Clayton Kershaw Community Projection Results
by John Sickels on Mar 4, 2010 2:23 PM EST
24 comments
We had 26 entries and a lot of interesting debate in the Clayton Kershaw Community Projection project. Most of the projections were very optimistic; some overly so in my view, especially in the H/IP department where there were some entries that looked weird to me. Nevertheless, I decided to tally the results as-is just to see what happens. The results:
32 games, 31 starts, 1 complete game, 194.2 innings pitched, 78 runs, 71 earned, 3.28 ERA, 203/86 K/BB, 150 hits, 12 homers allowed. 9.38 K/9, 3.98 BB/9, 6.93 H/9.
Comparing to other projection systems
Community 3.28 ERA 9.38 K/9 3.98 BB/9 6.93 H/9, 0.55 HR/9, 194.2 IP
Bill James 3.25 ERA 9.40 K/9 4.55 BB/9 7.00 H/9, 0.55 HR/9, 180 IP
CHONE 3.58 ERA 9.48 K/9 4.65 BB/9 7.69 H/9, 0.72 HR/9, 151 IP
Marcel 3.31 ERA 9.12 K/9 4.18 BB/9 7.26 H/9, 0.64 HR/9, 155 IP
Fangraphs Fans 3.26 ERA 9.61 K/9 4.08 BB/9 8.20 H/9, 0.66 HR/9, 192 IP
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pretty close to bill james cepting the BB/9
which I don’t think is weird to project that a 22-year-old kid will control his pitches better. as someone said in the projection thread, he doesn’t have bad command, and if he learns to take a bit off, and occasionally pitch a bit more to contact, then his BB/9 will improve.
I know some will give me crap
But that is why the comparisons to Sandy are so common. They are similar pitches with similar problems at a young age, throw with the same hand and are in the same organization…
by lakersdodgersyankees4life on Mar 4, 2010 4:52 PM EST up reply actions
I wasn't meaning you
I was saying that I expected someone to respond to my post and have a pissing fit because I used kershaw’s name in the same sentence as Koufax…
by lakersdodgersyankees4life on Mar 5, 2010 9:45 PM EST via mobile up reply actions
Chone and Marcel think he throws 150 innings?
Are they stupid? He has thrown more for each of the last two, why would he regress?
by lakersdodgersyankees4life on Mar 4, 2010 4:51 PM EST reply actions
Projection systems
Only Bill James constantly projects full-time production. The others (CHONE, PECOTA, Zips, Marcel, etc.) all factor in playing time with injuries, ineffectiveness, etc. factored in.
I would bet on the “over 150” for innings for Kershaw in 2010 myself.
I can see no way how they expect him to be so bad that he only throws 150 innings when he has thrown ~170 innings the last 2 years and flat out dominated the league last season…
by lakersdodgersyankees4life on Mar 5, 2010 9:47 PM EST via mobile up reply actions
It has nothing to do with being bad
It has everything to do with the chance of injury. They’re taking the chance he suffers a season ending injury, minor injuries, and whatever kind of injuries with the chance he pitches a full season and averaging it all out to however many IP they are projecting.
yea, I understand this
Im just saying that he was hurt last year(slightly separate right shoulder in Sept while shagging flyballs) for a few weeks and still threw over 170 innings.
my reply was more about the possibility that he is bad enough to get sent down, which, IMO, has about a 3% chance of happening.. and it’s only that high simply because anything can happen in sports
by lakersdodgersyankees4life on Mar 5, 2010 11:19 PM EST up reply actions
But they don't see him as being "bad"
All have his K/9 over 9.1, his BB/9 around 4.0 – 4.5, his HR/9 < 1 and his BABIParound .290.
The only real difference between all the projection systems is the projected IP.
When I said bad
I was saying the IP. Someone suggested that the IP totals were as low as they were because he would struggle. I’m just saying that I cannot see him struggling that much where the Dodgers have to send him to the minors… Injuries, of course, are the wild card that no one can predict
by lakersdodgersyankees4life on Mar 7, 2010 3:02 PM EST via mobile up reply actions
Of course
The median IP is probably more like 180 or so.
