Clay Buchholz

In reply to a comment that someone "expect[s] Lester and Buccholz to be as good or better" in 2011 as they were in 2010:

I wouldn't. Not Buchholz. Lester is Lester - he's established, in my mind, a consistent performance level, and I expect him to be a top starter again next year, in Cy Young contention if he can avoid the slow starts that have hampered him the past couple of years.

But I wouldn't be at all surprised if we've already seen Clay Buchholz' best season. Not that I expect him to be bad, because I don't, but I don't expect him to put up another 187 ERA+ (tied for the 73rd best season in Major League history¹.) I don't think his peripherals support it.

FWIW, Baseball Prospectus has continued working on the concepts which Voros McCracken first identified in DIPs, that pitchers have very little control over what happens to balls in play, and that pitching skills primarily manifest themselves in walks, strikeout and home runs allowed. While that's overly broad and not absolutely true, it does provide what has proved to be, over the years, a useful framework for projecting pitchers. The newest manifestation is SIERA, which is Skill-Interactive ERA. Last year, Buchholz put up a 2.33 ERA with a SIERA of 4.29. Of the 318 ML pitchers who threw at least 50 innings last year, only 7 had a better ERA relative to their SIERA than Buchholz. He could very easily pitch better in 2011 than he did in 2010 and still see his ERA go up by a run.

That's not to say that SIERA is the be-all and end-all, or that it's perfect in all cases, or that Buchholz doesn't do something which causes his SIERA to skew higher than his real run-prevention ability (though in 2009, he put up an ERA of 4.21 on a SIERA of 4.16) or that he won't continue improving or anything like that. But in my opinion, it's very unrealistic to look for an ERA+ over 140 from Buchholz this year.

2010 ERA vs. SIERA - Red Sox Starters

	ERA	SIERA
Jon Lester	3.25	3.2
Daisuke Matsuzaka	4.69	4.36
John Lackey	4.4	4.27
Josh Beckett	5.78	3.84
Clay Buchholz	2.33	4.29

¹ - Here's the list of pitchers that have put up multiple season at 187 or better ERA+:

Pedro Martinez
Walter Johnson+
Randy Johnson
Greg Maddux
Roger Clemens
Christy Mathewson+
Cy Young+
Dazzy Vance+
Hal Newhouser+
Lefty Grove+
Mordecai Brown+
Sandy Koufax+

Everyone on the list who is eligible is already in the Hall-of-Fame, everyone else is headed there (depending on how the voters eventually deal with Clemens.) There are a bunch of pitchers that managed to do it once (including Hall-of-Famers Tom Seaver, Bob Gibson, Warren Spahn and Lefty Gomez), but only all-time greats have done it more than once. I think it's unlikely that Buchholz is going to be an all-time great, and people need to be realistic about what they're going to get. It's easy to imagine him pitching as well or better in 2011, and people being disappointed with his 3.45 ERA...

Idle thought

I wonder if the Red Sox are showcasing Clay Buchholz for the Blue Jays tonight...

Sports radio mentality

I really think it's kind of funny. The Red Sox are doing something a little bit unconventional and imaginative, and many people seem to think that it's clever to propose that they're actually doing something trivial and cliche, and that it's clever to point out the trivial and cliche thing that they're doing while ignoring the unconventional and imaginative thing that they're actually doing.

The unconventional and imaginative thing that the Red Sox are doing is giving the Friday night start to Clay Buchholz in order to set up their rotation for the second "half" of the season. The trivial and cliche thing that each WEEI caller seemed to think he was really clever to have sniffed out was that the Sox are actually setting up an "audition" for Buchholz in front of the Jays, to enable a trade for Roy Halladay.

