Weighing Pitching Ratings

RoteLaterne · 07-13-2019, 03:52 AM

Well, there are 3 "basic" pitching ratings

Stuff
Movement
Control

How do you find your "best fit"?
Do you simply add up those 3 numbers? +++

Do you weigh them differently? Like 2-1-1?
Are they equally important to you?

What about Hold Runners?

Goliathus · 07-13-2019, 06:03 AM

It is widely agreed in PT that movement and control > stuff. I think people can argue whether movement or control is the most important, but they are better than stuff.

Hold Runners depend a lot on your opponents more than anything. If many of them are ninja squads, then it is important. If they are mostly power units with low speed, then it's not that big of a deal. It's more of a meta stat and its importance varies.

RoteLaterne · 07-13-2019, 06:09 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Goliathus

It is widely agreed in PT that movement and control > stuff. I think people can argue whether movement or control is the most important, but they are better than stuff.

So it is more like 1-2-2?

I am trying to compare SPs and therefore looking for a total score.

neugey · 07-13-2019, 08:10 AM

I like variety. I'm even gambling with 92 Bob Feller in my staff this year (128 stuff, 85 movement, 21 control). The walks are crazy but the upside is the occasional dominant game and not giving up HR's. It's a game, I like to take risks and it's not often I will go with a steady-eddie pitcher.

justpatrick · 07-13-2019, 08:50 AM

My formula is Movement x 3, Control x 2, Stuff x 1, and for simplicity I divide everything by ten first. So using Rapid Robert Feller listed above as an example, it would be (8.5 x 3) + (2.1 x 2) + 12.8 which would give us 25.5 + 4.2 + 12.8 = 42.5, which is an ok score, though that control would scare me off.

There are some ratings I won´t bother with, namely any movement under 65 (70 for lefties) and control under 60 for anyone. For stuff I prefer over 50 but I have had success with lower if the movement and control ratings are quite high.

My pitchers usually are at or near the top in ERA and always give up the fewest homeruns and walks. The trade off is they are always at or near the bottom in strikeouts, so if it´s power pitching you want then perhaps a different formula would be more useful for you.

atabakin · 07-13-2019, 10:49 AM

Stuff is more important if you have poor defense. Lower stuff = more balls in play, which works well if you have a strong defense, particularly up the middle.

RoteLaterne · 07-13-2019, 11:20 AM

Thanks for your answer.

My defense is top-5 league-wide.

I go with ...

Stuff x1
Movement x2
Control x2

justpatrick · 07-13-2019, 11:30 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by atabakin

Stuff is more important if you have poor defense. Lower stuff = more balls in play, which works well if you have a strong defense, particularly up the middle.

Excellent point, my pitching works because I have a top flight defense. Offense, on the other hand, is a bit problematic.

chazzycat · 07-13-2019, 11:35 AM

For what it's worth...to play some devil's advocate...my most successful team, which regularly makes the playoffs in perfect level (only spent $10, no packs) is the one that practically ignores MOV rating. The highest MOV rating of my starters is 62 with the rest in the 50s. I probably have one of the cheapest staffs that contends at perfect level...most of my PP go to the offense. It can work with the right park factors.

justpatrick · 07-13-2019, 11:49 AM

I think that´s great. I was thinking about starting a second team just so I could do something like that. As it is, my only team fits my comfort zone of pitching and defense and high average hitters, but I think it would be a hoot to have a team with power pitchers who don´t give a damn how many longballs they give up and filled with hard hitters who think fielding is for wimps.

waittilnextyear · 07-13-2019, 08:48 PM

I tend to prefer more balanced ratings for starting pitchers (over 70/100 for all 3 if possible) and am a bit more movement-centric for relievers (over 85 if possible). I've also started to ascribe to a theory that pitchers with 2 really high ratings and 1 so so rating can be quite useful. My data point here is 89 Dennis Eckersley who has been a rock as my closer for weeks and weeks at the perfect level. He has a cumulative 2.47 ERA over 8 seasons. He's finished in the top 3 for reliever of the year in each of the past 4 seasons, winning it once. Yet, I bet some folks wouldn't touch him with a 10-foot pole due to the 54 movement rating.

