Against Wins (the Stat)

[gregmag]

Does anyone else think pitcher wins have become a terminally stupid stat?

 

In the era when starters were supposed to go 7-9 innings and bullpens were afterthoughts, wins had the big problem of depending on run support.  But for most pitchers, run support came out in the wash, so you could be pretty sure a 20-game winner was a very good to great pitcher.  Bad things like Bob Welch's 1990 Cy Young happened, but the problem was limited.  (As Bill James pointed out, wins as a *career* stat in that era actually had great value.  If you wanted to rank the greatest pitchers of the 20th century, you could do a lot worse than taking all the 150-game winners and ranking them by wins per season and/or W/L percentage, adjusting for longevity if that's your jam.)

 

The wins stat still has the run support problem, but in our era of heavy bullpen usage, much bigger problems have come up.  The vulture scenario that happened with Ashby last night was one obvious example -- totally absurd.  But what about the starter who pitches 4 2/3 shutout innings while his team stakes him to a 6-0 lead, then watches a reliever come in for four innings, give up four runs, and get the win?  What are we even doing at that point?

 

I see three possible fixes: (1) get rid of wins and losses as stats entirely; (2) change the rules for what constitutes a win or loss to account for present norms; (3) expand official scorer discretion to award wins and losses and relax the norms that guide scorers' judgment in those situations (including the five-inning starter requirement).

 

Of course, none of this will happen.  Still, what do you think?

[JCREW]

I would love to leave it up to official scorers. 

That would probably drive the gambling/fantasy community crazy though. 

In last night's (6/16) game, Gasser should have gotten the W. Some shenanigans happened after he left the game. That takes nothing away from his great performance. 

[Turning2]

There are a lot of speculative measurements called metrics these days. But the younger generation thinks they're all that. The game has changed from a managerial perspective pressured by the economics of today's MLB. Yes, W's aren't as meaningful as they once were for a starting pitcher. 

[owbc]

I prefer a combination of options (1) and (2)

The easiest criteria to expand would be that if you are eligible for the win when you leave the game (5+ IP) then you get the win if your team wins the game, regardless of what happens in the later innings. 

For relievers I would be open to just dropping wins and losses entirely. Reliever wins are pointless and the blown save does a decent job of covering losses.