Sonny Gray's Criticism of Last Year's Rotation Shows How Far We've Come

On 3/27/2023 at 6:47 AM, CRF said:

Gray is 100% right, but ultimately it's up to the pitcher to show that he can last more than 3-4-5 innings. If the pitcher is giving up hits/runs, giving up walks, has no command, and generally pitching lousy...he's not going to be in there very long. I sure would like to have this staff go at least 6 innings in most of their starts...that would mean that they're doing their job, and we're probably in the game. We'll see what happens this season. 

Gray has been groomed under the old school, this mentality is to complete his game or at least go as long as his arm can take him. If a SP is having problems, you keep him in there & let him work it out.

Baldelli has been brought up with the new TB school. Where quality innings over rides quantity. If a SP is struggling you pull him. Even though TB had a far superior rotation than ours they pitched far fewer innings. The difference between us & them is that they have a steady pipeline of studs in their BP.

I believe you hit nail on the head CRF. It's the pitcher (his profile) which should determine how many innings (or pitches) a SP should pitch not a philosophy. When we signed Bundy, I was very disappointed, this is a terrible pitcher. when you look at his record you see during a regular season  he was terrible but he had a very good '20 shortened season. Which tells me if you limit his innings with a piggy-back system (as FO suggested) it could work. Needless to say long relief was never incorporated & short relief was a mess. So when Bundy was pitching great in the beginning of the  season, pounding his chest saying I want more innings, They gave it to him that caused his downward production. "How can you say that Bundy was over stretched when he didn't pitch over 5 innings on a regular basis?" you may ask. Because Bundy doesn't have the arm to blow you away, so he has to depend 100% on control. If his weak arm isn't 100%, he can't hit his spots.

Although I can understand where both Baldelli & Gray are coming from, but IMO they are both wrong. If a SP profiles 6+ innings/ game he should be allowed to do so to save the BP. IMO Lopez, Ryan & Gray could get to that. Last season we had 2 rookies; Gray, who was out of condition; Archer, who was still recovering from an extended absence and shoulder surgery and Bundy; plus our SPs had a shortened - practically no ST. You can't expect them to pitch much over 5 innings/ game on a steady basis.

I really liked Gray so when I heard his remarks, I could see how he was frustrated over his short outings & thought maybe they were over exaggerate. But him reiterating it again this ST, it makes me question his attitude. If he escaped the IL I could understand his complaining. But he landed there more than a couple of times. I'd think he'd be happy that he has come to ST 100% & forget the past.

This is Gray's last year, we should give him the minimum to keep him happy (for his & the club sake), then really make him  happy by pitching the living daylight out of his arm (Like OAK did with Montas). Then trade him.

15 hours ago, Richie the Rally Goat said:

 

FIP is the best predictor of ERA (better than ERA) and so I’d still stick with the bullpen was the right choice.

Thanks for the numbers!  I have to say, though, the response is part of what frustrates me about analytics.  let me be clear that I don't mean this personally, more of just a general comment on analytics.  Here 2 numbers were presented and the the one that better supported your thesis was chosen, in  lieu of the (more accurate) one that goes against your priors.  The bigger issue though is the idea that FIP is more meaningful than ERA when looking at last year.  This is fundamentally misunderstanding statistics.  FIP is a predicitve analytic.  It MAY predict NEXT YEAR's ERA better than this current year's ERA, but FIP measures what may have happened if baseball was played in a vacuum while ERA measures what actually happened.  FIP cannot predict last year's ERA better than ERA because we actually have last year's ERA - no predictions necessary.   So the numbers presented absolutely point to the Twins replacing a better pitcher (Gray) with worse ones, on average (the bullpen).  Maybe this doesn't conform to the analytics bible, but analytics is supposed to be about digging deeper to find the cold truth, and not being slavish to conventional wisdom.  

 That said, I am most interested in what happened specifically in the games that Gray pitched, and even more specifically with the pichetrs that replaced him.  One thing I've noticed is the stats crowd always focuses on when to pull the starter, and almost never on who they plan to replace him with.  Yes, third time through the order may result in a higher ERA for the starter, but it still might be better than the guy they are bringing in, and it is almost certainly better than the guy they are bringing it + the domino effect of wearing out your bullpen earlier.  And this is magnified when you have a starter who is dealing.  You KNOW how that guy is pitching, you don't need numbers to predict if he's pitching well.  But when you yank him you are taking a risk that the next guy maybe just doesn't have it today, or the next guy, or the next guy.  It just seems counterproductive to me.  But, again, maybe I'm happy to be proven wrong with the data.  I'll see if I can gather any numbers on this.  

17 hours ago, Nick Nelson said:

I'd say it's as simple as this: Lopez pitched deeper into games because he was good enough and physically capable. This combination was rarely in place for Twins starters last year. The idea that Baldelli obsesses over this kind of thing is overblown, IMO. Jose Berrios, as one example, had big workloads under Baldelli because he was good enough and physically capable. 

I would agree with assessment of Baldelli.  Pitchers that show they can be effective 3rd time through, or after x pitches will be given some latitude.

I am curious to know if the numbers back up the longer innings.  An ERA of 5.00 for Lopez 3rd time through the order might be acceptable for a terrible Marlins team, but that will not help the Twins.  If Lopez starts getting pulled earlier, the TD mob will go bananas.

