The Nationals Without Strasburg
Stephen Strasburg was shut down after pitching on September 7. The Nationals are 4-1 since then. This says absolutely nothing about Strasburg.
There’s been plenty of talk about the team’s decision to shut Strasburg down after nearly 160 innings. The dissenting opinion tends to revolve around the idea that the Nationals are much more likely to win the World Series with Strasburg pitching. This is probably true, unless we’re willing to attribute his late-season struggles to incurable fatigue. But just how much worse are the Nationals without Strasburg? Find out after the jump
Baseball-reference credits Strasburg with 2.7 WAR this season. Fangraphs gives him 4.3, since he’s been outstanding from a fielding-independent standpoint, but only very good in terms of run prevention. John Lannan has been a hair above replacement level (.9 rWAR/2.5 fWAR) over the last three seasons, while Chien-Ming Wang is a replacement-level pitcher (-2.5 rWAR/0 fWAR since ’09). Put Lannan in Strasburg’s rotation spot, with Wang pitching a little more as a spot starter, and the two versions of WAR tell us that the Nationals would be somewhere between 85-58 and 86-57, still winning the NL East and at least 12 games clear of the final Wild Card spot.
Looking at it a different way, the Nationals have outscored opponents by 134 runs, the best figure in baseball. The average ERA in the NL is 3.97. Strasburg’s 3.16 is .81 runs better than average and .83 runs better than Lannan’s career ERA. That means that over 159 1/3 innings, Strasburg saved between 14 and 15 runs. Round it up and add those 15 runs to the wrong side of Washington’s ledger and they’re tied with the Rangers for the best run differential in baseball (+119), 33 runs better than the Reds and Cardinals.
In the playoffs, of course, fifth starters and replacement level don’t matter much. The Nationals will lean heavily on Gio Gonzalez, Jordan Zimmermann, and Edwin Jackson, with Ross Detwiler starting as needed. Those four pitchers have thrown 671 1/3 innings this season. They’ve struck out 566 hitters, walked 199, and given up 56 home runs, giving up a total of 242 earned runs. That equates to a 3.24 ERA and a 3.49 FIP.
Aside from the Nationals, the best rotation ERA in the NL this season is the Dodgers’ 3.51. The best FIP is the Cardinals’ 3.51. Granted, these numbers include fifth starters and fill-in guys, very few of whom will start in the playoffs, but the Nationals can counter that some by giving more starts to Gonzalez and Zimmermann, who have been two of the best pitchers in the league, than to Jackson and Detwiler.
Neither ERA nor FIP is park-adjusted, and the Nationals play in a bit of a pitcher’s park. Let’s use fangraphs’ ERA-, where the second best figure for a National League rotation is 92, by the Dodgers and the playoff-bound Reds. The Strasburg-free Nationals ERA-? 85.
With Strasburg, the Nationals would probably be favorites to reach the World Series in the NL. Without him, they’re probably still favorites.
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In the 28 games Strasburg has started this season, the Nats’ winning percentage has been .679. In the 81 games started by either Gio, Zimmerman or Detwiler, the Nats’ winning percentage has been — would you believe .679?
Good numbers-based analysis, but I think there’s more going on here.
-the added distraction and pressure of the media’s coverage of the Strasburg bungling/shutdown. This team is going to feel an undue amount of pressure in the playoffs because of the way this thing’s been handled, and the questions the media are going to bombard the manager and players with are going to be there after every loss in the postseason.
-the loss in confidence that a team suffers when losing their #1 starter. You can argue that Gonzalez and Zimmermann have been better this year (they probably have), but let’s not pretend that Stephen Strasburg wouldn’t be the team’s #1 starter in the playoffs. This perceived downtick in team confidence could be construed as teeming bullsh!t, but I’ve seen it happen too many times to discount it completely.
-it’s not exclusively replacing Stephen Strasburg with Edwin Jackson in the Nats’ top 3. There’s a domino effect happening here. Your #2 becomes your #1, your #3 becomes your #2, and on and on down the line. This might be mitigated by the Nats’ depth in their rotation, but if Edwin Jackson gets his doors blown off in Game 3 of the NLDS, then it’s Katie, bar the door. The media’s gonna be all over that like flies on a fresh meadow muffin, which is only going to add to the pressure.
It’s also come out today that the actual doctor who performed the surgery on Strasburg’s shoulder was never and has never been consulted even once by the Nationals about how to handle Steven this year. Oh dear.
bstar, I’ll buy some of the intangibles about dealing with the consequences, but I’m not sure I care about the shift from #1 to #2, and so on. Outside of the first few games of the season, teams don’t line up their rotations so that a #2 guy always face the other team’s #2 guy. With the play-in game this year, I don’t see the playoffs lining up that way either. Even if they did, baseball is such a fickle game that the advantage of having a slightly better pitcher on the mound doesn’t make much difference in terms of win expectancy. What’s important in the playoffs is not having awful starters getting burned early and wasting the bullpen, and I don’t see that happening to the Nats this year. Did the Cards face better pitchers in every playoff game last year because Wainwright was hurt? What about in ’06 when they lost Carpenter?
