This week, position players join pitchers and catchers at spring training. For those who travel to Florida or Arizona to cover the teams, reporting on the same story lines can grow tiresome. For others, enjoying watching the same story lines pop up again and again is half the fun.
One traditional source of March copy has been position battles. Teams, wisely or not, sometimes view spring training as a sort of tryout, and so beat writers can craft a narrative around Player A vs. Player B, while maintaining that both players simply want what’s best for the team. Later in the spring, players will battle for the last roster spots-which is a battle with serious implications for the players and their careers. But this early in spring training, the dominant story lines are about rotation spots, particularly the fifth starter’s job. Aside from their dramatic value, do such battles have any significance?
Camptown Racetracks Five Weeks Long, Oh, Doo Dah Day
Let’s start with one of 2010’s battles for a fifth starter job. The most notable is being waged in Tampa between Yankees rotation candidates Joba Chamberlain and Phil Hughes. Both were highly touted starting pitching prospects in the minor leagues, but each has experienced setbacks at the major-league level. Chamberlain, saddled with the unfortunate (and inaccurate) perception that he is more valuable as a reliever, must battle the “B-Jobbers” in addition to Hughes. Hughes, on the other hand, is likely subject to an innings limit and was also effective as a reliever last year (his 3.84 WXRL ranked 14th in the majors last year). This sounds like a perfect battle between worthy adversaries, doesn’t it?
The world champs aren’t the only ones having trouble identifying their fifth starter. The NL champion Phillies, too, do not yet have a clear fifth starter. The primary battle is between the 47-year-old [sic] Jamie Moyer (4.65 SIERA last year) and the newly hirsute Kyle Kendrick (3.34 ERA at Triple-A in ’09). This one’s got built-in archetypes, as the aged veteran attempts to return from multiple off-season surgeries to battle the uneven youngster one last time.
Perhaps slightly less compelling is the battle in Bradenton, Florida. Pirates pitchers Daniel McCutchen (4.94 SIERA in 36
Is This Going to be on the Exam?
A more basic question we could ask about all of these battles is whether the ostensible winner will end up pitching more than the loser. Put slightly differently, what difference is there between the pitcher who pitches the fifth-most starts on a team and the pitcher who pitches the sixth-most starts? After all, most teams don’t even need a fifth starter until a few weeks into the season, and use every opportunity they get to skip the weakest link. On the other hand, pitcher injuries are all too frequent. Combined with trades, injuries mean that there is a good bit of rotation in the, er, staff. Of course, you want numbers, and who am I to get off on being withholding?
I ranked each team’s pitchers by games started in 2009. I then took the fifth- and sixth-ranked pitchers on this score and subtracted the number of starts for the sixth man from the number of starts for the fifth man. No team’s sixth starter started fewer than six games (Brad Penny and Ryan Sadowski for the Giants both did). No team’s fifth starter started more than 26 games (Rich Harden of the Cubs). On average, fifth starters took the ball just over 16 times, while sixth starters averaged just less than 12 starts. That’s a very small margin given the importance attached to spring battles. Here’s the full list:
Team 5th Man 5 GS 6th Man 6 GS Delta Braves T. Hanson 21 T. Hudson 7 14 Dodgers E. Stults 10 V. Padilla 7 3 J. Weaver 7 Giants R. Johnson 17 B. Penny 6 11 R. Sadowski 6 Cardinals Wellemeyer 21 M. Boggs 9 12 Cubs R. Harden 26 S. Marshall 9 17 Mariners J. Vargas 14 I. Snell 12 2 White Sox C. Richard 14 B. Colon 12 2 Phillies C. Lee 12 B. Myers 10 2 Tigers J. Washburn 8 D. Willis 7 1 D'backs Y. Petit 17 B. Buckner 13 4 Angels M. Palmer 13 S. O'Sullivan 10 3 Yankees S. Mitre 9 C. Wang 9 0 Reds H. Bailey 11 J. Lehr 11 0 Rays Sonnanstine 22 S. Kazmir 20 2 Marlins A. Sanchez 16 A. Miller 14 2 Pirates I. Snell 15 J. Karstens 13 2 Rangers V. Padilla 18 B. McCarthy 17 1 Red Sox C. Buchholz 16 D. Matsuzaka 12 4 Indians C. Pavano 21 A. Laffey 19 2 Blue Jays B. Cecil 17 Rzepczynski 11 6 Royals K. Davies 22 B. Chen 9 13 S. Ponson 9 Athletics G. Gonzalez 17 J. Outman 12 5 V. Mazzaro 17 Mets J. Maine 15 O. Perez 14 1 Padres C. Young 14 J. Peavy 13 1 T. Stauffer 14 Astros F. Paulino 17 R. Ortiz 13 4 Twins K. Slowey 16 C. Pavano 12 4 Nationals G. Mock 15 --- -- 0 S. Martis 15 J. Martin 15 Orioles R. Hill 13 K. Uehara 12 1 C. Tillman 12 Brewers D. Bush 21 M. Burns 8 13
