Best lefty off all time? My vote is Koufax!

[BobC]

Originally Posted by Ricky

Hornsby at second?

Regarding Koufax and Spahn, I don’t think it’s a case where Spahn is ancient and that’s why Koufax supporters denigrate him. They obviously overlapped. It’s that Koufax dominated and Spahn never did.

Depends on your definition of dominance though. Some may feel that having a winning record for as many years as Spahn did, leading his league in wins in 8 years (5 years in a row at one point), and having the most wins of any lefty all time (#6 all time overall), is a pretty dominant pitcher. Despite what many would say. And this with losing three prime years to WW II. Plus, he stayed around about 4 years too long, going 20-45 ove that time with an ERA in excess of 4.00. Just think if he somehow got the three early years back, and retired when he should have. Likely 400 wins (#3 all time overall), win Pct. well over .600, and an ERA under 3.00. He still won't get a lot of love though.

[Carter08]

Originally Posted by BobC

Depends on your definition of dominance though. Some may feel that having a winning record for as many years as Spahn did, leading his league in wins in 8 years (5 years in a row at one point), and having the most wins of any lefty all time (#6 all time overall), is a pretty dominant pitcher. Despite what many would say. And this with losing three prime years to WW II. Plus, he stayed around about 4 years too long, going 20-45 ove that time with an ERA in excess of 4.00. Just think if he somehow got the three early years back, and retired when he should have. Likely 400 wins (#3 all time overall), win Pct. well over .600, and an ERA under 3.00. He still won't get a lot of love though.

Wins in baseball don’t matter. I’ve “learned” that.

[Snowman]

Originally Posted by Carter08

Wins in baseball don’t matter. I’ve “learned” that.

Wins in baseball is everything. Wins as a statistic attributed to a pitcher don't matter. There's a difference.

When I'm building a statistical model, I always use wins as the target variable. I want to know which team is most likely to win the game and what their odds of winning are. But far, the most important factor in that model is who the starting pitchers are. I can throw 100+ variables at the model and the mathematics will determine which of them are important. But it turns out that if you want to predict wins, you should actually look at other statistics besides "wins" attributed to a pitcher, because they are simply irrelevant in the presence of other variables like SIERA, K/BB, xFIP, velocity, WHIP, or even ERA. Knowing a pitcher's win/loss record literally adds zero information mathematically speaking. It is a nothing burger that only serves as a surrogate for things outside of one's control. I can't imagine a noisier statistic to look at.

[Lorewalker]

Originally Posted by Snowman

Wins in baseball is everything. Wins as a statistic attributed to a pitcher don't matter. There's a difference.

When I'm building a statistical model, I always use wins as the target variable. I want to know which team is most likely to win the game and what their odds of winning are. But far, the most important factor in that model is who the starting pitchers are. I can throw 100+ variables at the model and the mathematics will determine which of them are important. But it turns out that if you want to predict wins, you should actually look at other statistics besides "wins" attributed to a pitcher, because they are simply irrelevant in the presence of other variables like SIERA, K/BB, xFIP, velocity, WHIP, or even ERA. Knowing a pitcher's win/loss record literally adds zero information mathematically speaking. It is a nothing burger that only serves as a surrogate for things outside of one's control. I can't imagine a noisier statistic to look at.

Gosh it sounds like we should just abolish that silly W-L stat then entirely. You heard it here first.

[BobC]

Originally Posted by Carter08

Wins in baseball don’t matter. I’ve “learned” that.

LOL

Yeah, tell that to the fans that watch.

This idea seems to come, at least partially, from starting pitchers almost never throwing complete games anymore. And as these bigger, taller, harder throwing modern pitchers become more the norm, they all seem to be throwing fewer and fewer innings. Their reduced impact on the outcome of a game does make sense though the earlier they leave the game. But that's another modern bias. You go back to older pitchers like Grove and Spahn who mostly pitched complete or near complete games throughout their careers, and not only did they win lots of games, but they were way more responsible for those wins than modern starting pitchers who only seem to go 5 or 6 innings in their starts all the time anymore. So for modern pitchers the wins are less meaningful. But why disparage Grove or Spahn who completed games, if anything, they should be getting some extra credit for seeing games through till the end to better ensure their teams win. Doesn't fit with statistician's narratives of what they think counts and shows their lean towards modern pitchers.

[Peter_Spaeth]

Originally Posted by BobC

LOL

Yeah, tell that to the fans that watch.

This idea seems to come, at least partially, from starting pitchers almost never throwing complete games anymore. And as these bigger, taller, harder throwing modern pitchers become more the norm, they all seem to be throwing fewer and fewer innings. Their reduced impact on the outcome of a game does make sense though the earlier they leave the game. But that's another modern bias. You go back to older pitchers like Grove and Spahn who mostly pitched complete or near complete games throughout their careers, and not only did they win lots of games, but they were way more responsible for those wins than modern starting pitchers who only seem to go 5 or 6 innings in their starts all the time anymore. So for modern pitchers the wins are less meaningful. But why disparage Grove or Spahn who completed games, if anything, they should be getting some extra credit for seeing games through till the end to better ensure their teams win. Doesn't fit with statistician's narratives of what they think counts and shows their lean towards modern pitchers.

These specimens also seem to be injured a lot more, although that's an anecdotal observation on my part. There are times it seems the great DeGrom can't go three starts without hurting himself?

[G1911]

Ignoring until after age 25, Spahn was far, far, far more valuable to his team than Koufax was. Every prominent baseball statistician recognizes this in their rankings. Koufax didn’t even pitch 1,500 innings after his age 25 season. Showing up is a key part. While Koufax was sitting on his ass, Spahn was producing effective innings.

