Best Stuff of the Cubs vs Pirates

With the Dodgers coming in for four, and the roster refreshed, the Cubs managed to take two out of three against the Pirates. Bottom line, the Cubs out pitched the Pirates.

Using "run values", I've rated all the pitches thrown in the series. Run values should add up to zero across a league-season, but my math is not quite right. I'm off about one run every 2500 pitches for 2009, so I'm either weighting events wrong or mis-estimating the run environment. Either way, the measure is good enough to use to make some direct comparisons.

It works by calculating the value of every pitch, based on the count and the outcome. No attention is paid to other aspects of game state, such as base runners, leverage or whatever. It's just about the pitch. 0 is average, or 0.04 in my world (for now), and negative is better for pitchers.

Once I had classified the pitches (I don't use Gameday's IDs), I ranked the best and the worst four ways each. rv, which is essentially a counting stat (like runs allowed) and rv100, which is a rate stat (like ERA). For rv100, it's the average pitch value x 100, for the plain rv it's simply the cumulative total.

Data covers the three-game series just completed this afternoon. And, yes, Neal Cotts' fastball leads a counting stat despite not seeing much action. He was that bad in his last bit of work before being demoted.


Best Pitches

rv
Zambrano Cutter -1.232
Marshall Slider -1.214
Duke Curveball -1.081
Duke Fastball -1.043
Ascanio Change-Up -1.034

rv100 (5+ pitches)
Ascanio Change-Up -10.34
Gorzelanny Curveball -10.30
Zambrano Cutter - 6.16
Chavez Fastball - 6.15
Guzman Fastball - 6.02

rv100 (10+ pitches)
Ascanio Change-Up -10.34
Zambrano Cutter - 6.16
Duke Curveball - 5.69
Zambrano Splitter - 5.41
Marshall Slider - 3.92

rv100 (20+ pitches)
Zambrano Cutter - 6.16
Marshall Slider - 3.92
Marshall Curveball - 3.48
Duke Fastball - 3.36
Duke Change-up - 0.31

Worst Pitches

rv
Cotts Fastball 3.372
Dempster Slider 2.052
Snell Change-Up 1.478
Chavez Change-Up 1.472
Duke Sinker 1.343


rv100 (5+ pitches)
Cotts Fastball 25.94
Dempster Slider 14.66
Ascanio Fastball 13.36
Snell Change-Up 9.85
Meek Fastball 6.98


rv100 (10+ pitches)
Cotts Fastball 25.94
Dempster Slider 14.66
Snell Change-Up 9.85
Maholm Fastball 6.47
Duke Sinker 6.40

rv100 (20+ pitches)
Maholm Fastball 6.47
Duke Sinker 6.40
Dempster Fastball 2.98
Maholm Change-Up 2.95
Dempster Sinker 2.02