26, 2007  05:23 PM ET
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yay front page.

October 26, 2007  05:24 PM ET
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Whos better than Harang? ZAMBRONO?!?!? GORZELANNY?

October 26, 2007  05:26 PM ET
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Rick Ankiel.

October 26, 2007  05:30 PM ET
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oh and as an aside, i'll be out from about 730-10ish tonight. Lewis Black is on campus tonight. woot.

October 26, 2007  05:34 PM ET
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I was thinking the same thing-Zambrano.

October 26, 2007  05:39 PM ET
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Harang has a better ERA and WHIP than Zambrano, more strikeouts and less walks. Harang > Zambrano.

October 26, 2007  05:41 PM ET
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I was kidding with Zambrono.
Gorzo could put up a good fight though.
Tell Carlos to be the best pitcher on his TEAM before he worries about the division. (Lilly)

October 26, 2007  05:50 PM ET
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What team does Harang play for?

October 26, 2007  05:53 PM ET
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err wait. I take back that last comment. Somehow i forgot who he was

October 26, 2007  05:54 PM ET
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I would say Harang is the best in the NL next to Scott olsen

October 26, 2007  05:59 PM ET
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harang plays for the reds

October 26, 2007  07:51 PM ET
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Santana? Here we go again...

October 27, 2007  12:22 AM ET
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CG for Twinks pitchers is a useless stat. The bullpen is good enough that they put in Rincon or Neshek or Guerrier in the 8th.

October 27, 2007  12:22 AM ET
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Also, the offense sucked this year...

October 27, 2007  12:24 AM ET
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To all Johan doubters.......
http://www.fannation.com/blogs/post/64882

October 27, 2007  10:14 AM ET
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a home run is an earned run...doesn't matter if it's by 3 singles strung together to create a run or a homer that creates it...an earned run is an earned run...so, it's a stat attached to ERA...

WIns and losses are a horrible barometer for picher since they're dependent a lot on their own team's offense and bullpen...Twins, in the 2nd half, had the lowet amount of runs scored in baseball...22 less than the next lowest teams...hard to win games that way. I look at the amount of games a true ace gets per game. 4 or more is good, 3 or less is bad. Of all the true aces in the AL, Santana had, by far, the most games where he got 3 runs or less of support...about 2/3 of his starts...compare that to a guy like Beckett who had like 6, maybe 7 games where he didn't get 4 or more runs of support. ... Sabathia had quite a few more games where get got 4 or more runs of support as well...PPG of support is a bad barometer cause if you have a game where an SP got 10 runs of support, then 2 games of 1 run of support, it makes him look like he's getting 4 runs of support on average a game(which isn't bad) In reality, that'd only be 1 game in 3 of good run support, which is bad...

So, Wins, Losses and winning % can go out the window as far as determining how good of a season the PITCHER has...(and I like how you used this as 3 different categories to build up the amount of categories you have to explain Sabathia being better....even though it's really just one...and a worthless at that...good try)

Complete games...well, managers have different approaches to complete games...Gardy doesn't like for his pichers to go complete games...he feels no need to wear them out. He uses his bullpen...even when Santana won last year, I think he only had 1 complete game, if that...

You bring up walks...Yes, Santana has 15 more walks than Sabathia...but he also had 26 more strikeouts...OOPs... Walks go into WHIP, and Santana had the best WHIP in the AL


3 5 best ways to evaluate an SP at the end ofthe season:

ERA (runs per game allowed), WHIP(how many people allowed on base), BAA (how hittable the SP is), Ks (dominance) and IP (durability...and, again, even this is iffy cause it's dependenat a lot on a managers willingness to burn put a lot of innings on his pitchers)...
These are the true ways to determine an SP effectiveness...

So, AL Rankings in..

ERA:
Santana: 7th
Sabathia: 5th

WHIP:
Santana: 1st
Sabathia: tied for 4th

BAA:
Santana: 3rd
Sabathia 17th (behind the great Guthrie, Bannister, Shields, McGowan, and others)

Ks:
Santana: 2nd
Sabathia: 5th

IP:
Santana: 6th
Sabathia: 1st


Santana and Beckett were the only 2 SPs in the AL that were top 7 in ALL categories...and Beckett only had a higher ranking in one of the 5 categories..

Santana is the best pitcher...still...

October 27, 2007  10:17 AM ET
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'3 5 best ways to evaluate an SP at the end ofthe season: '

The 3 was a typo...should read...'5 best ways to evaluate an SP at the end of the season'

 
October 27, 2007  10:23 AM ET
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OK...Beckett wasn't even top 7 in all categories...he missed out on IP...So, just Santana top 7 in all 5 categories...helps my poin more, actually..

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