John Grabow Gets Paid
According to Paul Sullivan, the Cubs will announce later today that they have re-signed John Grabow to a two-year contract. Previous reports have put the value of the deal at $7.5 million.
Once again, we’re witness to the power of ERA as a negotiating tool. Over the last two seasons, Grabow’s thrown nearly 150 innings and posted an ERA of 3.09, giving the impression that he’s a high quality LH reliever. Yet again, ERA misleads.
Grabow’s FIP the last two years? 4.37, thanks to an atrociously high walk total. The entirety of his low ERA over the last two years is driven by an 82 percent rate of stranding runners, which is just not sustainable. He’s succeeded by putting men on base and then wiggling out of jams, but that’s not the same thing as pitching well.
It would be one thing if Grabow had developed this knack for stranding runners by elevating his strikeout rate, but he’s not any different now than he has been for his entire career.
Instead, he’s just posted artificially low BABIPs the last two years, and by not giving up hits, he was able to keep the guys he walked on the bases. That’s not a recipe for success.
Grabow is a generic left-handed middle reliever, the kind of guy you’re fine having for the league minimum but that you don’t really want to pay any real money to. He’s eminently replaceable, but the Cubs have decided to commit real money to him over multiple years because he has a low ERA.
The Cubs have money, and $3.75 million isn’t going to drastically alter their budget, but this is just a waste of cash. Betting on reliever ERA is a great way to get burned, and given Grabow’s actual talent levels, the Cubs are unlikely to be very happy with how this deal turns out for them.
Dave is the Managing Editor of FanGraphs.
This would be a bigger waste of money if they use him as a LOOGY, because his best pitch is his changeup. It’s an overpay, but it’s always nice to have a lefty that can get both sides of hitters out.
Hendry needs to be fired now. Or Ricketts needs to get someone in the front office who has even the slightest bit of a stats background. This is ridiculous.
No, no, no, by not getting Cuban in, MLB has purposefully ensured the Cubs would not get a forward thinking owner, and ensure that their 100+ years of futility continues for the next… 15 years at least, allowing other teams in the National League to keep winning pennants, often on smaller budgets…
/tin foil hatted…
Maybe it’s all part of the Cubs’ strategy; their now-secure position as the most cursed team in baseball affords them an undervalued boost in popularity due to attractiveness of playing the pitiable “lovable loser” role. Were they to win a World Series, the Cubs would lose what makes them uniquely special and they would simply be, just another franchise.
Perhaps, for a team like the Cubs, the value of each win decreases as they get close to the threshold of making the playoffs, and as such, when they have a decent core group of players as they do right now, it makes financial sense for them to pay a bit extra for mediocrity – they need to add just the right amount of talent to fail as close as they can possibly get. There are only a limited number of guys who can provide such consistent mediocrity, and you don’t want to go with a farm hand who might have a breakout year and tip the scales too far forward. Missing the playoffs by a win or two increases the value of the Cubs brand more than actually winning ever would!
So the Cubs didn’t listen to the nerds about john grabow??
well i’m in shock.
So, last season was his highest walk rate and lowest strikeout rate. And its not like he’s a groundball pitcher getting out of jams by inducing double plays. He did post his lowest HR/9 last season, which is probably a decent chunk of why his ERA was so low, but that’s largely out of his hands anyhow. This seems like a pretty lousy deal.
I can think of 3 reasons that the ERA is lower than the FIP
1) Luck/Small sample sizes (duh, and obviously a healthy piece of it, but may not be 100%?)
2) Pitchers behind him? (say grabow has a tough outing and has allowed runners at 1st and 2nd thanks to a single and a walk). He gets yanked after 1/3rd of an inning. In comes Mariano Rivera’s secret twin brother, who is actually better than Mariano with double mariano’s strikeout rate. No runs stranded! In this case a low home run rate, and low hit rate compensate for a high walk rate, because on days he “doesn’t have it”, he gets pulled for strikeout machines.