I wasn’t talking so much about the opposition as much as Washington’s starting staff for the playoffs. Anyway, I’m not married to any of those theories. They’re just possibilities.
The one thing I hate about the Strasburg shutdown the most is that the reasoning of sacrificing the present for some possible future outcome just runs so counter to the integrity of all sports. I try to come up with a situation in the past where a team refused to play one of its best players in the playoffs for fear of injury but I can’t come up with one other example. It’s got to be a first.
And I just feel so bad for Strasburg himself.
On a tangent, Rany Jazayerli made a very good argument against “The Decision” (2012) on Grantland:
http://www.grantland.com/story/_/id/8369941/history-shows-washington-nationals-shut-stephen-strasburg-too-soon
Back on topic … I think the inherent advantages of a power/strikeout pitcher are enhanced in the postseason. Assuming the Nats will use 4 starters, and that the Strasburg benching means Detwiler is #4, now we’re talking about replacing 11.1 SO/9 with 5.5 SO/9.
Obviously, Strasburg is a better pitcher than Detwiler, period, but as the competition gets tougher I think the difference gets bigger. Career numbers:
– Strasburg in 7 interleague starts is 5-1, 2.13, with 14.0 SO/9 (and only one of those games was against Baltimore). Against teams with W% of .500+, he’s 9-4, 3.13, with 11.4 SO/9.
– Detwiler in 10 interleague games (6 starts) is 0-2, 3.95, with 4.4 SO/9. Against teams at .500+, he’s 5-10, 4.06, with 5.1 SO/9.
I think they’re making a colossal mistake.
P.S. I still liked the post, though.
Love the new folks! And, very interesting to see you comment on other posts, JA….;)
John, thanks for the link. Fascinating stuff, though I won’t weight on on whether the Nats were right or wrong. While I agree that Strasburg has a better chance to succeed in October than Detwiler, I really think the team with the better overall roster (and a healthy dose of luck) generally wins a playoff series- not necessarily the team with the better starting pitcher going every night.
I liked this article better than Rany’s. Rany is a good writer, but also a dermatologist who doesn’t mind massaging the facts to make his point hit home harder… I don’t dig them dermatologists.
Thanks, Jacob. How you do feel about nonprofit accountants?
Dusty Baker is a genius! He’s obviously been plotting this for years. Phase one of the plot was to blow out the arms of two young fireballing starters (Wood and Prior), thus making future teams more cautious in how they use such starters. And now, here he is, as manager of the Reds, poised to take advantage of the situation as his biggest rival to the NL crown voluntarily shuts down one of their best pitchers, trying to avoid what he did a decade ago. Sheer brilliance!
I love this. Feel like I missed a different angle to this piece that was right under my nose.
The dumbest thing of all this is that Strasburg’s arm is going to blow out again because they haven’t fixed his mechanics. Plus, when his elbow required surgery the first time, it sure wasn’t from being overworked… he pitched on 6 days rest in college and it’s not like he threw 200 innings in pro ball.
Fact is: it’s sports. Anyone can get hurt at any time doing anything. Jonathan Lucroy broke his hand when his wife dropped a suitcase on it; does that mean the Brewers should force him to pack his belongings in duffel bags the rest of his career? Did the Red Sox put the kibosh on Wade Boggs wearing cowboy boots? Did the Cubs ban pepper from the clubhouse after Sosa got hurt from sneezing?
Thanks Bryan! Oddly Dusty played on the A’s in ’85 and ’86 where he was teammates with Rick Langford and Steve McCatty, 2/5 of the rotation that Billy Martin is infamous for overusing. You think he might have learned something by, oh I don’t know, talking to his teammates or something.
And you know that the aforementioned Steve McCatty is the Nat’s pitching coach this year.
Nope Mo, I had no idea. That is ironic deliciousness come full circle!
The answer to all your questsions is “Yes”
I dont know why people always think Prior’s string of injuries was due to overwork. Most of his time on the DL was non pitching related.
2002: 167 IP (including minors) strained hamstring while running the bases
2003: 211.1 IP Shoulder injury after running into Marcus Giles
2004: 130 IP (incl minors) Achilles tendon injury
2005: 172 IP (incl minors) Elbow strain, 15 day DL, only 130 inning the previous year
2006: Shoulder strain, missed first half of season, same inning previous year as Strasburg this year
then his shoulder fell apart and he was done.
None of this is related to overworking.
I don’t think he had an elbow strain in 2005. I think he had a fracture from a line drive hitting him in the elbow.
O yeah that too, the elbow strain was in spring straining, the comebacker (off the bat of Brad Hawpe) cost him a month of the season. Also not overwork related
It was pitches, not simply innings, topper. He was throwing 130 pitches almost every time out at 22 years of age in 2003. That’s what a lot of people think led to the later shoulder and elbow problems.
He averaged 113 pitches/start over an entire year. And I am to believe this caused a shoulder problem 3 years later?
Topper: Do you honestly believe that pitchers go running to their manager/pitching coach the second they feel something wrong with their arm? Of course they don’t! Check out this article from 2007 re: Prior:
“Something, he told friends late in the 2004 season, “wasn’t right,” but he kept pitching.”
