NFL and Verizon renew mobile phone streaming deal
June 4, 2013
2013 NBA Draft, LeBron James, Trent Richardson, Asdrubal Cabrera and more with Dennis Manoloff – WFNY Podcast – 2013-06-04
June 4, 2013Back at the start of the season, I wrote a long-form edition of The Diff about quality starts and the Cleveland Indians pitching. Mostly, it was an excuse to lament about how awful the Tribe’s starting pitching was en route to the 68-94 season in 2012.
Thus, now that we’re just over the 1/3rd mark of the back-and-forth 2013 season, I felt it was appropriate to update the statistics and see how things are going. A conversation with Jon today on Twitter led me to posting the chart over there:
.@WFNYJon You mean a chart like this, sorted by 2013 AL teams and their QS percentage? http://t.co/UyxeWXwRpU
— Jacob L. Rosen (@JacobLRosen) June 4, 2013
Here are some main observations that I have, with relation to the 2012 numbers:
1) First, it’s notable that the Indians currently rank 10th in the AL in quality start percentage and 14th in bullpen ERA. Those are two facts of life right now. Difficult to swallow, but facts nonetheless.
2) Because the Indians rank fifth in the AL in runs per game, they’ve done quite well thus far at converting quality starts to wins. In fact, they rank second in the AL in that category with a .789 winning percentage in quality starts1.
3) Then, compounded by the bullpen issues, the Indians have struggled when the starters can’t deliver a quality start. Their .276 winning percentage in non-quality starts ranks 11th in the league.
4) Overall, what stands out to me2 is that the Cleveland Indians are what we thought they would be. The offense has been solidly above average and the pitching has been a question mark still. The pitching has improved overall, especially the starting rotation, and the Indians have improved (albeit slightly) on their ridiculously awful, league-worst non-quality start winning percentage from a season ago (it was .169).
5) Going forward, of course, all of the AL team averages will squish together as we have a larger and larger sample size. But the observations about Cleveland are clear: The team’s bullpen is a big problem, while the offense has the capability to carry the team whenever the starting rotation gets its job done.
[Related: Asdrubal injured; Masterson roughed up in 7-4 loss in New York]
- Oddly enough, Boston-Oakland-Cleveland, the top three teams in pitches per plate appearance, lead the AL (in a slightly different order) in this category. Maybe there’s something even more to be said for extra, extra patience? [↩]
- besides Seattle’s abysmal 2-23 record in non-quality starts, Chicago’s by far league-worst offense, poor Toronto’s early struggles and the flukey start for the LA Angels [↩]
5 Comments
Ah so my eyes haven’t deceived me the bullpen has been killing them! Stats, who needs stats! But seriously surprised the Indians aren’t a little higher in quality starts then 10th. Not surprising that the offense, despite a split personality at times, has helped perfume the pitching problems.
Btw for all the stat boys out there I know I’ve mentioned the MLB Network show with Brian Kenney (?sp) and Harold Reynolds before, interesting. I thought Kenney was doing the sabremetrics thing as part of the show turns out the guy freakin lives by stats. He hosted Sunday and every play he mentioned something statistical. It drove me insane!
Here’s the Indians quality starts by stretches of the season:
First 11 games: 7-4 (.636)
Next 10 games: 1-9 (.100)
Next 21 games: 14-6 (.700)
Last 15 games: 6-9 (.400)
So they’ve been really back-and-forth, as could be evidenced as well by the ERA, of course.
I don’t think the team will go out and get a SP. Whether I think they should is another matter. But I think the team feels confident enough in how the starting pitching has performed over the last month-plus (20-15, .571 in quality starts) along with Carrasco/Bauer in Columbus.
I think the team will keep looking for possible relief help (a la JC Romero) at the moment. Then, another weakness is infield depth at the moment, of course, and depending upon how long Cabrera’s out. And in the end, we could be sellers by the deadline.
That second ten games, yikes that’s what sunk them overall.
I guess alot will depend on where they are in the standings come the trade deadline but even with Carrasco/Bauer at Columbus I still feel like the Indians need to add at least one legitimate starting pitcher. If they are in contention at the trade deadline I’ll feel even stronger about it because as your statistics show the starting rotation is far from dependable. Come late in the season dependability will only be exponentially more important IMO. Lets hope they aren’t sellers.
I know we could be sellers but I would prefer to not think about that possibility for now. Unless we are selling Asdrubal for a young SP who can help us now.