Collette Calls: The State of Pitching

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Published on April 19, 2024

The last installment of this series looked at early indicators for homers and steals and found that we are currently experiencing a lower run environment than we had in 2023 and are likely to see lower offensive outputs this season unless some extreme heat fuels homers or some managers remove their restrictor plates on the running game. This week, I aim to take a look at two things happening on the pitching side, because strange things are afoot at the Circle K this season when it comes to pitching.

Pitching Wins

As play begins on Friday, April 19th, there are 17 pitchers tied with three wins a top the pitching leaderboard,with six of them being relievers: Craig Kimbrel, Shelby Miller, Luke Weaver, Garrett Cleavinger, A.J. Minter and Elvis Peguero. We learned late last year that predicting sources of reliever wins is very tough and lacks any year-to-year consistency, but those guys are the early leaders out of the gate to be this year's surprise source of wins. There are 13 other relief pitchers who already have two wins this season, or 12 if you remove bulk guy Ryan Yarbrough. So far this season, relievers are garnering 44 percent of the wins, which would be tied for the highest percentage of March/April wins in recent history:

Season	SP Wins	RP Wins	Total Wins	SP%	RP%
2016	243	111	354	69%	31%
2017	242	127	369	66%	34%
2018	271	148	419	65%	35%
2019	267

Pitching Wins

Season	SP Wins	RP Wins	Total Wins	SP%	RP%
2016	243	111	354	69%	31%
2017	242	127	369	66%	34%
2018	271	148	419	65%	35%
2019	267	170	437	61%	39%
2021	230	153	383	60%	40%
2022	176	141	317	56%	44%
2023	264	161	425	62%	38%
2024	158	126	284	56%	44%

We saw some of this in 2022 after the shorter spring training due to the labor strike, which didn't end until March 10th, and even more so in July during the 2020 Covid-shortened season, but this is the first season without any major external disruptions in which the relievers are pulling in a high percentage of wins. This is understandably frustrating in shallower mixed leagues where most of those names are unlikely to be in lineups, while Zack Wheeler has zero wins despite a 3.00 ERA and Cole Ragans is still searching for his first win to go along with his 1.93 ERA.

Using leverage indicators, we can see those relievers earning those wins in tougher situations and those who are simply vulturing them by happenstance like Weaver who has vultured three wins despite some very unsightly peripherals this season:

Name	Team	W	WPA/LI	inLI	gmLI	pLI
Craig Kimbrel	BAL	3	0.41	1.88	1.88	1.86
Shelby Miller	DET	3	0.28	1.96	1.59	2.03
Luke Weaver	NYY	3	-0.25	0.75	0.66	0.78
Garrett Cleavinger	TBR	3	0.05	0.93	1.00	0.94
A.J. Minter	ATL	3	0.37	1.22	1.23	0.87
Elvis Peguero	MIL	3	0.09	0.99	1.06	1.02
Kirby Yates	TEX	2	0.49	2.29	2.30	1.79
Drew Smyly	CHC	2	0.23	0.95	1.23	1.37
Michael Kelly	OAK	2	-0.12	0.49	0.66	0.33
Pierce Johnson	ATL	2	0.05	1.21	1.16	1.23
Giovanny Gallegos	STL	2	-0.28	1.04	1.20	1.73
Ryan Yarbrough	LAD	2	0.24	0.70	0.89	0.82
Reed Garrett	NYM	2	0.43	0.78	0.79	0.85
Jeff Hoffman	PHI	2	0.19	1.86	2.30	2.65
Peter Lambert	COL	2	0.29	0.58	0.62	0.60
Jason Foley	DET	2	0.37	1.96	2.24	2.35
Nick Sandlin	CLE	2	0.15	0.74	0.79	0.87
Abner Uribe	MIL	2	-0.11	1.48	1.60	1.99
Yennier Cano	BAL	2	0.09	1.45	1.49	1.97
Yuki Matsui	SDP	2	0.27	1.13	1.27	1.23

Kimbrel and Miller have been at the center of the action in Baltimore and Detroit respectively while the other three-win relievers have been in kinder situations. Jeff Hoffman and Jason Foley stand out in the two-win group only because the latter is the primary closer for Detroit while the former appears to be working his way into that role. The toughest part about predicting reliever wins is that they truly come from anywhere. Last season, Colin Poche and Mike Baumann each had double-digit win totals but Poche spent most of the season working in above-leverage situations while Baumann was mostly a lower leverage reliever who was on the mound when Baltimore had one of their 1,682 comebacks (allegedly) last season. Perhaps Weaver is this season's Baumann while Miller is this season's Poche. The larger point being that, so far, relievers are out there stealing wins from starting pitchers at a rate we haven't seen in a season where a disrupted Spring Training was not in the picture. Some of this could be a side-effect of the rash of high-profile starting pitching injuries we have experieneced already this season, but this is a trend worth watching since many of those names are not likely to return any time soon.

It is also worth noting that the average starting pitcher is working 5.2 innings in outings in 2024, which is exactly what they were working in outings this time in 2023. If we extend the decimal point to the hundredths place, 2024 is actually outpacing this time in 2023 5.19 to 5.17.

Starting Pitching

Starting pitching is seeing a bit of a resurgence this season as the collective ERA for starting pitchers is half a run lower than it was during March/April of 2023:

Season	G	TBF	ERA	AVG	OBP	SLG	wOBA
2016	708	17120	4.10	0.255	0.322	0.410	0.317
2017	738	17611	4.04	0.250	0.317	0.415	0.314
2018	838	19388	4.20	0.245	0.316	0.409	0.314
2019	874	19640	4.33	0.247	0.316	0.427	0.314
2021	766	16364	4.03	0.235	0.304	0.396	0.303
2022	634	12786	3.91	0.239	0.308	0.384	0.305
2023	850	18840	4.55	0.256	0.323	0.424	0.324
2024	568	12493	4.04	0.246	0.314	0.395	0.317

At a skills level, strikeout and walk rates are very much in line with previous March/April timeframes, but there are some other notable numbers early:

Season	HR/9	K%	BB%	K-BB%	AVG	WHIP	BABIP
2016	1.06	21%	8%	12%	0.255	1.33	0.297
2017	1.21	21%	8%	12%	0.250	1.30	0.288
2018	1.16	22%	9%	13%	0.245	1.29	0.287
2019	1.35	23%	8%	14%	0.247	1.29	0.288
2021	1.21	24%	8%	16%	0.235	1.22	0.282
2022	1.00	22%	8%	14%	0.239	1.25	0.284
2023	1.25	22%	8%	14%	0.256	1.34	0.303
2024	1.04	22%	8%	14%	0.246	1.29	0.296

What truly jumps off the page is the early home run rate is down 16.8 percent from this time last season, and the early data shows that the baseball simply is not traveling as far as it expected to do. The folks behind BallparkPal.com have some data which digs further into what is happening:

The ball simply is not traveling as far as the expected contact says it should. I don't believe anything nefarious is afoot here as much as we may finally have some standardization in both the production and storage of baseballs. The drag coefficient thus far in 2024 is right in line where things were this time last year, but the ball just is not traveling as far as it was, which points more to humidor storage than it does production of baseballs:

The league-wide 10.8 percent HR/FB ratio thus far is 15.6 percent lower than it was this time last season and just a tick higher than it was in 2022 as the league was coming off a shortened spring training:

I said it last week and I'll restate that opinion again here: unless something drastically changes, we should expect a lower run environment in 2024 than we experienced in 2023. All indicators thus far are pointing to a bear market for offense in 2024.