Now if he told friends in late 2004, we can probably assume that the problem began before that.
http://sports.espn.go.com/espn/columns/story?columnist=wojciechowski_gene&id=2851466&sportCat=mlb
It still doesn’t prove his injuries weren’t due to a previous non throwing injury or just his genetic makeup. There are so many examples of guys who have thrown more inning or pitches than Prior and lasted much longer that just assuming his ‘overwork’ ended his career is too easy.
Are people saying that if Prior was shut down or limited to 90 pitches/start in 2003 he would still be pitching today and never had multiple shoulder surgeries? I don’t buy it.
Look at the namesake himself, Tommy John innings after surgery:
207
220
213
276
265
140
221
234 (age 40)
My point is that for every guy you show me who was supposedly injured due to overwork I can show you one who was affected by overwork. If this is the case then shouldn’t that cause you (I mean in general, not just Ed) to question the validity of the theory itself?
In the month of September 2003, Prior averaged 126 pitches per start and another 120 pitches in postseason games. This, again, when he was 22 years old, in big games when nearly every pitch was stressful. And he felt the effects of this already in 1984, not three years later. Here’s an article from March 1985:
“Cubs ace Mark Prior will be out indefinitely because of inflammation in his right elbow, the latest injury to one of Chicago’s star pitchers.
“Cubs trainer Mark O’Neal said Monday the 24-year-old Prior has some inflammation in the elbow joint and a little irritation to the ulnar nerve.
“Prior missed the first two months of last season because of right Achilles’ tendinitis and stiffness in his right elbow. Last July, he missed a start because of discomfort in the elbow.”
The Achilles tendon injury was of course real, but so was the elbow pain. Reports were published saying that Prior would need Tommy John surgery on his elbow; both Prior and the Cubs denied this then. He did return to pitch again, on occasion decently, but would experience more elbow pain and also shoulder pain in 1986. In 2007 he had exploratory surgery that showed he had structural damage. Now maybe this all would have happened without Dusty’s doings, but the fact is that Dusty did what he did and Prior suffered injury.
1986 should obviously have been 2006.
And the 1985 at the top should have been 2005. Boy I can see anymore.
Man, really sorry, something happened with my keyboard. If anyone cares, here it is with the proper dates:
In the month of September 2003, Prior averaged 126 pitches per start and another 120 pitches in postseason games. This, again, when he was 22 years old, in big games when nearly every pitch was stressful. And he felt the effects of this already in 2004, not three years later. Here’s an article from March 2005:
“Cubs ace Mark Prior will be out indefinitely because of inflammation in his right elbow, the latest injury to one of Chicago’s star pitchers.
“Cubs trainer Mark O’Neal said Monday the 24-year-old Prior has some inflammation in the elbow joint and a little irritation to the ulnar nerve.
“Prior missed the first two months of last season because of right Achilles’ tendinitis and stiffness in his right elbow. Last July, he missed a start because of discomfort in the elbow.”
The Achilles tendon injury was of course real, but so was the elbow pain. Reports were published saying that Prior would need Tommy John surgery on his elbow; both Prior and the Cubs denied this then. He did return to pitch again, on occasion decently, but would experience more elbow pain and also shoulder pain in 2006. In 2007 he had exploratory surgery that showed he had structural damage in his shoulder.
Now maybe this all would have happened without Dusty’s doings, but the fact is that Dusty did what he did and Prior suffered injury.
This is what the research has concluded:
*What seems to put starters at risk of injury is throwing too many pitches per start.
*Roughly speaking, “too many pitches” seems to translate to “over 100″.
*Once a pitcher hits his fatigue point, his risk of injury goes up very quickly with each additional pitch.
*Pitchers under the age of 25 are exquisitely sensitive to overuse.
http://www.baseballprospectus.com/article.php?articleid=2633
Can I prove to you that being overworked in 2003 caused Prior’s later injuries? Of course not. But there’s strong suspicion. Prior was 4th in “Pitcher Abuse Point” in 2003 (Wood was 2nd btw). That’s a lot of abuses for a young pitcher. But for some reason you (Topper) want to completely dismiss this because there’s not 100% correspondence between being overworked and injuries. Unfortunately that’s not how the real world works. It’s very rare for their to be anything approaching 100% predictability. But that doesn’t mean we should throw the baby out with the proverbial bathwater.
“It seems to me that this stress business is not what it’s all about. Does PAP work? I don’t know that it does. But, it’s not for me to prove that it doesn’t work. It’s up to someone else to prove that it does work. And so far, I don’t see it.” – Tom Tango
I would be pretty sure of myself if I were to argue with him
http://www.insidethebook.com/ee/index.php/site/article/does_pap_work/
So Mark Prior, who has probably thrown a baseball 25,000 times in his life, can now not do it due to 8 starts in 2003?
So the camel, which had 25,000 straws on its back, succumbed to a spinal injury because of one straw added a week later?
I like Tom Tango but his “study” was a joke.
1) He didn’t control for pitcher age which has been shown to be an important factor in prior studies.
