Advanced stats: Jack Morris was a HOFer

[gunnarthor]

http://www.baseballprospectus.com/article.php?articleid=26706

 

Intro paragraph, rest behind paywall: 

Our generation of baseball fans and analysts might have been wrong about Jack Morris. Let that sink in for a moment. We yelled and bickered and picked Morris’s career apart, and we won: Morris is not in the Hall of Fame, and if he ever gets there, it will be on the strength of a Veterans Committee vote, not a BBWAA ballot. We told the world, in no uncertain terms, that Morris was an unimpressive compiler, a workhorse without distinctive merit. We scoffed at efforts to lionize him for his October achievements, pointing out (fairly, I think) that his heroics in 1984 and 1991 should be weighed against his abject failures in 1987, 1992, and 1993. Most of all, we contended that his high ERA and FIP, albeit in a huge number of innings, marked him mostly as a durable pitcher, and not as a truly great one. We might have been right, of course. But it looks a lot like we were wrong.

[drjim]

I remember hearing hints of this on an Effectively Wild podcast. Don't we all wish the stat heads would all make up their minds...

 

If nothing else, hopefully people will simmer down a little, stop belittling different interpretations and show some humility in these debates.

 

(OK, that last sentence was a joke)

[Willihammer]

So... what's DRA? And what is Morris' DRA?

[nicksaviking]

"DRA concerns itself with all outcomes and all runs allowed. It doesn’t zoom in on strikeouts, walks, and home runs, to the exclusion of all else. What it does do is credit pitchers with their role in the outcome of every plate appearance. The effects of opponent quality (in essence: how good is the opposing hitter?), defense, the catcher, the umpire, the ballpark, all of these things are corrected for. Not perfectly, of course, that would be impossible, but as well as we can. DRA also measures a pitcher’s role in slowing the opposing running game, and credits or debits him accordingly."

 

Well.  That sounds like a pretty ambitious stat.  I can't tell if I want to know more, or if I want to laugh at the sheer scope of what it wants to (thinks it can?) measure.

[Willihammer]

Right. Its a great tease, that's for sure (but I'm still too cheap to pay for a subscription)

[Thrylos]

43.8 career WAR, no Cy Young awards, 4/18 AS seasons.  He maybe borderline belongs to the hall of very good, and that is debatable.  He was not a top 10 pitcher in his era. 

 

DRA or not.