K-Town

I'm not "ignorant". I understand your statistics perfectly. I just don't care, actually. Not caring about pertinent statistics is pretty much the definition of ignorance, actually. I would have no problem saying that Carpenter deserved the Cy Young, if he actually did. I've been saying all year that I thought Pujols would deserve the MVP by the time the season ended, so you shouldnt act like I have some anti-Cardinal bias that is factoring into my decision. Nice Ninja Edit. If you want the Cy Young award to go to the "Pitcher who wins a bunch of games on a team that you root for", then it is a worthless award, and you should probably be circle jerking with fellow Cardinal fans somewhere else. Classy. I didn't invite you to this thread, and it has nothing to do with your team. If anybody should leave, it's you. I'm not convinced on Pujols yet, and you won't hear me tooting his horn much (so I'm not COMPLETELY biased). And it's not silly for me to be tooting Carpenter's horn for the Cy Young. It's a close race for the Cy Young, whether you want it to be or not.

I'm not "ignorant". I understand your statistics perfectly. I just don't care, actually, because that's not what the Cy Young Award represents, in my opinion. I've said that repeatedly.

Here we go with the "what if" game again......... You have no idea. If Clemens had the run support, he may be more aggressive, make more mistakes, and be able to go deeper into games. If Carpenter had less run support, he may be less aggressive, and not make as many mistakes. It's not as black & white as you want to pretend. Carpenter certainly has the ability to shut the opponent down better than Clemens does (as evident by the fact that he's pitched 4 of the top 5 games in the NL this year). He just hasn't needed to do that very often.

Yes, and if that were the case, K-Town would be arguing for Clemens because of his being a Cardinal, uh, no, I meant to say because of his win total. Although, both would likely be true. I make this observation based solely on the previous pages within this thread, and it is, of course, JMHO. Absolutely, and why shouldn't I? I wouldn't be much of a Cardinal fan if I didn't want my guy to win, would I? Based on the Cy Young precedence that's been set, Carpenter deserves the Cy Young Award this year. Like I said, I'm not sure why you all take it so personally........(some of you are downright testy about it), or why it's worth 20+ pages of effort from fans of a team who don't even have a horse in the race. I don't get it, unless it boils down the your hatred for the Cardinals, which is perfectly acceptable as long as you're willing to own that perspective, just as I own my Cardinal bias.

No more different than ignoring 8 or 10 wins that "didn't happen, but might have, if he had the run support".

I'm curious, why do Cubs' fans hate the Astros as much as they do the Cardinals? What's the history behind that?

Why should it? Cy Young wasn't the "best pitcher" of his time. Like I said, it's silly to ignore Carpenter's extra 30 innings that he'll pitch this year, but not ignore his horrible 3.1 innings back in April.

It's a joke, why? You honestly think that the Cy Young is a "no-brainer" this year? If that's true, then Cubs fans are the only ones in America that think that. cub fans and people who believe in legitimate statistical analysis beyond wins. Isn't it ironic that Cubs' fans don't believe in wins?? :lol: :wink: I think you may be stepping over the line toward trolling here. The wink doesn't change that. Why not start this debate at some other boards? Try http://www.orangewhoopass.com and see what they think. How about SOSH and see what they think? My guess is that those who value statistical analysis go with Clemens. Our argument has nothing to do with bias, yours however... :-k You're probably right, the comment was uncalled for. It wasn't meant in an offensive way, but this is probably the wrong forum for it. Apologies. Where does it say that the Cy Young is all about certain stats? Heck, Cy Young himself isn't, statistically, the best pitcher of all time..... probably not even the best of his era.

There's nothing wrong with it. What's wrong with making a case, based on history (it's not like I'm just making stuff up randomly), for a player on my favorite team to win the Cy Young Award?

It's a joke, why? You honestly think that the Cy Young is a "no-brainer" this year? If that's true, then Cubs fans are the only ones in America that think that. cub fans and people who believe in legitimate statistical analysis beyond wins. Isn't it ironic that Cubs' fans don't believe in wins?? :lol: :wink: isnt it ironic that i have a bigger ignore list now WINK Look, I'm not sure why you all take offense to a Cardinal fan arguing in favor or Chris Carpenter. You all seen to take it so personally, using words like "dense", "joke", etc. Relax a little. The truth of the matter is that Cubs' fans aren't going to find a way to give Carpenter the benefit of the doubt (you hate us, just admit it, and I don't blame you), and Cardinal fans aren't going to find a way to give Clemens the benefit of the doubt. The truth is probably somewhere in the middle. By most acounts, it's pretty much a dead heat right now. Pretending it's a "no-brainer" is just ignoring the obvious.

