This is also a very good point. Im pretty sure there is a chapter about this in one of Baseball Prospectus non-annual books, either Mind Game or Baseball Between the Numbers.

Even successful power pitchers learn to pitch to contact and go for the K when they need it. The reason power pitchers are successful in the postseason is because they have the ability to step up and get the K with men on 2nd and 3rd with less than 2 out whereas the "finesse" pitchers can get the occasional K, but normally don't have thatability to step up and look for the K. If they polled power pitchers I would bet that they say they learn as their careers go on when to go for the K and when to pitch to contact. And the strikeout is not the best out in baseball. I would take the first pitch groundball any day over the K.

I dont think anyone is arguing with this. I was just saying that a strikeout is better than a random grounder that you dont know if its going to be an out or not even if it takes an extra pitch here or there to strike him out.

Great argument for the strikeout, this is what I was looking for. Also, your last paragraph is spot on, and pretty much what I've been saying. Other than age, there is no difference between the two.




You seem to be stuck on "predicting" what MAY happen. I know that I said that Duke will have a better ERA by the end of the year, but let's get back to what I've been trying to say. Duke has better numbers right now. He has a better ERA, and a better WHIP. Lincecum has 1 more win and 3 less losses, and I've already argued that W's and L's are more an indicator of a teams success more so than an individual pitchers. So let's stop trying to predict the future (unless you can give me a heads up on a nice 3 team parlay ), and tell me why Lincecum is so superior in your mind.

He's trying to explain using strikeouts/walks, and I tried using BABIP and K/BB and FIP. You answer the "who has been better so far" question by pointing to "ERA." Obviously all that REALLY matters is how many runs a pitcher gives up, but over a small sample size -- like say a year, or half-a-year -- a BETTER determinant of future success is, like Moneyball and Cain, etc., have argued is a statistic that takes K's, Walks, HR's, and BABIP, and combines them to give you a picture of what his ERA should be.

It's a tough concept to wrap your brain around, but once the hitter makes contact, the pitcher has little-to-no control over what happens to it, except with respect to groundball/flyball/HR. Seriously. I know it sounds goofy, but no pitcher -- no matter how dominant -- can control a hitter's batting average on, say, groudballs. It's so counterintuitive, but it's true. If, for example, Tim Lincecum's opponents hit .380 on groundballs, and Dukie's hit .210, it is not reflective of some disparity in their respective skill levels, but rather lucky or unlucky variance.

Strikeouts are important because, with a strikeout, the batter CAN NOT get a hit. It's the only way to ensure the opponent cannot reach base. I hear your argument about pitch counts, etc., but:

a) High strike-out rates probably have an overall POSITIVE (ie, they lower the number) effect on pitches/out (which is all that really matters, right?). They simply lead to MORE OUTS, which means fewer baserunners, and fewer pitches. Pitchers who pitch to contact might have some 3 pitch innings, but they will also give up 10 hits in 4 innings on occasion, which is really bad for pitch counts, obviously.

I forgot what point ( was.


I would argue that, so far this year, regardless of their respective ERA's, Tim Lincecum has been a better pitcher than Duke. Duke's ERA is better, but only because he has been the beneficiary of positive variance. I'd lay good money on Lincy having a lower ERA than Dukie over their next 100 innings pitched, or 500, or 1000. And, no offense, but anybody who'd back Dukie in that spot straight up would be suffering from a fundamental misunderstanding of the nature of pitching. Dukie has had a good year, but he's waaaay more likely to regress towards an upper mean than not.


Wang

So do you want action on this Sportsmack?

I'll do whatever number you're comfortable with and I'm willing to escrow to pretty much whoever you'd like.

I understand everything in your post except for the highlighted. Why would you argue this? Just curious, other than the fact that it's your opinion. I mean seriously, maybe I'm just clueless, but I don't understand how you can argue with the current stats as they stand TODAY...not tomorrow, or at the end of the season.

I mean the last time I checked, the only stats that baseball takes into account are...ERA, WHIP, BB's, K's and W's and L's. When I look on ESPN.com I don't see a pitcher's BABIP or FIP. I mean I understand them, but if they are so important, then why aren't the listed as part of the "normal" stats? I understand that they might be an indication of things to come, but they have nothing to do with the present.

