Posts Tagged ‘Pythagorean expectation’
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Bad luck or just plain bad?July 5th, 2008
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It’s July, and Cliff Lee is second in the AL in ERA and Wins. CC Sabathia is first in the league in strikeouts. Grady Sizemore is first in home runs. The Cleveland Indians: 12.5 games out of first place in the AL Central, and the second worst record in the American League. Wait, what?
If you read my last post, which I seemingly wrote forever ago, you might remember that I wrote, “If ever there was a chance for the Indians to make up some ground in the race, the next two weeks are it.” Well, what happened? Not only did they lose ground in the race (four games to be exact), but they essentially threw in the towel for the rest of the season. Case in point: when the Royals have a better record than your team, it’s time to look toward next season.
But before the Indians trade CC (trade rumors involve the Brewers, Cubs, Red Sox, Dodgers, and Rays), I’d like to discuss what will probably be a hot topic in Cleveland come the offseason: were the Indians bad, or did they merely suffer from bad luck?
The case for bad is pretty easy: the Indians stink. Currently last in the AL Central, the Indians can’t hit (.247 avg is worst in the AL) and the relievers can’t hold leads (worst save:blown save ratio in the AL). And, the pitching staff as a whole, despite leading the league in shutouts with 9, has given up the most home runs in the league (94) and has the 4th-highest batting average-against (.270).
Sure, Cliff Lee has been spectacular, and CC Sabathia finally came around after his horrific start, but in the month of June, the Indians were last in the AL in ERA (5.27). You could easily blame injuries for the poor offensive output the Indians have given, but in June, they hit .273, which while still ranking in the bottom-half of the league, is the best they’ve hit all season. In other words: when they pitch well, they don’t hit. When they hit, they don’t pitch well. Maybe it’s a sign of bad luck, but more likely: it’s the sign of a bad team.
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Indians score 15 in rout…April 24th, 2008
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… but only needed 2 to win.
I hate to be picky, but after losing their last two games by scores of 2-1 and 3-0 to the Twins, it would have been nice to see some of those 15 runs spread out a little more evenly.
I last talked about how I was worried that this 2008 team would become the 2005 team incarnate, but maybe I spoke too soon. What if they are more like the 2006 Indians team?
In 2006, the Indians finished 78-84. Seemingly, they were an underachieving squad, as many pundits picked the team to win the Wild Card, or at the very least compete with around 85-90 wins. In hindsight, many national columnists stated that they were merely victims of bad luck, as their run differential for the season was +88, meaning they scored 88 more runs during the season than they gave up. Of course, bad luck was easy to cite, because according to their Pythagorean Expectation, the Indians should have finished with around 89 wins.
The real reason the Indians underachieved: poor record in one-run games (18-26), coupled with inconsistent offense and pitching. Rather than researching how often the Indians had “inconsistent offense and pitching” in 2006, I decided to take the easy route and find a small sample size that summed up the entire season: April 14-20, 2006. The Indians played a four game series on the road against Detroit, followed by a three game series on the road against Baltimore. During the two series, they managed to win 7-2, 10-2, and 15-1, and lose 5-1, 1-0, 18-9, and 9-4, for a record of 3-4. Total runs scored: 46. Total runs given up: 38. Pythagorean Expectation: 4-3 record. Sure, it’s an incredibly small sample size, but believe me when I say it’s dead on.
This year, we may be looking at a similar situation. Before the 15-1 win against the Royals, the Indians Pythagorean Expectation was 8 wins; instead, they had an ever-so-slightly-unlucky 7 wins. Not bad. However, after the offensive explosion yesterday, their Pythagorean expectation changed to 10, which would not only put the Indians at exactly .500, but probably into second place in the division. Instead, they are sitting on an 8-12 record for 4th in the division.
Sure, it’s early, and I’m probably cherry-picking from a small sample size, but it’s not unreasonable to see that an unfortunate pattern may be developing: close losses, some blowouts wins, inconsistency (sorry, hate to sound like Joe Morgan), and a lot of mediocrity. In other words, good numbers on paper, but nothing to show for it. Based on what we’ve seen so far, here’s what I think will happen:
The Indians offense will be good. Seriously, how could they not? With Sizemore at the top of the lineup, Dellucci playing out of his mind, Hafner, um, taking lots of walks when he isn’t grounding out weakly to first (actually, he’s been hitting a lot more opposite-field line drives lately, which is a really good sign), Victor just sitting back and ripping opposite-field singles, Peralta eventually rounding back to a .270 hitter with 25 homers, Garko having a ridiculously good eye with two strikes, Asdrubal keeping the clubhouse loose with his anal-bead necklace, Gutierrez heating up with the weather, and Blake, um, well he had a good night against the Royals. The point is, the Indians hitters will have their stats at the end of the year, and the offense will be among the tops in the league. (In fact, after last night’s win, they improved four spots in team slugging in the American League, three spots in runs, two spots in OBP, and one in OPS. Their batting average jumped 11 points, but they still suck in that department.)
The Starters will be really good. Despite CC’s struggles, the Indians currently lead the AL in quality starts with 13. If CC can build off of his strong start against the Royals (6 innings, 11 k’s, no runs, only 4 hits, of which like 3 of them were bloop singles), the Tribe staff will be the best in the league. Forget the 1-2 punch of CC and Carmona; throw in the revived Cliff Lee, and the Indians 1-2-3 is as good as any in years. Plus, Westbrook is off to a strong start, and provided he can bounce back from his left intercostal strain (whatever that is?), well, the Indians (warning: super-vague prediction alert) will win a lot of games.
The bullpen won’t be really good. We saw it against the Twins in the extra-innings loss on April 20th: with Betancourt as the closer, the bullpen is in trouble. (To recap, it was tied 1-1 after nine innings and the Indians lost the game in the 10th when Rafael Perez, who had already pitched 2 innings, gave up the winning hit with two men on). Forget for a moment that all three studs from last year’s bullpen are struggling, which is already tough enough to deal with. Moving Betancourt to the closer role puts a lot more pressure on the guys beneath him. If Joe Borowski were still pitching, Betancourt would have been in the game for the tenth inning, instead of a gassed Perez. Unfortunately, Wedge was “saving” Betancourt until the Indians could take a lead. Never mind that they gave up a run and lost the game before they could take said lead, the real problem here is the best reliever the Indians have was sitting on the bench during the most important time of the game. If Borowski doesn’t come back and Betancourt stays as the closer, I can see the Indians blowing a lot more games just like this.
What does this all mean? Well, it means pretty much what I’ve already said: blowout wins from great starting pitching and contagious hitting will be separated by close losses caused by a depleted bullpen and inconsistent hitting (and also Paul Byrd, who seems to be one of those guys who pitch just well enough to lose). In other words: not good.
Hopefully, the 15-1 win against the Royals is a sign that the 2008 Indians are back and ready for a strong season. If not, prepare for the worst: 2006 all over again.