Quote:
Originally Posted by AfWapo
I completely agree. While I do appreciate the ideas behind DIPS, and do think it is a very valuable tool, I also think it simply "sounds" like it takes things like the above for granted. Guys like Greg Maddux, Tom Glavine, Mark Mulder, and Chris Carpenter -- while they all CAN get a strikeout when they absolutely have to, they largely rely upon placement and inducing weak contact.
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Actually Maddux does exceptionally well under DIPS. A little mini-test: I calculated Greg Maddux's career hits per balls in play as of right now and the number I get is .280.
As a mini-test I kept hitting the "random" button at Baseball Reference" until it popped up a pitcher who was a contemporary of Maddux. What I got was Allen McDill. McDill pitched in parts of four major league seasons, finishing with a career major league ERA of 7.79 in 34.2 innings pitched. His hits per balls in play? .277.
Greg Maddux = .280
Tom Glavine = .280
Mark Mulder = .292
Chris Carpenter = .302
Carpenter actually has a higher career hits per balls in play rate than Jose Lima. And that's really kind of the point: you use Chris Carpenter as an example of this kind of pitcher and the numbers tell a different story. Do you do that with any other important stat? Do you talk about a guy being a big power hitter and then look up the stats and see he hits 5 homers a year in full seasons? Do you say a player is perennial batting title challenger and check and see that he's a career .245 hitter?
It isn't that the skill doesn't exist, it's that it's small enough in importance to usually be thoroughly trumped by other more important skills, and that often who we think are the best in the stat turn out to be pretty unremarkable in it (and succeed in other ways like Maddux did and Carpenter does).