That being said, I don't think you can really reduce it down to a single formula because there's too much context being omitted. Ballpark factors, infield/outfield defense, and strategy settings can all play a rather large role. Maybe you can get away with low movement pitchers if you have home ballpark HRs turned all the way down and you have your 'pitch around' strategy slider turned all the way up. Maybe low stuff pitchers aren't so good with your home ballpark batting averages turned all the way up and a bad defense. You could get singled to death. I think it's not a good strategy to use a formula as anything more than a crude approximation.

fredbeene · 07-13-2019, 09:24 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by RoteLaterne

Thanks for your answer.

My defense is top-5 league-wide.

I go with ...

Stuff x1
Movement x2
Control x2

I don't get the difference between STUFF and MOV
what exactly does it translate too?
Control is easy, how many walks.

Does STUFF and MOV match up better vs hitters?
Some hitter can't hit a curve so STUFF is better against them?

JasonC23 · 07-13-2019, 09:27 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by fredbeene

I don't get the difference between STUFF and MOV
what exactly does it translate too?
Control is easy, how many walks.

Does STUFF and MOV match up better vs hitters?
Some hitter can't hit a curve so STUFF is better against them?

In OOTP parlance, STUFF controls how many batters a pitcher strikes out, while MOV controls how many home runs a pitcher gives up. (CON, as you mentioned, controls how many walks a pitcher gives up.) It's not quite this simple, I imagine, but that's the gist of it.

One Great Matrix · 07-13-2019, 10:31 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Goliathus

It is widely agreed in PT that movement and control > stuff. I think people can argue whether movement or control is the most important, but they are better than stuff.

Hold Runners depend a lot on your opponents more than anything. If many of them are ninja squads, then it is important. If they are mostly power units with low speed, then it's not that big of a deal. It's more of a meta stat and its importance varies.

So if a guy only has stuff and not control, but his stuff is truly off the charts (>100), then he will typically struggle sometimes but will do a little better than his numbers look. Say in 9 outings, the control pitcher allows (0, 0, 1, 0, 0, 2, 0, 0, 1), he would have an ERA of 4.00 but let up runs 3 times. Now take the guy with the stuff and not much control, sometimes he might do something like allow (0, 0, 0, 0, 4, 3, 0, 0, 0). His ERA will read 7.00 but he only let up runs twice. In other words in a tight save situation he might be slightly more successful...but for starters, I absolutely agree control is where it's at...but if a guy is only going to pitch an inning sometimes if you can ignore his ERA a little bit, a pitcher with overwhelming stuff will get the job done more often than not.. Nothing uglier than a pitcher losing his command.

Except for maybe Chuck Knoblauch trying to throw to 1st that one year with the Yankees from second base.

DonkeyKongSr · 07-14-2019, 03:18 AM

Go with this. It's based on millions of Perfect League at-bats.

STU 1.0
MOV 2.4
CON 1.5

DonkeyKongSr · 07-14-2019, 03:20 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by JasonC23

In OOTP parlance, STUFF controls how many batters a pitcher strikes out, while MOV controls how many home runs a pitcher gives up. (CON, as you mentioned, controls how many walks a pitcher gives up.) It's not quite this simple, I imagine, but that's the gist of it.

It's pretty close to that simple...

STU = Ks
MOV = HR
CON = Walks

...with mostly Park Factors and Batter Ratings affecting them.

RoteLaterne · 07-14-2019, 03:53 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by DonkeyKongSr

Go with this. It's based on millions of Perfect League at-bats.

STU 1.0
MOV 2.4
CON 1.5

You mean ...

Stuff Rating x1 + Movement x2.4 + Contact x1.5 = Pitcher's Score ?