2) He only looked at quantity, not quality (which he admits in the comments).
3) Pitchers simply aren’t being used/abused the way they have in the past which is necessarily going to mitigate any effect. Even his “high stress” group wasn’t particularly stressed. In 1987 there were 60 pitchers who had a PAP above 10,000. Guess how many there were in 2007? Two. That’s it.
There are plenty of other flaws with Tango’s study but I think I’ve shown plenty. Definitely not his best work.
To continue to beat this poor dead horse, there’s no question that some people are more genetically prone to injury (Nick Johnson, anyone) and there’s also no question that some people are magically gifted genetically and can handle major workloads late into careers. But if you talk to orthopedists, doctors and sports physiologists, etc. they will tell you that the risk of injury rises significantly when you fatigued. It’s not so much the “stretching of the rubber band” as much as how fatigue effects your gait, your balance, the amount of force you need to use. For runners the worst thing you can do is change stride or-you will get out of alignment. For pitchers, arm slot, coordination, over compensation, losing rhythm. We can’t just say, “well, Nolan Ryan threw bb’s into his late 40′s, so everyone should be able to”
Great post, Ed. And Dusty’s own current fireballer is a reliever whom Dusty tried like crazy, only of course for verisimilitude sake in a further burst of malevolent craftiness, to subject to the same dire Woods/Prior consequences, but, now that Strasburg is indeed shut down, can give several days of rest to so that he regains his velocity and mojo. Dusty is indeed diabolical.
Thanks Tag! I just think it’s deeply ironic that the “poster-manager” for what not to do with your fireballers may benefit from lessons learned due to his actions.
Funny stuff, guys, although my brain still hurts trying to decipher “for verisimilitude sake in a further burst of malevolent craftiness”. tag, I think you’re saying Dusty almost burnt out Chapman’s arm, and I’m not sure I agree. His IP look high for two reasons:
-He was used in middle relief before injuries to other relievers forced Chapman into the closer role, and he often pitched 2 innings (mainly because he was so damn good) per outing early in the season. Seems reasonable enough.
-Since Chapman took over as closer, the Reds have had an inordinate amount of save opportunities arise for Aroldis to pitch in. Cincinnati leads the league in save opportunities with 66. If you were Dusty and you had Chapman striking out guys at a historic pace and posting a sub-1.50 BA against, wouldn’t you pitch him too?
Or maybe you were just being facetious.
Mostly being facetious, but I think if anyone can wear out a young fireballing reliever, it’s Dusty.
To me, the most bothersome aspect of the Nationals decision is that it was made before the season began. This says two things: 1) last week’s shut down was not based on Strasburg’s current health status; 2) the Nationals were anticipating failure this year. I finally heard thoughts similar to this on ESPN radio earlier this week.
To play devil’s advocate on (2), it could also be the opposite: they expect to be very good for a number of years, so what’s one year in the long run, and furthermore we have a decent ability to get the job done even without him this October.
Having said that, the thing I don’t understand is why they didn’t just space out his innings, or give him several weaks off midseason, or some other alternative solution that results in the same # of total IP.
I agree completely with the space-out-the-innings thing. Couldn’t they have skipped one start a month, or gone to six-days rest at a certain point? They knew they were in contention a long time ago.
It is silly that they didn’t use a creative way to space out the innings. Frankly, they could have been uncreative and copied an old-school way to space out the innings. Back when ML teams reguarly played a DH on Sundays, teams would often use an older pitcher as a Sunday starter. He would only pitch on Sundays for one the DH games. If the Nats had done that, they could have had Strasborg pitch around 25 starts over the course of the season, or 3 less than he had.
Yes, Tom Tango outlined a plan where they could have pitched Strasburg every Saturday, and with all the off-days in the season, the Nats would have only had to go to a sixth starter twice the whole season.
To me, that is the second most troubling aspect. What bothers me the most is that they made it public so it immediately became some kind of a countdown. If they had simply said “We’re going to try and limit his innings and not overwork him.” this would not have been nearly this issue it has become over the past weeks and even months. Follow a few of the suggestions that have been made here already- skip a few starts or go to a six man rotation- plus a few things like not sending him back out after a long rain delay and they wouldn’t be in this position. Not to mention that now Johnson was in a position where if he didn’t follow thru on the original plan and Strasburg did develop arm troubles every finger would be pointing at him.
I also don’t know enough about pitching mechanics to say for certain but if brp @ 15 is right and the problem hasn’t been fixed then I’m not sure that this isn’t all for naught anyways.
To an extent, we can blame this on the drum-beat of the “Verducci Effect”. Washington is taking the route of least resistance; shut him down, and if he blows out his arm again at least it won’t be their fault. It seems to me that a better approach would have been a complete physical evaluation first and then a decision.
My problem with the decision is that they only control where Strasborg is going to pitch for 4 more years after this. Lots of commentators have commented on how they want to ensure that is an effective pitcher for years to come. Well, that shouldn’t be the Nats concern (OTOH, it is Strasborg’s concern and Scott Boras’s concern). In 4 years, either the Nats will no longer have him as an asset or they will be paying considerably more/year to have him as an asset, either way, that will negatively effect their ability to win. So when evaluating whether this move was correct from an economic standpoint, I think the window you have to look at is the next 4 years, not the rest of his career.
