Those of you that follow me on Twitter know that for the last week or so, I have been working on a post about Javier Vazquez and the disparity between his peripherals and his results. It needed about an hour of touching up, which I decided to leave for after the holidays so that the work did not go for naught. Alas, my efforts turned to dust when I refreshed my feed reader this morning and saw this post from Jay over at Fack Youk, which makes the same arguments and reaches the same conclusions as my post. As Jay noted, this is the lot of a Yankee blogger in the current market, where you need to be incredibly quick with your thoughts or risk being preempted. Luckily, Jay did a fantastic job, so I just want to run through his conclusions.
The questions about Javier Vazquez stem from the disparity between his career FIP and ERA. His ERA is about .30 worse than his FIP, and he has only had two seasons in which his ERA was lower than his FIP. Basically, his peripherals suggest that he should be an ace, but the results as captured in ERA do not support that designation. So what is going on?
Jay looked at Javy’s doubles rate (which can create a disparity), but found nothing anomalous there to provide an explanation. He next looked at the area that most believe explains the disparity: sequencing. Basically, the idea is that Vazquez is poor with men on base, such that many of his limited number of baserunners come back to bite him. The numbers do support this assertion, as Jay found that Vazquez:
1) Is significantly worse with men on, and is awful with the bases loaded.
2) Is much better with a big lead.
3) Has his performance get worse as the leverage increases.
I would like to add that one other explanation for the ERA-FIP disparity is that Vazquez has played in front of poor defenses. Jamal Granger, a commenter at RAB, emailed the following list to me:
Although, if you look at each of Vazquez’s teams over the years, a trend is made, with 2006 being the outlier:
2009 ATL: 21st
2008 CHA: 23rd
2007 CHA: 20th
2006 CHA: 9th
2005 ARI: 24th
2004 NYA: 20th
2003 MON: 15th (3.24 ERA)
2002 MON: 27th
2001 MON: 23rd
2000 MON: 27th
1999 MON: 24th
1998 MON: 15thI definitely do not want to tarnish such an in-depth conundrum with an oversimplified answer, but the numbers do indicate that he Vazquez has played on an above-average defense just once in his entire career, and we know how ERA treats defense in regards to a pitcher’s performance. A horrid defense sure does its most damage to a pitcher when runners are already on base, I would think.
I think separating out which portion of the disparity belongs to poor performance with runners on and which belongs to defense is likely impossible, but I think it would be fair to suggest that Javy has been a bit “unclutch,” and poor defense has exacerbated that deficiency.
Jay concludes:
Javy’s K/BB ratio slips from 4.34 to 3.26 to 2.57 as the leverage rise from low to medium to high. His batting average, on-base and slugging percentages all ascend with the gravity of the situation as well.
Even if you grant that Vazquez gets worse under pressure and will pitch worse just by virtue of being a Yankee, he’s still likely to be better than league average and throw more than 200 innings. It would be extremely difficult to do that and not add significant value to a team regardless of how his performance is distributed by leverage.
And of course, there’s a big difference between “hasn’t” and “can’t”. I’m willing to say that Vazquez certainly hasn’t pitched well under pressure in his career, but not that he can’t.
That is the key point here. Vazquez may very well have been unclutch to this point in his career, an assertion supported by the numbers. This does not preclude him from having a good year, as he has been an above average pitcher over his career despite his “unclutch” nature. While it may mean that he will not be the ace his peripherals suggest he should be, he will almost certainly pitch well enough to be a 3rd or 4th starter in the AL East, and that is all the Yankees need. As Keith Law noted:
The main knock against him has been his difficulty when pitching in tight spots, as he’s less effective by about 100 points of opponents’ OPS out of the stretch. Still, he’s so good out of the windup and good enough from the stretch that he can be one of the most valuable pitchers in his league in most years.
And that is all that matters to the 2010 Yankees.
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15 Responses to Fack Youk: Is Vazquez Unclutch?
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TIQ IQ
This is a thing I wrote a few months ago, about hitting but, it also applies to all walks of life and sports.
Clutch (situational) hitting is in the DNA of the individual”, I learned that many years ago. Some people tighten-up (freeze) under fire, others react very concise, as though they knew what was coming and dictated the out come of any situation.
I can’t understand people saying; “He must relax etc., to be a clutch performer.” Hell, every player knows that, even the best clutch players fail 60% of the time, one can learn most anything…clutch is not one.
To expound on that….clutch can’t be learned, it can be helped along but the real clutch performers have always been that way. Some never knew it but, they were the people one could depend on to do the right thing at the right time.
One caveat (maybe more) goes along with that statement, un-clutch can be caused by lack of confidence, training or work, among other things.
Being on a much better team and not having to be the #1/2 guy in the rotation may be the thing to help him gain confidence
I’m not as certain about clutch, as I think that ultimately talent wins out. I’m more prone to believe it is a mechanical/strategic issue that hurts him with men on base than a mental “cant handle the pressure” issue.
Ken, normally I agree with you. I just have no idea how you can make this argument, when it’s SUCH a subjective issue. For instance, how did ARod go from “clutch” when with Seattle, “clutch” with the Yankees in the ALDS against the Twins, then go on an “unclutch” stretch from the ALCS ’04-’08, then became “clutch” again. And then David Ortiz in the playoffs used to be “clutch,” but in the last couple years, became “unclutch.” Explain this? These are just two examples.