Goliathus · 07-14-2019, 07:02 AM

Side note: The importance of those stats might varied in lower level leagues but building towards perfect level is a good long-term thinking. It's kind of like how you can dominate iron with full offense only but eventually you have to pick up on defense on bronze or silver and above because offense alone with horrible pitching and defense will not get it done. Or how many players dominate in high school and/or college but cannot make it in the big league in real life. Things are different on every level.

Like I can see stuff being better than movement in some leagues that many players have low eyes and low avoid Ks, in which many lower tier cards are. Movement could be not as important too assuming you are dealing with flawed batters that can't make a lot of contacts(which a lot of the lower tier cards are).

If you are seeing bad result with DonkeyKongSr's assessment, don't panic. Silver is very different from Perfect.

RoteLaterne · 07-14-2019, 07:46 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Goliathus

Side note: The importance of those stats might varied in lower level leagues but building towards perfect level is a good long-term thinking. ... Silver is very different from Perfect.

Good points. Hope to be promoted to gold level soon.
3rd time in a row making the playoffs, but always eliminated.

I see that formula being more accurate in higher leagues as well.

masterofgrond · 07-15-2019, 11:05 AM

The last time I ran a regression based on a relatively large amount of high level PT pitching data, the relative component values came out to be (normalized to Stuff for simplicity):

Stuff: 1x
Movement: 2.65x
Control: 1.5x

which basically agrees with DKSr's numbers, so.

07-13-2019, 03:52 AM	#1
RoteLaterne Major Leagues Join Date: Jun 2009 Location: Germany Posts: 387	Weighing Pitching Ratings Well, there are 3 "basic" pitching ratings Stuff Movement Control How do you find your "best fit"? Do you simply add up those 3 numbers? +++ Do you weigh them differently? Like 2-1-1? Are they equally important to you? What about Hold Runners? Last edited by RoteLaterne; 07-13-2019 at 05:59 AM.

07-13-2019, 08:10 AM	#4
neugey All Star Reserve Join Date: Apr 2011 Posts: 805 Blog Entries: 39	I like variety. I'm even gambling with 92 Bob Feller in my staff this year (128 stuff, 85 movement, 21 control). The walks are crazy but the upside is the occasional dominant game and not giving up HR's. It's a game, I like to take risks and it's not often I will go with a steady-eddie pitcher. __________________ Online OOTP League Play: PBA - Cincinnati Reds MLM - Baltimore Orioles

07-13-2019, 08:50 AM	#5
justpatrick Major Leagues Join Date: Jul 2018 Location: Czech Republic Posts: 305	My formula is Movement x 3, Control x 2, Stuff x 1, and for simplicity I divide everything by ten first. So using Rapid Robert Feller listed above as an example, it would be (8.5 x 3) + (2.1 x 2) + 12.8 which would give us 25.5 + 4.2 + 12.8 = 42.5, which is an ok score, though that control would scare me off. There are some ratings I won´t bother with, namely any movement under 65 (70 for lefties) and control under 60 for anyone. For stuff I prefer over 50 but I have had success with lower if the movement and control ratings are quite high. My pitchers usually are at or near the top in ERA and always give up the fewest homeruns and walks. The trade off is they are always at or near the bottom in strikeouts, so if it´s power pitching you want then perhaps a different formula would be more useful for you. __________________ Last edited by justpatrick; 07-13-2019 at 08:52 AM.

07-13-2019, 10:49 AM	#6
atabakin All Star Reserve Join Date: Dec 2018 Posts: 762	Stuff is more important if you have poor defense. Lower stuff = more balls in play, which works well if you have a strong defense, particularly up the middle. __________________

07-13-2019, 11:49 AM	#10
justpatrick Major Leagues Join Date: Jul 2018 Location: Czech Republic Posts: 305	I think that´s great. I was thinking about starting a second team just so I could do something like that. As it is, my only team fits my comfort zone of pitching and defense and high average hitters, but I think it would be a hoot to have a team with power pitchers who don´t give a damn how many longballs they give up and filled with hard hitters who think fielding is for wimps. __________________

07-13-2019, 06:03 AM	#2
Goliathus Major Leagues Join Date: Apr 2019 Posts: 449	It is widely agreed in PT that movement and control > stuff. I think people can argue whether movement or control is the most important, but they are better than stuff. Hold Runners depend a lot on your opponents more than anything. If many of them are ninja squads, then it is important. If they are mostly power units with low speed, then it's not that big of a deal. It's more of a meta stat and its importance varies.

