Stat of the Day and The Value of Starters

Somehow I missed it, but back in December Baseball-Reference did a Post-2003 Yankees Pitching Scorecard for their blog. Using ERA+ (adjusted ERA) as a guide, and appearance in 28 games as a minimum (with 90% being starts), they set out to determine how many Yankee pitchers post 2003 had an ERA+ of 110 or greater for the season (which would be probably considered "good" though they go with "very good" as the description here). The Yankees had only 4 pitchers reach that mark in a season, and only 6 such seasons like that.

It's an amazing statistic when you think that in the 5 years, with 5 starters per year, they have 25 possible starters in that time with only 6 of those guys (24%!) Who were actually considered very good. 

If you relax that statistic just for players who have had an ERA+ of 100 or greater (league average or "solid" seasons), you only get one more season in there: Jaret Wright's 2006. So the Yankees have had only 7 "solid" seasons from a starting pitcher (coming from 5 starters) since 2003. That's a 28% success rate (pretty damn awful considering the money they've spent there). And only one of those guys--Chien-Ming Wang--actually came from the Yankees farm system (Pettitte did as well, but his 2007 season came after he was resigned for good money as a free agent).

Meanwhile, the Red Sox in that same time had 14 "solid" seasons coming from 8 different starters. That's a 56% success rate or DOUBLE that of the Yankees (double!).

Which leads the article to conclude: "So, if you want to know why the Red Sox have two World Series rings since 2004 and the Yankees have zero, part of the reason is the fact that Boston (and their front office) has lapped the Yankees (and their front office) in terms of identifying and retaining quality starting pitching. And, unless the Yankees organization can close this front office efficiency gap with respect to filling out a starting rotation, don’t expect New York to catch up to Boston, any time soon, in that ring tally board."

The Yankees have made a renewed effort to developing and signing starting pitching, while the Red Sox starters have struggled to date. Right now the Red Sox have only two pitchers (Tim Wakefield and Josh Beckett) within the ERA+ of 100 range ("solid") and no pitchers at 110 ("very good"). 

Meanwhile on the Yankees, AJ Burnett (97) is right around the 100 cusp and one more solid start from him would give the Yankees a top four of average to above average pitchers. Furthermore, this year, they have 3 such starters who are on pace to have ERA+ of 110 or better "very good": CC Sabathia (132), Andy Pettitte (111) and, yes, Joba Chamberlain (123). So before you think of moving Joba off to the bullpen, understand that one of the biggest reasons the Red Sox have been better than the Yankees since 2004 has been the starting pitching gap.