Game 105 Thread / Marlins @ Cubs (4 of 4)
| SP | Rick VandenHurk | SP | Jason Marquis |
| 1-1, 6.10, 14 K, 8 BB, 10.1 IP | 6-6, 4.44, 56 K, 41 BB, 105.1 IP | ||
| SS | Hanley Ramirez | LF | Alfonso Soriano |
| RF | *Jeremy Hermida | SS | Ryan Theriot |
| 3B | Jorge Cantu | 1B | Derrek Lee |
| LF | Josh Willingham | 3B | Aramis Ramirez |
| 2B | Dan Uggla | CF | *Jim Edmonds |
| 1B | *Mike Jacobs | 2B | Mark DeRosa |
| CF | Cody Ross | RF | *Kosuke Fukudome |
| C | * John Baker | C | Henry Blanco |
| P | Rick VandenHurk | P | *Jason Marquis |
The Cubs need this game to preserve at least a tie for first place and to halve the four-game series. Marquis hasn't faced the Marlins this year, but was hit hard in each of his two starts against them last year. VandenHurk has never faced the Cubs, hasn't shown the ability to put up an ERA below six, and has as many major league innings pitched this year as Marquis has in his last one and a half starts. Fukudome bounces from eighth up to seventh.
In 9 PA Jeremy Hermida has a 1.083 OPS against Marquis. In as many PA, Ramirez has a 1.111 OPS against Marquis. Edmonds is the only Cub to have faced VandenHurk.
VandenHurk was born in Eindhoven, Netherlands. Its history dates back to its founding in 1232, is home of Philips light bulbs and Rik Smits.
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#1 Harden
Lou just told Ron Santo that Harden was pulled because his shoulder tightened up about the time he hit a batter.
#2 Re: Game 105 Thread / Marlins @ Cubs (4 of 4)
A Dunking Dutchman drop-in from Trans.
Exceptional.
#3 Re: Game 105 Thread / Marlins @ Cubs (4 of 4)
It has occured to me that the dip in the fortunes of our beloved residents of 1060 West Addison may have coincided with the cessation of re-caps.
Is there anyway we can get back to re-caps, both parachat and regular? I fear that the season hangs in the balance! Help us Cub Reporter re-cappers, you're our only hope!
#4 Re: Game 105 Thread / Marlins @ Cubs (4 of 4)
i forget who to give credit to, but the popular consensus (aka, 100% indisputable fact) is this is all the work of the Curse of Matt Murton.
FACT: the cubs have a losing record since trading murton
FACT: the cubs hitters are in a slump since trading murton
FACT: the cubs have not won a SINGLE playoff game since trading murton
FACT: matt murton is cooooooooool
i think this pretty much speaks for itself, and if you don't buy into it...to hell with ya.
#5 Re: FACT
Matt Murton must have cursed himself while he was at it. 3/30 (.100) since the trade, .186 .219 .229 .448 this season
#7 Re: FACT
it is a very powerful curse.
#24 Re: FACT
The Curse of Matt Murton was all my work. It is indisputable and all doubters are blasphemers.
#31 Re: FACT
Murton down, E-Pat up.
Not fun to be Matt right now.
#6 Re: Game 105 Thread / Marlins @ Cubs (4 of 4)
Is it too early in the second half to DFA Marquis?
#9 Re: Game 105 Thread / Marlins @ Cubs (4 of 4)
I less than 3 Mike Fontenot. And I might be falling in less than 3 with Jeff Samardzija, I'll get back to you on that one.
#14 Re: Game 105 Thread / Marlins @ Cubs (4 of 4)
Yea... because we should DFA a guy after one bad start.
#8 Have I mentioned...
Mike Fontenot is probably our best hitter right now.
Go Cubs!
#10 Re: Have I mentioned...
Is there a better kind of "scrap" than "clutch-scrap"?
Or a better kind of "clutch" than "scrap-clutch"?
If there is, I don't wanna hear about it.
#11 Re: Game 105 Thread / Marlins @ Cubs (4 of 4)
Well that one was never in doubt :) and I knew that the Astros would come back on the Brewers. Never in doubt.
Actually our weekend was better than the Brewers..how crazy is that? They lost a home series with a bad Astros team where we lost 2 very very close games to a good Marlins team.
I said it before I will be very satisfied with a split in Milwaukee. Hopefully the bats can come alive.
