Episode 199
RotoGraphs editor and semi-notable German-American Eno Sarris is the guest on this Fantasy Friday edition of FanGraphs Audio.
Discussed:
• How and why Shawn Camp is closing games for the Cubs.
• How and why pitchers like Shawn Camp end up closing games — and what information, generally, is predictive of future save opportunities.
• Noted prosecpts Trevor Bauer and Wil Myers: their roles in the near future.
Don’t hesitate to direct pod-related correspondence to @cistulli on Twitter.
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Audio after the jump. (Approximately 42 min. play time.)
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I’m a fan of all the podcast, and a big fan of the sight.
Somewhat surprised you guys didn’t know Cook wasn’t from Australia though. He’s from California. C’mon Cistulli!… I wanted in on this ottoneu league you are leading until this Cook debacle. 🙂
I’m a big fan of this site, and even bigger fan of sight. 🙂
As you can see we all make mistakes.
well, that was embarassing mate
Ryan Cook is from the US. I think you’re thinking of Travis Blackley.
Grant Balfour is Australian.
The A’s also had Luke Hughes (3B) and Rich Thompson (RP).
Audio after the jump? Who wants to hear a 45 minute podcast to get 3 minutes worth of info? Can you just write?
I’d you did 40 hours a week of this I could maybe stand going to work
I’m not sure that 8% of closers being left-handed is less than expected as Eno claims. I guess it depends on how deeply you think about the concept of “expected”.
Here’s what I’m thinking:
25% of pitchers are left-handed, yes. But only something like 10% of the population is left-handed. I think it’s fair to assume that being a LHP doesn’t give you any sort of advantage in your pitching makeup (pitch speed, control, etc.); rather, it’s likely that 15% of all LHP wouldn’t be major-league quality if not for the platoon advantage that they see for upwards of 70% of the plate appearances that they pitch [I took that number from CC Sabathia’s 2011 splits. I didn’t research any more than that; his 2011 data may turn out to be non-representative of the splits of your average LH SP for some reason].
Some of those guys end up as LOOGYs. More might be fifth starters or long relievers who would end up below replacement level if not for that advantage.
The point is that closers are the cream of the relief pitcher crop (some clubs recent decisions to put their best reliever in a fireman role rather than the designated closer role notwithstanding). This constraint means that the only lefty who end up as closers are the ones who would be good enough to be closers if they had the same pitching ability and were right-handed. If that’s the case, you might expect to see the same percentages as is seen among the general public, which is about what it is.
Um, so obviously I misspoke a bit there. Obviously lefty pitchers get the platoon advantage when facing lefty batters. But when it comes to relievers, the math still works. I show that lefty relievers in 2011 face lefty batters 44% of the time, in comparison to lefty starters who only face lefty batters 23% of the time.