As to the "audition" aspect, I think that it's absolutely not part of the decision for three reasons:

1. I believe that they'd be doing exactly this no matter where the game Friday night was being played, and no matter who the competition was. It's a smart move, in that enables your major league starters to prepare mentally and physically without uncertainty, it gives them all a little bit of extra rest, it allows you to set up the rotation the way you want it, and it offers a little taste and reward to someone you expect to be in the rotation next year for being a good soldier during this season and working hard in AAA. Win-win-win-win. There's really no need to search for hidden motives if the surface motives are clear and make sense.


2. If Toronto wants Buchholz in a trade, they want him. Everyone already knows that he can throw a great game in the Major Leagues. Not just the no-hitter - even last year when he struggled, he had a number of very good performances. (Six innings, one run against the Yankees. Six inning, no runs against the Rangers. Eight innings, nine strikeouts, two runs against the Rays.) Everyone already knows what he's done at AAA this year. He's been a top prospect for three years know - he's not a mystery.


3. To the extent that his value can change with one outing, it's far more likely to go down than up. Unless he throws another no-hitter Friday night, his value won't go up any as a result. But if he gets shelled, we could start to hear talk about "AAAA pitchers." In my opinion, there's far more to lose than gain if they were, in fact, "showcasing" him.

I think that the move is being made for exactly the reasons that they've talked about. I think that the fact that they're opening in Toronto is a coincidence, utterly irrelevant in making the decision. I don't think that they're going to trade Buccholz for Halladay if Buccholz is awful Friday night and I don't think that they're going to trade Buccholz for Hallady if Buccholz is oustanding Friday night. In short, I think that talk of an "audition" is an attempt to fit an unconventional management move into a conventional sports-writer and sports-radio template.

Monday Pythagorean, 7/13/2009

And into the All Star break we go, with a 5-2 week leading to a 3 game lead over the Yankees, and 6 1/2 over the Rays.

• So we hit the break with the Red Sox having both the best record and the best run differential in the AL. They're three up on the Yankees in the East and 5 1/2 up on Texas for the Wild Card. They're a long way from locking up a playoff spot, but for those of who thought they were the best team in the league before the season began, nothing that's happened so far has altered that.



• The Red Sox are currently 54-34, 20 games over .500. When you get to 20 games over .500, that means that .500 ball the rest of the way results in 91 wins. To win the AL East, I suspect that 30 games over .500, 96 wins, is necessary. The Red Sox are obviouly on pace, both by record and by run differential, to exceed that.



• Earlier in the year, I said that they needed Jed Lowrie back. I said that they had gotten more than they had any right to expect from Nick Green, and hoped that people would recognize that. I wanted him replaced before he turned back into a pumpkin. Well, Cinderella - your coach isn't waiting anymore. In his last 51 games, since May 4, he's hitting .240/.310/.370/.680. That happens to good hitters, of course (though not usually in stretches quite that long), but it also happens to bad hitters. That's a lot closer to realistic Nick Green expectations than what he did the first month.



• The Red Sox have more road games left than home games (36 vs. 38) while the Yankees have more home than road (39 vs. 35). But. The Red Sox played their last game west of the central time zone on May 17. The Yankees played their first game in the pacific time zone on July 10, and still have two more trips to the west coast. Advantage: Boston.



• The Baseball Prospectus Playoff Odds Report has the Red Sox with a 52% chance of winning the East and 30% chance of winning the Wild Card, for an 82% chance of making the post-season. This is second in MLB only to the Dodgers, a good team playing in a lousy division.



• I commented on this yesterday, but I wanted to note it again - I love the decision to start Buchholz on Friday night. I think that it shows foresight and imagination, while using the organizational depth efficiently. For many teams, a move like this wouldn't make sense, but a) Buchholz has been dominant at AAA and certainly looks ready to throw an effective start and b) they've got roster moves that they have to make (Lowell, Lowrie) anyway. This means that all of the starters go into the All Star break knowing exactly when their next starts are, and when they need to throw to prep. There's no preparation uncertainty pending the appearance or non-appearance of Beckett and/or Wakefield on Tuesday night. It would be a stretch to call it brilliant, but it is unconventional, and I love the move, regardless of how it ends up working out.