#12 Re: Game 105 Thread / Marlins @ Cubs (4 of 4)
Classic example of why starter wins are a good stat. Hot day at Wrigley with the wind blowing out and an umpire who won't call the bottom of the strike zone... unless a pitcher is batting.
At the end of the year the stat heads will say 'look at Marquis's run support', but pitching today was a lot harder than it was for Hardin yesterday.
#25 Re: Game 105 Thread / Marlins @ Cubs (4 of 4)
Because at the end of the year numbers average out. Marquis isn't pitching every game with the wind blowing out and a bad ump and our other pitchers pitch in those kind of environments also. Marquis pitched badly today, wind out or not. Besides, he didn't get the win anyway, so your point isn't even valid.
#27 Re: Game 105 Thread / Marlins @ Cubs (4 of 4)
Devil's advocate:
Wouldn't the 'end of the year numbers' averaging out actually be a good argument for wins? That all pitchers over the course of the year will see @ the same amount of good conditions and bad conditions. As well as high run support games and low run support games?
#29 Re: Game 105 Thread / Marlins @ Cubs (4 of 4)
Chad,
The reason that people don't like Wins for starters is that we know that pitchers get varying levels of run support, and to a lesser degree bullpen support, which both can be a major factor into getting a win, according to the 'wins are stupid' theory.
The thing is, that unless they play all games in domes and replace the homeplate umpire with Strikequest or whatever the hell it's called, all pitching conditions aren't equal.
#38 Re: Game 105 Thread / Marlins @ Cubs (4 of 4)
Because wins are flawed as a stat, they created another wonderfully flawed stat to make up for inconsistent run support called the Quality Start.
#28 Re: Game 105 Thread / Marlins @ Cubs (4 of 4)
Johann,
Why do end of year numbers average out? Do you have any proof of that? A couple years ago when Rob G was saying that Oswalt should have won the Cy Young, I looked at the starting umpires for all his and Webb's and one other guy's games and found that Oswalt's umps had an ERA about a quarter of a run lower than did the other two guys. That's not averaging out.
If you just think about it for a minute, why would you assume that 'pitching conditions' average out, when you know that run support doesn't? Intuitively it makes no sense, and if someone does a proper exhaustive study, I bet practically it makes no sense.
#30 Re: Game 105 Thread / Marlins @ Cubs (4 of 4)
Statistically, the term "average out" applies only as the sample size aproaches infinity. Since we are dealing with real life we make the cut-off somewhere below infinity. But the more samples we have the greater our confidence interval. Comparing one game below Oswalt and Webb would not show us much. A month of starts? A bit better. Most people would say over a season they could be compared reasonably well. Although perhaps we really need to look at 2-3 season swatches. The more data obviously the more confident we are in the comparison.
The counter to your ERA example above is that others would say umpire ERA is only a small part of the equation. Maybe Oswalt pitched more day games, had more starts on the road, had more starts against higher octane offenses, had more starts in hitter friendly ballparks, etc. While you were able to find a significant difference in one factor (umpire ERA) most would argue that all of the factors averaged out over a complete season.
Also, it's entirely possible that umpire ERA didn't really make a difference. If you don't think pitcher ERA has averaged out yet over a full season, it is entirely logical that umpire ERA hasn't either. Maybe the umps are exactly the same and umpired exactly the same in Oswalt and Webb's starts. It's just that those who umped Oswalt more experienced two more blowouts than the set of umpires who umped Webb and thus his umpire ERA went up .25 runs. Over a longer time span this would, in theory, average out and they would all experience just as many blowouts!
With regards to run support - it too will average out in the sense that a pitcher for one team is going to, on average over the long term, get the same amount of run support as other pitchers on his team. During single seasons some pitchers get lucky and others get screwed, but over time this averages out. Over a career you play for a lot of different teams and so this pretty much averages out too. The only way it wouldn't is if pitcher A pitches for high run scoring teams for almost his entire career and pitcher B pitches for low run scoring teams his entire career. But to matter you would also have to show that all of their other conditions were about the same, and even then the difference probably won't be too many wins, and other stats like ERA, etc. should be comparable between the two.
We realize that someone who played for the Yankees his entire career in the 1960s probably ended up with more winds that a similar pitcher throwing for the Cubs, so I don't think anyone thinks that wins average out for everyone.
