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June 28, 2005
10 Long Minutes
“Victor Zambrano starts for the Mets tonight against the Philadelphia Phillies.” That line used to scare me. That line used to make me not want to watch the game. That line used to make me think automatic loss. Notice the past tense? Well, that’s what happens when a pitcher gives you a June (so far) with a 2.60 ERA in 27.2 IP. Look, I haven’t turned the corner yet on Victor, but I’m more willing to think open-mindedly about his ability and more importantly, want Kaz Ishii and Tom Glavine out of the Mets rotation before Victor. So, where does this new improvement come from? Here are a few charts, month by month… BB/9 After a horrendous April and May, Victor’s walk rate in June is, dare I say it… normal! WHIP An excellent WHIP in June, both a show of walking less people this month and his H/IP rate going down after a terrible April in that catergory. P/IP IP/GS Not only is Victor being more economical every inning, he’s pitching much deeper into games, including an 8 inning start against Arizona on June 1st. A 15 P/IP rate would put Victor in the top 15 in the NL in that catergory for the year, by the way. RA Obviously the most important and telling chart. No UER (unearned runs) allowed this month and a 4+ run improvement in RA over the first two months of the season. Still, there is one trend that does bother me… K/9 Victor’s K rate has dropped like a rock, making his K:BB rates still look undesirable. Still, he has also had better control over this period and I’d prefer the better control over a high K rate and no control. So, will Victor’s improvements stick? Has he finally figured it out? Time will only tell and to be honest, I don’t have the slightest idea, but his drop in walk and hit rates and his ability to throw less pitches and throw deeper into games (which are the biggest issues I have had with him this year), all give me faith that some of this might be real improvement and not just a small sample freak of good pitching. Victor Zambrano pitches tonight for the Mets. Unfortunately, I will not be home to see the game. Yeah, I just said unfortunately. Baseball and Met fandom… gotta love it. 24 Responses to “10 Long Minutes”Leave a ReplyYou must be logged in to post a comment. |
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What’s his BABIP?
I think the biggest change is VZ is now getting early strikes with his slider and cutter. He used to nibble with his slider and cutter, falling behind in the count, and then hitters could sit on the 3-0 fastball.
The theory that i heard that Prof. Rick wanted to implement, VZ has so much movement on his pitches, he should just challenge hitters early in the count and let the defense work for him. Getting those early strikes puts the hitter on the defensive, and makes it much harder to put good wood on his pitches. Anyway, that’s the theory i heard. It could nonsense.
Victor, for what it’s worth, I apologize for giving up on you so early. Even though I’m not completely sold on you yet, I’m more than happy to hope that you continue to make me look wrong.
No more two-toned hats,
Kent
As has been said many times before in this site, Vic is always going to be wild, he just naturally has a freakish amount of motion on his throws. But if you can limit that wildness the be inside the strike zone, it creates great short and long term results, because not only will batters fail to make good contact now, but they can watch all the video and have all the prior at bats in the world, it won’t help them figure it out.
I’m also curious about his BABIP. I feel like the strikeout numbers are down because, now that he’s staying in the zone more, hitters are making a lot more bad contact than swinging and missing at stuff that comes down the middle then breaks out of the zone, which is how he got a lot of Ks in the past.
Victor’s BABIP for the year is .276, with a 1.15 DIP%, not too out of line with the rest of the league.
But more importantly his BABIP in June is .231, with a DIP% of 1.52 (meaning that with his peripherals and independent of the defense, he has an expected ERA of about 3.97). All this suggests that he has been a bit lucky in June and should return to somewhere in between his April form and his June form. That being said, he could end up being a solid 3.50 ERA pitcher which is plenty good enough to warrent the #3 spot for years to come.
His quick and dirty BABIP (using the basic formula of (HR-H)/(IP*3+(HR-H)-K)) is .276.
I would tend to agree with your thoughts Goldy and bmc, though I would like it if he could get the K rate up a little, but for now, I’ll take what he’s doing.
