Looking at Statistics

I'm going to look at some stats.. but first I want to mention something I neglected earlier. The Twins placed Adam Everett on the DL and called up Brian Buscher. This was a move I alluded to earlier. Not a big surprise.

I decided to look at some pitching statistics, but not ones you'd see in a normal boxscore. I want to look at "pitches" and how they can relate to other statistics. The three things I'm going to look at are pitches per earned run (PER), pitches per inning pitched (PIP), and pitches per base runner (PBR).

My orignial assumption is that pitches per earned run would be the most important. My theory is that you want this number to be very high. If it is high, you are pitching the longest without giving up a lot of runs.

My second thought was that pitches per inning pitched would be least important. If you are a strikeout pitcher, you're going to throw more pitches to get less people out. If you have a low PIP, it would seem that you have a great defense behind you and/or you're getting lucky.

Before I get into my findings, I'll go through my process. I took the four starters (Hernandez, Bonser, Baker and Blackburn) that have been pitching all year. I also took Liriano's two games. Lastly, I compared these numbers to Santana's Cy Young years of 2004 and 2006, and Liriano's All-Star year of 2006.

Pitches per earned run:
Liriano in 2006 – 62.1
Santana in 2004 – 51.9
1) Nick Blackburn – 52.4
Santana in 2006 – 48
2) Livan Hernandez – 40
3) Scott Baker – 29.3
4) Boof Bonser – 28.4
5) Francisco Lirano – 25.4

Looking at this, I would say it's somewhat telling. Although I wouldn't agree that Blackburn is having a better year than Santana's 2006. I would agree that Liriano and Bonser's years so far aren't the greatest. This stat shows that.

Pitches per inning pitched
1) Livan Hernandez – 13.3
2) Scott Baker – 14. 1
3) Nick Blackburn – 14.5
4) Boof Bonser – 14.8
Santana in 2006 – 14.8
Liriano in 2006 – 14.9
Santana in 2004 – 15
5) Franciso Liriano – 18.4

Because the 2008 samples are so small, I have a hard time regarding this stat. I would assume, though, that the target should be between 13-16 pitches per inning on average. When you get higher than that, you're asking for trouble.

Pitchers per base runner
Santana in 2004 – 16.31
Liriano in 2006 – 14.89
Santana in 2006 – 14.82
1) Scott Baker – 13.2
2) Nick Blackburn – 11.8
3) Boof Bonser – 11.4
4) Livan Hernandez – 10.9
5) Francisco Liriano – 8.9

Now we're onto something! In Santana's great year of 2004, he only allowed a runner every 16.31 pitches. In 2006, Liriano and Santana both were around 14.8. (Sabathia, 2007 was 12.99; Colon, 2005 was 13.28; Halladay, 2003 was 12.74.) It's hard to tell with this year's guys because the sample is small, but if Scott Baker can stay on track, it makes me think that he'll have a very good year. He's on the hill tomorrow, so I guess we'll see!