#32 Re: Game 105 Thread / Marlins @ Cubs (4 of 4)
Well, there's a couple things here.
First of all, umpires call a lot more innings than pitchers pitch, so their sample size is a lot bigger (300+ innings), and consequently less prone to be influenced by other factors.
But my point really is that looking at run support for one starter on a team (like Lilly) versus another starter on the same team (Hardin) may vary widely during a given season, despite the fact that for the most part, over the course of the season the talent behind them is going to be equal.
Conventional sabermatic analysis says 'well, the reason that this starter got a lot of wins and this starter didn't is because the first starter got more run support, even though he pitched less effectively." But I will bet good money, if you dig into it, and look at the scoring conditions (Wind strength and direction, temperature and humidity and home plate umpire), you'd find that a large part of that discrepancy will be explained. Yes, there will still be some luck in there, but will there be the sometimes wild variances we see by just looking at RS/9 (like 100% variance), probably not.
When you get down to it, the Win essentially says 'Was this starter more effective than his opponent, on a given day?' Which, last I checked, is the starter's job.
#33 Re: Game 105 Thread / Marlins @ Cubs (4 of 4)
I guess I would disagree somewhat with your last point. If a pitcher goes 20-0 on a season, but had a 6.50 ERA and won every game 10-9 and only threw 5 innings a start we need to know that. Sure, he did his "job" each and every game, but the probability that he continues to get 10 runs of support a game is statistically low (in fact my example is statistically improbable). He is also hurting the bullpen by only going 5 innings. Even though he wins his games, over the long run, you would not be well off with him in your rotation. That is obvious I think.
I personally don't think you'd be right, but I would think you would make some good money if you could prove that some combination of wind/temperature/umpire explains more of the variation in wins between like-pitchers than run support does.
#35 Re: Game 105 Thread / Marlins @ Cubs (4 of 4)
What I am saying is that run support and ERA are influenced by the pitching conditions.
If you don't want to use Marquis as an example, take the 2007 version of Carlos Zambrano.
He set a career high in ERA, HRs and Wins. So even though he gave up more runs per start than he had previously, he also received more runs per start. That seems like a strange coincidince. And intuitively, if he had to pitch a greater than normal share of days at Wrigley with the wind blowing out, and with stingy umpires, (or in Citiziens or Coors etc) you would expect two things to happen.
1. His ERA would go up
2. His RS would go up
And his winning % would be relatively unaffected. And that's what we saw. Now it could be a coincidence that he just happened to have his worst year, at the same time his teammates threw the majority of RS luck his way, but I'll take logic over hoping for coincidence seven times a week and twice on Tuesday, as they say.
#39 Re: Game 105 Thread / Marlins @ Cubs (4 of 4)
So basically, if I understand this correctly, you believe that "pitching conditions" are actually the underlying explanationa behind everything. Run support is just an intervening variable that we look at to explain wins, but really conditions explain run support. Run support, in essence, is just a manifestation of the conditions a pitcher pitches in. That is interesting, but you can't really prove it.
Zambrano's 2007 season is a good case in point. His Run Support was high because in the majority of the games he won the Cubs scored a ton of runs. But in those games he pitched well and would have won low scoring games regardless of run support: 10-1, 8-1, 5-1, 6-2, 6-0, 12-1, 6-0, 5-1, 8-0, 6-0, for example. His ERA, HR, etc. went up because his losses were really bad. 5, 6, 5, 7, 6, 7, 6, 5, 8 earned runs, for example.
If pitching conditions explained things we would expect the Cubs to have scored a lot of runs in those games and the opposition to have scored a lot of runs in the wins. But that didn't happen. Zambrano only won TWO games with more than 2 earned runs (3 and 4). He dominated and the Cubs offense rocked the opponent, or the sucked and the Cubs offense was dormant. Pitching conditions wouldn't explain that, nor would run support for that matter.
But run support did matter in one way. Z has about the same number of dominating starts every year that he should win. In the past the Cubs have blown 2-4 of them by getting shutout or low-runned themselves. Last year they won virtually all of those great starts of his, making the differene between 16 and 18 wins. It's not surprising that Z would have a few more wins last year than in 2006, for instance: the Cubs offense and team in general was a lot better and won more games in 2007.