Obviously grabow doesn’t have mariano’s twin brother behind him. but Marmol, for all his failings (JUSSSSSST a Bit Outside!), does strike out alot of batters… So maybe in outings that he is pulled maybe a higher percentage of batters strand than one might expect?
3) The breakdown of his FIP. I would need about 16 hours that I dont have right now to really test this, but maybe at the extremes…
high walk rate + low strikeout rate + high groundball rate and thus (low homer rate)
is better than
same walk rate + high strikeout rate + low groundball rate
meaning after you walk someone, you would rather have someone that gets groundballs 100% of the time versus someone that gets a K 40% of the time and yields a FB (homer or otherwise) 60%?
I dont know.
I still say you are right Dave, and luck is over 60% of it. I wonder if factors 2 and 3 matter at all though.
Your comments back are welcome.
on second thought, this might not be true.
I am playing with a sample FIP of 4.5, and the inputs it would take to get there.
Lets take a bb/9 of 8 and a FIP of 4.5
Now lets give one pitcher a gb rate of 50% and the other of 30%, again keeping bb/9 and FIP fixed.
and… ill have to get back to you on the rest. i am doubting my own initial thesis hard on #3 (#2 i maintain as still valid)
Maybe Grabow has dirt on Hendry.
The Neifi Perez Collection of Compromising Photographs of Cubs Management strikes again!
Do Bradley, Soriano, et al have dirt on Hendry too?
Maybe Grabow has other benefits to the organization they are willing to compensate. Or perhaps the market for John Grabows is more expensive this year than an average year. Lastly, maybe the Cubs see a higher probability for improvement from Grabow than most guys with his numbers. Salary should also consider potential improvement/weakness than just his numbers in 2009.
In other words, there is far more to what drives someones compensation than pure numbers and without that information this article has little power. You can say he is overpriced in your analysis, but to say the Cubs are clueless (or even likely to be unhappy) is ridiculous without more information.
‘Maybe Grabow has other benefits to the organization they are willing to compensate.”
What, is he a pilates instructor or something? Is he a computer technician that doubles as an IT expert for the organization in the offseason? Is he a heart surgeon that the Cubs outsource to medical institutions? I have no idea what you could possibly mean.
Maybe they should have just kept Mike Wuetz?
Mike Wuertz, that is.
lou-“Wuertz walks too many guys!”
Just when you think the Cubs cannot make a worse move than the one before, Jim Hendry manages to outdo himself. Great job Hendry! Given the Type A status, this deal might be worse than the Aaron Miles deal! ok that is impossible, but it’s mighty close. terrible.
I don’t think anyone else would have signed him for the league minimum until the Type A compensation deadline passes.
If anyone knows Tom Ricketts’ email, or anyone moderately high in the organization who does not report to Hendry, I would love to get ahold of it so I can send a strongly worded piece along with a compendium of sources such as this article backing up the fact that Hendry basically just flushed $5MM down the toilet, and didn’t even bother to wipe his ass with it first.
This isn’t a bad contract. It’s not a good one either. $7.5 million over 2 years is paying for about 1.4 wins. He was worth 1.6 over the last 2 years.
The bigger issue with this contract is that the Cubs have very little money to spend and are intent on making their team worse by trading Milton Bradley. They don’t have money to give to setup men.
StatCorner seems to be using the same baseline for all pitchers. Lowering it by a run to account for his being a reliever would knock him back down to replacement level, where FanGraphs has him.
There’s a link in there on the “1.6 over the last 2 years” part.
Grabow made $2.1 million in 2009. Had the Cubs offered arbitration I doubt any team was going to give up a first round pick for him as a Type A FA. How much would he get in arbitration for a year? There’s no way it goes as high as $3.75 million. I’m not even sure that it would hit $3 million.
MB21- The only reason he was “worh 1.6 over the last 2 years” was because of his unsustainable ERA. What would he have actually been worth if his ERA was what his skills say it should have been? Much worse.