Here’s a case study in a pitcher who was overused by a team early in his career, who had his career shortened by that. After I reveal who it is, ponder whether that was good or bad for the team.
First 8 years (ages 20-27)(all for original small market team): 110-78, 1660 innings, 3.34 ERA, ERA+ 128, WAR 38.8 (team went to the playoffs twice, won 1 WS in his second year, (he won the WS MVP), 2 All Star appearances(starter in one game and winning pitcher in the other), 2 Cy Youngs in those 8 seasons)
Next 8 seasons (ages 28-31, 33-35, 37) (all but 43 innings for big market teams):
57-39, 902 innings, 3.58 ERA, ERA+ 124, WAR 17.2 (team went to playoffs 3 times, no WS appearances, 1 AS appearance)
The pitcher is Bret Saberhagen. If the Royals had shut him down because of inning load when he was a 21 year old, I am pretty confidant they would have zero WS champion flags over the Stadium, rather than one. Did the 260 innings (including post season) he threw in 1985 shorten his career, make his less effective in his 30s when he pitched for the Mets and BoSox? I would say so. Should the Royals (and did the royals) care about that? I don’t see why.
Sometimes, you only get one shot at a championship. You have to take your shot when you can.
I agree 10000%
If these guys refuse to take the millions of dollars the lower market teams offer them then the teams need to start treating the whole situation more like a “business” Run them into the ground and let the Yankees overpay for whatever is left over.
Um, “run them into the ground?” if they don’t take whatever their team is offering? I won’t comment on the morality of that statement, just the business aspect. The Nationals Strassberg strategy is based on the present and future. He’s got time on his contract left. Throw him out there for 260 innings because you want to run him into the ground so that the Yankees don’t get him is self defeating. The idea is to maximize his value while under contract. Is the last twenty innings of the year worth another lost season? Obviously, the Nationals don’t think so.
Why is it OK for the player to say “screw you small market team, its just a business” but team cant say “screw you greedy player, its just a business.”
The idea is to win the world series. You should not run them into the ground to hurt the Yankees, you should run them into the ground to maximize their value while on your team.
Are you saying the Nats should have an organizational strategy that is both not in their best interest and beneficial to other clubs?
The Nats are assuming 20 innings will cause Strasburg to go from perfectly fine to the DL, which is completely idiotic. They are doing it so the people in charge cant be blamed and fired if Strasburg gets hurt, that is all.
What is the evidence that 160 inning is the magic number? What study was done to suggest 160 is OK after TJ but 180 is too risky? Is this based on like 25 guys? Sample size?
Topper, the system is that players are bound to their teams for six years, and then can leave. While they are bound, they have to play for below market salaries. Look at your man Ryan Braun and how much he was underpaid for some fantastic early years. Or the entire Tampa starting pitching staff. That’s the system-a trade off of lower salaries earlier for free agency later. The Nationals may be completely wrong in their judgement to shut down Strassberg, but to use your formulation, he’s their property right now. And if they think (and they obviously do) that running him out there right now could kill his arm for the following years that he’s still under team control, what’s your beef with that? I really doubt they are saving him for a big market team.
If a player signs an extension with a team that is totally different, then you should be more careful with them since you invested in them. If they refuse to sign an extension for what is always at least an 8 figure number, then who cares about them. Please stop acting like a guy playing baseball for $5 MM per year instead of $10 MM is some huge injustice.
There is no such thing as a market in MLB since there is no fair competition. The Yankees set the market only because MLB has given them a monopoly on the city of NY which (even with the Mets) gives them an extremely unfair advantage. If there was a true market in baseball there would be 4-5 MLB teams in the NY city area.
I dont think they really have any idea whatsoever if pitching Strasburg any more will cause any harm to him. There is no evidence at all that there is some magical workload that starts to cause problems. They are only doing it so they can be blamed if something goes wrong. If there was an unwritten rule that you should limit guys to 200 IP after TJ then the Nats would not shut him down. They don’t have some guys sitting around working on an organizational formula to determine when to shut Strasburg down.
Topper, I know you hate the Yankees, but there aren’t the only team throwing around the big dough. Red Sox, Marlins, Tigers, Phillies, Angels, Dodgers, Nationals-do I need to go on? I can’t agree that players should play for whatever the owners offer. Not every team offers extensions, and certainly not every player is offered them. Cheap young players who are still under control are used as assets by owners, including those who are signed to team friendly extensions. That’s the nature of the business.
Running a player into the ground, ethics aside, is a pretty awful business strategy anyway you slice it. After you’ve run your third or fourth pitcher into the ground, how many draft picks do you think you’ll be able to sign? Only the lower round ones and/or most desperate. Boras and every other high-powered agent would make sure you didn’t sign a single one of their clients, which would surely affect your ability to compete long term.
The most ridiculous thing about this whole situation is that nothing that has ever happened to Strasburg has been overwork related.