#67 Re: Game 105 Thread / Marlins @ Cubs (4 of 4)
If we're talking about the difference between 15 and 18 wins, the first 10 wins are irrelevant.
Even in some of the games where the Cubs dominated 10-1 versus the Mets, you can see Zambrano wasn't that good, just lucky, unless you think 3 BB's and 3 K's and a HR with a 1:1 GO/FO ratio is good pitching. He actually got out DIPS'd by his opponent that day, a pretty good pitcher himself in Maine.
Even in your example you've got him in games where he won because of run support (5-1), where he could have lost if he had one of his 'bad games' (6 or 7 runs). If you say 8 runs would be a guaranteed win, he only have 4 of those in your list.
On May 4th he won 6-4 versus the nationals. Not a really good hitting team. His next start he lost to the Pirates, also a bad hitting team by the same score. He lost to the white sox 6-10 on May 20th. Three out of 4 starts exhibit the phenomena I am describing. A good pitcher, most likely pitching on days that favor hitters, and gives up more runs than you would expect, but wins 2 out of 3.
I never said or even implied '"pitching conditions" are actually the underlying explanationa behind everything." What I am saying is that taking them out of consideration, is willfully ignorant.
Can you give a good reason why 'pitching conditions' even out over the course of a year, but there can be a 100% variance in one starter's run support over another?
Seems I've been asking that question for four posts now, and no one has answered.
#72 Re: Game 105 Thread / Marlins @ Cubs (4 of 4)
I'm not even sure exatly what you are arguing at this point. In Zambrano's 10-1 win he pitched 8 innings and gave up 6 hits and 3 walks and 1 earned run. If you believe this is not good pitching I'm not sure what I can really add to this discussion.
Also, in your example he LOST 2 of 3, not won them. We would expect him to lose the 7 ER game, and we would probably expect him to win 1 and lose 1 of the 4 ER run games. Basically, nothing surprising.
As to your question. First, variance is not measured as a percentage, which could be part of the confusion. I've avoided addressing it because I don't really know what you mean by it. But I don't think anyone, at least not I, ever said that certain factors average out over the year and others do not. In fact, above I spent a great deal of time talking about how all statistics even out as we move towards infinity. The larger the sample, the better. Is it possible that someone could have pitched in shitty conditions all year and another in great conditions? Yes of course. Is it possible that someone could have great run support during the year and another pitcher has terrible run support? Sure. Definitely. Over time both run support and pitching conditions should average out though.
But I don't think statisticians ignore this. There is a ballpark factor that I know for sure gets used quite a bit in their models. Pitching at Coors is not the same as at Petco. But you would really have to demonstrate that other conditions matter before they become utilized regularly. Pitchers all pitch similar amounts of games in each month of the year, so we assume, roughly, that we don't need to control for how many starts are made under X degrees or something like that. There also is no real strong evidence that temperature is a huge factor on pitching statistics. Wind might matter but we assume that controlling for ballpark captures this for the most part. Also, wind changes throughout the game so it would be hard to code. Would you measure each at-bat? This is a lot of work for something, again, we don't think matters that much in the scheme of things. I have not seen much data on umpire ERA, and that might matter. But again, we assume over time you get the same umpires as other pitchers.
The big thing is that if you include every possible variable in the model you can, theoretically, explain everything. But we can't add everything in. So we pick a few that we know matter quite a bit. There is a consensus that run support matters, so it is often used and talked about. It is certainly possible though that a "pitching conditions" with some combination of things you talked about could also be useful.
#73 Re: Game 105 Thread / Marlins @ Cubs (4 of 4)
aaron sele approves of this thread.
#13 Re: Game 105 Thread / Marlins @ Cubs (4 of 4)
Just wondering if the Cubs should bring up some pitchers (or P coaches) from the Peoria Chiefs. Now there's killer instinct.
I know ARam was ducking out of the way when he was plunkt in the head, and it was a soft pitch relatively speaking...but then Jason serves up a juicy one to Uggla so the Merlins take the lead. Something Drysdale and Gibson kinda wrong here. SOMEBODY has to make Marquis fight for his job. Jeff S, mebee?
All things considered, a win is a win. Go Cubs!
#16 Re: Game 105 Thread / Marlins @ Cubs (4 of 4)
Huh?
The Cubs should have retaliated after A-Ram got hit by a breaking ball?
No thanks.
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