4 or 5 man rotations

[Curtis]

Originally Posted by Le Grande Orange

The number of doubleheaders played was less than the number that were originally scheduled due to the players' strike. There were 47 doubleheaders played in the abbreviated 1981 schedule as compared to the 48 that were present in the original 162-game schedule.

As always, great work, LGO!

[RchW]

Originally Posted by RonCo

Just for kicks, I went to retrosheet and pulled the 1965 Dodgers schedule and compiled data on their 4-man starters -- Drysdale, Koufax, Osteen, and Podres:

	Drys	Koufax	Osteen	Podres
Starts	41	40	38	23
Days Rest				
3	1	2	5	0
4	29	29	19	7
5	10	9	10	6
6	0	0	2	1
7	0	0	0	3
8	0	0	1	2
9	0	0	1	0
10+	0	0	0	4

You can see they were brought back on even 3-days rest on occasion--though many of those were after short-stints the start before. The schedule resulted in about 25-30% of their starts being on 5 days' rest. There is, of course, no record of the number of pitches these guys threw in any particular game, but it's probably fair to say they experienced more than 120 on more than afew occasions.

Note that Podres had several 10-day+ layoffs, which I assume are due to nagging injuries. I admit to being blissfully ignorant on that front right now, but his usage pattern suggests as much.

Osteen's pattern is interesting. His longer spans appear to generally be related to shuffling of rotation to take advantage of the schedule and get Drysdale or Koufax more starts...or maybe due to match-ups. It doesn't appear he was really replaced (as if he were injured, or just pushed back).

The point being that a 4-man rotation results in several 5-day stints.

Hmmm there seems to be a discrepancy with BR where it has Drysdale with 29 starts on 3-days rest and Koufax with 30. Maybe I'm reading this wrong.

Sandy Koufax 1965 Pitching Gamelogs - Baseball-Reference.com

Don Drysdale 1965 Pitching Gamelogs - Baseball-Reference.com

[RonCo]

Well, first, we're off a day in our definition. What I called 4 days of rest they call 3 days. Next, I included only GS where the BR data is all appearances. Allt hat said, it's also possible I calculated the days across a month break incorrectly. Retrosheet has the dates identified, so I calculated days rest by doing a straight sibtraction, then manually correcting for a month break. It wouldn't be the first time I've created an error.

Regardless, the message is the same in context of the argument.

[RonCo]

Just as an interesting aside, Koufax's average Game Scores that year:

4-Days Rest: 69.4 (BR calls this 3-days rest)
5-Days Rest: 76.5 (BR calls this 4-days rest)

Standard Deviation:

4-Days Rest: 19.3
5-Days Rest: 9.7

So Koufax's performance in 1965 had more variability and was lower on average when he pitched evry 4th day than it was when he had that extra day of rest.

[waltwa]

Lots of great info- much more than i expected. So has the question been answered?

In ootp and in 2010 0r 11 does it make sense to use a 4 man rotation?

We won't get fired if a sp goes down due to overwork. But do the results of eliminating the 5th sp make sense to go with a 4 man rotation or does the ootp game penalize you for using 1 less pitcher.

[RonCo]

Originally Posted by waltwa

Lots of great info- much more than i expected. So has the question been answered?

In ootp and in 2010 0r 11 does it make sense to use a 4 man rotation?

We won't get fired if a sp goes down due to overwork. But do the results of eliminating the 5th sp make sense to go with a 4 man rotation or does the ootp game penalize you for using 1 less pitcher.

My current opinion:

OOTP "penalizes" teams for 4-man rotations, but it's much like a poker game. It's no guarantee your pitchers will be hurt in a 4-man. Several factors seem to play into it--age of your pitchers, their durability, how you set your pitch counts and where you set your "hook starters" all affect the probability your pitchers will be abused or get hurt through that abuse. And, of course, some pitchers get hurt either way.

But, after all this, it's currently my opinion that in most "routine" cases in OOTP if you're running a 4-man rotation you're increasing the possibility of injuring your pitchers...and to some degree you're _probably_ lowering their effectiveness a bit.

It still may be a great play, though ... or not. If there's a wide variance between your top 4 and any 5th you can find, then the performance benefit of staying with 4 may well outweigh the risk factors.

In other words--I don't know if it's a perfect model or not, but I think the game's set-up seems to make managers face the same quandry that real-life GMs and managers face. You set your course, you rolls your dice, and you takes your chances. Sometimes you win, sometimes you lose, and sometimes it rains.

[Curve Ball Dave]

Originally Posted by RonCo

So Koufax's performance in 1965 had more variability and was lower on average when he pitched evry 4th day than it was when he had that extra day of rest.

Considering the condition Koufax's elbow was in by 1965, he may not be the best case study. A healthier pitcher who didn't need buckets of pain killers and ice after every game may give a more consistent result.