2008: 98 IP
2009: 104 IP
2010: 68 IP…Tommy John
So what caused the injury? Certainly not pitching too much. Its either mechanics or simply he is just a guy who is prone to injuries, and always will be.
The whole pitcher abuse thing is so stupid. There is no correlation at all between pitching a lot and injuries. If there was then why do relievers get injured? Plus thinking you can prevent injuries is just naive. Its sports, he is just as likely to get injured bunting or running the bases or from a comebacker. These front office guys just take the most conservative possible approach so they cant be blamed if anything goes wrong instead of being aggressive and trying to win.
Strasburg is the kind of player who will always be injured, no matter how many innings he throws, so if you have the rare chance to use him in the playoffs and don’t it is a historically bad move for the franchise. No matter what happens to Strasburg this year, 50 innings, 160, or 250, he is going to be on the DL again in the near future.
Why dont the Redskins sit RGIII every other game so he will be healthy for 2015?
I assumed the issue there was that, *post-surgery*, you have to be careful with potential over-work, especially given that he’s not used to a heavy innings load to begin with, but perhaps entirely independent from that consideration.
I’m disappointed in the Strasburg decision, but the tenor of some of the comments here has me puzzled.
The Nats made a decision that worked against the franchise’s short-term interest – I think everyone accepts that. Their explanation was, as I recall, that they were protecting the team’s long-term interest and the pitcher’s long-term interest. Whatever we may think of their medical judgment, it would be hard to doubt that the team believed it was the correct judgment, and I can’t believe that they did not consult some medical authorities in arriving at it. The judgment may be wrong, but in principle such judgments cannot be tested and I’m sure no one is arguing that the Nats should have followed HHS, fan, or sports writer opinions instead of their medical consultants. The Nats are paying the price and taking hits for sticking to their basic judgment of a 160 IP limit – I think we have to respect that.
Of course, there are many different ways to get to 160 innings, but for a franchise like the Nats, I think the priority has to be getting to the postseason, rather than planning for a WS win. The team only began to pull away a month ago – I can see a fair argument for their straightforward approach. (And I don’t think baseball team ownership is or should be guided by a simple one-year all-or-nothing matter.)
But what really puzzles me is the attitude that the Nats are somehow culpable because they have not used crude profit calculations and exploited their property to the max. I’m sure the team had the idea that treating Strasburg well would increase the likelihood that he would re-sign with the team if things worked out, but I also believe that the ownership made an uncynical decision not to treat their player as chattel in the service of the team’s short-term goals. That may be a bad business decision, but (as a one-time Koufax idolator) I thought it was sort of refreshing – ethical, even – the sort of thing one doesn’t associate with baseball team ownership. I’m surprised to see HHS commentors advocating the chattel strategy that an owner appears to have rejected.
Excellent comment epm.
munu, I would love to believe that this move earned the Nats some brownie points towards re-signing Strasburg. But I think anyone who believes that either is a Pollyanna or is completely unfamiliar with Scott Boras’s track record.
I don’t know about the angle of anyone else’s argument, but in my view, the matter never even reaches the question of treating their player as chattel. I see it merely as ill-informed, boneheaded strategy — much like the insistence on routinely using an ace reliever to close out a 3-run lead, while refusing to use him in the higher-value situation of a tie game.
The decision is not founded on evidence. It’s founded on anecdote and emotion. If I were a Nats fan, I would be livid.
And by the way, this is the first time I’ve heard “trying to wring a World Championship out of our first playoff appearance in 30 years” characterized as a short-term goal. I thought it was THE goal. And these people who talk about how the Nats are set up for the long term — sorry, but those folks are separated from reality. Davey Johnson could tell us how ephemeral a rosy future can be, since he managed the ’86 juggernaut Mets who were expected to be in the WS for years to come. They never got back.
It doesn’t mean you grind your players to the bone to win now, without a single care for next year. But it seems to me that the Nats are putting a theoretical, unmeasurable future benefit in front of the very tangible immediate value of an ace in the postseason.
As to what level of paternalistic protectionism is appropriate or honorable here — what degree of the team putting aside its interests and just “looking out for the young man” — let’s remember that the risk involved is not to Strasburg’s long-term health and well-being, but to his ability to throw a baseball well enough to earn a living at it. We’d all like him to have a long career, but without question he’s already made more money than the average American will earn in a lifetime, and the risk of an arm injury is one that every pitcher willingly accepts. Strasburg wants to keep going, and it’s not at all clear that his throwing another 30 innings would significantly heighten the risk. When you add up all the factors, there just isn’t enough to justify the paternalism.
John I don’t think we should ascribe motives like paternalism and whatnot to what the Nationals are doing. We don’t know those things so it’s a waste of time.
I don’t really know why people are so bent out of shape on this topic. The decision’s been made and they’re not likely to change it. The Nats have to move forward with what they have now and, it’s not just Strasburg that’s gotten them to the best record in MLB.
I mean, why are people not all up in arms that the Tigers have disallowed the possibility of Victor Martinez returning this month (which originally they said they would do and who was a KEY component of their success last year), when basically they’re doing exactly what the Nats are doing, in trying to prevent a another Grady Sizemore type of situation?