The drop in K rate is definitely problematic, but I think it was much more important for Zambrano to find some semblance of the strike zone. Zambrano doesn’t really have that big power stuff that would come with a strikeout guy. What he does have is great movement on a lot of different pitches, and if he can switch speeds and locations effectively, he can “pitch to contact” with a lot of success. But it is nice to be able to reach back and get that strikeout in those tight spots with runners on base.
I try to separate him from The Trade, because the guy will never be worth Kazmir, even if Kazmir blows his arm out tomorrow. But he can be a very good middle of the rotation guy on a contending team if he continues to pitch smarter.
I think DIP% is not as worthy of a stat as folks think - at least I don’t think it (or BABIP) have anything to do with “luck.” A good pitcher keeps a batter off balance and makes him make bad contact - resulting in pop-ups, weak grounders and lazy fly balls. These result in a very low BABIP and potentially high DIP% although it is a result of quality pitching - not luck.
I am not sure Pedro’s BABIP, but I imagine it is fairly low - none of us would say he is lucky.
As far as the strikeouts, a higher total would be nice, but as long as he keeps guys off balance the strikeout won’t be that important. Benson’s K rate has plunged since early May, but he has been doing some of the best pitching of his career.
Just outta curiosity, whats BABIP and DIP% stand for and how do u get someones expected ERA from that?
To me, the reason his strikeouts are down is obvious. He’s walking less meaning he’s in the strike zone more often meaning more of a chance for the batter to make contact. When Zambrano walks a ton of batters, he is all over the place and sometimes becomes “effectively wild”…..with him walking less and staying in the strike zone more often, it allows hitters to make contact. The good thing is when they are making contact, its usually not good contact.
His K/IP ratio doesnt bother me one bit if he walks less batters.
I think that this is the pitcher that the Mets thought they were getting last year and if Zambrano was able to pitch like this in the second half of last year, then we would probably be a lot closer to .500. Watching Kazmir pitch this year shows you that he’s not quite ready for the big leagues. He definately should be down in AAA this year. He’s shown flashes of brilliance, but overall has had control problems and is a below average pitcher.
If Zambrano can pitch like this for the rest of this year and next, then I think that the trade works out. Honestly, the Mets didn’t trade Kazmir to a contender so while he learns how to pitch, he won’t hurt the Mets. Also, if Kazmir does come into his own and become a great pitcher, then Tampa can’t keep him because they have a payroll of zero. That allows the Mets to try and sign Kazmir again in the future while having a big league guy help out the team now.
wow I that lost post is rediculous. You think that Kazmir would come back to the team that sold him off so young in his career. Maybe we can look forward to the day he signs with they Yankees and faces us in the subway series.
I bet Zambrano gets rocked tonight because Jeremy jinxed him
BABIP = Batting Average on Balls In Play
This basically subtracts out the HRs and Ks from the total plate appearances and looks at how many batted balls turn into hits. There is much disagreement on this subject, but one line of thinking goes that pitchers have little to no control over this so that it will generally move towards a midrange number (.270-ish, I think, but I could be wrong). Recently, people have shown that some pitchers may have more control than others of BABIP (sinker pitchers and knuckleballers in particular), but none have a whole lot.
DIPS = Defense Independent Pitching Statistics
DIP% = DIPS/ERA (so that basically it will tell you whether the defense is hurting the pitcher - under 1.00 - or helping)
Roughly, this is calculated by assuming a pitcher has “average” defense but maintains the same Ks, HRs, BBs, etc. Again, somewhat controversial as to how good a stat this is, but several prominent studies have shown that you get a better sense of the future ERA of a pitcher by looking at his DIPS than at his actual ERA because over time a pitcher will experience some good defense and some bad defense (or good luck and bad luck).
As to Pedro’s BABIP, it is the lowest in the league (.213), but his DIP% is actualy 0.94 indicating that he has such a good K and BB rate that his ERA should be better even with an average BABIP (go figure).
Anyway, the point is this: Zambrano has a low BABIP and a high DIP% which both indicate he is going to get worse. Regardless of how much stock you put in these numbers, you might want to brace yourself for a falloff in production from him. At best, he will turn out to be able to induce a better-than-average number of outs/batted ball, but even then it appears he will probably not be a sub-3.00 ERA pitcher.