CHONE doesn’t care about the median. It’s projecting the mean. The risk of season-ending injury, ever-present for pitchers and especially young pitchers, is substantial and drags the average down.
Shawn Spencer: "I’m receiving a transmission from your husband. Really more of a voicemail, if I'm being honest. A status update. Perhaps a twitter."
Burton Guster: "I believe it’s called a tweet."
Shawn Spencer: "There’s no way I’m saying that."
ZIPs
3.06 ERA 175K 84BB 139H in 176.2 IP
You should add ZIPs as well to these.
The Dodgers won't win a playoff series until the Cool-a-Coo returns.
WTF
Apparently all these projection systems are as terrible as all the Kershaw backers on this site. I don’t see why anyone would think that he isn’t going to get killed this year. When his BABIP, HR, and strand rates all move towards the league average he’ll be lucky to have an ERA under 5.00. The math doesn’t lie people, time to get on board. Kershaw = Average At Best He’ll be lucky to have a lefty version of AJ Burnetts career
"This has got to hurt"
maybe I was a little hard
He was extremely lucky last year and if he has average luck I suppose he could post an ERA of around 4.00. If he has an unlucky year, look out, it could get ugly. If he gets off to an unlucky start, I could see him getting sent back down to AAA to save his confidence and maybe get him to throw some strikes. Maybe then he could be ready for a stretch run. I like the Burnett comp, both have great stuff and are basically two pitch pitchers with control problems. They both have very similar true performances if you look past the first layer of numbers, which are the least important
"This has got to hurt"
I'm comparing
Kershaw’s 09 season to Burnetts 02. It was the first time both pitched full seasons in the majors. Its all there, the mid nineties heat, the great curve, K’s, BB’s, HR rate. Lets take a look.
Kershaw Burnett
2.79 ERA 3.30
9.74 K/9 8.94
4.79 BB/9 3.96
2.03 K/BB 2.26
.37 HR/9 .57
.274 BABIP .274
77.5 LOB% 71.4
3.08 FIP 3.19
3.90 xFIP 3.75
4.1 HR/FB% 6.1
30 wFB 32.5
7.4 wCB 7.2
83.3 zCONT% 80.3
76.7 CONT% 71.8
50.9 ZONE% 51.9
55.6 F-STK% 56.4
4.2 WAR 4.6
They profile statistically and stuff wise as very similar pitchers. Granted, Kershaw is younger and a lefty, but statistically at approximately the same point in their careers they are about as close as it can get. I dare anyone to find a better second year statistical comp for Kershaw. This serves as a warning for anyone overly optimistic about Kershaw, regression and injury are real concerns.
"This has got to hurt"
Fangraphs
http://www.fangraphs.com/statss.aspx?playerid=512&position=P A.J. Burnett
http://www.fangraphs.com/statss.aspx?playerid=2036&position=P Clayton Kershaw
"This has got to hurt"
Your Stats Comparison Is Idiotic...
…precisely because Kershaw and Burnett were FOUR whole years apart “at the same point in their careers.” You are defining career as major league career. Career should be defined as PROFESSIONAL career. Kershaw and Burnett both turned pro at 18. At age 21 Kershaw was one of the most effective pitchers in MLB. At that age Burnett had yet to even sniff high A. He spent the season in low A, four entire levels below Kershaw. Their respective age 21 seasons represent the “same point in their careers.”
lol
If you are going to use quotes, atleast put the “approximately” in
“Granted, Kershaw is younger and a lefty, but statistically at approximately the same point in their careers they are about as close as it can get.”
Find me a better statistical comp for a guys second year in the majors, do it, find me somebody, anybody do it. I bet you can’t.
"This has got to hurt"
Kershaw and Burnett...
