Ender

Baseballprospectus just posted their valuations of the contenders rotations. The Brewers ranked #7, the Cubs #10. They used qERA as their stat of choice which ignores defense by keying in on K's, BB's and GB%. The truth is going to obviously be somewhere between ERA and qERA but an outside source does seem to agree with me that the differences aren't all that big overall. The biggest difference is the Brewers bullpen has been just horrible with inherited runners and the Brewers defense is terrible. Both problems that are going to last the rest of the year most likely and will likely be why the Brewers don't make the playoffs, so its kind of nitpicking. It just always rubs me wrong when people point at the starters as the problem when the bigger problems are out of their control. Article is linked below though its premium. http://www.baseballprospectus.com/article.php?articleid=6662

Laugh all you want but at least I have some sort of statistical proof to back up my opinion instead of just looking at ERA and saying see here is my proof. I cannot believe in this day and age there are still people who judge pitching this way. Thats not to say the Brewers have an amazing starting rotation. Sheets is an Ace, Gallardo is eventually a #1 or #2 most likely but Bush, Suppan, Capuano and Vargas are all #4/#5 starters. But the majority of the problems with the team's pitching this year compared to their 3 year averages is just how terrible the fielding is. So ERA isn't a statistic? What is so horrible about ERA, but so great about choosing a statistic which just ignores hits given up, and assumes that hits is a stat that the defense is entirely responsible for(which is a pretty simplistic view)? ERA doesn't correlate from season to season, it has an extreme amount of noise in it. Look at Joe Blanton in 2005 and 2006, he pitched better in 2006 and had an ERA that was way higher. ERA is a combination of luck, how well you pitched, your home park, your bullpen and the defense behind you. The stats I pointed are mostly just controlled by the pitcher and show much stronger year to year correlation. Even if you don't buy into something like BABIP the fielding metrics fully support the opinion. Teams with very good plus/minus universally have better ERA's than FIP's. Those with very bad plus/minus universally have worse ERA's than FIP's. There is a very real correlation between fielding and ERA and that is pretty much out of the pitchers hands. Capuano is a great example of a pitcher whose ERA doesn't really correspond with how he has pitched. 67% of his ground balls have been fielded for outs; the major league average is 75% so he obviously is giving up a lot more singles than he should. His bullpen has given up 3.904 runs more than expected on him. Compare his 2005 to his 2007 and he's actually pitched better overall but in 2005 he had a 3.99 ERA! Thats not to say he's a 3.99 ERA pitcher, he was extremely lucky in 2005 and has been unlucky in 2007, his true ERA level is probably around a 4.60 or so both seasons. 2006 is the only good year in his career and that was driven by a big reduction in walks. Every single stat except ERA disagrees with you and even if you are going to judge just by ERA they are roughly league average, not terrible. Anyway its not worth it, since anything I say will be chalked up to me being a Brewer fan. If you want to have a really honest discussion about how to evaluate pitching we can do that, but I don't think that is where this thread is really going.

Laugh all you want but at least I have some sort of statistical proof to back up my opinion instead of just looking at ERA and saying see here is my proof. I cannot believe in this day and age there are still people who judge pitching this way. Thats not to say the Brewers have an amazing starting rotation. Sheets is an Ace, Gallardo is eventually a #1 or #2 most likely but Bush, Suppan, Capuano and Vargas are all #4/#5 starters. But the majority of the problems with the team's pitching this year compared to their 3 year averages is just how terrible the fielding is.

Got any proof at all to back that up? Every fielding metric in the game points at the Brewers as having one of the worst defensive ball clubs in baseball. Every pitching stat that corresponds from year to year shows the Brewers pitching itself is as good as the Cubs. The plus/minus system lists the Cubs as +54 and the Brewers as -40 which means as many as 94 extra plays have been made by the Cubs defense. This is why the Cubs have a BABIP against of .288 while the Brewers have a .319. The Cubs K/9 is 7.3 vs Brewers 7.1, BB/9 is 3.7 vs Brewers 3.1. HR/9 is 1.1 vs 1.0. The Cubs have given up more HR/G than the Brewers on the year so I hardly see your point. Capuano has been giving up a lot of HR's, Zambrano has been giving up a ton of BB's, those things are included in the overall stats.

As a Brewer fan Trachsel would be the #7 best option on the team and thats with Parra and Vargas hurt. You can have him~ Really? Because your rotation is god awful. Not that Trachsel is Roger Clemens, but that is a bold statement. no our defense is god awful which is why the teams ERA is high yet they have one of the better FIP's in the NL. If you swapped the Cubs rotation and the Brewers rotation the Cubs team would still have a better ERA, its all in the fielding. Cubs have been well above average, Brewers have been one of the worst teams in the NL. Judging a pitcher by ERA will never tell you how good they are, too many things out of his control go into it. Bush Sheets Gallardo Villaneuva Suppan Capuano I'd take any of those 6 over Traschel who is sitting on a 5.71 FIP this season.

There have been 3 No-Hitters THIS YEAR Not often a 1-AA team beats Michigan in the Big House You can't divide it into just Michigan though, no rookie SP has thrown a no hitter for Boston ever as far as I know, I mean if you break it down by team its just as amazing. Some guy threw a no hitter in his 2nd start ever, that is amazing. Some overrated football team lost a game early, big whup. But thats just me.

I'd lead with the no hitter too, every year at least one ranked team loses early, some seasons go by without a no hitter and well baseball matters more than college football.

As a Brewer fan Trachsel would be the #7 best option on the team and thats with Parra and Vargas hurt. You can have him~

Back to back HR's Hart and Mench, 12-2 Brewers.

