To Trade or Not to Trade?

[lukestephens2293]

Its Noah Syndergaard hes a great pitcher but hes letting me down big time and I cant afford to have someone of his calibre putting up numbers like this throughout the season if I want to win a world series

[greenOak]

Its a small sample and he's been unlucky. 4.03 FIP is pretty decent, .366 BABIP is really high.

[lukestephens2293]

Originally Posted by greenOak

Its a small sample and he's been unlucky. 4.03 FIP is pretty decent, .366 BABIP is really high.

that shows how well i know my baseball stats lol what is FIP and BABIP?

[jimmysthebestcop]

FIP. Fielding Independent Pitching converts a pitcher's three true outcomes into an earned run average-like number. The formula is (13*HR+3*(HBP+BB)-2*K)/IP, plus a constant (usually around 3.2) to put it on the same scale as earned run average.

Batting Average on Balls In Play (BABIP) measures how often a ball in play goes for a hit. A ball is “in play” when the plate appearance ends in something other than a strikeout, walk, hit batter, catcher’s interference, sacrifice bunt, or home run. In other words, the batter put the ball in play and it didn’t clear the outfield fence. Typically around 30% of all balls in play fall for hits, but there are several variables that can affect BABIP rates for individual players, such as defense, luck, and talent level

No one looks at era anymore lol

[Kuroc]

In baseball statistics, Batting average on balls in play (abbreviated BABIP) measures how many of a batter's balls in play go for hits, or how many balls in play against a pitcher go for hits, excluding home runs.

Essentially Noah got a bit unlucky this season because a fairly high % of the balls that were hit turned into hits instead of outs.

FIP is similar to ERA, but it focuses solely on the events a pitcher has the most control over -- strikeouts, unintentional walks, hit-by-pitches and home runs. ... For example: If a pitcher has surrendered a high average on balls in play, his FIP will likely be lower than his ERA. The MLB active leader in FIP is Clayton Kershaw at 2.740, Noah's 4.03 would be 36th on the active career list, so not great but above average indeed.

Bottom line is he got unlucky with the high BABIP but his above average FIP shows that he could easily have a much better year in the future when his BABIP is likley going to be lower.

[lukestephens2293]

Originally Posted by greenOak

Its a small sample and he's been unlucky. 4.03 FIP is pretty decent, .366 BABIP is really high.

so basically if your FIP is lower than his ERA then his just been unlucky but if its higher it means hes pitched poorly?

[jpeters1734]

Originally Posted by lukestephens2293

so basically if your FIP is lower than his ERA then his just been unlucky but if its higher it means hes pitched poorly?

I'd say more like if FIP is lower, then he's been helped by defense, and higher, then his defense is making mistakes

[backupbatboy]

Worth asking how good of a defensive catcher you have. It makes a big difference. If it's just him pitching poorly then yeah see what you can get for him, but it does look like he has been on the unlucky side more than the just sucking side.

[qcbandits]

I'm gonna agree with a lot of what's posted. He seems unlucky. But to make a totally informed decision, when is his contract up? What's your finances look like? and what can you get for him?

[treymancini]

I just want to add something here: for some pitchers, FIP is objectively terrible. We know now in the statcast era that each pitcher induces a different level of "good contact" with pitches. Groundballers in particular tend to induce weaker contact. FIP is a stat that puts a heavy emphasis on strikeouts, which is great when dealing with flamethrower pitchers to determine their value, but pitch-to-contact guys tend to have FIP repeated 1.5, 2 points above their ERA. At some point, ERA has value unless you have access to statcast data. Unfortunately, many baseball fans are still stuck in the era of FIP.

A much better thing to look at is simply the BB/9 and HR/9, strikeouts are in the end just another type of out. If you notice a spike in walks and homers, it means your player might be declining (or you have an awful catcher).

To determine whether a pitcher is unlucky, you should look at whether his BABIP is comparable to his career norms or not. In this case, I'm going to hazard that Syndergaard's BABIP is much higher than his career norms, so he's probably had bad luck.

tl;dr FIP is typically billed as "only looking at the things a player can control" when in fact he can to a degree control hits, they aren't simply random about a grand mean.

[Kuroc]

Originally Posted by lukestephens2293

so basically if your FIP is lower than his ERA then his just been unlucky but if its higher it means hes pitched poorly?

That's perhaps a little too literal. I look at FIP as an indication of whether the pitcher was good at the things he could control and BABIP as an indication of the things out of his control helped or hurt him.


Take a look at the other pitchers on the team and see how their FIP, BABIP and ERA compare. I'm guessing you'll find a pitcher with a low BABIP (under .250) whose ERA was more acceptable but he had a higher FIP. I would be more concerned with the future performance of that pitcher because if his BABIP goes up, his ERA will jump up as he is likely not as good at the things under his control.


Bottom line, because of the one year of high BABIP and the pretty good FIP I would not trade Noah for one bad year, believing that by the law of averages he will have better years down the road.