I agree with you on Milton Bradley, Cubs should keep him if they are just going to give him away for nothing and also have to pay $ for the privelege to do so. That is asinine…although sadly it is predictable coming from Hendry.
IMO, milton bradley, and his issues with the cubs fans transcends statistics. From a statistical standpoint it makes sense to keep him, yes. But stats don’t account for the way his antics influence the club house, and the fan’s attitude towards the club (and likely hood to purchase tickets).
82 percent rate of stranding runners, which is just not sustainable
Really? He sustained it for two years. And they signed him to a two-year contract. What’s your argument?
He pitched 148.1 innings over those two years. If a starter had that high of a strand rate over 150 innings, any reasonable person would write it off as a fluke, especially if there was nothing in his arsenal at all to suggest an ability to strand runners. The relevant sample size is innings, not years.
What’s your argument?
He’s not a starter. He’s a reliever, who will throw a similar number of innings. Given that he had an 82% strand rate over 148 innings over two years, it seems silly to say he cannot sustain an 82% strand rate over two years.
No, it doesn’t. His role doesn’t change the sample size. If a starter had a high strand rate over one year, it doesn’t demonstrate he has any ability to sustain it for another year, just as a reliever having a high strand rate over two years doesn’t mean it’s indicative of any ability of his. Thus, we would reasonably expect him to revert to the league-average strand rate (or thereabouts).
So Grabow’s 82% strand rate is sustainable?
http://www.fangraphs.com/careerleaders.aspx?pos=all&stats=pit&type=1&min=1000
He must be one of the greatest pitchers ever.
@ Joe R.
Or he’s comparable to Papelbon, Takashi Saito, Chad Cordero, Billy Wagner, and a little better than Armando Benitez, if you set the number to 200 IP. Seriously, we’re not concerned with career numbers. We’re talking about a two year period. And how many relievers pitch 1000 innings in their career?
Fire away with a sample size argument if you like, but relief pitchers can sustain rates similar to this for at least a few years.
This makes a few hilarious points
1) That because he did it in 08-09, that we ignore his previous three years where he was pretty much around the league average of 70-71% (btw a lot of his high strand rate since 2008 was from 2008)
2) That Grabow (1.91 career K/BB) belongs in the same discussion as Papelbon (4.49), Wagner (3.93) and Saito (3.86). And Cordero, well, how did he do in 2009?
Sure, Grabow can strike some guys out. He was still only 78th of 138 relievers w/ 50+ IP. Also 17th in walks. And his HR/FB rate of 5.7%, well, that’s just not sustainable given that the rest of his marks are in the 10%-15% range.
So let’s say a pitcher in a few game gives up 100 balls in play. 20 liners, 40 grounders, 40 fly balls. Pretty standard. 70 go for outs. Also pretty standard, so 30 of those are hits. Pretty standard.
In Grabow’s case, strike out 8 per 9 innings, then you have 19 of those balls a game going for outs, and about 8.14 for hits. Add his walk rate of 4.15 per 9, get 12.29 WH per 9, or 1.365 per 9 innings. That’s a guy whose contemporaries are Jesse Chaves, Clay Zavada, and D.J. Carrasco.
For Grabow, it’s more like 19/46/35 distribution, so out of 100 batted balls, 35 are fly balls. You would expect 4 of them to leave the yard. You’d expect 69 to go for outs, and 27 more to go as non-HR hits. And you’d expect 19 batted out per 9, or 8.54 hits per 9. Last year in MLB, 49,117 bases were taken as a result of non HR hits, out of 38,482 hits that weren’t a result of HR. So what we can expect from Grabow is a (8.54)/(8.54+27) = .240 BA against. And for bases against, you’d have 27(49117/38482)+4(4) = 50.4618 bases per 100 batted balls. If Grabow gives up 27.54 batted balls per 9 innings, that’s 13.625 bases / 27 outs. 13.625/(8.54+27) = .383 SLG. His 1.365 WHIP yields a (1.365)/4.365 = .313 OBP.