…were neither at “the same point in their careers” nor APPROXIMATELY at the same point in their careers in your comparison, so it is a pointless distinction: Kershaw was THREE years into his career, and Burnett was SEVEN years into his career. Statistical comps based on how long a guy has been in the majors are simply NOT done, and that is the case because they are useless. Age is the basis for stat comparisons, so to make comparisons to Kershaw look at pitchers who were MLB starters at 21: Sabathia, Kazmir, Beckett, Dontrelle Willis etc. If it is permissible to cheat a bit by ONE year of age difference, take a look at Rick Ankiel’s numbers in his age 20 season: pretty similar to Kershaw’s age 21 season, but of course we will never know how Ankiel would have developed if he hadn’t come down with Steve Blass disease.
And
You just happen to leave out the slider that he developed mid season that is already above average. And the fact the he throws 3 plus plus pitches from the EXACT same spot(release point) and the all look the same out of hit hand. One goes 95 and no one has hit it since he was in the 6th grade, one has a massive horizontal break at 85(not sure about exact velocity) and the final drops so much that the legendary Vin Scully deemed it public enemy #1 and called it one of the best he had EVER seen. Oh and he was 21.
And I’ll give you some advice, if you normalize most players stats, they will suck. That’s the Point though. Kershaw had the 2nd best fastball in the league last year that was simply unhittable. If you pretend that it is just average, then yea, he would suck. But he also wouldn’t be being compared to HOF pitchers.
This is the 1st post i’ve seen from you and I lost a lot of respect already. It’s ok to not like a guy, but when every stat someone pulls out backs him up, you just look naive…
by lakersdodgersyankees4life on Mar 5, 2010 9:44 PM EST via mobile up reply actions
I excluded pitches that were not thrown atleast 10% of the time, at levels below that, they are basically just show me pitches and there isn’t enough actual data to give a meaningful result. Thats why I didn’t include a slider or change up in the data I posted.
Maybe if somebody had given Burnett’s curve a nice name he would have been able to overcome his control and injury problems.
By the numbers, and most scouting reports, his pitches are the equal of Kershaws, but alas, Vin Scully says so, so there, I guess. But I suppose you didn’t bother looking at the stats and notice that Burnetts fastball got more done than Kershaws in the years I compared, oh well. I should give you a napkin I guess because it looks like you still got a lil bit of Kershaw on your chin yet.
"This has got to hurt"
I really dont know how many people need to tell you that
comparing players based on number of years in the majors is usless, but I’ll bite.
You want stats? Ok, at age 21, Kershaw’s fastball was statistically the best in the majors. Either with all pitchers or only qualified ones.
http://www.fangraphs.com/leaders.aspx?pos=all&stats=pit&lg=all&qual=n&type=7&season=2009&month=0
Quick fact: Clayton Kershaw’s fastball was the 2nd best pitch in baseball, behind only Lincecum’s changeup. That’s how crazy his fastball is. And that is why major league hitters hit a dismal 198 against him.
When a pitcher is 25 compared to when a pitcher is 21, the 25 year old SHOULD be better. That is 4 years of development where a pitcher arguably changes the most. If you want to compare Burnett and Kershaw, you have to look at Burnett’s age 21 season… in A ball.
With Kershaw’s slider, the reason it wasnt thrown more than 10% of the time was because it was developed in June, and I dont believe he really trusted it until July. Thats 3 months into the season that he threw the pitch 0.0% of the time. Basically, for 3 months he threw the fastball and curve 100% of the time for 3 months. In order for him to get the slider to above 10% of the time for the WHOLE year(even though he only had it 1/2 the season), he would have needed to be pumping slider after slider, and even then, he probably wouldnt have gotten it to 10%. When you have the best fastball in the league and then add in a curve and another weapon, you dont need to rely on the slider nearly as much. This year, Id be willing to be he will throw it 15-20% of the time because he will have it for the whole year. And even though he only threw the slider for 1/2 the season, it was still the 30th best slider in baseball..
And are you really attacking one of the best commentators that ever lived? Wow, how freakin low can you get?
If you dont think his curve is a plus plus pitch… you shouldnt be commenting here.
by lakersdodgersyankees4life on Mar 6, 2010 7:09 PM EST up reply actions
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