Mike Montgomery Did More Than Aroldis Chapman
The Cubs are the champions. There’s a rule about champions: the end justifies the means. There are no regrets, and, given a time machine, there’s nothing the team would want to undo, because every event, every decision led up to that final, most beautiful inning. A championship season is a delicate thing, and if you go back to adjust or remove one Jenga block, there’s no telling what causes a tower collapse. The Cubs won, so they’ll embrace how they came to win, for all of the good and all of the weird.
With that being said, we’ve seen something remarkable. *I* think it’s remarkable, anyway — your mileage might vary. Near the end of July, the Cubs made a low-profile trade, adding lefty Mike Montgomery from the Mariners. At the time, it looked like the Cubs might’ve gone for a cheap alternative to the premium-priced elites. A few days later, they paid said premium price for an elite, adding lefty Aroldis Chapman from the Yankees. The Chapman move was the more celebrated one, as all the championship dreams would go. With Chapman, the Cubs looked almost invulnerable. He could be the piece to put them over the top.
Yet in the end, Montgomery proved more valuable. By at least one measure, anyway. Chapman wasn’t what he was supposed to be. The Cubs won almost despite him.
For these purposes, I have only the playoffs in mind. Chapman, without question, was fantastic after he first arrived. Montgomery was fine, but Chapman recorded 16 saves. He allowed four runs and 12 hits over 28 regular-season games with Chicago. The Cubs got what they thought they were getting, but really, all that did was give them some extra confidence going into the playoffs. Because the Cubs were pretty much always going to win the division no matter what. Montgomery was acquired on July 20. Chapman was acquired on July 25. Here’s a plot of the Cubs’ chances of winning the NL Central:
At the time of the Montgomery trade, the Cubs were up 7.5 games on the Cardinals. At the time of the Chapman trade, the margin was identical. The Cubs were great, and they projected to be great. Even without any moves, the Cubs were going to win the division. Roster modifications were made essentially with October and October alone in mind.
So let’s just get to that. Win Probability Added — WPA — isn’t great for analysis, but it’s a lot of fun for hindsight. According to Baseball-Reference, Chapman had a playoff WPA of +0.31. Montgomery had a playoff WPA of +0.41. According to our own numbers we have here, the figures were +0.17 and +0.27, respectively. I don’t know why there are differences, but the gaps are the same. Overall, folding in the ups and the downs, Montgomery was on the mound for a better group of events. Chapman, obviously, is the better pitcher. He’s one of the best per-inning pitchers on the planet. He simply didn’t generate enough of those results. It’s one of the things that made these playoffs so bizarre.
Chapman was anything but bad. He had his heroic outings, like World Series Game 5, when he got the final eight outs. He had four pretty spotless saves, and in all he pitched 13 times. Even in Game 7, he recovered from a nightmare eighth inning to manage a 1-2-3 ninth. If the ninth had gone worse, the season would’ve gone worse. Yet the ninth sure tried to suck. And Chapman was on the mound for three memorable events in particular. I sorted all the Cubs pitching events by WPA. The third-most damaging event was Adrian Gonzalez‘s game-tying single off Chapman in NLCS Game 1. The second-most damaging event was Rajai Davis‘ game-tying homer off Chapman Wednesday night. The single-most damaging event was Conor Gillaspie’s go-ahead triple off Chapman in NLDS Game 3. Those were the three most harmful events by a sizable margin, and you wouldn’t think Chapman would allow any of them to happen.
In this plot, you see Chapman’s 13 appearances, and Montgomery’s 11 appearances, in descending order of WPA. Chapman’s record was a bit more extreme in both directions.
It’s not so much that Montgomery was a star. He was just fine, one of few Cubs relievers Joe Maddon could trust. It did end up being Montgomery who threw the final pitch of the Cubs’ championship season. This is more about Chapman getting saves in four of seven opportunities. During the season, he recorded saves in 36 of 39 opportunities. Three blown saves in each. Certain memories will be hard to forget.
So who cares? It’s a worthwhile question. The Cubs won anyway, and maybe without Chapman, the replacements would’ve done even worse. We all noticed that Maddon didn’t trust Hector Rondon or Pedro Strop. Perhaps Chapman’s very presence in the bullpen somehow allowed for the Cubs to win as often as they did. Again, no champion would want to change a thing. The Cubs are happy to have exchanged Gleyber Torres for an ahead-of-schedule trophy.
I think there are two considerations. One, there’s a lesson in here about midseason trades. The Indians would tell you they’re thrilled with the trade they made for Andrew Miller, and then some. Miller was a crucial part of what got them as far as they got. Yet trading for an elite reliever is no guarantee of anything, especially if you’re already sitting in a pretty regular-season position. The playoffs can be just that unpredictable. For Chapman, the Cubs gave up a top-30 prospect, and still more pieces. Arguably the more valuable reliever wound up being the one they got for Dan Vogelbach. Navigating the trade market is hard. It’s impossible to know what might actually be worthwhile.
