Should Pedro be thrown into the NL Cy Young Mix?

[mrbaseball]

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But the Cy Young is supposed to go to the best pitcher for the given year. Wins and ERA are not the best stats for measuring that.

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511 wins. Winningest pitcher in the history of the game. Isn't that why they named an award after him? Is Cy Young sabermetrically the best pitcher of all time? I have no clue, but I doubt it.

Wins may be overated for statfreaks or fantasy players but in real life they are the one and only thing that matters. Baseball is a very results oriented game. The winners get to go to the playoffs and the ultimate champions get a trophy and a Wheaties box no matter what their stats were.

[imported_The Vibesman]

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But the Cy Young is supposed to go to the best pitcher for the given year. Wins and ERA are not the best stats for measuring that.

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511 wins. Winningest pitcher in the history of the game. Isn't that why they named an award after him? Is Cy Young sabermetrically the best pitcher of all time? I have no clue, but I doubt it.

Wins may be overated for statfreaks or fantasy players but in real life they are the one and only thing that matters. Baseball is a very results oriented game. The winners get to go to the playoffs and the ultimate champions get a trophy and a Wheaties box no matter what their stats were.

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So why don't they just give the Cy Young to the best starting pitcher on the World Series winner?

[mrbaseball]

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So why don't they just give the Cy Young to the best starting pitcher on the World Series winner?


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From what I understand these awards are for regular season accomplishment which gets them (hopefully) to the world series. But you already know that so I guess I don't really understand your question.

[imported_The Vibesman]

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So why don't they just give the Cy Young to the best starting pitcher on the World Series winner?


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From what I understand these awards are for regular season accomplishment which gets them (hopefully) to the world series. But you already know that so I guess I don't really understand your question.

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Sorry, I was being glib. Let me put in another way: Do you believe that a pitcher who gives up 4 runs per game but plays on a team that scores 6 runs per game is better than a pitcher that gives up 3 runs a game and plays on a team that scores 2? That is what it seems like you are telling me. If so, we will agree to disagree. I don't believe that. Ask the Dodgers what was more important, Derek Lowe's prior win count or his peripheral stats. I know what they thought when they signed him, and I know what they think now...

[mrbaseball]

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Do you believe that a pitcher who gives up 4 runs per game but plays on a team that scores 6 runs per game is better than a pitcher that gives up 3 runs a game and plays on a team that scores 2?

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I believe it is subjective. Some guys pitch just well enough to win while some guys pitch just poorly enough to lose no matter the situation.

I do think wins are much less important than they used to be. With the emphasis on bullpens and pitchcounts these days much of the actual pitching aspect is taken away from the starter. Back when Gibson and Marichal and Jenkins etc. were throwing 30+ complete games a year it was pretty much on them. They got into and out of the sticky situations all by themselves. I'm guessing back when Cy Young was amassing 511 wins it was the same way.

Typically though guys who give up 4+ runs a game won't be considered for the award because they will still lose enough and more effective guys (runwise) will eclipse them. But given guys with similarly effective era's the guy with the wins (ie Carpenter in the Pedro, Clemens debate) should win it even if his internal stats are slighty worse because that one external stat (Wins) is the bottom line. The actual result and what the team actually did when he threw the ball. He can thank Pujols and company and a great bullpen but the bottom line is his team was more effective when he pitched than the Mets or Astros when the other guys pitched. It's not Clemens fault Houston couldn't hit a lick in April and May but it's not Carpenters fault either as he did what he needed to do to notch the W's for his team.

[Paluka]

Why do people think strikeouts should factor into deciding who should win the Cy Young? I understand that Ks are an indicator of how good the pitcher is etc..., but people seem to think they should count for something on their own.

[RR12]

Strikeouts limit the chance of errors, ability to move runners over, slows the down the hit an run attempts which keeps players from scoring from first.

Can't you make a an argument that wins are overrated? It takes good pitching, but also good feilding and ability the to score runs. Do you feel era is the most important stat when figuring cy young? How about whip? Would you look at this if you were a voter?

[sublime]

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But the Cy Young is supposed to go to the best pitcher for the given year. Wins and ERA are not the best stats for measuring that.

[/ QUOTE ]

511 wins. Winningest pitcher in the history of the game. Isn't that why they named an award after him? Is Cy Young sabermetrically the best pitcher of all time? I have no clue, but I doubt it.

Wins may be overated for statfreaks or fantasy players but in real life they are the one and only thing that matters. Baseball is a very results oriented game. The winners get to go to the playoffs and the ultimate champions get a trophy and a Wheaties box no matter what their stats were.

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Wins/losses are a horrible way to measure a PITCHERS season.

[Paluka]

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Strikeouts limit the chance of errors, ability to move runners over, slows the down the hit an run attempts which keeps players from scoring from first.


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Yes, but but in theory all of this is taken into account in how many runs end up scoring. Like I said, I understand all the peripheral benifits of strikeouts and what they indicate about a pitcher, but I just think that some people think they should count for something beyond that.

[imported_The Vibesman]

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Strikeouts limit the chance of errors, ability to move runners over, slows the down the hit an run attempts which keeps players from scoring from first.

Can't you make a an argument that wins are overrated? It takes good pitching, but also good feilding and ability the to score runs. Do you feel era is the most important stat when figuring cy young? How about whip? Would you look at this if you were a voter?

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I'd look at a combination of ERA, Runs Allowed, WHIP, K's, K/9, BB/9 and K/BB. I think overrated is actually weak, wins are almost meaningless in the context of figuring out how well a guy pitched. I don't believe that some pitchers routinely pitch "well enough to win" while others routinely pitch "just well enough to lose." Clemens was pitching the same exact way with the Yankees as he is pitching now (he may even be pitching better now), but with the Yankees it was "well enough to win," with the Astros it is "just well enough to lose." If he is a good pitcher, why can't he pitch "well enough to win" with the Astros?
This is IMO, many people disagree with me, including some "respected" baseball writers.

*edit - One more point, none of this is to say I don't believe in "clutch" pitching, or the ability of a pitcher to ratchet it up a notch every once in a while when needed. There are stats guys that believe, for example, that a pitcher can't control when he gives up hits, so if they are all bunched together in one inning, it is just bad luck. I think this isn't always true; sometimes it is, but sometimes guys can get disturbed mentally and allow it to mess up their focus/mechanics and so on, which causes the inning to spin out of control. On the other hand, there may be guys who can really dial it up and get a K w/ a runner on 3rd and one out, and we just don't know how to quantify that ability yet. It's like Bill James says about clutch hitting, just because we can't measure it doesn't mean it doesn't exist.