[BobC]

Originally Posted by G1911

Ignoring until after age 25, Spahn was far, far, far more valuable to his team than Koufax was. Every prominent baseball statistician recognizes this in their rankings. Koufax didn’t even pitch 1,500 innings after his age 25 season. Showing up is a key part. While Koufax was sitting on his ass, Spahn was producing effective innings.

+ 1,000

As I've quoted the old axiom multiple times now - The greatest ability is availability!

[BobC]

Originally Posted by Peter_Spaeth

These specimens also seem to be injured a lot more, although that's an anecdotal observation on my part. There are times it seems the great DeGrom can't go three starts without hurting himself?

See, you get what I'm trying to say in thinking of pitchers as more like machines, and how even though the taller pitcher has a physical advantage, when he starts to get over a certain height that pitching ability actually drops quickly it seems. And along with pitching velocity, there may be a breakdown and more wear on a taller pitcher's biomechanical machine/body the longer and harder they continue to throw. That was what I was referring to when talking about a sweet spot/range in size and height for a pitcher to maybe still throw at a fairly high velocity, but also be able to pitch for a longer, extended period without suffering injuries or the inability to continue pitching at such a high level for very long. I get it that the height of the average MLB pitcher has slowly been going up a few inches the last few decades, but is that because the bigger, faster, stronger = better argument is really true, or is it maybe more from the fewer and fewer innings starters seem to be pitching anymore, so they don't injure/wear out their arms. These modernists talk about what an old time picther couldn't do if they transported him to the game today. Maybe they also should start asking what a modern pitcher couldn't do if they transported him back to a time when pitchers were supposed to complete their games. I can already picture these old time players fouling off pitches and running up pitch counts on them once they figure out some fireballer from the future seems to tire out a lot faster than pitchers they're used to facing.

Shoot, now there I go thinking about that human element again, instead of just trusting everything my friends the statisticians have told me because they are so smart and know so much more about everything. Oh foolish me, how could I ever doubt them?

[Snowman]

Originally Posted by BobC

Depends on your definition of dominance though. Some may feel that having a winning record for as many years as Spahn did, leading his league in wins in 8 years (5 years in a row at one point), and having the most wins of any lefty all time (#6 all time overall), is a pretty dominant pitcher. Despite what many would say. And this with losing three prime years to WW II. Plus, he stayed around about 4 years too long, going 20-45 ove that time with an ERA in excess of 4.00. Just think if he somehow got the three early years back, and retired when he should have. Likely 400 wins (#3 all time overall), win Pct. well over .600, and an ERA under 3.00. He still won't get a lot of love though.

Here you go again with "wins" attributed to a pitcher. Lol

(facepalm)

[Peter_Spaeth]

Hypothetical.

As a rookie, a guy next year sets records or is close in every meaningful modern metric. It's universally acclaimed as the greatest pitching season ever. He then quits baseball or dies. Is he the best pitcher ever?

[G1911]

Originally Posted by Peter_Spaeth

Hypothetical.

As a rookie, a guy next year sets records or is close in every meaningful modern metric. It's universally acclaimed as the greatest pitching season ever. He then quits baseball or dies. Is he the best pitcher ever?

Only if one today thinks Ferdie Schupp is the best lefty

[Carter08]

Serious thought on wins. I get the argument against but isn’t it defeated if there’s a pitcher out there who said I could absolutely fan guys and dominate for 6 innings but my bullpen needs help, my team behind me is pretty strong, so I’m going to go 9 innings and give up maybe 3 runs and still win. That’s the pitcher I would want.

[Snowman]

Originally Posted by Peter_Spaeth

Hypothetical.

As a rookie, a guy next year sets records or is close in every meaningful modern metric. It's universally acclaimed as the greatest pitching season ever. He then quits baseball or dies. Is he the best pitcher ever?

He might be, but we wouldn't have enough data to say that with confidence. We'd probably want something like 600-800 innings worth of work for variance to even out. And even then, someone could still have gotten lucky over that sample size, it's just significantly less likely.

[Peter_Spaeth]

Originally Posted by Snowman

He might be, but we wouldn't have enough data to say that with confidence. We'd probably want something like 600-800 innings worth of work for variance to even out. And even then, someone could still have gotten lucky over that sample size, it's just significantly less likely.

So if in my hypothetical the guy puts together two more similar seasons, then quits or dies, you would say he's the greatest ever?

[Snowman]

Originally Posted by Peter_Spaeth

So if in my hypothetical the guy puts together two more similar seasons, then quits or dies, you would say he's the greatest ever?

If someone strings together the 4 greatest years in history then dies in a plane crash, then I think they're at least worth considering. It depends on how much better they were than everyone else though too. If some kid shows up next year and throws 225 innings with a 0.71 ERA, a 0.51 WHIP with 16 K/9, all while maintaining a league average BABIP, and then repeats it for 2 more years before hanging up the cleats to join the Navy Seals, then I'd have no problem saying he is the best pitcher of all time, despite only giving us 675 innings of greatness.

[G1911]

I very much admire the Socratic, and generally adopt the view that I might think a lot but don't really know a whole lot. One thing I know is that Sandy Koufax absolutely did not string together the best 4 pitching years in history.

No prominent baseball statistician has reached this conclusion, and the cumulative advanced metrics do not support it either. By the appeal to authority, prominent baseball statisticians outrank anyone else for baseball stats. Via the appeal to authority, this argument for Koufax thus fails.

See why these kinds of arguments are not good ones to make?