The other consideration is a soft one. Chapman’s presence on the Cubs provoked, for so many fans, something of an ethical dilemma. I don’t know how many times I saw a Cubs fan saying they’d feel a little weird if it was Chapman on the mound celebrating the final out. Obviously not everybody felt the same way, and you are how you are, but this worked out well in the end for a significant part of the Cubs fan community. The championship was deservedly won, but Chapman wasn’t so vital to the effort. If anything, he tried his damnedest to lose. It could’ve played out in a more psychologically challenging way.
As it played out, the Cubs won, as they were supposed to. But they also didn’t win how they were supposed to. You’ll never get this game figured out. Nobody will. Even Theo Epstein and the Cubs don’t have it figured out. They just get to shrug the happiest shrugs.
Jeff made Lookout Landing a thing, but he does not still write there about the Mariners. He does write here, sometimes about the Mariners, but usually not.
Corrinne called it in her article on Montgomery. “It’s rare that a non-closing relief pitcher gets any glory, but, who knows, maybe Montgomery will be some version of this year’s surprise star.” it’s nice as well that the guy who got the final out for the team is definitely playing for the cubs next year
The Gonzalez single came with two outs after Chapman came in with the bases loaded and no outs. And he retired the next batter to end the inning. Obviously part of the alleged benefit of having Chapman is the idea that you could bring him in with the bases loaded and no outs and expect him to strike out the side, but as a Cubs fan I actually thought that was a “good” inning for him, given the situation he inherited. I didn’t have an “I can’t believe Chapman let that happen” reaction to that sequence.
Yeah, overall, that wasn’t so bad. And Chapman for that game wound up with a positive WPA! The real damage was done yesterday, and in the Gillaspie game.
I don’t know the numbers so maybe I’m way off. But I assumed at the time that, given the situation (3-1 score, no out, bases loaded, Seager-Puig-Gonzalez due up), holding the Dodgers to 2 runs was a better-than-average result. Of course, given Chapman’s talent and what the Cubs gave up to get him you’re entitled to expect something better than “better than average” when he comes into a game.
Edited to add: I was at Game 3 of the NLDS and I DID have an “I can’t believe Chapman let that happen” reaction to the Gillaspie triple and Crawford’s hit in the next at-bat.
Based on what we have, the run expectancy when Chapman entered was 2.3. Now, that doesn’t adjust for the hitters or for the pitcher. With someone as good as Chapman, I doubt 2.3 stands up, but of course the hitters were collectively better than average, too. In the end I’d say he got about what you’d think. It just happened in a weird order.
The RE24 of bases loaded with no outs is 2.292 runs – http://www.tangotiger.net/re24.html . I agree that it’s fair to bump that number up a bit because Seager, Puig, and Gonzalez are all better than league average hitters (though any LH pitcher would have a platoon advantage on 2 of the 3). So my interpretation of the numbers is that they support your view: Chapman got a “better than average” result.
Chapman also threw, what, 97 pitches in a span of 4 days? He didn’t put himself into game six for no discernible reason. That he was less than sharp in game seven is as much on Maddon as it is on Chapman.
I like the spirit of this article but cumulative WPA comparisons always feel like apples and oranges. Working in the later innings almost always gives opportunities for larger magnitude WPA events not to mention normalizing to batters faced. Would WPA above replacement make sense as a stat to compare players who have been deployed in different situations more readily?
In other words: what WPA would we have expected from a replacement level player put into the same spots Montgomery and Chapman were put in?
WPA is relative to average. Replacement pitching is basically a specified amount below average, by RC+ allowed. Leverage is a multiplier from RC+ to wins, and it’s going to apply to both pieces: the step from replacement to average, and the step from average to Montgomery.
So you could calculate the replacement-WPA, it would be negative, and it would be more negative in high-leverage situations. Using it as a baseline would help show an average pitchers value accumulated. But it wouldn’t help compare between different leveraged usages.
Thank you for the very thorough response. I guess what I am really getting at is reconciling whatever the cumulative WPA number accrued is vs. the range of possible outcomes: as it stands WPA feels like RBI and too context/opportunity driven to use for comparisons.
It’s striking that all three of Chapman’s postseason disasters came specifically in 8th innings while people were talking about how he isn’t comfortable varying his usual 9th-inning-closer routine.
Chapman also entered all of those games with at least one runner on base, which he reportedly doesn’t like doing either (and where he has a tendency to throw almost exclusively fastballs to the point of becoming overly predictable).
I wouldn’t call the Dodgers game a disaster for Chapman, though. He entered with the bases loaded and no outs, got two consecutive four pitch strikeouts, gave up a single to score 2 runs, and then got a groundout. That’s a good but not perfect job that wasn’t enough because he entered in a huge jam.