6 hours ago, wabene said:

Ok let's clear this up. Originally I posted my opinion on your quoted post, but then decided not to get involved, it's not my job, but since you can't delete posts I left the expressionless emoji there. After you responded with the emoji, I made a flippant response, which I regret.

Now I'll just give it to you straight, I didn't like you calling Rocco Baldelli, Baldi. I get it if you don't like his management style, or perhaps you just like to complain about management, doesn't matter to me. Just give the man basic respect. I believe that would fall under the rules of this site anyway. 

Thanks for clearing up the concern! 

I in no way intended 'Baldi' to be a derogatory nickname referencing his hair but I now see how that could be the interpretation. 

I will not use that nickname going forward! 

12 minutes ago, Richie the Rally Goat said:

If we want to know what would happen if we made a change, that’s a prediction and FIP fits better.

Well, not really.  If we wanted to guess what would happen in the future if we were to make a change, we might use FIP.  But after the fact we don't need to guess, since we now know what happened - that's ERA. You are using FIP to predict something that already happened.  It's like saying 538's March Madness matchup predictor is a more accurate predictor of a game's outcome than the actual outcome of the game.  "Yes, Alabama lost, but 538 had them as the favorite to win it all so they're still the favorites in my book."  

Let me ask, is there a reason you are looking for a certain narrative here?  It just seems like you are trying to make the numbers fit a story, rather than let the numbers tell the story.  I don't really have a horse in the race, and part of the reason I started posting here is to learn if the data supports some of the things that have concerned me about the organization's direction under this leadership team.  Honestly I wanted to be proven wrong - it would make me more opmistic about the future of my favorite club :)

6 minutes ago, Richie the Rally Goat said:

We know the outcomes based on how the events transpired. We don’t know what the outcomes would have been if the events were managed differently.

Thanks so much for the explanation.  I better understand now where you were going with this.  Personally, I was talking about specific outcomes.  I.e., how did X reliever do on X date after Gray was pulled in X inning.  I tried looking and it doesn't appear there is an intuitive way to gather this data, so maybe this is a moot point.  But to look at it from your perspective I think you'd need to include the entire bullpen right?  Not just the best relievers.  Because part of my theory is that pulling starters early taxes the bullpen unnecessarily.  In other words it forces you down the road to use lesser quality relievers because the better ones are overworked.  But of course, this is hard to quantify too.

"Lucky for him (and us), there's good reason to expect a big change in the season ahead."

We'll see. I don't see how it can change much too early in the season, as I don't think one of these guys threw anything more than about 4 innings/80 pitches in any of their spring training outings.

I don't think a 'big' change is coming. I think a change in approach is appropriate...but the staff isn't going to be averaging 7-inning starts, and of course, the starters need to hold up their end of the bargain in terms of efficiency.

On 3/27/2023 at 12:03 AM, D.C Twins said:

I hope Gray continues to hold Baldi accountable throughout the year. 

Not all pitchers are the same and not all starts by each pitcher are the same. 

You can't use one algorithm. Some days pitchers will have more stamina and easy/sustained velo while feeling goooood.

Let them roll through the 3rd and (GASP) 4th time through the order when that occurs.

I hope to see a little more situational awareness in game by Baldi this year with accountability provided by players and management if he cannot or will not improve in this area. 

 

How much say does Rocco even have? It feels like it's often decided at 2:00 that afternoon whether the starter will be allowed to face the order a 3rd time by Favley and his analytics gurus and Rocco does what he's told.

57 minutes ago, Richie the Rally Goat said:

You make a good point. Expanding scope paints a different picture. I used a simple average, because ERA is already an average, but I used an arbitrary 40 innings as a cutoff (not rate stat to cherry pick). 30 innings or 20 innings might have been more representative. I don’t think 12 innings of Danny Coloumbe makes sense to include in the sample. He only pitched 12 innings.

Thank you so much for putting these numbers together.  I owe you one!  I think a deeper dive would be required to really come to a definitive conclusion, but my takeaway is that if you're going to use short starts as a proactive strategy, a very strong bullpen is necessary.  The other thing I would really like to see is a more balanced evaluation between "Should we pull the starter?" and "Who are we going to replace the starter with?".  Even if a starter is tiring somewhat or facing the dreaded 3rd time thru, he may still be the best option on that day, for that inning/at bat, etc.  

Thanks again, I really appreciate the discussion!

4 minutes ago, Nick Nelson said:

That's a pretty standard build-up. I don't think anyone's generally throwing 100 pitches in spring training games. 

Agreed. All I'm saying is that going deeper into games is an approach that really isn't available until these guys get stretched out. That used to happen in spring training. Now, it happens over the first month of the season.

10 hours ago, Major League Ready said:

You could make the same statement had they signed Correa / Judge / Turner / Verlander and Scherzer.  You could say Houston appears to be a good team based on this logic.  Until they play the games it only "appears" they are better.  This is fan speak rhetoric as I see it.  Injuries happen and players sometimes underperform but that as of this moment it's a better team than last year.   

Actually as of this moment nobody's played a game and we, along with everyone else are exactly the same as last year.