Also, I think you have to take into account the fact that Duke is doing this in the AL and Lincecum is doing it in the NL. IMO, the level of competition is and always will be better in the AL. Not that Lincecum couldn't do what he's doing in the AL, but Duke is doing it in the AL and is doing it with better current numbers than Lincecum. And you don't have to look any further than the Giants own division to see that the level of play is far superior in the AL. The first place team (Diamondbacks) isn't even playing .500 ball! They'd be 10 games out in the AL West...I mean seriously, what a joke! This is the only reason why I'm even a little hesitant about taking any action on the season ending ERA's, becasue Lincecum will be going up against the horrid NL West, while Duke will be going up against the AL West.

The reason some of those stats are not mainstream yet is because baseball is an unabashedbly "traditional" sport. As an A's fan you should know this.....people used to think Billy Beane was crazy didnt they?

I agree 100% about AL vs. NL. That is the only reason I am calling Dusch v. Linc a wash this year. Linc is younger and his "predictive" stats and history point to him being the better pitcher. However, Dusch is pitching lights out in the tougher league (no easy out at the 9 spot) so that gives him bonus points in my mind. Both play in pitchers parks so that is a wash.

I think Wang's main point is that pretty much all the statistical evidence points to Linc being the better SP long term.

For this year, though, I think you can make a decent argument that Dusch has been better than Linc....though dont forget that Dusch has the luxury of playing for a good team whereas Linc has to pitch for the hapless giants.

To explain, sportsmack, I'll make a poker analogy.

During a string of ten tournaments, you make a few trivial cashes, but otherwise bomb. During those same ten tournaments I make 3 final tables, top 3 them all, and even win 1.

At this point, it looks like I'm a better tournament player than you. It turns out, however, that -- during my sick run -- I've won 72% of my races, never lost in an 80-20 spot, and flopped a set almost 15% of the time I've had pocket pairs.

You, however, have won 39% of your races, had AA cracked 5 times and KK 3, and flopped 2 sets with 75 pocket pairs.

Isn't it very possible that you've played better than me? I'd argue, if a smart, thinking player watched each of us play, he'd very easily be able to determine which of us was better. What if it was you? What if, even though you've been unlucky and barely cashed a few times, you PLAYED BETTER THAN ME, even in the tournament I happened to win? That's not that outrageous, is it?

Dukie's ERA is lower, but Lincecum has pitcher better. FIP (aka DIPS) not only works as a predictor of things to come, but also as a backwards-looking crystal ball. "If we ran the season over and over and over again, and both Dukie and Lincecum pitched with the exact same quality, what would their ERAs be? What SHOULD their ERAs have been over this stretch, if we ignore the noise?" THat's what DIPS/FIP does. It's a better judge of someone's CURRENT performance than ERA is.



As fas as why BABIP and FIP aren't on ESPN's stat page, well... they are. Even if they weren't, just because ESPN doesn't wholly endorse OPS+, WARP, BaseRuns, Linear Weights, and DIPS doesn't mean they're not better metrics by which to analyze baseball. Baseball is a game of old-timey mythological nostalgia, so people don't WANT the stats to change. No matter what anybody says, some people are going to just KNOW that a .300 hitter is a good, pure hitter, and Adam Dunn -- who hits .220, but has an OPS+ of 138 because he walks and hits for power -- sucks.

Wang

I have come to the conclusion that we're just gonna have to agree to disagree on these two pitchers. It was a very well thought out and enlightening discussion though. I now know waaaaaaaaaaaaaaay more than I ever wanted to about obscure pitching statistics lol.

This is unacceptable.

People probably shouldn't disagree with Wang about anything baseball related.

Would this been more acceptible...


"I don't know anything about stats that matter, and I got owned trying to talk with someone who knows 100x more about the subject than I do. I will now stop talking because my ignorance has become painfully obvious"

lol, but seriously...thanks for enlightening new stats. I will def. pay more attention to these, oh and for the links in the other thread...good stuff.




Meh, just didn't feel like going on for 5 more pages about Lincecum vs. Duke. It is okay to maintain your original position and still come away having learned a lot.




Still just being a dick huh? Cool, carry on then.

FYP

I'm not meaning to come off as a dick ( well, not THAT Much of a dick) It's just that, there are those who believe things like sports can be looked at logically, methodically. They believe that you can analyze a player, and predict their future success, based on statistics that matter. They do not believe that arguments like "Pedro vs Koufax" are matters of opinion, but can actually be answered, if you analyze the numbers well enough. They believe that there is an answer to who is better, Lincecum or Duke.

