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Since the season has ended, many have been quick to point at the Rookie of the Year Candidate and his historically low .224 batting average on balls in play. Hellickson’s BABIP is the seventh lowest total since the 1980 season and the lowest since 1990. Only Jeff Robinson, Tom Browning, Pascual Perez, Tom Seaver, Dan Petry, and Jerry Ujdur have had BABIP’s lower than Hellickson’s in a season large enough to qualify for the ERA title. Before Hellickson’s result this season, Chris Young is the only other pitcher in this millennium with a BABIP this low—.230 in 2006.

Nobody expects Hellickson to be able to post such a low BABIP in 2012 as we know pitchers cannot control everything that follows their release of the baseball. What we do not know is how much Hellickson’s BABIP will increase. If we look at the six pitchers who had lower BABIPs than since Hellickson since 1980, we see mixed results:

PITCHER

LOW BABIP

NEXT SEASON

DIFFERENCE

Robinson

.209

.267

.058

Browning

.221

.262

.041

Perez

.221

.277

.056

Seaver

.222

.324

.102

Petry

.223

.276

.053

Ujdur

.223

.289

.066

 Overall, the numbers are not terribly encouraging. Tom Browning had the smallest amount of regression while Tom Terrific regressed right passed the mean without collecting $200. The average BABIP for these six pitchers was 62 points higher in the following season, which is a scary thought for those in keeper leagues that are protecting Hellickson and something to keep in mind as making your 2012 draft plans.  Six pitchers are a ridiculously small sample size to look at, but it at least gives us a starting point for a range of expectations for where a pitcher with an extremely low BABIP could regress to the following season. If we expand the pool to look at pitchers since the 2000 season who have had BABIP’s below .260, we get a larger sample size to look at:

PITCHER

LOW BABIP

NEXT SEASON

DIFFERENCE

Barry Zito

.248

.242

-.006

Jamie Moyer

.251

.246

-.005

Carlos Zambrano

.256

.257

.001

Tim Wakefield

.258

.264

.006

Paul Abbott

.253

.262

.009

Kazuhisa Ishii

.259

.269

.010

Pedro Martinez

.252

.262

.010

Jason Schmidt

.256

.267

.011

Matt Cain

.254

.265

.011

Ted Lilly

.254

.266

.012

Chris Young

.230

.243

.013

Johan Santana

.251

.264

.013

Randy Wolf

.256

.269

.013

A.J. Burnett

.256

.271

.015

Carlos Zambrano

.257

.272

.015

Chris Young

.243

.258

.015

Jonathan Sanchez

.255

.276

.021

Jamie Moyer

.246

.269

.023

Randy Wolf

.256

.276

.023

Tim Hudson

.253

.276

.023

Gavin Floyd

.259

.285

.026

Jeremy Guthrie

.255

.287

.032

Barry Zito

.242

.275

.033

Freddy Garcia

.258

.294

.036

Russ Ortiz

.252

.288

.036

Mark Buehrle

.245

.281

.036

Barry Zito

.246

.284

.038

Bronson Arroyo

.241

.281

.040

Ryan Franklin

.248

.289

.041

Tim Hudson

.257

.300

.043

Jake Peavy

.258

.303

.045

Odalis Perez

.252

.297

.045

Joe Mays

.246

.294

.048

Tim Wakefield

.240

.295

.055

Ramon Ortiz

.239

.295

.056

Damian Moss

.238

.295

.057

Tim Wakefield

.237

.295

.058

Derek Lowe

.237

.296

.059

Woody Williams

.255

.314

.059

Armando Galarraga

.237

.298

.061

Roy Oswalt

.258

.321

.063

Hideo Nomo

.258

.322

.064

Al Leiter

.244

.310

.066

Darrell May

.251

.319

.068

Trevor Cahill

.237

.306

.069

Pedro Martinez

.237

.310

.073

Rodrigo Lopez

.257

.342

.085

Joe Blanton

.249

.336

.087

David Bush

.238

.327

.089

That group of pitchers contains as many hard throwers as it does soft-tossers; BABIP regression does not discriminate. Only lefties Zito and Moyer saw their BABIP fortunes improve the season after a fortunate season while 15 others saw their BABIP rise by less than 20 points.

The correlation between BABIP and the regression from one season to the next is not terribly consistent. In fact, the correlation coefficient is only -0.37. The following graph shows this relationship.

The average BABIP for these pitchers in their fortunate year was .249 while their average BABIP the following season was .286; a difference of 36 points.

One thing that should help temper Hellickson’s regression is the Tampa Bay Rays’ team defense, which continually grades out as the best in baseball. Manager Joe Maddon implements more defensive shifts than any other manager in baseball, and that is one reason why only James Shields has had a BABIP over .290 as a Rays pitcher the last few seasons. In 2011, the pitching staff’s BABIP was just .265, which helps frame Hellickson’s numbers in a better light rather than just chalking it up to extreme good fortune. If he were pitching for the White Sox or Twins, teams that each had a team BABIP over .300, owners would rightly be concerned for 2012.

 The fact that Hellickson has a strong team defense behind him and has shown a strong ability to generate harmless infield fly balls should help keep his regression under control in 2012 and at a more palatable level than what others before him have experienced the season after their BABIP fortunes.

Thank you for reading

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shmooville
10/10
So if one plugged in a Rays' team BABIP figure of .265 into Hellickson's 2011 performance, then what would his ERA and WHIP numbers look like? I.e., if we assumed that his good fortune was only relative to the team's average performance. Of course, it probably should be a bit higher than .265 then, since Hellickson's own numbers influenced that team average down to .265, but I'm just curious for a ballpark figure here. Thanks.
moonlightj
10/11
As far as ERA goes, FIP would give us the best judge of that. I'd have to run numbers to look at the effect on WHIP but I would guess that we would see a bump of at least 0.10 for a traditional pitcher.

Another story idea is to look back at how team defense has affected these fortunate pitchers in the following season. There is no doubt Hellickson's BABIP is going to regress next season as .224 is nearly impossible to repeat even for the best relievers. The only question is, how much?
Carosella
10/11
Does 0.10 mean 1/10 of a run or does it mean a 10% increase in ERA?