That's a cumulative stat, correct? I thought it was but since Dempster and Marmol are towards the top and both have missed significant time it makes me think it isn't. It is but you can also get -WPA. Carlos Villaneuva would have been towards the top of those charts had he been injured at the all star break but he wasn't and had a complete collapse in the 2nd half and now isn't in the top 100.

Umm, okay. To answer the question, no, he won't get any votes. But we wouldn't be in first place without him. You wouldn't be in 1st place without Ned Yost either, doesn't mean he should win the MVP! Marmol has been good but if you take away the best hitter or ace starter on any 1st place team most of them wouldn't be in 1st anymore either.

Yes it was the right move, Fielder is around a 1.000 OPS player, Jenkins who any sane manager in baseball would have had hitting is a .870ish OPS guy. One hit ties the game and with Fielder that one hit might put them in the lead anyway. Yost's decision to let Mench bat was probably the worst managerial decision made in baseball this season though and I hope he's instantly fired tonight because of it. Its a slap in the face of every Brewer fan that has gone to a game this season to leave out a .550 OPS vs righties player when you have your righty killer on the bench still.

Milwaukee Brewers 1, Ned Yost sucking 2. Have fun in the playoffs guys, no way this joker can manage a playoff team. How on earth do you leave in a career suck vs righties hitter in that situation.

Not worthless but certainly weaker than the W3 stat which uses expected runs rather than actual runs. ERA shows very weak correlation from year to year for a pitcher, FIP shows a much stronger correlation and pulls out variables that don't belong to the pitcher like fielding etc. Its still not the greatest stat though, something like Shandler's xERA is probably the best. Take a look at Joe Blanton once. He pitched better in 2006 than he did in 2005 from pretty much every stat he can control but his ERA was over a run higher that year. The reason his ERA was so high in 2006 was BABIP and LOB% which are things pitchers have little control over and are predictors of his true talent level, that combined with a good bit of luck in BABIP in 2005. The difference is that things like K/9, bb/9, GB% etc are predictable, they correspond year to year and most pitchers don't see big changes in them. ERA is a result that the pitcher only partially controls, it is all over the place and you really cannot predict it year to year. If you want to see the results of his pitching you look at ERA, if you want to predict future results you look at indicators.

They also play in a hitters park in a division with horrible pitching. Not to mention actual runs scored has a ton of noise involved, you'd be better off looking at something like RC or even OPS. The Cubs have scored more runs than they probably should have on the season. Same thing with the pitching, ERA is a horrible stat to use to judge pitchers by because of how much statistical noise and variance is involved in the stat.

This is Zambrano, this has been what he has been like his entire career. Crappy month, absolutely dominant month, absolutely dominant month, mediocre month, crappy month. Thats held true for almost his entire career now. No reason to try to make an excuse for it, its just who he is.

The majority of the roster is below career norms given their role. Braun obviously is playing out of his gord but for every plus on that team there is a Hall who hit 35 HR's last year and has like 12 this year or a rotation that is all having the worst year in their past 3 etc.

Brewers have lost 10 games that they led by 3+ runs since July 28th and 14 total on the year now. Its never over against them.

In regards to your first point, you have to consider both the hitter and pitcher splits. Both of your pitchers are typically good against lefties but one pitcher is a right and the other is a lefty. The batter you are facing is far better against righties than lefties. But like you said, you have to consider what you're going to do with Monroe and Kendall after Jones bats. It would seem to me that Yost didn't want Shouse to face just one batter or face Monroe and Kendall so he left Linebrink in and he got burned. You are overthinking it. Linebrink is the Brewers 7th inning guy. Even if its a bad matchup or the fact linebrink has struggled lately or the fact he was obviously perterbed after the error it doesn't matter, he's the 7th inning guy so he pitches. Turnbow is the 8th inning guy, he is almost never used unless its a save situation in the 8th inning. Cordero is the 9th inning guy, he has pitched 2 innings since August 11th because the Brewers haven't had many 9th inning leads. That is how Yost runs the bullpen, he has player roles and he sticks to them no matter what happens and he generally leaves the guy in even if he doesn't seem to have it that night.

I really enjoyed the little smirk he had after they lost the lead. It was either a fake smile trying to pretend everything was okay, or him laughing at his own team's floundering. I noticed that also. My wife and I wondered what that was about. He does that all the time, I have no idea why but its not something unique to last night. Gross has been really hot lately and Jenkins had a very bad road trip, I didn't have a big problem with that move. Letting Linebrink face Jones was horrible though and yanking Suppan after a HBP was terrible too, you either pinch hit for him or show a little faith in him.

Yost is a below average manager and bullpen usage is probably his biggest weakness, so its really no surprise.

Doesn't really matter, whatever happens the Brewers will blow the game in the 6rh or 7th inning like they have blown 20 other games this season and the Cubs will win. Probably not even worth watching the game.

Im not worried about Sheets. Last I read his finger wont be fully healthy the rest of the year, and hes already had 2 blister problems. Add that into the fact he hasnt pitched in quite awhile, and I look forward to seeing the Brewers pen in about the 4th or 5th inning. Parra on the other and.... never seen him, not gonna hit him. He's a lefty too Does his fastball rest comfortably at 84mph? Nope, he's more of a power lefty, throws up to 95 though I think he generally works more in the 89-92 range. He threw a no hitter in AAA this year and is only one step behind Gallardo in potential. Of course potential doesn't win games.

Im not worried about Sheets. Last I read his finger wont be fully healthy the rest of the year, and hes already had 2 blister problems. Add that into the fact he hasnt pitched in quite awhile, and I look forward to seeing the Brewers pen in about the 4th or 5th inning. Parra on the other and.... never seen him, not gonna hit him. He's a lefty too

Sheets scheduled to pitch tomorrow, Parra on Thursday for those that were wondering.