NLCS Game 4: Blanton, Bumgarner, Spitting Images
This preview contains a hard-hitting poll. Just, FYI.
Philadelphia at San Francisco | Game Four, NLCS | 7:57pm ET
Starting Pitchers
Phillies: Joe Blanton
175.2 IP, 6.87 K/9, 2.20 BB/9, .331 BABIP, 41.9% GB, 12.2% HR/FB, 4.06 xFIP, 1.9 WAR
Giants: Madison Bumgarner
111.0 IP, 6.97 K/9, 2.11 BB/9, .322 BABIP, 45.1% GB, 8.1% HR/FB, 4.03 xFIP, 2.0 WAR
Notes
While I typically attempt, at all costs, to avoid learning, it occurs to me that, looking at Blanton’s and Bumgarner’s season lines in relief, one is absolutely forced to comprehend the baleful effects of the Fly Ball on a pitcher’s fortunes. For, while Blanton struck out and walked batters at a rate almost identical to Bumgarner — and conceded fly balls on 38.7% of balls in play, versus Bumgarner’s rate of 38.0% — he ended the season with an ERA exactly 1.82 points higher than Bumgarner (4.82 versus 3.00).
Indeed, the only real difference between these pitchers — besides their handedness and respective waistlines — is what happened to the balls once they got in the air. For Bumgarner, about eight percent of them became home runs; Blanton conceded that many, plus half again.
To what do we owe this difference? Well, we can’t ignore the pitchers’ respective ballparks. Philadelphia’s Citizens Bank certainly has a reputation for allowing dongers, while the Giants’ home park is, anecdotally speaking, known as either average or slightly below in this regard. Still, per Dan Turkenkopf’s four-year weighted HR/FB park factors, Citizens Bank Park actually supresses homers, producing a park factor of 94. San Francisco’s AT&T Park, on the other hand, has a 95*.
*Note: numbers are for 2006-09.
Another thing to consider is the type of balls that are being hit in the air. For, while grounders are relatively easy to classify, the difference between a fly ball and line drive is slightly more mysterious. (As I’ve almost definitely mentioned in these pages, we members of Team FanGraphs who were lucky enough to attend spring training had endless hours of fun attempting to identify batted-ball types).
In fact, we do see that Bumgarner induced more grounders per batted-ball than Blanton. It follows, of course, that Blanton allowed more balls in the air. How many? Well, in his 175.2 IP, Blanton conceded 221 fly balls and 111 line drives, for a total of 332 balls in air (BIA), or approximately 17 for every nine innings. Bumgarner, on the other hand, allowed 135 flies and 60 line drives, for a total of 195 BIA, or 15.8 every nine innings.
Does that make things any different? Sort of, but not by much. Blanton, with his 27 homers-allowed, still allowed a home run on 8.1% of his BIA; for Bumgarner that number was only 5.6%.
Ultimately, we’re forced to concede that Blanton’s relative susceptibility to the home run is inexplicable. It could be the home park; it could be the types of batted-balls he’s allowing; it could be random variation. It’s very likely, all three things, plus some other factors beyond these that we (read: I, Carson Cistulli) are failing to consider.
The notable thing, so far as this game is concerned, is how similar these pitchers have performed and how different have been their results. Do we regard Bumgarner as “better” because he’s managed to suppress about five home runs that Blanton would’ve allowed in the same numbers of innings? Do we regard Blanton as “worse” because those same fly balls have left the park on his watch? Were you a manager, who would you rather have pitch for you tonight? From what we know, the answer should be “either,” but I don’t know if that’s the case.
How’s about we find out, huh? Below, reader, you’ll find a poll whose question essentially amounts to a Zen koan. Bring it.
Carson Cistulli has published a book of aphorisms called Spirited Ejaculations of a New Enthusiast.
Just a note: Bumgarner has given up 5 HRs in 45 innings at home, and only 6 in 66 innings on the road. So the AT&T advantage might not be as drastic for him as it seems
He also gave of 3 of those 5 HR’s in one terrible game against the Reds. You obviously can’t take those back, but his HR/IP at home is a little inflated from that game.
Carson,
Your link to the poll – assuming it is supposed to be a jump – is broken. The poll does not appear unless one manually opens the comments.
Noted. Currently efforting.
Do RHP and LHP have the same HR/FB rates throughout the league?
The other thing to consider of course, is the park factor split for L/R batters. ATT has a much higher damper effect of LHB HR than on RHB.
Doesn’t look like many people rate ‘postseason experience’ in their choice of who to start.