Jim, insofar as the action affects Strasburg, it meets the definition of paternalism.
As to why people are bent out of shape about a fait accompli: We’re talking about whether a decision was good or bad, just as we talk after a game about a questionable sac bunt, or bringing in that pitcher to face that hitter, or any other element of strategy. If all discussion of final decisions were eliminated, the baseball chatter landscape would be barren indeed.
I don’t think that anyone expressing their opinion about this decision is under the delusion that we might convince someone to change their mind. But I can accept that a team has decided to do X and will do X, while still feeling that I can learn something from discussing whether they made the right choice.
As far as comparing Strasburg’s situation to that of Victor Martinez or anyone else, forget it. We’re not talking about a player who is out, and trying to get back; we’re talking about a player who is 2 years removed from surgery, and who has been back for over a year, while showing no sign of trouble.
I can’t help feeling that Mike Rizzo is a little like the HAL-9000 computer in 2001: A Space Odyssey, confidently predicting that the AE-35 unit is about to fail.
Well you’ve got me scratching my head with a bunch of those statements John.
But it’s late and I’m brain dead so I’ll just say that if we have no hope of changing someone else’s mind with what we say here, then why are we doing this? I want to be open to having my views challenged and potentially changed by others, and in turn to have some hope that I can affect others with what I say, assuming it’s well considered. Indeed, epm’s comment above made me change an important viewpoint about this whole issue. I’m 100% un-interested in talking just to hear myself talk.
But like I said, it’s late and I’m gone so these and others are topics for another day.
P.S. “The judgment may be wrong, but in principle such judgments cannot be tested and I’m sure no one is arguing that the Nats should have followed HHS, fan, or sports writer opinions instead of their medical consultants.”
This I just don’t understand at all. It seems to imply that people outside of the Nationals organization shouldn’t have opinions, or express them. Which seems an odd position to take.
As for the implication that the decision is based on the sound, evidence-based reasoning of medical consultants, I’ll believe that when I hear from them, including what studies they relied on in forming their opinions.
If the Nats’ FO had been the least bit forward-thinking, they could have eaten their cake and had it too. They could have treated Strasburg less paternalistically (I think the term does apply here) and more like a fellow responsible adult.
They could have met with him and his “people” to outline their strategy and in the process exhibited real concern for him/their “asset” (which can in fact have positive spillover effects in the marketplace – if not with Boras himself then with someone else). They could have solicited his own take on matters and got his “buy in” to the strategy. They could even have kept to their 160 inning number.
“Look,” they’d say, “sorry, but there’s no negotiating on this 160 limit thing. Okay, we don’t have a whole lot of science backing us up, but we have a lot of money invested in you and we really do think this is the best route after your surgery” – and they’d give their reasons why.
(And, gee, perish the thought that the Nats’ FO might be concerned about public opinion/their jobs if Strasburg goes down again. Baseball has basically become an adjunct of the entertainment business; the Nats’ FO has to prioritize good PR and media coverage to keep asses flowing into the seats for years and years, and doesn’t particularly want fans airing bitter recriminations like Ed and I about how the team handled its prize young fireballer).
“Now, we value you and respect you,” they’d say, “and, despite this limit we’re imposing, we want you somehow to pitch the whole season. We fully intend/expect to compete this year and you’re of course key to that. So here are some plans we’ve laid out” – cut to PP presentation (Boras is in the room after all) with Tango’s/Brent’s/assistant assistant GM’s various strategies about how they could do this.
“Now if your pitching, along with Gio’s and Zimmy’s, happens to get us to the postseason and you’re butting up against that limit, man, well, shit, we gotta respect the contribution you’ve made and we can’t simply shut you down. I mean, how many times has this franchise reached the postseason” (uncomfortable looks around the room) “and plus we can’t simply rob you of the chance to be a WS winner.
“But, like we say, this 160 limit thing is pretty important to us. ’Cept what we’d be willing to do then is have you undergo a stem-to-stern physical with” they name a couple of prominent TJ surgeons “and, if they give the all-clear, great, awesome, then you can pitch and bring that f***ing WS trophy to Washington” (Nat FO high fives all around). “And if they don’t, well that sucks big time” (Nat FO nods and frowns all around) “I mean, for you especially but really for all of us. But, still, we’re gonna have to listen to those consultant croakers cuz we want you with us long term, we think we’re playoff bound for the rest of this decade, plus” (inaudible mumble) “we gotta cover our ass.
“So whaddya say?”
JA, You’ve made a lot of points in #53-55.
On the matter of expressing opinions, my idea was that when a decision like this is clearly at great cost to the organization, it’s probably best to assume that the organization considered cost/benefit carefully and on the basis of a more complete set of facts than we have, especially when the decision was one that was announced as under continual review. I don’t have any problem with people disagreeing with the decision (I do) and offering other ways to implement the 160 IP strategy (I thought about them all summer too), but I don’t think it’s fair to assume that the Nats put post-season success at risk simply on the basis of anecdote and emotion, and not rational evidence. I think we ought to take the cost they accepted into account as evidence in its own right and see it as likely that there is very probably a perspective from which we’d see the decision as fully reasonable, even if not correct.