So .240/.313/.383 OBP against is reasonable (and probably lowballing his BA and OBP). That probably works out to about a 3.80-3.90 ERA.
sure, but the two years they signed him to are 2010-11, not 2008-09.
At least he has those bone chips in his elbow.
I thinks it’s a great signing. Paul Sullivan also reports that Hendry is close to signing the batboy to a 5yr/120mil contract.
Urgh!, I’m in agreement with this article, I wish the cubs would hire ME to help educate them.
This kind of move has to be written into the Cubs Charter. They carry at least one overpaid underperforming reliever every year. In 2008 it was Bob Howry, then Gregg last year, and now Grabow. Wouldn’t be a Cubs game without the obligitory 8th and 9th inning nailbiter.
You’re forgetting that rather ridiculous deal that Scott Eyre got at the beginning of ’07.
Way to show YOUR maturity :/
This is why we can’t have nice things
I guess this is Jim Hendry’s idea of donating to charity…
Excellent stats, Dave, and your point is well taken. Even if it’s not likely that he’ll sustain stranding all these runners I still think it’s a good signing. Most other top-tier teams have paid well for relief pitching for the last 15 years. The Cubs in general haven’t, so when they do I’m not going to let it embitter me.
Wow. How did the Yahoo Sports comment section get transferred to FanGraphs?
Has fangraphs ever banned people before? If not, this might be a good time to get Appleman on it.
Agreed with Tim & Kevin. It took a lot not to reference Hire Jim Essian in my above comment.
Phillies fan here with a humble request. I love this site, but seeing the Game 6 WS graph is killing me. Any chance of having it removed?
Yes, except for it probably makes all the new yorkers happy, at the expense of us. How many games do you get out to see Dogma? I was thinking if we could rope in Seidman maybe tailgate a few of them next year? The draft for the season tickets that i split is in february usually and I might draft accordingly.
Didn’t the game graph of the ’08 clincher stay up all of last season? Be quiet. 😛
Once again, we’re witness to the power of Cameron not knowing how to properly value a player. Explain to me why a player should be devalued because he he puts a man on base to get to a high percentage matchup and wins that battle more often than you are willing to acknowledge is sustainable.
Grabow is easily worth 7.5 million in this market. All. Day. Long.
Because even if this were true, the marginal value of getting a better matchup is significantly less than the value lost in putting a player on base.
well, i’d imagine what he says is *sometimes* true. but i’d be shocked if that is what Grabow is actually doing.
Are you John Grabow’s mother or something?
Very good point , intentional walks count just the same in the statistics and are often not acknowledged by bloggers. Many times there are “unintentional” intentional walks ordered by the dugout as well. These count the same in the end statistics though and may look bad to the naked eye!
Intentional walks are almost always bad-percentage plays.
Kevin S.
They may be but that is besides the point.
Also you never know what that hitter may have done if pitched to.
John Grabow issued three intentional walks this year. He also hit three batters. Take out the IBB, add in the HBP, and we’re back where we started.
this group doesn’t understand that an ‘intentional walk’ means one either ordered by the bench after a certain count achieved as well as one where four pitches are thrown out of the batters strike zone to intentionally put him on base. There needs to be a better understanding in here on the philosophy of *some* pitching coaches. Joe Kerrigan and Larry Rothschild are classic examples.
We understand it just fine. We just demand evidence before we’ll blindly believe things.
I just have a few questions for you DAVE regarding how you evaluate players.
1) When you say that him wiggling out of jams is not sustainable… why do you say that?? There are a lot of pitchers in this game who have the ability to “buckle down” and make a pitch in tough situations. Many are criticized by their coaches for “buckling down” at the START of the inning and staying out of the jam in the first place. It’s odd , but some guys just focus better when they absolutely have to.
Jair Jurjjens is a great example of this and I watched him do this in Atlanta time after time this season… when he got into jams everything was suddenly 2-3mph harder and on the black.