Blanton’s a horse, but Madison is usually able to get it done pretty efficiently. I think that right now, he’s at least as good as Blanton (every bit of analysis I’ve heard so far has put him at a significant advantage in this game), and considering his age, probably has the potential to be far better.
Nice write-up and good info.
One thing that you need to take into account is that MadBum is a different pitcher since the end of August. The velocity on his FB has finally come back close to where it was in the first 1.5 years of his minor league career. He now is consistently sitting in the 92.5-93 mph range, and touching 95. That makes all of his other pitches more effective too. His velo has been slowly coming back since Dick Tidrow had a few sessions with him in Fresno back in the middle of April. By MadBum’s own admission, he didn’t fully incorporate the tweaks, and feel truly comfortable with them, until the end of August. The velocity jump bears out his words, because one would expect that a young pitcher throwing by far the most innings of his career would start to get a “dead arm” in Sept. and lose velocity. MadBum did just the opposite, and has even taken it up a notch in his 1 start against Atlanta in the NLDS. It would be very informative, and more applicable IMHO, if you would run the same type of analysis just using MadBum’s starts in Spet. and Oct.
Joe Blanton, ont the other hand, has been basically the same pitcher for the last 2 years, although he ended the last 2 months of the season on a nice roll when compared to the first half of the season.
He was basically Cliff Lee in September: 32/4 K/BB rate in 32 IP.
Cliff Lee disguised as a manatee.
That’s Bumgarner’s line. Blanton in September had a 36/11 K/BB rate in 36.2 IP.
Blanton missed time at the beginning of the season with an oblique injury, and I think he came back still somewhat hurt. He’s been a much better pitcher in the second half.
Yeah, it really bears repeating that Bumgarner seems to have returned to the level that saw him rated as one of the best pitching prospects in the minors in 2008 and early 2009. He started in the Giants organization throwing in the mid-90s and racking up impressive K rates, but in 2009 he experienced a mysterious drop in velocity. His K rate went down in tandem.
There were reports that he was regaining some fastball velocity earlier in year, but when he came up in June his fastball was still sitting around 90 MPH. But the velocity has gradually increased since then, and he’s also continued to improve his secondary offerings. And these scouting observations are supported by the stats – he’s had and attendant increase in Ks, no increase in BBs, etc. I think it’s a good bet that Bumgarner will be better than Joe Blanton going forward – and Bumgarner’s true talent level may already be higher right now.
I’m impressed, very good article. I usually avoid your articles.
Necessary?
you avoid carson’s articles? he is far and away the best frequent contributor to this site
I’m confused. I’ll admit that I’m not good enough at math to understand the B-R formula at first glance, and not willing to sit down for a few hours to try to understand the B-R park factor analysis, but the ESPN numbers show that Citizens Bank has consistently been a HR-favorable park for the past 5 years. Their formula is significantly easier: ((Home HR scored + Home HR allowed) / Home Games) / ((Road HR Scored + Road HR allowed) / Road Games). Given that Philadelphia has been amongst the top 5 NL teams in HR total (3x they were no. 1) every one of those years, and that they would always see more AB on the road (considering all the bottom of the 9ths they didn’t bat at home, in games in which they had the league), the fact that they and their adversaries still hit relatively more HR at the bank would indicate that Citizens’ Bank is indeed a HR friendly park, unless other parks in the NL East are disproportionately difficult HR parks. I’m assuming that extra innings games would even out over a 5 year sample, and that pitchers with favorable HR/FB rates would pitch equal numbers of games at home and away over those 5 years.
Since the Phillies and their adversaries hit many more HR in the Bank than at other NL parks, wouldn’t this indicate that the Bank is in fact very HR-friendly? I don’t see how the complicated B-R formula could undercut this simple logic.
Assuming this is the case, it is very easy to explain why Blanton yields more HR than Bumgarner per fly-ball.
*league = lead. Always proofread.
So we’re completely ignoring the possibility that Bumgarner is capable of inducing more weak contact? What if he has a penchant for inducing infield pop flies? Are those to be treated the same as Blanton’s penchant for giving up lasers to the outfield?
“Ultimately, we’re forced to concede that Blanton’s relative susceptibility to the home run is inexplicable. It could be the home park; it could be the types of batted-balls he’s allowing; it could be random variation. It’s very likely, all three things, plus some other factors beyond these that we (read: I, Carson Cistulli) are failing to consider.”
I believe the ‘types of batted-balls’ argument Carson gives here covers your point?
Notice how similar their final lines were…
Please jump off a bridge for calling him “MadBum”