The Unluckiest April Pitchers

When discussing the early season productivity of a player it is important to remember that the barometric statistics analyzed by those on television often have better evaluative indicators beneath the surface. Many of these indicators deal with luck, or a lack of luck, and provide a more telling window into what should be expected from the player in the coming weeks and months. Dave Cameron wrote earlier today about Nick Johnson and how, based on his high percentage of line drives but low BABIP, Johnson has experienced an unlucky streak this month. Using a slightly expanded method to the ones currently used to determine luck (relative to GB/FB/LD and BABIP) I decided to figure out the unluckiest pitchers of the month.

Initially the method consisted solely of BABIP and the difference between FIP and ERA (FIP-ERA) but I then extended it to include their current W-L records. Though anyone at least casually versed in statistical analysis will explain the faults of a W-L record, fans that simply love the game without analyzing anything equate W-L records to quality.

A pre-requisite also found its way into the criteria in that the FIP could not be above 4.30, a cutoff I usually look for when determining the difference between good and average. This way players like CC Sabathia and Barry Zito could be avoided; players who, despite having large FIP and ERA discrepancies, still had very high FIP and ERA counts. In summation, the players I considered to be the unluckiest were those with high FIP and ERA discrepancies, a high BABIP against, and a W-L record that does not do a good job of representing the quality of games pitched. This left me with the following four candidates:

Nate Robertson: 6.91 ERA, 4.18 FIP, -2.73 FIP-ERA, .333 BABIP, 0-3 W-L
Nick Blackburn: 3.45 ERA, 2.72 FIP, -0.73 FIP-ERA, .347 BABIP, 1-1 W-L
Ian Snell: 4.45 ERA, 3.03 FIP, -1.42 FIP-ERA, .358 BABIP, 2-1 W-L
Zach Duke: 5.34 ERA, 3.97 FIP, -1.36 FIP-ERA, .369 BABIP, 0-2 W-L

So, of these guys, whom do you consider to be the unluckiest this month?