It's frustrating when someone presents a logical, well thought out argument that player X is better than player Y and are ignored. They take the time, not only to explain why, to explain the obscure stats, and to explain the very logic on why traditional stats are overrated. And in the face of this thoughtful, well thought out explanation, someone responds " Oh well, you have your opinion, I have mine". I have nothing but contempt for that sort of reaction to a well thought out and rational arguement.

LOL, that's the funny thing, we actually were having a well thought out conversation...complete with stats and everything. And after 3 pages, I decided that we just weren't getting anywhere and I was just done presenting my side. "Agree to disagree" or "concede," whatever you want to call, that's what I did.

I completely understood all of the stats presented to me, but my argument had to do with who the better present day pitcher is. And according to the stats that MLB actually records, it seems to me that Duchscherer would be the better present day pitcher. Not by a lot, as a matter of fact it's probably like comparing apples to apples, but his stats are indeed better right now.

But then you come in at the end and mouth off about how I got owned, as if I didn't state any facts or stats throughout the entire thread. It's "Johny-come-lately's" like you that I have nothing but comtempt for.

I agree that wang's end was well thought out.

No, see.. you were getting somewhere, it just wasn't somewhere you wanted to go. The stats Wang gave you suggest that Lincecum is the better pitcher, right now. The issue is, do results matter or do actual things a pitcher can control and is responsible for matter.The stats that "MLB actually records" are results oriented.

You were "done presenting your side" because you have nothing logical to add. You can only spew out statistics that you think matter because they've always mattered.


If you think that Duke really is a better pitcher, I encourage you to take wang up on his bet.

That's pretty awesome that you seem to think you know me so well, but ummmmmm...no I was actually just done arguing my point after 3 pages. Didn't realize that there was actually a set point in time when I could just be done with my argument and move on with my life lol. If you could enlighten me as to how long I have to argue before I can be done, please do. I wouldn't want to throw off the dynamics of the forum.

god damn, you have poor reading comprehension. Seriously poor. I was saying Why you were done, not that you were done. YO uare done because you have nothing to add other than nonsense.

Manny Parra's beating Lincecum right now. Parra is better. YES!

LOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOL, actually I'm done because I am done...gg though.


edit: Lincecum's line for today: 6 IP, 121 pitches, 6 H, 5 ER, 4 BB, 8 K...guess all those K's didn't help...eh, maybe next game. Current ERA of 2.79

Duke's line for today: 7 IP, 109 pitches, 6 H, 2 ER, 3 BB, 4 K...current ERA of 1.87

okay nothing more to add

Lincecum gave up runs 3-5 because Bochy ran him out there like a fucking moron in the 7th inning when he was already at 115 pitches.

kthxbyeggnore

Yes, we know that already, you've had nothing to add since you started in this thread.

Keyword

next time try coming in somewhere in the beginning if you're gonna attempt to contribute, kthxbye...nice effort though lol.

Everyone in this thread has behaved like a two year old. Including me, probably. I don't even remember what I said.

Sportsmack: You have a good amount to learn about baseball. Most standard evaluative metrics (ERA, RBI, Batting Average, Errors, etc.) are sorely lacking in the "actually tells me something I care about" department. Give me K's, BB's, and HR's allowed, and I'll be able to give you a more accurate prediction of future ERA than YOU would be able to do with "current ERA." There's simply a better correlation between "K/9, BB/9, HR/9" and "ERA-future" than there is between "ERA-now" and "ERA-future." Weird, huh?

Anyway, some of this stuff is really, really important, and you'd be well-served if you started acclimating yourself with the very basics of SABRmetric analysis. None of it is that hard, and it carries the added bonus of allowing one to feel superior to his peers.


You know what I am starting to fool with? WPA/LI (Win Probability Added/Leverage Index). Every action a player takes has a distinct effect on the likely outcome of the game. Either it increases the chance to win (like a walk in the top of the first with no out) or it decreases the chance to win (a strikeout in the same situation). Sum up aaaaall these actions, and we get a player's "Win Probability Added." Over the course of the year, a player is going to be responsible for some fractions of a win that will sum to a games-won value. Anyway, I wonder how Duke and Lincy fare...


Wang


HINT: They are #2 and #3 respectively in baseball.

This made me LOL

...also I have absolutely no desire to learn anymore than I already have in this thread about useless stats just so I "can feel superior to my peers." If that's why you study these meaningless stats, well then I'm just sorry for you.

I'm good just sitting back and enjoying a beer in the bleachers watching my boy Duke own opposing batters...peace out.