It's a joke, why? You honestly think that the Cy Young is a "no-brainer" this year? If that's true, then Cubs fans are the only ones in America that think that. cub fans and people who believe in legitimate statistical analysis beyond wins. Isn't it ironic that Cubs' fans don't believe in wins?? :lol: :wink:

It's a joke, why? You honestly think that the Cy Young is a "no-brainer" this year? If that's true, then Cubs fans are the only ones in America that think that.

It's probably not, but we'll see.

Maybe so, but why is that relevant? Chad Cordero has an equal margin over Roger Clemens. So Cordero is your man? And what to A.J. Burnett or Brian Moehler have to do with the conversation. It's amazing how you're all "right", and I'm wrong, and yet most of the voters are starting to lean toward Carpenter.

So technically, if Chad Cordero pitched more innings, his "accumulative stats" would put him ahead of Clemens, at some point? So you're punishing him because his manager chooses to not pitch him more innings? Accumulated stats don't take game conditions (pitching with a lead, etc.) into account. So even VORP can't tell us who the best pitcher in MLB is. Furthermore, the Cy Young Award doesn't necessarily have anything to do with "who is the best pitcher", as has been established. It's more about which pitcher has helped his team the most. That's Carpenter.

Who ever said that the Cy Young Award should go to the best pitcher? Where did you read that criteria? Because it's clearly not the criteria that's been established. There's also no Cy Young criteria that say that we should ignore relief pitchers. Like I said, you seem to be setting the criteria for the "Vance Award", not the Cy Young Award. Which is fine. You're more than welcome to establish your own award, but let's not confuse it with the stanard that has already been set for the Cy Young Award.

I'm "projecting", that's how I come up with 4 or 5 games, and not just 3. If you're going to ignore the extra 4 or 5 games, then ignore the 3.1 innings, and 8 earned runs, too. Otherwise, that ONE GAME is going to go a long way toward making up your mind, even though Carpenter will have pitched an extra 4 or 5 games. Suppose Carpenter had given up 16 runs in that one game (3.1 innings), rather than spreading them out over the rest of the year? His ERA for every start EXCEPT THAT ONE would be near what Clemens is doing, but since his overall numbers would be the same (because of the bad 3.1 innings) would still have you saying Clemens is "more than slightly better". Does VORP take into account how Carpenter may have pitched if he'd been locked in tight games all year, like Clemens has been? Does it take into consideration that Carpenter might have not been as aggressive with a 1-0 lead as he has been with a 4-1 lead? You and I both know that pitchers are likely to pitch differently in different situations.

When you're talking about averages (earned run "average"), then what difference does it make? In one regard, it's harder for Cordero to keep his ERA that low, because he's out there every other day, and one or two bad outings will send his ERA through the roof.

If that 20-30 innings would make up the statistical difference, I would as well. But, Clemens still has a higher VORP and pitching runs above avg. despite the drop in IP. So what? So you think it's as simple as giving the Cy Young Award to the guy with the best VORP every year? If it's that simple, then we won't be needing voters anymore. So you're willing to ignore the extra 4 or 5 games that Carpenter has pitched, but you won't ignore the 3.1 innings that didn't go so well back in April (we're talking about APRIL!!......... over the last 15 starts or so, Carpenter has actually been better than Clemens, I think).

