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As an astute participant in the ever-so-popular game of fantasy baseball, I tend to pay a lot of attention to players’ statistics and how well they correlate to their overall contributions to their teams. In my opinion (and the opinion of many other “stathead” baseball fans and analysts), the traditional fantasy categories are not very accurate indicators of a player’s overall value to his team. I have already alluded to my dissatisfaction with the use of Wins as an important pitcher category in a previous post about Roger Clemens. Today I’d like to talk about a category that is an even worse metric for a pitcher’s overall value: the save. Because there are so many arguments that can be presented against using saves as a pitching statistic, I’m going to present my case in a multi-part series. (Disclaimer: the number of parts in this series is thus far an undetermined amount and could range anywhere from 1 to a lot more than 1)

First, let us consider the official definition of a save taken from a sports encylopedia:

A save is credited to a pitcher who fulfills the following three conditions:

1. The pitcher is the last pitcher in a game won by his team;
2. The pitcher is not the winning pitcher (for instance, if a starting pitcher throws a complete game win);
3. The pitcher fulfills at least one of the following three conditions:
   1. He comes into the game with a lead of no more than three runs, and pitches the remainder of the game, gaining at least one out.
   2. He comes into the game with the potential tying run being either on base, at bat, or on deck. In other words, the potential tying run is either already on base or is one of the first two batters he faces.
   3. He pitches at least three “effective” innings (this is the only subjective criterion and is judged by the official scorer).

In the first part of this series, I’m going to stay away from some of the statistical arguments and outline the perhaps “common-sense” reasons why saves and the concept of a closer is a misguided tool in measuring pitching performance. The first thing that should be easy to notice from the above definition is that not all saves are created equal. The most obvious and most common save oppurtunities are those in which the pitcher enters the game in the 9th inning with a 1, 2, or 3 run lead. Clearly it is easier to hold a 3 run lead than it is to hold a 1 run lead. However, in both cases, the pitcher receives a save that for statistical purposes, is the same size and shape. Even more difficult saves than your standard 1 run lead, 9th inning save is a situation where a pitcher must enter in the 8th inning with a 1 run lead and runners on base. Still, if the save is converted it’s worth the same as that 3 run lead breeze through the 9th.

Perhaps the greatest atrocity to the save rule, though, is the final condition mentioned in the above definition. Consider the following two situations:

1. A pitcher enters a game at the start of the 7th inning. The game has gotten out of hand and his team has already compiled a 13-0 lead. The pitcher proceeds to give up 6 runs in the final three innings of the game and his team wins 13-6
2. A pitcher enters a game with one out in the 8th inning with the bases loaded. His team is leading 4-3. He induces a double play ball and then pitches a 1-2-3 9th inning to complete the 4-3 victory.

Guess what. Both pitchers earn a save even though the performance by the first pitcher is significantly short of stellar. This is the problem with the save rule. It is a superficial statistic that is completely dependent on game conditions and not all “save situations” are equal. The result is a statistical category that has very little meaning in terms of a pitcher’s overall value (it is true that there is some merit in saves but the correlation between saves and talent is not strong). However, it is still used as a primary category when evaluating relief pitchers and negotiating contracts.

The final point that I want to mention is that basically all teams have a designated “closer” who comes in whenever there is a save situation. Usually the closer is the most talented relief pitcher on the staff. However, the problem with using your greatest talent in this way is that most save situations are not the must crucial situations in the game, and usually there are higher stakes circumstances that occur during a game that a lesser talented “set-up” man is used for. Because of this, you can argue that the closer role is the least valuable role on the entire team. In the next part of this series, I’m going to bring statistical merit to this statement using probably one of the most interesting statistics I’ve seen: Win Probability Added or WPA. Stay tuned.

This entry was posted on Wednesday, August 17th, 2005 at 4:36 pm and is filed under Baseball, Series: Closers. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.