You also have a lot to learn about: sardonic/tongue-in-cheek humor/jokes. I was in here semi-defending you and telling people to cool out, trying to keep the atmosphere light, and you respond with this nonsense? "Stats are stupid and meaningless. Give me beer and a real game at the stadium anyday. I feel sorry for you. LOL." I go to tons of baseball games, and before I quit drinking, I drank more beer in six-months than you'll consume in a decade. So cool it with that weak-ass, junior-year-of-highschool shit, okay?

LMFAO

sigh

Lincecum: 7IP: 2 Runs, 7 Hits, 13 K's - Tyler Walker blows another win

Duke: 6IP: 8 Runs, 9 Hits, 6 K's - Loser

Yeah, a very weird game from Duke. However it's only the 2nd game all year that he's given up more than 2 ER's in a game. Lincecum has given up 2 Runs or more in a game 8 times (very surprised at that actually). Guess everyone is due for a bad game.

ERA's after yesterday's games: Duke 2.37, Lincecum 2.78. It's gonna be fun to see this thing play out.

Since bets would have been placed.

Duke 2 starts 13 Innings 6.92 ERA 10k 5BB
Lincecum 2 starts 13 Innings 4.85 ERA 21k 4BB

Lincecum is gonna smoke him. 13 strikeouts and no walks in 7 innings for Tim last night is sick good. The Freak is all that is man!!!!

The analysis in this thread is simply awful. Duke is not close to the pitcher Lincecum is. I've seen more than one person say that the only difference between them is age, but seriously, just look past ERA.

thank you.

You're quite welcome.

bump for lincecum!

Most of the analysis was good. Sportsmack is just an idiot.

I read this from the last post and for about 2 pages I swore you were talking about Zach Duke

People semi-conceded to him a few times and said that it was close between the two. It wasn't and isn't, but maybe they were just appeasing him. Shrug.

LOL...can't we all just along?




You mean we weren't




lol @ appeasing me

I didn't mean it offensively sportsmack. I harbor no ill will toward you. You just happen to be very very wrong in this instance. You certainly are entitled to that very very extremely wrong opinion though, so I didn't mean to offend.

that's what I think is so funny, that everyone took it so seriously. I was just having a fun sports argument lol. The fact that everyone got all wound up is just hilarious to me. I totally forgot about this thread, thanks for bringing back the good memories. Let's try not taking ourselves so seriously, after all it's just sports.

What it's really about is critical thinking. It's the lack of critical thinking that people were upset about, not the sports.

lol, school starts in 2 weeks, I'll save the critical thinking for then. And it's still just sports imo.

See, this is the whole point, you're entire failure to even understand the issue. Are sports important? nope. Is looking at things with a critical, logical, rational eye important? yes.

Since July 16th when bets would have been made.

Lincecum 7 starts, 48 innings, 2.42 ERA, 65 Ks, 20 BBs
Duchscherer 6 starst, 33 innings, 4.91 ERA, 29 Ks, 11 BBs

Edit. I had wrong K and BB totals for Duke. I had replaced his real ones with Tims K/bb before last nights game. All good now.

lol @ all the faux intellectuals in this thread. Glad I don't watch sports through such a magnifying glass, how boring that must be.




So now we only play half a season? If that's your argument, then Duke wins the first half ERA title. And CC Sabbathia wins the second half CY Young. LOL, nice try though.

What annoys me about this whole thing is that in a different thread (I can't remember which one, or I would quote you on it) you got into a debate with CaneBrain about who's a better GM, Beane or Beinfest. You even told Cane to read Moneyball to understand how great Beane is. In that book they specifically talk about how traditional statistics are flawed and how Beane is able to exploit this. They even specifically mention BABIP. Yet, you're in here going on about how these advanced statistics are meaningless and the only ones that matter are the traditional ones like ERA and WHIP.

If you want to watch sports just for the sake of enjoying the game, then that's fine. But don't get into arguments like this one when you're clearly out of your league. Most of the anger that was directed towards you was because you looked at logical arguments right in the face and said LMAO.

It's not boring at all, because everyone is HUGE!

No, but seriously, acting like a Philistine and mocking intellectual engagement is the last resort of a man overmatched. "Jesus, I don't know how to win here. Better I just pretend I don't care if I win. That way nobody will know I lost."

You know how I watch sports? In a lab-coat with 10 notebooks, 3 different-colored pens, and a TIVO. It takes me 7 hours to watch an NFL game. You ran your mouth about Duke, everyone told you Lincecum was and is the better pitcher and that Duke's success was unsustainable, and still your gums kept flapping. Now the crow's coming home to roost. It's roosting right in your fucking face.