One thought you might have is that better teams tend to have less turnover in their rotation. But a quick regression of the delta term against team wins revealed a very low correlation (r-squared = .005). More significant, however, was the correlation between team-wide starters’ ERA (r-squared = .14). This suggests that perhaps some of the explanation for why a fifth starter might get more starts than the sixth starter is due to the overall quality of the team’s starters. However, the low correlation also points out the essential randomness of the baseball season. The excellent Braves (3.52 starters’ ERA in ’09) got just seven starts from their No. 6 (Hudson), but the nearly as good Dodgers (3.52) got just three more starts from their No. 5 than from their No. 6. At the other end of the spectrum, the poor Brewers squeezed a 5.37 ERA out of their starters and yet their fifth starter (Dave Bush) took the ball 21 times.
Question of the Day
Certainly, there are better ways of measuring which is the fifth and which is the sixth starter than mere games started. But does this simple method show that, over the course of the season, even the guys who lose out on the fifth starter’s job can still expect to start at least 7-10 games per year? Is there a psychic significance to making the rotation out of spring training I am overlooking? How about an economic difference?
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Another point, btw, is that getting the fifth starter "right" is more important for some teams than others. Wrangling over the fifth starter doesn't make any sense at all if you're Pittsburgh or Kansas City or Washington. If you're Colorado or Minnesota (or several other teams), by contrast, the one or two games that the "right" fifth starter might gain you compared to the "wrong" one who's relegated to the sixth spot could loom very large at the end of the season. I really don't blame those teams, the ones who are serious contenders but not locks to win their divisions, for hosting these battles, nor commentators for homing in on them.
While Cliff Lee and Pedro Martinez were two of those guys, Brett Myers; Chan Ho Park; Rodrigo Lopez; Andrew Carpenter; Kyle Kendrick and Antonio Bastardo were the others.
Almost all teams get a pretty high number of starts from guys who aren't in their original first four or even five. The battle for the 5th starter really pales in comparison to the number of starts given to mid season trade guys and injury replacement guys and guys who get called up to replace someone who just isn't doing the job.
I think a lot is made of who is going to be the 5th starter in the spring but it doesn't end up being as important as who are going to make all those other starts.
But that's not what a 5th starter is. The 5th starter is the guy whom the team expects to be the 5th most effective starting pitcher. Thus, the point of comparison which is more appropriate is the performance of the the guy who opened the season as the "5th starter" compared to the rest of the guys who made starts but who were not part of the rotation when the season started. And the reason the battle in ST matters is because it's possible that a better pitcher will never get an opportunity to be the "5th starter" if he doesn't win the job at the start of the season. Your analysis obscures this.
For example, let's say a team gives a guy, let's call him Joe Veteran (or Kip Wells if you prefer), the 5th starter job and he puts up a 5.50 ERA while making 28 starts. He gets skipped a few times but pretty much keeps his rotation spot all year. Meanwhile, Stud McRookie loses out in the ST competition and goes to AAA.
Midway through the season, the team's #2 starter goes down and Stud McRookie gets called up. From that point forward, he makes 14 starts and puts up a 4.50 ERA. Let's also assume that a collection of other guys get a handful of starts due to various injuries.