• The big stories of the "first half":
  
  • The Big Man - Cries for his dismissal abounded as he began the year .185/.284/.287/.570 with 1 HR in his first 178 at-bats. Then Papi returned, as he's hit .278/.368/.617/.986 with 1 HR every 10.45 at-bats since June 1.
  
  
  • The Rivals - The Yankees had the first game won until Jason Bay took Mariano deep in the bottom of the ninth. They had the second one won when they took a 6-0 lead over Beckett with Burnett on the mound, until Burnett melted down. They had a couple more that they lost late. Why are the Red Sox three games up on the Yankees? Because they're eight games up on the Yankees head-to-head - against the rest of baseball, New York's five games ahead of Boston. If Boston were 6-2 against New York rather than 8-0, they'd be a game down instead of three games up.
  
  
  • The Adventures of Daisuke Matsuzaka in the Land of the Rising Sun - Matsuzaka, who finished 4th in the AL Cy Young balloting a year ago with 18 wins and a 159 ERA+, is 1-5 in 8 starts, with an ERA over 8. The team has been surprisingly (and refreshingly) forthright in blaming the World Baseball Classic, which prevented his having a normal spring training, and left him unprepared for the start of the regular season.
  
  
  • A Pair of Aces - The two Aces of the Sox staff started slowly, but since May 1, Beckett and Lester are a combined 16-5 with a 2.71 ERA in 26 starts, while striking out 177 in 176 1/3 innings.
  
  
  • There's a Hole in the World - Many teams have struggles with their fifth starters - the Sox have had problems with their third. From May 1 through July 6, more than two months, the pitchers in that slot (Masterson, Matsuzaka, Smoltz) went 1-8 with a 6.59 ERA.
  
  
  • The Best Bullpen in Baseball - The 'pen has been mostly outstanding. They've had a couple of significant meltdowns, losing a couple of games that should not have been lost, but they've won a bunch of games that shouldn't necessarily have been won, too. Justin Masterson is struggling, and they need to get that straightened out, but they've got a bunch of pitchers in the bullpen who can miss bats, and if they haven't been quite as dominant as advertised, that's more a result of the advertising than the performance.
  
  
  • The Crusty Vet - Though in my opinion undeserved, Wakefield makes his first All Star team at age 42. There's no question that he was very good early and has been pretty good again lately. The long bad-to-mediocre stretch somehow escaped people's attention.
  
  
  • Three Musketeers - Pedrioa, Youkilis and Bay were expected to be key offensive contributors, and all of them have been. Youkilis and Pedroia got the big money, and it obviously hasn't affected them (negatively) as it seems to affect some.
  
  
  • The Other Crusty Vets - Question marks, coming off of injury and just plain decrepitude, Lowell and Varitek have met or exceeded expectations.



• Red Sox Player of the Week: In basketball, they used to call Vinnie Johnson "the microwave," because he'd get so hot so quickly. I'm thinking that works for Dustin Pedroia just as well. When he's cold, he gets very cold. But when he's hot, he's scorching hot. The hot Pedroia is back, as he hit a ridiculous .462/.500/.885/1.385 with a home run and six (6!) doubles for the week, despite missing a game to be with his pregnant wife at the hospital.



• Red Sox Pitcher of the Week: No-brainer. Jon Lester was spectacular in his one start with 8 innings of 4-hit shutout ball, and Daniel Bard struck out 8 in 4 1/3 innings while allowing 1 hit, no walks and no earned runs (because of an error and a bloop double, he ended up giving up 2 unearned runs). But Josh Beckett started two games and threw 15 2/3 innings while allowing only 9 hits and 2 runs to earn the honors for the week.