Based on the criteria that's been set for winning the Cy Young Award (win alot of games, keep your ERA respectable), it wouldn't be a travesty at all. And once again, if you're going to be dazzled by ERA, then be dazzled by Chad Cordero's ERA, not Roger Clemens'. If you're going to give it to the guy with the spectacular ERA, then you've got to give it to Cordero. If you're not going to give it to him because he hasn't pitched the innings that Clemens has, then you have to take it away from Clemens and give it to Carpenter, because Carpenter has pitched more innings than both Clemens AND Cordero. You can't have it both ways. Or, you could just give it to Roger Clemens because he's Roger Clemens, which seems to be the criteria that you're using. There's a huge difference in a starter's ERA and that of a one inning closer. If you can't understand that, we really have nothing left to discuss. My guess is that you understand that completely well and just bring it up to try to derail the point that Clemens ERA for a starter is something that indicates one of the greater pitching performances of this half-century. The fact is, I don't find your arguments too compelling. Closers and starters are different animals. The fact that Carpenter has pitched more innings than Clemens isn't that big a deal to me. Clemens has pitched 184.1 IP over 27 starts or 6.8 innings per start. Carpenter has pitched 204 IP over 27 starts or 7.5 innings per start. Carpenter is pitching roughly an inning more per game than Clemens. On the other hand, Cordero has only pitched 66.1 IP, in 64 games so barely an inning per game. Not anything close to Clemens or Carpenter. It's an entirely different animal. So, yes I can discount what Cordero has done without immediately deferring to Carpenter. It's not a "double standard" as you imply. To me it is a double standard. It's not like relief pitchers haven't won the award before. So you're willing to discount the extra 20 or 30 innings extra that Carpenter will likely pitch this year, that Clemens isn't pitching? That's about 4 or 5 extra games that Carpenter will have pitched. You're willing to ignore that, but you won't ignore the 3.1 innings that Carpenter got shelled back in April??

And Chad Cordero would have more wins than both of them, "if" he had pitched the innings that Clemens is pitching.

The same reason Oswalt has been more successful than Clemens this year.......because those pitchers held the opponent to fewer runs than the opponent scored in those games. Now I have a question for you: If Clemens is getting 3.6 runs per game, but giving up 1.5 runs per game, then why is he winning fewer than half of his games? A quick perusal of the game log will answer some of that. In one game, the Astros scored 9 runs and another game they scored 14 runs. Those outbursts will have an effect over the averages. Also, looking over that game log reveals how many times Clemens lost a start when allowing one or even no runs while he was in the game. It's ridiculous. I'm no fan of Clemens, but what he has done this season has earned him the Cy Young and I won't fault him based on the fact that the offense wouldn't show up when he was pitching. What the bolded statement tells me, if I'm understanding you correctly, is that "averages" don't necessarily tell us the whole story. If that's the case, then an Earned Run "Average" doesn't tell us the whole story, either. Carpenter had a horrible outing in April. One game has "skewed" his ERA. Without that one outing, his ERA would be under 2. Should ONE bad game cost him the Cy Young Award? Based on the criteria that's been set for winning the Cy Young Award (win alot of games, keep your ERA respectable), it wouldn't be a travesty at all. And once again, if you're going to be dazzled by ERA, then be dazzled by Chad Cordero's ERA, not Roger Clemens'. If you're going to give it to the guy with the spectacular ERA, then you've got to give it to Cordero. If you're not going to give it to him because he hasn't pitched the innings that Clemens has, then you have to take it away from Clemens and give it to Carpenter, because Carpenter has pitched more innings than both Clemens AND Cordero. You can't have it both ways. Or, you could just give it to Roger Clemens because he's Roger Clemens, which seems to be the criteria that you're using.

The same reason Oswalt has been more successful than Clemens this year.......because those pitchers held the opponent to fewer runs than the opponent scored in those games. Now I have a question for you: If Clemens is getting 3.6 runs per game, but giving up 1.5 runs per game, then why is he winning fewer than half of his games?

peavy barely qualified for the ERA title, which explains why he wasn't in the voting. an ERA as low as clemens' in this era is unheard of since maddux and certainly makes him deserving of the cy young, considering his peripherals. "Barely qualified". What the heck does that mean, and what does it have to do with anything. If the voters are using terms like "barely qualified" when voting, then the award is a farce. You either qualify or you don't.

If you're going to play the "what if" game ("what if" Clemens had more run support), then you have to play it both ways. What if Carpenter had LESS run support. He may have thrown shutout after shutout, also. Pitching with a lead is completely different than pitching for your life. You tend to relax a little, maybe be a little more aggressive, and are prone to making a mistake here and there. We know what happened last year with the voting, but here's an even more glaring example of what the voters think the Cy Young should be about (which is what really matters, right?). 1996 Cy Young Voting: Kevin Brown: ERA 1.89 (17-11 record) - 2 first place votes John Schmoltz: ERA 2.94 (24-8 record) - 26 first place votes. You all can define the Cy Young criteria however you want to, but you're not the ones voting. As far as I'm concerned, a strong precedence has been set, and it clearly has very little to do with ERA.