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09 Jan 2009 |
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Tweet me!LOB% is the number of runners a pitcher strands as a percentage of total runners allowed to reach base. The league average is around 72% and most pitchers will be within 2-3% of that amount. A pitcher who has lower than 72% LOB% is generally considered to either be unlucky, pitch for a team with a bad defense or have problems with pitching from the stretch, while a pitcher with a score over 72% has been lucky and given up less runs than expected.
There is some evidence that high strikeout pitchers can control their LOB% and will strand 76-78% of runners. This helps keep their ERA a bit lower than their FIP, which is their Fielding Independent Pitching or ERA without fielding effects. We will not address these guys right now, but look at some pitchers who had lower LOB% in 2008. These pitchers got unlucky and should have improved results in ERA in 2008.
We include K/BB, as it is one of the best standards for pitching evaluation. A pitcher with a K/BB under 2.0 is poor and over 3.0 is a top pitcher. This will help us evaluate how unlucky these pitchers were. We also need to look at FIP vs ERA to see if without luck and fielding they would be useful.
Most of these pitchers got unlucky, but still had a FIP over 4.00 and are not going to get much better. What we are looking for are pitchers that have a big difference between their FIP and ERA in conjunction with a lower LOB% than normal. Some names to keep an eye that fit this criteria are pitchers like Andy Sonnanstine, Andy Pettitte, Javier Vazquez, Hiroki Kuroda and Aaron Cook.
Andy Sonnanstine is a great value pitcher in 2009 and should out produce his 2008 line as he gets better; his K/BB of 3.35 is very impressive. He is a control pitcher, so don’t expect many K’s, but his ERA should improve. He is almost certain to be undervalued in 2009 as many will think that he has little chance of getting better.
 Andy Pettite and Javier Vazquez are both better pitchers, but they under produce their FIP every season. They should be better, but they cannot always be trusted to meet their true value. One problem for Pettitte is that the Yankees defense is terrible so if he changes teams he could surprise.Hiroki Kuroda is tough to deal with since his track record is unknown, but he was much better than his final line in 2008. He had an impressive K/BB and a very impressive ground ball rate of 51%. He should be a target as he is falling in early drafts, but without previous season’s in depth stats, it’s unclear how repeatable the K/BB is.
Aaron Cook has a low K/BB at exactly 2.00, but a pitcher with groundball rate like Cook is a unique talent. His GB% has been 55-62% every year and his 55.9% this year was the third best. Cook has such a low strikeout rate that he has a small margin for error and even a few extra walks make him a poor pitcher.
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Comments (8)
  written by Sam Samson, February 08, 2009
Troy
If the correlation for improving LOB% is with K/9 not BB/9, wouldn't it be more useful to use K/9 here instead of K/BB? Then we'd get a gauge of who could improve in this respect, rather than just a more general 'who is a good pitcher.' Or am I missing something?
written by TroyPatterson, January 12, 2009
Here is my correlation study for what improves LOB%.
http://www.rotosavants.com/200...th-k9.html K/9 is the strong correlation and BB/9 has no correlation. It is a skill in striking out batters that improves LOB%.
written by TroyPatterson, January 10, 2009
As for Brian Bannister. Just because I say he was "unlucky" doesn't mean he would have been good anyway. A FIP of 5.03 would have still been awful.
written by TroyPatterson, January 09, 2009
Hey Brian you got my next article already. I did a whole correlation run on LOB% and found some interesting things. I am posting it over at rotosavants.com and I'll let you know when it's posted. I still have some things to check.
The short answer though is yes it's based on a pitchers stuff.
written by tonycincotta, January 09, 2009
Troy,
Great article, I had Brian Bannister last season in an AL only league.The issue I have with your article is Brian Bannister was not unlucky. I was! Man oh man ! It started so nice and went to heck really quick. Great stuff there, looks like we have some rebounders !
written by Brian Joura, January 09, 2009
Good stuff.
Seems like a lot of the guys on this list were soft tossers. Is there any correlation year-to-year with LOB% and a pitcher's stuff?
written by D Wrek, January 09, 2009
First name that jumps out at me is Verlander. The previous 2 season he had a LOB% of 78.3 and 74.9. 10% difference from last season. His BABIP also rose from .293 to .294 to .305.
Combo this with a full season of MCab not at 3rd, Guillen to the OF, and the addition of Everett. I could see that improved defense and a little luck getting those BABIP and LOB% back to where they once were. Of course it would help if he got that K/BB back on track too B) Good article BTW.
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Tags: Brian Bannister Andy Sonnanstine Andy Pettitte Javier Vazquez Hiroki Kuroda sleepers drafts mixed league mock draft
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I had not finished my correlation study when I wrote this article and I have yet to correlate a poor K/9 with a poor LOB%. I would hypothesize that this is the case, but not done yet. I had assumed initially that K/BB had some control, but it doesn't seem to.
Also I included the K/BB to show the full talent of the pitcher. During the season when we look back at LOB% I will include K/9. I also will run some correlations to confirm poor K/9 leads to poor LOB%.