07-13-2019, 11:20 AM	#7
RoteLaterne Major Leagues Join Date: Jun 2009 Location: Germany Posts: 387	Thanks for your answer. My defense is top-5 league-wide. I go with ... Stuff x1 Movement x2 Control x2

07-13-2019, 11:35 AM	#9
chazzycat All Star Starter Join Date: Dec 2014 Posts: 1,685	For what it's worth...to play some devil's advocate...my most successful team, which regularly makes the playoffs in perfect level (only spent $10, no packs) is the one that practically ignores MOV rating. The highest MOV rating of my starters is 62 with the rest in the 50s. I probably have one of the cheapest staffs that contends at perfect level...most of my PP go to the offense. It can work with the right park factors.

07-13-2019, 08:48 PM	#11
waittilnextyear All Star Starter Join Date: Jan 2016 Posts: 1,272	I tend to prefer more balanced ratings for starting pitchers (over 70/100 for all 3 if possible) and am a bit more movement-centric for relievers (over 85 if possible). I've also started to ascribe to a theory that pitchers with 2 really high ratings and 1 so so rating can be quite useful. My data point here is 89 Dennis Eckersley who has been a rock as my closer for weeks and weeks at the perfect level. He has a cumulative 2.47 ERA over 8 seasons. He's finished in the top 3 for reliever of the year in each of the past 4 seasons, winning it once. Yet, I bet some folks wouldn't touch him with a 10-foot pole due to the 54 movement rating. That being said, I don't think you can really reduce it down to a single formula because there's too much context being omitted. Ballpark factors, infield/outfield defense, and strategy settings can all play a rather large role. Maybe you can get away with low movement pitchers if you have home ballpark HRs turned all the way down and you have your 'pitch around' strategy slider turned all the way up. Maybe low stuff pitchers aren't so good with your home ballpark batting averages turned all the way up and a bad defense. You could get singled to death. I think it's not a good strategy to use a formula as anything more than a crude approximation. __________________

07-14-2019, 03:18 AM	#15
DonkeyKongSr All Star Reserve Join Date: Dec 2018 Posts: 777	Go with this. It's based on millions of Perfect League at-bats. STU 1.0 MOV 2.4 CON 1.5 __________________

07-14-2019, 07:02 AM	#18
Goliathus Major Leagues Join Date: Apr 2019 Posts: 449	Side note: The importance of those stats might varied in lower level leagues but building towards perfect level is a good long-term thinking. It's kind of like how you can dominate iron with full offense only but eventually you have to pick up on defense on bronze or silver and above because offense alone with horrible pitching and defense will not get it done. Or how many players dominate in high school and/or college but cannot make it in the big league in real life. Things are different on every level. Like I can see stuff being better than movement in some leagues that many players have low eyes and low avoid Ks, in which many lower tier cards are. Movement could be not as important too assuming you are dealing with flawed batters that can't make a lot of contacts(which a lot of the lower tier cards are). If you are seeing bad result with DonkeyKongSr's assessment, don't panic. Silver is very different from Perfect.

07-15-2019, 11:05 AM	#20
masterofgrond Bat Boy Join Date: Mar 2019 Posts: 1	The last time I ran a regression based on a relatively large amount of high level PT pitching data, the relative component values came out to be (normalized to Stuff for simplicity): Stuff: 1x Movement: 2.65x Control: 1.5x which basically agrees with DKSr's numbers, so. Last edited by masterofgrond; 07-15-2019 at 11:07 AM.