On the matter of a WS-or-bust philosophy, we disagree, I think, on two levels. First, in the specific Strasburg strategy, given the 160 IP decision, I see it as prioritizing getting into the post-season: resting Strasburg so he could have four or five post-season starts puts at risk perhaps 2-3 regular season wins, which would be a significant hit to most teams’ post-season chances (though at the moment it’s obvious the Nats could have afforded some extra losses). If this were the Yankees, where post-season play begins as a likelihood, tha calculation might have been different. On long-term strategy, obviously none is guaranteed to succeed. But if I were an owner I would not accept the idea that a WS win is so valuable that any future cost to team success is justified if it significantly increases a realistic chance of success this year. (I don’t think we actually disagree much here – you made clear your position was not absolute – but it seems we weigh these things differently.)
I agree with you that the Nats seem to have acted paternalistically. I think degrees of paternalistic behavior can be appropriate in particular circumstances, especially when the person in control accepts a significant share of the cost (in this case, I’d say the lion’s share). You may be right that the parternalistic decision was not justified by the facts in this case – my point is that the entire idea of acting paternalistically at significant cost is refreshing. “Looking out for the young man” empahsizes how quaint this kind of attitude is now; I guess I’m writing in defense of quaintness (quaintitude?), although I recognize that there are good reasons we’ve moved away from approval of power-holders rationalizing their actions on paternalistic grounds. As for whether there’s a long-term payoff at re-signing time, I mentioned that as a possible argument that the decision was made for ultimately self-serving reasons, not as a prediction of Scott Boras’s sentimentalism; he ain’t quaint.
munu — Nicely reasoned retort. I think this is our main bone of contention:
“it’s probably best to assume that the organization considered cost/benefit carefully and on the basis of a more complete set of facts than we have”
(emphasis added)
On both prongs of that statement, I disagree with the implications, if not the literal meaning.
(1) I’ve no doubt that their cost/benefit analysis was “careful”, but that doesn’t mean it was rational. Nancy Reagan used to do a very careful analysis before setting her husband’s schedule, but as the analysis was based on astrology, it was obviously irrational. And in general, I’m not sure what Mike Rizzo has done to earn a presumption of good judgment; we’re talking about a man who owes another $100 million to Jayson Werth for his age 34-38 seasons.
(2) Again, I’ve no doubt that Rizzo has far more facts at his fingertips than I do. But I don’t concede that those facts add up to anything that approaches scientific validity. From all that I’ve read, the sort of rigorous studies that would support a decision of this magnitude simply do not exist, and in fact it may be that there are not enough precedent cases similar to Strasburg.
And again, after one has seen how much weight some MLB decisionmakers still give to debunked pseudoscience like the Verducci Effect, among other things, I don’t see grounds for a presumption of good judgment.
One thing I will concede, though: this discussion is better saved for the hot-stove league. There’s too much good stuff going on!
Agreed, JA. Truth will be more visible in the snow and we can hunt it down then (hopefully with Jim and tag).
A few Strasburg numbers:
His career 1-game high in pitches is 119, then 111. In innings, his high is 7.
His high average for any 2 or 3 consecutive starts is 106 pitches.
He’s never pitched on less than 4 days’ rest, and half his starts have been on 5 days’ rest or more.
He averages 16 pitches per inning, exactly average.
Some 2012 Strasburg numbers:
28 games started.
159.1 innings pitched.
2607 pitches thrown(70th in MLB).
16 pitches per inning.
5.2 innings per start.
93 pitches per start.
I’ve heard the word “paternalistic” used to describe how the Nationals are treating Strasburg. While that’s certainly true, the words “coddle” and “pamper” also come to mind.
The passionate baseball fan WILL have this conversation.
And what the Washington franchise does owe us is the full information to work with.
If they had just kept it to themselves, and then said
“Okay, Strasburg is done. Company decision.”… well, then ok.
But they opened the discussion six freaking months ago.
If you’re gonna do that, publish every iota of your data so that we can argue about Facts, rather than speculation. And that way, since everybody really is trying to figure out the best way to do things, maybe the discussion could lead to something positive.
The beef most people (and most on this discussion) have is not WHAT the Nationals did but HOW and WHEN they did it. Limiting Strasburg to a certain IP or, hopefully, pitch limit is sound strategy. Choosing to shut him down in the middle of September and have him miss the playoffs is not sound strategy at all. It’s the antithesis of that.
All they had to do was have him skip every 5th start.
Really that simple.
Instead, he pitched these three games instead of three games in October:
http://www.baseball-reference.com/boxes/LAN/LAN201204280.shtml
http://www.baseball-reference.com/boxes/ATL/ATL201205260.shtml
http://www.baseball-reference.com/boxes/COL/COL201206250.shtml
Voomo, you have a point. I always thought the Nationals mishandled the Lannan situation, and could have used him more effectively (and possibly increased his trade value)early on to ease Strassburg in.