The Yankees beat writer for the NY Daily News is one of two BBWAA voters who left Josh Beckett off their Cy Young ballots. His ballot had Sabathia, Lackey and Carmona. I don't care that he didn't vote for Beckett, but his reasoning is flimsy. From his "Blogging the Bombers" blog:
"Quality starts is a great stat, one which does a good job of representing how often a pitcher gives his team a solid chance to win."
ME: A great stat? Even if you accept the premise of the stat, it still doesn't tell you anything about how a pitcher pitched. It only tells you a pitcher's results. Considering all of the variables involved, when evaluating a pitcher -- especially when doing so for Cy Young purposes -- shouldn't you go a little deeper than that?
"Beckett had 20 quality starts out of his 30 starts, 67 percent. Sabathia had 25 out of 34 (74%), Lackey had 24 out of 33 (73%), while Carmona had 26 out of 32 (81%). To me, that's a big difference. Essentially, one out of every three of Beckett's starts didn't register as quality."
By that rational, shouldn't he have voted for Dan Haren who had an AL-best 28 quality starts in 32 starts, 82 percent? I know some sabermetric-types find it useful, but I'd put quality starts on the back porch.
Posted by Jason Thornbury at 11/15/2007 11:28:00 AM