I assume that because you are the “Old Ranger,” you are probably older then I am. I know you used to comment at RAB (I’m pretty sure you used to end your posts with a 27 at the bottom). Being 30 years old, I deal with my grandfather and situations like this all the time; whatever he sees, he believes that is the way things are. The fact is, your eyes lie. I also think stats lie as well, so I am not going to try to beat you over the head with OPS+, WAR, UZR and stuff like that. However, unless you are able to look at an 18 year old and decide if that kid could turn into a superstar, you need to rely on stats more often then not. A good baseball player gets 600 ABs a year, and plays 10 years or so. They also have 3 years of minors, spring ball, winter leagues, etc… There is no way your eyes can see all these at bats, thus you cannot determine, just off of what you see, whether or not a player is having a great week, month or year, or if the player is just that good. Relying on your eyes will get you Chris Shelton, and get rid of ARod because he is bad in the postseason.
In the case of Vasquez, I’m not in disagreement with the post. He thus far hasn’t shown that he has performed well. However, if you look at his portfolio as a whole, both how he performed and what he costs/is worth, it’s a major plus. I agree with your closing statement about his lack of being the leader. I do think the arguement could be made also that last year he turned a corner. Lastly, the key to the entire post is this: “And of course, there’s a big difference between “hasn’t” and “can’t”. I’m willing to say that Vazquez certainly hasn’t pitched well under pressure in his career, but not that he can’t.”
Mo, Jamal’s argument doesn’t hold up because he was on awful defensive teams in 03, 07 and 09, which were by far the 3 best years of his career. The best defensive team he was on was the 06 ChiSox, and he had a middling season. Looking at the numbers, I’m not even sure what point he was trying to make.
I also don’t like looking at his entire career to draw conclusions. I’m really not interested as much in what he did as a 22 year old kid for a team that doesn’t even exist anymore. I’m much more interested in his recent work, say his past 3-4 seasons. 2 of the past 3 (07/09) he’s narrowed the gap between his FIP and ERA, and appears to have matured as a pitcher. Less fastballs, more breaking stuff. That tells me he’s challenging hitters less and thinking more. In other words, being less of a thrower and more of a pitcher.
http://www.fangraphs.com/statss.aspx?playerid=801&position=P
Jamals point is that the yearly gap between FIP and ERA can be partially attributed to defense, not that his good years are based on defense being better. The good and bad years are based on fluctuations in his performance.
OK, then I’ll need you to explain 07, 09 and 06 to me. All of which seem to disprove his theory.
Well, I would suggest that just because they are bad defensive teams does not mean they always played poorly behind him. That being said, you raise a strong point, and seem to poke a hole in that suggestion.
Does anyone know what the league average drop in #’s is for pitchers going from low to medium to high leverage situations. I fell like having runners on base impacts the way almost every pitch and negatively would affect more than just Vazques. Not sure if he’s way worse than average but I was wondering if you guys could help make your point by comparing him to the rest of the league
I’m going to bed, but I’ll post the numbers in the morning. Vazquez is significantly worse than league norms in terms of the gap between his performance from the stretch and the set.
Moshe, interesting post.
I have two questions:
1) What were Vazquez’s performance/leverage numbers down the stretch last year, when atlanta was legitimately in the Wild Card hunt until the final few games of the season? Given that he just had a career year and pitched 7 quality starts out of his last 10 appearances, I imagine that some of the argument that he isn’t clutch can be mitigated, even if only marginally so.
2) I don’t get the part about pitch sequencing. Isn’t that as much a catching/coaching issue as it is an indictment of Vazquez’s own imput into the sequencing/setting up of hitters? Posada and Pierzynski (2004, 2006-2008) aren’t exactly known as great receivers back there.
I’m not saying that sequencing isn’t a problem — clearly it is — but that’s not 100% on the pitcher either. The catcher, manager and pitching coach share at least some of the blame there.
I’m sorry, the post was unclear. The issue is not pitch sequencing, but rather event sequencing. Vazquez seems to give up a lot of his hits in bunches, pitching poorly with men on base. Basically, sequencing is what the runners on base numbers were supposed to speak to. Sorry for the lack of clarity there.
As to your other point, Im running out the door, but Ill look it up and post a response to you here in an hour or so.
Ah, gotcha. In that sense, I’m still confused. The sequence of events themselves may be “bad” and thus indicate poor results in higher-leverage situations but I don’t know how you correlate results to psychology since poor results are attributable to any number of things, including injury, fatigue, league/park, defense, etc.
What of his bad starts in April and May, when “seasonal” leverage is at its lowest? Are you unclutch if you get rocked in the 8th inning of a 2-2 game in April or are you unclutch in that same situation in September?
In any case, it’s an interesting topic.
All excellent points. Looking back, I think that if I were doing it again, I would make this two posts:
1) The ERA-FIP gap, and
2) Is he unclutch?
I wanted to address #1 mostly, but it seems that the title that I used from Fack Youk has obscured that a bit. I think the men on base splits explain #1. #2, however, has a lot more variables, as you noted, and probably needs a closer look than just leverage numbers.
It would be interesting to find out the ratio of fly balls to grounders for Vasquez when he has runners on board. If he is giving up a lot of grounders, then some of the problem can be based on the defense playing behind him which may not be able to reach the ball as easily when they are pulled in or covering the plate. On the other hand, if he is giving up a lot of fly balls and home runs in those situations, you could more easily blame it on Vasquez being “unclutch.”
Great point. Unfortunately, I dont have access to an easily “splitable” play by play index. I will say that the high slugging numbers against him with runners on suggest lots of extra base hits.