2) This batting average on balls in play statistic is interesting but I don’t know how useful it is. You say that Grabow is getting lucky because he didn’t elevate his strikeout rate and he stranded a lot of runners….. Obviously with a low strikeout rate there will be more balls put in play and if pitchers don’t have strikeout stuff , they have to focus on getting bad contact from the hitters.
To make my point I would like to say that if a guy has great stuff (not neccesarily strikeout stuff) and a little deception than he is going to induce a lot of bad/soft contact resulting in a lower batting average in balls in play. Meaning maybe he isn’t a generic lefty and maybe the hitters have a hard time sqauring the ball up against him. The hitters make contact against grabow but it is not good contact.
It’s makes sense to me that a lefty , with 3 pitches , coming in from the bullpen where he won’t be exposed more than once through a line-up would be able to keep hitters just off balance enough to be effective.
I would like you take on this . Thanks.
Someone finally agrees with me. Wasn’t sure if I was the only one who thought this wasn’t total blasphemy.
When you say that him wiggling out of jams is not sustainable… why do you say that??
Because it’s a statement of fact. We (and others) have looked at the predictive power of LOB%. There are two pitchers in the history of the game who have posted a career LOB% over 78% (min 1,000 IP), and one of those is Mariano Rivera – his career LOB% is 80.1%.
The best relief pitcher of all time couldn’t sustain Grabow’s 2008-2009 strand rate over long periods of time. No one can.
It’s odd , but some guys just focus better when they absolutely have to.
There is no evidence this is true.
Jair Jurjjens is a great example of this and I watched him do this in Atlanta time after time this season… when he got into jams everything was suddenly 2-3mph harder and on the black.
Jurrjens has a career LOB% of 74.6%.
To make my point I would like to say that if a guy has great stuff (not neccesarily strikeout stuff) and a little deception than he is going to induce a lot of bad/soft contact resulting in a lower batting average in balls in play.
Besides knuckleballers, there’s no evidence this is true. The studies on BABIP are extensive and conclusive, and the amount of control a pitcher has over whether a batted ball becomes a hit or not is barely measurable. Pitchers who post a low BABIP in one year almost universally regress the next year.
It’s makes sense to me that a lefty , with 3 pitches , coming in from the bullpen where he won’t be exposed more than once through a line-up would be able to keep hitters just off balance enough to be effective.
There are a lot of things that make sense but aren’t true. This is one of those.
“Because it’s a statement of fact. We (and others) have looked at the predictive power of LOB%. There are two pitchers in the history of the game who have posted a career LOB% over 78% (min 1,000 IP), and one of those is Mariano Rivera – his career LOB% is 80.1%.
The best relief pitcher of all time couldn’t sustain Grabow’s 2008-2009 strand rate over long periods of time. No one can. ”
——>> Agreed , I have not done the research on the subject but 80% seems very tough to sustain. Grabows career is nearly 75% though which looks to be pretty sustainable. This year he was 78%. If he drops 3% will it really make a huge difference?
—>> Jurrjens is young and one of the most mature 23 yr olds you will see , one who actually pitches and doesn’t use his 95mph fastball until he needs it. This year he was close to 80% LOB. I don’t know if you guys watch the games or just look at numbers all day but if you watched him pitch you would understand the way he turned it on with runners on base.
Some guys do the exact opposite and lose control during jams … which is probably what balances out all of the “studies” .
Dave – ”Besides knuckleballers, there’s no evidence this is true. The studies on BABIP are extensive and conclusive, and the amount of control a pitcher has over whether a batted ball becomes a hit or not is barely measurable. Pitchers who post a low BABIP in one year almost universally regress the next year.”
—–>Do you have any studies on deception? Who’s the most deceptive pitcher in baseball?? Who’s fastball is hardest to pick up? Why is one pitcher’s 88mph fastball better than someone elses 95mph fastball??
