A better way to predict pitcher injury and regression
You know, I’m tired of being a nobody blogger. As I’ve pointed out numerous times, I’m just as qualified as the big shots. The only thing keeping me back is the lack of an ego large enough to shout absurdities and get them accepted as truth. It’s time to change that. We’re going for the big time with this article by revealing the secret to predicting which pitchers are due for injury and regression. I call it the Good Pitcher Effect (GPE).
You may be familiar with the “Year-After Effect” from a so-called sportswriter who will remain nameless. It is also known as the “Verducci Effect,” named for someone whose name I won’t mention. On the surface it sounds logical: young pitchers who increase their workload too much are likely to have trouble the next year. Some may point out that picking names out of a hat is just as likely to get you the same results, but we can all agree that these stat nerds are ruining baseball with their bizarre measures of greatness that are far more complicated than simple stats like batting average and earned run average. I mean, how hard is it to count up at-bats and earned runs? It’s not like there are arcane rules governing what does and does not count.
I don’t want to rely on stats to predict who is at risk this year, they’re just too unreliable. Instead, let’s look at something much more meaningful, voting by baseball writers! These guys know baseball, so they should be the experts we listen to. Unfortunately, they don’t vote on which pitchers will be injured next. All we have to work with is the Cy Young Award voting, so let’s go with that.
Here’s how the GPE works: if a pitcher gets a vote for the Cy Young Award, he is at risk for poorer performance in the following season. That’s it. No complicated math, no comparisons between seasons. Age doesn’t matter, body type doesn’t matter. If you get a vote, you’re at risk. Does it work? Let’s look at what happened to the 2011 Cy Young vote recipients in 2012:
| Name | ERA11 | ERA12 | + | .5 | 1 | 2 | IP11 | IP12 | – | 15 | 30 | 45 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Justin Verlander | 2.40 | 2.64 | X | 251.00 | 238.33 | X | ||||||
| Jered Weaver | 2.41 | 2.81 | X | 235.67 | 188.67 | X | X | X | X | |||
| James Shields | 2.82 | 3.52 | X | X | 249.33 | 227.67 | X | X | ||||
| CC Sabathia | 3.00 | 3.38 | X | 237.33 | 200.00 | X | X | X | ||||
| Jose Valverde | 2.24 | 3.78 | X | X | X | 72.33 | 69.00 | X | ||||
| C.J. Wilson | 2.94 | 3.83 | X | X | 223.33 | 202.33 | X | X | ||||
| Dan Haren | 3.17 | 4.33 | X | X | X | 238.33 | 176.67 | X | X | X | X | |
| Mariano Rivera | 1.91 | 2.16 | X | 61.33 | 8.33 | X | X | X | X | |||
| Josh Beckett | 2.89 | 4.65 | X | X | X | 193.00 | 170.33 | X | X | |||
| Ricky Romero | 2.92 | 5.77 | X | X | X | X | 225.00 | 181.00 | X | X | X | |
| David Robertson | 1.08 | 2.67 | X | X | X | 66.67 | 60.67 | X | ||||
| Clayton Kershaw | 2.28 | 2.53 | X | 233.33 | 227.67 | X | ||||||
| Roy Halladay | 2.35 | 4.49 | X | X | X | X | 233.67 | 156.33 | X | X | X | X |
| Cliff Lee | 2.40 | 3.16 | X | X | 232.67 | 211.00 | X | X | ||||
| Ian Kennedy | 2.88 | 4.02 | X | X | X | 222.00 | 208.33 | X | ||||
| Cole Hamels | 2.79 | 3.05 | X | 216.00 | 215.33 | X | ||||||
| Tim Lincecum | 2.74 | 5.18 | X | X | X | X | 217.00 | 186.00 | X | X | X | |
| Yovani Gallardo | 3.52 | 3.66 | X | 207.33 | 204.00 | X | ||||||
| Matt Cain | 2.88 | 2.79 | 221.67 | 219.33 | X | |||||||
| John Axford | 1.95 | 4.67 | X | X | X | X | 73.67 | 69.33 | X | |||
| Craig Kimbrel | 2.10 | 1.01 | 77.00 | 62.67 | X | |||||||
| Madison Bumgarner | 3.21 | 3.37 | X | 204.67 | 208.33 | |||||||
| Ryan Vogelsong | 2.71 | 3.37 | X | X | 179.67 | 189.67 |
Ouch. Of the 23 players on the list, 19 of them had a higher ERA and pitched fewer innings in 2012, including every AL pitcher. Only Matt Cain and Craig Kimbrel reduced their ERA and only Madison Bumgarner and Ryan Vogelsong pitched more innings. Increase the thresholds to an ERA increase of 1 point or more or a workload decrease of 30 innings or more and you’re still left with 12 players. That’s more than half of the players on the list with significantly worse performances in the season after they received Cy Young votes. I think we’re on to something. So how are last year’s Cy Young vote recipients doing? We’re only a week into the season, but there are some interesting small sample size results:
| Name | ERA |
|---|---|
| David Price | 8.18 |
| Justin Verlander | 2.19 |
| Jered Weaver | 1.50 |
| Felix Hernandez | 2.57 |
| Fernando Rodney | 16.20 |
| Chris Sale | 1.84 |
| Jim Johnson | 0.00 |
| Matt Harrison | 8.44 |
| Yu Darvish | 0.00 |
| R.A. Dickey | 8.44 |
| Clayton Kershaw | 0.00 |
| Gio Gonzalez | 0.00 |
| Johnny Cueto | 2.77 |
| Craig Kimbrel | 0.00 |
| Matt Cain | 8.38 |
| Kyle Lohse | 1.50 |
| Aroldis Chapman | 0.00 |
| Cole Hamels | 10.97 |
Out of the 18 vote recipients, 6 have started out with an ERA of more than 8, including both Cy Young winners. Success! Update: shortly after this was posted, Jered Weaver was injured and will now miss a few weeks. They’re dropping like flies.
For those of you still reading this, yes, this is a joke. Pitchers get injured. Players regress. There’s no magic formula to predicting who is due for trouble, mainly because this sort of thing is so common. Older players are at risk. Younger players are at risk. Good players are at risk. Mediocre players are at risk. Healthy players are at risk. Injury-prone players are at risk. All we really know for certain is that the repeated throwing of a ball at high speed isn’t exactly a recipe for an injury-free life. But if you want a shortlist of pitchers due for some trouble, you could do worse than the GPE.
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