AL Pythagorean Projection Report - 7/13/2009

							Projected		Actual
	R/G	(rank)	RA/G	(rank)	Pythagorean	(rank)	W	L	W	L	Luck
Boston	5.28	(4)	4.32	(2)	0.591	(1)	52	36	54	34	2
Tampa Bay	5.35	(3)	4.49	(4)	0.579	(2)	52	37	48	41	-4
New York	5.63	(1)	4.94	(11)	0.559	(3)	49	39	51	37	2
Texas	4.94	(6)	4.55	(7)	0.538	(4)	47	40	48	39	1
Detroit	4.8	(9)	4.44	(3)	0.536	(5)	47	40	48	39	1
Toronto	4.86	(7)	4.51	(5)	0.534	(6)	48	42	44	46	-4
Los Angeles	5.36	(2)	4.99	(12)	0.533	(7)	46	40	49	37	3
Minnesota	4.85	(8)	4.53	(6)	0.532	(8)	47	42	45	44	-2
Chicago	4.63	(11)	4.6	(8)	0.502	(9)	44	44	45	43	1
Seattle	3.95	(13)	4.16	(1)	0.477	(10)	42	46	46	42	4
Cleveland	5.07	(5)	5.6	(14)	0.455	(11)	40	49	35	54	-5
Oakland	4.2	(12)	4.66	(9)	0.452	(12)	39	47	37	49	-2
Baltimore	4.64	(10)	5.3	(13)	0.439	(13)	39	49	40	48	1
Kansas City	3.93	(14)	4.82	(10)	0.408	(14)	36	52	37	51	1

Top 5 projections (using current winning %)

Boston	99	63
New York	94	68
Los Angeles	92	70
Texas	89	73
Detroit	89	73

Top 5 projections (starting with today's record, using Pythagorean winning %)

Boston	98	64
New York	92	70
Tampa Bay	90	72
Los Angeles	89	73
Texas	88	74

Standings for the week

							Projected		Actual
	R/G	(rank)	RA/G	(rank)	Pythagorean	(rank)	W	L	W	L	Luck
Detroit	5.5	(5)	2.83	(1)	0.771	(1)	5	1	4	2	-1
Baltimore	4.17	(10)	3.17	(2)	0.623	(2)	4	2	4	2	0
Boston	5.43	(6)	4.14	(5)	0.621	(3)	4	3	5	2	1
Oakland	4.33	(9)	3.5	(3)	0.596	(4)	4	2	3	3	-1
Los Angeles	7.33	(1)	6.33	(10)	0.567	(5)	3	3	4	2	1
Tampa Bay	4.5	(7)	4.33	(7)	0.517	(6)	3	3	4	2	1
Seattle	4	(11)	4	(4)	0.5	(7)	4	3	4	3	0
Texas	4.43	(8)	4.43	(8)	0.5	(7)	4	3	3	4	-1
New York	6.29	(3)	6.43	(11)	0.49	(9)	3	4	3	4	0
Chicago	7	(2)	7.17	(14)	0.489	(10)	3	3	3	3	0
Minnesota	5.83	(4)	6.5	(12)	0.451	(11)	3	3	2	4	-1
Toronto	3.71	(14)	4.29	(6)	0.435	(12)	3	4	2	5	-1
Kansas City	3.86	(13)	6	(9)	0.308	(13)	2	5	2	5	0
Cleveland	4	(11)	7	(13)	0.264	(14)	2	4	2	4	0

Interesting news out of Fenway this afternoon

Francona just announced, after the game with Kansas City, that Clay Buchholz is starting Friday, followed by Penny and Lester in Toronto, then Smoltz, Beckett and Wakefield in Texas.

They're trying to make sure that people know when they are going to throw. With the uncertainty of when or if or how much Beckett and Wakefield throw on Tuesday, they've slotted it so that Buccholz goes on Friday (his normal day), everyone else knows when they have to throw, and Beckett and Wakefield get full rest even if they pitch on Tuesday.

I love this organization. I love the foresight and creativity that goes into a decision like this and I love the depth that enables it.