Why is JA Happs fastball so hard to square up when theres tons of guys stuck in the minor leagues who can throw 90mph left handed and can’t get anybody out???/
Your “studies” may point to his secondary pitches or tell you he has great location but he doesn’t , he has something called deception! An 89mph right down the middle gets swung through or popped up because he throws it with near perfect backspin and gets very good ride to it. JUST ENOUGH for them to miss hit the ball. You can’t teach that , it’s just natural and I bet you won’t find any “studies” explaining why one guys fastball is harder to pick up than another.
The reason knuckleballers get such bad contact is because it is such an unpredictable pitch and deception works the same way but to a lesser extent. Bad contact is bad contact.
Also , maybe Grabow has tinkered with his delivery or grips on his pitches and figured something out over the past 2 seasons. The media doens’t exactly suck off middle relievers , so this info usually doesn’t make it to the blogs but guys are tinkering and making adjustments every year.
Obviously not all adjustments turn into great results long term , especially the storys of ” (Insert struggling pitcher) finds new grip on 2 seamer” you hear about after a guy has his first good game in a month. These are usually just B.S. stories anyway. But sometimes small changes can make a HUGE difference in on field play.
It’s funny that all of the stat guru’s out there can paint everyone with the same brush when there are so many different variables in baseball.
I’m not going to bother getting into another stupid “why don’t you watch the game” argument.
But, if you’d like to educate yourself, why don’t you go through the archives of Dave Allen’s posts using Pitch F/x data to show how different pitches work. You’ll learn something.
When you’re done with that, perhaps you should move on to logical fallacies. Specifically, post hoc analysis.
Finally, you’ll probably want to brush up on the usefulness of sample size.
Or, you can hang out for a little while, have an open mind, and learn a few things about the game.
This reminds me of when a guy with a harvard education starts using the biggest words he can think of because he knows he is losing the argument.
Just explain to me what you know about deception. Because deception and mental toughness do not show up in any stats.
I think the size of a player’s chaw and/or gum has a positive effect upon their offensive production.
Prove me wrong.
Then why don’t YOU prove what’s magically changed in Grabow since 2007 that makes him magically crack-down-y and clutch.
This is the same stuff that was said about Papelbon all of 2009 when he was having walk-issues. Then game 3 of the ALDS happened.
Pitchers who give up baserunners eventually get cracked. And when it happens, they get hit hard. Ask Dice-K.
Sure, deception and mental toughness matter. They are a component of what makes a pitcher what he is. What is a pitcher? The best we have is his stats. Those intangibles don’t make a player better than his stats, they help him achieve them.
If they don’t show up in any stats, then they have zero effect on the game. Runs scored are “stats.” Outs are “stats.” Hits are “stats.” Any “intangible” you want to wave around that doesn’t influence those is just a lot of hooey to handwave yourself through an argument that you can’t otherwise support. You might as well be talking about the players’ horoscopes.
On the other hand, if those things matter then they’ll be captured in the data. Argue from the data, not from the mythic.
Eric Seidman has a series of articles on BP that in part explore the difference between actual and perceived velocity, which I imagine would qualify as deception.
Above in the first paragraph I meant ” Many are criticized by their coaches for NOT buckling down at the start of the inning”.
My mistake.
It’s worth pointing out Dave, that relievers (especially LOOGY’s who are in favorable matchups more than average) will generally outperform their FIP’s.
I know. Grabow can outperform his FIP by the normal amount rather than the absurd amount of the last two years without changing any of the conclusions of the post.
Nothing about this deal makes sense, especially given his Type A status (the statistical evidence is just icing on the Cubs illogical cake).
Offer him arb. If he accepts, you get him next year for roughly the same amount you were planning to offer him anyway, without the unnecessary guarantee of a 2nd year.
If he declines, maybe someone will be stupid enough to actually sign him, hooray for comp! If no one is willing to sign him, you can bring him back for relative pennies next spring when he has no other options.
The pitcher who keeps runners off bases is a lot more valuable than the one who loads them up, and somehow the runs don’t cross the plate.
John Grabow is the latter. The Pirates knew what they were doing when they traded him for Ascanio.