Great for Monty too. I drafted him in a prospect draft many years ago when he was a 1st round pick and he struggled mightily after that and his prospect stock plummeted. Wasted pick by me but good for him making a career for himself as a reliever and what a moment to finish a game 7 for the Cubs. FOX broadcasters saying he’ll be in their rotation next year, I don’t think it will work with his spotty fastball command, but he should be a very good reliever going forward.
Yes, it’s odd to say that Montgomery will be in the rotation next year when the Cubs already have 5 starters assuming that they pick up Hammel’s reasonably priced option ($10 million option that only has a net cost of $8 million compared to the $2 million buyout).
I’d expect Montgomery to start the year in a bullpen/swingman role because I’m pretty sure that the Cubs don’t have much in the way of high minors pitching prospects. Such prospects typically serve as starting pitching depth. The Cubs’ front office are clearly smart enough to know that teams often need to use 7-8 starting pitchers due to injuries. Going into 2016 they’d acquired Adam Warren to help with starting pitching depth, though he didn’t work out and ended up traded back to the Yankees as part of the Chapman deal. So I’d think that Montgomery starts 2017 as a swingman who can move into the rotation if required by injury.
It’s a failing of a lot of “mainstream” broadcasters/journalists that they imply that going into a season planning on using only 5 starting pitchers is a good plan. It’s a terrible plan, because just under 40% of starting pitchers end up on the disabled list each year with an average stint of about 65 days lost – http://www.fangraphs.com/blogs/starting-pitcher-disabled-list-analysis-1-of-3/
I hated the trade when it happened, and I still hate it now.
Which trade (Chapman or Montgomery), and hated it for whom (Yankees, Mariners, or Cubs)?
Gotta assume he’s a Cub fan who dislikes Chapman due to the domestic violence situation.
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1. Chapman did well just to throw strikes in the 9th inning. Many pitchers in that situation walk every batter until they get pulled.
2. Maddon (and other managers) seem to be unduly stuck to their game plan and unwilling to change it in response to in game results.
3. Maddon was also playing games with Chapman’s financial future. An overuse injury could have cost Chapman $50-100M on this year’s contract.
4. It is interesting to compare Cleveland’s 1-2-3 ninth with the 2 runs they somehow scored in the 5th.
I was blown away with Monty’s stuff when I started seeing him on a regular basis after his trade to the North Side. The only thing he’s lacking to become a middle-of-the-rotation SP is consistent fastball command, which Chris Bosio has been able to help some of the other previously-thought-to-be-unfixable projects currently contributing to the Cubs pitching staff. I think he goes into 2017 as the No. 6, and likely is in the rotation in 2018 and beyond.
But I also don’t think the Cubs win the WS without Chappy. Obviously, he had three BS in some huge moments, but he also had plenty of critical moments for a team that was only a break or two here and there from having any of their series go the other way. His 1-2-3 9th to end the NLDS is consistently overlooked, especially considering it was his fourth appearance in five days. He gave the club 8 HUUUUGE (albeit stressful) outs in G5, and pitched the gutsiest 9th inning in Cubs history in G7, when he appeared to resemble Wild Thing at the start of “Major League 2” when he had “forgotten how to throw heat.” Maddon didn’t trust Strop and Rondon throughout the playoffs, and they consistently showed why every time they came in. It appears the late-season injuries took their toll, because both were excellent throughout most of the regular season.
The only real decisions Theo has to make in the offseason are whether or not to trade Soler and how to reconstruct the bullpen that, without Chapman, would be missing that fearsome shutdown arm every team covets in the playoffs. If he doesn’t re-sign Chapman or sign Jansen, he’ll have to pay another steep price in prospects at the deadline again, something which I think he wants to avoid.
But, despite how some Cubs or MLB fans might remember his World Series performance, long after he’s gone the record books will still say that Aroldis Chapman was the winning pitcher of G7 of the World Series. I’ll remember him as the guy who had enough guts to fight through tears in order to retire the most dangerous hitters in the Indians lineup with far-less-than-his-best stuff in order to allow the team I’ve rooted for all my life to win its first World Series in 108 years.
He was also the guy who blew a 3-run lead in G7 of the World Series. And he would have blown a 4th save in G1 of the NLDS if the wind hadn’t blown down Posey’s double.
You know, John, my second emotion after the pure, unadulterated joy I felt after the Cubs eliminated the Giants in miracle fashion was that I hoped you were miserable. Justice for how you made FG posters feel all year. Convenient how you forgot about Ross’ deep fly earlier in the game that I also thought was gone but was held up by the wind. Or just the general change in strategy that accompanies such a huge change, rather than a cherry-picking of what happened followed by spiteful disdain.
I think using WPA+ to compare Chapman and Montgomery is inappropriate.
Chapman’s WPA was hit by his game 7 appearance which was the result of overuse.
If Montgomery was used like that, I doubt he fares nearly as well.