Post by sansterre - Milwaukee Brewers on Feb 1, 2024 9:30:34 GMT -5
90 Games into the 2070 season, the Cincinnati Reds are leading the PBL in team ERA narrowly, with a 3.33 (barely edging out the Orioles at 3.34). How much of this is luck and how much is performance - do the Reds actually have the best pitching in the league?
The Reds are 5th in the league in K%, 4th in the league in BB% and 7th in Home Runs allowed. Those are pretty reliable metrics (particularly the BB% and K%), so we know that they're really good.
However, interestingly, their FIP (a composite of those three stats) is actually only 5th in the league. Here's how those five teams break down in those stats:
Baltimore: 26.1% / 6.96% / 2.7% / 3.56
Detroit: 23.9% / 6.59% / 2.5% / 3.64
Kansas City: 25.3% / 7.27% / 2.6% / 3.67
Texas: 23.7% / 6.37% / 2.7% / 3.72
Cincinnati: 24.6% / 6.76% / 2.8% / 3.77
Looking at that list, Baltimore looks pretty dominant. That K% is really, really good and they lead FIP for a good reason. Cincinnati's metrics are good, but not as good.
Looking at that list, Baltimore looks pretty dominant. That K% is really, really good and they lead FIP for a good reason. Cincinnati's metrics are good, but not as good.
So why are the Reds leading the Orioles in ERA (albeit barely)?
A lot of it is about hits.
The Reds have the highest rate of stranding opposing runners in the league, and have the second lowest BABIP allowed.
A lot of this is fielding. The Reds are 4th in Zone Runs in the PBL. But Zone Runs only explain about 50% of BABIP - the Reds ZR only suggests a BABIP of 293, and their pitcher's park probably drops another 5 off, but that only gets them to 288, not 278.
At the intersection of all of this stuff, I'm inclined to say that the Reds have really good pitching (5th in the league is a fine estimate), really good fielding (4th in the league so far) and between these things they have *really* good run prevention. I think their BABIP is benefiting a bit from random chance, and if I were asked to choose I'd rank Baltimore's run prevention ahead of Cincinnati's (based only on repeatable performance to date).
But make no mistake. The Reds are a really, really, really good run preventing team.