Barometers Unkind to Beckett

by
June 12, 2008

Yesterday I wrote about how C.C. Sabathia has not necessarily turned his season around recently but rather had worse numbers than his performance level would indicate; this was primarily due to two poor starts quite early in the season. As I went to post the article I caught a glimpse of the leaderboards on the main page here and spotted Josh Beckett amongst those with the fastest heaters. It soon dawned on me I had absolutely no idea what Beckett was doing this year; how he had performed; how the numbers looked; or even his finger-blister ratio.

Checking out his statistics I soon realized he is also suffering from Unjust Barometer Syndrome; not that a 4.22 ERA is terrible or a 6-4 W-L merits demotion but remove those barometers and Beckett is doing pretty much exactly the same thing as a year ago.

2007: 6.69 IP/G, 3.08 FIP, 1.14 WHIP, .316 BABIP, .250 BAA, 4.85 K/BB
2008: 6.58 IP/G, 3.33 FIP, 1.13 WHIP, .311 BABIP, .249 BAA, 5.53 K/BB

So, literally, if you strip away W-L and ERA, the similarities amongst these statistics should be similar enough to the point that any added commentary would come off as redundant.

His K/9 has gone from 8.70 to 9.46; his BB/9 has dropped from 1.79 to 1.71; and his HR/9 has risen from 0.76 to 1.25. Put together, this has led to the increase in FIP. His rates of balls in play have shifted in quite the odd fashion as well. His career LD/GB/FB is 18.8/44.2/37.0. Last year they came in at 15.8/47.3/36.9; this year they are currently 21.9/37.9/40.2. Beckett is getting significantly less grounders than a year ago, and many more line drives/flyballs. His HR/FB has, in turn, risen from 8.0% to 12.5%.

His LOB has dropped, too, from 75.2% to 70.1%. Since he is allowing essentially the same amount of baserunners (look at his WHIP, BAA, and BABIP posted above) it seems that his higher-than-it-should-be ERA is a direct result of the change in BIP rates, which give more of an opportunity for balls to leave the yard—which they have as evidenced by his HR/9 increase. All told, Beckett’s numbers should not worry Red Sox fans at all; they weren’t too bad even with the barometers but, when we dig deep it becomes clear he is just as good as last year.

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Eric is an accountant and statistical analyst from Philadelphia. He also covers the Phillies at Phillies Nation and can be found here on Twitter.

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