Looking at the guys who opened the season in the rotation:
#1 starter = 34 GS, 3.25 ERA
#2 starter = 18 GS, 3.75 ERA
#3 starter = 26 GS, 4.25 ERA
#4 starter = 30 GS, 4.75 ERA
Joe Veteran = 28 GS, 5.50 ERA
-------------------
Stud McRookie = 14 GS, 4.50 ERA
other guys = 12 GS, 6.00 ERA
Using your methodology, we wouldn't consider Joe Veteran the #5 starter. You'd be looking at the guy who was expected to be the teams' 2nd most effective starter as the "5th starter" because he spend half the year on the DL. And then you'd be saying that the 5th starter decision wasn't that important because there was only a 4 start difference.
But that's not the right point of comparison. We should be looking at the fact that Joe Veteran put up 28 GS of a 5.50 ERA while Stud McRookie only got 14 GS while putting up a 4.50 ERA. That's going to mean 1.4 wins worth of difference because of your choice. That's not a huge deal, but it's significant in my book.
Allow me to present the argument slightly differently. Look from the standpoint of the ostensible sixth starter. By design, he is the sixth best starter on the team. That means, assuming he can stay healthy, he should get at least the sixth most starts on the team. Even though my data only looked at who received the 5th and 6th most starts, it still demonstrates by implication that guys who enter the season as the 5th starter and stay healthy will often end up with more starts than that. The exact same logic applies to the guy who "loses" the spring training battle, and implies that sixth starters are nearly guaranteed to join the rotation for a considerable amount of time at some later point in the season.
The win consequences are a separate matter not considered here. The best practice (somewhat trivially) is always to give playing time to players in decreasing order of value. Plenty of things are going to affect that, but what you call a guy ought not to. I don't think focusing on the nomenclature is particularly helpful, nor would focusing on who is the starter who pitched most often on Tuesdays be.
The simple point I intended to demonstrate is that the sixth starter can anticipate significant playing time despite the fact that he lost the battle.
Looking for the exact point in the column, this - "A more basic question we could ask about all of these battles is whether the ostensible winner will end up pitching more than the loser. Put slightly differently, what difference is there between the pitcher who pitches the fifth-most starts on a team and the pitcher who pitches the sixth-most starts?" isn't as slight a difference as you set out (again, just my opinion).
If you want to look at 5th and 6th starter battles from last spring, you may wind up with a very different conclusion. The veterans that lose the competition (e.g., Colon) may end up getting waived, while young players with options can be sent down and saved for in season, and others get to while away in relief. Who were the winners and losers of these camp battles last year? I think you'd find the losers do not consistently wind up ranking in that team's top 6 GS (guessing 50-60% do). In particular, I'm guessing players without options that lose that battle become roster footnotes.
You set up the analysis with "A more basic question we could ask about all of these battles is whether the ostensible winner will end up pitching more than the loser." This very clearly means specific Player A (the guy who wins the #5 job) vs. specific Player B (the guy who loses the #5 job).
However, you then immediately re-frame the question fundamentally by making it not about the players in competition in the spring, but by the players who eventually wind up with the 5th and 6th most starts at the end of the season. For all we know, those guys could have been the #1 and #2 starter out of camp --- telling us nothing about the eventual opportunities of the guy who made the team and the guy who didn't. By doing it this way, all we're learning about is the general distribution of starts among starters, not about the starts for the two players on whom the entire article is premised.
So I've posited that despite your conclusion, which might lead one to the understanding that the answer to this question is 'no', spring training battles don't really matter, that the answer is actually yes, such battles do have significance. Because while it's highly likely that the #6 starter will see some action, he will not likely see as much action as he would have had he begun the year in the rotation -- or as much as the guy to whom he lost the ST competition. Unfortunately, you didn't really analyze this comparison.
Yes, rotations are turbulent and the guy who loses the competition for the #5 job will get some opportunity to pitch. We can agree on that. But the amount of difference between some opportunity of unknown proportion due to roster turbulence and the opportunity that the loser would have had if he had earned the job out of spring training is still an open question.
To summarize the results of this "study": there's not much difference between the number of games pitched by the guy who pitches the fifth highest and sixth highest number of starts per team. Really? Wow! I'd be quite interested if there's much difference between the number of doubles hit by the players that rank fifth and sixth on each team too, that's about as relevant and interesting. To quote Diego Montoyo, "I don't think that means what you think it does."
