To K or Not to K, Is That Really a Question?:
A Study on Strikeout Proficiency
"If you can get an out on one pitch, take it. Let the strikeouts come on the outstanding pitches. Winning is the big thing. If you throw a lot of pitches, before you know it, your arm is gone." ~Dwight Gooden
If you ask any pitcher, they are likely to tell you that the strikeout is arguably their out of choice. Sure, some think strikeouts are boring and facist, and of course a tapper back to the mound or a lazy pop-up will do just fine...especially if the at-bat is only one or two pitches.[/extreme foreshadowing] However, in terms of dominance, bragging rights, Steve Nebraska Award votes, and salaries, the strikeout rules all. But what is the best way to measure the value of a strikeout as well as a pitcher's overall talent and potential?
Read the typical BBA article about a pitcher or scan the back of his baseball card and the sheer number of strikeouts he's compiled is likely to be cited. Here are the strikeout kings from the 2038 season of qualified* pitchers (*1 1P per team game, so some workhouse relievers were included):
NAME | TEAM | K |
---|---|---|
Jubal Troop | EDM | 247 |
Arthur Dempster | RCK | 241 |
Feliciano Rafael | SFB | 235 |
Aki Kondo | SA | 231 |
Carlos Rodríguez | CLG | 231 |
Héctor Márquez | SEA | 221 |
Peter Grady | JAX | 220 |
Chris Kelly | TC | 217 |
Miguel Ramos | CAL | 214 |
Jefferson Pierce | CLG | 213 |
Now perhaps you want to go even deeper and obtain some context and examine a pitcher's strikeouts per nine innings (K/9) as a metric, which provides a useful rate statistic hinting at a pitcher's additional dominance:
NAME | TEAM | K/9 |
---|---|---|
Carlos Rodríguez | CLG | 11.5 |
Aki Kondo | SA | 10.5 |
Jefferson Pierce | CLG | 10.1 |
Manuel Andrés | CAL | 10.0 |
Diogo Lindt | LBC | 9.8 |
Arthur Dempster | RCK | 9.7 |
Peter Grady | JAX | 9.4 |
Miguel Ramos | CAL | 9.4 |
two tied | n/a | 9.2 |
So total strikeouts is good, but whiffs per nine innings is even better. That said, K/9 tends to favor hurlers who face more batters and have a greater opportunity at a strikeout. Conversely, K/9 penalizes pitchers who don't give up a lot of hits, walks and hit by pitches. Striking out the side in order is a much greater outcome than a pitcher who strikes out the side along with a few baserunners, so strikeouts per batters faced (K/BF) is even better than K/9.
NAME | TEAM | K/BF |
---|---|---|
Aki Kondo | SA | 0.289 |
Carlos Rodríguez | CLG | 0.282 |
Diogo Lindt | LBC | 0.270 |
Jefferson Pierce | CLG | 0.270 |
Arthur Dempster | RCK | 0.258 |
Peter Grady | JAX | 0.256 |
Yrrigs Carpenter | SA | 0.254 |
Manuel Andrés | CAL | 0.253 |
Feliciano Rafael | SFB | 0.252 |
Miguel Ramos | CAL | 0.250 |
Okay, we've established that a K is useful, K/9 is better and K/BF is even more desirable. Alas, not all batters faced are equal, right? Two pitchers may have the same K/BF but what if one achieves the strikeout in fewer pitches? If a pitcher is missing bats at a higher percentage of the time, he's more likely to pitch deeper into games and record a greater number of strikeouts (and outs in general) than his counterparts. Now we're really lasering in on dominance AND efficiency.
NAME | TEAM | K/100 |
---|---|---|
Aki Kondo | SA | 7.423 |
Carlos Rodríguez | CLG | 6.985 |
Peter Grady | JAX | 6.890 |
Diogo Lindt | LBC | 6.889 |
Jefferson Pierce | CLG | 6.880 |
Arthur Dempster | RCK | 6.870 |
Yrrigs Carpenter | SA | 6.776 |
Feliciano Rafael | SFB | 6.573 |
Manuel Andrés | CAL | 6.532 |
Tristan Alfama | YS9 | 6.504 |
Among those qualified BBA pitchers from 2038, below are the correlations of the three strikeout statistics used above, (K/9, K/BF and K/100) against four run-prevention metrics: Earned Run Average (ERA), Adjusted ERA (ERA+), Fielding Independent Pitching (FIP), and Component ERA (CERA).
ERA | ERA+ | FIP | CERA | |
---|---|---|---|---|
K/9 | -0.425 | 0.442 | -0.508 | -0.505 |
K/BF | -0.507 | 0.526 | -0.569 | -0.595 |
K/100 | -0.513 | 0.532 | -0.581 | -0.608 |
Now back to Kondo, who went 13-8 this past season en route to an All-Star Game nod. On the surface, the San Antonio Outlaw hurler has rather pedestrian traditional stats, and even some average advanced stats as well [keep in mind this is based on the 103 qualified pitchers from 2038]:
STAT | TOTAL | RANK |
---|---|---|
ERA | 3.99 | 26th |
IP | 198.2 | 51st |
BABIP | .303 | 72nd |
ERA+ | 115 | 78th |
HR/9 | 1.5 | 85th |
There are some outstanding signs of dominance that tie back into Kondo's league-best K/100:
STAT | TOTAL | RANK |
---|---|---|
K/100 | 7.42 | 1st |
K/9 | 10.5 | 2nd |
K/BB | 6.6 | 3rd |
K | 231 | 4th |
WHIP | 1.09 | 9th |
BB/9 | 1.59 | 10th |
FIP | 3.53 | 11th |
CERA | 3.37 | 16th |
All in all, it's clear that the more strikeouts, the better and the fewer pitches, the better. Combining the two (K/100) is a recipe for success and could be the go-to stat the next time you do some scouting and evaluating. Who really cares if the strikeout is boring and fascist as long as it's efficient.