Thanks. I have been watching baseball for a number of years and I never heard of some of the stats on this site lol.
Sorry, I made a mistake: the league average BABIP is more like .290, not .270.
BABIP = Bases Allowed on Balls In Play
DIP = Defense Independant Pitching
http://www.baseballthinkfactory.org/mccracken/dipsexpl.html
Generally I agree with Sweetlew that BABIP is not synonymous with “luck” as it’s often confused; it’s probably a combination of stuff and luck, but you’ll find that better pitchers seem to have more luck. Unless you’re Al Leiter circa 2004.
I know there are some companies that track the quality of hit balls (velocity, trajectory, which segment of the field hit to), and in conjunction with the K & BB peripherals should give a better indicator of how well they’re pitching.
Unfortunately, those stats are expensive to get hold of. I know MLB is experimenting with tracking hit balls via Radar, but they’re having trouble accurately tracking grounders. Soon. Soon.
One question I did not ask early is if soemone could find Zambrano’s career BABIP? I have a hunch that his career number is better than average. There is no way that a guy with his tendency to walk batters would have a sub-5.00 ERA with an average BABIP.
This would also fit my hypothesis that pitchers have contol over BABIP - with Zambrano’s movement, he rarely gets hit hard. So while a lot of balls go into play, they are not hard hit resulting in an above average BABIP.
As far as Leiter - even last year, his control was awful leading to high pitch counts and lots of walks, but he still broke more bats than any pitcher I have ever seen. All of those off the hands, broken bat, slow rollers like dropped his BABIP a lot — although he has just been god-awful this year — best move Omar made was the signing he didn’t make.
Zambrano’s career BABIP rates are nothing special.
I only have percentages rounded to the nearest whole number:
2001: 30%
2002: 29%
2003: 27%
2004: 28%
They look very average.
Another difference since VZ arrived in Shea is that he’s throwing more groundballs.His GB/FB rate in Tampa was generally around 1.2.
This year his rate is 1.7.
My guess is that this isn’t an accident. Peterson may have him sacrificing some Ks in attempt to get more grounders. His HR rate is also down. Pitching in Shea is likely part of the reason for the lower HR rate; but lots more grounders have to be a factor too.
Just for the record, since 2000 Pedro’s BAIBIP rates have averaged 29% (or .290)
2000: 25%
2001: 32%
2002: 29%
2003: 31%
2004: 30%
His rate this year is very low; near 20%. Let’s hope he can keep it there.
To be honost I don’t think Met fans actually ever hated Victor Zambrano, they hated the fact he was traded for Scott Kazmir but had he come using another player who was crappy and useless then he woudln’t recieve such abuse.
I think we’re all aware that he’s nasty if he can control it. I mean some of his pitches are just…WOW. His fastball moves a ton. So when it comes down to it, it’s not a personal thing agaisnt Zambrano just the fact of who was used to get him here was that bothered the fans the most.
I know I liked him alot when he was in Tampa Bay but it was ridiculous when Scott Kazmir was used to get him.
Guys can we post more and more articles about the horrid Mets front office?
I need to relieve a lot of anger, especially when I see all that talent on the field and this friggin record
I used to hate watching VZ pitch, now I enjoy it
with all the movement Heilman and VZ have all they would ever have to do from here on out is learn to pitch, maybe Glavine is good for something
I’m kidding did someone call him a cab before tonight’s homestand?
Looks like VicZ found his strike out pitch - but he has been wild as hell again!
I think looking at BABIP is interesting, but that’s about it. For example, let’s take a look at two NL pitchers from last year, both playing in parks that favor pitchers: Kaz Ishii (Dodgers) and Jake Peavy (Padres). We know who the better pitcher is. Yet, who had the lower BABIP? Ishii (.243) compared to Peavy’s (.290).
BABIP is basically luck. It’s not surprising Ishii had a better BABIP than Peavy as it’s got very little if anything to do with talent.
“BABIP is basically luck. It’s not surprising Ishii had a better BABIP than Peavy as it’s got very little if anything to do with talent.”
That was precisely my point.