Rich Harden? Vincente Padilla? Cliff Lee? Tommy Hanson?
This is an example of not doing your homework. Not all teams treat their 5th starter the same way. Some teams (most notably the mid-90's Braves) worked a 4+ rotation where the 4 top starters always pitched on their normal rest and the 5th starter pitched whenever needed. Other teams had a more true 5 starter rotation and allowed their pitchers more (or less) rest so that they would continue to go in order.
Whats more important is that rotations evolve over the season, and the 5 guys who start the season as the rotation usually don't all end up taking their turn each year. A perfect example is last years Rangers. In 2009, the Rangers broke camp with a Rotation as follows: Kevin Millwood, Vincente Padilla, Brandon McCarthy, Matt Harrison, and Kris Benson. Their number 6 starter turned out to be Scott Feldman, as he was the first person put into the rotation when it was obvious that Kris Benson sucked (something that most of us fans saw during spring training).
An hour or so with retrosheet (or some other boxscore like site) would allow you to have reconstructed each teams starting 5 in that way, with the number 6 starter as the first pitcher outside the starting 5 to start a game.
In the case of the Rangers, its quite obvious that the difference between their number 5 and 6 starters was immense, but in the opposite direction, as Feldman ended up with an SNLVAR of 5.6 in 31 starts, and Benson had a -0.4 SNLVAR in 2 starts. This example would have been an extreme addition to your main thesis.
Let me quote you back to you: "A more basic question we could ask about all of these battles is whether the ostensible winner will end up pitching more than the loser. Put slightly differently, what difference is there between the pitcher who pitches the fifth-most starts on a team and the pitcher who pitches the sixth-most starts?"
The two sentences here seem to follow from one another, but in reality they don't. With the volatility of todays teams, the times where the pitcher who starts the fifth most games and the pitcher who starts the sixth most games are almost never the two pitchers who were vying for the fifth spot in the rotation. I gave you two examples above. In one, (the Rangers), the "winner" of the number 5 spot (Kris Benson) quickly pitched his way out of the rotation and even off the team, while the "loser" ended the season as the teams number 1 starter. In the other, (the Yankees), the "winner" ended up as the number 4 starter all year, and the "loser" was the number 5 starter for a month or so before settling into a role as the primary setup man.
Now, if your analysis was to go through each team, identify who their number 5 and 6 starters were coming out of camp in 2009 and telling what happened to them, that would have been a great article. (and in fact, what I was expecting when you started talking about this years camp battles). Instead you took a much easier way out by "identifying" each teams 5th and 6th starters based on number of starts, ignoring trades and injuries, and then tried to perform regression analysis on it.
Once again, as I said above, seeing you talk about Rich Harden as a number 5 starter for the Cubs bothered me. (though apparantly the Cubs had him as their number 4 starter behind Zambrano, Dempster, and Lilly) A little checking reveals that the Cubs number 5 starter at the beginning of 2009 was Sean Marshall with Randy Wells as their number 6 starter. Marshall ended up the year as a 6th or 7th inning pitcher, behind Chris Marmol and Kevin Gregg.
If Rich Harden upset me, I'm sure Phillies and Mariner fans objected to the idea of Cliff Lee as a 5th starter, as well.
It would take a bit of digging, but the comparison you want to be making is between pitchers who are the 5th pitcher to start a game for each team and players who are the 6th pitcher to start a game for their team during the year. That's a pretty clear expression of team's preference orderings coming out of camp, and would give a much clearer picture of whether winning the positional battle matters.
Jimenez: 33
Marquis: 33
de la Rosa: 32
Hammel: 30
Cook: 27
(I'm a bit curious why this isn't being addressed. I know its only a one team omission but the fact that Colorado is the biggest possible outlier on the high side makes it significant.)
"We probably spend just a little too much psychic energy obsessing over fifth starters. In the 1940s, a baseball writer might refer to a team's "Big Four," even though no team was going to get through a season using just four starters. Granted, there is unpredictability and instability almost everywhere. But for many teams, that No. 5 slot in the rotation is particularly unstable, and the real key isn't picking the right guy in March; it's having viable options over the course of the season."