[bailey]

Originally Posted by treymancini

Unfortunately, many baseball fans are still stuck in the era of FIP.

Thanks, for letting this ERA guy know that he hasn't missed anything!

[jpeters1734]

Originally Posted by treymancini

A much better thing to look at is simply the BB/9 and HR/9, strikeouts are in the end just another type of out. If you notice a spike in walks and homers, it means your player might be declining (or you have an awful catcher).

Why would a bad catcher influence HR/9?

[lukestephens2293]

Originally Posted by Kuroc

That's perhaps a little too literal. I look at FIP as an indication of whether the pitcher was good at the things he could control and BABIP as an indication of the things out of his control helped or hurt him.


Take a look at the other pitchers on the team and see how their FIP, BABIP and ERA compare. I'm guessing you'll find a pitcher with a low BABIP (under .250) whose ERA was more acceptable but he had a higher FIP. I would be more concerned with the future performance of that pitcher because if his BABIP goes up, his ERA will jump up as he is likely not as good at the things under his control.


Bottom line, because of the one year of high BABIP and the pretty good FIP I would not trade Noah for one bad year, believing that by the law of averages he will have better years down the road.

so BABIP is what i should be looking at?

[treymancini]

Originally Posted by jpeters1734

Why would a bad catcher influence HR/9?

Sorry, bad grammar on my part, I was referring back to BB/9.

[treymancini]

Originally Posted by bailey

Thanks, for letting this ERA guy know that he hasn't missed anything!

I mean, ERA still has its own problems, namely that defense highly influences it, but yeah, not sure if FIP is too significantly better from a mathmetician's standpoint.

[jimmysthebestcop]

I recommend checking out how fan graphs rates pitchers. They even have a glossary to teach you all the new terms.

Ootp has most of the star categories they are missing a couple I like.

In my game I don't look at fip either. But another fip variant

[lukestephens2293]

Originally Posted by jimmysthebestcop

I recommend checking out how fan graphs rates pitchers. They even have a glossary to teach you all the new terms.

Ootp has most of the star categories they are missing a couple I like.

In my game I don't look at fip either. But another fip variant

good shout thanks

[chazzycat]

Originally Posted by treymancini

I just want to add something here: for some pitchers, FIP is objectively terrible. We know now in the statcast era that each pitcher induces a different level of "good contact" with pitches. Groundballers in particular tend to induce weaker contact. FIP is a stat that puts a heavy emphasis on strikeouts, which is great when dealing with flamethrower pitchers to determine their value, but pitch-to-contact guys tend to have FIP repeated 1.5, 2 points above their ERA. At some point, ERA has value unless you have access to statcast data. Unfortunately, many baseball fans are still stuck in the era of FIP.

A much better thing to look at is simply the BB/9 and HR/9, strikeouts are in the end just another type of out. If you notice a spike in walks and homers, it means your player might be declining (or you have an awful catcher).

To determine whether a pitcher is unlucky, you should look at whether his BABIP is comparable to his career norms or not. In this case, I'm going to hazard that Syndergaard's BABIP is much higher than his career norms, so he's probably had bad luck.

tl;dr FIP is typically billed as "only looking at the things a player can control" when in fact he can to a degree control hits, they aren't simply random about a grand mean.

This is a pretty bad take IMO. FIP is much more useful than you suggest. Yeah groundballers generate groundballs...so what? A groundball can be a hit or not a hit, and that involves a lot of pure luck. Batters aren't trying to hit the ball a certain direction. They are just trying to barrel up the ball. If it goes straight to a fielder, that's bad luck. If it goes in between them, that's good luck.

That's the entire point of FIP - evening out the luck. Strikeouts do NOT carry the same risk as generating soft contact, because strikeouts are guaranteed outs, not outs dependent on luck. That's why FIP emphasizes strikeouts....that is literally the best result a pitcher can get. Strikeouts are good, y'all. Other more advanced stats like SIERA put even MORE emphasis on strikeouts, because that's how good they are. Strikeouts correlate with generating weak contact as well - that's the idea behind SIERA.

Of course the quality of defenders plays a huge role as well. When there is a big difference between FIP and ERA that could be luck as previously mentioned, OR it could just be bad defense. It's basically a red flag that something is going on. Then you might need to use other stats to determine what that thing is.

[thklein]

I have my doubts about FIP, but it's certainly useful. It just seems wrong that a ringing double off the wall and a routine ground ball to the short stop affect FIP exactly the same (not at all). My guy says it probably undervalues pitchers who induce weak contact but don't strike out many batters. But those guys are also going to give up fewer home runs. And Kyle Hendricks was 19th in FIP last season, so maybe I'm wrong.

To answer the original question, I wouldn't trade him unless he's making a whole lot of money that could be better used elsewhere or you can get a really good haul for him. I think if you stick with him he's likely to get better luck on that BABIP.